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Message no. 1
From: Kismet kismet-sr@****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 21:05:25 -0700
We recently decided to try out White Wolf's Mage: The Ascension. (I know, I
know, most people play SR after playing through WW but we're strange.)
Anyway, I couldn't help but notice A LOT of similarities between the worlds.
Their Virtual Adepts are a lot like Deckers, Riggers-Sons of Ether, etc. I
was wondering which game came first?

Also, I would like an antidote to whatever hypnotic device is implanted in
FASA's materials that makes it impossible to switch games. I know that there
has to be one, and that you guys know the secret. How else do you explain
that SR has 300+ websites and Mage has 30 or so and NO mailing list!?

Kismet
Message no. 2
From: Sebastian Wiers m0ng005e@*****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 21:56:51 -0500
:We recently decided to try out White Wolf's Mage: The Ascension. (I know, I
:know, most people play SR after playing through WW but we're strange.)
:Anyway, I couldn't help but notice A LOT of similarities between the
worlds.
:Their Virtual Adepts are a lot like Deckers, Riggers-Sons of Ether, etc. I
:was wondering which game came first?

Shadowrun, by a longshot. Shadowrun existed before White Wolf (as an
entire company) did, afaik.

:Also, I would like an antidote to whatever hypnotic device is implanted in
:FASA's materials that makes it impossible to switch games. I know that
there
:has to be one, and that you guys know the secret. How else do you explain
:that SR has 300+ websites and Mage has 30 or so and NO mailing list!?
:
:Kismet


Honestly, I think its in large part because SR has a lot of positive
points (mostly in the area of allowing players to failry easily identify
with characters) that other games lack. There was a whole thread about this
not to long ago. Check the archives 4-19-00, "What is it about Shadowrun".
I think boiled down to the fact that SR allows players to failry easily
identify with characters, while still providing a very "different" world.
The net presence of Shadowrun is impressive, but its also heavy for SR's
sales volume (this was more true before SR3 pumped sales up over 30K). It
seems to attract a lot of (or unsually productive) netizens, relative to
sales.
As fnord secret hypnotic techniques, I could tell you, but I'd fnord
have to kill you.

Mongoose

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Message no. 3
From: Shadowboy 88 shadowboy88@*******.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 22:30:51 CDT
I've not tried White Wolf, what's that like, and yes shadowrun came out in
the late 80's with the first edition, I know I have that book, as well as
the second. As for the third, well it wasn't all to much like shadowrun to
me. I didn't like the fact that the corperate war ended but the shadow
projects were still needed. It defeated the purpose of the original game in
my opinion.

-Shadowboy88
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Message no. 4
From: Phil pames@*****.net
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 22:39:12 -0500
At 10:30 PM 6/13/2000 CDT, you wrote:
>I've not tried White Wolf, what's that like, and yes shadowrun came out in
>the late 80's with the first edition, I know I have that book, as well as
>the second. As for the third, well it wasn't all to much like shadowrun to
>me. I didn't like the fact that the corperate war ended but the shadow
>projects were still needed. It defeated the purpose of the original game in
>my opinion.
>
>-Shadowboy88

<Peer?> Corporate War ended? There's a lot more players in the triple A
tier, and the defined a lot of the lesser megas. Heck. Corporate Warfare,
is, if anything, even more widespread. Especially with the Fuchi split.
Lots of bad blood between the old heads to play with, there.

Phil
Message no. 5
From: caelric@****.com caelric@****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 20:42:27 -0700
At 10:30 PM 6/13/00 CDT, Shadowboy wrote:
>As for the third, well it wasn't all to much like shadowrun to
>me. I didn't like the fact that the corperate war ended but the shadow
>projects were still needed. It defeated the purpose of the original game in
>my opinion.

/sarcasm
Oh? The Corporate War ended? So the corporations don't fight anymore?
Really? Thats a new one on me.

/sarcasm off

Just because their is no 'declared' 'corporate war' doesn't mean the corps
aren't still fighting. Accoring to SR3 canon, they most assuredly are
still fighting, unless of course you have changed it in your game.

