Ask a simple question, Awakened edition

[monteparnas]

4)Can I redirect my rotational velocity around the sun, or galaxy as a means to gain a rather high velocity quickly?

This would probably change your referential for movement, since you would be targeting your speed in relation to something else than the ground. That means you would have to also calculate the resulting movement in relation to the same reference.

It would be pretty unpredictable, and would only work towards a distinct direction than the one you're already moving, but for space travel could give you a pretty decent starting point for a motion away from the sun/quasar. For moving around them, though, it would just keep you in stationary orbit.

[TempleBuilder]

1) Yep, entropy and endings are within its purview
1.5) It would probably require a Reach, but the Condition would end when with the duration does
2) You can with a Weaving of Death
2.5) Yes, by transfering Potency damage to the target, withstood by Stamina. You can arguably do it with Weaving of Life as well,

Yay, I though it was fine, but sometimes I just feel like double checking. I don’t know why but vampiric healing necromancy seemed like it should be a thing.

or transfer the lastest Potency turns of damage via Time's purview of change (resisted by Composure)

Wait…What? Time can do that?…Wow. I guess I never thought about transferring causality of events before with Time. Time is way broader than I thought. (Granted, Time is my second worst Arcanum in comprehension)

3 & 4) I feel like it would be a Weaving of Forces with Potency determing how much, but not sure how that translates mechanically. I also feel you are thinking of replicating some of the abilities of Accelerator from Index.

Probably. I mean, that’s pretty much how I think I would use Forces in game, Force, Light, and Gravity are my favorite Forces. I’d also use Forces veiling to block light pollution whenever I wanted to see stars. I’m trying to plan on how to in game make it to Alpha Centauri (and not take 400 years).
(Side question: it has been forever since I watched “A Certain Magical Index”. I think I stopped fairly early on, I remember being annoyed by the amnesia drama and the fan service…did it ever get any better after that?)

[TempleBuilder]

This would probably change your referential for movement, since you would be targeting your speed in relation to something else than the ground. That means you would have to also calculate the resulting movement in relation to the same reference.

It would be pretty unpredictable, and would only work towards a distinct direction than the one you're already moving, but for space travel could give you a pretty decent starting point for a motion away from the sun/quasar. For moving around them, though, it would just keep you in stationary orbit.

Yeah, I’m *really* not thrilled to use these because they really complicates matters, but at the same time, they were the most effective of my apparent options for interplanetary and interstellar travel. Honestly seems especially easy to screw up, and that would be extremely bad with this amount power. That said, a perfectly stationary orbit could be useful somehow.

[monteparnas]

Yeah, I’m *really* not thrilled to use these because they really complicates matters, but at the same time, they were the most effective of my apparent options for interplanetary and interstellar travel. Honestly seems especially easy to screw up, and that would be extremely bad with this amount power. That said, a perfectly stationary orbit could be useful somehow.

Well, your purpose is rocket science. Which actually gives you an advantage.

Your character will probably screw up if they try it on intuition alone, but we do have the science and calculations for that kind of stuff. You can probably use mundane but specialized skills and computers to figure out moment and local of departure and a route to achieve your goal.

From the two ideas you had, robbing momentum from another object will be the most efficient, since momentum is speed in relation to mass. So when you manage to rob momentum from a heavier object you'll accelerate more than that object, while redirecting your own vector won't give you that much astronomically speaking. Earth's orbit is still too slow for interstellar travel, slower actually than our current space crafts (otherwise they wouldn't manage to reach anywhere).

Gravitational slings are a thing to consider, too, and you can manipulate them with Forces. Also, remember that once in space you won't have friction robbing you of speed, so any increase in speed during the trip is permanent.

[KaiserAfini]

Yay, I though it was fine, but sometimes I just feel like double checking. I don’t know why but vampiric healing necromancy seemed like it should be a thing.

Wait…What? Time can do that?…Wow. I guess I never thought about transferring causality of events before with Time. Time is way broader than I thought. (Granted, Time is my second worst Arcanum in comprehension)

Probably. I mean, that’s pretty much how I think I would use Forces in game, Force, Light, and Gravity are my favorite Forces. I’d also use Forces veiling to block light pollution whenever I wanted to see stars. I’m trying to plan on how to in game make it to Alpha Centauri (and not take 400 years).
(Side question: it has been forever since I watched “A Certain Magical Index”. I think I stopped fairly early on, I remember being annoyed by the amnesia drama and the fan service…did it ever get any better after that?)

