Mage Character Generation

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Mage House Rules

Application

Please use a new Bg section for each of the following. SEE +bghelp

A few things mage staff expects in applications are:

1. A rather decent background. I don't expect a novel, but I do expect more at least a page and a half. If nothing else
having become a mage would warrant a rather good chunk of a background. App'ing a super requires a better background
then a normal mortal, as there is much more to go into.
2. A detailed bit on your Avatar. It helps out when we need to know such info for Seekings and so on.
3. Your Paradigm, what is it? See M20th Anniversary pg 568-572, and the write-ups for your tradition
4. What about your Resonance?
5. For any other current restrictions for the sphere please review the note to applications in the Mage room in the Sphere Information Room.

Mage Factions

Open: Traditions, Disparates, Technocracy,

Closed: Marauder, and Nephandi

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Tradition Names

See house rule on Tradition names. Make sure you choose the appropriate one at chargen

Arcane

Arcane is extremely difficult to monitor in MUs. Arcane will remain a buyable background in chargen. However, Personal Arcane will only apply in regards to NPCs. Personal Arcane and Venue Arcane will not stack. Only venue Arcane will be in effect in regards to PCs.
In regards to other backgrounds, Personal Arcane affects the levels you can buy when it comes to Allies, Influence and Contacts, and fame..

Deduct your arcane rating from 6.

That is the highest that:

Allies, Influence & Contacts can go to.

Deduct 2 from that.

That's as High as your fame can get to.

So, if you have Arcane 3?

You can have a Maximum Allies score of 3, maximum fame of 1. All clear? I'm sure you can see the
reasoning behind it.. all those Backgrounds rely on people knowing who you are. With arcane?
They can't recall specific details about you.

Instruments: The Tool of Focus

Called 'Foci' in revised.

'Mages don’t choose their tools based on convenience, but rather upon what they believe they
need to do in order to alter reality.

House Rule: You must start play with 8 "instruments.

In M20, you must choose an personalize, or personalize and Unique instrument for your Affinity Sphere. Otherwise, instruments are not tied to your other spheres.

Foci

Foci: plural of form of Focus.

This is how you set and see for Focus Instruments.

To see your current foci: +foci -- If you see nothing you are either not a mage, or haven't followed the steps below. Will also display the longer version on your choosen Paradigm (if it is displayed on your sheet as abbreviations), will also display the practice(s) you've choosen to use from what your paradigm(s) allow. For more info and charts Paradigms, Practices, Instruments

You are required to pick 7 tools. One of these is your "primary" tool. It is the one you learned magick with first, and is the one you rely on the most. This is, by default, a personalized Focus that is tied to your Affinity Sphere, granting you a -1 to your arete rolls involving that sphere ONLY. It is also the Focus you will drop last. You may choose to make your Primary Focus "unique" as well, in which case it will grant a -2 to rolls involving your Affinity Sphere ONLY

Aside from your Primary Focus, in M20 foci are no longer tied to spheres.

FOCI SETUP

If you need help while going through this process, please ask Staff.

To start setting up for Foci type: +foci/setup

To see your foci template: +foci -- and at any time while going through these steps to see your work

To define/describe your Foci: +foci/desc <primary or a number from 1-6>=<desc> -- do for each of the 7 foci (primary,1,2,3,4,5,6)

Example: +foci/desc primary=bamboo flute handcarved as I awoke

Example: +foci/desc primary=Mentor Sasha's tea pot

Example: +foci/desc 1=artwork

Example: +foci/desc 3=Fashion

Example: +foci/desc 6=Household Tools

To set your primary Focus as Unique: +foci/unique --Sets your primary instrument as personalized and Unique, make sure the desc fits

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A Mage needs to pick at least 1 paradigm, 1 practice, and seven instruments. NOTE: Please choose only instruments and practices that are listed on those pages. The Practices page cross-references well with instruments. Also, do not use a Practice as a instrument/tool/focus.

To set your practice(s): +foci/practice <blah> Not yet coded, supply in your approval job after staff let you into "More Info" room.
Please see Practices for a chart that lists which Paradigms are associated with which practices.

Example: +foci/practice Craftwork

Example: +foci/practice Alchemy, Chaos Magick, Craftwork, Crazy Wisdom, Faith

In the end your +foci should look similiar to the example below. If you need to make more notes for yourself, please use +notes (+help +notes).
<br

+---------------------------< Random's Instruments >----------------------------+

                 (Those Marked with * Are no longer required)          


Affinity Sphere: Prime

Primary Focus - Light and lasers (Personalized -1)

+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Focus 1: Computers and IT Gear

Focus 2: Devices and Machines

Focus 3: Elements

Focus 4: Energy

Focus 5: Gadgets and Inventions

Focus 6: Laboratories and Lab Gear

+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 Grace period ends on Oct 15, 2023 
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Your paradigm: A Mechanistic Cosmos

+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 Your Practices:

 Hypertech, Craftwork, Weird Science
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

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To drop a focus: Please submit a +magereq. (Example: +magereg <your name>:dropping foci=I'd like to drop my 6th focus, artwork.)

