| "Some
Special Soulmaster Arts"
by Minuette
 Before I begin, I wish to go into a
few basics, for background. Essence is the makeup of everything in the dream, including
dreamers and nightmare avatars. How much essence one has is measured by the amount of
dreamsoul one has. When one is harmed, one loses dreamsoul, and, if one loses enough, the
avatar is unable to maintain its form. What is Strength? It is much like an Orbit...simply
the amount of protection an Avatar provides. How "thick" the Avatar is.
When the
Nightmare roams the City, it has a high amount of strength. When it is shot with a chakram
(or hurt by another Art), it's Avatar is damaged. It's Strength goes down. When it's
avatar breaks, it can't hold itself up and it collapses. What's left is only a little itty
bit of strength. When we use that little essence, that strength is gone of course, because
we don't even have the essence anymore. That is why Trapped Nightmares have higher
strength. Because we didn't have to damage their Avatars to get 'em. We just, trapped
them. ...the more the dreamer dreams the better they learn you protact their essence....
The more Orbits they gain (shells around their Avatar) if they are collapsed , only their
outer shell breaks open revealing their inner ess , their soul , so to speak What
exactally that soul is, is up to personal belief.
Drain Essence
With drain, you are doing something
totally different with the essence than with the other arts discussed here. Instead of
casting the nightmare away, wherever you send it to when banishing or imprisoning, you are
absorbing it into your own avatar And a transformation occurs, transforming it into
dreamsoul. The effect of this act upon the avatar of the one evoking it is an ongoing
debate within the dream, and one I will not go into here, as this is pure research and I
am attempting to keep beliefs out of it as much as possible.
Banish Nightmare
The Soulmaster has an essence in
hand. He evokes Banish 'Mare on the essence, and the essence is promptly thrown beyond the
City Walls, out into the Chaos (or some believe out of the Dreamstate entirely. What is
left behind after evoking this art is a token. When the Nightmare is banished, it has no
strength because the Avatar is outside the City walls, not in the token.
The Banished Nightmar has 1 function
and 1 charge
Function #1: Essence - Essence Type:
Emphant ; Strength : 0;
Imprison Nightmare
Again, we will start with the
Essence already in the Soulmaster's posession. And we decide to imprison it So we evoke
Imprison 'Mare on it. The Essence (of 1 strength) is then cast into a prison. Again, what
is left behind after this art is evoked is a token. When the Nightmare is imprisoned, it
has no strength because it's Avatar is in a prison, not in the token.
The Imprisoned Nightmar has 1
function and 1 charge
Function #1: Essence - Essence Type:
Emphant ; Strength : 0;
Ok, we have two arts, both of which
are similar in that they leave a token, of strength 0 One art casts the nightmare outside
the City walls, the other places it in a prison Whether outside the walls or in a prison,
the strength doesn't matter. Somethings holding it. Something is around the Nightmare
Essence. And since Identify is only looking for the strength of the Nightmare essence, in
this case, it is 0, because something new is encasing the essence. Perhaps the Dreamer's
own essence, or resilience. If there is an essence trapped inside, which is doubtful, it
is, trapped inside behind something! Or within something. That is why Identify can't
locate any Nightmare essence within the token.Now, this being so, what is this token? If
you try to drain it, you find there is no nightmare essence within it. If it is placed
within a house artifact, it does not increase the artifact strength, again indicating no
nightmare essence. Perhaps the Token created by using the art of Banish 'Mare is simply a
result of the concentration of Resilience the Soulmaster used to evoke the art. I have a
hope that it's the Dreamer's essence, that they used to pull the Resilience.
A Potential New Art
Based on this research, I wish to
propose a new art, conforming to the only mare house without a house art, Gathering of the
Entranced. This is the art of Cleanse Nightmare.Again, we will start with the Essence
already in the Soulmaster's posession. And we decide to cleanse it So we evoke Cleanse
'Mare on it. The Essence (of 1 strength) is then wrapped in dreamsoul and exposed to
harmonics which in effect purifies the essence. The dreamsoul and harmonics are created by
the soulmaster evoking this art. Again, what is left behind after this art is evoked is a
token. When the Nightmare is cleansed, it has no strength because it's Avatar has moved on
to another plane, and is not in the token.
The Cleansed Nightmar has 1 function
and 1 charge
Function #1: Essence - Essence Type:
Emphant ; Strength : 0;
In researching this art, from
ancient scrolls found in pieces within the house, I found that the mare cleansed depended
on the level of the art itself:1-9 Cleanse Emphant10-19 Cleanse Bogram20-29 Cleanse
Agoknight30-39 Cleanse Shamblix40-79 Cleanse Horron50-59 The failure rate of
this art, as with many other arts, went down as the art level rose.
Many rituals were performed when
this art was evoked, using waters (resilence) from the various planes of the Basin to aid
in the cleansing process and the protection of those doing the actual cleansing. The fact
that a very high sphere dreamer was required to cleanse the larger mares is most likely
the reason very few of the larger mares were ever cleansed.
Going OOC a moment, the roleplay
potential of this art is tremendous, as cleansing rituals and the potential of cleansing a
dark mare come into play. Personally, I think actually cleansing a larger mare would spoil
the fun for those who love to hunt dark mares, but it would certainly put GoE on the map!
But then, considering an elder would most likely have to do the cleansing, it most likely
won't happen anyway.
Dreamers should actually roleplay
these arts more. After all, they are the core of the beliefs of the houses. Perhaps if
Cleanse were developed and roleplayed properly, the imprisoning and banishing houses would
follow suit, and we could see some really good ceremonies come out of this.
I have taken this report further
than asked by bringing in the new art, but I have made new friends with this research, and
have stretched myself a little, which I love to do. I want to thank Watcher, Dark Master,
Terra and Flushy for their input and stimulating discussion, and my mentor, Mashman, for
his information onthe basics of the art of Banish Nightmare.
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