While we are regrouping, let us know what you all would like to see in the kickstarter. Feedback would be very helpful and appreciated!
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:( i was totally gonna work on a witch archetype called dark mistress...
:( i was totally gonna work on a witch archetype called dark mistress...
And you still can Christos. We will be going ahead with Battlewitches and Hexcrafters as part of the reloaded Ultimate Witches and Warlocks Kickstarter. As long as we can keep some design space apart from my Tainted Consort and Haunted Eye, I think this trio of archetypes will be fantastic...
:( i was totally gonna work on a witch archetype called dark mistress...And you still can Christos. We will be going ahead with Battlewitches and Hexcrafters as part of the reloaded Ultimate Witches and Warlocks Kickstarter. As long as we can keep some design space apart from my Tainted Consort and Haunted Eye, I think this trio of archetypes will be fantastic...
Yes, please move ahead as planned. This is a minor hiccup in our plans. We can overcome this. :)
If I can be of any help, just say the word. ^^
Yes, please move ahead as planned. This is a minor hiccup in our plans. We can overcome this. :)
I was sad about this development. I am glad this will be overcome.
We are relaunching in mid-March--with a video, graphics, and a clearer explanation of what we are trying to achieve.
Please keep us in mind when you budget for your gaming expenses in April! Also, let us know if there are particular tiers or information you'd like included in the project.
Christina
Just as a reminder I am also talking about this project a lot over at my own blog at http://timbrannan.blogspot.com/.
Stop by and say hello!
The Kickstarter will be relaunching in April - watch this space for the announcement!
Yay!
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Tim will definitely be providing more information about the warlock.
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I may tease about the stretch goal stuff i did with Morgan, but after the big man himself does his warlock spiel (sides i really want to hear about it.)
Any word on the relaunch?
Should be a couple more weeks
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I'm waiting for a few things before this goes live--one of which is a video, since KS folks seem to like them.
A to Z of Witches. W is for Warlock
.. Blog by Timothy Brannan with some hints on the style of warlock that will be in The Ultimate Witch & Warlock
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Actually, I'm more surprised at how many people DON'T know that warlock actually/literally means 'oath breaker'. You'd think, in the Information Age, that anyone interested in the subject would have seen that via google already.
I'm actually suprised that in the information age so many people think it DOES mean oathbreaker....and more than a little frusatrated.
Warlock is a Scott's Gaelic word...it NO WHERE in extant lore has EVER been used to mean "oathbreaker".....
It has ALWAYS been used while listing specific types of magical practioner....
The first person to "suggest" that it could be derived from the scandinavian word warloghe (oath breaker) was Tolkien.
However current linguists find this to be very unlikely, as it doesn't match language drift at all.
It is far more likely that the word is a Gaelic basterdization of the Scandinavian word "vardlokkr" which translates roughly as "spirit chanter"....fit's language drift from Germanic language to Gaelic...and matches it's usage in extant lore.
Modern American Neo-pagans have pushed for the definition of "oathbreaker" to the point that people simply assume that it means oathbreaker, and that this is the "literal" translation....when it simply IS NOT.
@ Nighttree - My apologies, it would appear I hit a nerve unintentionally.
Thank you for your in-depth analysis; I'll be certain to forward this along to my colleagues at the University.
Sorry if my reaction seemed a bit caustic...I guess it is a bit of a raw nerve for me....
Nikolas Gander is one of several linguists that have been looking into the etimology of the word in it's original usage, as compared to what people are using post Tolkien.
I just wanted to add some potentially useful information on the use of the term "warlock." First of note is that the Modern English definition of the term has nothing to do with traitors or such, and at least according to the 'Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary' is defined:
1 : a man practicing the black arts: sorcerer;
2 : conjurer".Whatever its hypothetical etymology, it is nowadays *not* used to indicate a traitor. And any who choose to self-identify as a warlock are saying nothing at all about their ability to keep oath.
Also, it has long irked me that compilers of Modern English dictionaries seem so very ignorant of the role the Scandinavian languages played in the development of English in England and Scotland.
Allow me to illustrate with the word warlock.If, as is posited in many Modern English dictionaries, the word"warlock" comes from a ME "warloghe" from OE "w¾rloga", then the Modern form we should expect to see would be something like warlow, or werlow, since the tendency to move from 'gh' to 'w' is strong in English, and from 'gh' to 'ck' unknown.
