Secret Lore

Since the days when elves, dwarves, giants, and dragons ruled a Faerûn of trackless forest and unspoiled wilderness, those who could manipulate the Weave have sought deeper understanding, greater power, and hidden knowledge in the hope of gaining an advantage over their enemies. The early human empires were no different. The Imaskari mastered the lore of gates and portals, transporting thousands of hapless slaves from other worlds to serve their arcane might. The Netherese studied the art of devising magic devices, creating marvels and terrors that still slumber under the sands of Anauroch. The Raumathari blighted Faerûn forever by summoning hordes of orc warriors to serve in their war against old Narfell and then losing control of their own warriors.

Wizards dream of secret schools of magic, paths of spells made possible by a new understanding of the Art, and forbidden studies leading to awesome new powers. Dozens of paths to power and understanding have been tried and abandoned, and new research— some founded in meticulous study, some inspired by fevered flights of horror—routinely unveils some new methodology of arcane spellcasting or results in spells never before seen in Faerûn.

Stories abound of the legendary spells of old Netheril and the vanished elven realms, spells whose power dwarfed that of the mightiest wish possible today. Wizards have unlocked the secrets of a dark Weave unfettered by Mystra’s power, clerics and adepts draw potent spells with runes, and the wreckage of ancient dweomers lie scattered across the land in the form of a portal network riddling the fabric of space.

The Shadow Weave

During the course of her eternal war with the goddess Selûne, the goddess Shar created the Shadow Weave in response to Selûne’s creation of Mystra and the birth of the Weave. If the Weave is a loose mesh permeating reality, the Shadow Weave is the pattern formed by the negative space between the Weave’s strands. It provides an alternative conduit and methodology for casting spells.

Shar, being the goddess of secrets, has mostly kept the secret of the Shadow Weave to herself. Over the millennia some mortals, mainly her servants, have been allowed to discover the Shadow Weave or have stumbled across it in their researches.

Shadow Weave users enjoy several advantages. First, they ignore disruptions in the Weave. A Shadow Weave effect works normally in a dead magic or wild magic zone. (An antimagic field, which blocks the flow of magic, remains effective against Shadow Weave magic, as does spell resistance.) Skilled Shadow Weave users are able to cast spells that are extraordinarily difficult for Weave users to perceive, counter, or dispel.

Shadow Weave users also suffer some disadvantages. First, Shar has full control over the Shadow Weave and can isolate any creature from it or silence it entirely without any harm to herself. Second, the secrets of the Shadow Weave are disquieting and injurious to the mortal mind. Without assistance from Shar, a Shadow Weave user loses a bit of his or her mind. Third, while the Weave serves equally well for any kind of spell, the Shadow Weave is best for spells that sap life or muddle the mind and senses, and is unsuited to spells that manipulate energy or matter—and cannot support any spell that produces light.

Finally, the more familiar a mortal becomes with the secrets of the Shadow Weave, the more divorced she becomes from the Weave. An accomplished Shadow Weave user can work spells that Weave users find difficult to detect, dispel, or counter, but the Shadow Weave user also becomes similarly unable to affect spells worked through the Weave.

SHADOW WEAVE MAGIC ITEMS

Magic items created by those who use the Shadow Weave are rare and dangerous. Only the clergy of Shar and Shar’s few arcane devotees create any number of Shadow Weave items. Shadow adepts unallied to Shar’s church are rare and reclusive enough that only a handful of magic items are manufactured as Shadow Weave items.

Shadow Weave items are nearly identical to items created by Weave users, but the differences are profound.

Spell-like effects generated from Shadow Weave items have the same benefits and limitations that a Shadow Weave spellcaster has: Effects from the schools of Enchantment, Illusion, and Necromancy gain a +1 bonus on their save DCs and a +1 bonus on caster level checks to overcome spell resistance. The same benefits apply to effects with the darkness designator. Effects from the schools of Evocation and Transmutation have their caster levels reduced by one (though their costs are based on the original caster level). The reduced caster level affects the spell’s range, duration, damage, and any other level-dependent variables the effect might have. The effect’s save DC is reduced by –1 and caster level checks to overcome spell resistance suffer a –1 penalty. The DC to dispel Evocation or Transmutation effects from a Shadow Weave item is 11 + the reduced caster level. In general, Shadow Weave users do not bother to create items that include Evocation or Transmutation effects.

