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[IronyOwl]

Welcome, lucky contestant, to the greatest game show this side of Mish'Malar's Void! Pit your skills against eleven other novice summoners in daunting challenges judged by some of the most discerning eyes in The Craft, and prove yourself alone worthy of the grand prize- a guaranteed apprenticeship under a venerated archwizard!

Let the games begin!

Spoiler: How the Game Works (click to show/hide)

Welcome to The Summoner's Gauntlet, the greatest game show this side of the Mish'Malar Void! Drama, creativity, passion, judgement, acid, malformed atrocities- we've got it all! Let's see how it works.

ROUNDS
Each round, our novice summoners- individuals with some talent in creating living weapons and tools- battle it out to see who will be the best summoner that round... and who will be on the bottom!

Each round consists of a challenge, a team organization, and a set amount of time, at which point the contestants' creations are judged and the rewards- and punishments!- doled out accordingly.

CHALLENGES
Each round is characterized by a Challenge. This is, of course, the task our valiant summoners have been set to! Challenges typically consist of creating a servant- from any of the summoners' available materials- which conforms to a set of criteria. These criteria can include overall function, desired traits, complexity of design, or anything else the judges decree! Best get creative, summoners, you never know what you'll be called upon to design for next!

TEAM ORGANIZATION
Not every challenge is the same. Some challenges leave each summoner on their own; others combine them into teams for various purposes. Some challenges even give them designated rivals or partners that they'll be compared to and judged beside!

As with the nature of the challenges, the nature of who's on what side is always shifting. Best keep on your toes, summoners!

JUDGEMENT
Once the time limit has elapsed, the summoners and their creations are brought in for judgement. Our panel of three judges scores each summoner's creation on a scale of 1 to 5- or rarely 0, for particularly hilarious failures!

This is also a time for summoners to receive constructive feedback on their works, as the judges comment on what they liked and didn't like about a given creation.

REWARD
Once the judges have made their decisions, the summoners are rewarded for their efforts. Each summoner receives a number of tokens equal to the combined scores they got from all judges. Tokens can be spent on new, more lavish tools and materials for the summoner to utilize next time!

The winner, usually one of the summoners who received the most combined points from the judges, also typically gets an extra bonus mystery prize, as well as something perhaps even more valuable- immunity to being banished for failing the next real challenge!

BANISHMENT
Rounds are classified as "bonus" rounds or "real" rounds. Bonus rounds are a chance for the summoners to hone their craft in relative safety- there's no danger if they come out last!

Real rounds are quite different. The loser of a real round, usually meaning one of the summoners tied for lowest score amongst all the judges, is banished to the icy wastes of Nar'gatoth for their failures. Best step up your game, summoners! I hear it's cold down there!

Spoiler: Welcome, Summoner (click to show/hide)

As a novice summoner, you have some ability and talent in the art of creating servants for yourself or others. Not enough for anyone to feel bad about banishing you to frigid death on a ball of ice, mind you, but enough to not let anyone turn you into a shambling husk so they can advance themselves on a game show.

Well, not this game show.


Minion Creation
Your most essential and fundamental ability is that of creating servants, often-warped creatures to do your bidding for you. That is, after all, why you're on an inane game show, risking your life for the entertainment of the masses and the impatience of the Patriarchs.

To create a minion, you generally need a base creature or substance to work with. Then it's generally a matter of selecting a principle and element from a school, and combining them in a way you think might make your servant more useful (including making it a servant and not a pile of rocks at all, of course). Most principle-element combinations have several useful ways they might be combined.

As another note, bear in mind that simply being able to do something is not necessarily sufficient to impart that ability into your subjects. Being able to breath fire may well make it easier to render your creations able to do the same, but it is, by itself, insufficient to actually imbue that ability into something else.


Schools
The Craft, the common name for the discipline of creating servants, is divided into six schools: Necromancy, Alchemy, Nature, Light, Demonology, and Elementalism. Each is composed of Elements and Principles, and it is which of each you apply and how that determine how your creation turns out.

Mastery over the components to a school can translate to a mastery over the school in general. This represents a deeper understanding of the elements and principles in question than might be otherwise surmised by your skill level, and can have unexpected uses.