Ironically, Forces is the Arcanum I have the most trouble with by a wide margin, whereas Time and Fate are the most intuitive.
Time is how we frame reality. So you could use a Weaving (same principle as Shifting Sands) to rewrite who received a change. The chair across the room received the damage from the attack, not you. The Seer didn't persuade his werewolf ally out of a frenzy, but was talking to the the potted plant in the corner. Weave the conditions to interact with objects in the timeline and you get temporal phasing.

Even Veiling can have multiple angles. Used broadly on your entire past can make you Anonymous or Untouchable by mundane investigations. Creating disposable and airtight Alternative Identities is also simple. Veil yourself entirely from being detected in the present and you make Temporal Invisibility. Alternatively, capture Potency turns of actions and falsify your present self with a realistic looping temporal echo to make an Acanthus Alibi. You can also make people think its a specific time of day in order to control guard shifts or use a Ruling so they loop their actions, making them think its the first time they did something and they see things as they were when they did it.

In Patterning, you can mix Temporal Stutter with Fate's ability to read intentions to create a container that sends things to the future and retrieves exactly what you want (provided it fit in there), a temporal bag of holding.

Even Shielding is great, invert Veil of Moments to make sure all natural healing stops, no food is processed, no rest is sufficient and negative condition timers do not advance. A Ruling can make bleedout from lethal and aggravated damage happen in much smaller intervals, half per Potency level or a quarter for a Reach. Use a Weaving to put that into a bullet and foes fall from blood loss immediately after the first hit. Place a powerful version into a lunargent bullet and even a veteran werewolf will go splat in moments.

Time is pretty great, to me the least explored part of its purview is change. Whereas for Fate the same is true for intentions, like Knowing a person's long term intentions (Aspirations and Obsessions) or Unveiling their current intentions (what do they want from this scene ? Do they intend to lie to me ?), distorting or even altering the details of their intentions can be surprisingly helpful. I think its one of the reasons why a dedicated Acanthus can be disturbingly precise and terrifying when pushed.

Index has gotten a lot better and the animation is still solid, I think its worth a watch, Regarding Alpha Centauri, so long as you have visual via telescope, satellite or the like, they are all valid targets for Co-Location. Alternatively, if you can find a place, time or Mystrery related to it, maybe there is a Emanation realm for it, which could lead to a shortcut to the real one. Its still an unexplored infinite dimension, but if anything, that is just more incentive for mages to poke around the unknown

[TempleBuilder]

Well, your purpose is rocket science. Which actually gives you an advantage.

Your character will probably screw up if they try it on intuition alone, but we do have the science and calculations for that kind of stuff. You can probably use mundane but specialized skills and computers to figure out moment and local of departure and a route to achieve your goal.

Yeah, any character I do this with will be way better at this than me, that’s for sure. I just have my basic physics understanding, but it’s fun to try to do this. I’m leaning towards wanting Time 2 so I can do precise motions, and I can set up the majority of spells in advance.

From the two ideas you had, robbing momentum from another object will be the most efficient, since momentum is speed in relation to mass. So when you manage to rob momentum from a heavier object you'll accelerate more than that object, while redirecting your own vector won't give you that much astronomically speaking. Earth's orbit is still too slow for interstellar travel, slower actually than our current space crafts (otherwise they wouldn't manage to reach anywhere).

Well, nothing says I just have to use only one type. Hmm I’m going to have to do so more math to figure out exactly how much momentum I need, and it’s relative amount compared to the Earth. Also I feel inexplicably guilty about stealing momentum from the Earth. I know this is pretty much how Gravitational slings work and they barely affect anything, but it still feels wrong somehow.

Gravitational slings are a thing to consider, too, and you can manipulate them with Forces. Also, remember that once in space you won't have friction robbing you of speed, so any increase in speed during the trip is permanent.

Very true. For Interstellar travel, I’m probably going to need them to reach anything like the speed I want. That said, I’m going to need to reduce my velocity somehow if I don’t want to just skip right past whatever I want to explore. Hmm, I wonder if I can get a teapot in a stable orbit between Mars and Jupiter. That would be amusing.

