Joseph – Page 25 – Mage: The Podcast

December 14, 2019July 3, 2021

Mage Noir with Matt Webb and The Art of Mage with Rich Thomas

Two interviews this week! First, World War II shook the mortal world providing example upon example of how no dark forces in the shadows are required for there to be atrocities. But how did the Awakened respond? Matt Webb of Jackalope Live Action Studios talks about the setting and process for Mage Noir, a boutique LARP set in 1940s America.

Second, so why does Mage look like it does? Rich Thomas, artist, creative director, and head of Onyx Path Publishing talks with Terry at PAX Unplugged about the early history of Mage and how RPG art has changed since 1e.

Interview with Matt Webb
- Mage Eclipse – Matt’s sample M5 setting
- Mage Eclipse MtP episode
- Cast a Deadly Spell movie – Noir TV movie in a world of common magic
- Mage Noir Facebook group
- Mage Noir Casting Call (application)
- Jackalope Live Action Studios
- Jackalope on Twitter
- Nelly’s By Night – Toronto Boutique LARP
- College of Wizardy – Three night immersive LARP in a 13th century Polish castle
Interview with Rich Thomas
- Richard Thomas’s CV
- White Wolf Magazine
- Scion 2e cover, Scion 1e cover– Showing Eric
- Flip Book of Doom Segments – Fight between Mari Cabrah and Jonas Albrecht
- Josh’s interview about Werewolf
- John Cobb
- Christopher Shy
- Rat Guy Storyteller Screen
- Leif Jones
- Alex Sheikman
- Ron Spencer
- Richard Kane Furgeson
- RK Post
- Planescape

Executive Producers

Alexia • Aleksandra J • Alexander G • Alexander P • Ambiversion • Andrew E • Anders S • Andrew • Andrew E • Andrija J • Anon Ibid • Bdurfy • Benjamin B • Berto • Blaise H • Blake R • Bo • BoogersBoogersBoogersBoogersBoogersBoogers • Brad M • Brandon • Bryce Perry • Bubba, The Pale One • Buck Farmer • Chris B • Chris Z • Christopher P • Cinshadis • Connor G • Cromwell The Archaeologist • Curtis H • Dan Svensson • Daniel C • Daniel S • Darren H • David M • David R • DrawnCap • Dennis O • Derek S • Ean R • Eli l • Entropy_Prime • Eric S • Fragarach • Freddy • FriedrichOwl • Gabriel P • Garga L • George L • Gray -Trilug- H • Guy Conan S • GuyWithPuns • Henry Craft • HugoTheBogPerson • I Jaye S • Ian • Illara S • Ira Grace • Isabel CL • J Gatsby • Jason B • Jason D • Jason K • Jason V • Jason Vines • Jeffois • Jenna F • Jervis Johnson • jj225000 • John • John Hillerup • jj225000 • John Magnuson • John W • Jolyne A • Joshua Hillerup • Justin • Karl H • Kathleen H • Kevin F • Khris K • Larrendias D • Leroy B • Leslie W • Lexiconjurer • Lolzandstuff • Manel C • Maurice H • Matthew P • Melissa K • Michael C • Michael Parker • Mikael S • Morgan A • Nathan W • Nebero • Neil P • Nikita K • Oliver S • Patrick M • Patrick Mc • Paxcow • Pooka G • Rachel G • Ralf S • Regina O • Ren M • Ricardo • Richard “Bat” Brewster • Rob D • Rob H • Ruben J • Ryan H • Ryan K • Ryan S • Samuel T • sbloyd • Schnabeltierkrieger • Sean G • Sev Nessus • Simon S • SorcererSanguine • Sean Ryan K • St U • starfish • Stefan C • Steve Winyard • thatsrealneeto • Tyler • Tyler B • Vince H • Vincent • Walter • Warmstarter • William M • Wolf L • ZakRulz

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December 7, 2019July 3, 2021

A Guide to the Mage: The Ascension Tarot with S. Rune Emerson

The mystery and mood of Mage are heavily informed by the art and artistry on the Mage tarot deck. Every edition of the Mage Core Rulebook has featured The Magician and almost every book leads with a card or spread. What are these cards? Why are they special to Mage? What can they add to your game? Terry sits down with occult instructor and author of Nothing But a Pack of Cards, S. Rune Emerson to talk about what these 78 cards can do for your table.

