Negative Iconomancy
Iconomancers juice up off of the love, adoration, and respect paid to the great fallen by the mass of humanity. Fools.
Irascimancers, sucking in all the negative energy around them and using it for power, are closer…but why take all that negativity yourself?
There are those in the world who are hated. The infamous dead, the Jim Joneses, Ed Geins, and yeah, the Hitlers of the world, all funnel the loathing and disgust of so many of us. That right there? That’s juice, that’s mojo, that’s the real deal, brother! And if you’ve got the stones and you’ve got the know-how, you can suck some of it off and use it. Sure, sometimes you’ve got to take a risk, go out in public dressed SS, wave a flag with the hammer and sickle of Stalin’s USSR, or goose-step through Berlin, but hey, it’s a small price to pay. You get a little of the venom, but the return from the real Big Bads is so, so worth it!
“Infamyancers” are the mirror image of Iconomancers. They venerate and worship the mad, bad, and dangerous dead, tapping into the cosmic hatred that Irascimancers only get a little piece of…or so the Infamyancers say.
This school was started by a crazy German living in Miami. He’s currently in the hospital after a wicked fight with a standard Iconomancer; they were both channelling Che Guevara, one as a charismatic leader of men, the other as a dirty Commie executioner.
Stats
Like Iconomancy, Infamyantic charges are keyed to whichever negative Idol they were gotten from.
Generate a minor charge: Same as Iconomancy.
Generate a significant charge: Perform an hour-long public ritual of praise and adoration to a negative Idol. This can get you beaten, insulted, or jailed. If you are beaten, you get an extra minor for every person who attacked you solely because of the ritual. If you are jailed, you get an extra minor for the first 24 full hours you spend in jail solely because of the ritual, and one per week thereafter. You can also undergo the body modification described in Iconomancy for a sig.
Generate a major charge: Same as Iconomancy. Harder to get one on purpose, though, because people who are hated that much tend to be well-guarded. Bush might (MIGHT!) have one ready. Fred Phelps almost certainly does.
Taboo: You can never openly praise anyone known for good or openly denigrate anyone known for evil. This depends on your audience; if you praise Che or Lenin to a neo-communist or deny them to a strong conservative, you lose your juice.
Negative Idols
Adolf Hitler
The demagogue, racist, and conqueror Hitler casts a long shadow over Infamyancy. As by far the most famous negative Idol, and certainly one of the most loathed, Hitler is followed by many. His power is tied to fear, hate, despair, and inspiration.
For a minor charge, Hate Speech will give you a +10% shift to attempts to convince a group of people to do something. This can ONLY be used to instigate actions of hate and violence. Two sigs will give you Down in the Bunker, blasting your foe with the crushing despair of seeing all you’ve built torn down around you. It is identical to the Plutomancer significant blast. For three sigs, you can raise the Blutfahne, the Blood Banner. Anyone following you in a task of violence is protected by a burgeoning sense of rightness and holy purpose; they do not have to make stress checks rising from their actions. This lasts for a few hours. Invoked in a rare positive sense for three minor charges, He Was a Painter, Too lets you use any non-combat skill you have at the level of your Infamyancy skill for one check.
A major charge from Hitler could have raised worldwide public sentiment against any one group, dragged a nation into nationalistic frenzy, or caused a failing economy to completely recover.
Che Guevara
Che Guevara is commonly known as both an Idol and a negative Idol; he’s a touchstone for conflict between Iconomancers and Infamyancers. Because there’s less negativity and risk associated with publicly praising him, his significant formulas tend to be more expensive.
For 2 sigs, you can use Whitewash of Ignorance. This acts as the Cliomancer spell gnostic gossip, but only lets you counter information or misinformation already out there, to make you look good; you could spread the rumor that you’re a kind and loving man, for example, despite being a hardened TNI operative who kills puppies for fun. Congo and Bolivia can only be used on someone after they enjoy a major public success. For five sigs, their next two similar attempts are doomed to failure. This formula works on synchronicity; things just fall apart for the poor bugger. In a positive light, Field Hospital lets you use your Infamyancy skill as a First Aid skill for two minor charges.
A major charge from Che could’ve completely turned public opinion around on someone, positive or negative, ignited a revolution in a small country or a small revolutionary movement in a large one, or caused anyone’s image to become iconic, splashed across shirts, purses, and God knows what else. Obviously, anyone who hates an Iconomancer would have loved to have one of these.
Charles Manson
Manson, of course, isn’t dead yet. However, with Infamyancy spreading fast, it’s only a matter of time until some duke gets it in his head to snuff the punk and steal some of that sweet, sweet Helter Skelter mojo.
Once the bastard’s dead, for two minor charges, you can use The Manson Family Feeling. Anyone participating in a relaxed party or hang-out session with you (drugs, sex, and/or alcohol must be involved) becomes much more susceptible to suggestion, taking a -20% shift on any attempt to resist your persuasion. For five significant charges you can set off Helter Skelter itself, igniting a vicious race riot in a city. Channeled in a positive (or at least not negative) light, three minors lets you use The Beatles Are Calling Me. You can send an audio message of up to one second per point of magick skill you have to any person or group you’re familiar with. It finds them the next time they listen to the music on the radio, on a record, or on an audio cassette.
