The Magicians

The Magicians

We review the first episode of The Magicians television series, comparing and contrasting the magical displays in that with how the effects could be accomplished within the system of Mage: the Awakening. https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia [https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia] https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight [https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight]

Characters

We introduce the Storytelling System and the components that make up a character in Chronicles of Darkness. https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia [https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia] https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight [https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight] Mage: the Awakening is played with the Storytelling System, primarily using a dice pool for the likelihood of success with a given action. For most mundane actions, the size of this pool is determined by adding your character's score in one of nine Attributes with their score in one of the eight skills corresponding to the Attribute's category. A character's Advantages are other kinds of scores, often derived from Attributes and Skills. They are used for abstractions like how fast a character can move and how much damage they can suffer before facing further consequences. One such Advantage is Willpower, representing a character's tenacity in adverse situations as a resource to spend for additional dice on a roll. Characters also have Anchors, consisting of a Virtue and a Vice, representing the ideals of those concepts for the character, as well as a list of Aspirations. The first two have the game benefit of restoring spent Willpower but also serve as a means of customizing a character, while the last provides Beats towards Experiences in addition to providing an explicit understanding of what a character hopes to accomplish. Lastly, a character will have a set of Merits, which represent uncommon or unique traits. A Merit might represent a relationship with a powerful organization or a special talent. Merits offer benefits in specific situations greater than what can be gained by increasing one's aptitude in a Skill or Attribute.

Practical Magic

We review the movie Practical Magic and talk about how the mysticism in that movie compares with Mage: the Awakening lore. https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia [https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia] https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight [https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight]

Mage Sight

We explain our understanding of Mage Sight in Mage: the Awakening, discussing the differences between Peripheral, Active, and Focused Mage Sight. https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia [https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia] https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight [https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight] Awakening is a metaphor for opening one's eyes to the Truth. Once open, however, they cannot be shut again. The primary consequence of this is Mage Sight, the ability to perceive the supernatural in one's surroundings. This always-on magical sense is called Peripheral Mage Sight, but a Mage can choose to put more attention on it. Doing so, however, is distracting at best, and dangerous at worst. If they do so choose, the Mage can concentrate on these Supernal perceptions with the hope of deriving a stronger understanding of the effects they create. This is called Active Mage Sight. Each of the Arcana offer Mages a unique sensory ability under Active Mage Sight, potentially offering clues to an ongoing riddle. Still, that is often not enough to gain sufficient understanding, and the Mage may decide to concentrate further yet on the phenomenon. Doing so is called Focused Mage Sight because it requires a Mage's attention to remain solely on their object of study during the practice, even go so far as to manipulate Mana in the area. Due to its nature, Focused Mage Sight has the highest potential to reveal information of supernatural phenomena, but that increased utility comes with the potential of alerting other supernatural beings to a Mage's study. Practically speaking, with Focused Mage Sight, a Mage may attempt to Reveal information about their subject or further Scrutinize it to hopefully allow for better revelations.

Arcana Practices

We go over the thirteen different Practices a Mage can use with Arcana to interact with the Supernal elements of the Fallen World. https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia [https://www.instagram.com/magesightmedia] https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight [https://www.patreon.com/c/MageSight] Understanding the means of magic is core to being a Mage. These means are called Practices, thirteen different ways of interacting with the Lie. Ability with these is used to gauge a Mage's mastery of an Arcanum. To this end, Arcanum mastery is denoted by five levels: Initiate, Apprentice, Disciple, Adept, and Master. Each of these levels encompass some subset of Practices. An Initiate will be proficient in Compelling, Knowing, and Unveiling; an Apprentice, having first learned Initiate Practices, will next learn Ruling, Shielding, and Veiling; Disciples know Fraying, Perfecting, and Weaving; Adepts know Patterning and Unraveling; and finally Masters know the arts of Making and Unmaking. Together, these Practices allow for manipulation of any apsect of the Exarchs' Lie.