Minion Specifics
There are four general goals when designing a minion. Each varies in importance depending upon the circumstances.

Strength is a minion's offensive power. Strong minions are handy for killing things.

Toughness is a minion's defensive strength. Tough minions are hard to kill.

Abilities are positive or negative tricks, traits, or other modifiers to a creature that aren't just a matter of raw strength or power. Abilities vary wildly, and producing the right and avoiding the wrong abilities on a given creature is often the difference between a brilliantly designed instrument and another brainless meatwall.

Cost is a general estimate of how difficult it is to produce such a creature. Remember, the judges are looking for viable models, not just showy one-offs. Balancing cost with effectiveness is a vital duty of any successful summoner; sometimes near-uselessly weak creatures can be wildly effective if they can be deployed in massive hordes, while a perfect instrument of destruction can prove too pricey to be feasible.


Accoutrements
Each round you compete in will grant you tokens based on your combined scores from each judge. Tokens can then be spent on accoutrements at a rate of 3 apiece.

Spoiler: Magic and Schools (click to show/hide)

The Craft is the term commonly given to the various methods and disciplines of servant creation. It is divided into six schools: Necromancy, Alchemy, Light, Nature, Demonology, and Elementalism. Each school is further divided into Principles and Elements.

Principles and Elements are available from Tomes, which are purchasable accoutrements. Normally access to the tome is required to utilize these components properly, but rolling a 5 or 6 on an attempt with them represents a breakthrough moment that gives you a deeper understanding of how they work, negating the need for handy reference materials. The Tome may then be sold, disposed of, or merely ignored at your leisure.

Principles
Principles are the fundamental ways a school of magic works; the ways they can be shaped, essentially. Each school possesses three, and while they differ considerably, each set can be thought of roughly as In, Out, and Other. That is, one aspect is putting something into something else, one is taking something out, and one is somewhat harder to generalize across schools.

School	1st	2nd	3rd
Necromancy	Animation	Draining	Sublimation
Alchemy	Infusion	Denudation	Replacement
Nature	Growth	Spreading	Mutation
Demonology	Invocation	Evocation	Transvocation
Light	Invocation	Evocation	Transvocation
Elementalism	Bending	Bursting	Precipitating

Elements
Elements are the fundamental materials a school manipulates; what's being shaped, essentially. Each school possesses several, many of them too obscure for most to bother with. The following is an incomplete but still very useful listing.

Necromancy	Bone	Flesh	Blood	Souls
Alchemy	Vigor	Malaise	Vitriol	Amity
Nature	Root	Leaf	Stem	Thorn
Demonology	Fire	Hate	Darkness	Souls
Light	Purity	Light	Serenity	Shelter
Elementalism	Fire	Earth	Water	Air

Levels and Power
Not all magic is equal in strength. Some tricks are simple and easy; others are difficult and immensely complex. The level of magic used to create something generally determines its cost and power, as well as determining how difficult it is for the summoner to pull off.

Level	Name	Sample Minions
1	Novice	Zombie, Strengthened Goon, Animate Sapling, Hatefueled Cultist, Tranquil Healer, Campfire Elemental
2	Apprentice	Skeletal Warrior, Toughened Warrior, Angry Bush, Tainted Berserker, Lightguarded Soldier, Swimguard Elemental
3	Adept	Spectre, Acid Spitter, Thorn Lasher, Hungering Savage, Paladin, Stoneskin Warrior
4	Expert	Mummy, , Treant, Half-Demon, Half-Angel, Hurricane Elemental
5	Master	Vampire, Superhuman, Oakvine Treant, Ascended One, Enlightened One, Lightning Drake

Summoner skills are measured on the same scale as spell levels. A summoner attempting to use a spell above or below his current skill level suffers a penalty or gains a bonus equal to the difference.

Summoners increase their skill level by gaining experience. Each roll has an experience gain associated with it that is applied to all aspects being used on the roll. Bonuses to the roll subtract their value from the experience earned, as the summoner is clearly too advanced to gain much knowledge from such an easy attempt. Penalties, on the other hand, add to it, as attempting such an ambitious and difficult task is an excellent learning experience.

Note that rolls of 0 or below may have impacts on the summoner, not just their creation.