A major charge could ignite riots in major cities nation-wide, start a new wave of survivalist craziness, or let you write an album whose songs would influence anyone who heard it, for good or ill.
I’d love feedback on this…I’m iffy on the extra charges for jail time, what do you think?
Good job, John. I think the extra charges for jail time are fine. Many of the most hated are stuck in jail.
“There’s a theory running around some circles that the constant political upheavals in certain third world nations are just successions of negative Iconomancers, each feeding off of the infamy of the previous regime.”
Also, why not stat up Idi Amin for some cannibalistic fun?
Also, this really should be under Adepts, shouldn’t it?
Heheh, yeah. And Idi Amin would make a badass negative Idol.
Nice Idea.
You definately need more negative idols though.
Easy enough to do.
lots of “more of the same” politicians available. ditto for serial killers (although they are likely to be more varied)
for variety though-
while mengele is another nazi he could be focused more towards evil scientist schtick. similarly there are plenty of infamous “horror” doctors out there, can’t think of one big enough, but I’m not in america (evil dr f the year is Pattel round where I am).
You could probably sneak a professional sports player onto the list with a little thought.
Actors/musicians might be more difficult- can’t think of any specifically reviled ones right now. actually Liberachi has enough anti-gay hate to be both an idol and an anti-idol
Also mafiosi! Al Capone et al- hated men in the right circles, or on the other side of the fence- J. Edgar Hoover.
Josef Stalin
Another strong contender for Infamyancy’s top anti-idol, the monstrous dictator of the USSR is a symbol of cold-blooded determination and ruthless, hateful paranoia. Infamyancers have been known to develop real ugly rivalries over whetever he or Hitler is the better power base.
For five minor charges, an Infamyancer can channel Stalin’s ideal physical and mental image, becoming The Man of Steel and gain a +10 shift to all Body, Soul and Mind rolls for 24 hours. Two Significant charges from Stalin allows you to channel his vicious, inhumane pragmaticism with A Million Is A Statistic and ignore any Self, Isolation and Violence checks for a number of minutes equal to the roll. One Significant charge invokes Stalin’s toadying propagada machine, Pravda, causing all of your recent (within 24 hours before and after you cast this spell) wrong-doings and bad impressions to be interrepted and/or re-interrepted in the best possible light to those who hear of them. One of Stalin’s few positive effects, Troubled Wife, allows you to channel the dictator’s rocky and tragic relationships with his loved ones, by spending intimate time with one of your family and friends, you can both give that person one Hardened notch on a meter of your choosing and/or remove one of his/her Failed notches in any meter you choose, at the cost of two Significant charges. A Major charge from Stalin could make a country become incredibly powerful both politically and militarily, kill millions of people over the course of a year or two, or make any enemy you have or make permanently afraid of you to the point of trying to appease you however they could.
Good stuff! I’d love seeing anyone else’s takes on more negative Idols, too.
The name of the school doesn’t quite sound right. It makes sense, of course, but shouldn’t the first ‘y’ be dropped, to give it the proper ending of ‘mancy’?
There needs to be some sort of Nitpicker avatar…
Sure, anon, but then think of all the poor saps that will confused Infamancy with Infomancy.
Actually, this school is still just Iconomancy, so it doesn’t need another name.
I realize, but it is part of the essence of the Nitpicker to point out minor problems which are not easily solved without offering anything in the way of a solution. That said, it could be fixed by changing the root word, to make it something like notoriemancy.
I’d call it a subschool or a variant or Iconomancy.
Someone really needs to write up the Nitpicker. I think it’s a fairly universal concept.
I like the ideas but I don’t think it needs a whole new school. These idols fall neatly into iconomancy. Yeah, where is Idi?
Another variant idea would be an adept who gains power and charges like an iconomancy but using social groups or organisations instead of lone figures like the Nazi Party.
C.
It’s not a school, really, just a variant charging scheme for Iconomancers, with all-different Idols (and thus all-different spells) since it takes its power from something very different.
Well crap, I guess it is a new school. Oops 😉
Jes’ a joke there, but the only reason it has a different name is that “Infamyancers” and Iconomancers tend to hate each other, and these guys don’t like using the name of their enemies. That’s also the reason the name is in quotes in the title.
Yeah, like many things in the underground, the details only matter to those people deeply invested in them. To all of us, they’re all Iconomancers.
Something seems wrong about the taboo. Isn’t it too easy to just avoid talking about politics?
It’s not just politics; it’s anyone known as a “good person” or “bad person.”
It does seem a little light, though, now that I think about it. Maybe change it so that they’d have to actually denigrate any “good person” who was mentioned to them (“Y’know, Mother Teresa was a hypocrite who didn’t really believe in what she was doing”) and praising any “bad person” (“Say what you will about Hitler, he sure turned the German economy around! We could use a politician like him now”).
BTW, would Joe Qaesada work?