That is true, but I wouldn't want to go lower than -3 so it still costs at least -1 refresh for the full on sorcerer or wizard family member.

Thinking on an element, perhaps "Blood"? For Thaum I'm still drawing blanks.

So this is an extension of an idea I've had for a while. Magic flows through bloodlines, and it seems practical (for many reasons, such as longevity) that wizards prefer to marry other wizards. It seems that there should be, if not common, a tradition of intermarriage between wizard families.

Taking the intermarriage between wizard families to an extreme, a family might try to improve their position by "marrying well".

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House Haydon
House Haydon is a well connected, well monied house with a huge propensity for magical talent. So much so in fact that those without the talent for magic are (discreetly) looked down upon. Family obligation is first in foremost in the thoughts of most members. Nepotism runs rampant in family businesses, and scions of the house are expected to make advantageous marriages, bringing in more talented blood.

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Greatest Mother
High Concept: Ghostly Matron of House Haydon
Trouble: Long Dead, But Not Forgotten
Other Aspects: Bound to the Family Estate; Mother to Them All; Centuries of Magical Experience; Managing The Bloodline; Family Matchmaker

Skills
Lore (Fantastic, +6)
Conviction (Superb, +5)
Discipline (Superb, +5)
Alertness (Great, +4)
Athletics (Great, +4)
Empathy (Great, +4)
Presence (Good, +3)
Intimidation (Good, +3)
Deceit (Good, +3)
Rapport (Fair, +3)
Most other skills default to average or mediocre.

Stunts & Powers
The Greatest Mother can be considered plot-device-powerful. She is a ghost and so has Spirit Form, and the Poltergeist upgrade, along with being a powerful sorceress or wizard with over a millennia of experience. Despite her power, she is fairly limited in her activities, only waking to provide protection and guidance to her family, and only able to directly intervene in special circumstances.

Stress: M OOOO (Extra Mild Consequence), P OOOO, S OOOO

The Greatest Mother is the eldest "surviving" member of what became House Haydon. Sometime in the early second century she enacted a ritual which would allow her to protect her family as a ghost, and has continued to do that throughout the centuries. She is present, in spirit if not manifest, during any family celebration, ceremony or ritual held on the family estate.

Refresh: Probably in the 30s.

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Binding The Blood
A voluntary ritual which binds a person to a particular bloodline, usually highly ritualized as part of a wedding or adoption. This ritual requires at least two other family members, who will act as surrogate parents for the target and assist in the ritual, and possibly a fourth family member to act as the potential spouse. The ritual has specific requirements to succeed, each of the main participants must feel genuine affection and love for eachother, without that bond to build on the ritual will invariably fail resulting in the death of the target.
Type: Thaumaturgy
Complexity: 36
Opposed By: Target’s Endurance
Effect: All family ties are cut from the target, and he or she is then bound by those same frayed ends to his or her surrogate parents, and possible spouse. Each participant is flooded with a true sense of the others, similar to the effect of a soulgaze. Any bonds of affection are strengthened, surrogate parents will feel the joy of a new child, the target will feel the love of his new family, and spouses will feel the love they feel for each other. This ritual creates an enduring bond between each participant, represented by a change in aspect which may be compelled to alert members to danger, or invoked to aid each other. If the family has a Bloodline Magic sponsor then the new family member can (with practice) gain access to that source of power.

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Bloodline Magic [-4]
Your magical pedigree is beyond reproach, and has been carefully cultivated for generations, which wizardly speaking, is a long time. As part of this cultivation, a well of magical energy has been created to empower scions of your family in times of deepest need.
Musts: You must have an aspect that signifies your familial connection to the Sponsor.
Benefits: Standard sponsored magic benefits (page 288), with an agenda to further family status, power, wealth and safety.
In addition by drawing on the generations of power and experience within your family you can use Bloodline Magic to supercharge any element that you've already specialized in, though it can't be used as an element in it's own right.
For use in thaumaturgy Bloodline Magic provides a +1 bonus to the ritual leader for each other practitioner who is a family member who is participating, up to a maximum of +3, to be divided as desired between control and complexity.

Oh, you can have more enchanted item slots, lets say you've got Joe Wizard, with the full wizard package and Tattoo Magic on top.

Joe can have up to 8 enchanted items, since he starts out with 4 focus items and converts on a 1:2 ratio. Joe can still have only up to 5 tattoos however, since his max Conviction (and thus his max accidental hexing) is 5. This leaves 3 enchanted item slots unaccounted for, which he can use for normal enchanted items or potions, or whatever.

I just accounted for that in the latest version, I put a limiter on how many tattoos you can have as equal to your conviction, though upon further though perhaps you can only have as many enchanted item slots dedicated to tattoos as your conviction.

The idea is that for each tattoo/slot you need to have some "ambient leaking power" to draw from to feed it. Each tattoo/slot reduces that ambient energy by 1 shift (so accidental hexes are 1 shift weaker), until there is no more leaking power (accidental hexes are 0 shifts strong, AKA: nonexistent).

