Mage:the Awakening is out. Opinions?

[GRIMJIM]

You seem to be arguing that an element which people subjectively do or don't like is an objective flaw in a game, based on people's potential agreement with you. Why do you care what the "common impression" is? By that standard, none of us should even be having this conversation since the common impression of RPGs is that they're a hobby for socially-retarded losers, anal-retentive geeks who live in their parents' basements and have severe issues with weight management, fashion sense and personal hygiene. Much like the common impression of Atlantis, the common impression of RPGs is indeed based on the sad cases we're exposed to every day. If the common impression were an issue for me, I wouldn't bother with Mage or any other RPG.

As I think I just said in the other post (its all getting a bit muddy now) the Atlantis thing seems to be what both sides fixate and argue over but really, to me, its a catalyst that makes the already existing problems with the system that much worse.

Also when I refer to common impression I'm mostly talking about common impression for the audience you're designing for. I'll come back to that in a minute looking at your example below.

For a brief (alas Atlantis based) digression.

Atlantis would have worked fine in oMage. Why? Because the approach fits the sons of ether, lots of crazy people of various sorts believe in Atlantis and thus either here or in the spirit world or both there'll be a reflection of it (especially since deepwater can have natural gateways to the umbra or the abyss). It could be made as much a part of the setting as shangri-la or the hollow earth because there was facility for it in those terms fitting the perceptions of the audience.

Some people are going to focus on the stupid pop-culture stuff you reference when they read the word "Atlantis," and for them it's a negative. Some people are going to focus on the legitimate occult traditions of the word, and be happy with what's there. And some people, like me, are going to ignore the stupid stuff and minimize the literal relevance of the term "Atlantis," using it as the placeholder name it's clearly intended to be (I prefer to use the term "Awakened City" instead).

That's not _necessarily_ useful for when you're making a review though. That's reviewing the 'game as could be' which I think I touched on earlier. OK, so a lot of us like to kitbash but that's a bit reviewing D&D and saying 'Its great, if you make all these changes to the combat system' (Substitute any other game and similar comment if you prefer). I have the handicap of being trained into looking at WoD books as canonical source whereas something like Exalted I can rip apart and put back together with gay abandon.

I'm cool with the idea that some people just can't swallow the use of "Atlantis" because of all the baggage attached to it, even if I think they overstate the centrality of Atlantis in the game. I wish you would be cool with the idea that not everyone is as hung up on the dross as you are, and that we can take the material in the spirit in which it's intended. Contrary to what you've written, pop-culture Atlantis isn't as big a deal to everyone as it is to you.

I can appreciate it but when critiquing the game that's not the only flaw and its also remiss to ignore it. If I ran mage again I'd probably extricate (some of) the system changes and use them, though there's a few problems IMO with nWoD core too.

To say again more clearly, Atlantis is not the only problem with it.

But if I wrote a review (or a pseudo-review, whatever) of the book saying "this book sucks because everyone will see the title and think of Sarah McLachlan" I'd be laughed off the 'net. And rightly so.

This would only be a comparable situation if SPycraft 2.0's campaign world DID include Sarah McLachlan as a central and supporting strut of the campaign and gameworld. Then you'd quite rightly have a beef and no, you wouldn't be laughed off the net.

 

[Mark Hope]

I'm just starting to work my way through Awakening now (starting with the magic system in the middle and working outward from there, as is my wont) and so far I am liking what I am seeing. I'm not really finding myself having any issues with the whole Atlantis/Fallen World backstory, though. I tend to keep what I like and modify or ditch what I don't so it's no big deal either way (plus I don't really see the Atlantis backstory as being hugely different from the OWoD's First City/Shattering/Sundering backstory, thematically speaking, so I guess I am missing what all the fuss is about. Ho hum.)

I am a huge fan of Ascension, I have to say, but the only comment I would make on Ascension/Awakening is that I am just not done with Ascension yet. I'm midway through an absurdly large and ambitious Ascension/Dark Ages crossover and there's plenty of life in the purple old dog yet. However, there are quite a few elements of the Awakening magical system that I might try to port over (Eyebeams, your modding notes are pretty useful in that regard)... assuming that I can sell the changes to my recalcitrant players

Actually, in all of the kerfuffle in this thread, this aside really caught my eye:

On the other hand, unlike Ascension, Awakening doesn't make higher ranked spells weaker than lower ranked ones. Ascension had some awful math we couldn't get rid of for legacy reasons, and working around that was a constant design problem.

A big amen to that! Eyebeams (if you would be so kind), how might you best tackle this issue (short of using the Awakening spell system, that is)? Would a return to the Mage 1e system of having higher Sphere levels give higher damage multipliers fix this in any way? The core Awakening system of large dice pools and successive penalties for more expansive effects is pretty simple to insert into the Ascension system, but I was wondering if there were any easy tweaks that could be made to the Ascension system that might address this mathematical problem (and legacy be damned).

 

[Funksaw]

Agreed: The variable difficulty levels resulted in wonky math.

I was thinking about working it out this way and making all difficulties Difficulty 7. Ones don't subtract from successes, but if you have more ones than successes, it's a botch.

Characters start with Arete 1, and sphere knowledge is capped at Arete+2

Arete: Spells without paradigm/focus
Arete+Sphere: Spells in paradigm
Arete+Sphere+appropriate skill: Rote (Players design 6 rotes from starting spheres during character creation)

Arete=Highest Sphere... No bonus
Arete>Highest Sphere, add bonus dice equal to the difference. (I.E., Arete 3, casting a Forces 1 rote would get two bonus dice.
Arete<Highest Sphere, subtract dice equal to the difference. (I.e., Arete 1, casting Forces 3 rote, would have a 2 dice penalty)

 

[TheAuldGrump]

The net result of this thread is that now I would not touch the game with a ten foot pole.

