Who thinks that Appellomancy sounds like an awesome magical school for Unknown Armies? Pic most definitely related. Anyone else have any sweet Unknown Armies concepts?
>>20453601Heh, that is pretty good.
On the upside, at least now he's a Captain. That's not an insignificant rank.
So...do they change your very nature through the name or is it just a hurtful insult?
>>20453971>Hire Appellomancer to name you in High Mage Maggotbreath>Instantly become High MageWow, appellomancy sounds like a really powerful school
Oh god, imagine if an Apellomancer got hold of the complete works of Shakespeare.http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/Shaker/
>The doctor's face when /tg/ discovers appellomancyHe won't be the only one anymore.
>>20454031Suddenly, jarring full-gorged hugger-mugger's everywhere.
>>20454031>Romeo and Juliet are appellomancersOne bird is in for an identity crisis.
So... Appellomancy plays completely on the magicians ability to hurl insults?It's like one form of old finnish spells, expect they had the additional requirement to make the spells rhyme and you had to sing them.
>shitty stories with buttfucking and lame sense of humor.
>>20454127Everyone knows that if it rhymes it must be true.
But how do they generate charges?
>>20453601I would be that class just to fuck people overAre you being a complete jackass? You are now Senior Donkeyfucker!Are you one of those idealists who want to save everyone but don't have the power? King Dumbshit!Or if I'm bored, go with the classic and make adventurers. Sir Murderhobo!
>>20454228Only a fool would believe in something like that.Fool's blood, king's blood, blood on the maiden's thigh, but chains for the guests and chains for the bridegroom, aye aye aye.
>>20454010I think it's a buff/debuff system.
There clearly is a balancing act going on. The more heinous the curse an Appellomancer uses, the more they also must elevate the target. So, to get her to fuck her father, the Appellomancer had to make her a princess to balance it out. However, to get the guy's cock to stink, she only had to elevate him to the rank of captain. Magic!
>>20454228>whoever smelt it>dealt itHOLY SHIT
>>20454228Guys...I just realised I went to primary school with an Apellomancer. Kid had an amazing talent for making names stick. All he did was rhyme it and everyone started using it.
>>20454293That's neat, do you remember any names?
>>20454291Maybe a bit more complex than that.While the balancing is part of it, I think it should be possble, depending on the level of the Appellomancer to not have to balance it but directly use magic energy. A balanced curse like Captain Cockstink needs next to no energy while elevation or defamation need large amounts of power.Thus dubbing someone William the Bastard or William the Conqueror would be a strainous act, while King Bastard is pretty balanced and thus easier, unless he already is king.
>>20454250You come up with a unique nsult never before heard in the language you speak?You degrade someone's reputation through an insult cast by non-magical means?You ruin a public figure by way of a carefully timed insult?Wha would the taboo be of Appellomancer? What about its the Paradox? (ex The money-mancers - those guys who get charges everytime they make over $1000 - have a taboo of not being able to spend more than $200, and as such have the Paradox of they have all this money, but no way of doing anything with it)
>>20454293I might have had that power too, I accidentally made people believe one guy was Jewish and another was a furry based entirely on jokes and puns I made regarding their names. Names are some kinda powerful magic.
>>20454335Uhm... They themselves can never have a name? That'd cause a lot of subtle inconvenience.
>>20454354They could have serial numbers instead. That's what I did with my Awakened Ant-man.
>>20454330So you could easily name someone Professor Stupid?
>>20454364And cause a paradox, destroying universe?
>name someone Captain Obvious
>>20454354Ooh! that's perfect! Particularly when the who 'become an Adept' thing involves having full Hardened notches in your Self sanity track. People'd forget your name. Official documents would blur out of reality. Any attempt to have a pseudonym would fuck up somehow. I like it! Cool shit!
>>20454335They have to learn the names of things, recite them and contemplate their nature and collect them.Then they develop mantras from them that consist of puns, references and jokes.By doing so they become one with the nature of names and can manipulate them.
>>20454361the way I pictured it, no serial numbers either. That's just a name made of numbers. I'm saying they can have no unique personal designation at all. First, that stops them from using their power on themself, which would be some kinda infinite loop if they gave themself a powerful name, then used that power to self-bestow an even more powerful name, and so on. And second, it's got the irony balance.
>>20454389So Appellomancers are only greeted with cries of "Hey...you!"?
>>20454399Exactly.>Hey, you!>hey, magic guy>Yo, person by the doorOnly the most vague and temporary designations can be made.
>>20453601This is the oWoD Mummy ultimate thing (pre-hardback, the softcover Mummy). It was pretty great if you ever managed to get the power.
The problem with the "no name" taboo is that a UA school needs a way to potentially BREAK their taboo.
