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[Ambrosia]

Well, the chart essentially gives you (successes - 1) x 2 damage. I think it's a bit unclear wording. When it comes to healing or quintessence channeling, it works in pretty much exactly the same way - except it's healed health levels or drawn quintessence. It's all more simple than it seems

Personally I also use the chart when it comes to Mage vs. other-Sphere counterspelling, contested rolls and the like.

[Ambrosia]

Fighting trousers of course! (The time travel trousers might also be a good second choice). Good for gaining respect in those duels in umbrood courts.

[Ambrosia]

Trinkets are essentially faux-wonders. That is, the resulting object is magically changed, but it in itself is no wonder.
See: Bulletproof hoodie made with the matter sphere. It's still the best example.

So no, a Trinket can't do that - a charm could though, and technically it's already possible to give you extra health levels with Life 3 alone. So Prime 3, Life 3 would allow for making charms that temporarily give those extra levels.

[Ambrosia]

Small correction, the total damage in V5 in that baseball bat example is 3 Superficial damage. Superficial (i.e. non-bladed/non-piercing/non-gun weapons) gets halved for *everybody* in V5 - the halving is not vampire exclusive anymore from the looks of it. Aggravated (i.e. lethal damage) weapons though have become even nastier, in the way that you describe. Full damage, no soaking mechanism. Against vampires, that damage turns superficial however - so, halved.
For mortals, things have become nastier there - while they weren't able to soak lethal/agg before either, now that damage is higher...

[Ambrosia]

Good catch there!...

[Ambrosia]

Nope, in Revised it was Life 4. And the Verbena Revised Handbook gave that Tradition the speshul ability to heal others with Life 3 already - if it is bashing damage.

There was a Mage Revised FAQ later that somehow says 'As implied with the writeup of Life 3 you can heal others with it', but I think whoever answered that question in the FAQ completely missed the Life 4 and Verbena writeup somehow, as both of those directly contradict that.

On that note, I'm glad M20 moved that back down to Life 3....

[Ambrosia]

In M20? Nah, Time 5 allows proper travelling back in time. Howeverrrrrr it (probably very intentionally) does not talk about the concepts and theories of multiple timelines, branching possibilities etc.
I think the VE's mention Everett Volumes though.

I think it's very very safe to say that the past of a current timeline can't be changed - else a random powerful Mage could literally undo everything.
However, it even allows for further thought experiments.

Consider a Mage that drops an anchor in their current time, travels back, does things, and travels forward...

[Ambrosia]

I personally agree that the Archsphere system in the Horizon book is better than the one in Masters Of The Art. A single new level 6 that enhances and boosts the sphere's normal effects by a great deal.
It would need some subtle rewriting for things like the Life sphere, because in M20 it allows full Metamorphosis on others at 5 already, and the Time sphere because M20 allows backward travel at 5 already as well - but for the most part the Horizon system just works, and it works fine in the way that it simply takes the previous sphere levels and turbocharges them by essentially allowing...

[Ambrosia]

And you're wrong.


Which is..mostly moot in actual gameplay, really.
At the tables I've been at, in 99% of cases the ST handwaved Dominate rolls against low-WP targets because they're so easy, and the rolls they actually had players roll were all WP 5+ anyways - which were all the special mooks, notable enemies, plot-important people, other Supernaturals...literally all the stuff where it actually matters or there's a challenge.

In the end, STs seldomly toss anything lower than 6 WP at you where it actually matters for the campaign or plot. They don't give...

[Ambrosia]

Statistically it happens in around 8% of cases at 8 dice and default difficulty 6. Which doesn't sound like much until you realize that's about every 12th roll or so. Far from a Freak accident. The 1s-remove-successes system is pretty much to blame.
EDIT: Just checked. Without the 1s-take-successes mechanic, that'd shrink to about 0.4% at that difficulty. Mind you, in V5 I think that mechanic *is* gone, and replaced by the messy criticals.....

[Ambrosia]

That's entering Vampire/Werewolf Crossover-Land. Your Mage *literally* wants to beat capital-G GOD and/or one of the three fundamental forces of Reality itself. That's far beyond 'epic'.

That's not a matter of a simple set of rolls - Archspheres or not - but should be the subject of a whole *campaign*, Storyteller fluff, perils, pitfalls, quests and absolutely epic achievements.

If it was just a matter of having some Archspheres and doing enough rolls to literally beat God, that Mage also could singlehandedly end the Ascension War by themselves at any time....

[Ambrosia]

Quite frankly, with M20 the Spheres at level 5 are so open-ended and flexible, there is no real *need* for Archspheres.
All it takes is enough successes and creativity. Your Archmageness comes from your high Arete stat and dropped instruments - because I dare you to tell an Arete 8 Mage who can do most things without even needing to snap fingers, that they are 'Not a real Archmage'.
Now, getting those tons of successes for the really godlike feats might be the hard part - and it *should be* - but technically there is no actual need for those 6+ Spheres.

[Ambrosia]

Iteration X 1st ed page 48 describes it as using Mind 2 to temporarily reduce Willpower for the duration of the effect, and it is actually resisted with a Willpower roll diff 7.
It is a sort of Rote that is aimed at humiliating or depressing the victim, and that's a case where Mind 2 makes very much sense, as it is used to affect emotions - however, this is a social rote, not a combat rote.

Similiar NWO 1st ed also uses Mind 2 for a sort of psychic weaking of resolve.

Syndicate 1st ed has a similiar psychic rote, though this one uses Life 3 + Mind 3 to have a Syndicate...