Ironically, Forces is the Arcanum I have the most trouble with by a wide margin, whereas Time and Fate are the most intuitive.

That’s pretty awesome though, you totally have a Acanthus (Acanthian?) mindset. I’m pretty close to a Orbimos mindset, Forces and Truth are my best, but my worst is Spirit. I just don’t get Spirit ecologies. I have all the puzzle pieces, I just can’t put them together. I really feel like you need to know a entire area, to a crazy level of detail before you can make the local Shadow. And without getting the context of the Shadow, I can’t do Spirit very well.

Time is how we frame reality. So you could use a Weaving (same principle as Shifting Sands) to rewrite who received a change. The chair across the room received the damage from the attack, not you. The Seer didn't persuade his werewolf ally out of a frenzy, but was talking to the the potted plant in the corner. Weave the conditions to interact with objects in the timeline and you get temporal phasing.

I’m going be honest, this makes my brain hurt.I think I understand how this works, especially since you explained it, but the concept of this really doesn’t do good things to my head.

Even Veiling can have multiple angles. Used broadly on your entire past can make you Anonymous or Untouchable by mundane investigations. Creating disposable and airtight Alternative Identities is also simple. Veil yourself entirely from being detected in the present and you make Temporal Invisibility. Alternatively, capture Potency turns of actions and falsify your present self with a realistic looping temporal echo to make an Acanthus Alibi. You can also make people think its a specific time of day in order to control guard shifts or use a Ruling so they loop their actions, making them think its the first time they did something and they see things as they were when they did it.

Veiling is probably the best practice after Weaving, I can think of tons of thing you can do with Veiling from all the Arcanum. You can veil your past, and present? What about further Veiling your future so people can’t know what you are planning? The Alibi is actually pretty cool. The Veiling of daytime is actually the only one on the list I’ve thought of before. Now I had (very wrongly) considered that the limit of usefulness of Veiling Time. The loop is cool if you need to waste someone’s time, useful in a fight too. Why is Forces everyone’s go to combat Arcanum, Time seems way more combat oriented? In a fight, sheer brute force is nice, but precise timing is much better.

In Patterning, you can mix Temporal Stutter with Fate's ability to read intentions to create a container that sends things to the future and retrieves exactly what you want (provided it fit in there), a temporal bag of holding.

*sound of my brain breaking, again* what? I guess that makes sense if I think about it, but how in the world did you think this up? The Free Council in my games is so going to be selling these now.

Even Shielding is great, invert Veil of Moments to make sure all natural healing stops, no food is processed, no rest is sufficient and negative condition timers do not advance. A Ruling can make bleedout from lethal and aggravated damage happen in much smaller intervals, half per Potency level or a quarter for a Reach. Use a Weaving to put that into a bullet and foes fall from blood loss immediately after the first hit. Place a powerful version into a lunargent bullet and even a veteran werewolf will go splat in moments.

See above about Time being more combat focused than Forces? This is why.

Time is pretty great, to me the least explored part of its purview is change. Whereas for Fate the same is true for intentions, like Knowing a person's long term intentions (Aspirations and Obsessions) or Unveiling their current intentions (what do they want from this scene ? Do they intend to lie to me ?), distorting or even altering the details of their intentions can be surprisingly helpful. I think its one of the reasons why a dedicated Acanthus can be disturbingly precise and terrifying when pushed.

Acanthus are the most terrifying Mages, and always have been in my opinion. Sure, Orbimos can just flat out kill you, and Moros can just outright kill you (or leave you permanently on the verge of death) and rip out your soul, and Thyrsus can make every living moment agony, and Mastigos can do worse than all the others and get you from your friends, but only Acanthus can get you at any time in your life. Have a perfect hidden pocket dimension? You weren’t always in it. Stupid heavy ward? Had to cast it at some point. Going to heal all damage? They are just going either just speed up how much damage you take, or remove you from the timeline.

