Alchemy

The study of transformation and purification, Alchemy is an ancient art and science. Practitioners draw from disparate practices, both magical and scientific, to understand the hidden properties of matter and the soul. The most traditional goal of alchemy is not the more famous transformation of base matter into more “noble” counterparts — such as lead into gold — but rather the perfection of the alchemist.

As a Path, Alchemy creates one-use magic items and transformations. Many of the things it produces are meant to be ingested, though few are made with taste or even the health and wellness of the consumer in mind. Alchemy also produces coatings that may be applied to the skin or objects, and reagents that catalyze transmutations of base elements into other matter.

Though often studied as a means of perfecting the soul, this pursuit is very much bound up with actual Alchemical practice. Other practices put their own spin on it: Practitioners of Witchcraft call the Path Herbalism and focus on natural ingredients and effects related to them, while Hypertech engineers and tinkerers utilizing Weird Science call it Advanced Chemistry, and completely eschew the metaphysical implications the Alchemy practice places on the Path.

In all cases, the Path of Alchemy is expensive. For most versions of the Path, it requires a well-equipped laboratory and strange ingredients. The most powerful applications require increasingly exotic components and extremely specialized Tass. Though the Herbalism variant tends to be cheaper in terms of money, it requires more time and effort, with plants and fungi collected under strict conditions.

Many applications of this Path have passed into legend. Few alchemists are known to have actually completed the so-called “Great Work,” the creation of a Philosopher’s Stone, or any other product conducive to immortality, but most masters of the Path make an attempt.

This Path has no spells. It does everything through rituals called recipes.

System

Modifiers: Once the magician successfully follows a recipe three times, the difficulty is reduced by one.

Time: Alchemy takes longer to obtain results than most Paths. Recipes require one day per level to prepare, but this can be shortened if the Path Ability exceeds the recipe level. Each dot of the Ability higher than the ritual level reduces the total time spent by one day. If this would reduce preparation time below one day, instead assume several hours of work.

Duration: Effects last for a single scene unless otherwise noted.

Effects: Alchemy doesn’t have Aspects; instead, each dot increases the practitioner’s power and control. Except for the most potent recipes, they only require a single success to make. Additional successes are split between providing additional doses and keeping those doses potent for one day per success spent.

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Distillations at this level do not appear magical in any way. These recipes are simply more advanced versions of extant chemicals and concoctions, producing more potent painkillers, poisons, glues, solvents, etc., and increasing the Toxin Rating of the chemical by one (as per Mage 20 p. 442). Higher Path levels can further alter the Toxin Rating, increasing or decreasing the rating by one per dot.

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Now the substances created let the imbiber exceed their usual physical limits. Any one Attribute can be increased by one dot, up to a maximum of five, for the scene. Special prepa­ rations can expand one’s mystical awareness, mostly through induced dreams or hallucina­ tions. These visions are left to the Storyteller’s discretion and should remain cryptic and un­ certain. Visions attained at this level lack the power of a system benefit and are included as a narrative device.

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Not only can the alchemist now enhance their targets beyond the normal capabilities of hu­ mans, but they can also grant low-level psychic abilities (see Chapter Two) for an hour at a time. These psychic abilities begin at a single dot, but every additional two successes provides an additional dot, to a maximum of the alchemist’s Path rating.

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Alchemists can bring about truly potent im­ provements to living beings. They can increase a single Attribute or Ability by two or two Attributes or Abilities each by one, and the

normal human limit of five no longer applies.

••••• The alchemist can now craft recipes that repro­ duce up to three dots worth of supernatural powers. Each dot reproduced this way mimics a single effect — chosen when the recipe is crafted — even if the replicated power offers multiple effects. These are some of the hardest potions to produce and require exotic components, such as pieces of the supernatural being in question.

Price of Failure: Working with volatile compounds is dangerous in and of itself. Even mere failure results in broken equipment and ruined reagents, requiring expensive replacements. In the best-case scenario with an actual botch, the alchemical product explodes, poten­ tially damaging the magician (as well as their neighbors). More commonly, though, the botched recipe appears to come together perfectly, but produces undesirable, and possibly harmful, effects. Even an unexpected but benign effect can be catastrophic at the wrong time.

Sample Recipes

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A powder that enhances alcohol. The drinker must roll Stamina (difficulty 8) or spend a point

19 Chapter One: Hedge Magic