Banner — RPGaDay #14

When considering banner in respect of The Dee Sanction, I suppose the key element would be the use of Dee’s Wax Seal in the header of the site and the covers of the books.

While the specific detail of Dee‘s use of the seal is a little vague, in the game it has a specific purpose. In many ways, it represents the sign of the Sanction, it’s genuine seal of legitimacy. At the same time, all Agents carry a smaller copy of it, like a chain of office about their necks—though not necessarily always in the open.

Functionally, in the lands of the British Empire, it offers them a right of access. Operationally, it provides all Agents with a means to communicate with anyone through the strange medium of the angelic tongue, as Dee understands it. In the early days of the Sanction, that mechanism works less effectively because Dee himself has a weak grasp of the concepts, but by the 1580s, it can handle all languages. Agents speak and understand as if fluent in all language.

Of course, there is a downside; the presence of the Seal is like a red rag to a bull for enemies of the Queen, adversaries of Dee and Walsingham, and counter-agents in thrall to certain courts of the supernatural—notably the Fae and the King of Spain, Philip II. That’s the nature of such talisman, in that they serve a purpose both favourable and detrimental. You can’t have one without the other, and the Seals are not easy to replicate—any Agent would not readily seek to destroy one or leave it in a place that might have it falls into the hands of another.

Banners of allegiance have a broad purpose and the Wax Seal is very much the same; a declaration of personal interest, motivation and purpose that the Agents will both depend upon and rue of their possession, in equal measure.

Every day during August, I’ll be writing something new on The Dee Sanction and aim to connect the word prompt of the day with the development of the game. Check out the concept, the list and the graphics over at AUTOCRATIK.