Roll	Base Experience Granted
5-6	+2
3-4	+1
1-2	+0

The amount of experience needed to increase a principle or element is always 3, and experience is applied to principles and elements separately and at full value.


Tomes and Learning
To successfully utilize an element or principle requires considerable knowledge of it. This can be accomplished in two ways.

The first method is to have a Tome of that aspect on hand. Tomes are accoutrements that can be purchased for 3 tokens each, and detail a single element or principle of a single level.

The second is to acquire innate knowledge. This is achieved by rolling a 5 or 6 on an attempt at using the element or principle in question, which results in a much deeper understanding of the aspects being used at whatever level they are being used at, obviating the need for a tome.


Combining Schools
One of the most useful and difficult uses of The Craft is combining disparate factors from multiple schools. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done, as the schools are arranged as they are for good reason, and melding portions of them requires a considerably deeper understanding than does using the aspects of a school internally.

Specifically, principles and elements may only be used with elements and principles outside their own school if all components are innately known, not simply present in tomes. Beyond this, melded aspects function identically to components from a single discipline.

Spoiler: Accoutrements (click to show/hide)

Accoutrements are tools and materials that summoners may purchase to aid in their works. Anything reasonable may potentially be purchased for tokens, but some of the most common desires are mentioned below.

All accoutrements cost 3 tokens each, though more expensive and powerful accoutrements might become available in the future. Accoutrements may not be sold back, but may be freely traded or sold amongst any willing summoners.

Tomes
A Tome is a spellbook containing all the information you need to use an element or principle properly at the tome's level (note that tomes do not allow proper use at levels below themselves). Having a wide assortment of tomes is essential for summoners seeking flexibility and breadth of knowledge.

Tools
A tool is anything used to augment a creation without being expended. It can include mundane devices, such as cutting implements or heating mechanisms, or more advanced fare, such as dissolving tanks or unholy altars. Very few tools provide concrete bonuses to rolls; more often, they simply enable some action or process.

Materials
Materials is a supply of any sort of material expended in minion creation. This can include living things. The supply of a purchased material is not inexhaustible, but generally allows for one or two uses per round; after that, the material is expended for the moment and you will have to wait for the next round to get another shipment.

Assistants
Rarely, summoners may wish to purchase individuals to aid them in their works. Usually assistants have no particular skills, and are thus useful for performing menial labor and little else, essentially serving as living tools. A few summoners manage to get around this limitation through rigorous augmentation, and many, many summoners end up augmenting their servants regardless.

-Magic School Details-

Spoiler: Necromancy (click to show/hide)

Necromancy is the art of life and death. Well, mainly death, but you do use life from time to time. It covers a fair amount of combat magic, but its use to summoners is obviously more focused on its amazing ability to raise corpses as shambling undead slaves.

Necromantic servants are usually animated corpses. They have a reputation for being fairly strong, immune to certain annoyances, and possessing truly unpleasant abilities at more advanced levels of creation. However, they are also known for suffering from mental issues, either stupidity or lack of motivation, a ravenous desire to murder everything alive including, nay especially their creators, or in some cases even both.

-Principles-


Animation
The first necromantic principle is Animation. This principle involves focusing power or souls into something, usually a corpse, in order to achieve an effect, usually to raise it from the dead. Other uses include some aspects of controlling the resulting servants, and blood sacrifice.

Draining
The second necromantic principle is Draining. This principle involves grabbing something in a target and dragging it into oneself instead. The most iconic use of this principle is the necromantic ability to drain the life force of the living to heal oneself, but it also includes sacrificing victims for power and a handful of other uses.

Sublimation
The third necromantic principle is Sublimation. This principle involves destroying something without transferring it anywhere else. This is the source of most wilting or rotting effects in necromancy, as well as having some uses in other fields.



-Elements-


Bone
Bone is one of the more basic elements of necromancy. Its uses in animating and controlling skeletons are obvious, but it can also be used to alter the shape of potential servants, reinforce an existing creature against skeletal damage, and in some cases even ossify the flesh into bonelike armor plates.

Flesh
Flesh is another fundamental necromantic element. Its most obvious use is in raising zombies and other fleshy undeads, but it can also modify existing creatures or assist in raising things not normally noted for their corpulence.