Index has gotten a lot better and the animation is still solid, I think its worth a watch, Regarding Alpha Centauri, so long as you have visual via telescope, satellite or the like, they are all valid targets for Co-Location. Alternatively, if you can find a place, time or Mystrery related to it, maybe there is a Emanation realm for it, which could lead to a shortcut to the real one. Its still an unexplored infinite dimension, but if anything, that is just more incentive for mages to poke around the unknown

All of these are good answers, but I have always imagined having to set up way points so others can teleport to whatever location I’m going to. Hmm, the Emanation realm isn’t a angle I had considered. I will think more on that. I’m probably still going to try it the Obrimos way just to see how bad it is. (I will give Index another try)

[Satchel]

*sound of my brain breaking, again* what? I guess that makes sense if I think about it, but how in the world did you think this up? The Free Council in my games is so going to be selling these now.

I would advise taking Afini's suggestions with a grain of salt; they tend to be a bit power-creep-y vis-a-vis their assumptions of how the metaphysics work compared to published example spells.


I'd also like to point out that the way the setting is described, you're going to need a pretty strong Anthropic Principle justifying travel outside the solar system in material reality as a Storyteller, because to all available evidence it's mostly empty space and barren landscapes as in real life, and other dimensions usually provide the requisite novelty or alien-ness for greater returns without having to go nearly as far afield.

That is to say, if you're going to spend a significant portion of your game trying to get light-years away in objective time and space, you'd better have something to do there that's worth dedicating camera time and gameplay to, especially if there are other players for whom extrasolar exploration is not a focal activity nor something they have the means or motive to help you with.

Obsessions relate specifically to mages' drive to explore the supernatural, and other sources of Arcane Beats are similarly magically-oriented — figuring out how to use magic to facilitate superluminal travel, searching for ruins of the Time Before on other planets, researching the planetary angels that occasionally make their way to the terrestrial Shadow from across the void, investigating the relationship between space and the Abyss, and so on are all going to keep a mage's enlightened attention, as might more particular and esoteric things, but just Trying To Go To Space isn't going to advance your Gnosis or strengthen your grasp of the Arcana.

Which isn't to say "don't try to go to Alpha Centauri" so much as "bring it back to magic in some way and make sure the story can have a worthwhile payoff if this is more than a distant dream you're planning to end the chronicle on."

[KaiserAfini]

TempleBuilder Thank you, glad you liked them. A part of them come from thinking in how to do cool things from other Arcana in an Acanthus way. It leads to some terrifying possibilities, like forcibly creating or adapting Dedicated Tools on the fly.

Another one is to use Patterning so you don't suffer negative changes, at all. So apart from making indestructible Grimmoires and unbreakable Sanctum walls, the most terrifying thing is applying it on living subjects. Walking barefooted in a volcano, swimming in the lava and breathing in the toxic fumes ? Sure, no problem. Taking a walk through no man's land while being hit by cross fire and stepping on land mines ? Meh, not even a real challenge. Stepping between two angry dueling spirits and shouting them down ? All part of the job, how else will they understand that The Silver Ladder is the path to victory ? Essentially this is a variation of the Eternal Object spell from 1ed.

Inspiration wise, I am currently in a homebrew D&D campaign where our DM is mixing elements of Destiny, Dark Souls, Re:Zero and Genshin Impact with a lot of lore from all editions. Chronomancers and dunamancers are on top of mind, since they had a big impact in the backstory (the previous master chronomancer / greater god of time was basically Destiny's Clovis Bray mixed with FMA's Father). There is a reason 2ed chronomancy was considered insanely powerful and even the 5ed chronurgy is very strong. The Awakened can do a lot of those spells without archmastery. He is doing an incredible job, so I have time magic on top of mind, which inspired me to see what kind of original spells I could come up with. But yeah, my ideas do tend to be power creepy, partially because I keep wondering how mages would push the limits of the Arcana and how to come up with new and interesting veins of them to explore.

As for useful resources, I highly recommend the lore of Destiny, especially about the Vex, their take on sci-fi time magic is brilliant. Byf is a great lore channel for that.

I would particularly love to make the Vault of Glass and the Vex into a Wending of Prime/Truth, Space and Time. After all, its not just about "fixing" the Abyss, but doing so in such a way that the Exarch can't have free reign to send down unlimited resources (ochemata, Artifacts, etc) to complete their conquest. What happened to the archmage who created that ? Don't know, probably locked away somewhere. Some kind of Time and Space Legacy and some Artifacts would probably be linked to it, just so I could throw in a few elements of the Infinite Corridor from the Castlevania animated series.

