Mage: The Ascension

For Mage: The Ascension being run by IXJac.

So yeah, create pages for your character. Or just link your userpage if you're lazy. Nobody cares.

Protagonists

Now in Alphabetical order.

Active Cast

Cara Stang (Andronicus)

Hermetic mage who's got an incurable case of vampire echoes. Really good at the whole mind control thing. As a Disciple, once stabbed an Adept to death. Now has a Kana-approved eyepatch to go with the existing dominatrix look. Once "confused" by Derek Maxwell for a dominatrix nurse. Successfully mind controlled a senior Technocrat, successfully executed a traitor in the Chicago Chantry while fending off (with Mari-chan's help) the misplaced anger of a high level Askahic. Escaped from China-Town, leaving the Chinese Hulk to cover her escape, with Shu and ended up burning down Starborns boat. Recently visited Lo Pan's realm (and found out Chor Memor was indirectly reponsible for Castlar's death) with her Green eyes. A practitioner of Hermetic Thaumaturgy, focusing on the Spheres of Life (Death) and Mind.

Theme Music: The Offspring-You're Gonna Go Far, Kid

Aptitudes: Offensive Life Magic, Mind Control, Vampirism, Makes good pancakes, Green Eyes

Botchery: Cara Stang almost never botches and only rarely fails and generally does not do so during a critical situation. Quite appropriately she is one of the two undisputed survival mode characters and a proven survivor of IXBot's wrath.

Classification: Insurable Type

Insurance Rate: D

Banality: 3 (An open mind is like a castle with its gate unbarred.)

Humanity: 3 (Cold-hearted child-killing vampiress)

Catherine West (Norseman)

A silly librarian who thinks she's from the Victorian era. Talks to trees (they talk back). Carries a revolver containing a good Victorian constable (spirit).

Theme Music: Mary Poppins-A Spoon Full of Sugar

Aptitudes: Spirit Magic, Scrying, Occult Knowledge, Enhancing Alcohol Sales

Botchery: IXBot has so far declined to openly dispense criticality during key moments for Cathy. She does get into plenty of trouble however, especially when left without supervision. Did botch with after-effects at least once while poking the Loom of Fate.

Classification: Should-Not-Be-Left-Alone Type

Risk Assessment: C

Banality: 3 (Neo-Disney princess)

Humanity: 8 (But Ma'at 0)

Christopher Westin (MJ12)

An Entropy mage who has spent years and years of experience honing himself into a weapon of fate. Chalice trainee who is competent in all methods of murder and surprisingly good at several intellectual pursuits for a Euthanatos commando. Despite being more down to earth and grounded in reality than several party members, often demonstrates only somewhat more social grace than a HITMark.

Theme Music: Ilaria Graziano-I Do

Aptitudes: Omnicompetent at mundane combat and stealth, Computer Hacking, Entropy magic, healing, stunt driving.

Botchery: Westin demonstrates the ability to botch and/or fail key rolls in dangerous situations, putting himself and others at risk. The 1's tend to strike during routine rolls where he seems to have a decent dice pool and during confrontations where you would really rather his opening actions not fail horribly. Key areas to be aware of are most non-combat dexterity rolls such as athletics or stealth, as well as Arete (obviously).

Classification: Operational Failure Type

Terror Rank: A

Banality: 7 (Only cares about things he can shoot)

Humanity: 5 (Sole Tradition member of Terminators Anonymous)

Derek Maxwell aka Eli Lorentz aka Captain Cavitation (OmegaPaladin)

Former aspiring technocrat who now happily deviates reality. Operates out of a "Welcome to My Laboratory!" in Chicago. Cackles maniacally while operating a tunneling machine. Earned his True Name by making the world's first supercavitating underwater speedboat while evading a technocratic laser satellite off the coast of Florida.

Theme Music: Jack Wall et al. - Mordin

Aptitudes: Technocratic Lore, Mad Science, Healing, Paragon Interrupts

Botchery: Derek hasn't made any real botches of failures yet and in fact has a good share of success stories. Can be left unsupervised to accumulate successes.

