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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Afrodyte" data-source="post: 519684" data-attributes="member: 8713">As a devoted fan of Mage: the Ascension, I am starting to wonder what you are trying to do with this system.  Part of what makes Spheres a viable option is the lack of hard-and-fast rules regarding what can be done with them outside a broad description.  The descriptions you have for each Sphere are severely limited compared to what's offered in Mage:the Ascension.  In fact, aside from the names, the Spheres barely resemble what's in Mage:the Ascension.  Perhaps this is intentional, but if you were aiming for something a bit more flexible with d20 magic, it needs a great deal of tweaking.My major issue with the mechanics you have here is that seems needlessly complicated.  You not only need a skill to cast magic, but you also must keep track of mana points.  Also, you still have a limit on how many mana points you can spend per day, which limits which spells you can cast and how many times per day.  Why use this instead of sticking with spell slots?  Your selling point seems to be that you can cast any standard D&D spell with this system.  Great, so now what?  If the parameters of the spheres are so limited that it is difficult to create various effects in various ways (ie, there is more than one way to set soemthing on fire), it almost defeats the purpose of your system.  One of the things that makes Mage's magic system work is that you could conceivably do just about anything as long as it is in line with your character's paradigm.  Since Mage's thematic elements will not play as large a part in your system, more work will have to be done to justify the way magic works the way it does.  Why, for instance, do you have the restrictions for classes?  For instance, you note that Forces controls air and sound, yet you prohibit Bards from learning it.  I'm not sure about you, but I think more people would be eager to play bards if they could someday cause storms with the power of their song.  Are you sure that a Druid would be unable to control the weather (another use of Forces)?  With Entropy, a character can sense the weak points in things, beings, events, and forces and perhaps bring them out.  The Smite Evil and Favored Enemy abilities of the Paladin and Ranger work well with Entropy.  With Correspondence, Entropy, Mind, and Time, a Paladin could sense the importance of a place, person, or event to a quest she has.  She could even lay a quest onto someone as a way of making him or her repent wrongdoing.  Do you want Paladins unable to do this?  Could you explain why a Cleric of Wee Jas would not have the Entropy, Mind, or Time Spheres?  Do Druids lack the power to maximize the growth period of living things?  When you prohibit Matter, are you saying that you do not want that particular class to make more durable, more solidly constructed items?I would be more inclined to give favored Spheres as opposed to penalizing or prohibiting Spheres.   Consider how they do Traditions in Mage.  You could easily work them into class models.  The Celestial Chorus and Verbena work especially well for Clerics (and Paladins) and Druids (as well as Rangers and Clerics of nature deities) respectively.  The Order of Hermes works well for your standard wizards, as do the Sons of Ether.  Dreamspeakers could work for Druids and Clerics.In all honesty, I don't think that Mage:the Ascension translates well to d20, at least not in this way.  A more easily translatable system, I think, would be Ars Magica.  From what I've heard of it, I think that the system flows much better than that of Mage, and it offers even more versatility and flexibility.  You may want to give it a look because that setup may have what you are looking for to translate most smoothly.I'm not trying to slam your efforts.  I can see the need for a more flexible, logical magic system in d20.  However, simply transporting Mage:the Ascension may not be the best way to go about it, as there are systematic elements in the game that make it work the way it does that are generally missing in d20 magic.  If, however, you are also going to use the rules for paradox and resonance, though the rules would still need more tweaking, the results could completely change what is done with d20 magic.Small note:  Astral projection, in Mage, needs only Mind because it is your consciousness that floats around.  Just as you do not need Correspondence to walk a block, you do not need it to travel astrally.  However, if you want to make travel go by faster, or instantaneously go from one place to another, you do need Correspondence.</blockquote>

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