Dave
Message no. 6
From: Shadowboy 88 shadowboy88@*******.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 22:59:02 CDT
To my understanding after Fuchi splint into Novatech, Fuchi asia, and
LegacyTrax, that Renraku would be unfathomed in the computer field until I
learn about the Arcology shutdown. That set them back but Villars is a mega
corp play and he's very passive. Sure he's trying to get Fucki asia and
LegacyTrax burried so he has the only remaining Fuchi split, but technacally
the war's over between the Corps. And by the way you're wrong, the
corperations needed shadowrunners to deal in the only commodity some corps
had, Information, hence deckers, as well as Sabitoge, hence everyone else,
that's why shadowrun can be violent. The GM that I played under before I
became a GM always told me the rules of the shadows are never trust a suit,
an do things that you believe in, not anything else anyone tells you.

-Shadowboy88
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Message no. 7
From: Josh Harrison mataxes@****.net
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 00:04:52 -0400
----- Original Message -----
From: Kismet <kismet-sr@****.com>
> We recently decided to try out White Wolf's Mage: The Ascension. (I know,
I
> know, most people play SR after playing through WW but we're strange.)
> Anyway, I couldn't help but notice A LOT of similarities between the
worlds.
> Their Virtual Adepts are a lot like Deckers, Riggers-Sons of Ether, etc. I
> was wondering which game came first?

First Edition SR premiered in 1989. Mage: The Ascension was first released
in 1993.

And I don't think the similarities are that striking, yeah the Virtual
Adepts are kind of deckerish, but that's really a trope of the cyberpunk
genre, and not exclusively a Shadowrun property. I personally don't see much
smilarity between the SOns of Ether and riggers, myself.

I have to say that Mage is the one WoD game that I most wanted to like, but
I ultimately found it disappointing. The magic system in SR works. After
half a dozen read throughs, I still can't get a handle on how magic in M:tA
operates. I get it from a game mechanics perspective, but from the setting
end of things? Sorry. This strikes me as a major flaw in the writing.
Supposedly the third edition clears some of this up, but I haven't bothered
to take a look yet.

-- Josh
Message no. 8
From: Alfredo B Alves dghost@****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 23:35:34 -0500
On Tue, 13 Jun 2000 21:05:25 -0700 "Kismet" <kismet-sr@****.com> writes:
<SNIP>
> Also, I would like an antidote to whatever hypnotic device is
> implanted in
> FASA's materials that makes it impossible to switch games. I know
> that there
> has to be one, and that you guys know the secret. How else do you
> explain
> that SR has 300+ websites and Mage has 30 or so and NO mailing
> list!?

There isn't one. But all hope is not lost. The hypnotic device doesn't
prevent you from playing other systems in addition to SR ... ;)

--
D. Ghost
Profanity is the one language all programmers know best
- Troutman's 6th programming postulate.

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Message no. 9
From: Augustus shadowrun@*********.net
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 22:13:22 -0700
----- Original Message -----
From: Sebastian Wiers <m0ng005e@*****.com>

>
> Shadowrun, by a longshot. Shadowrun existed before White Wolf (as an
> entire company) did, afaik.
>

Not that it makes any difference, but I was just gonna say that White Wolf
(as a company) was around before Shadowrun... but up until 1990/1991 they
were just a magazine company (at the time of Shadowrun's Release, they had
only printed 15 issues of the magazine)

Just some useless trivia to clutter up the minds out there that still have
spare room...


Aug
Message no. 10
From: Ahuizotl cuellare@*******.net.mx
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 02:15:38 -0500
....
> Their Virtual Adepts are a lot like Deckers, Riggers-Sons of Ether, etc. I
> was wondering which game came first?

Shadowrun as far as I know.

>
> Also, I would like an antidote to whatever hypnotic device is implanted in
> FASA's materials that makes it impossible to switch games. I know that
there
> has to be one, and that you guys know the secret. How else do you explain
> that SR has 300+ websites and Mage has 30 or so and NO mailing list!?
>
> Kismet
>
O dear god he found it....

Ahuizotl
Message no. 11
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 10:32:45 +0200
According to Shadowboy 88, at 22:30 on 13 Jun 00, the word on the street
was...

<GridSec reminder>Please quote the relevant parts of the message you are
replying to, as I've done here with your post.</GridSec reminder>

> I've not tried White Wolf, what's that like

It's a big game publisher. I have no real idea what they're like as a
company, though the few WW employees I've chatted with at cons were nice
enough...

Oh, you mean their games? Pretty good, if you like semi-dark games for
which you need to buy multiple books to really play them :) Mage is
probably my favorite of the various WW games I've played or read, but the
others I play with tend to favor Vampire.

