"Makes it more intuitive to figure out a bad omen and what to do instead. Gives you hints like 'today take a scenic route' or 'this time skip the fish sandwich'."

"...that could be very handy. Having very specific bad omens... yes, let's toss it on the pile."

"All right. Doing this means you must take four of Divination, so that brings us to ranks." She puts four ranks of Divination in the tentative build. "Generally recommended to do a stack shape sort of thing - something at rank three, something at rank two, something at rank one, for each at four. Fiddling with this a little is okay though."

"Huh. But in a few decades, when I've mastered everything I'd set my mind to, I don't need that kind of stack anymore, right? It would be irritating to need to dabble constantly to shore up everything I perfect."

"Right. Stack helps early on, not necessary forever."

"Excellent. Shall I look through my options myself, or will you be giving me an overview?"

"Because you are a warlock, you gain a point each from taking one rank of Consortation - that is demon summoning - Curses - what it sounds like - Hexes - transmutation - Necromancy - as you would expect - and Divination, though you have more divination than that so it is not net positive. You seem the type to want all these points." Yoink yoink yoink yoink. "Since your affinities are Soul and Body from being Neutral plus Mind from the nymph perk, you get discounts on Runes, writing symbols on things to make them do stuff, Familiarity, having an animal companion, Portals, which you have heard of already, and Psionics, an elementalism. Because you are not a real sorceress and only play one on TV, you are limited to one elementalism you do not have affinity for, so on top of Psionics choose one - you can fiddle with affinity later with your pearl - of fire, water, air with bonus electricity, earth, nature, and metal. That dimmed out one is metamorphosis, turning into a kaiju, because you are not any of the races that do that, but you can get it if you take enough Familiarity and let the familiar be the one to menace Tokyo. That one is Alchemy, what you'd expect, this is Witchery, that's come up before regarding your hat, and that is Aethernautics, basically astronomy, not popular except with nerds or people planning to do advanced portal shenaniganry. That is the overview, what shall I say more on?"

"I am full-on kid-at-Christmas, here - won't I get another affinity for the Pearl, should I pick that up now so I can figure it into my calculations in case I end up wanting three specialties with Fire discounts?"

"You have to actually brew your actual pearl into an actual potion and actually drink it which you cannot do right here right now, but you could choose with advance plans in your mind. Inconveniently you cannot wait to pick up any Alchemy ranks till you get a Water or Nature affinity for this reason, though you could take just one for just one point and wait for later on the rest, potion is not complicated. Affinities do not count twice, so most of these are already as cheap as they will ever be except the elementalisms. For this I recommend you pearl on a Nature affinity. Combined with others it gets you not just Naturalism but also earth and wind and alchemy. So, for your out of affinity elementalism you will want metallurgy, waterworking, or firecalling. Being part nymph I suspect you may be best served by waterworking but it is your call."

"...damn. Hmm. I do think I'll want Nature eventually, then, but do I need to take my out-of-affinity Elementalism now, or can I wait until I've got my feet under me with the non-elemental specializations and see what'll serve me best then? I might invest now anyway, but more information is better than less."

"No need to take it now, all this is available forever."

"Alright. Then I think I'll leave my Elementalism choices for last, keeping your Nature recommendation in mind. Um - I genuinely can't choose what I want to hear about first, and I am going to want to hear about all the specializations - can you find some sensible order to tell me about them -"

"The ones you are taking one rank of anyway unless you do something weird, how's about. Curses! - assume for all ranked magic that they all get better in numbers kinds of ways as the ranks go up, I will mention new things at each rank but not bigger things till you ask me how much how fast how often etcetera, okay? Otherwise gets terribly wordy. A curse is a thing, almost always a mean thing, you can plant on somebody else, but you can do it conditionally - when you say to them 'fuck you' or when the moon is full or when they try to drink beer or when they violate their restraining order or something. Divvy up the duration how you like, to catch the next five restraining order violations with ten seconds each or something. Curses have five basic kinds. Sickness is what it sounds like, Pariah makes wildlife hate them starting with bugs and eventually also plants, Madness makes them crazy amounts of angry, Disaster gives bad luck, Spellbind attaches other magic like potions or setting things on fire to curse effects so they can use the fun conditional setup. The spellbindings can be nice things but do have to go with some curse, even if it is only a little one, and you can only spellbind magics of up to your Curses rank - no reason you cannot attach a rank five potion to a rank one curse so long as you could do a rank five curse though. Rank three lets you cast many at once, and adds voodoo dolls - can curse through voodoo dolls, cannot decapitate through voodoo dolls, can tickle or pinch them. Rank four the voodoo dolls are more full featured, you could pick up marionetting if you wish, damage transfers too. Rank five can curse people with immortality. Very thorough. Still age and get hurt, just not die. Do it backward to de-immortalize somebody who is immortal. Mighty serious collateral damage around here from standard curses, avoid on this Earth to prevent going the way of dinosaurs, again, from planar dynamics problems. Voodoo dolls can now be one doll many customers and they can hear you if you want, make them levitate and go someplace, free indefinite duration with purchase for curses you do through dolls on these people. Will you surprise me not taking all five ranks right away?"

