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The first question to ask when coming up with a name is always "who named it?" Chances are the Chaos and the Warp are more names from the 40k universees for what it brought/did to reality. After all- how many things name themselves?

Multiple names wouldn't be bad either, as long as they were connected to different conceptions of it. IE, a cult who of people who go on drugs and then use magic to get visions of it might perceive it as a wonderful thing come to set them free somehow, something uplifting and airy. A council of mages group would probably instantly have two reactions to it- to see it as a new source of power or to perceive it's most demented and frightening aspects. So if the "official" name came from Agrippa, I'd have to imagine it would be something halfway between "scientific" and a reflection of that hazard, and likely either in a long dead language, or something fancy sounding like mock-Latin, at the very least.

...granted, a bunch of them might then translate that name into it's more accessible English equivalent for actual conversation, which would make it easier on us.

So I'll start with an all-around hello. It's a pleasure to join with you all here, and after reading over what you have so far I'm pretty excited to see it work.

I'm just going to start from the beginning since it's probably the most relevant to me personally. What I find really funny is that practically the first two things to be discussed are True Namers and self-detrimental psions, mainly because I once created an RP group around the combination of exactly that. The concept never got off the ground, so it's a very fun thought that I might be able to revive them here.

The concept was formed around a sort of "Priest/Paladin class for Atheists" (inspired by a webcomic, because RPG classes such as Kirkegaardian and Dark Kantian were filled with too much win for me to not lustily fondle), where they use divine-like powers in the name of popular philosophical ideas instead of deities. Unbeknownst even to them, the actual source of their powers comes from a form of psionic empathy so powerful it gives them subconscious knowledge and control of their patient/victim's true name. Quite obviously, the backlash is severe, and although I'm not at all familiar with these Psykers I'm sure it can easily fit with what you had in mind.

I can go into as much detail as you want, but for now I just wanted to put that out there since if I was to have a "first choice" character, this is what I would like to use.

I'm afraid I can't really offer much feedback on location, other than to say that I agree with what Sins and Damnatus have been saying so far, on the topic of a Providence-like city modified to suit our needs. I would also be more than happy to help write up and/or brainstorm specific locations.

Then we get to government. If I understand correctly, we're still sticking with the good 'ol USofA's Democratic Republic system since this underground magic society is supposed to be hidden from the general public and therefore mostly does not impact the average citizen's daily life, yes? And if we're going with the "mage tax" idea we have to assume that the government actively knows about this society, meaning such things fall under CIA/FBI, local police/PI, and local/federal judges. Unless Agrippa has enough political weight to claim jurisdiction over magical investigation and prosecution, in which case it'd just be CIA/FBI and maybe an exceptionally resourceful PI. Either way, ye poor hapless cultists, beware the Patriot Act... what year / time period will this be taking place, anyways?

It also seems to me like having mage tax and mage hunters is an exceptionally counter-productive concept. Like, why would the government want to kill off all the people who were raking in extra money for them? Independent hunters I can see, or even privatized to give the mages more incentive to pay their taxes, but otherwise I think it needs to be one or the other.

As for everything else, there's already more than enough corruption in the government that anything we could possibly think of will probably make complete sense.

I think I'll stop there for now. Maybe read over the other posts one more time to see if I missed anything and then sleep on any other ideas I might can think up.

Yup! This is what Jay and I were talking about. The international organization that is connected to Agrippa and other major cabals would trust them to enforce their own people. Agrippa has everything to lose if they do not keep a tight grip on their own affairs - public exposure incidents, deaths of their own members, risk of audits from the government organization and crumbling trust between them. Agrippa would have used the Guardian system since their formation, but now it is even more critical to police their own. When it comes out outside threats, it is generally either one or the other, or both working together. A cadre of mages and a specialized kill team of mundane humans would make a bad day for just about anyone.

Of course, there would be independent hunter cells that would go and deal with stuff on their own - think Supernatural for this. They might not even know Agrippa or the government organization exist, or they might believe that they are simply incompetent or are an actual enemy. With what Night stated, I could officially see governments claiming the one Interpol/Xcom organization to be paramilitary contractors, as if any connection ever did spring up, it is best to have that plausible deniability in place.

@ Selini: The mage tax was an old idea, but I would like to see Jay and Jak expand with it. Since the organization won't have actual POWER over Agrippa and others, it wouldn't exactly be a tax. Maybe do what Witch Hunter Robin did? Namely, they sometimes just captured metas/mages/etc. instead of killing them, only to intern them forever as to continually siphon their energies or just experiment on them. After all, most of these entities wouldn't even have any civil rights - even the magi would likely not have any, due to Agrippa or other organizations relinquishing rights sometimes to persecute them (I'd imagine they'd relinquish this if they were unable to deal with a rogue mage themselves).

As for your psyker idea, I like that! Psykers are will-based, so if they believe that they are drawing power from deities, then they could easily fool themselves into thinking they are using divine powers. Backlashes could be seen as individuals channeling too much of a god's/goddess' power, which results in damage, madness and even death. The true name concept could work as well, but it'd be more difficult - only mages can really affect someone due to their true names, at least insofar as how discussion has gone thus far. We could definitely look more into this, though!

Also, thanks for the opinion on the city! We can definitely use some help there, but yes, it seems everyone prefers the mixed option, which I am happy for. Hurhur.

Well, the true naming part came from perspectivism, and the though of "How would such an individual literally impose his reality on others? Well, by changing the very nature of their reality." Kind of like Perception Synchronization (obviously under the existential philosophy that your perception is your reality), which is something True Naming can do a lot easier than psionics. Which is also why I thought they worked so well together (Not necessarily psionics as much as Empathy). You need a very strong will just to convince yourself "this is how the world is", and then true naming allows you to impose that perception on others.

I had originally created it to be philosophical, but it can be religious too. Just the difference between calling it an act of god versus an act of existential perception. In this setting it may even fit better if it was under the direction of religion. That way they have more reason to take interest in/against the occult.

On the topic of Dragon Age, I personally like the way they did the templars. No innate magic, just highly addictive drugs that grant magic resistance and anti-spell-like abilities, among other more detrimental side-effects.

Wait, so Kat, you haven't gotten any of the templar references I've made before now then? I figured Cog would have told you, he played dragon age.

Guess I'll link drop info on templars real quick, since I do like them for inspiration for this kind of thing in particular, even if we'll probably be unfantasifying them a bit.

Lyrium

Templars


Something influenced by that would be an easy second choice for me, if we want said mage hunters to have any kind of resistances to or ability to sense magic (if they did I'd assume mages would too, and these hunters would have more of a lesser equivalent) next to the one I mentioned earlier. There is something nice about the idea that any normal person can be made into one. Not that a gun won't kill mages dead like anyone else, but it's a bit of a grim reminder, or equalizer, I guess.

Though the more I think about it, I suppose the thought that whatever mages used to cast would be in all people and they were simply the ones with it the strongest, while most had such a paltry amount that true names wouldn't even work much on them. If they do come in, and have any kind of specialty so, that it be partly born from altering that minuscule inborn talent.

I wouldn't want to flatly use anything from the game- but the game as a whole has a surprisingly rich world and unique semi-dark flavor. If we don't use the influence, I don't mind, but it generally seems worth bringing up decent examples and seeing what happens after it bounces about in people's heads for a bit.

It's both excessively cheesy (from a storywriting pov) and yet excessively relevant. I like.