|
Terrorforge posted:"Weak but useful" will always be my favorite category of magic item. Swords that split your foes apart at the atomic level for +2 aggravated damage are cool and all, but they'll never be half as fun as figuring out how to abuse a disposable camera that can't be disposed of. My development notes on Mementos were basically a DVD rip of The Lost Room with some skulls drawn on. Which is to say, I agree with you, and I can't wait to see what crazy shenanigans PCs manage to get up to with a mountaineer's oxygen tank that gives anyone who huffs from it addictive, hypoxia-induced hallucinations. GimpInBlack fucked around with this message at 15:54 on Feb 23, 2018 |
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 15:52
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 21:33 |
|
|
I've seen a lot of people playing Mage forget that Mages are the monsters in this game series about playing supernatural horrors. But they're less so for what they can do so much as what that understanding drives them toward. The Silver Ladder plays their incestuous Illuminati games and exposes people to breaking points to try and get them to Awaken, the Mysterium murders people for the sake of keeping knowledge out of their hands and in the hands of the Mysterium, the Guardians trap people in layers of falsehood and practice assassination as a sacred rite. The Free Council is a grab-bag of a thousand different mystic methodologies and ideologies which are as likely to be sympathetic as they are to be a Left-Handed Legacy that wasn't declared as such because it'd be politically inconvenient for the Diamond, and the Arrow... well, the Arrow'd probably be able to get on swimmingly with Hunters if not for the Arrow being BFFs with the Ladder. And the Seers are just unapologetically evil. Your average mage'd probably be willing to sign up with some Hunters for roasting a vampire. Then the mage'd go home to the interdimensional lizard monster they keep in their basement which totally will never break out guys I swear, milk its venom, then go out to feed that venom to a Sleeper while making shapes dance in front of them to see if it produces desirable results and not just a mentally-scarred burnout. They do this because they position themselves as wiser and more enlightened and therefore either they matter more or they know best. When your starting point is just a A Dude, and your highly-illogical endpoint is as a potential god-thing sitting above humanity and contemplating their extermination as part of your pet project, there's a lot of screwed-up things that go on in the meantime.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 16:24
|
|
|
GimpInBlack posted:My development notes on Mementos were basically a DVD rip of The Lost Room with some skulls drawn on.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 16:45
|
|
|
Terrorforge posted:I tend to think the average hunter doesn't have nearly enough understanding of the internal structure of gribbly politics to even know there are multiple factions, let alone have an informed opinion on any specific one. They're not going to see the difference between the Seers' unnatural, manipulative, self-serving machinations and the Pentacle's unnatural, manipulative, self-serving machinations, especially since a lot of the conflict centers around things that only matter to wizards. To the Union soccer mom who just wants to drain her local swamp, the fact that a friendly Pentacle mage is willing to kill in order to "prevent the Seers from strengthening the influence of the Exarchs and reinforcing the Lie" marks him as a dangerous lunatic, not a hero. I mean, ultimately, if it can be neatly summarised in the setting chapter of the rulebook to an extent that we who are not Mages can understand and play in the Mage setting, it stands to reason that it can be explained to a similar extent in-character.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:01
|
|
|
I'll be honest, I find the conception of Mages that just places them as 'dicks, but, also concerned with pointless esoterica' really uninteresting even as monsters. For me, the horror of Mage is gnostic horror - Mages know the truth, and the truth is that reality is a prison and humanity made chattel of alien forces, forces who were in all likelihood once Mages. The horror of a Mage is also pretty well laid out in the Path introductions - someone who has powers you literally cannot understand and who clearly knows something you don't, and implies that the world is not what you think. Putting all the emphasis on 'oh they do weird things' ignores that those weird things are objectively closer to the core nature of reality and more far-reaching than anything knowable to a hunter. That's what makes gnostic occultism more interesting and central than any given cult: the Silver Ladder, the Mysterium, all of them have some claim to truth and ends that are noble. The Pentacle and hunters have a lot in common - hunters are 'monsters' too for their game line. They both share dedication and purpose, and both are prone to excess in that pursuit.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:05
|
|
|
It is also perfectly reasonable for most Hunters to look at the guy explaining this and go 'so you're telling me evil witch-god-kings run the world? Pull the other one, it's got bells on, witch.'