Shadow Weave items cannot generate effects with the light designator.

Shadow Weave items can pose a serious danger to users who are not familiar with the mysteries of the Shadow Weave. Activating a Shadow Weave item through spell completion, spell trigger, or command word deals 1d4 points of temporary Wisdom damage to the user unless the user has the Shadow Weave Magic feat. A use-activated Shadow Weave item deals 1 point of temporary Wisdom damage the first time it is used each day unless the user has the Shadow Weave Magic feat. If the item functions continuously, the temporary Wisdom damage occurs at dusk each day or when the user takes off or puts aside the item, whichever comes first.

Elven High Magic

In ancient times, before the Weave took on its present form, the rules of magic were different. Many beings experimented with powerful dweomers that produced larger and much more potent effects than are possible today. Many minor and major artifacts date back to these times.

Just as one can find ancient artifacts scattered across Faerûn, one also can find ancient and powerful magical effects still lingering (and usually functioning erratically) today. The most famous of these is the mythal of Myth Drannor. A mythal is an ancient form of elven magic created by a group of spellcasters working together to create a lasting magical effect over a large area. Mythals that remain today usually are beginning to fail but resist attempts to dispel them. They can produce any number of bizarre effects, including wild magic (see the Wild Magic section above). The exact nature of such effects varies with each mythal.

Rune Magic

In the snowbound mountains of the North, dwarves and giants have dwelled for uncounted years as rivals and enemies, and their deeds are only rumored in human lands. In the lore of the shield dwarves, runes—carefully inscribed symbols from the secret characters of the dwarven alphabet—can be carved to hold spells of great potency.

LEARNING THE RUNES

In order to use rune magic, a character must learn the Inscribe Rune feat (see Chapter 1: Characters). Rune magic is strongly tied to the dwarven and giant deities and is thus the province of divine spellcasters. Some students of rune magic choose to virtually abandon the normal practice of magic in order to concentrate on their chosen medium, becoming runecasters of great power.

CREATING RUNES

If you know Inscribe Rune, any divine spell you currently have prepared can instead be cast as a rune. A rune is a temporary magical writing similar to a scroll. It can be triggered once before it loses its magical power, but it lasts indefinitely until triggered. A rune written or painted on a surface fades away when expended, erased, or dispelled. A rune carved into a surface remains behind as a bit of nonmagical writing even after its magic is expended.

Inscribing a rune takes 10 minutes plus the casting time of the spell to be included. When you create a rune, you can set the caster level at anywhere from the minimum caster level necessary to cast the spell in question to your own level. When you create a rune, you make any choices that you would normally make when casting the spell.

You must provide any material components or focuses the spell requires. If casting the spell would reduce your XP total, you pay this cost upon beginning the rune in addition to the XP cost for making the rune itself.

Inscribing a rune requires a Craft check against a DC of 20 + the level of the spell used. The Craft skill you use is anything appropriate to the task of creating a written symbol on a surface (metalworking, calligraphy, gemcutting, stonecarving, woodcarving, and so on). You paint, draw, or engrave the rune onto a surface and make the check. (Dwarves usually engrave their runes in stone or metal in order to take advantage of their racial affinity for these items.)

If the check fails, the rune is imperfect and cannot hold the spell. The act of writing triggers the prepared spell, whether or not the Craft check is successful, making the spell unavailable for casting until you rest and regain spells. That is, the spell is expended from your currently prepared spells, just as if it had been cast.

A single Medium-size or smaller object can hold only one rune. Larger objects can hold one rune per 25 square feet (an area 5 feet square) of surface area. Runes cannot be placed on creatures. The rune has a base price of the spell level × caster level × 100 gp (a 0- level spell counts as 1/2 level). You must spend 1/25 of its base price in XP and use up raw materials costing half this base price. A rune’s market value equals its base price.

