how good or bad is mage the awakening?

[nihil8r]

i'm in charge of the next few games for my group. i was looking at my bookshelf recently and noticed i had several mage: the awakening books that i've never read. is this game any good? my group is usually role-play heavy. :smallcool:

[Pilo]

I think it is kind of good.
I'd rather play Vampire however.

[Inglenook]

I've never played it, only read over bits and pieces of the rules, but …

I prefer Mage's spheres/rotes magic system to D&D's Vancian casting—feels more fluid and less arbitrarily structured, which I think is how magic should be. However, it seems like it could be quite overpowered at higher levels, I'm not sure.

[The Glyphstone]

D&D Wizards turned up to 11 in every direction simultaneously. Unto like tiny spellcasting gods with prep time and creativity, incredibly fragile and easy to kill in the rare circumstances they're caught unprepared. It's overpowered from the start, and gets worse, but it evens out because all your enemies will be mages too, or magical monsters.

Thematically, the game's aimed around this too. You have incredible, world-reshaping power...but the world doesn't like being reshaped. Do it too often or too severely, or anywhere a 'normal' can see, and you get backlash that can range from a severe migraine to demons eating your face. Meanwhile, you have to literally avoid going MAD WITH POWER in the face of realization that laws only apply to you when you want them to.

[Wyntonian]

D&D Wizards turned up to 11 in every direction simultaneously. Unto like tiny spellcasting gods with prep time and creativity, incredibly fragile and easy to kill in the rare circumstances they're caught unprepared.

Thematically, the game's aimed around this too. You have incredible, world-reshaping power...but the world doesn't like being reshaped. Do it too often or too severely, or anywhere a 'normal' can see, and you get backlash that can range from a severe migraine to demons eating your face. Meanwhile, you have to literally avoid going MAD WITH POWER in the face of realization that laws only apply to you when you want them to.

I wonder what it says about me that this sounds like a lot of fun....

[The Glyphstone]

I wonder what it says about me that this sounds like a lot of fun....

that you have good taste?:smallcool:

[laeZ1]

Mage is my favorite Whitewolf genre. No matter what game you play, creative, smarter players will always have an edge (whether it's how they build their character, if they figure out that the princess is a demon in disguise, or if they think of a crafty way to cross to lava). Mage: The awakening takes that aspect, and amplifies it.

While you can still see the same character concepts in Mage that you could see in any of the other Whitewolf genres (from medics, to two-gun mojos, to socialites, etc), by becoming an ST for mage, you've opened up a can of "huh"?

You said you haven't read through the book yet, assuming you still haven't, I'll explain the magic system to you in a nutshell.

There are different catagories of magic, called Spheres. Each sphere you have ranks in grants you control over a small part of reality. You can have up to five ranks in each sphere. Now, unlike every other Whitewolf genre, when you gain a new rank in the sphere, it doesn't say "with this rank, now you can turn other people invisible too!"... Let's look at the life sphere.

With one rank in the life sphere, you can sense life-related things. The book will list two example "rotes" (a rote is a premade or player made spell that the character has practiced and is easier to cast). The two examples might be life sense (a sort of radar ability) and dialysis (a sort of diagnostic ability). Every sphere's first rank will see pretty simular, with sensory magic only.

With rank two, you start being able to -do- things. Generally, small alterations of what's there. Life allows you to make alterations to a person, either dealing damage or healing them, giving or taking away traits, maybe improving their vision. While the book may only list two rotes, the important part of the new rank is the paragraph of what you can affect, and how much.

As the ranks increase, how drastically you can alter things, as well as the things you can alter changes. How creative and smart the player is will have a much bigger impact on what the character can do in mage, compared to say, Vampire or Garou.

For instance. Let's say we come across some Garou and we want to put the hurt down on them. With three ranks of life, and three ranks of matter, a creative player might turn the Garou's blood to silver, while a not-so creative player (who may have a character with more points) might simply use the rotes out of the book to throw fireballs and the like at his foe.

I could go on... but I just used up my lunch break. Hope my ramblings helpped!

[Jerthanis]

The big problem with this godlike power is that it's really unclear what you should be doing with it.

Essentially the vauge setting doesn't effectively set up any conflicts which are sensible. There's essentially what boils down to a religious conflict with the Seers, where your side thinks unknowable immortal godlike beings that no one has ever seen or heard firsthand are fighting against other unknowable immortal godlike beings that no one has ever seen or heard firsthand and you're fighting the people stupid enough to follow the other group of "uigbtnohesohf-s".