This is a trait it shares with Danish, and to provide an example, the Old Swedish "lagh" (meaning"law") is spelled in Modern Danish "lag" but pronounced "law" and in English, orthography and pronunciation are again in sync, with the form "law." That "gh" in the Middle English form "warloghe" indicates a uvular fricative, that is a g that is pronounced as if one were gargling (as in Dutch "gulder"). That aspirated "g" is what, in English, is usually exchanged for a "w". Other examples in English:"through", "drought", etc.When one also considers the semantic shift,i.e., from "traitor, oathbreaker" to "sorcerer, conjurer", this all begins to introduce an element of doubt as to the actual etymology.
Now, when I find corroboration for this hypothesis in dictionaries of Old Norse (Cleasby, Vigfusson and Craigie), I must, as a trained linguist, seek another more satisfying etymology.
Here, then, is an alternative etymology for "warlock", one which I find both satisfying as a linguist and as a magic user.In the Old Norse tale, Eiriks saga RauÝa (The Saga of Eirik the Red,mid 14th century), the term "varÝlokkur" appears in the context of a prophecy-session at a farm in Greenland.
It is used to mean a song of conjuring.
When the two constituent terms are split, we see "varÝ"which had by that time the sense of a spirit, and "lokkur" or a song of luring or attracting.
In Modern Swedish, the term "lock" is used for the pastoral songs that are sung to call the cows home from the meadow -- "kolock".
In just this same way, the song to attract or call the "varÝ" or spirit, was the "varÝlokkur".
Gradually, with time, the term for the song and for the singer became interchangeable, i.e., the same term was used for both.Semantically, we can interpret the term as "enchanter, conjurer." Now, is all of this linguistically feasible? Yes, and here's why: The term varÝlokkur is a compound noun.
The consonantal combination "rÝl" could never occur otherwise.
As it is,this consonantal cluster is very difficult, even in Norse, so the tendency is to simplify.Since in Old Norse, the rolled "r" followed by the liquid "l" would have organically produced the medial "Ý",this consonant is the most likely candidate for deletion.
Also, word initial "v" was commonly anglicized into word initial "w" in English.Examples: vOErd = ward, vurm = worm, vatten = water, ved = wood, etc.
And finally (and in my mind, most convincingly) the geminate "k" at the end of the Norse is reflected in the "ck" of the English.
Orthographic tendencies in English tend to reflect "kk" as "ck".Lastly, the nominative "ur" ending in Old Norse is superfluous in English, as we had abandoned case endings long before.
And the fact that the Scottish and East Anglian coasts had been battered by Scandinavian raiders for quite some time prior to the word's first attestation in *English* adds historical probability to linguistic possibility.Now, even if my etymology back to the Scandinavian form for enchanter is unconvincing to you, at least remember that the Modern English term has nothing to do with traitors.
Sweet! I hoped for a Warlock as a spontaneous witch.
We've got a video together. I'm still waiting on some graphics. If you want to see the video right away, please friend me on Facebook. We'll get it up on Youtube and the Kickstarter, of course.
The warlock is not set in stone. One of the things we want is to hear from you on what you want in the class. Timothy's version will be available to backers early on, and we will do a round of feedback on it before finalizing it.
Nikolas Gander is one of several linguists that have been looking into the etimology of the word in it's original usage, as compared to what people are using post Tolkien.Could you be so kind as to share the source of your quote?
I tried digging, and came up with nothing- not even the name in association with 'warlock'. (well, aside from vard-lokkur being listed as 'inadmissible' as a source by the Oxford scholars, and some persons from Scandinavian lands who doubted that vard-lokkur had anything to do with the English warlock, since the pronunciations were completely different). I just know that, without a source that I can cite or refer to, that those persons I know at the Uni are unlikely to take it seriously. Thanks!
That specific quote was from a folklore forum back in 2009 (ish)...I'll see if I can still find a link to it.
Barry Cunliff, Ronald Hutton, Thor Ewing....and I believe Mirands Green have also at least touched on the subject in variouse writtings...I'll dig through my books and see If I can get you actual book titles and page references.
Oxford has always claimed it was "inadmissible"...not suprizing as it was their dictionary that printed Tolkiens interpretation.