> and yes shadowrun came out in the late 80's with the first edition, I
> know I have that book, as well as the second. As for the third, well
> it wasn't all to much like shadowrun to me.

How so? It has basically the same rules as SRII, but adjusted for better
playability, and the game's background (which is what makes it Shadowrun,
after all) remained unchanged. I admit I didn't like all of the changes
that were made, but then again, I didn't like all of SRII's rules, either.

> I didn't like the fact that the corperate war ended but the shadow
> projects were still needed. It defeated the purpose of the original game
> in my opinion.

Regardless of whether there's a true corporate war on, the (mega)corps
will keep trying to outdo each other, so shadowrunners will continue to be
needed. No change there, either...

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Here come the golden oldies. Here come the Hezbollah.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
->The Plastic Warriors Page: http://shadowrun.html.com/plasticwarriors/<-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+(++)@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X++ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 12
From: Kismet kismet-sr@****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 07:40:08 -0700
----- Original Message -----
From: Josh Harrison <mataxes@****.net>
To: <shadowrn@*********.com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 13, 2000 9:04 PM
Subject: Re: SR vs White Wolf's Mage



> First Edition SR premiered in 1989. Mage: The Ascension was first released
> in 1993.

Thanks for clearing that up guys. White Wolf must have one hell of an
advertising department. I remember hearing about them long before Shadowrun,
but that may just be a Texas thing. A lot more people here play WOD games
than SR (at least the gamers locally)
.
> And I don't think the similarities are that striking, yeah the Virtual
> Adepts are kind of deckerish, but that's really a trope of the cyberpunk
> genre, and not exclusively a Shadowrun property. I personally don't see
much
> smilarity between the SOns of Ether and riggers, myself.

My perceptions may be screwed up by the "hypnotic device", when we were
reading through the rules for mage, we kept saying-"so those are this games
version of_______". I know that a lot of things in the WOD come directly
from legends, and If you don't know that they are legends you see
similarities. For instance, I thought the Seelie Court was something made up
for Shadowrun, but it's from faerie legends.

>
> I have to say that Mage is the one WoD game that I most wanted to like,
but
> I ultimately found it disappointing. The magic system in SR works. After
> half a dozen read throughs, I still can't get a handle on how magic in
M:tA
> operates. I get it from a game mechanics perspective, but from the setting
> end of things? Sorry. This strikes me as a major flaw in the writing.
> Supposedly the third edition clears some of this up, but I haven't
bothered
> to take a look yet.

I only just started playing and I have the Third Ed rules. They must have
cleaned things up a lot because the system IMO, is much easier than SR.
There are no "spells" you can do anything with magic. The game requires a
lot more imagination on the players part, and this will probably screw up
the 'plan everything down to the minute detail' GM's. The setting is pretty
cool. There are SOOO many enemies!, and because it's set in our present, you
get to use current news for your story idea's without having to fudge so
much to fit it into 2060. The other thing about the setting I really like
is that you don't have to pigeon hole characters. Your characters goals make
the game and the setting gives you hundreds of possibilities. I also like
the fast that there is tons of background information already there. The
other World of Darkness games-Wraith, Vampire, Werewolf, and Changeling, all
work in the same world, so you can throw those conspiracies in whenever you
want.

So if I like it so much why will I still play SR? I would miss Lofwyr and
Harlequin too much.

Kismet
Message no. 13
From: Raveness Ravensbane ravenessravensbane@*****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 06:28:40 -0700 (PDT)
> <SNIP>
> > Also, I would like an antidote to whatever
> hypnotic device is
> > implanted in
> > FASA's materials that makes it impossible to
> switch games. I know
> > that there
> > has to be one, and that you guys know the secret.
> How else do you
> > explain
> > that SR has 300+ websites and Mage has 30 or so
> and NO mailing
> > list!?
>
> There isn't one. But all hope is not lost. The
> hypnotic device doesn't
> prevent you from playing other systems in addition
> to SR ... ;)
>
> --
> D. Ghost

No, the hypnotic device simply makes you want to play
roleplaying games all the time. I mean, I usually
don't care if we play SR, Earthdawn, D&D, Torg, GURPS,
Legend of the Five Rings, Traveller, Mech Warrior,
Seventh Sea...whatever! I just wanna play! *begins
shaking uncontrollably, voice shifts to that of a
demonic monster* AND I WANNA PLAY NOWWWWW. *voice
shifts back as she goes into tears* It's been more
than a month, and they promised... *the clouds break
and a beam of light lands on her* August, GenCon!
*stands raising fist like in Gone with the wind*
There's always GenCon! There IS hope for me yet! I'll
never go without roleplaying, not me or any of my
kinfolk, not if I have to beg, promise to do household
chores or even *shudder* go *in disgust* camping. I'll
never go without roleplaying again! *transparent
gencon flag waving behind her*


====~Raveness

http://www.sova.net/trish/roleplaying/shadowrun/pocketsecretary/

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Message no. 14
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 19:14:19 +0200
According to Kismet, at 7:40 on 14 Jun 00, the word on the street was...

