Welcome to THAUMATURGE, the fifth game in the Princess with a Cursed Sword four-part trilogy! Thaumaturge has never been published before, and is original to the Princess Sword bound edition. If each of the previous games is connected to a suit of the tarot, Thaumaturge represents the Major Arcana, and its protagonist is the Fool.

For this playthrough, which will run up to launch of the BackerKit campaign on October 1, I'll be posting daily card draws and the writing they spark. We're going to start with character creation, and I'm going to be doing two things that are technically optional according to the game's rules.

Optional thing No. 1: I'm going to draw a card to help me decide my character.

[Image description: The Three of Pentacles, illustrated in a chunky pixel style. In the background, a figure reaches toward a decorative arrangement of three coins at the top of a column, while in the foreground, two larger figures appear to consider and comment on it. A cloudy blue sky is visible above.]

For this playthrough I'm going to be using droqen's tarot deck, which has a tile-based pixel art style that I think is so gorgeous and evocative. One of the things I love about the Princess Sword games is that whichever deck you use has a huge impact in the tone and direction of your playthrough. I'm already imagining this playthrough as a little RPG about a little nerd trying to bumble around a map.

"Bumble" would be a good name for a fool.

So who is Bumble? The Three of Pentacles is traditionally a card of an apprentice showing off their masterwork and preparing to ascend in rank, but Thaumaturge's character creation begins with the line, "You are a nobody." So I think that this is actually a depiction of Bumble doing grueling manual labor on behalf of the cruel magicians he works under.

Journal entries in Thaumaturge should be thought of as notes scrawled in the margins of the inscrutable magic grimoire the protagonist has absconded with. (More on that grimoire tomorrow!) Here is what I think Bumble's first entry is.

In the name of the Sacred Librarian, I do solemnly profess the following errors, committed on this Third Moon of the Month of the Bell:

1. Overslept by one minute and seventeen seconds.
2. Mismatched socks at morning assembly.
3. Applauded insufficiently loudly when Garner was promoted to First Full Apprentice over me.
4. Took over an hour to escape the cellar Garner locked me in despite my duty to bring a very important grimoire to Master Ramos' study.
5. Snuck out of the library rather than face Master Ramos' anger.
6. Stole a very important grimoire.
7. Wrote on the pages of a very important grimoire.

For these errors, my punishment should be thus: turned into a sheaf of paper in Master Ramos' notebook so I can store his ideas until they become his next genius manuscript, or until he gets frustrated and throws the notebook on the fire like what happened with that one group of apprentices.

8. Considered that I might never be punished if Master Ramos never finds me.

This is the second optional thing I'm doing, by the way: writing a passage to introduce the character's backstory. It's just as fine to answer the character creation process, keep the answers in mind, and start "in media res," letting the backstory elements you've chosen come to the surface in a more organic way. Writing a character intro could be a nice way to find the character's voice, though.

Now we've met Bumble. Tomorrow we'll meet Bumble's stolen grimoire.

Sign up to be notified when the BackerKit campaign goes live on 10/1!