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[Dataweaver]

Should if give Scale +1 to anything besides size and strength? If so, why?

[Dataweaver]

Two of the Potential Recruits for the Disparate Alliance were originally introduced as sorcerer factions. Given that there's no official S20 book, I think it's a near-certainty that they'll be reinvented as mage factions if they end up getting included. That does potentially open the door for other sorcerer factions to similarly be reinvented and included.

[Dataweaver]

The Lore of the Traditions KS just released the chapter for the Celestial Chorus, and they just did something that I've had as a house rule ever since the Syndicate Revised Convention Book came out: the Chorus's view of Prime gives them access to a variation of the Node that's not unlike the Ventures of the Syndicate.

Presented as an optional rule, these Stable Wellsprings are brought about by active religious communities bringing together emotion, belief, and hope. Where Syndics are required to invest in a Venture in order to tap into it like a Node, a Chorister participates in...

[Dataweaver]

Mage the Ascension uses a similar tracking system, with one to five dots and the fifth dot being Mastery. I think they may even use the same ladder of names; I'd have to check to be sure. As far as I know, though, no organization in Mage bothers with “how many Spheres do you know?” when deciding someone's status in the group: there's no “fourth degree apprentice”; there's just “apprentice”.

[Dataweaver]

Upvoted for this. If you look for holes, you'll find them, no matter what system you're dealing with....

[Dataweaver]

From past experience, use “fair use” guidelines. I've had no problem in the past with quoting those parts of the text that are directly relevant to what's being discussed; but doing an infodump of whole sections of a chapter (let alone whole chapters) is a no-no.

Put another way, you can be fairly confident that Onyx Path won't have a problem with you if your post effectively doubles as free advertising for them (whetting people's appetites and making them want to back it); but they will have a problem if your post discourages people from considering backing it (“why should I bother...

[Dataweaver]

They've already established that they'll be providing two: Faces of Magick, which is a Who's Who of the Traditions; and Forgotten Ones & Forbidden Orders, which looks like it's going to be the Disparates. I don't expect that we'll be getting any more.

But my wish list would be an M20 Book of Madness. It's now the only “faction” without a book (or the promise of one) in M20.

[Dataweaver]

The Akashic Record is a central element of the Akashi Paradigm, and is described in Lore of the Traditions as “the cosmic repository of information”. The Akashayana house it to measure an event's karmic balance: how good or bad it was.

I don't know what the chapter on the VAs will say; but the Revised Tradition Book for them talked about the Hypersphere as a realm of pure information in which the Digital Web resides.

Could the Hypersphere of the Virtual Adepts and the Akashic Record of the Akashayana be the same thing, seen differently through each Tradition's Fo...

[Dataweaver]

The Stretch Goal that was just unlocked a few hours ago was:

Forgotten Ones and Forbidden Orders
A collection of lesser known but no less magickally potent orders, traditions, cults, and gatherings of mages, from the Ahl-i-Batin to Ngoma (and some in between) will be created and released as a small M20 PDF Supplement. All Kickstarter backers receiving the M20 Lore of the Traditions PDF will automatically have this PDF added to their reward list.

Basically, the beginnings of a Lore of the Disparates/M20 Book of Crafts has just been achieved; I expect that later Stretch Goals will include some...

[Dataweaver]

I was fourth to pledge. The campaign was funded in 62 minutes, and hit its first stretch goal a little over an hour later. As I write this (less than an hour after the first stretch goal was hit, and about three hours into the campaign), we're about $250 away from the second stretch goal.

[Dataweaver]

More of a sequel than a revised edition; but yes. Which is why it got an Appendix in Wr20 addressing it.

[Dataweaver]

As far as that's concerned, there's also the MRev version of the Blessed Background, which is basically a mystical version of Enhancement. That is: of you want a passive Effect, one way to get it is to use the Wonder rules with yourself as a Living Foundation for it. Requires Life and Prime in addition to whatever Spheres are required for the passive Effect, and comes with drawbacks.

It also doesn't require or come automatically with Mastery of a Sphere, which is why I didn't think of it earlier.

[Dataweaver]

Let's see: the Orphan-Grinder Horrors include one that lets you sense spectres and hide from them, one that lets them summon and ride spectral mounts (Hellions), and one that lets them possess ghosts. Are there any Dark Arcanoi like that? I might use Collogue as the closest Wraith counterpart to Oblivion's Husk, possibly adding a few powers to it to represent a wraith's ability to hide from spectres; and I might replace Vector with Contaminate. My first idea for replacing Hellion would be a reflavored Argos.

I'd rather not add new Shades of I can help it; and I think I can avoid...

[Dataweaver]

To borrow a bit from file system terminology: is the moment in question moved from another timeline? Or is it copied? Both “taken” and “borrowed” implies that it was removed from somewhere, either permanently or temporarily; but there's nothing saying that it was.

[Dataweaver]

Canonically, I think it's more along the lines of the Talent subconsciously choosing which path into the future to take, rather than “switching moments” with alternate presents. Though I could be wrong about that.

[Dataweaver]

As I understand it, Quantum Aura is supposed to represent things like the Human Torch's “flame on”, but generalized to allow for other kinds of damaging effects besides fire. Use that as a guide: touching the Human Torch will result in getting burned. Likewise, touching someone using Quantum Aura inflicts the appropriate damage to whoever touches it. This works both ways: if you grab the Human Torch's arm, you get burned. If he grabs your arm, you get burned.

It helps to keep in mind what a given Quantum Power is supposed to represent, and not get too bogged down in the precise wording...

[Dataweaver]

Returning to this, I think I found a few more Shade errata. When comparing the Pathos, Willpower, and Angst modifiers to the starting Vitality, Spite, and Willpower in Orpheus, Wr20 got the Pathos and Willpower modifiers for the Banshees and the Wisps backwards. It also gave the Marrow more Pathos and less Willpower than its Endgame counterpart; though I think this was deliberate, as otherwise the Marrow would have the same Pathos/Willpower/Angst modifiers as the Phantasm.

For the record, the Orphan-Grinders would have Pathos +1, Willpower +3, and Angst +2.

A further...

[Dataweaver]

Orpheus is a corporation that specializes in techniques for interacting with the dead. Its agents include two kinds of Projectors: Sleepers (think “Flatliners”) and Skimmers (people capable of projecting their ghost-forms through meditation and/or drugs), as well as ghosts. Orpheus was originally a separate gameline that came out four years after Wraith ended; but Wr20 includes an appendix allowing you to approximate it in Wraith terms....

[Dataweaver]

Even the latter part of the first question (developing a drug that allows projecting) is the stuff of Orpheus. As for the first part of the first question, one of the ghost hunter groups has exactly such a ritual: the Benadante.

[Dataweaver]

Are you familiar with Orpheus?