[TempleBuilder]

I'd also like to point out that the way the setting is described, you're going to need a pretty strong Anthropic Principle justifying travel outside the solar system in material reality as a Storyteller, because to all available evidence it's mostly empty space and barren landscapes as in real life, and other dimensions usually provide the requisite novelty or alien-ness for greater returns without having to go nearly as far afield.

I’m fine with there being void. Personally I’d love to examine the symbols of the Heliopause, and I’m still really curious if one can manipulate near total void with Death. Frankly, there are tons a magical experiments one can do with complete void. Heck, maybe there are Hallows in the void. Granted the Mana those generate probably would in no way be safe.

That is to say, if you're going to spend a significant portion of your game trying to get light-years away in objective time and space, you'd better have something to do there that's worth dedicating camera time and gameplay to, especially if there are other players for whom extrasolar exploration is not a focal activity nor something they have the means or motive to help you with.

Even with a very generous estimation for how fast I can get a ship to go, I’m probably looking at at least 40 year journey to the closest star system. That is a rather long time. The best way to deal this with seems to be a Colocation that adjusts ones relative velocity to match that of the other side. Which means I definitely will need a ship with life support for other to visit in. At worst it will be like a pocket dimension my Mage hangs out in too much.

Obsessions relate specifically to mages' drive to explore the supernatural, and other sources of Arcane Beats are similarly magically-oriented — figuring out how to use magic to facilitate superluminal travel, searching for ruins of the Time Before on other planets, researching the planetary angels that occasionally make their way to the terrestrial Shadow from across the void, investigating the relationship between space and the Abyss, and so on are all going to keep a mage's enlightened attention, as might more particular and esoteric things, but just Trying To Go To Space isn't going to advance your Gnosis or strengthen your grasp of the Arcana.

I mean, all this is very true. I guess I need to define the Obsession better then. There unlimited things to try and figure out in Physical Outer Space. Physical Outer Space in general seems to not be much of a concern for most Mages. And that makes it worth exploring on it’s own. Who really knows what we might find. I mean, the Exarchs made probably want us to stay put on Earth, why not see what they don’t want us to see?

Which isn't to say "don't try to go to Alpha Centauri" so much as "bring it back to magic in some way and make sure the story can have a worthwhile payoff if this is more than a distant dream you're planning to end the chronicle on."

Fair. If I’m going to really devote chronical time to this, it seems interplanetary travel is my best bet for something that is both interesting to everyone and takes relatively little time. I think I can reasonably get that time down to about a month and a week round trip for Saturn, two weeks with a colocation back. That’s reasonable for down time in a chronicle, right? Or a story?

[TempleBuilder]

New question:
I remember the long term nimbus itself being untouchable, but is it possible to weave other effects in addition to it, or have an effect spread like a long term nimbus? Or is it completely outside of a Mage’s reach?

[Satchel]

New question:
I remember the long term nimbus itself being untouchable, but is it possible to weave other effects in addition to it, or have an effect spread like a long term nimbus? Or is it completely outside of a Mage’s reach?

The Long-Term Nimbus is a narrative convention for "Path-appropriate supernatural phenomenon tend to be attracted to a mage's sympathetic connections based on their Wisdom and the maintenance of their Shadow Name. You can certainly have an effect target things a mage has a sympathetic connection to, but making effects that "spread" in general is the domain of Dynamics spells and thus limited to archmagic.

I’m fine with there being void. Personally I’d love to examine the symbols of the Heliopause, and I’m still really curious if one can manipulate near total void with Death. Frankly, there are tons a magical experiments one can do with complete void. Heck, maybe there are Hallows in the void. Granted the Mana those generate probably would in no way be safe.

I'm curious about what those experiments might be, but as mentioned, you're going to have to get to that point first, whether by having seen something in your Periphery in a photo or through a telescope or by being given a revelation during your Awakening; there's a reason one of the most evident long-term project-oriented mages is a type of barrow-lich that wakes up every few decades to do astronomy.

Even with a very generous estimation for how fast I can get a ship to go, I’m probably looking at at least 40 year journey to the closest star system. That is a rather long time. The best way to deal this with seems to be a Colocation that adjusts ones relative velocity to match that of the other side. Which means I definitely will need a ship with life support for other to visit in. At worst it will be like a pocket dimension my Mage hangs out in too much.