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:05
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:The other thing is that, thanks to the Lie, magic hurts people. Mages can try to tell you what they're doing, but they can't ever show you, because it will literally make your mind start tearing itself apart. They can tell you it's the Lie, they can tell you they can't help it, but they can never be honest with you, you can never trust they're doing what they say, because they can't show you their magic. Basically, you want them thinking you're Deep Throat, or if you want a less Seer-ish guise one of the Lone Gunmen from the X-Files. You're the fixer who can arrange for circumstances to be juuuust right for their next raid. Sure, it's harder to get their trust that way - that's why you start with the information broker angle, if you hand them some secrets they can go corroborate for themselves on their own time you aren't asking for much. Then eventually, once you've established your credentials with them, you can do more for them, until eventually they won't know how they got along without you.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:06
|
|
|
Terrorforge posted:Both Hunters and Mages are of course very heterogenous groups though, so in the end there are no hard and fast rules. It's just that given the whole "he who hunts monsters" theme I would think that the default position of a hunter being offered magical aid would fall somewhere between deep suspicion and "kill it with fire". The players in my mage game are creating a mystery cult, and the first person they went to recruit was the vampire hunter that they had essentially brought to the city about a year ago. It's a Maiden's Sisterhood hunter, and she doesn't know that they are mages, and I'm not sure what would happen if she ever really found out. So now said hunter is going to hunt mage supernatural things (for the mages) with the intel (and magic?) that they give her. These things happen. What could possibly go wrong? Jhet fucked around with this message at 17:09 on Feb 23, 2018 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:07
|
|
|
The more I think about it, the more the "Lone Gunman" cover works beautifully for a Mage. Then all your weird obsessions and the red-string conspiracy boards that clutter the walls of your house are all just part of the cover. "Bob's a crackpot conspiracy theorist, sure," think the Hunters. "He's a little odd that way. But hell, look at us. We spend our evenings hunting vampires and wolf people and we've stumbled across more ancient cults and weird secret societies than your average Dan Brown novel - people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. And every single time Bob's encouraged us to go check out a location, it's turned out to have had some weird poo poo going down there, so his research methods can't be that off-base."
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:12
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:I'll be honest, I find the conception of Mages that just places them as 'dicks, but, also concerned with pointless esoterica' really uninteresting even as monsters. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 17:24
|
|
|
I think the stance that "mages are objectively closer to the core nature of reality" is something even other mages would argue against. Probably not anywhere near a majority, and probably from within the Free Council. Mages have an understanding of how to manipulate reality and the tools to examine it more closely, but that doesn't impart any real knowledge of what it all genuinely means. The Mutapa had a pretty fine system going seperate Diamond gnosticism, for example. Buying wholesale into that idea that what you do has more truthiness is ultimately the sort of thing that turns a Mage into Kadmon.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:00
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:I think the stance that "mages are objectively closer to the core nature of reality" is something even other mages would argue against. Probably not anywhere near a majority, and probably from within the Free Council. Mages have an understanding of how to manipulate reality and the tools to examine it more closely, but that doesn't impart any real knowledge of what it all genuinely means. The Mutapa had a pretty fine system going seperate Diamond gnosticism, for example. I think the idea that mages are already fully cognizant is certainly hubristic, but the idea that they don't have more knowledge of things than someone caught more fully in the Lie just removes the entire point of playing Mage, to be quite honest. If I wanted to run a game of characters with vast powers but no actual claim to knowledge superhero games exist. If you're talking about existential meaning and morality, that's like saying "physicists aren't any closer to the nature of reality now than they were in the 1850s' - taking that position about causal reality rather than ethical and philosophical truth is a much stronger statement than I think you mean. Also, philosophically, Mages do seem to be broadly correct about Neoplatonism. The existence and value of multiple cultural frameworks does not disqualify scientific knowledge from being meaningfully knowledge, and the same applies to Awakened knowledge. Edit: or the Mutapa are right about sacred bloodlines - one of the models, ancestry or bloodline, is true (in a given campaign). That still insists that there is a real truth and power associated with magic which is not available to the average soul. Also, frankly, I find it more constructive to treat the Mutapa setting as one where the Mutapa are broadly correct in their basic assumptions, and standard Mage as one where Neoplatonic Gnosticism is broadly accurate. Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Feb 23, 2018 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:35
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:I think the idea that mages are already fully cognizant is certainly hubristic, but the idea that they don't have more knowledge of things than someone caught more fully in the Lie just removes the entire point of playing Mage, to be quite honest. If I wanted to run a game of characters with vast powers but no actual claim to knowledge superhero games exist. Magic isn't science. Mages have been granted a view of the bigger picture of what's going on, and an idea of how things work, but it's not inherently holistic. Why and How are things they're entirely ignorant of, and part of what makes Mages horrors is that they very much make the mistake of conflating this glimpse of the source of reality with these two things, and using that to go on to justify all the high-concept monstrousness they end up doing in service to extrapolating further on it all. They see the workings of the world, and then decide to name it capital-t Truth. Because doing that gives it and them value.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:42
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:Magic isn't science. Ok, real question: what is science, in the context of a universe with Neoplatonic magic? You clearly see a sharp delineation. What's your epistemological difference between the empirical study of reality using a microscope, and the empirical study of reality using a crystal sphere? Edit: there's a philosophy of science position I think is comparable to yours on magic, called scientific antirealism, which holds that because we do not have holistic knowledge nor experiential knowledge of the structure of the atom, all we can say is that the tools we have respond in certain ways to our manipulations. This is not dissimilar from the position that Neoplatonism in Mage is just a 'glimpse' despite its useful predictive and active applications. Ironically, the argument against scientific antirealism that has the most acceptance is the 'no miracles' argument: if the theories we have just happen to predict but are not actually true, then they just happen to work a hell of a lot for chance. Now, none of this says our models (atomic theory, Neoplatonism, respectively) are perfect, absolute, or complete. But they're likely more true than false. Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 18:55 on Feb 23, 2018 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:46
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:Ok, real question: what is science, in the context of a universe with Neoplatonic magic? You clearly see a sharp delineation. What's your epistemological difference between the empirical study of reality using a microscope, and the empirical study of reality using a crystal sphere? The entire experience of magic is a qualia. That precludes an ability to make absolute determinations about any of it because while one Mage is looking at some magical event and seeing the Eye of God staring into the end of the universe, the other one is seeing the hole through which the Magnificent exited the world. And they're both right as far as magic is concerned. Magic, as it gets more powerful and more meaningful, also becomes more intensely personal. It's why mages almost-inadvertently develop magical styles, and why at the highest levels spells can only be done using a component with specific symbols relevant to the worker in question. Objectivity dies at a certain point, and then you pass the threshold and swallow the kool-aid of yourself being more True than anyone, and suddenly you're trying to encode yourself as a cosmological constant.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:55
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:The entire experience of magic is a qualia. That precludes an ability to make absolute determinations about any of it because while one Mage is looking at some magical event and seeing the Eye of God staring into the end of the universe, the other one is seeing the hole through which the Magnificent exited the world. That sounds incredibly dumb. What is the point of playing a game about Seeing Past The Lie and Delving The Truth Behind Mysteries if the ultimate answer is some freshman bullshit about how "everything is just subjective, man"?