TRIGGERING RUNES

Whoever touches the rune triggers the rune and becomes the target of the spell placed in it. The rune’s creator may touch the rune safely without triggering it, or deliberately trigger it if he so desires. (Runemakers often carry healing or restorative runes for just this purpose.) The rune itself must be touched in order to trigger it, so an object with a rune may be handled safely as long as care is taken to avoid contacting the rune. If the spell only affects objects, then an object must trigger the rune. Triggering a rune deliberately is a standard action.

As with a symbol spell, a rune cannot be placed upon a weapon with the intent of having the rune triggered when the weapon strikes a foe.

Unlike the spell glyph of warding, the rune spell is not concealed in any way and is obvious to anyone inspecting the object holding the rune. A read magic spell allows the caster to identify the spell held in a rune with a successful Spellcraft check (DC 15 + the spell’s level).

DISARMING RUNES

Runes can be disarmed or deactivated in several ways. A successful erase spell deactivates a rune (DC 15 + your caster level). Touching the rune to erase it does not trigger the rune unless the erase spell fails to deactivate the rune.

A dispel magic spell targeted on an untriggered rune can dispel its magic if successful (DC 11 + your caster level). Untriggered runes are not subject to area dispels. Finally, a rogue can use her Disable Device skill to disable runes (DC 25 + the spell’s level), like any magic trap.

Circle Magic

Some of the most powerful and spectacular spells worked across Faerûn are cast in the form of circle magic. Circle magic is a type of cooperative spellcasting that allows the spellcaster leading the circle to increase her caster level significantly and achieve results otherwise unavailable to the spellcasters composing the circle. The Red Wizards of Thay and the Witches of Rashemen make frequent use of circle magic. Stories of other forms of circle magic abound in Faerûn.

PARTICIPATION

The ability to participate in circle magic requires the selection of a character feat—Tattoo Focus for a Red Wizard or Ethran for a Witch of Rashemen.

One spellcaster, usually the most powerful or experienced character present, stands at the center of the circle. This character is the circle leader. A hathran must be at least 4th level in the hathran prestige class to be a circle leader.

A Red Wizard cannot be a circle leader unless he is at least a 5th-level Red Wizard. A circle requires a minimum of two participants plus the circle leader. Up to five participants can aid a circle leader in a standard circle, but a Red Wizard of 10th level can lead a great circle containing up to nine participants.

All participants in a circle must stand within 10 feet of the circle leader, who stands in the center.

CIRCLE POWERS

The first use of circle magic is to empower the circle leader with the strength of all the participants. This requires 1 full hour of uninterrupted concentration on the part of all participants and the circle leader. Each participant casts any single prepared spell, which is consumed by the circle and has no effect other than expending the prepared spell. The spell levels expended by the circle participants are totaled as circle bonus levels. Each bonus level may be used to accomplish the following effects:

• Increase the circle leader’s caster level by one for every bonus level expended (maximum caster level 40th).
• Add Empower Spell, Maximize Spell, or Heighten Spell metamagic feats to spells currently prepared by the circle leader. Each bonus level counts as one additional spell level required by the application of a metamagic feat to a spell. The circle leader may add the feats listed to a spell even if he does not know the feat or if the addition of the feat would raise the spell level past the circle leader’s normal maximum spell level (maximum spell level 20th).
• Increase the circle leader’s level by one for level checks (dispel checks, caster level checks, and so on) for every bonus level expended (maximum level 40th).

These effects last for 24 hours or until expended. Circle bonus levels may be divided up as the circle leader sees fit. For example, the Red Wizard Hauth Var leads a circle in which four participants each cast 2nd-level spells. Hauth Var chooses to use three circle bonus levels to maximize his cone of cold spell, three to increase his caster level from 10th to 13th level for all level-based variables in his spells, and two to add a +2 bonus to any level checks he needs to make. The maximized spell is used up whenever he casts his cone of cold, and the other two effects remain for the next 24 hours. Many high-level Red Wizards lead circles on a daily basis to exact magical power from their apprentices.