Symbolically speaking, a place is a place, and "matching relative velocity" is more the sort of complication that arises from Paradox or poorly-placed boundaries. The inside of a moving vessel is still the inside of a vessel.

More prosaically, this is getting into the matter of creating your character in a way that allows them to be involved with the rest of the cast and interact with whatever other plot comes their way; "guy who wants to take a decades-long journey into the great unknown" tends to be more interesting in the preparatory phase (that needs outside assistance or hard study in a related field) or as an NPC who's most of the way there already (e.g. a lich who's bound their soul to a soul-stone in transit and is leveraging old or borrowed sympathies to relay information back to their collaborators). It's important not to get too caught up in the abstract and wind up producing something that doesn't interact with the rest of the game.

I mean, all this is very true. I guess I need to define the Obsession better then. There unlimited things to try and figure out in Physical Outer Space. Physical Outer Space in general seems to not be much of a concern for most Mages. And that makes it worth exploring on it’s own. Who really knows what we might find. I mean, the Exarchs made probably want us to stay put on Earth, why not see what they don’t want us to see?

This seems to be committing the cardinal mistake of assuming the Exarchs are responsible for every inconvenience humans have ever encountered, when the more probable explanation is that most terrestrial life emerged and/or adapted on Earth and does not perform well in an exposed vacuum with no gravity.

Also, I think the bigger reason not as many mages (at least among the published example characters) are concerned with Physical Outer Space is because its conditions can be replicated with existing spells and the space program is people-intensive in a way that presents something of an obstacle to overt meddling. You can find vacuum and zero-gravity in nature (and if not, store-bought magically-produced is fine), and the shortcuts similar things from the Abyss or the Depths can take make them less of a shot in the dark to access if there's anything out there to look at personally (instead of by grabbing samples and sympathetic connections from the space program or reachable mage-astronomers).

Fair. If I’m going to really devote chronical time to this, it seems interplanetary travel is my best bet for something that is both interesting to everyone and takes relatively little time. I think I can reasonably get that time down to about a month and a week round trip for Saturn, two weeks with a colocation back. That’s reasonable for down time in a chronicle, right? Or a story?

I think developing the magical and/or mundane expertise needed to survive most aspects of space travel and/or extraterrestrial exploration can get you a decent daisy-chain of Obsessions to build along for a game; lord knows you wouldn't have too much trouble fitting into the Arrow's ethos of self-refinement, for example.

[TempleBuilder]

The Long-Term Nimbus is a narrative convention for "Path-appropriate supernatural phenomenon tend to be attracted to a mage's sympathetic connections based on their Wisdom and the maintenance of their Shadow Name. You can certainly have an effect target things a mage has a sympathetic connection to, but making effects that "spread" in general is the domain of Dynamics spells and thus limited to archmagic.

“Is the domain of Dynamics”, so very much out of reach.

I'm curious about what those experiments might be, but as mentioned, you're going to have to get to that point first, whether by having seen something in your Periphery in a photo or through a telescope or by being given a revelation during your Awakening; there's a reason one of the most evident long-term project-oriented mages is a type of barrow-lich that wakes up every few decades to do astronomy.

Alright let’s see, off the top of my head: is void a symbol -> is void a material like shadow is for death -> does the interstellar medium count as void (there is technically stuff in it)-> can there be perfected void -> do patches of it exist in the interstellar medium or galactic voids like perfected metals do sometimes in ore -> what occult properties does perfected void have
Is there resonance in the void between stars -> is it plentiful because there is a lot of void, or is it thin because it’s void resonance -> is it possible that ley lines run between stars -> are these lines tainted by void resonance or perhaps defined by it. -> can Hallows or Nodes form from intersections of these ley lines and ( if so what kind)
Is the interstellar medium a potent yantra -> is there a difference between the yantra some of the Star Dust by itself produces and that of both the void and the dust
what prevents the teleportation by telescope.-> Do the threads of Sympathy get eroded by the void->

Stuff like that. I’m sure if I spent more time I could come up with more.
Actually being a barrow-lich isn’t a bad idea, if I can’t manage to get a higher top speed. Maybe even if I can. I’d be leaving everyone behind, or maybe almost everyone. But it would let me go very far indeed.