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 18:58
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:The entire experience of magic is a qualia. That precludes an ability to make absolute determinations about any of it because while one Mage is looking at some magical event and seeing the Eye of God staring into the end of the universe, the other one is seeing the hole through which the Magnificent exited the world. The perception I have of the light through a microscope is also a qualia, you realize. Magic exaggerates that, but the fact that we have no idea if we see the same color doesn't make our retinas relativist. Mages do work with incredibly difficult-to-use tools, in an epistemological battle with a truth they don't fully understand. But the fact that a Lustrum has to be constructed to make Supernal reality comprehensible to an arch Mage doesn't mean the Lustrum is itself objectively true. Mages approach reality like we all do, through phenomena, but the basic premise of the setting is that there is something concrete there to interpret. Idealist phenomenology is not cultural or other relativism, it's just aware that we all approach truth with our own interpretation. EDIT: hell, even a Nietzschean perspectivist position, that my interpretation is all I will ever know of truth, is still less relativist than what you're suggesting, and even that is a pretty extreme read on Mage (though one I do personally find attractive, if incomplete). Joe Slowboat fucked around with this message at 19:07 on Feb 23, 2018 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:03
|
|
|
Kaza42 posted:That sounds incredibly dumb. What is the point of playing a game about Seeing Past The Lie and Delving The Truth Behind Mysteries if the ultimate answer is some freshman bullshit about how "everything is just subjective, man"? I get the impression that a lot of people miss that "the Lie" is a word mages came up with. And, what a shock, it denigrates non-magical existence. The things mages find behind mysteries may or may not hold a degree of objectivity (see: everyone perceiving leylines differently but them all being the same thing), or may be entirely personal (the grand meaning of the cast-off supernal concept of cosmological sacrifice). That these two things are mixed together and are both part of the same whole runs against treating supernal magic as one of the sciences in the same way you could, say, mortal alchemy. And, yeah, everything it subjective. It sorta has to be from a presentation standpoint, as this is a game capable of being played multiple ways by multiple people. What is true, what is True, and to what degree the cynicism of "mages-as-monsters" holds sway are dependent on what type of game is being run and who is running it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:08
|
|
|
Well, no, it’s a word the game uses in ooc text. If your argument is that the actual game text cannot ever be trusted, we can say that actually Mage is Synnibar.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:14
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:And, yeah, everything it subjective. It sorta has to be from a presentation standpoint, as this is a game capable of being played multiple ways by multiple people. What is true, what is True, and to what degree the cynicism of "mages-as-monsters" holds sway are dependent on what type of game is being run and who is running it. The fact that a fictional setting can be fairly run multiple ways doesn't mean each individual instance of it must be relativist in regards to truth, though. Or else the Star Wars RPG is a bastion of relativism where Empire and Rebels are equally heroic/villainous, because some benighted souls want the Empire to win.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:15
|
|
|
Mages have superior knowledge of practical and moral truths that Sleepers can't see. That doesn't automatically make them a better person, in the same way that knowing Barack Obama wasn't born in Kenya doesn't automatically give you the moral high ground.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:15
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:And, yeah, everything it subjective. It sorta has to be from a presentation standpoint, as this is a game capable of being played multiple ways by multiple people. What is true, what is True, and to what degree the cynicism of "mages-as-monsters" holds sway are dependent on what type of game is being run and who is running it. A game line can present multiple ideas for what a thing is, or what the truth is, in order to provide variation and give people a framework to come up with their own ideas. Within a specific game being run, the storyteller should pick one to be actually true. Since nobody is playing "Mage: The Awakened, the abstract version of the game presented in the books in order to provide room for multiple interpretations" it's really the latter that matters.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:19
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:Well, no, it’s a word the game uses in ooc text. If your argument is that the actual game text cannot ever be trusted, we can say that actually Mage is Synnibar. The books are widely-considered to be written from the perspective of the beings they're about. Beyond it having been said before, we'd otherwise need to assume that Beasts really are teaching lessons and not just being abuse monsters. Joe Slowboat posted:The fact that a fictional setting can be fairly run multiple ways doesn't mean each individual instance of it must be relativist in regards to truth, though. Or else the Star Wars RPG is a bastion of relativism where Empire and Rebels are equally heroic/villainous, because some benighted souls want the Empire to win. Star Wars doesn't exactly engage with or play in the same sorts of complexity Mage does. It's a strange comparison. Kaza42 posted:A game line can present multiple ideas for what a thing is, or what the truth is, in order to provide variation and give people a framework to come up with their own ideas. Within a specific game being run, the storyteller should pick one to be actually true. Since nobody is playing "Mage: The Awakened, the abstract version of the game presented in the books in order to provide room for multiple interpretations" it's really the latter that matters. That's what I said. But we're not discussing someone's specific game here, otherwise I'd be having a fun time discussing the recent discovery on what potentially happens with souls and what this might mean in a broader context with my own. This doesn't conflict with the inability of two mages to ever reconcile the two different facets they saw of the supernal god of fire beyond the ability for the two to recognize that they spring from a similar symbol. Posting this on behalf of Axelgear, because he's presently not available to and asked me to. Axelgear posted:I wouldn't say objectivity dies, per se, so much as there is a hard limit in both what level of understanding you can have without being The Thing Itself, and in that conveying your qualia to others is exceptionally difficult. Even Mind magic can't convey the full experience of knowing something (otherwise you could just Mind 4 someone into being as good at magic as you are). He clarifies my statements better than I could; I suspect I've given a wrong impression on how I view things by leaning into the cynicism that I often feel is neglected when people look at Mage. Magic and science don't really stack together, because science itself is a supernal symbol, and it's impossible to truly and accurately describe anything within that supernal framework without being that thing. It's why your average person is subsumed when they cross over into it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:28
|
|
|
What is the appeal of Mage vs Demon vs Wraith? I have only played VtM but I want to convince my ST to start another white wolf game and I don't know what would be fun to play. I don't care as much about the politicking part of VtM as I do about making fun character mechanics work/building sheets and doing the roleplaying stuff.