Classification: Insurable Type

Lab Safety: D

Banality: 7 (L trains on Ether Tracks? Uh, yeah...)

Humanity: 8 (Captain Cavitation takes all the Paragon interrupts.)

Elizabeth Allegheny (Phantom Llama)

Cardshark moebomb part-time Batman villain Umbrood Lord shrine maiden. Writes fanfiction and reality.

Theme Music: Anza-Tobira o Akete

Aptitudes: Lies, Spirit Magic, games of chance, getting possessed, dragonfacts

Botchery: Unknown but expected to have a high degree of vulgarity. Follows crazy persons to join resistances.

Classification: Should-Not-Be-Left-Alone Type

Card Tournament Ranking: C

Banality: 3 (Believes in spirits the same way fishes believe in water. Alien attack? Fuck yes!)

Humanity: 7 ("Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind." [She hasn't read the rest of the poem yet])

Kanako Kuga (Maloncanth)

Japanese-Canadian girl and Orphan mage whose paradigm is that anime works. Her special ability is the Power to Cosplay. Adept in Matter and skilled in Prime, Kana is also presently the chantry's de facto talismancer and her products range from mundane arms and armor to battle robots and underground bases. A recent 3-month refit at Pharos has also uprated her firepower to the level of a Mk1 Mari. In the field, Kana's decisiveness and tendency to undertake large scale and/or independent action lands her in a lot of trouble, ranging from death curses to piles and piles of paradox that the rest of the chantry often have to extricate her from.

Theme Music: Battle of Heroines - Actually, this is just her paradigm in 60 seconds.

Aptitudes: Swordplay, Matter magic, Anime Trivia.

Botchery: Kana mixes frequent(ly significant) success with spectacular accumulation of trouble, curses, quint resonance and paradox. Botches are infrequent but may strike large or strike in storms that overwhelm willpower and quint reserves. Holds the current dice pool record - having botched rolls on her stealth pool of 10 on two separate occasions.

Classification: Should-Not-Be-Left-Alone/Paradox Accumulation Hybrid Type

Difficulty Level: S

Banality: 3 (Drew the line at telepathic pink dinosaurs)

Humanity: 6 (Cheery Otaku with a Heart of Jade)

Marilia Caldwell (Silence)

Fireball mage and sole heir to a Hermetic dynasty. The artillery of the chantry. Resurrection count: 1 Fireball Count: Many. Technically grounded from fighting the Ascension War again. Diableriezed her shadow and next incarnation for more power. Continues the Caldwell clan tradition of foiling Jodi Blake.

Theme Music: Hammerfall-Any Means Necessary

Aptitudes: Firepower, Collateral damage, Occult Knowledge (specializing in onyx), being mind controlled

Botchery: Mari botches from time to time and tends to do so at critical times and with terrifically damaging results - she has killed herself with her own fire once already. The botches of Team Fireball's burning heart have passed on into legend.

Classification: Explosive Type

Fireball Intensity: S

Banality: 5 (I was dead. I got better)

Humanity: 3 (When all you have is fireballs, the entire world starts to look like kindling.)

Hubris: 6 (Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger)

Proteus v2.6 (Shrike)

Emergent AI that Awakened in a previous iteration, has unlocked various aspects of his morphable nature. Generally seen as the glue that holds Tempus Spatium together, he and Beta take care of a lot of the mundanities that keep the chantry running as well as communication. Has started taking a more direct role in things recently to fight the Ascension War his own way.

Theme Music: Juno Reactor-Guardian Angel

Aptitudes: ECM/ECCM, Healing, Computer Hacking, Digital Web Ops, Intelligence Gathering, Paragon Interrupts, keeping teammates alive.

Botchery: Numerous key Arete rolls botched or failed. The 1's are the new tundra.

Classification: Arete Cascade Failure Type

eVulnerability: B

Banality: 8 (This shit is tacky. Seriously.)

