1000 Mage Plots

[BurritoMage]

25)Unusual swarms of cockroaches are eating homeless people, leaving them hollowed out husks.

[BurritoMage]

26) Somewhere in the projects is a door, a door where one shouldn't be and it's frame is covered in locks. Padlocks, dead bolts and chains. Some who know about the door say the locks are coming undone and it's tied to phases of the moon.

[Bluecho]

27) On the internet, a series of bots post across message boards and social media, asking the same question: Have you see the disembodied head, with white hair, blue eyes, and a scar across his nose?

No one knows who started this campaign, and most are quick to write it off as a bit of viral marketing, an ARG, or a meme no one gets the reference to. It flares into popularity as folks talk about it, making theories or parodies. Eventually, the meme fades into the background. No one had much to go on anyway, so it didn't have anywhere to grow. The bots just kept spamming their message, or variants on the message, and people learned to block or ignore them.

Then, a few months later, a few of the dedicated or lucky users began noticing something. In one city, buildings were tagged with messages akin to the meme. Except the messages verifiably date from before the first appearance of the bots. In other cities and towns across the world, people began noticing certain individuals who ask around for the blue eyed severed head. They turn over every leaf they can, asking the police, criminal groups, the homeless, journalists, and random citizens if they've seen it. In one place, a detailed drawing of an elderly man's head - complete with white hair and beard - begins to circulate, handed out by a wandering street artist.

At one point, law enforcement in a city in Saudi Arabia take issue with someone asking after people's severed heads (that the man was looking for a specific head was not relayed to them it seems), so they arrested him. They got him as far as the police station. They were found hours later, the station trashed, their heads cut off and placed in their hands. The same question - "Have you seen the severed head with the blue eyes and white hair?" - was scrawled on the station house walls, while another wall had a man-sized escape hole melted through it.

Now, someone who apparently holds up this crusade has appeared in the PCs' own town, asking around for the now notable lost head. And like many of his ilk, he has a scar around his neck, and more than a little personal power.


[The truth is that the head belongs to a Dullahan, an umbrood that appears as a headless knight. He appears to those who suffer from accidents or violence, and suffer decapitation. As their brains rapidly die, they are pulled into a misty realm, where the horseman appears and picks up their heads. He plants them atop his neck stump, and speaks to them through their own mouths. Tells them that he lost his own head, and wants it back. If the person agrees to look for it, the Dullahan will not only restore the person's head to its proper perch, but grant them supernatural gifts. Naturally, it's not really a choice at all, and many have taken the deal.

The Seekers of the Head are not Infernalists, though they receive Investments after a fashion. The Headless Knight has no interest in souls or promoting suffering. He only wants one thing: his head. It's lost somewhere in the material world, and he needs agents to find it. The agents receive a bit of power in the bargain, which can include dots in Sorcery Paths - sometimes even Spheres, should the encounter with the Dullahan trigger an Awakening. All they must give in return is their quest. The Headless Knight hounds their dreams and assaults them with hallucinations, if they aren't actively looking for the head. The one who finds it is promised a rich reward. If they shirk their duties too much, however...well, the Dullahan is quick to remind them that he gave them renewed life. He can take it away, if he so chose. He's not running a charity.]

[Muad'Dib]

28) The Glass Walkers call in a hefty debt the local Technocrats owe them and demand that one of their younger Kinfolk be Awakened by their expertise and effort. This wouldn't make the Technocrats involved that nervous except for one caveat - the tutelage given by the Technocrats to the Kinfolk must be of a mystical bent; so that the Kinfolk, as the Glass Walkers put it "Can help us deal better with the spirits of the city, among other things.".

[GogariGlenRoss]

29) The characters walk through the lobby of the building and look down at the marble floor—white marble with dark green veins—and notice that it's written in Enochian. What ancient secrets are embedded in the ancient stone? Can they bluff or sneak their way into the restricted parts of the building to see more of it?

[Saikou]

30) Why does this duck keep following us?

[Bluecho]

31) In a run-down neighborhood near the local Chantry, a derelict house lies vacant, legally abandoned and of too little value to the city to sell. But the mailbox on the door is still there, and indeed kept in good repair by parties unknown. Drop a letter, talking about one's problems or needs, and return a week later. The letter will be gone by then, replaced by a Charm enchanted with an effect that will hopefully solve the issue. Healing potions are common, and commonly asked for. As are magic bullets, spirit warding candles, temporary intelligence boosting pills, and even a disposable debit card that siphons otherwise lost fractions of cents into a single purchase or bill payment. Many mages - and some well-informed sleepers - have come to rely on the service. But, of course, creating Charms is expensive, tass-wise. So the deal with the mailbox - single-use magic for nothing - is simply too good to be true. There has to be a hidden cost to all this...