|
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:30
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:The entire experience of magic is a qualia. That precludes an ability to make absolute determinations about any of it because while one Mage is looking at some magical event and seeing the Eye of God staring into the end of the universe, the other one is seeing the hole through which the Magnificent exited the world. You're describing oMage here, and moreover, you are describing the reason oMage sucks and nMage is a vast improvement over it because it does the exact opposite.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:31
|
|
|
Tuxedo Catfish posted:You're describing oMage here, and moreover, you are describing the reason oMage sucks and nMage is a vast improvement over it because it does the exact opposite. I'm not, is the thing; two mages looking at a supernal symbol and coming away with wildly different views of the same thing is the norm. It's why there's Zeus, and Indra, and Thor. All of them are part of the same larger symbol, but each is a different view and encompasses more and different symbols.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:34
|
|
|
In nMage Zeus, Indra, and Thor are either literal (and probably distinct) beings that actually existed like Father Wolf did, or they're myths. Like it's true that the question of whether or not the Supernal is itself a phenomenon is a giant pain in the rear end and neither answer is particularly satisfactory, but even Imperial Mysteries basically throws up its hands at that one and refuses to say one way or the other. Tuxedo Catfish fucked around with this message at 19:42 on Feb 23, 2018 |
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:39
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:Star Wars doesn't exactly engage with or play in the same sorts of complexity Mage does. It's a strange comparison. The point was that Star Wars is an incredibly straightforward text but the method of interpretation you were suggesting (variable reader perspectives being respected) would imply that any RPG must contain relativism. Also, Beast being terribly written doesn't mean the authors didn't write that lesson crap to be read as objective setting description. Axelgear's understanding of the phenomenology of magic accords with my own; however, these issues are still present in the quaila we have of scientific endeavors, to a lesser degree, and the same philosophical responses are available for mages as for scientific realists. Also science exists within the Lie and is therefore not merely fallible but actively manipulated by the Lie to prevent it understanding higher truths, despite that it has symbolic relationships to Symbols (probably empiricism, humanism, experimentalism, universalism, and a few Supernal gods of the intellect).
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:39
|
|
|
I'm pretty sure science works in Awakening, even when used on magic; it's just severely complicated by the fact that some data will cause a scientist to have a nervous breakdown if she looks at it, and then forget that it happened.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:41
|
|
|
Tuxedo Catfish posted:In nMage Zeus, Indra, and Thor are either literal and distinct beings that actually existed like Father Wolf did, or they're myths. Technically, Zeus, Indra, and Thor all exist in the Astral as myths, and likely have some connection to a Symbol-deity who is vaguely like them or not like them and who can be invoked through them. But also they could just be symbolically charged with Authority and Thunder in various ways. They are myths but they're also tools for accessing the real thing; there is only one real thing and it is not Indra nor Zeus nor Thor, any more than Helios is the star Sol.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:42
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:The books are widely-considered to be written from the perspective of the beings they're about. Beyond it having been said before, we'd otherwise need to assume that Beasts really are teaching lessons and not just being abuse monsters. Except that within Beast, yes, that is true as written. The game is not lying to you. It is just extremely bad. This is not proof that Mage is lying to you. The gently caress even is this argument? Beast is bad, therefore OOC text can never be trusted?