Humanity: 9 (I do good not because I must, but because I choose)

Shu Izanagi (Kerrus)

An assassin from the Meiji Era. Everything old is new again. Recently became the student of a kid he used to train. Now on his own operating out of Arcus Prima, fighting technocrats, and rescuing orphans.

Theme Music: Machinae Supremacy - Player One

Aptitudes: Swordsmanship, Stealth, Entropy magic, Scrying, Surviving inordinate amounts of damage.

Botchery: Many failures, fortunately including the failure to die when punched in the face by a demon and the failure to stab self. Later almost got ganked by a ghost girl wielding a soul sucking blade. Always seems to be in over his head. :(

Classification: Introspective Oratory Sword Ninja-Type. With a Buster Sword.

Ninja Level: B+

Banality: 5 (A man out of time)

Humanity: 6 (Ninja Vigilante with a Heart of Gold)

Xia Yu Lan(FBH)

An Akashic swords-woman on a quest for vengeance

Theme Music:

Aptitudes: Kung Fu

Botchery: No basis for measurement

Classification: Unclassified

Straightness of Lace: D

Banality: 4 (Even dragons can't be angry randomly!)

Humanity: 6 (Throws evildoers into acid vats to die horribly, but only if they deserve it)

Allies and Familiars

Beta - Proteus' AI computer familiar and probably Tempus Spatium's most indispensible ally. She is called Beta-chan by Kana, an appellation which seems to have stuck. Like her master, she has no last name. Usually just Proteus' digital assistant and housekeeper (sometimes in a maid outfit, unfucking his paradox as he sleeps), Beta is a remarkably powerful being while on the internet, turning Chor Tempest's Five Man Band up to Eleven on her own. Also looks good in a Red Army uniform.

In her capacity as a mage (on the internet only), Beta is considered to have an Insurable Type rating of D.

Constable Nerton - The animating spirit of Catherine West's revolver, Norton is a very proper Victorian era London constable who (despite being the least powerful and capable of independent action) has demonstrated remarkable courage in adversity. In contrast to everyone else in Tempus Spatium's monkeysphere, Constable Nerton has the unique distinction of having no first name.

Kano - Former Yakuza midboss turned aspiring badass normal, now arguably definitely a genuine badass normal. He was, with some help from Kana, responsible for slaying the somewhat horrible Kang Zhang, a half Kuei-Ji half human dude mostly known as the man with the flaming hair. In the final episode of the arc, he joined Kana once again (this time with additional Proteus) and dealt the final blow to the more genuinely horrible Mister Lao. Kano managed to out-DPS Technocratic black helicopters against the enemy bioroid in Mage S3, further cementing his badassery. Recently became more image conscious, gaining fangirls. Kano finished off Boss Sasaki recently, adding yet another "exceedingly powerful supernatural" to his kill count.

Yeah, man. What the fuck. Why the hell doesn't he have fangirls? M.M. 16:28, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

He needs a higher appearance, that's why. --MJ12 Commando 23:10, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Monta - A Tanuki which has become attached to Catherine. Witty, talkative, and with massive balls, shit gets totally metaphorical around him. A very talented shapeshifter, Monta is the only chantry ally besides Beta who can pose as a team by himself.

Natalie Boerman - Derek's old flame from Techno College when he was Darrin Clark. Recently had a moral qundary and choose not to turn Derek in - Leading to Derek holding her hostage with a suicide vest and blowing her and him up. Luckily C-10 had planned on that to happen. Arete 3, a trained Genegineer with Life 3, Matter 2, Mind 2, Prime 2 as Spheres.

Onyx - A newborn werewolf puppy, product of a forbidden (werewolves are obligate xenophiles) werewolf union. Rescued by Mari and duly imprinted.

Ozu (Mari: Ozu-sama!) - The Japanese (Possible Ventrue) Kindred who was contesting with Kang for control of Vancouver. Part of the Camarilla, and possibly the Camarilla prince of Vancouver. Saved from death at the treacherous hands of Team Timeout by Team Fireball. An ally, if an untrustworthy and vampiric one, of the chantry. For the moment.