>>20454399"Hey Appellomancer/Fellow Appellomancer?"It's not a name, it's a job that many people share
>>20454437They could finally come up with a name so fitting, so dead-on appropriate for themself, that it can't help but stick?Of course, the twist is that they had to choose a name that fit the subject, instead of making the subject fit the name.
>>20454368>>20454364You haven't met many professors have you?
>>20454437Appellomancers can potentially give themselves a name through Appellomancy, but because names naturally "fall off" them, they need to give themselves a name which is so potently insulting that the universe itself falls under the effects of Appellomancy and the name sticks.So you can go to great pains to have a name, but you need to make yourself Dogfucker, Feltch-Lord of the Abyss.
>>20454455>Some call me Tim
>>20454345I have delve in this power too, back in primary school I call other kid Tutti frutti once to mock him, And the nickname stick to him for several years.
>>20454471>I dunno, you don't look like a Tim to me. Naw, definitely not a uhm... What was that name again?
>>20454481>...Reggie?
>>20454478In my case, I knew it had gone too far when I was accused of being anti-Semitic in regards to always referring to how that guy was Jewish. Obviously that was wrong for several reasons. And an example of Appellomancy overpowering its user, I'd say.
>>20454440Thus Appellomancers stay as spread out as possible so they can use that designation with lower chances of being confused for another Appellomancer.Still, any context in which Appellomancers logically congregate is an organization nightmare.
Archivedhttp://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/20453601/
>>20454571IT'S NOT EVEN A HUNDRED POSTS YET, WHY WOULD YOU ARCHIVE THIS YOU STUPID FAG?
>>20454553If they do have to congregate together does this mean they there's quite an emphasis on fashion and dressing individually/memorably just so people can tell them apart
>>20454589That's what I was thinking. Every Appellomancer picks out one super glaringly obvious accessory so when they're together, they could at least say "hey, guy in the polkadot cowboy hat! No, I meant the the guy with the green and purple one, sorry blue and orange."
>>20454553Maybe they're given serial numbers that are sewn into their hat at the start of the convention? >Hey, 388,678, get over here!>Yes, 24,789?And after the Appelomancy convention, they all burn the numbers?
>>20454631The inability to have names would cause the serial numbers to cease to exist pretty quick. Heck, the fashion trick is already pushing it. They are allowed no name or symbol in any medium. Not in human memory, or written down, or in sound form, nothing. If you tried to name them for their color scheme, sooner or later you'd forget their signature color scheme. Write it down and the writing disappears.
The first time I crossed an Appellomancer, I both had the misfortune to find him on a bad day and to find one still new to the name magic. 'Shitstain'. I don't think he particularly meant harm upon me; it was simply an exclamation in moment. I went on with my day, thinking little of it. Shitstain, they called me. My friends, my coworkers, my family, and they all thought nothing of it, as if it had already been as such all my life. They thought I was mad when I insisted my name had not always been Shitstain. When attempting to recall what my name had been previously, I could not even find it myself. It was as though my identity had been torn from me. I sought out the Appellomancer again to fix this. He admitted the blame was entirely on himself, but could not repair my previous name. It was gone- erased from all of reality. There was no trace of what it had been, because it had not been- it was Shitstain, for that was the new reality. He apologized profusely, and offered to at least give me a new name, if nothing else. But I could not find another name. To my surprise, I had an attachment to my new name, as that was what it had always been in this revised world.
>>20454683Also, I started buying only brown underwear, as the name was more than rhetorical.
>>20454616>green and purpleThanks doc.
>>20454743>dat dose
>>20454376No, that's not how a taboo works. It would have to be that whenever the appellomancer gets called by their real name instead of a nickname, pseudonym, or title, they lose all charges. It would give someone who learns the appellomancer's real name the power to totally shut them down. It would be a rare but powerful taboo.
How about this:Apellomancers *can* make up names for themselves and even tell them to others, BUT if they use the same name too long it'll catch on. That would be Very Bad.
>>20454801>Very BadThe new alignment everyone's talking about!
>>20454808Really Good here, Very Bad is the shittiest alignment.
>>20454801A taboo in Unknown Armies isn't just a weakness, it's something that, when you do it, you lose all of your charges, which are basically a mana analogue. So, a taboo has to be something you're not allowed to ever do or else you'll lose all the magic charges you've built up. This guy has the right idea, even if his specific taboo isn't that great:>>20454777
>>20454801You know, it strikes me that Apellomancers of all people would be concerned about the entire "true name" thing which pops up quite a bit in fiction and folklore. It wouldn't surprise me if they did keep their real name secret, and alternating between different identities is considered the norm.
>>20454812Not as bad as Kinda Meh
>>20454829>>20454777These.
So, Appellomancers probably have control of names of things that aren't people, right? How far does the power go?
>>20454866Well, as >>20454808 and >>20454812 clearly demonstrate, their power extends to the Alignment Chart itself.