Blood
Blood is one of the more "essential advanced" necromantic elements. It covers life force as much as it does literal blood, and is involved in stealing or rotting away an opponent's vitality, empowering living or dead subjects, and just about anything else a power source is desired for.

Soul
Soul is another "essential advanced" necromantic element. It covers the manipulation of souls, and is obviously used extensively in the creation of self-aware undead. It has some other uses as well, such as instantly killing targets via targeted soul removal.

Spoiler: Alchemy (click to show/hide)

Alchemy is the art of altering substances. It has a number of uses regarding raw materials and manufactured goods, but its primary interest to summoners is its ability to affect the substances living things are made of.

Alchemical servants are usually augmented creatures that have been trained to serve beforehand.

-Principles-


Infusion
Infusion is the art of adding something to a material's composition. It's commonly used in alloy making, health regimens, and other cases of adding a desired property to something. Summoners tend to be more interested in its ability to imbue muscles with increased strength, reinforce skin with greater resilience, and otherwise alter the makeup of a living creature's tissues via the addition of new components.

Denudation
Denudation is the art of removing something from a material's composition. It's used to remove impurities, weaken troublesome objects, or even strip away every known component in order to leave only the anomalous materials. Summoners tend to utilize it to remove troublesome or weakening features of something's flesh.

Transference
Transference is the replacement of one thing with another within a material. It's commonly used to alter a feature or property rather than adding or removing it entirely, by translating the presence of one agent with a new one. For summoners, this often means shifting a creature's elemental alignments, replacing one composition-related ability with another, or just conveniently replacing weakness with strength in one go.



-Elements-


Vigor
Vigor represents energy and vitality. It is the tendency of things to be active, gregarious, and powerful. It's commonly used to imbue features or materials with greater strength, power, or effectiveness.

Malaise
Malaise represents slowness and apathy. It is the tendency of things to be inactive, listless, and unresponsive. It's commonly used to attempt to slow down or weaken undesirable reactions or traits within a material.

Vitriol
Vitriol represents incompatibility and spite. It is the tendency of things to be volatile and separate from other things. It's commonly used to prevent two things from merging or intentionally create hostile reactions.

Amity
Amity represents acceptance and compatibility. It is the tendency of things to merge well or not interfere with each other. It's commonly used to more properly bind or prevent unpleasant reactions between two materials.

Spoiler: Nature (click to show/hide)

-Principles-


Growth: Additions of form or increases in size.

Spreading: Overt outward movement or actions.

Mutation: Fundamental changes to some aspect of the subject.



-Elements-


Leaf: Broad, thin but living appendages.

Root: Basic, fundamental structures, often used for feeding.

Thorn: Sharp implements of harm.

Stem: Supporting cores.

Spoiler: Demonology (click to show/hide)

-Principles-


Invocation: Summoning of internal forces.

Evocation: Summoning of external forces.

Transvocation: Sacrificing something to receive an appropriately imbued equivalent.



-Elements-


Fire: Demonic fires tend to be somewhat more consuming and vicious, and less helpful and controllable, than mundane ones.

Hate: Seething, emotional dislike for something.

Darkness: Shrouding, suffocating absence of life and light.

Souls: Demonic dealings with souls tend to include warping their nature.

Spoiler: Light (click to show/hide)

-Principles-


Invocation
Invocation is the summoning forces internally to oneself or others. It is commonly used to imbue recipients with inner tranquility, innate resilience to attacks, or other such boons, as well as to mend wounds and purify poisons.

Evocation
Evocation is the summoning of external forces to oneself or others. It is commonly used to create shields of light, blast foes with holy power, or other such flashy effects, as well as to generate light and heal targets.

Transvocation
Transvocation is the art of switching something of the caster's with something enlightened. This generally takes the form of an item, substance, or creature having some of its essence replaced by light-oriented equivalent, but in rare cases can even result in the entire subject being replaced or remade.



-Elements-


Purity: Absence of certain things within a medium.

Light: Clear, bright light.

Serenity: Peace and inner calm.

Shelter: Protection and defense.

Spoiler: Elementalism (click to show/hide)

-Principles-


Bending
Bending is the gentle shifting of something's form or position. It is used to lead fires, shape stones, make water dance gracefully, or create a gentle breeze.

