Guido Karl Anton List - Weird War 1 Austrian occultist and arch manipulator.

Guido Karl Anton List

Guido Karl Anton List, was an Austrian occultist, journalist, playwright, and novelist. He expounded a modern Pagan new religious movement known as Wotanism, which he claimed was the revival of the religion of the ancient German race, and which included an inner set of Ariosophical teachings that he termed Armanism.

Born to a wealthy middle-class family in Vienna, List claimed that he abandoned his family's Roman Catholic faith in childhood, instead devoting himself to the pre-Christian god Wotan. Spending much time in the Austrian countryside, he engaged in rowing, hiking, and sketching the landscape. From 1877 he began a career as a journalist, primarily authoring articles on the Austrian countryside for nationalist newspapers and magazines. In these he placed a völkisch emphasis on the folk culture and customs of rural people, believing that many of them were survivals of pre-Christian, pagan religion. He published three novels, Carnuntum (1888), Jung Diethers Heimkehr (1894), and Pipara (1895), each set among the German tribes of the Iron Age, as well as authoring several plays. During the 1890s he continued writing völkisch articles, now largely for the nationalist Ostdeutsche Rundschau newspaper, with his works taking on an anti-semitic dimension half-way through that decade. In 1893, he co-founded the Literarische Donaugesellschaft literary society, and involved himself in Austria's Pan-German nationalist movement, a milieu which sought the integration of Austria into the German Empire.

During an 11-month period of blindness in 1902, List became increasingly interested in occultism, in particular coming under the influence of the Theosophical Society, resulting in an expansion of his Wotanic beliefs to incorporate Runologyand the Armanen Futharkh. The popularity of his work among the völkisch and nationalist communities resulted in the establishment of a List Society in 1908; attracting significant middle and upper-class support, the Society published List's writings and included an Ariosophist inner group, the High Armanen Order, over whom List presided as Grand Master. Through these ventures he promoted the millenarian view that modern society was degenerate, but that it would be cleansed through an apocalyptic event resulting in the establishment of a new Pan-German Empire that would embrace Wotanism. Using New Dawn influence and other contacts within fraternal occult organisations, List has insinuated himself into the Austrian Schwarzbureau and works from within the Austrian government like a spider at the centre of his web, utilising the energy released from the deaths on the western front to further his malignant agenda.

Attributes: Agility d6, Smarts d10, Spirit d10, Strength d4, Vigor d4

Skills: Fighting d4, Notice d8, Spellcasting d10

Cha: 0; Pace: 5; Parry: 4; Toughness: 4

Hindrances: Elderly, bad eyes

Edges: Arcane Background (Magic), New Power, Power Points

Powers: Bolt (lightning), fear (Unearthly scream), obscure (cloud of frost), puppet (hypnotic eyes)

Power Points: 15

Gear:  Spectacles, Occult tomes