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:43
|
|
|
Rand Brittain posted:I'm pretty sure science works in Awakening, even when used on magic; it's just severely complicated by the fact that some data will cause a scientist to have a nervous breakdown if she looks at it, and then forget that it happened. Exactly. Empiricism works, Paradigm is not a thing (even beyond the problems it already had as a conceit in a tabletop RPG even in the game where it IS a thing), it's just that on a practical level the odds are massively stacked against it.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:43
|
|
|
Tuxedo Catfish posted:In nMage Zeus, Indra, and Thor are either literal and distinct beings that actually existed like Father Wolf did, or they're myths. But they do exist. There are a Zeus and an Indra and a Thor kicking around in the Temenos. And there might also be some spirits that held those titles. And those characters themselves might be representative of actual mages or other supernaturals that wandered around at the same time. And their symbology is reflected in those people who take on those shadow names and start beating people with hammers or who start impregnating people as swans. Literally everything in existence is tied up in supernal symbols. That's what makes it existence. Things not are Abyssal. Hell, as of Dark Eras Father Wolf himself might've been a being cast out of the supernal following the Fall. He was a pangaean. They outright used supernal magic.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:44
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:Except that within Beast, yes, that is true as written. The game is not lying to you. It is just extremely bad. This is not proof that Mage is lying to you. The gently caress even is this argument? Beast is bad, therefore OOC text can never be trusted? Writers on these books have stated that's not the perspective they approach these writings from.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:45
|
|
|
Rand Brittain posted:I'm pretty sure science works in Awakening, even when used on magic; it's just severely complicated by the fact that some data will cause a scientist to have a nervous breakdown if she looks at it, and then forget that it happened. Science is a set of cultural and social practices used to create knowledge through the application of empiricism and statistical analysis; it's really more organizational than ideal in practice, which is why the Free Council are perfect for it's magical champions. Since it's made up of humans, within the Lie, it is necessarily confounded by it in various subtle ways. My favorite example is the Obrimos Awakening in the 2e core, who was working to model economic and sociological paths to utopia, and found that despite the math being correct, it never turned out right. Math and physics and economics were bent and distorted by an unseen gravity to ensure that no way to perfect the world exists, and it was only when she Awakened that the Obrimos saw through that Lie- and understood what had prevented her scientific success. There may be a Supernal Science, an ideal form, but it necessarily does not exist for humanity. At least, not to Sleepers. The Awakened may be capable of it!
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:46
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:Writers on these books have stated that's not the perspective they approach these writings from. Great! That's great. That's not the text. You are currently arguing that vampires don't actually get set on fire by sunlight, that's just what the text says, and that's written from a vampire perspective. Actually maybe they just hulk out and turn blue. If we cannot trust the text, there is no game.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:46
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:Great! That's great. You're making some bold and insulting leaps. Mages named "the Lie, " "the Lie." That's... not really something which isn't the case. They also settled on naming the things they used "arcana."
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:49
|
|
|
Stank posted:What is the appeal of Mage vs Demon vs Wraith? I have only played VtM but I want to convince my ST to start another white wolf game and I don't know what would be fun to play. I don't care as much about the politicking part of VtM as I do about making fun character mechanics work/building sheets and doing the roleplaying stuff. Sorry, you posted during mage chat, no one will answer. I've only played mage in owod, but there have been a bunch of posts about how fun wraith, especially Orpheus, is. Now if you were playing chronicles of darkness, I'd say demon. Playing as a biomechanical horror hiding inside a skin suit while conductinga cold war against the servants of the god machine using cartoon physics powers is amazing.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:50
|
|
|
Ironslave posted:You're making some bold and insulting leaps. Mages named "the Lie, " "the Lie." That's... not really something which isn't the case. They also settled on naming the things they used "arcana." The Lie is explained by out of character text. The entire idea that the world is, in fact, Fallen, that Mage is about a Gnostic search for a greater truth, is not a wholly IC invention; it is the game. It has rules, even! The Lie asserting itself has rules. You are basically going 'but what if, actually, this entire book is lying to you and everything about the game is false? makes u think'
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:51
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 12, 2024 21:33 |
|
|
Tuxedo Catfish posted:Exactly. Empiricism works, Paradigm is not a thing (even beyond the problems it already had as a conceit in a tabletop RPG even in the game where it IS a thing), it's just that on a practical level the odds are massively stacked against it. Kind of similar to Unknown Armies, where magic resists scientific explanation because the rules will change once they become widely known.
|
|
#
?
Feb 23, 2018 19:52
|
|