Then there's the political groups within your own side, who are supposed to be at each others' throats, but their goals and mentalities are so different and complimentary that it's hard to not see the society of mages as working too well. There are the soldiers who care about protecting mages, spies interested in uncovering secrets, librarians who are interested in cataloguing secrets, and hippies. There's just not enough inbuilt problems between these groups since they seem designed to work well together to facilitate groups consisting of mages of each faction, and the suggested problems between them seem ad-hoc as a result. The fact that these arcane secrets the game wants you to be seeking and uncovering are vague at best and aren't applicable in any way other than saying, "Alright, so how much Arcane Experience is that worth to have learned?" since by definition they aren't applicable to the world as we can understand it.

Practically speaking, Mages are best suited to paranoidly sitting in their towers, researching in solitude. The game then doesn't do enough to pull you out of your tower and get you in the world because there aren't conflicts there worth having.

The problem with Mage Conflicts all being between Mages and never with the wider world is that essentially nothing would change about the game if your twist is that all Mages are just delusional... they believe they are using powers but the paradox of them not working around 'sleepers' is that they're simply more aware of their delusions being merely delusions when that happens.

EDIT: Oh wait, Mage: The Awakening is nWoD, right? That one has Arcana rather than Spheres. I like the oWoD Mage, but I thought that was "The Ascention" which DOES have comprehensible problems that get you out of your tower and has sensible intra- and inter-Tradition conflicts, but with a good enough antagonist to pull you together. I like a lot of things about Ascention and would play it again if I got the chance, having only played a couple sessions way back in the day, but having played a couple Awakening games and run one, I wouldn't play or run it again if I could help it.

[Wings of Peace]

Personally it's my favorite splat for NWoD mechanically and largely thematically as well. That said, I've spent a lot of drunken nights attempting to forget the parts of the canon that deal with Atlantis.

[Mephisto]

The magic system is flexible, powerful, and rather subject to shenanigans. For example, being proficient enough in Life magic to heal others also means you are capable of turning a tree into a tree's weight in BEEEEEEES! and sicing them on your enemies.


Practically speaking, Mages are best suited to paranoidly sitting in their towers, researching in solitude. The game then doesn't do enough to pull you out of your tower and get you in the world because there aren't conflicts there worth having.

I kinda disagree entirely. Mages are the WoD supernaturals closest to humans and are heavily involved in worldly affairs. The Guardians of the Veil and the Silver Ladder both run organizations meant to nudge worthy people closer to enlightenment, the Adamantine Arrows get involved in wars and human conflicts, the Mysterium goes out and digs up Atlantean ruins and investigates supernatural goings-on, and the Free Council works to improve modern society.

[Jerthanis]

I kinda disagree entirely. Mages are the WoD supernaturals closest to humans and are heavily involved in worldly affairs. The Guardians of the Veil and the Silver Ladder both run organizations meant to nudge worthy people closer to enlightenment, the Adamantine Arrows get involved in wars and human conflicts, the Mysterium goes out and digs up Atlantean ruins and investigates supernatural goings-on, and the Free Council works to improve modern society.

Why?

Why do they do any of that? Nothing they do magically can affect anything they do outside their towers, since Sleeper unbelief undoes all of it. They're limited almost to their barest human capabilities when trying to affect the human world and are practically gods within their towers. Add to this that Awakening can't be forced, and is always intensely personal and difficult to predict, and if someone who wouldn't awaken DOES see the kind of stuff, they widen the abyss, most Mage organizations are about finding potential mystic sources and hiding them away from humanity.

Vampires run organizations that influence politics, policy, government, commerce and they also get involved in wars (though not often personally). They don't really dig up ruins so much, but they do police the supernatural a bit, since if ghosts are totally plausable and accepted by the average joe on the street, the Masquerade is threatened. They have an investment in all these things greater than simply continuing in being involved in the things they cared about when they were alive (unawakened for the Mage), but the Mage specifically has reasons NOT to, since they're engaging in a place they're less powerful and more vulnerable, and by engaging in things they used to care about, or participating in the things they cared about in their life before they expose their True Names.

So... no, I don't see why they're more involved in the world than anything else. They have more reasons not to and fewer reasons to do so. If the books say they're the most involved in the mortal world of the splats, then give me a reason why that is the case.

[nihil8r]

thanks for the replies so far, everyone.


For example, being proficient enough in Life magic to heal others also means you are capable of turning a tree into a tree's weight in BEEEEEEES! and sicing them on your enemies.


i lol'd for realz.

so it seams like mages are very powerful. but if mages are so powerful, why do vampires and werewolves still run amok? based on my previous experience with world of darkness, vampires>all ...

[Cirrylius]

...but if mages are so powerful, why do vampires and werewolves still run amok? based on my previous experience with world of darkness, vampires>all ...

Because they 1) are really good at covering their tracks in most cases, 2) have supernatural abilities that, in most cases, are much more resistant to Supernal magic than Mages are used to (or completely resistant), 3) have Epic-Level cosmic sponsors who react very badly to Archmages trying to mess with their race(s) as a whole, and 4)will do their very damndest to rain down scalding death on Mages who make themselves a threat/nuisance.

