Reaching the Next Level [Mage: The Awakening]

Mage: The Awakening, Open Development

Attainments!

Early in the discussions around a new edition of Awakening‘s ruleset, the team expressed a desire to tidy up some of the exceptions and secondary effects built into the system – things like Sympathetic casting, Aimed Spells, Spell Triggers, Counterspell, Summoning. Anything that was magical, but didn’t strictly speaking follow the magic rules.

Some of them – like aimed spells, and the effects of High Speech and runes – have been folded into our Yantra and Spell Factor systems. Mage Sight is no longer a spell but a key part of the mage template, like the shapeshifting rules in Werewolf.

If you’ve played first edition Awakening, you’ll be familiar with all the things that require certain Arcanum ratings. These made up the largest set of secondary rules we had, and laying them all out in a list it became very clear that there was almost one for every dot of every Arcanum.

So, naturally, we decided to write new ones for the handful of dots that didn’t have associated effects, and organize them all into one section of the book. They’re not exactly the same thing as the powers gained through Legacies, but they’re still powers mages get as they become more experienced, as a consequence of raising one of their two magic traits. So they’re still “Attainments.”

Unlike Legacy powers, these Attainments don’t have costs. You get them when you buy Arcanum dots. Because of that, they’re one of the things that distinguishes mages of different ranking. When writing the Attainments, we had to bear in mind that a character will almost always get the first two with any Arcana they have, while the fourth-dot ones represent being an Adept.

While we’ve severely dialled back on how many spells cost Mana, Attainments use it quite a bit. They’re not the largest source of expenditure, though – that would be Mage Sight.

And, as they’re the most-requested spoiler, here’s a list.

First Dot: Counterspell

As in first edition, mages who see other mages casting spells can attempt to Counterspell if they know the correct Arcana. As second edition doesn’t divide spells as covert or vulgar, you can attempt to counter any spell, as long as you have Active Mage Sight up to see them cast. Countering uses the Clash of Wills rules you might be familiar with from other second edition games, and costs Mana if the mage you’re countering has a higher Arcanum rating than you.

Second Dot: Mage Armor and Lesser Utility Attainments

We’ve gone back and forth on Mage Armor in writing and redlines, trying to find a happy level of expenditure and protection; we had weak mage armor you could spend Mana on to make strong for a scene, but that proved both fiddly and terribly difficult to balance different Arcana against one another. The version we’ve got now costs one Mana per scene, but is pitched to be worth it, mechanically. Every Arcanum has a different Mage Armor, useful in different situations. For example, Death Armor makes the mage react to damage like a vampire, downgrading wounds to bashing, while Time Armor adds to your Defense and you can spend Mana on a successful dodge to reduce your opponent’s Initiative.

The Lesser Utility Attainments contain some long-term players will recognize, like Sympathetic Range and Hung Spells. Some used to be spells, like Universal Counterspell for Prime. Some, like Death and Spirit, allow the mage to see things in the appropriate form of Twilight when using their Mage Sight. We’ve used the remaining ones for balance tweaks to some of the Arcana – the Matter 2 Attainment means Matter spells don’t require Reach to use Advanced Duration.

Third Dot: Targeted Summoning

All mages can summon Supernal Entities once they become Disciples. Summoning was first described in the sourcebook “Summoners,” but in second edition it’s made it into the corebook as a template ability. This Attainment means that, for example, an Obrimos who has Mind 3 can summon angels who have Mind as their secondary Arcanum.

I should note that this isn’t summoning ghosts, goetia, or spirits – those are still spells.

Forth Dot: Greater Utility Attainments

The majority of the new powers we’ve invented for second edition come here, extrapolated from the two we already had. Unbound Fate was a power Fate Adepts had in first edition where they could Counter unwanted changes to their destiny; converting that into second edition’s Counterspell mechanics means it becomes a Clash of Wills, and that got us thinking about what other Arcana could allow you to Clash. We also had some systems that we didn’t want to keep as spells, the Prime (pun intended) example being Imbue Item. Making Imbuing an Attainment rather than a spell has allowed us to design a proper system for it that uses extended actions, as it was one of the most confusing aspects of the previous rules.

Here’s the Death one:

Death: Inviolate Soul

The soul of an Adept of Death is almost impossible to affect, let alone harm or dislodge. The mage can reflexively repel deleterious magic that will or could harm her soul.

System: The mage can reflexively use this attainment under the following circumstances:

— Her soul is being tampered with or attacked.

— Something attempts to alter or influence her Nimbus or aura.

— A ghost attempts to use its powers with her as the target.

Using Inviolate Soul requires that the player spend a point of Mana. The character enters a Clash of Wills (p. XX) pitting her Gnosis + Death against the Gnosis + Arcanum of the incoming spell (if the incoming effect is not a spell, use the appropriate dice pool).

The mage needs only the Death Arcanum to counter the attack. She doesn’t need to know all the Arcana involved in the attacking spell.

Fifth Dot: Create Rote

We’ve talked about the benefits of rotes in previous blogs, and as in last edition, Mastery gives the ability to create them. Rote creation is an extended action costing an Arcane Experience once successful. Once the mage has the rote, she can teach it to other mages directly or scribe it into a Grimoire with a Prime spell.