I'm in a fluffy quandary for my game.
ancient mysteries, magic traditions, arcane symbols, constructs, dragons, magical beasts
I'm looking for suggestions on how to describe these things bolded to my player when he makes a skill check. He's purposely put a lot into the skill and enjoys a lot of roleplaying and fluff. When I give him his first found spellbook in our next game, I don't want to say "its a leatherbound spellbook with an excellent lock and the following magic auras and their strengths..." but rather I'd like to allude to a magic tradition, arcane symbol or perhaps an ancient mystery. Any suggestions?
Here's what I've come up with so far:
The spellbook has Arcane Lock, Nondetection, and it turns it' own locking mechanism into a pair of medium dragons to protect itself
When Detect Magic is employed: A total of 3 auras are woven into the book. 2 of these are Faint while the third is of Moderate power. The first minor aura forms a translucent haze all around the book, obscuring it from more detailed scrutiny through magical means (Knowledge: Arcana DC 17 - Abjuration). Inside the lock the tumblers glow with blue-white filigree of eldritch force adding extra complexity to the mechanism (Knowledge: Arcana DC 17 - Abjuration). The greatest of the auras however emanates from the draconic visages. Each beast diffuses a different colored hue, one like rippling flames along its scales while the other bristles with a rich coat of spectral frost (Knowledge: Arcana DC 20 - Transmutation).
Does this seem ok? What kind of "tradition" would this suggest?
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The arcane lock might visibly manifest to someone attempting to identify it as a pair of clawed hands, clutching greedily at it, holding it shut, keeping with both the draconic theme, and also with the 'tone' of the spell (a different arcane lock might present with different arcane symbology, making it more of an art than a science!). Alternately, the 'information' might appear to the spellcaster as runes of restraint, possessiveness, forbiddance, etc. appearing and disappearing across the surface of the book, skittering along as lines of energy that form briefly into the shape of the rune and then fly apart and reform elsewhere on the book.
The non-detection spell as hazy obscurement totally works, although, if the spellcaster doesn't beat the non-detection, he won't see any aura at all, let alone a hazy one. Once he bests it, it could manifest and dissipate, like a warm sulphur-scented wash of dragon-smoke.
The third spell, that's a big one, and probably would have a higher DC (just because it's a polymorph any object level thing, I would think), and having the dragon decorations seem to weave and coil themselves into powerful runes of life or becoming or actualization under magical inspection might suggest their effect without giving up the game, so to speak.
Another thing to keep in mind is that magic (in many settings, at least) is different based on the spellcaster involved. How would the creator of the spellbook describe these spells? Allow that to inform your description of the spell effects.
Maybe the creator of the spellbook (or the caster of the protective spells, they don't need to be the same person!) would view the polymorphed dragons within not as guardians but as trapped souls. This could perhaps turn your imaging from writhing dragons to dragons that have been chained to the lock, constantly struggling to free themselves.
The more these images match the personality of the creator (or, perhaps more succinctly, the more the images run counter to the personality of the PC), the more likely your fluffy player is going to be intrigued by the images and the book. Maybe the image of chained dragons, to the PC, means that there are dragons trapped within, vying for freedom. Or perhaps they truly are a warning. Now you have a moral quandary and potential danger simply from opening a spellbook. At this point, what's the likelihood that this PC begins to investigate the origins of the book: who wrote it? how long ago? how likely are these spells to hurt me?