D!cking with the other supernaturals on any more than a strictly personal level is to invite warfare, open or covert. And war is immensely costly. Better to choose your fights, and try to avoid stepping on the Others' toes.


Nothing they do magically can affect anything they do outside their towers, since Sleeper unbelief undoes all of it. They're limited almost to their barest human capabilities when trying to affect the human world and are practically gods within their towers.
This is a gross hyperbole. Only the most ham-fisted, or most-about-to-get-Abysally-violated-ing-est, mages use Vulgar over Covert magic in public. Provided they don't draw too much prolonged attention, Mages can get away with a lot, especially if they keep moving, and especially with magical tools, which mitigate low-level Paradox almost entirely.


Add to this that Awakening can't be forced, and is always intensely personal and difficult to predict, and if someone who wouldn't awaken DOES see the kind of stuff, they widen the abyss, most Mage organizations are about finding potential mystic sources and hiding them away from humanity.
There's a difference between wide-scale encouragement and individual coercion. Mages don't hold small rec-center classes on occultism culminating with Vulgar demonstrations. They have to find extremely subtle, farther-reaching influences that gradually change peoples' overall mindset towards cosmic openness and possibility, and do it lightly enough to weaken the Lie without triggering a response. If you want to create artists, you don't grab people off the street, jam a brush into their hand, and start batting them with blank canvasses, especially if open artistic demonstrations happen to be illegal enough to draw a swat team; you hire elective art teachers at college campuses, run museum ads in the paper, and put more money into grade school creative programs.
...okay, that metaphor was maybe a little off-kilter, but whatever; it's really late at night :/



So... no, I don't see why they're more involved in the world than anything else.
Well, for one thing it's much easier for them. They don't look like walking corpses, they can move around in the day, they don't have to worry about Frenzy, Death Rage, Disquiet, Humanity, Harmony, or Synergy. They are more truly mortal than the other splats. While that doesn't mean necessarily they hold the Unawakened world by the balls, it means they can interact on a more personal level much more freely and naturally when they do chose to exert influence, and their supernatural versatility makes any heavy-handed influence much simpler and easier to steer.

I'd probably put mages at #2 in terms of mortal influence, behind vampires. Vampire-mortal interaction has evolved specifically to be parasitic and controlling of human society, to protect the undead in their numerical inferiority and diurnal vulnerability. Besides, the theme for the Masquerade setting pushes the whole "shadowy predator overlords" angle pretty heavily.

[Mephisto]

so it seams like mages are very powerful. but if mages are so powerful, why do vampires and werewolves still run amok? based on my previous experience with world of darkness, vampires>all ...

Mages have their own problems to worry about with the Seers of the Throne, Abyssal entities and their followers, Banishers, Left-Handed mages, and general Weird Magic Stuff. If a group of vampires or werewolves go crazy and start murdering entire neighborhoods worth of people that's worth intervening in, but the status quo is not worth getting into a war with another group of supernatural beings with freaky powers over.

There are some mage factions that have different opinions, though. There's one group in the Mysterium that wants to eradicate everything that's supernatural but not Supernal.

[Jerthanis]

This is a gross hyperbole. Only the most ham-fisted, or most-about-to-get-Abysally-violated-ing-est, mages use Vulgar over Covert magic in public. Provided they don't draw too much prolonged attention, Mages can get away with a lot, especially if they keep moving, and especially with magical tools, which mitigate low-level Paradox almost entirely.

The effects of longterm magic erode in public, so while you might be able to trick a cabdriver into thinking you paid when you didn't with mind magic, since you get away from him before he realizes what happened, you couldn't mindcontrol the Mayor into changing his position, because every sleeper who is close to him would say, "You're acting really strange, you haven't said stuff like this before" and this would erode the spell and eventually he would come to his senses. Even covert magic is subject to this wearing away unless I am very mistaken.



There's a difference between wide-scale encouragement and individual coercion. Mages don't hold small rec-center classes on occultism culminating with Vulgar demonstrations. They have to find extremely subtle, farther-reaching influences that gradually change peoples' overall mindset towards cosmic openness and possibility, and do it lightly enough to weaken the Lie without triggering a response. If you want to create artists, you don't grab people off the street, jam a brush into their hand, and start batting them with blank canvasses, especially if open artistic demonstrations happen to be illegal enough to draw a swat team; you hire elective art teachers at college campuses, run museum ads in the paper, and put more money into grade school creative programs.
...okay, that metaphor was maybe a little off-kilter, but whatever; it's really late at night :/

Okay, but like... the books present very strongly the idea of finding these metaphorical brushes and canvasses and hiding them far, FAR away from these rec centers, and gives only vague handwaving lip service to what you could do to encourage an overall mindset towards cosmic openness. Especially considering the implied magic-mentality is so vague and new-agey, it's hard to really figure out what to do to spread the gospel. It gives you examples of specific goals towards hiding magic away from sleepers but almost no concrete ideas of what to do towards the opposite goal. Because of this and many other things, I got a strong impression the game was weighted towards Mages as insular and jealous of their secrets...