So I'm digging more and more into some of the thematic thaumaturgy types, and self-targeted psychomancy just pinged on my radar, and I think you can probably pull off some really cool things with it.

Examples:

A mechanism by which you can completely turn off emotion = The Logic Obsessed Wizard. This would be useful for a few reasons:

• White Court Vampires should be Very Afraid.
• Gets rid of issues with accidental Hexing.

Any other ideas for uses of internal psychomancy?

How far can you go before you can be considered "inhuman"?

I can even see this as a legitimate way to (and I hesitate to use this word since it implies powergaming) justify "Inhuman Resolve" types of abilities (longer mental stress tracks).

I was looking at some lawbreaker discussions when I hit upon the idea of a wizard who created a "locked room" in his or her mind to seal away the corruption, allowing him/her to function as a "non-Crazy" until great need.

Initially I was thinking something along a Human Form power which simply denies access to lawbreaker powers until you "shift", but I'd like something a little more detailed than that, possibly something that allows you to "shift" into "lawbreaker mode" and have your lawbreaker aspects come into play then.

Ideas?

The reason why I dont want to use an ordinary mental attack is mainly due to other effects of mental stress on the target, I dont think fate weaving should, for instance, reduce an enemy wizard's stock of power. I've been thinking of just having it work as a long duration maneuver instead, since I also dont like the fact that it takes up an enemy's consequences either.

Powers:

Proclaim Fate [-???]
v0.1
Description: Reaching out to the humming threads of fate, you twist and turn them towards your own ends, whatever they may be, for good or ill.
Options:
Musts:
Skills Affected: Conviction, Discipline
Note:
Effects:
Weave Fate. Once per scene you may twists the strands of fate bending your targets destiny to your will. You and your target enter an immediate private conflict (similar to a soulgaze). This mental struggle lasts until one party sustains a consequence. Each combatant rolls Conviction to attack the other, and defends with Discipline. If you succeed in dealing a consequence your are able to Weave the target's Fate, using the aspect attached to the mental consequence to lay out their future. You may expend one fate point to extend the conflict by one exchange in order to further press your weaving, giving you more time to inflict mental stress, and thus stronger consequences. As long as the mental consequence you've inflicted persists it acts as a lodestone for the destiny you've laid upon your target, invoking up to once per scene (for free) in order to force that destiny upon them. The target is generally unaware of what has just happened, though if you are successful they may feel a vague sense of uneasiness.

Proclaim Fate [-???]
v0.2
Description: Reaching out to the humming threads of fate, you twist and turn them towards your own ends, whatever they may be, for good or ill.
Options:
Musts:
Skills Affected: Conviction, Discipline
Note:
Effects:
Weave Fate. Once per scene you may twists the strands of fate bending your targets destiny to your will. You and your target enter an immediate private conflict (similar to a soulgaze). Each combatant rolls Conviction to attack the other, and defends with Discipline. Once one of the combatants sustains a consequence the contest is over, unless you spend a fate point to extend it by one exchange. At the end of the contest the mental stress track of your target is reset to the condition it was in before the contest started, and all of their consequences are healed except the one which is most severe. Your mental stress strack (and consequences) are not reset. If you were successful in inflicting a mental consequence on your target the aspect generated by that consequence will automatically invoke once per scene (for free) in any situation that could conceivably guide your target along the fate you've chosen. Further invocations of that aspect in the same scene, however, require you to expend more fate points. The target is generally unaware of what has just happened, though if you are successful they may feel a vague sense of uneasiness.

Possible Upgrades
Strong Weaving [-1] If you increase the refresh cost of this ability by 1 you gain a +2 stress bonus on a successful hit (as though it were Weapon: 2), increasing the chances of inflicted a mental consequence (and thus a more lasting Fate Weaving).
Potent Weaving [-1] The Strong Weaving upgrade is a prerequisite for this one. You get another +2 stress bonus on successful attacks as per Strong Weaving, as though you had Weapon: 4.

(This is intended to be the mechanism by which most fateweaving effects are generated, its poorly written as yet, but the general idea is to have aspects generated by the consequences invoke/compel in any situation that could conceivably push the target towards the destiny you've laid down. I have no idea how strong the power is yet, however.)

Hidden Fate [-???]
Description: As far as the Powers that Be are concerned, your fate is an enigma. Your destiny is entirely your own, and you are beholden to none in this regard. You do not even appear in prophecy, and divinations targeting you are particularly difficult.
Skills Affected: None
Effects:
Nonexistent Prophecy. As far as prophecy is concerned, you are a complete and utter nonentity. Prophecies do not take your presence into account in any way, shape, or form. Events play out in such visions as if you aren't invovled.
Difficult to Divine. The complexity required by any divination spell that targets you or any item in your possession is increased by one half of your discipline.