Show Notes

Mage Tarot on DriveThruCards
Anders Tarot Game
Mage Tarot Art Pack on the Storytellers Vault
Jodi Blake as Queen of Primordialism
Kevin Andrew Murphy and the Penny Dreadful novel
Truth Until Paradox and Truth Beyond Paradox
Caeron Mustai as The Emperor
Jet Boy on The Chariot
Raging Eagle as Justice
Saulot as Temperance
Pre modern Koran cards meditation tool
Duke of Milan Procession of the Triumphs
Antoine do something something
Secret book of Thoth
Celtic cross
Medea, Marauder Oracle
The Game of Triumphs by Laura Powell
Last Call by Tim Powers

Executive Producers

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November 30, 2019July 3, 2021

Tomes of Magick: Void Engineers

Mage is often an intimate game revolving around neighborhoods, a small cast, and the hopes and perils of magick. But sometimes, Mage is about making sure space dragons don’t eat your voidship and that may take depleted uranium and some Accelerated Force Cannons. Void Engineers is very much for that second type of game. Adam and Terry dive into the first real look we have of mages in space and far beyond the protections of the Horizon. Where is the COP? Who’s Tychoides? What’s the difference between a LERMU and a GENES? Listen and find out!

Show Notes

Dyson Sphere
Relics Star Trek: The Next Generation episode
Autochthonia in Mage
Autochthonia in Exalted
Chthonic deities
Plural of apparatus
Ka Luon
Mathematics Research Group
Doctor Robert Hill, Void Engineer

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November 24, 2019July 3, 2021

M5 Meditations, Metanarrative Tools and Mummy with Matthew Dawkins

Role playing games have changed over time and one new family of play options involve handing players ways to change the story outside of the actions of their characters. Matthew Dawkins is an in-house developer for The Onyx Path and talks with Terry about ways to bring metanarrative tools into your games as well as some healthy speculation about what M5 should be.

Also, if you see this before December 5th, another Matthew project, Mummy: The Curse 2nd Edition, is on Kickstarter. If you like what you hear, go back it!

Show Notes

Guidelines to submit on The Onyx Path
He-Man and Skeletor team up to fight Hordak
Green Ronin’s Adventure Game Engine (AGE)
The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen, a game of playing rôles
Fiasco RPG
Paranoia RPG
The Truman Show
Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker
John Scalzi’s Red Shirts
It Came From the Late, Late, Late Show
They Came From Beneath the Sea
Redmoon Roleplaying live play of Mummy: The Curse 2e
The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers
Storypath Nexus

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November 16, 2019July 3, 2021

Tomes of Magick: Outcasts: A Players Guide to Pariahs

The Council gets their Tradition books, the Technocracy gets their Convention books, but what about the Hollow Ones? Not necessarily Orphans, not quite a craft, these creatures of modernity claim to go back to at least the Jazz Age but how do you play one? Outcasts: A Players Guide to Pariahs was the first supplement to give more information on this collection of goths and romantics along with information on the Caitiff of Vampire and the Ronin of Werewolf. Adam and Terry talk about the Hollow Ones changing story and the role of Orphans in Mage: The Ascension.

Show Notes

References!
- Lord Dunsany – Writer of works that sound an awful lot like someone visited the Umbra
- Teratology – The monster manual for Invisible Sun
Other Books!
- Tradition Book: Hollow Ones – probably the best text on the group and published in Revised
- Book of Crafts: Whispers of Dissent – 2nd Edition‘s big book of entities not aligned in the Ascension War
- Orphans Survival Guide – Expands on non-Hollow Orphan groups in Mage
Next Book!
- Void Engineers – Fascinating group with a questionable narrator

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November 9, 2019July 3, 2021

Mage Writer James Estes Talks About Religion in Mage

James Estes, former Mage writer and current professor and library director, takes some time to talk with us about religion in Mage. Can it contribute something to our Chronicles and how should we handle it? He also shares his experiences about writing for Mage and offers advice for those thinking of contributing to Storytellers Vault.

Show Notes

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November 2, 2019July 3, 2021

Tomes of Magick: Hidden Lore

Mage’s Second Edition Core Rulebook had a strict page count and clocked in at fewer pages than First Edition. So what were these missing pages and where did they go? Hidden Lore was the collection of all the materials that ran over the page count and for the Second Edition Storyteller it’s your best source for additional rotes and systems as well as an entire cabal. Terry and Adam discuss what to take from it and what to leave behind in this episode of Tomes of Magick.

Show Notes

Troupe play from Ars Magica
Dice for gaming on our Discord server
Inphobia Magazine
Alternative play styles in Mage
A trip to Pike Place Market in Seattle
Theater of the Mind Chantry
Mages of Note
Enlightened Grimoire list of all rotes
Sphere handouts for M20
Umbraships

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October 26, 2019July 3, 2021

How to Homebrew Mage Rules with Monica Speca

Not every rule makes sense in every Mage game, but how do you figure out what to change and know when to change it? Monica Speca, developer and writer for Onyx Path Publishing walks through the design considerations for making the rules of the game fit the game you want to play. Learn about mechanics like momentum, stunts, investigation, stress, and relationship tension Jenga towers.

