Sorcerer Without Demons, Magic Or Demons
smonsoon:
I've actually been toying with this for awhile, and here's what I came up with:
The PCs are not sorcerers, they are mad scientists. For some reason, they have an insight into the way the world works, even though it shouldn't work that way. The replacement for the "demon" is an "unnatural law," that is, a law of nature that shouldn't be.
The unnatural law could be unnatural for any reason that the GM and players find acceptable. They could bends in space/time, methods for focusing chi, perpetual motion machines, etc.
Inconspicuous demons have a clear counterpart here, in the form of little gusts of wind that follow a Quantum Meteorologist around or distortions in space that accompany an expert in Transdimensional Portals.
Object demons translate into Gadgets.
Parasites become anything internal to the mad scientist's body, such someone who focuses chi to perform stunts like a movie martial arts master, or an electricity manipulator who acts as a human battery.
Passing demons translate into creatures: alien life forms, realistic humanoid robots, or bioengineered beings.
(I can't really think of a way to justify Possessors. Mind control, perhaps?)
The six rituals that manipulate demons handily translate as follows:
Contact --> Theory
Summon --> Practice
Bind --> Control
Punish --> Diminish
Banish --> Contradict
Contain --> Contain
The mad scientist Theorizes a new unnatural law. Instead of talking to it, he does thought experiments to project what it might be like. Afterwards, he brings it into Practice. Immediately after doing this, it is Uncontrolled, so he must bring it under Control, perhaps by building a weird science device to contain it (Lore based Control contest) or by being physically fit enough to dominate a creature or contain a "parasite" internally (Stamina based), or being smart or perceptive enough to intuitively understand things about it that all the calculations can't work out (Will based). Someone looking to deal with an aggressive Unnatural Law could figure out a way to Diminish its power, or "remind" the natural world how its laws Contradict it, or build a device to Contain it.
Here's a mostly-made character:
Dr. Phillip Taratowski
Stamina 2 (Clean Living)
Will 4 (Belief System (extreme rationalism))
Lore 4 (Self-Taught, "adept")
Cover 4 (Physics Professor)
Price: Bookish (-1 to the first roll in any scene)
Telltale: His breathing is far too slow.
Unnatural Law: Paraconsistent Chronodynamics
Object (a fancy programmable calculator)
Desire: Knowledge
Need: To be used in "grading" (evaluating other people's faults)
Stamina 3
Will 5
Lore 4
Power 5
Abilities: Fast, Travel (super-fast running), Special Damage (lethal) (aging), Hold
Telltale: Reacts to input a split second before it is actually entered.
Ron Edwards:
Hey, that's pretty good. Not quite as extreme as what I was thinking - in which the game is played, essentially, 100% naturalistically. But I do like it.
Best, Ron
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