How do you think Mage 5e will play out?

[ArcaneArts]

Does singular play experience exclude crossover? I'm just starting on Awakening Core, in which the ten Spheres are grouped into five Paths that tie into other game-lines within CoD. Where can I read or watch their spokespeople explain Singular Play Experience, mocking alternatives?

Sooooooo, The Paths do not tie into other gamelines within Chronicles. The Shadow and the Primal Wild are not Related, Vampries have nothing to do with Stygia, Changeling Arcadia is not Mage Arcadia, etc. The sooner you come to terms with that, the better a time you're going to have all around, and if you wanna ask more about it, we can deal with that over in those forums.

That said, Awakening Mages derive power from seeking occult occurences and internalizing them into their overall symbol makeup, and that basically includes any and everything in the Chronicles universe, so Awakening can be played entirely with it's own material, or they can take the business and activity of other monsters as an excuse to hang out and help out. With some proper character management, it's not too bad to handle, power wise.

No comment as it relates to Ascension, either past, present, or future. While I've played Ascension a fair amount, I've never really tried it with any of the other gamelines, asides from that one time I briefly played a Fallen demon in one and my GM kept asking what the fuck I was on about certain skill rolls.

[AnubisXy]

When Paradox first started talking about acquiring the World of Darkness, one of the things they said was that they wanted "One" World of Darkness. If that's still the plan, then segments of Mage will have to be filed down so that the game can slot in with Vampire and Werewolf.

First thing, I don't think they'll want players playing as members of the Technocracy. Most likely they're going to want to roll the Technocracy back into being a somewhat vague, dangerous, shadowy organization. I really doubt they'll want to have a Technocracy where readers can make strong arguments that they're actually the heroic good guys. So I'd guess that they'll have the Technocracy go all in on being the fascist, evil, bad buys and moved squarely into NPC territory.

We'll probably see the Tradition Council broken up to some degree. I'd expect one or more Traditions would leave the Council. Then I think the Crafts become a more central part of the story and they'd be an alternative option for players to play. We could also see support for Mages who aren't part of any tradition or organization, just people who suddenly learn they have powers (sort of like the Anarch/Camarilla/Thinblood divide in V:tM). The Umbra will probably be mostly closed off - it's a scary, dangerous places where smart Mages (like the PCs) don't tread unless they have no other choice.

With the Technocracy totally ascendent and monitoring communications and most areas of modern life, and the Umbra mostly closed off, this leaves Mages as fairly isolated. You won't be able to easily do a lot of the higher-end game ideas that you could in earlier editions, pushing stories towards the street level of trying to survive in a world out to get you.

[HorizonParty2021]

Sooooooo, The Paths do not tie into other gamelines within Chronicles. The Shadow and the Primal Wild are not Related, Vampries have nothing to do with Stygia, Changeling Arcadia is not Mage Arcadia, etc. The sooner you come to terms with that, the better a time you're going to have all around, and if you wanna ask more about it, we can deal with that over in those forums.

Pardon my Hubris. It was in a homebrew YouTube chronicle that the storyteller made that association. I'm a slow reader. I will definitely be visiting the Awakening forum in due time.

That said, Awakening Mages derive power from seeking occult occurences and internalizing them into their overall symbol makeup, and that basically includes any and everything in the Chronicles universe, so Awakening can be played entirely with it's own material, or they can take the business and activity of other monsters as an excuse to hang out and help out. With some proper character management, it's not too bad to handle, power wise.

In the Ascension game I run, I told players Wraiths and Changelings exist, but are rarely encountered. I prefer any version of Mage to mostly exclude other splats.

[ArcaneArts]

In the Ascension game I run, I told players Wraiths and Changelings exist, but are rarely encountered. I prefer any version of Mage to mostly exclude other splats.

I find a lot of people prefer keeping to just the one gameline for actual games, even over in Chronicles where crossover is better supported. Advantages of building from strong themes!

On the actual subject, I don't really have expectations, except I do think they've learned some of their lessons and so won't softly encourage players to play a pedophile.

[Shakanaka]

I disagree with everyone saying they'll tone down the Technocracy in the coming dreaded "5th Edition" Mage. Parawolf hates everything too complex or non-"street-level", so I believe they're going to do the opposite of what everyone is saying: they're going to tone down the Traditions and make the Technocracy even more overpowered than what we saw in Revised. The Technocracy will fill-out the writer's proxy role of making Mage harder to play for the Traditions, just like what went on in Revised.

There would be no benefit for Parawolf to weaken the Technocracy, considering their current design philosophy nowadays from a meta standpoint. Making the Technocracy weaker and unable to enforce the conventional paradigm, means that you'd be able to emerge from forced "street-level" play to a higher form of epic-tier "play".

With no Umbra to explore (not even a pretext of an Avatar Storm, just the Umbra basically written out to nothingness) since the Parawolf developers "Unified One World of Darkness" don't want anything to do with the Umbra, Technocracy going to more bulkheaded/boosted, current Parawolf developers probably not having ANY experience with doing Mage material, and building your character up for Ascension will basically be toned down because that's non-"street-level"... basically means M5 is going to be horrible.

It all basically depends on how W5 pans out. But I think even if that goes horribly, they're still going to do whatever they're going to plan with M5. I just hope the 6th (if WoD still even exists as an active franchise) editions for all the gamelines will be significantly better than the current editions now...