The Auld Grump

 

[King of Old School]

Reasonably valid point KoOS but when approaching Kult there isn't really any baggage, one doesn't expect everything to be addressed (though it is in a way in the form of being part of The Prison Reality). It comes in fresh without the baggage that Awakening has. Something that can be a valid criticism of a Mage derivation doesn't necessarily apply to everything.

This encapsulates exactly what I've been saying all along: Your baggage does not constitute valid criticism of a game.

If you can't separate Awakening from Ascension, that's entirely and wholly down to you. Awakening is not a "derivation" of Ascension, they're separate games and explicitly marketed as such. Likewise, if you can't separate Atlantis from Aquaman and crystal-wavers that's not a flaw in the game.

As for the specific comment to which I was responding, Funksaw is the guy who panned the nWoD corebook because the Virtues and Vices were "too Christian." That kind of baggage isn't going to just vanish when moving from nWoD to Kult (not in a rational mind at least).

Also when I refer to common impression I'm mostly talking about common impression for the audience you're designing for.

The audience WW is designing for is an audience that is going to accept Atlantis in the spirit it is clearly intended, and not immediately conflate the Atlantis in the book with Aquaman and crystal-wavers. If that's not you, then you are not the intended audience.

That's not _necessarily_ useful for when you're making a review though. That's reviewing the 'game as could be' which I think I touched on earlier. OK, so a lot of us like to kitbash but that's a bit reviewing D&D and saying 'Its great, if you make all these changes to the combat system' (Substitute any other game and similar comment if you prefer). I have the handicap of being trained into looking at WoD books as canonical source whereas something like Exalted I can rip apart and put back together with gay abandon.

Again, those are your shortcomings rather than the game's. I'm not talking about kitbashing anything, I'm talking about filling in the blanks according to your own perspectives and those of the player characters, which is an inherent part of any RPG unless you're only running with prewritten scenarios and pregenerated characters. The fact is, for many (most?) PCs in Awakening the whole Atlantis thing is entirely irrelevant to the game, as irrelevant as Caine was in Masquerade.

KoOS

 

[Hoodooman]

Exalted and Mage the Awakening: Any connections. Just curious.

Not meaning to step on any occultist toes here, but I wish to change the subject.

As a previous fan of Exalted, I was wondering, does Mage the Awakening have any connections to Exalted. The Seers of Time seem a lot like the Siderals from Exalted.

so i sort of was wondering if this coincidence? means that Mage the Awakening might be Exalted in a modern setting? it seems coincidental at least to me.

by the way, i might be wrong in all these speculations..

 

[wingsandsword]

Not meaning to step on any occultist toes here, but I wish to change the subject.

As a previous fan of Exalted, I was wondering, does Mage the Awakening have any connections to Exalted. The Seers of Time seem a lot like the Siderals from Exalted.

so i sort of was wondering if this coincidence? means that Mage the Awakening might be Exalted in a modern setting? it seems coincidental at least to me.

There is nothing to really support that, in that the NWoD is apparently supposed to be a completely different world than anything that has come before. Now, the backstory is that in long-lost antiquity there was a city/civilization which was advanced and enlightened, some horrible cataclysm happened and mankind was shut off from enlightenment, and now only a scant few people can lay any claim to remembering the nigh-infinite power that is their birthright, which certainly could be a modern version of Exalted.

It sounds like an interesting idea for a campaign, but I don't think it'll be officially supported by WW.

 

[GRIMJIM]

If you can't separate Awakening from Ascension, that's entirely and wholly down to you. Awakening is not a "derivation" of Ascension, they're separate games and explicitly marketed as such. Likewise, if you can't separate Atlantis from Aquaman and crystal-wavers that's not a flaw in the game.

Its a failure on the part of the creators to create the impression they were - possibly - seeking.

As for the specific comment to which I was responding, Funksaw is the guy who panned the nWoD corebook because the Virtues and Vices were "too Christian." That kind of baggage isn't going to just vanish when moving from nWoD to Kult (not in a rational mind at least).

He'd be entirely correct to make that observation. It was a major problem in the old game, at least in Vampire, that has now been spread to all the lines, though at least Werewolf now has a slightly more appropriate spin. Linking an objective determination of morality and linking it to systems and sanity when morality is a very subjective thing, very different from person to person and culture to culture. One of the things that could have very much done with a 'fix' in the new versions. This is also one of the most telling flaws in Awakening with magical capabilities also being linked to morality.

Again, those are your shortcomings rather than the game's. I'm not talking about kitbashing anything, I'm talking about filling in the blanks according to your own perspectives and those of the player characters, which is an inherent part of any RPG unless you're only running with prewritten scenarios and pregenerated characters. The fact is, for many (most?) PCs in Awakening the whole Atlantis thing is entirely irrelevant to the game, as irrelevant as Caine was in Masquerade.

Cain was, of course, an extremely central element to Masquerade, especially at the end but also very much so earlier, particularly for Sabbat games, though only indirectly linked to any powers - unlike awakening where Atlantis is directly tied to methodology, arguably making it even more centralised.

And if existing Mage fans wasn't part of the target audience, big whoops.

 

[eyebeams]

The net result of this thread is that now I would not touch the game with a ten foot pole.

The Auld Grump

Yes, but it is understood that saying things like this would be your primary contribution to the thread as it has been in others.

 

[GRIMJIM]

The net result of this thread is that now I would not touch the game with a ten foot pole.

The Auld Grump

If you continue to play Ascension regularly it may still be worth it for some of the mechanics but they'll need a fair bit of tinkering.