How the heck's this guy a protagonist?! Are you guys dense?! --Suiren 9:09, 9 September 2009 (XST)

Pam - An innocent loli who Kana rescued from the insidious clutches of a Vancouver pedoring. Rather than being groomed for CP, now she is being indoctrinated into the cel-shaded paradigm. Recent episodes have increasingly emphasized her supernatural status. Her special ability is the inability to fail stealth rolls.

Mentors

Vincent Caldwell A Master of House Bonisagus and Mentor and uncle to Marilia Caldwell. Murdered during a magic dual, he was subsequently resurrected after his soul passed through the gauntlet during Team Fireball's first, confusing, mission. In cahoots with Noldos Vayne before Vayne's death. His death was directly caused by tainted Tass provided to him (through intermediaries, including Marillia and Ren) by the Verbena adjudicator of the Certamen... corrupted by a Nephandus who managed to penetrate the Chantry. It is very possible this was the same Nephandus who went to so much trouble to seize Catherine West and attempt to get one of the Japanese Umbrood to do away with her on the basis of being a self-proclaimed enemy of Caldwell.

Josephine Mordant - The Magistatus of Jove of House Quaesitor and Mentor to Cara, who swore her into the House, and the closest thing to family the Cabal's Quaesitor has. She gave a flower to Cara during her childhood after viewing her future. The flower allowed Cara to defeat the Wilder Luss, a far superior Mage. Supported Cara in the events involving Tom One-Eagle in Winnipeg with the Council.

Nakazawa Takumi - Shu Izanagi's cabal shota a hundred and fifty years ago. He is now an old man and still stuck with his little kid name. Played Go with Miho once last century and got his ass kicked. Kicks modern Shu's ass at martial arts and beat Kana at Go.

Dimitri Sotiris - A member of the Chalice grooming Westin for promotion. In his first appearance of two to date, proved that he wasn't above the words "necessary sacrifice". On the other hand, nobody died from it and Westin himself didn't care about being used as bait, so it all worked out in the end. Does, in fact, use a computer and understands the importance of internet security. Only time will tell if he will gain more importance later.

Margrave Karl-Werner Luftwelle III - One of the most progressive and well mannered Etherites on Victoria Station, and now Kana's new mentor in Robodynamic Engineering.

Retirees

Ichijo Watanabe (Ezekiel)

Genuine Japanese junior VA. Learning to hate Marauders. Unofficially apprenticed to Proteus. Virtually going crazy with power. Hooked up with a hacker chick in Chicago and left.

Theme Music: Chiaki Ishikawa-Uninstall

Aptitudes: Long Range Strike, ECM/ECCM, Computer Hacking, Digital Web Ops, Firearms

Botchery: Ichi botches very frequently at a steady and unavoidable rate but mostly doesn't cause huge problems for anybody else. He tends to do be online a lot - so since internets dox and IRL dox are tabulated separately, one can consider Ichi to have twice the safety buffer for dox accumulation. A recent crowning moment of awesome in Chicago has justified the lowering of his insurance rate.

Classification: Operational Failure Type

Brainmeat Integrity: C+

Banality: 7 (I saw this on a youtube once)

Humanity: 7 (Too young to become drunk and bitter yet)

Casualties

James Reines (Shrike) - Void Engineer who got Nephandirized, bringing an end to Team Techno.

Marilia Caldwell (Silence) - Hermitic book loli of Team Fireball. Consumed by fire and paradox in an untimely botch while burning vampires. Currently not resting in peace. Alive again! And finally succeeded where she once failed!

Ren Dynler (Ralson) - Hermitic mage of Team Fireball who majored in Drinking and Driving. Consumed by fire and steel-beam-through-chest in glorious fashion while torching vampires. May he also rest in peace.