[AnubisXy]

I disagree with everyone saying they'll tone down the Technocracy in the coming dreaded "5th Edition" Mage.

I don't think they're going to make the Technocracy less powerful. Rather, I think that the Technocracy is going to be presented as pretty much unbeatable. It'll fill a role similar to the Second Inquisition in V:tM to explain why Mages have to keep hidden. Mages who stand out get nailed down. It's no longer an Ascension War, the Technocracy has thoroughly won. For Mages it's about surviving in an increasingly unfriendly and dangerous world (story beats it will share with W:tA).

For example, I would expect the Technocracy's heavy hitters such as HIT-Marks to fill a similar story function that Agents did in the first Matrix movie. When they show up, the story turns into one about running away or escaping because you can't really expect to "beat" them and win.

[Asmodai]

Does singular play experience exclude crossover? I'm just starting on Awakening Core, in which the ten Spheres are grouped into five Paths that tie into other game-lines within CoD. Where can I read or watch their spokespeople explain Singular Play Experience, mocking alternatives?

Look at V5 and H5. Do those games look conductive to crossovers to you? ArcaneArts already explained it, but I'll just reiterate that the spheres are not tied into other splats. FOr the comments feel free to track Justin Achilli on twitter, and/or check out the references in the two Werewolf 5th edition threads here in the Werewolf subforum.

Paradox is not Onyxpath - right. Still, there is a small but growing audience for Technocracy games on YouTube. It could be a stepping stone toward making a series for a streaming service like Netflix. That's potential revenue. There is one called As Above So Below that was praised in the comment section for its production value. I have also read speculation that the Disparate Alliance would emerge as the heroes of the new metaplot.

Those are all small numbers. If anything is clear so far is that whatever Paradox does it will be informed by its own priorities, and those consider old material "legacy". It seems to me that the One World of Darkness isn't about the RPG's, it's just about getting the IP's into a state they want it to be in.

[Technoma]

At this point I am afraid to see it. I might have disagreed with some stuff Brucato did with Mage but I take him over Achilli everyday.

[Ragged Robin]

At this point I am afraid to see it. I might have disagreed with some stuff Brucato did with Mage but I take him over Achilli everyday.

Phils a really good writter as long as he's got a really good editor behind him, when his flights of fancy and purple prose get reigned in hes sorcerors crusade tier good. Revised has the right mix of street and gonzo imo, if you got that (which we definatly wont) it could work.

[Ramnesis]

At this point the only thing I am expecting is that is that it will be a massive shift that undermines the the idea and themes of Mage. I suspect they will massively undercut the idea of subjective reality, reduce the Ascension war to a battle for control of reality (rather than a battle for the form of reality), and strip out most of the "gonzo" elements.

I also suspect they'll double down on some of the old stereotypes that only function some of the time, like the Technocracy falling to the Nephandi, the OoH being blindly arrogant and their magics failing due to disbelief, etc.

[Ragged Robin]

At this point the only thing I am expecting is that is that it will be a massive shift that undermines the the idea and themes of Mage. I suspect they will massively undercut the idea of subjective reality, reduce the Ascension war to a battle for control of reality (rather than a battle for the form of reality), and strip out most of the "gonzo" elements.

I'm not going to lie, I'm following for two reasons firstly to see if it has any good ideas to steal and second is I love a good train wreck. I have zero expectations.

[Astromancer]

2nd edition was wonderful. But some how the designers got the idea that such an wonderous game wasn't in line with their self image. Mage: the Awakening was their vision of improvement.

Frankly, Mage and Changeling are games of hope and wonder as much as terror. Vampire, Wraith, and Werewolf are basically different.

Vampire equals the damned.

Werewolf equals the doomed.

Wraith equals the lost.

Mage and Changeling are wonder versus despair.

They don't want despair challenged anymore.

[Ragged Robin]

2nd edition was wonderful. But some how the designers got the idea that such an wonderous game wasn't in line with their self image. Mage: the Awakening was their vision of improvement.

Frankly, Mage and Changeling are games of hope and wonder as much as terror. Vampire, Wraith, and Werewolf are basically different.

Vampire equals the damned.

Werewolf equals the doomed.

Wraith equals the lost.

Mage and Changeling are wonder versus despair.

They don't want despair challenged anymore.

I run a lot of actual horror and ironically a bit of good in the world usually helps horror. The warm greeting at the Inn actually makes the haunted castle feel worse and provides actual stakes. Endless horror and misery will degenerate into dreary shit if you're not careful. It's partly what make the nephandi scary-the battle for humanities soul has stakes with them.

[Astromancer]

I run a lot of actual horror and ironically a bit of good in the world usually helps horror. The warm greeting at the Inn actually makes the haunted castle feel worse and provides actual stakes. Endless horror and misery will degenerate into dreary shit if you're not careful. It's partly what make the nephandi scary-the battle for humanities soul has stakes with them.

Agreed. The very fact that Mage can be exhilarating makes the possibilities of terror so much more intense.

[HorizonParty2021]

There are things I have to read, unrelated to gaming, that are dry and technical. After Awakening, most of the WoD/CoD related stuff is going to be from Storytellers' Vault. If they constrain the theater of play to "street level", it just encourages character creation that adapts to those scenarios. Invest Attribute points into Wits and Dexterity so you can shoot first. "Kill the Technomancer, steal his node" is a playstyle.