> I only just started playing and I have the Third Ed rules. They must have
> cleaned things up a lot because the system IMO, is much easier than SR.

Wait until you actually get to play *g* You'll spend a lot of time
thinking about how to justify the "anything" you can do with magick.
That's not to say anything is impossible, though -- just that you have to
be much more careful with magick than in SR.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Here come the golden oldies. Here come the Hezbollah.
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
->The Plastic Warriors Page: http://shadowrun.html.com/plasticwarriors/<-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+(++)@ UL P L+ E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X++ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 15
From: Josh Harrison mataxes@****.net
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 17:47:03 -0400
----- Original Message -----
From: Kismet <kismet-sr@****.com>
> I only just started playing and I have the Third Ed rules. They must have
> cleaned things up a lot because the system IMO, is much easier than SR.
> There are no "spells" you can do anything with magic. The game requires a
> lot more imagination on the players part, and this will probably screw up
> the 'plan everything down to the minute detail' GM's.

While the WW system does allow you to do anything, I find (at least in 2nd
Ed.) that the boundaries between the spheres are vague, and it is possible
for the same effect to be done with different spheres (especially at the
higher power levels). this may be the intention, but I don't like it. The
interaction between spheres is a little vague as well, IMO.

If you ask me, the best "do anything" magic system out there is Ars Magica.
It was owned by White Wolf at one point (now Atlas Games has it, and its in
its 4th edition) and is *clearly* the game that inspired M:tA. The
similarities between the magic systems are obvious, save for one crucial
difference -- Ars Magica is fairly clearly defined. You know what the
boundaries of the "spheres" are (called "arts").

But I think my biggest complaint about M:tA is that the magic system doesn't
really get you into the mindset of the spellcaster, and there are almost
*no* limit placed on what you can do, save what you develop for a character
concept. In theory, you can't cast magic that doesn't fit your paradigm, but
the enforcement of this is left *entirely* to the discretion of the GM and
players. In theory this isn't a bad thing, but it invites abuse, and I've
seen more abuses of magic in M:tA than in any other system I've ever
encountered.

At least SR gives clear cut boundaries, and doesn't solely rely on GM
adjudication to limit spell ability.

-- Josh
Message no. 16
From: Sidhe tirnanog@****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 18:13:14 -0700
||Wait until you actually get to play *g* You'll spend a lot of time
||thinking about how to justify the "anything" you can do with magick.
||That's not to say anything is impossible, though -- just that you have to
||be much more careful with magick than in SR.
||
||Gurth@******.nl

especially considering that in 3rd edition the technocracy won the ascension
war so now humanity is pemanently stuck in the technological era they are
now, with no room for "wondrous" and "magickal" improvements. this
means, as
gurth says, that justifying magickal effects to be coincidental so as to
avod paradox is much much harder.

.me
Message no. 17
From: Ahrain Ahrain-Drigar@**********.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 23:30:33 -0400
----- Original Message -----
From: Raveness Ravensbane <ravenessravensbane@*****.com>
Subject: Re: SR vs White Wolf's Mage


> No, the hypnotic device simply makes you want to play
> roleplaying games all the time. I mean, I usually
> don't care if we play SR, Earthdawn, D&D, Torg, GURPS,
> Legend of the Five Rings, Traveller, Mech Warrior,
> Seventh Sea...whatever! I just wanna play! *begins
> shaking uncontrollably, voice shifts to that of a
> demonic monster* AND I WANNA PLAY NOWWWWW. *voice
> shifts back as she goes into tears* It's been more
> than a month, and they promised... *the clouds break
> and a beam of light lands on her* August, GenCon!
> *stands raising fist like in Gone with the wind*
> There's always GenCon! There IS hope for me yet! I'll
> never go without roleplaying, not me or any of my
> kinfolk, not if I have to beg, promise to do household
> chores or even *shudder* go *in disgust* camping. I'll
> never go without roleplaying again! *transparent
> gencon flag waving behind her*