Reynolds (MJ12) - ItX traitor member of the shortlived Team Hacker with eight points in AAAA TECHNOCRACY. Killed by Contingent 10 and then baleeted himself. May he rest in peace.

Wilhelm Deimos (Ezekiel) - Anarchist Etherite. Destroyed by techno beamnuke fire during the disastrous awesome disastrome Shady Vale mission. May he rest in subatomic pieces.

Tia Mazu (Ent) - Hot Ninja Girl. Destroyed by techno beamnuke fire during the disastrous awesome disastrome Shady Vale mission. May she rest in subatomic pieces.

John Nightingale (Screwball)

A buff action hero type from Val Verde. Currently MIA, might have moved on...TO THE NEPHANDI.

Vali Bartal (Ralson)

Psycho werecat. Narrowly avoided death at the hands of a 300 Gigajoule plasma cannon and has a skull for a face now. Scary!

Alexandra Solaimani (Norse ally NPC played by Kerrus) What can one say, Jodie Blake is a mean bitch.

Kiyoshi Nakamura - Ichi's buddy. Did not fuck around while attacking a massive Progenitor web server. Vanished with Ichi.

Tempus Spatium

The spaces in time.

The current team rosters of our glorious chantry. Format: Cabals are the new thing! Previous groupings ("teams") and histories of should be put here: Chantry/Team History. Short descriptions, therefore, are fine here.

Cabals

Tempus Spatium constitutionally has three or four founding cabals.

Chor Ignis?

Founder: Cara? Mari?
Membership

Chor SOS

Founder: Kanako Kuga
Membership

Chor TEMPEST

Founder: Proteus
Membership

Tempus Spatium Holdings

Arcus Prima, Chantry of Tempus Spatium Chantry Offices

Dirtfort Tempus Spatium is a multi-tradition chantry based in the city of Vancouver. We value diversity, commitment, and moé.

Proteus' Pad - A 3-point node located in Proteus' apartment. All the tass it produces is consumed by Beta-chan.

Hasseltine House - A 4-point node controlled by Chor Memor.

Kana's Keep - A third node awakened by Kana is presently 1-point but growing slowly. Located in a condemned apartment formerly occupied by a Wuff.

The Gundam - The 1:1 Gundam in Tokyo is a five point node which has leylines connecting to Technocratic concerns, some of which appear to be in the umbra. Nevertheless, Kana knows how to access the Tass from this hallowed ground and has built a Jaburo Base the size of a small complex beneath it (Sanctum 1). Initial observations after the complex was finished showed a drafty shaft beneath the mecha elevator, raising the suspicion that she had either dug too greedily and too deep or perhaps not deep and greedy enough. Later exploration confirmed that the passage beneath the elevator leads to Undergundam (or Okhun if you believe the locals), a part of the Hollow Earth.

The chantry also has about 4 dots in resources, a 60m yacht with a helipad, and a not-inconsiderable amount of weaponry, including multiple Technocratic smallarms and a sizeable cache of iron oni equipment, wreckage, and Soviet surplus.

Tempus Spatium Associations

Pharos of Azkazia, in the Sea of Storms. Three earthly aspects. One is a manor in Winnipeg watched by a platoon of Chorus Slayerettes and one is a cabin out in the everglades west of Miami. Home base of Cathy and Mari.

Notable Incidents

Notable Incidents

Does anyone bother updating these anymore? --chickenstrangler 03:14, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Nice Things

NPCs of Mage

Locations in Mage

Strike Force Zero Gadgets

Catherine West: A brief psychological analysis by K. E. Rrus. M.D. Dacis2 09:30, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Captain Cavitation in the Windy City

Mage Humor

Historic Events of 2010

Progenitors Revisited

Robot Plans/Brainstorming

Team Techno

Useful Things

http://wodwarfare.tripod.com/firearms.html

Enhancing Mundane Rolls with Magick

Choose an appropriate sphere to support the mundane action, and roll Arete at the difficulty of the mundane action. Each success reduces the difficulty of the mundane action by 1, to a maximum of 3. Really difficult actions, or less than fully appropriate spheres may reduce this benefit.
When using magick to enhance the mundane it is traditional to "stunt" a little, for the sake of atmospherics:

"Iterator Apthalon's right eye glows red as a targeting beam plays over Proteus' body, settling on the rogue AI's forhead. The Iterator raises his disruptor pistol and in a thick accent says, "This system, is down."