Show Notes

Bonus Experience podcast – Monica’s podcast along with cohost Rai Cole.
BXP episode 2 on House Rules
“house ruling is basically just micro game design for an audience of like six people”
Age system – Game with an investigation mechanic and the generic version
Gumshoe games – Game centered around investigation in different settings like:
Ashen Stars – Sci fi investigation game
Trail of Cthulhu – dark horror investigation game
Star Crossed – Two player Jenga Love Game
Stunts in Exalted – a run down of stunts in Exalted
Invisible Sun – A somewhat pretentious but surreal game by Monte Cook that Terry loves a bit too much
Planescape for Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2nd edition – The best 2e setting
Through the Breach – A game Monica likes, not all characters in the game are swol/skinny bitches
Apocalypse World – GM doesn’t touch dice system
Blades in the Dark – A tight system with hard tradeoffs

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October 19, 2019July 3, 2021

Tomes of Magick: Second Edition Core Book

Second Edition’s (2e) intimacy and depth is sometimes viewed as a radical departure from First Edition’s (1e) cosmic stories but what are the nuts and bolts of the differences? Was the change sudden or gradual and how was Brucato’s vision implemented in a core book? Adam and Terry talk about how mechanics, mood, setting, and metaplot changed and what you should remember when looking back on 2e’s groundbreaking release and what got left behind from 2e’s strict page count.

Show Notes

Changes:
- Mechanics
  - Difficulties change for vulgar magic from rolling Sphere to rolling Arete in all cases
  - Focuses opened up and focus-specific time requirements dropped
  - Orphans progress at same rate as other mages but require focuses
  - Bonuses for being near a node no longer swing as wildly, capped at -3 instead of -5
  - Can now re-try failed effects without blowing willpower
  - Damage chart unified and one-off modifiers listed for Spheres (Mind does bashing, etc)
  - Coincidental magic now process
  - Much of the content of Book of Shadows: the Mage Players Guide is baked in
  - More difficulty modifiers introduced
- Mood
  - Game less cosmic interaction of Avatars for the metaphysical trinity to something more personal
  - Mage less might-makes-right with mages delivering sleepers from Technocratic Union control. Technocrats no longer fighting for strict rigid equality.
  - 1e was “conflict between utopias.” Utopia not visible in 2e.
- Setting
  - Pure Ones no longer believed in by all mages
  - Void Engineers no longer viewed as infected by the fae and no longer wish to destroy space
  - Continuum dropped as a term
  - Marauders no longer universally fighting for a return of the Mythic Age and in 2e are generally less sane
  - Fight for Nodes and Quintessence less front and center
  - Penumbra established, no longer just Near Umbra
  - Nephandi no longer strictly star-squid cultists
  - Oracles no longer those near Ascension but those who’ve stepped back from it
  - No longer one Chantry per Tradition
  - All nine spheres now used in metaphysical cycle rather than just six
  - Essence de-emphasized
  - Rotes change
- Metaplot
  - Syndicate un-disappeared
  - Amanda Johnson revealed to share Avatar with former Senex apprentice who went barabbus
  – Fors Collegis Mercuris evacuated to Cerberus after Nephandi and Technocratic attack

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October 12, 2019July 3, 2021

Darkness in Scandinavia with Erik Hoftaniska

How do you do the World of Darkness in the happiest places on earth? What’s magick like when the sun doesn’t set for weeks at a time? How does the Syndicate deal with social democracy? What are trolls really like and what is a well-pisser? Karl Erik Larsen Hoftaniska of the Symposium Podcast answers these questions and more.

Correction! Erik corrected himself to say that the Nordic countries were Social Democracies but the sound for that portion was garbled.

Show Notes

Kurt Andersen’s Fantasyland – Book on how America has always been a little bit crazy
Scholastic movement
Sámi people – Culture of the way north
Mage things!
- Difficulty of being a necromancer – Every line does it a little differently
- Mage: The Awakening arcana fate vs death
- Werewolf: The Forsaken – Chronicles of Darkness game
- Exarchs – Possible big bad from Mage: The Awakening
- A giant discussion of Mage: The Sorcerers Crusade
- Valdaerman – Fellowship from Dark Ages: Mage
- Itarajana – Magickal fellowship
- Spirit-Talkers from Dark Ages: Mage
- Gabrielites or the Cabal of Pure Thought, the precursors to the New World Order
- Seiðr – Shamanic sorcery
Other!
- Trollhunter movie – They can smell Christians
- Vices and Virtues – Album by Panic! at the Disco
Creatures!
- Trolls – Not the ones from Changeling
- Elves
- Fossegrim – Water spirit
- Brunnmigi – Well Pisser, yep, that’s what they do
- Draugr – Pretty well the same in lore
- Mare or Nightmare – They sit on your chest

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