SM ARCSYS: Disciplines

Arcane Disciplines
Just as there are several branches of natural sciences, there are several disciplines in Arcane Actuation and Engineering. There are commonalities at the very lowest and very highest applications, where "cross-discipline" is the norm rather than the exception.

Every Discipline, and every actuation within it, will follow a particular Routine.

Routines within the grasp of an individual magician are colloquially known as "spells." For those approaching the arcane field from more traditional, mundane backgrounds, a spell can be thought of as natural self-ordering that may be built up to a complexity similar to a set of commands for a computer program.

Critically, arcane energy has a sensitivity to human neural wavelengths. There are inherent dangers to this, but it is also the trait which allows an individual to actuate that energy through thought. At that level, most individual actuation falls under the Common Actuation or Conjuration disciplines.

Common Actuation (CA)

 * Low-level arcane energies activated in unprotected areas, with expected temporary and/or transient energization (even if it leaves permanent effects). This is the average wandist or caster opening a door, turning their wand into a flashlight, casting a fireball, etc. "Low level" is a relative term, as a high-level wandist could produce area-effect lethal damage (equivalent to pounds of TNT).
 * Routines are often called "spells" during Common Actuation.
 * One of the signatures of the Common Actuation of Routines is that the execution comes directly from the mental commands of the practitioner.

Conjuration (CJ)

 * The arcane synthesis of meta-elements. This is low-energy, low-complexity production of a magical substance that mimics Fun-4 elements in every way, including chemical interaction, but is otherwise a magical doppelgänger. Meta-elements will eventually fade from the Fun-4 form, making ingesting those elements a potential health hazard.
 * For instance: disappearing water will result in sudden dehydration. Sudden disappearance can work for people, too: especially with 30-second Cheetos®, where people get all the mouth-watering crunch but the calories and the cheesy mess disappear 30 seconds later.
 * Similarly, most forms of arcane-produced fire are actually meta-elemental plasma.
 * Photonics Note: arcane synthesis of light can be actual light, and possible at any wavelength, polarization or coherency.
 * The cohesion decay rate worked akin to a kind of modified logarithmic scale, with each energy level poured into it boosting it to the next level of stability before dispersion. Each level has a rough half-life so the "fade process" can be uneven (and potentially messy).
 * 30 seconds
 * 4-6 hours
 * 3-4 days
 * 3-weeks
 * 6-months
 * 5 years
 * 100 years
 * 1,000 years
 * 10,000 years
 * Increases in Conjuration skill trade capacity between three metrics, with adaptations and conditions based on the material created.
 * Intensity: how [hot] does the [fire burn]?
 * Volume: how much [fire] does the spell create?
 * Duration: how long does the [fire] last?

Enchantment (EN)

 * The process of creating, activating or imbuing an object with arcane energy. Technically, one does not have to have any AP skill to create a device, though they will require Arcanology Skill. Creating a wand of any sort requires Enchantment skill, and some level of Arcanology. Having AP skill helps in product testing and quality assurance.
 * Skills such as Alchemy, Transmutation and so on require a minimum 20 points of Arcanology before the separate technical Discipline Skills would be comprehensible.

Arcane Productive Atomics (APA)

 * Arcane Productive Atomics (APA) are better known to the world as the ancient pursuit of alchemy, turning lead into gold, of the same origin that arguably gave rise to the modern science of chemistry. APA is the transformation of one chemical element into another, an actual shift of atomic structure and a jump in positions on the periodic table. It took learning how to conduct that transformation to realize that it's not actually synonymous with "transmutation" (see below).

Transmutation (TR)

 * Similar to alchemy, but a much lower energy transformation that may change an element's chemical form without changing its atomic structure. An example might be turning charcoal into diamond. Transmutation can still be very high energy, requiring exactly what would normally be required for such a change. For many materials, however, the ability to manipulate organic chemistry can whip a chemistry-set packet of chemicals into a Denver omelette at minimal energy or hazard.
 * The basis of most TR routines rely on matching and/or filtering substances or compounds based on their resonant frequency. The frequency is imprinted in the mind of the caster and anchored with arcane assistance, allowing pitch-perfect analog recall.
 * Complexity note: In the vast majority of circumstances, the complexity of even "simple" Fun-4 compounds and substances is way beyond the average caster without relying on a direct template. The organic chemistry of scrambled eggs is mind-blowingly complex for novice magicians (and getting it wrong ranges from unpalatable to utterly toxic).

Arcane Nucleosynthesis (AN)

 * The arcane synthesis of Fun-4 particles, with an emphasis on production of normal baryonic matter (protons, neutrons, electrons), usually into elemental-level compounds which may be modified by other steps (such as alchemy or transmutation). Unlike meta-elements, those produced by nucleosynthesis are permanent creations. There are two fundamentally different ways of doing this.
 * Cross-tap: This is a high-energy, mid-complexity operation that permanently converts pure magical energy into Fun-4 energy.
 * Deep-tap: This is a mid-energy, high-complexity version that leans into arcane harvesting of Planck-scale (zero-point) energy, condensing it to produce Fun-4 elements. This takes less energy to synthesize materials from scratch, but is a more complex operation.

Arcane Transit (AT)

 * This is the use of arcane energy for exceptional movement (in a quantum physics context). There are two profoundly different methods that have little connection to each other, but both fall under the Arcane Transit description.
 * Portaling: this is the act of bending space-time to create a tunnel (essentially a wormhole) between two distinct points. In normal operation, there is no loss of target coherency or integrity during transit. The are two forms of portaling: gate and drop.
 * Teleportation: this is the act of converting a physical target into a waveform for any number of alternate means of transmission. A few are incredibly safe, most are extraordinarily dangerous but have advantages that may be situationally useful. Star Trek's transporters would class as a mundane form of teleportation.