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Here are some basic descriptions of each Major Arcana card's properties, so that you can get a sense of what they're all about. And here are some great ideas for card abilities!
If you are planning to create a character as option 2 (joining the circus), you can preference what card you would like your character to bond with once they join.
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I may repeat myself a bit, but here you go...
Brief Overview
The Arcana Battles are a year-round annual event made possible by the curse, and occur randomly according to the characters' organised determination. The winner of all the battles is determined at the very end of the year, and is the circus member with the most battle victories.
Details
The Arcana Battles do not operate in a structured time period. An Arcana Battle can take place anytime, anyplace, anyhow. They can happen during performances at night or during the day when the circus is closed. The characters participating in a battle must all agree to the terms of each battle. The curse is the judge, and will announce the outcome of a battle by burning the losing character's Roman card numeral onto the winners body (like a tattoo).
The characters organise the battles. If a character wants to escape the circus, they need to battle the others. However, the battles don't only have to be physical ones... they can be anything. If a character is smart, they will initiate a battle that lends to their personal strengths. It can be a battle of popularity, knowledge, object hunting, stealth, discipline etc.
As long as the battle form and its terms are named, and as long as the other battle contestant agrees to the battle the initiating character describes, then the curse will recognise the battle, and it can begin.
Examples of battles can range from a physical fight in the Hall of Mirrors tent (this could lend itself to The Magician card), to the best display of control in a performance (perhaps between two elemental cards), to winning the heart of a desired person in a love triangle (this could lend itself to The Lovers card), to locating and stealing a particular object before the other contestant (this could lend itself to The Hermit card), to constructing the most impressive new circus attraction, to going the longest without using any card abilities whatsoever.
As you can see from the examples above, the only limit to an Arcana Battle is your imagination. The characters will want to learn the strengths and weaknesses of the other cards and their owners in order to take advantage of them.
The Arcana Battles occur annually, from the beginning of the year to the end. Each circus member must fight at least one Arcana Battle in order for the year's winner to claim the freedom prize, whether they want to or not. The winner of all the Arcana Battles is the character with the most 'card tattoos' on their body (a.k.a. the most battle victories) by the end of the year. Only that one person may leave the circus, while the other circus members remain trapped.
The Arcana Battles are for every member of the circus. Each circus member must participate in at least one Arcana Battle before the year's end, or else the winner of all the battles is held back from leaving the circus. This means that those not wanting to escape the circus would ideally only need to fight one Arcana Battle. However, those competing seriously in the Arcana Battles will need to win as many battles as they can, and hence will likely ask non-serious circus members to battle them.
Serious Battle Competitors
A circus member who is serious about winning won't have to battle everyone in the circus. They will only need to battle enough circus members to win at least one more victory above all the others. Because many circus members don't feel inclined to leave the circus, the amount of victories needed to have the most won't be too high.
The curse restricts that a circus member can only battle another circus member once in the year. This would mean that towards the end of the year, those serious participators would eventually want to face each other, after already battling the other non-serious members or being refused battles. Naturally, the difficulty of these battles would be much harder and more ambitious, since both battle competitors are serious about winning against the other.
Meanwhile, those non-serious characters would barely have any victories, and it would take an immense amount of effort for them to get on the same level as the serious competitors, especially later on in the battle year.
Curse Side-Effect
The circus curse also messes with the lifespans of the circus members, meaning that the longer-enduring members of the circus could be almost a hundred years old and not look a day over fifty. The curse increases the lifespans of members, but does not make them immortal. Basically, a circus member ages twice as slow after joining.
Card Abilities
Due to the unlimited possibilities of an Arcana Battle, there are sure to be plenty of battles that each character will struggle with, no matter their ability. The characters will also use their abilities casually for performances and everyday life.
Their card powers only exist within the circus boundaries; once they leave, their ability stays behind, making them the normal person they were before joining the circus. This consequence might add reluctance to those who are considering leaving the circus, because they are essentially choosing between magic and the real world.
Someone else would be able to take a leaving character's Arcana card after they leave. However, if that leaving person were to return, the circus curse would 'analyse' which character's spirit is most similar to the card. If the card is still better fitted to the previous owner, then it will be snatched from the newer owner, who will have theirs replaced with another. If the card is better aligned with the newer owner, it will remain theirs, and the previous owner would be given another. It comes down to the spirit of individuals.
The Circus
The circus is like a secret bubble of magic, hidden from the real world. Its name, Le Cirque d'Avalon, is French for 'The Circus of Avalon', like the mythical Avalon island from Arthurian legend, which is also cloaked from the real world by mists. I decided to leave the setting without a description, so that everyone posting for this storybook can help build the circus out of their imagination :3
The place has a very dreamy and mystical atmosphere, with lots of secret tents and rooms with cryptic purposes. The circus' appearance takes on elements of King Arthur's legend, Avalon island, and other medieval ideas. It seems to mysteriously travel from town to town via thick mists. The mists conceal the circus during the day when it is closed, and if outsiders of the circus were to try and find it in the mists during the day, they would get lost and find themselves back where they started.
The circus is almost a century old. It was created at the start of the 1800s, and the storybook is currently set in the mid-1870s. How it was created and how the curse came to be is a mystery to most people.
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