32) All throughout the state or province, high schools are being flooded with three-ring binders, filled with text photo-copied from a magical tome. It provides the bare essentials needed to teach Sorcery, specifically the first three dots of the Path of Summoning, Binding, & Warding, focused on certain elemental spirits (of fire, water, earth, and air). Naturally, the Technocracy has been busy cracking down, seizing the books and erasing memories where they can. But they frequently only find specific clutches of nascent Sorcerers after they've managed to do some damage (to others or to themselves), and the copies just keep popping up. The Union is working to track the printings to their source, but it's slow going. More pressing, however, is that various circles of students (and the occasional teacher) are wise enough not to kill themselves or others (too much), and have begun experimenting. They're starting to research on their own, to expand their knowledge. Worse yet, some groups across the state have made contact with each other, either through the internet, word of mouth, or through spirit gossip. And they're comparing notes.

Technocrat PCs, obviously, want to see these superstitionist groups stamped down. But while Traditionalist PCs may see allies, the young Sorcerers don't necessarily see the same. They have their own goals, short-sighted though they may be. Further, they've grown proud, despite how little they truly understand. They might not see the Traditions as any less controlling than the Technocrats. No, this whole affair is going to end poorly, one way or another. Perhaps that is the intention of the person or people spreading the texts around, if they aren't just of the opinion that information should be free (even dangerous info).

[BurritoMage]

33) a contact of one of the pc's has a problem. The contacts S.O swears that their infant has been replaced by some creature. Are they mentally ill or ?

[Muad'Dib]

34) A visiting Chorister head-honcho tries to draw Quintessence from the city's major religious site...yet feels only a slight tingling, which subdues at once and is replaced by a mild headache. A group of Hollow Ones comes from around a corner and offers their help in explaining this issue, that they too have noticed.

[BurritoMage]

35) over the past several months individuals participating in underground parties have been discovered in a vegetative state at the conclusion of the evening. Authorities are blaming it on a dangerous new street drug called "soul taker".

[Muad'Dib]

36) A newly initiated - yet already greatly Enlightened and skilled - Ecstatic wishes to party with the Nephandi. "Surely, if they are any reasons as to why somebody would not want to party with the Nephandi...then those reasons and issues can be fixed by partying with them, at those very parties!".

[Bluecho]

37) One of the cabal member's consors, long desiring to achieve the same Enlightenment as their master, has despaired of ever Awakening. In their desperation for true power, they are considering drastic action. Infernalism, seeking a vampiric Embrace, selling their master(s) out to the rival sect in exchange for instruction that may be more helpful, or stealing a Primer are all possible methods. How far they get towards these goals depends on how well the cabal is paying attention to their unAwakened friend.

[Bluecho]

38) Ravens have been gathering in large numbers around three locations in the city. One is the safehouse of a local Euthanatos. One is a suburban home, where a Verbana woman lives with her husband and three children. One is the high rise apartment of an up-in-coming member of the Syndicate. If someone so able speaks to the ravens, they merely say, "Papa Corvo is looking for a servant". Asking around the local Penumbra, one will be informed that the resident spirits know Papa Corvo as a powerful Raven spirit. Possibly even an aspect of the Raven Totem, though this is debatable. Whatever the case, the spirit seems very interested in these three mages. But which will be chosen for this "honor"?

[GogariGlenRoss]

39) The PCs are at a wake for the child of an NPC who they know. Bobby-Ray was a 19-year-old engineering student with a promising internship at a biotech company, but he developed cancer a few years ago and eventually had to withdraw from school because of his illness. At the wake, they see a photo of him from high school, at the peak of his health—he looks identical to the Technocracy clones/cyborgs/HITMarks that they've encountered in the past. He is the genetic donor for a cloning program?

With this method of cloning, every clone of Bobby-Ray carries a shard of his Avatar and every time one incurred Paradox, he got some of it. It eventually killed him.

What was he doing at school? What was going on at this internship? Did they did this to him? How do they investigate this without traumatizing his family, who don't know?

[Muad'Dib]

40) A Widderslainte of the Chaotic Essence and high Enlightenment has been staking out his influence around the city. His Paradigm is a bold combination of witchcraft (Both blessing and cursing, you never which one it is till you see what you are made of!) ecstatic states (He favors both LSD and cocaine, and has a Child of Knowledge making him both in thanks for sorting out the problems she had with the Technocracy.) and channeling the city's urban legends, story-weaving and folklore.

The Traditions has so far been unable to both Unweave his mystic protections and deal with the numerous people he has going around the clock for his protection. The local Technocracy is currently paralyzed by the Widderslainte's ongoing Effects that he managed to cast on their Sympathizers and interests.
The matter is further complicated by so far unidentified Kindred of the Clan Malkavian who seem to be aiding the Chaotic Widderslainte with unusual ardor (To anyone asking why they do it, they say "Well, isn't it obvious it is at least partly because he makes it look so easy..?") ; the Malkavians are covering his mistakes with social Disciplines and supplying him with Auspex-derived information.

The Widderslainte of the Chaotic Essence, when confronted about this once by a Verbena Acolyte, denied having a rank within the Nephandi - "What rank would I have? I can't be a Shaytan, I'd make a boring Adsinistratus....".