Essentially, the problem I have with Mage comes down to a lack of strong sense of stakes in the conflicts, making solid motivation hard to instill. If you work hard enough, I can see how it could be instilled even so... but I feel like it's a critical flaw in the setting.

[Wings of Peace]

The effects of longterm magic erode in public, so while you might be able to trick a cabdriver into thinking you paid when you didn't with mind magic, since you get away from him before he realizes what happened, you couldn't mindcontrol the Mayor into changing his position, because every sleeper who is close to him would say, "You're acting really strange, you haven't said stuff like this before" and this would erode the spell and eventually he would come to his senses. Even covert magic is subject to this wearing away unless I am very mistaken.


This particular example would actually work fine with around 3 or 4 dots in Mind depending on how much extra work you want to do. Modifying behavior via magic is typically a covert effect and a permanent one. Even if it did erode after a long time all the mage would need to do is refresh the spell.

A lot of it depends on how you go about things. Sleepers interacting with magic only tends to matter when it's vulgar effects and they know it's maagic. If their mind can explain away the event with a mundane solution then there's no risk of paradox. A good example would be a power station that uses Force magic to generate electricity. I don't know why such a thing would be built but if it was it would be highly vulgar most likely. However, if it was placed next to a river and all relevant public officials had memories of signing documents for a new hydro-electric dam placed in their heads (and gave a couple speeches on the matter) it would become completely innocuous until closely examined.

In the short term using magic in public gets a easier but is generally considered a bad idea from what I can tell. It gets easier in that Attainments typically grant one or two nifty effects which don't suffer from paradox at all.

As for the OPs original post. My biggest warning about using Mage: The Awakening is that if you're going to mix it with other splats be very careful in how you set up your challenges. Mages are the swiss army knife splat of NWoD. Where a Mage might just need to get creative in order to solve a problem another splat could likely have to call in a buddy with a different skill set.

Everyone has their preferences but my general approach to Mage is to run it like the first Jurassic Park movie with Mages as the park founder and the rest of the world as all the people questioning whether the Mage had a right to make the park in the first place.

[Cirrylius]

The effects of longterm magic erode in public, so while you might be able to trick a cabdriver into thinking you paid when you didn't with mind magic, since you get away from him before he realizes what happened, you couldn't mindcontrol the Mayor into changing his position, because every sleeper who is close to him would say, "You're acting really strange, you haven't said stuff like this before" and this would erode the spell and eventually he would come to his senses. Even covert magic is subject to this wearing away unless I am very mistaken.

You're partly correct. Covert magic is always Covert, even when it's unlikely enough to be considered... uh... Unlikely. The effect doesn't collapse under scrutiny, it just results in delayed Paradox. It's only Vulgar magic that gets gradually gnawed away at by Sleeper exposure.



Okay, but like... the books present very strongly the idea of finding these metaphorical brushes and canvasses and hiding them far, FAR away from these rec centers, and gives only vague handwaving lip service to what you could do to encourage an overall mindset towards cosmic openness. Especially considering the implied magic-mentality is so vague and new-agey, it's hard to really figure out what to do to spread the gospel. It gives you examples of specific goals towards hiding magic away from sleepers but almost no concrete ideas of what to do towards the opposite goal. Because of this and many other things, I got a strong impression the game was weighted towards Mages as insular and jealous of their secrets...

Heh. This is broadly correct; mages approve of the vague promotion of the possibility of magic in socitey, but do their damndest to hide the specific instances in case of Sleeper endangerment or accidental Paradox accrual. It's not an easy balancing act. Dealing with the immediate and obvious as opposed to the eventual is much easier from a gaming or role-playing perspective, too. Most players would rather cover up an Abyssal intrusion than spend a session getting a chain of occult bookstores on its feet. Add that to how likely mages are to hoard actual Supernal knowledge from one another to gain advantage, and it can make mages come across as petty schemers and Men in Black.




Essentially, the problem I have with Mage comes down to a lack of strong sense of stakes in the conflicts, making solid motivation hard to instill. If you work hard enough, I can see how it could be instilled even so... but I feel like it's a critical flaw in the setting.

I agree with this whole-heartedly. With the exception of the Technocratic siege-mentality mindset of Ascension, I preferred the more obvious factionalisms and world-goals of the OWoD. The Awakening setting fluff feels much less immediate and urgent to me.