The world is a magickal place. Becoming a real magician is easier than it seems, but it's also too hard for most people. To Awaken, all one has to do is surrender to its powerful, drowning flows. Most people fear giving up all control of their lives and just moving with the current of the world. It's only when people are in that half-conscious state of inebriation that they have a chance of discovering this truth and surrendering to this path of exquisite pleasure and beauty.
Unfortunately, that same state of inebriation tends to make selfish louts of people. Judgment is clouded when it should be clarified. Only a lucky few, whether they're lucky or more inherently enlightened, have their eyes open in some perfect moment of drunken delight. Tommy was one of those lucky few. He finds that wine is the key to the most open-minded state of inebriation, as opposed to beer and booze. Its varied flavors allow for a vaster potential of innovation. Besides, wine is his family heritage. Tommy is all about wine and one day wine will be all about Tommy...or rather, the gifts he wishes to pass onto the Masses.
Mainly, he wants to help release the Masses from their banal drudgery. Their daily lives of droning work only enforces the Consensus and widens the ravine between they and real peace of mind (if not just world peace). Indeed, because reality is subject to perspective and Tommy swimming in magick is only his perspective, his Arts are subject to mass doubt: Paradox. The world just needs to get drunk and stay drunk! Then the Quintessence, the energy flows of purified magick, would flow and carry the dreams and hopes of all.
For Tommy, all magick is a matter of perspective and sentiment...like wine itself. Sometimes, he needs only representative elements of the world and wine he wishes to affect. Other times, he actively seeks to manipulate the perspectives of others.
For example, to affect the bodies of plants and animals and people, Tommy employs grapes of vinting quality. Of course, these grapes are sour to the taste -- they're grown for vineyards. But they represent the basis of his life's work. Understanding their foundations is tantamount to understanding all life's foundations. He may crush a grape under foot to bring harm, but more often he will savor the taste of the grape (sour as it may be) to better life around him. Either way, it's a matter of channeling the fruit's inherent vitality and crucial importance to his Path. In a pinch, Tommy can go without the grapes, as he understands his own Path surely enough now. They are not necessary foci for Life.
The Sphere of Matter is another matter. Like Life, to understand the foundation of the earth and all inanimate materials, Tommy goes to the heart of his endeavors. To that end, he sprinkles handfuls of fertile soil from a cultured vineyard over the subject of his Art. This soil contains the hope and physical power to change the world. He is confident enough with Life to go without the grapes. He understands the wine slightly better than he understands the vineyard. Nevertheless, sprinkling soil on his subject is not necessary still.
On the other hand, Mind is a Sphere that involves Tommy directly attempting to manipulate the perspectives of others. The benefit of Awakening is an awareness of certain truths about reality and goals. Sleepers especially are blind to the real needs of the world. This close-minded vision makes them more vulnerable. And some of the Awakened can be manipulated as easily, too. Of course, Tommy is not the kind of man to erase memories or brainwash people into loyal fascists. Instead, he seeks only to encourage people to let go of anal-retentive habits and have a good time. And what better way to do that then through wine? When people see bottles of wine, it's the label that first catches their eye. His artistic talent lends a hand to designing bottle labels that carry emotional impulses and whims that range from encouraging the subject to buy that bottle of wine to just let go and drink the bottle dry in an hour. And many more possibilities are available to the creative mind. The imagery captures the hopes and desires of others and himself. Regardless, Tommy cannot play with the hearts and minds of others without bottle labels. They are necessary.
The flow of hopes and dreams of the past, present, and future coalesce into streams of energy. Known as Quintessence commonly, a mage can weave those dreams into his magic to give it an extra punch. But understanding where that energy is to be found, how it comes to be, is an Art into itself. Tommy finds that examining the environment -- feeling the wind, touching the earth, walking the topography, viewing the horizon -- while he has a lucid mind helps him understand the local status of that energy. A form of practical geomancy, surveying the immediate area is necessary to his practice of Prime.
The key to all Ecstatic magicks is Time. Time is all about perspective, and so as far as Tommy is concerned the best time to affect the passage of time beyond his own perceptions is when there's a good wine on the table. If everyone is drinking and getting drunk, great! It makes things much easier. But even if it's just Tommy doing the drinking, it reopens his mind to that epiphany of perfect awareness. What others think becomes irrelevant. Tommy slides right into that flow of dreams and hopes of the past, present, and future. Of course, Tommy is an experienced Cultist of Ecstasy. He does not have to get drunk to manipulate Time, nor get others drunk. It just helps. A lot.
Avatar
Whenever Tommy thinks back to that first Epiphany, he envisions the form his Avatar takes. He views a great river of red wine flowing across a vast, empty plain. The current may be sluggish, steady, or swift depending on the events in his life. But its flow is always unstoppable. Tommy believes it's his Path to guide the people to this river, or maybe vice versa. He's not sure how yet. But all his Destiny really includes is that he ride the river's flow well. His Avatar just wants him to pay attention to the trip downriver. Tommy's just too easily distracted and often doesn't.
Resonance
Dynamic (Intoxicating)
Tommy Faxon is all about wine. He practically sweats it. With his urbane veneer and a relaxed California swagger combining with his artistic talents, he finds it easier to encourage others to drink, too. Whenever persuading other people to drink, he gains a -3 difficulty to related Social rolls. But he suffers a +3 difficulty to related Social rolls whenever he attempts to advise moderation...in anything.
Mystickally, he finds it naturally easier to cast spells that improve the effects of alcohol, while Effects that encourage sobriety are harder: -1/+1 difficulty respectively to Arete rolls.
Static (Creative)
Artistic and innovative himself, Tommy finds that it's a gift he can pass on and inspire in others rather well. Encouraging others to create gains a -3 difficulty to related Social rolls. But if he attempts to stem off new ideas -- even bad ones -- most people turn their backs on him and do them anyway. He suffers a +3 difficulty to Social rolls of that nature.
This Resonance reflects in Tommy's Arts on a personal level. Rotes that Tommy has personalized and adapted to his own ways, if not created and developed on his own, are easier to cast: -1 difficulty to the casting rolls. But "general" rotes that all Tradition magi or even other Cultists cast are harder for Tommy: +1 difficulty to the Arete rolls.