"No!"

"Seven points down the hatch then!" Put. "Way of the dinosaurs business is however business of the serious sort. No being obvious magic to people on this particular Earth. Veil will cover little slips but big ones destabilize the complicated thingamajig. Last time this wasn't even the keystone Earth and it got dinosaur problems and now it is."

"I don't actually intend to cause the next Black Death. I have a sense of priorities. But I do want to be able to flick a finger at someone and ensure they can't pop back up like a springtime daisy if I need them dead. So: seven points, down the hatch."

"Your points to spend! Hexes are transmutations. There is a rank zero one to mint your mana into witch money, which is called Kisses. They sound weirdly specific but are more useful than they sound. Eggs into chocolate and back, and such - you do not have to end with the same kind of egg you started with. But also polymorph live creatures into other live creatures, size limited by rank. Grownup human into classic frog or something is rank three. Hexes need some sacrificed medium - wood, metal, semiprecious rocks, fancy wood, super precious rocks or metals, by rank. Rank three lets you animate objects to do your dishes or fold your laundry - remember to program in a way to make them stop or become a cautionary tale. Rank four you can make golems, souped-up version of animating objects or get fancier if you stick a spirit into it, various options how to come by such a spirit. Rank five you can duplicate objects but it is slightly nerfed, magical properties don't carry over and you can't make more medium of the same rank this way."

"...fuck me, I just realized they're all going to be like this."

Fighting himself, he unclasps his metaphorical fingers from around all but two ranks of Curses - it's point-neutral even if it doesn't actively give him a point - and sighs, then takes one of Hexes.

"Alright. Next one. I'll up some of these later, probably, but - for now, let's just keep going through."

"Many have a sort of inflection point at rank three because that is a common maximum rank and has accordingly much prior art from many prior artisans. Next is consortation. With demons. Trading with them so they will do your bidding. They do not all completely deserve the bad rap but still risky. This your sort of fun or not so much?"

"...enough that I'll hear them out, not enough that I'll be making any kind of serious bargaining. If they want blood, or sex, or a chip butty, something can be worked out, but I'll sign no contracts. Does that sound reasonable from your better-informed point of view?"

"The littler ones do want a chip butty or sex. None of this is paper contracts, the deals are implicit with the summonings - you pay in advance and then they're bound to service. Ranks determine what kinds you get. Imps are just six inches high, foliots nearly grownup sized, succubi and incubi and nabasu can pass for human, etcetera, and they have sin-themed skills."

"Oh, adorable, I could shag a satanic Minpin. Not a strategic priority. Rank 1 for the point, but I think we'll move on for now."

"Necromancy! Spirits and the undead. Rank zero to see dead people. Just the ones who did not go to an afterlife or are floating around for some reason, also works on demons and animal spirits and such. Gaining ranks gets you shinies like letting mundies see the sights, being an unknown phone number to whoever is in a grave you visit, have pet skeleton cats or whatever. Rank two and you can cleanse a loony ghostie so it remembers what is going on, flag it for a psychopomp if you want. Make Frankensteins, control more undead animals and they could be bigger, telekinesis of bones. Rank three, combine runes with bones. Telekinesis with non-bones deadness, be very dangerous in a butcher counter. Make bones out of nothing. Glue spirits to your undead if they're okay to play along. Rank four be a psychopomp your own self, if you know the afterlife address to send them to and the head honcho will not return to sender - probably you could send some care of Chanabiel, though I do not know her life. Telekinesis live bones and meats. Sense it alive or dead through walls. Rank five you can be a lich, that is the thing where you hide your soul in an egg or something and hide it. You can make your own afterlife if you have your own extradimensional space to keep it in."

"Five."

"You are very suited to being a warlock." Five ranks of necromancy is seven points. "Do you want to hear more about divination to see if you want a fifth rank of it?"