Standard Instruments

Standard instruments offer no benefit or penalty to die rolls. You might incur a penalty if you work without one, or receive
a bonus if you use one in an especially significant manner These are also considered "tradition foci". Things such as magic circles, sex, martial arts, concentration or candles. They are non-specific items in which any representation of them will do. Think "ritual items".
There can be found in M20 Anniversary core book for each tradition.

Personalized Instruments

Personal instruments offer -1 to arete rolls. For your character’s affinity Sphere, choose one personal instrument that fits his
practice and that Sphere. Personal foci are specific tools that the mage acquires during the
process of learning a sphere. If a candlestick holder held a significant place in learning a sphere, it would be
considered personal. It has to mean something to the mage. The ruling between standard and personal is storyteller discretion.

Personalize and Unique Instruments

Unique instruments offer -2 to arete rolls. Unique foci are literally unique items. They are either handcraft, personally-invented
or individualized. They may also be items created to used in one ritual only. (Want to make a special candle for that life ritual?)
"Used-only-once-ever items" need ST approval as these can't/won't be set with the +foci/unique. +Foci/unique is meant for permanent
unique foci.

Sanctum / Sancti

HR on Sanctum

Resources 0 - 1 Characters can only buy up to Sanctum 2. This may be raised if your
character ever raises their resources post chargen.

Primary Sphere

"Affinity Spheres: The Sphere most often associated with the group’s training and specialization. In the Council’s
old days, each Tradition held a seat based on that Sphere; given recent, intervening events, however, this may not be
true anymore. Training in the 21st century is more eclectic and personalized than it used to be, so the secondary
Spheres are also available as Affinity Spheres. In any case, a new character gets only one of these Spheres as his
Affinity Sphere." M20 Anniversary pg 147

Chargen doesn't currently allow Tradition mages to choose their primary sphere we are working to correct this, but
to be honest chargen code is a beast, it may take awhile
When you are done with your character and use +char-submit, add a note to the job that is opened for you and
state what you'd like your primary sphere to be. You will have the default free dot of sphere moved to your choosen
primary sphere. A +note will be added to you.

Affinity Sphere Choices

In M20th, some traditions may be allowed another affinity sphere that is not listed there.
If you want a different affinity sphere than the default, contact staff to have this set and noted for you.

Akashayana: Mind(default) or Life
Celestial Chorus: Prime (default); Forces or Spirit
Sahajiya: Time(default); Life or Mind
Khavadi: Spirit (default); Force, Life, or Matter
Chakravant: Entropy(default); Life or Spirit.
Order of Hermes: Forces provides the core of Hermetic training. Certain Houses favor Life, Matter,
Mind, and Spirit as secondary pursuits, but Forces is always essential.
Society of Ether: Matter(default); Forces or Prime
Verbenae: Life (default); Mind, Matter, Entropy, Forces
Mercurial Elites: Correspondence (default) as Data; Forces