Bursting
Bursting is rapid, violent shifts in something's form or position. It is used to shoot flames, shatter stones, attack with lashes of water, or buffet a target with intense winds.

Precipitation
Precipitation is the fundamental alteration of something's form. It is used to conjure flames from warmth, condense dust to solid rock, evaporate water, or dismantle a hurricane.



-Elements-

Fire: Hot, bright, and hungry.

Water: A heavy fluid.

Earth: Dirt and stone.

Air: Wind and air.

-Signup Sheet-

Name:
Appearance:
Talents: Each summoner begins the game with one Element and one Principle at innate novice level.
Bio: Optional. Do remember that you're a member of a fairly unpleasant, very magically inclined civilization, and are talented and useful enough to not be considered fodder but weak and useless enough to find yourself in this situation.

Also I get the distinct feeling I've left parts out or left outdated parts in or something, so do let me know if something doesn't make sense or you have questions in general.

I'm also curious about whether everyone prefers Necromancy's in-depth style of presentation or the other ones.

[IronyOwl]

Remaining Contestants
-

Still thinking about max players. I don't want it to get too insane, especially since [REDACTED], but there will be a bit of attrition.

Former Contestants
-

[IronyOwl]

THANK YOU 504S, NOT LIKE I WAS IN THE MIDDLE OF ANYTHING

Ahem. Creation roster goes here. I do not require any further posts.

[Unholy_Pariah]

Ill reserve a slot while i work out my character, this could be interesting

Name: Dragor the Spiteful
Appearance: A tall pale man cloaked in a leaflike green robe and a mossy leather tunic.
Talents: Growth and Thorn, because yay hard mode.
Bio: Before dragor joined the gameshow he spent his time ambushing unescorted traders and unwary travellers that passed his encampent in a nearby forest by using his meager talents to cause thick thornbushes to unexpectedly burst from the ground causing relatively minor but nonetheless extremely painful injuries to his victims and then dissapearing into the trees with their possesions laughing gleefully while they painfully extricated themselves.

[Xantalos]

Name: Grank Bloukat
Appearance: A short, weaselly man, with a hooked nose, wrinkled skin, and resentment in his eyes.  His hair is long and stringy, and hangs over his face in the brown cloak he wears.
Talents: Element: Demonology | Principle: Evocation
Bio: A former street rat, he got his hands on a demon tome and began using it to exact revenge on everyone he knew before being arrested and thrown into the game show.

I much prefer the style you used in Necromancy's description, because I can't figure out what Invocation does beause I'm stupid.

[borno]

Name: Nerdillus Maximus
Appearance:  A pale, short and chubby guy with a perpetual 'I told you so' face on. Wears stereotypical glasses.
Talents: Principle: Infusion Element: Amity
Bio: This guy's parents had no idea what they had started by calling him what they had. A long life of using big words he didn't really understand himself, being a constant tattle-tale when people were out behind the school creating minions and locking himself in his room to play Summoners and Servants ^TM until it was time to go to sleep, Nerdillus was, in fact, a huge nerd. One day everyone decided that the best way to get rid of him would be to send him to this competition, so here he is now.

[scapheap]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Name: Jane Torn
Appearance: A green haired woman with grey eyes. Pleasantly plump.
Talents: Light:Invocation/Shelter
Bio: A nun of the saint Kerco Lacker church, she a fairly good summoner, but with her rather common screw ups the higher ups put her where she can't do much harm.

I like the Necromancy's in-depth style.

[Unholy_Pariah]

I too would like more clarification on the elements and principles as i cannot decide which of them my desired actions would fall under.

[superBlast]

Name: Reina
Appearance: A girl with long dark-brown hair and blue eyes.
Talents: Element: Root Principle: Growth
Bio: A smart upbeat girl who has always been fascinated with animals and began experimenting with magic to create all sorts of animals that can be useful to society. Unfortunately she has a terminal illness that while it doesn't have a noticeable affect on a person it does for an unexplained reason cause a sudden death by sometime between the ages of 20 and 30 with the rare few that might live to 35. Just turning 20, she decides to get on the this game show as her fast track to learn and study magic quickly without having to save up money and resources that would normally take years for a normal summoner.