*heart fely sigh, with fluttery eye lashes* "Where have you been all my
Gaming Life.....?" *Sigh* : P

Ahrain
Message no. 18
From: Ahrain Ahrain-Drigar@**********.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2000 23:35:56 -0400
----- Original Message -----
From: Kismet <kismet-sr@****.com>
Subject: Re: SR vs White Wolf's Mage


> My perceptions may be screwed up by the "hypnotic device", when we were
> reading through the rules for mage, we kept saying-"so those are this
games
> version of_______". I know that a lot of things in the WOD come directly
> from legends, and If you don't know that they are legends you see
> similarities. For instance, I thought the Seelie Court was something made
up
> for Shadowrun, but it's from faerie legends.

Unfortunaltey, I have a tendancy to describe things about other systems this
way.

> I only just started playing and I have the Third Ed rules. They must have
> cleaned things up a lot because the system IMO, is much easier than SR.
> There are no "spells" you can do anything with magic. The game requires a
> lot more imagination on the players part, and this will probably screw up
> the 'plan everything down to the minute detail' GM's. The setting is
pretty
> cool. There are SOOO many enemies!, and because it's set in our present,
you
> get to use current news for your story idea's without having to fudge so
> much to fit it into 2060. The other thing about the setting I really like
> is that you don't have to pigeon hole characters. Your characters goals
make
> the game and the setting gives you hundreds of possibilities. I also like
> the fast that there is tons of background information already there. The
> other World of Darkness games-Wraith, Vampire, Werewolf, and Changeling,
all
> work in the same world, so you can throw those conspiracies in whenever
you
> want.

In truth I actually use WoD as my supernatural background in my SR games.
So far my players have loved it. I use Werewolf (a fav), and Vampire
mostly. I may start using Hunter: the Reconing as soon as I buy it.

Now, I don't use it as a focus, I am running SR not WoD, but it seems to
mesh a little better IMHO. I have always had a prob with the general
"Shapeshifter and Vampire" in SR, but then again I like the supernatural
aspect more than the cyber anyway. Biased I guess.
Message no. 19
From: Steve Collins einan@*********.net
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 00 19:33:28 -0500
On 6/13/00 11:04 pm, Josh Harrison said:

>
>I have to say that Mage is the one WoD game that I most wanted to like, but
>I ultimately found it disappointing. The magic system in SR works. After
>half a dozen read throughs, I still can't get a handle on how magic in M:tA
>operates. I get it from a game mechanics perspective, but from the setting
>end of things? Sorry. This strikes me as a major flaw in the writing.
>Supposedly the third edition clears some of this up, but I haven't bothered
>to take a look yet.
>
>-- Josh

MAGIC IN M:tA is kind of wierd. On one hand it is obvious that someone
involved in creating the system knew something about Quantum Physics
because it is all based on the observer influencing reality. That is why
it is easier (less paradox concerns) to do obvious magic effects when no
one is looking, there is no other observers influence on reality to
overcome. On the other hand it is obvious that they knew absolutely
nothing about science. The fact is that at 5 circles the Matter and
Energy spheres become interchangable and Entropy can duplicate anything
you can do in either of them plus a few extra things. The Life sphere
should really not exist either as except for artificial game mechanic
reasons Biology could very easily be controled at an electro-chemical
level by any of the previous 3 spheres. Another problem with the Entropy
sphere is that realistically it is nearly impossible for it to ever be
obvious and therefore an Entropy adept really doesn't have to worry much
about Paradox.

There is no such thing as a "spell", you just describe what you want your
character to do and if the GM decides if the power of the effect is
appropriate for your level of skill in the appropriate sphere and wether
it fits within your characters paradigm or not. If he approves he assigns
a target number. You could as a player come up with a list of commonly
used effects and think of it like a spell list if you wanted but unless
for some reason your player believed that they were limited to those
effects (for example a character who believed that the source of his
magic relied on a spell book) it would represent just a fraction of your
characters power.

This system has some advantages in a group with very good players and a
good GM, but 1 Munchkin or a GM (storyteller) who doesn't know as much
about the system and to some extent science as the players can ruin the
game for everybody. It is especially dangerous for Munchkins because it
is actually very easy given the description of the spheres for any
character with 5 dice in either Entropy, Energy, or Matter to simply walk
around and cause large nuclear blasts and it could be possible at 4 dice.