Many other dictionaries, especially European dictionaries make no mention of warloghe/oath breaker....
For example....from an Icelandic/English dictionary.
"Vard lokkur, f. pl. (Scot. Warlock), 'ward songs,' 'guardian songs,' charms (or better, 'wierd songs,' ep.the other form, urdar lokkur); from this word comes the Scot. 'warlock' though it has chaged it's sense to that of the wizard himself."
More importantly is it's ACTUAL usage among the Scot's...where it is never used to mean oathbreaker....but has always been used as a descriptive of either a spell caster....a descriptive for something "magically bound" as in "warlocked" or a descriptive of a haunted place...ie a "worlocked glade".
Scandinavian sources when translated into English likewise make use of the term warlock specifically as a form of spell caster...never as "oathbreaker" ie "wizards come from Ville, sorcerrers and warlocks come from Ve" (spelling may be off, I'm doing this from memory).
@ Nighttree - feel free to PM me the info/links; I fear we've inadvertently entered into Threadjack territory...
OOppss....your right.
Will do ;)
Now that Deep Magic is out, what do you think we could do similar for witches? We want this book to be something that opens up possibilities for the class.
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I find it puzzling that a witch hasn't access to Undead- creating and controlling spells, neither to outsider- binding spells, unless she has the right patron. In my mind, that's what a witch should be all about.
Now that Deep Magic is out, what do you think we could do similar for witches? We want this book to be something that opens up possibilities for the class.
Your book has over 500 pages! You've already done it.
I sometimes wonder if it should be divided into 2 smaller tomes.
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There should be an archetype giving channeling abilities, or at least commanding undead and turning/rebuking outsiders, clerics and holy warriors of opposite alignment, like clerics could do in 2E.
There should be an archetype giving channeling abilities, or at least commanding undead and turning/rebuking outsiders, clerics and holy warriors of opposite alignment, like clerics could do in 2E.
And you should write that, Bardess. :)
If you will, I'll do. :)
sooooo about that stretch goal stuff morgan boehringer and myself have been working on. The witch archetypes i've personally been working on.
Virulent Witch: A spell-less witch archetype that gains a unique contagion ability (a sort of build your own magical disease mechanic).
Haruspex:(awesome name courtesy of morgan, was originally fortune teller) a divination focused witch that bonds to either a deck of cards or crystal ball...and can wield them like magical weapons.
Dark Mistress(Master): A work in progress witch archetype that manipulates with pain, pleasure, and domination. gains proficiency with whips.
Element Bonded Witch: A witch with an elemental familiar and powers.
ive also done a couple of feats and witch-like archetypes for other classes including paladin.
I feel like these might be a stupid questions but I'm having a hard time finding answers on my own and I need some details to know if I'm excited about this;
1. Mechanically, what is a Warlock?
2. Aside from new archetypes, spells, hexes and patrons what is in this book?
3. Why Witch specifically? Seems interesting that this one class gets 500 pages of support.
I feel like these might be a stupid questions but I'm having a hard time finding answers on my own and I need some details to know if I'm excited about this;
1. Mechanically, what is a Warlock?
2. Aside from new archetypes, spells, hexes and patrons what is in this book?
3. Why Witch specifically? Seems interesting that this one class gets 500 pages of support.
I am just coming out of the peanut gallery but at least in the case of number 3, it is because it is not as well understood as other classes. Most people have a really good idea of what a Wizard, Cleric, Fighter, or most other classes are. But what is a witch? What is different from a witch in that it is not a wizard or cleric? I think that is what the book is trying to help us to understand.
Another class that for me is hard to understand is the Oracle. You have powers from a deity and yet you do not have to follow a certain deity? That is contradictory to other divine classes; I view the Oracle as a type of Sorcerer. In my mind, Oracles and Sorcerers are both what we might call psychics. They have powers that come from within.
With Oracles I always saw them as being much like Sorcerers, primarily that they come across divine might or favor without choice. I assumed that the curse was a result of divine power being thrust upon them without consent and they gain said power for various reasons depending on the deity(s)
Tim Brannan shares some thoughts on warlocks.
Going live on May 13th. I'll have the preview link up available earlier for you guys to make comments on reward levels and such that you'd like to see before then.
It's going to be a full 30 days of funding.
Additional supplements could be mythic material such as mythic hexes and lesser versions of Baba Yaga's hut