>>20454866I don't think you could change anything grossly physical, but you could change the way it behaves/operates and how people perceive it. So you can make someone fuck their father, make a car run really well, make someone perceive someone's cock as stinking, and so on. You could even make people think that someone renamed Invisible Man is invisible, for example, but he wouldn't actually technically be invisible.
>>20454291>>20454330The One God and All Powerful Rapist of Kittens.
Appellomancy draws from the word 'appellation,' which is any name or title, positive or negative. So, the people talking about the truenaming abilities and taboos are the ones who have it right, I think.
>>20454890Woudltn this scenario make every neglect the person exist? You could most definitely see him but your eyes would surely advert. Like the forgotten child in middle school nobody thinks about or really talks to.
>>20455105Well unless you have synesthesia and can see names, no, it wouldn't do that.
>>20455140So only after you learn his name? Imagine trying to hide his name.
>>20455105That person would, logically become Someone Else's Problem.The SEP field prevents people from paying attention, because, obviously, it's someone else's problem and they'll deal with it. See a strange man standing in the middle of a tunnel? Yes, but he's not causing me any harm, therefore I'll ignore him. That's how ts apparent invisibility works.
>>20455105That seems about right. Are we going with the charging scheme detailed here >>20454335 ? If so, how do we determine whether an insult is devastating? Is it just that it makes everyone playing laugh or some kind of table vote.
Isn't this school just a variant of Anagram Gematria from Break Today. Or does it just have analogous powers?
>>20455175No, see here:>>20454937Appellomancers wouldn't just be about insults, they would be about names. I think that appellomancers would gain charges by naming things that don't have names yet, and would have magic that lets them change the names of things that already have them (with the magical effect of altering the nature of that thing).So, for example, naming your television, computer, couch, whatever? That would probably net you a minor charge.Naming a person, a pet, or something else more significant than an object? That would probably net you a significant charge. Naming wild animals and farm animals would count towards minor, they have to be significant things being given a name that matters for this level.Getting to name a major thing, like a mountain, a major bridge, a skyscraper? That's what nets you a major charge.
>>20455575If you were the one who got to name the Empire Sate Building, you could use the major charge from that to, say, change the name of the United States of America into the Imperium of Man, which would change the attitudes of Americans and the world appropriately.A significant charge could probably be used to give something of a magnitude no greater than a person a name permanently, while a minor charge would give someone a name temporarily. A significant charge could also give something greater than a person, like the NAACP, a new name temporarily.And then, the taboo is someone using your real name. If someone calls you by your real name, all your charges are lost.
>>20455575So, what about naming fictional constructs?Say an author, or some other storyteller, is an apellomancer. When they tell new stories, when naming their characters, what kind of charge do they gain?
>>20455581http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-bloomberg-empire-state-building-shooting-20120824,0,7004815.storyToo soon.
>>20455645I would say a minor charge, but that's still a pretty sweet route of gaining minor charges. Perhaps naming the individual characters would be insufficient, but the titling of the story would be?
>>20455667Makes sense, but then again a dipsomancer gains a minor charge every time they drink one serving of alcohol. Perhaps this is one like that, where they can have minor charges out the ass but significant ones are harder to get?
>>20455667That could work, and the size of the charge could be influenced by the story's. Sonnets, for example, wouldn't net you as large a charge as you would get from naming an epic.
>>20455716Makes sense to me. I would almost like the cultural significance of the work to have a bearing on the power of its name, but who would have known what Harry Potter would become at the time of its naming, for example? So, I think it might be reasonable to say that you wouldn't ever be able to get a major charge from a work of fiction like that, the greatest you can aspire to from naming fiction is a significant charge.
Any good archetypes to go with appellomancy, like how the mystic hermaphrodite and epideromancy mesh extremely well?
Well, if you know the true name of something, you know its true form and therefore how to truly damage it.
>>20456158Probably the Confessor is the best, taking in everyone's secrets and naming them alike to aid the people in their troubles. The Scholar would make the taboo difficult, as your own name could never be completely eradicated, and the Messenger has a similar problem. The Hunter could be good, but hunting information infringes on the Scholar and Chronicler too much. The other Archetypes could be combined but don't have any real synergy.
A really efficient way to be an appellomancer would be to adopt nameless stray animals from animal shelters, then set them free again.
>>20457357Don't Catholics have a tradition where babies get a new name on the day of their baptism? Being the dude who picks that name could be a sweet source of naming charges.
Only half of Oglaf is any good, the other half is pretty fucking bad.
>>20457385
>>20457372You're thinking of confirmation. But no one actually uses that name anyway.The only Catholics I'm sure of who use names acquired via the church are the Popes.
>>20457385>benderletmelaughharder.jpgYou funny guy, I kill you first.
