Professional Documents
Culture Documents
body) falls under this Sphere’s control. Biological functions may be sped up, slowed
down or even completely rewritten at the whim of the Mage who masters this Sphere.
Life is the study of Patterns which are constantly developing and changing – in other
words, alive. Once a Pattern is no longer developing and changing, it becomes the realm
of Matter – so corpses and wooden chairs deal with Matter, not Life.
Life is a versatile Sphere, not only allowing the Mage to heal and change his body, but to
harm and twist the bodies of others. At higher levels, Mages can shapeshift into creatures
unimagined by humans – or reduce their opponent to a pile of water and goop.
Life cannot affect anything other than living things, making it quite limited. It also
cannot cause inorganic changes – you could turn your skin to bark, but you couldn’t turn
it to steel without Matter. Likewise, you can’t alter someone’s emotions or mind without
using Mind. Furthermore, drastic changes to Patterns cause Pattern Bleeding – if the
Mage wants to stay in an unnatural form for more than one day, he takes one level of
Lethal Damage each day. It may be easier to simply let the change fade, then suffer the
Paradox of casting again, or make the extra push to make the effect permanent.
Permanently changing his body can cause the Mage to risk forgetting who he really is,
however.