Steve
Message no. 20
From: losthalo brucekitty@*****.com
Subject: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 15:24:25 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Re: SR vs White Wolf's Mage
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 00 19:33:28 -0500
From:
To: "Shadowrun List" <shadowrn@*********.com>
Reply-To: shadowrn@*********.com

Steve Collins <einan@*********.net> wrote:
>On 6/13/00 11:04 pm, Josh Harrison said:

>MAGIC IN M:tA is kind of wierd. On one hand it is obvious that someone

>involved in creating the system knew something about Quantum Physics
>because it is all based on the observer influencing reality. That is
>why
>it is easier (less paradox concerns) to do obvious magic effects when
>no
>one is looking, there is no other observers influence on reality to
>overcome. On the other hand it is obvious that they knew absolutely
>nothing about science.

I believe you are mistaken. One of the problems I had with
understanding the game was just this, thinking as if science rules
everything in the Mage setting. It does not. When a Verbena (for
instance) believes that Life is a principle and a type of things
entirely different from Matter, she is right (to her). Reality to
willworkers is very subjective, very open to interpretation, and thus
very malleable. That is how Sons of Ether can ignore "standard"
science and concentrate on the possibilities that ether and other
"edgy" science offer them (cold fusion, for example :). Playing or
running Mage requires the players to think of reality as up for grabs,
science is only one way of interpreting what we see, and at the same
time, think about particular characters' paradigms (way of seeing
reality. All of which is very interesting and a big mental
challenge...

>The fact is that at 5 circles the Matter and
>Energy spheres become interchangable and Entropy can duplicate
anything
>you can do in either of them plus a few extra things. The Life sphere
>should really not exist either as except for artificial game mechanic
>reasons Biology could very easily be controled at an electro-chemical
>level by any of the previous 3 spheres. Another problem with the
>Entropy
>sphere is that realistically it is nearly impossible for it to ever be

>obvious and therefore an Entropy adept really doesn't have to worry
>much
>about Paradox.

This is not true, except by a very literal reading of the rules (which
brings problems in any WOD product, since they're meant for gamers
who're interested more in story than rules...). The comments about
turning vampires into lawn furniture in the Book of Shadows are a good
example.

>There is no such thing as a "spell", you just describe what you want
>your
>character to do and if the GM decides if the power of the effect is
>appropriate for your level of skill in the appropriate sphere and
>wether
>it fits within your characters paradigm or not. If he approves he
>assigns
>a target number. You could as a player come up with a list of commonly

>used effects and think of it like a spell list if you wanted but
unless
>for some reason your player believed that they were limited to those
>effects (for example a character who believed that the source of his
>magic relied on a spell book) it would represent just a fraction of
>your
>characters power.

>This system has some advantages in a group with very good players and
a
>good GM, but 1 Munchkin or a GM (storyteller) who doesn't know as much

>about the system and to some extent science as the players can ruin
the
>game for everybody. It is especially dangerous for Munchkins because
it
>is actually very easy given the description of the spheres for any
>character with 5 dice in either Entropy, Energy, or Matter to simply
>walk
>around and cause large nuclear blasts and it could be possible at 4
>dice.

Actually, scale becomes a big issue in the second edition, not to
mention the number of successes needed to pull off a "nuclear blast" or
the equivalent.

Granted, Mage gives characters a lot of power, but it is up to the GM
and the players to mold the sort of game they want, the WOD rules don't
do a lot of the work for the GM. The theory is rules get in the way.
WOD assumes a mature GM and mature players who can do without rules,
much the same as SR (in my opinion).

To bring this remotely back on topic :), I think SR's continuing trend
of increasing the range of magical tradition types is a good idea, but
at the same time I don't enjoy the Mage-like "anything goes as a
paradigm" approach that it's moving toward. Characters modeled after
Jedi Knights and superhero comic book characters don't really charm me.

Further, I think that Magic's place in the SR world can get blown out
of proportion easily, especially given the supposed rarity of it.

One last note, on the subject of "variant" approaches to Magic, what
about variant approaches to, say, insect totems? Since variations on
the classical SR totems were mentioned somewhere (MitS I think), what
about non-horrific takes on Insect totems where the magician isn't a
pawn of the insect spirit hives?

Losthalo (and another thing...)

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Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about SR vs White Wolf's Mage, you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

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Thwap!