Mage Specific Merits

Merit	Cost	Description
Avatar Companion	7	From lifetime to lifetime, you share a bit of your Avatar with a companion who follows you through incarnations, recalling more about their details than you do. Although he’s not as powerful as you are, and lacks the metaphysical prowess of the Merits: Twin Soul or Shattered Avatar (above), this companion knows a great deal about your reincarnated self… quite a bit more about it than then you do. This loyal (if not always agreeable) character literally follows you for life, typically ending his life when you do; in the meantime, he provides insights, advice, information about previous life times, and whatever other forms of aid he can possibly offer. Like the Merit: Guardian Angel, the Avatar Companion is essentially a walking boost from your Storyteller, subject to her whims but acting in your best interests… for the most part, anyway. Unless it’s purchased in addition to the Background: Allies, your companion isn’t anything special; he could be a person or animal, but not a vampire, a werebeast, or some other Night-Folk entity. Your Avatar Companion could also be a Ward, the focus of True Love, or perhaps an embodiment of a Manifest Avatar. Treat him badly enough, and he might become an Enemy. (See all appropriate entries for details.) As with all other character-based Traits, this companion has his own personality, desires, and so on. He may be loyal, but he’s not suicidal, and isn’t likely to be thrilled if the mage decides to abuse his loyalty! Ref: M20 BOS, 79
Circumspect Avatar	2	You’ve never seen your Avatar, and probably doubt that such a thing exists. Sure, you have a shadow, and a reflection, or maybe a little dog who’s followed you around since you were a kid and seems no older even though he should have died of old age years ago, but an Avatar? Nah – that’s a buncha New Age hippie crap! You have yet to encounter any such thing, you don’t go on “seekings” or whatever they’re called, and you get your metaphysical insights the same way any normal person does: through everyday events in the everyday world. Essentially, this Merit grants a “silent” Avatar – one that, for whatever reason, does not hound or guide your character but merely drops hints, cues, and clues that the mage either figures out or doesn’t figure out on her own. Seekings and Epiphanies take place in the physical realm, typically as puzzles and dilemmas that happen to be related to issues that the mage needs to sort through in order to advance to the next level of understanding. During such situations, the Avatar may indeed appear (possibly even manifest – see the Merit: Manifest Avatar), but only as some apparently mundane person, creature or thing, not as an obviously paranormal entity. You could, for instance, get a call from your mother that sends you into an introspective mood which, in turn, leads you to figure out an important riddle from your past; Mom, of course, denies even having called you. Huh. So who could that call have been from, anyway? Or did you, perhaps, just imagine it after all? Ref: M20 BOS, 67
Cyclic Magic	3	The strength or weakness of your Arts is tied to some periodic cycle – the phases of the moon, night or day, your menstrual periods, the rise and fall of the stock market, and so forth. At the peak of your cycle, your magick flows most easily; at its nadir, you find it challenging to work with your magick at all. System-wise, this Trait is both a Merit and a Flaw, granting bonuses at one point in the cycle and penalties on its opposite point. At the highest point, you reduce your casting difficulties by -3 for one hour, while at the lowest point you increase them by +3 for one hour. On either end of that cycle, you subtract or add -1 /+1 to your casting difficulties for each hour on both sides – the surge and the ebb – of that cycle: -2 or + 2 for the two hours on each side of the peak or nadir, -1 or +1 on the two hours on the side of those two hours, and no modifiers during the rest of the time in between. If, for example, Victoria Ashley-Croft bani Flambeau has a peak at midnight and a low at noon, her player would receive a peak modifier of -3 difficulty at midnight, -2 difficulty at 11:00 PM and 1:00 AM, a -1 difficulty at 10:00 PM and 2:00 AM, and no modifiers otherwise, aside from the reverse modifiers (+3 at noon, +2 at 11:00 AM and 1:00 PM, and +1 at 10:00 AM and 2:00 PM) at the opposite end of that cycle. Naturally, you’ll need to decide just what this cycle is when you select this Trait, and then determine what the highest and lowest points of that cycle would be. This Merit must also be tied into your focus – intrinsically connected to the beliefs you hold and the practices you follow. Your choice of instruments is often tied to such cycles too; cycle-bound instruments include celestial alignments, crossroads and crossing-days, formulae and mathematics, group rites, money and wealth, music (peaks and lulls in a song, movements in a symphony, etc.), numbers and numerology, and offerings and sacrifices (“when the stars are right”). A stockbroker will be watching the peaks and ebbs on Wall Street, while a witch pays attention to the cycles of the moon or her blood. By observing your cycles, you’ll have a good idea about the best and worst times to use your Arts. And by observing you, your allies and enemies may be able to figure those things out too Ref: M20 BOS, 69
Deathwalker	4	The Underworld welcomes you. While most Umbral travelers are more or less barred from the Shadowlands and Low Umbra unless they possess special magicks (or have died), you can step sideways into the Dead Lands with a simple application of Spirit 3. When you do so, your aura assumes the pale tone of death, and you become essentially indistinguish able from a ghost unless some knowledgeable entity makes a successful Perception + Occult roll (difficulty 7) to see you for what you really are. If the Avatar Storm is still raging in your chronicle, you can pass into the Low Umbra without suffering the Storm’s effects. This sort of “gift” often leaves macabre traces on the mortals it favors. Hence, this Merit is well-suited for the Flaws: Echoes, Uncanny, and Primal Marks. Thanks to their innate ties to the Dead Lands, Deathwalkers, as a rule, view the Otherworlds through the Vidare Mortem, suffer from Morbidity Quiets, and tend to have a rather fatalistic view of life. Ref: M20 BOS, 74
Dual Affiliation	7	You’ve been initiated and trained in two different Awakened groups. Perhaps you were a Verbena who gravitated toward the Virtual Adepts, or a Man in Black who sought refuge among the Templars. Whatever your history and affiliations might be, you’re intimately familiar with both groups, have connections (not nec essarily friends) in both groups, and may use and understand the practices, tools and beliefs (in short, the focus) of either group. Ref: M20 BOS, 80