Symbolically speaking, a place is a place, and "matching relative velocity" is more the sort of complication that arises from Paradox or poorly-placed boundaries. The inside of a moving vessel is still the inside of a vessel.

This makes sense. At least I don’t have worry about it being complicated.

More prosaically, this is getting into the matter of creating your character in a way that allows them to be involved with the rest of the cast and interact with whatever other plot comes their way; "guy who wants to take a decades-long journey into the great unknown" tends to be more interesting in the preparatory phase (that needs outside assistance or hard study in a related field) or as an NPC who's most of the way there already (e.g. a lich who's bound their soul to a soul-stone in transit and is leveraging old or borrowed sympathies to relay information back to their collaborators). It's important not to get too caught up in the abstract and wind up producing something that doesn't interact with the rest of the game.

I will remember this. If I ever get to play Mage as a player, I will keep this mind.

This seems to be committing the cardinal mistake of assuming the Exarchs are responsible for every inconvenience humans have ever encountered, when the more probable explanation is that most terrestrial life emerged and/or adapted on Earth and does not perform well in an exposed vacuum with no gravity.

Eh, I was thinking about how populations are easier to control if they all are in relatively the same space. I don’t doubt that the Exarchs probably didn’t cause the void between stars to be so big, but I’m betting they benefited or are benefiting from it. There is probably “a stay at home” ministry. Probably extremely minor, though.

Also, I think the bigger reason not as many mages (at least among the published example characters) are concerned with Physical Outer Space is because its conditions can be replicated with existing spells and the space program is people-intensive in a way that presents something of an obstacle to overt meddling. You can find vacuum and zero-gravity in nature (and if not, store-bought magically-produced is fine), and the shortcuts similar things from the Abyss or the Depths can take make them less of a shot in the dark to access if there's anything out there to look at personally (instead of by grabbing samples and sympathetic connections from the space program or reachable mage-astronomers).

True, but to see how things are outside of controlled conditions requires going there. Plus, look how mystery packed Earth is. I’m sure there is plenty of crazy stuff just out of sight, even in the sky.

I think developing the magical and/or mundane expertise needed to survive most aspects of space travel and/or extraterrestrial exploration can get you a decent daisy-chain of Obsessions to build along for a game; lord knows you wouldn't have too much trouble fitting into the Arrow's ethos of self-refinement, for example.

hmm, the Arrow? Honestly, didn’t really think of myself that way. I do like self refinement, but I’m a pacifist, and dislike physical confrontation. I’ve always seen myself happy in between the Silver Ladder, the Mysterium, and the Free Council. I believe, everyone, even people I disagree with should have the chance to awaken, if they want. I’m no leader, and some of my worst nightmares are me being in command, but I’d support someone who I’d think would do a good job. I’d also like to just be able to pursue my Obsessions and bring back information for what ever order I was in. Still, wouldn’t be the first time I failed to account for some aspect of myself.

[21C Hermit]

“Is the domain of Dynamics”, so very much out of reach.

You can visit one of the Aeons of the Arcana in the Anima Mundi to petition for Auctoritas (Signs of Sorcery). One possible form of Auctoritas is a +1 dot in the Aeon's Arcanum for one single spell. The +1 dot trumps Gnosis and Path limits... I assume this means a Master (5-dot) can cast a Dynamics (6-dot) spell once.

I glossed over the science parts of magical astronautics, but the main problem I see here is Paradox. IIRC, a sidebar in Dark Eras 2 mentioned the ocean's vicissitudes forcing extra Reach on certain uses of Fate, Time, and Space magic. I wouldn't be surprised to see the yawning gap of the void of outer space forcing similar, if not worse, Reach restrictions on certain Forces, Space, Time spells. Not to mention possibly having to use Advanced Scale and Advanced Duration on top of those.

But hey, summoned Supernal Entities have infinite Reach, and another form of the Auctoritas is casting one single spell of the Arcanum without Paradox no matter what...

hmm, the Arrow? Honestly, didn’t really think of myself that way. I do like self refinement, but I’m a pacifist, and dislike physical confrontation. I’ve always seen myself happy in between the Silver Ladder, the Mysterium, and the Free Council. I believe, everyone, even people I disagree with should have the chance to awaken, if they want. I’m no leader, and some of my worst nightmares are me being in command, but I’d support someone who I’d think would do a good job. I’d also like to just be able to pursue my Obsessions and bring back information for what ever order I was in. Still, wouldn’t be the first time I failed to account for some aspect of myself.