((And yeah I would like a more in depth explanation like you did with necromancy. The way the rest of the stuff is now is still too vague to me... though i get the general idea of them.... I think. Not 100% sure really.))

[IronyOwl]

Alright, I'll see if I can flesh them all out at some point.

[HmH]

Name: Nathaniel the Thunderous
Appearance: A large, loud person in his late thirties. He has an enterpreneurial spark in his eyes and a mischievous smile hidden behind his bushy beard.
Talents: School: Alchemy; Element: Vitriol; Principle: Infusion
Bio: Nathaniel lived his entire life as a traveling alchemist, making and selling magical explosives to anyone who paid; however, he, being self-trained, never got far with any magic subtler than making things walk up to the target and go boom at the right moment. Being a merchant of death paid nice but was a disreputable job; when Nathaniel, worn out from decades of being despised by all around him, began to seek a way to master other facets of Alchemy, he found that no mage in his right mind would take an apprentice their own age and that his only chance at getting a good apprenticeship would be to prove himself in the Gauntlet.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Name: Drake Kelt
Appearance: This guy reminds you of a deadly eel. He has beady gray eyes. His fine, straight, black hair is short and is worn in a weird style. He has an angular build. His skin is tanned. He has a crooked nose and thick eyebrows. His wardrobe is complicated, and is completely white and green.
Talents: Mutation, Flesh (or Stem if I have to stick to within the same school).
Bio: Drake was born in a fairly distant land, a large island not far off the coast. While he was sent here for schooling, he still maintains some traits of his old country (sort of a hodgepodge mixture of Ireland and Scotland, with a little Norse thrown in for good measure). He enjoys the fenny environment, and while he's not much of a people person he's loyal. Drake's the life of the party once he's had a few too many meads, no matter how much he regrets it the next day...

[HmH]

((Regarding the question about in-depth style vs brevity: I'd like to say that yes, a description of what minions each school can make would be nice, but it'll be mostly unnecessary if you encourage people to ask you questions. You won't be able to cover everything you have in mind with just a few sentences anyway; it'll be easier to let people ask about the specifics they're interested in.

While we're at it, I'd like to ask a few questions about the minions:
1) Can Alchemy be used to make minions out of inanimate matter, like golems and whatnot?
2) Do we get any materials to make minions with before the first Challenge starts?
3) How will the Cost of minions be determined? Will it be derived from the other stats?))

[IronyOwl]

((Regarding the question about in-depth style vs brevity: I'd like to say that yes, a description of what minions each school can make would be nice, but it'll be mostly unnecessary if you encourage people to ask you questions. You won't be able to cover everything you have in mind with just a few sentences anyway; it'll be easier to let people ask about the specifics they're interested in.

While we're at it, I'd like to ask a few questions about the minions:
1) Can Alchemy be used to make minions out of inanimate matter, like golems and whatnot?
2) Do we get any materials to make minions with before the first Challenge starts?
3) How will the Cost of minions be determined? Will it be derived from the other stats?))

Hm, possibly. I'd agree that some question-asking will probably be necessary, but if someone's question is something along the lines of "I'm trying to decide what school to take, what can everything do?" then I'd more or less be writing out the more in-depth descriptions anyway.

1) Not normally. It's theoretically possible to create blobs that move around under their own power or similar, but Alchemy by itself doesn't really have any mechanisms for making them properly "alive" in terms of following orders, perceiving its environment, or other generally minion-essential abilities.

2) No, for the first challenge you'll be forced to make something out of nothing, or else go all fell mood on your rivals. Yes, each apprentice will get some starting tokens for the first round. Also the first few challenges are likely to be fairly simple bonus challenges designed to make sure everyone has a feel for what they're doing.

3) Cost is a slightly tricky concept. It's mainly derived from its other stats, yes; a flying fireproof firebreathing dragon will be a lot more costly than a shambling zombie. How many and what type of actions you spent on it can also sometimes be a factor, though, and of course the base materials can sometimes apply a cost above its state. Butchering drakes to fashion chicken-sized meat golems would probably be a lost more costly than its stats or the effort you had to go through to make them would imply, for instance.

[javierpwn]

NameStone Frank
Appearence:Tall, thin man with scars on every surface of his body, wears heavily black robes
Talents:Animation Blood!

Heavily necromatic man!