You could go straight to the Vidanti within the Arrows. I don't remember much of their 1E form, but for 2E they were mentioned off-hand out-of-book as a Nameless Order inside the Arrow, reserved for people who can't follow their tenets any more. It's more like a retirement program, though, so I suspect the Arrow would still put you in a magical boot camp at the least. (Or whatever their initiation is; I really need to reread the 1E orderbooks...)

[Isator Levi]

You can visit one of the Aeons of the Arcana in the Anima Mundi to petition for Auctoritas (Signs of Sorcery). One possible form of Auctoritas is a +1 dot in the Aeon's Arcanum for one single spell. The +1 dot trumps Gnosis and Path limits... I assume this means a Master (5-dot) can cast a Dynamics (6-dot) spell once.

Although I think there's an implicit or explicit premise that granting somebody access to Imperial spells with the Auctoritas does not automatically convey understanding of the Quintessence required to cast them.

That being said, there are Artifacts that can cast Imperial spells, and I've never seen any suggestion that those would require Quintessence. If the pirate Nameless of Nassau could use an Artifact that shut down all Yantras based on authority within a certain area, I'd say somebody could acquire an Artifact with a power that spreads out.

I glossed over the science parts of magical astronautics, but the main problem I see here is Paradox. IIRC, a sidebar in Dark Eras 2 mentioned the ocean's vicissitudes forcing extra Reach on certain uses of Fate, Time, and Space magic. I wouldn't be surprised to see the yawning gap of the void of outer space forcing similar, if not worse, Reach restrictions on certain Forces, Space, Time spells. Not to mention possibly having to use Advanced Scale and Advanced Duration on top of those.

Although I find myself wondering if the Mysteries about such travel in that book are supposed to persist into the modern day; if mages did not find some way to resolve them at some point.

You could go straight to the Vidanti within the Arrows. I don't remember much of their 1E form, but for 2E they were mentioned off-hand out-of-book as a Nameless Order inside the Arrow, reserved for people who can't follow their tenets any more. It's more like a retirement program, though

Yeah, I think they're more like a kind of tradition within the Order's systems then a separate embedded Order.

...Although calling them a Nameless Order within sounds vaguely like the kind of thing DaveB would say... I'll look back into it.

For the time being though, I'd say that with the Order as written, the Adamantine Arrow would simply not accept avowed pacifists into their ranks. I think the corebook line about being willing to look upon peace as a greater challenge to achieve means that they can make some allowances for people who are highly reserved about the use of violence or dedicate themselves to resolution of conflicts without it, and the Order book itself talks about many aspects of what they do that are not strictly to do with fighting (one that I find interesting is the Arrow as element in a Consilium deadlocked by an excess of intrigue that gets people back on task), but they reject people who specifically not only reject all use of violence but view it as a moral wrong.

[monteparnas]

Also I feel inexplicably guilty about stealing momentum from the Earth.

Steal it from space debris, man-made or natural. Forget about Earth or the redirection of your own speed vector, this is too much work for too little pay-off.

Instead, just use fuel and then steal momentum from space rocks. You're trying to come up with the most complex answer by doing it with magic alone.

Rockets use tonnes of fuel because they need to accelerate tonnes of fuel. You can magic the energy out of the fuel and not carry the weight. Asteroids are relatively common and high speed, and the big ones will be so many times your weight, vessel included, and you can guilty-free steal all their momentum. Plan your trip to pass through a few select targets and that's it, 1.000 Km/h stolen from a rock 100 times your mass will give you 100.000 Km/h because we're magicking physics out of the equation.

Stripping energy/mass equivalence and other bits out of the equation simplifies your predicament immensely, and you can simply throw your excess momentum somewhere else when you arrive at your destination. There's no reason to think the trip will take more than a year with magic at your disposal.

But Satchel is right that you need to think through how this whole idea plays a role on the story. Unless it is a solo game or a novel/fiction you're writing, in which case you can enter suspended animation and don't care about the time.