Remember describe exactly what you're doing to the ST as well - "Apthalon is using forces to range in on Proteus and reduce the difficulty of his shot"

(If you choose not to stunt, or otherwise get into the spirit of things, the ST reserves the right to have your enhancing magickal roll take a full action, rather just being reflexive with some cool SFX and/or a witty line.)

Enhancing Magick with Mundane Rolls

This works on a same principle as enhancing mundane rolls with magick, but the mundane roll always takes a full turn and cannot be done reflexively in the same turn as the magick.

(The ST reserves the right to violate the above rule for really cool and inventive applications in times of dire stress - that means cool and inventive, not verbose)

Combat Maneuvers

All maneuvers are difficulty 6 unless specified otherwise.

Offensive

P185 Revised.

Clinch

With a successful attack roll, the attacker grabs the target and begins to squeeze. First turn the attacker rolls damage (Strength). Each suceeding turn both attackers act according to initiative. Each combatant can either inflict damage automatically (roll soak normally) or attempt to break clinch. To escape, make a resisted Strength+Brawl roll.

Disarm

Make a attack roll at difficulty penalty of 1 (typically 7). If successfull attacker rolls damage normally. If sux exceeds the defenders strength, the defender is disarmed.

Kick

Dex+Brawl. Difficulty +1, Strength +1 (Bashing).

A Kick has the chance to knock an enemy back, or over, or otherwise toss them around.

Multiple Opponents

Characters fighting multiple opponents in close combat suffer cumulative attack and defense penalties of one per additional opponent (to a max of 4). I.e. John Courage fighting three Ninja hitmen at once suffers a difficulty penalty of 2 to all attack and defence rolls.

This penalty is reduced for the difference in combat skill between the combatants. Jackie Chan laughs at being mobbed by half-a-dozen mooks.

Strike

Dex+Brawl. Difficulty Normal. Strength (Bashing).

Defensive

Block

Dexterity + Brawl move to block an incoming hand-to-hand attack. Cannot be used on lethal or aggravated damage unless the character is wearing armor, using magic, or has some sort of special training (like say, Do).

Dodge

Dexterity + Dodge roll to move out of the way of an attack. Cannot be used if there is no space to maneuver.

Difficulty is usually 6 in close combat.

Difficulty varies in ranged combat depending on cover.

4 for heavy cover (only very small portions of body exposed, like head or arm)

6 for medium cover (half body exposed)

8 for light cover (more than half body exposed)

9-10 for no cover at all (caught in the middle of an empty parking lot)

Parry

Dexterity + Melee roll to parry attack. If enemy is attacking unarmed and character parries with weapon that deals lethal damage, enemy may be wounded by parry.

Desperate Defense

The character gets his full defense pool against the first attack, then loses one die off of every subsequent defensive roll instead of normal multiple action rules.

Changing to a Defense

The character can abandon any declared action to conduct a defense at a +1 difficulty.

Combat Misc

Target Size Diff Dmg Modifier

Medium (arm, briefcase) +1

Small (hand, head) +2 +1

Precise (eye, heart) +3 +2

Multiple Actions

Taken sequentially and in initiative order for each "round" of a "turn" until all participants have used all actions.
(Numbers given are dice penalties)

1 action: -0

2 actions: -2/-3

3 actions: -3/-4/-5

4 actions: -4/-5/-6/-7

5 actions: -5/-6/-7/-8/-9

6 actions: -6/-7/-8/-9/-10/-11

Simultaneous Attacks

Done in a single turn against multiple targets, without waiting for the next initiative stage - generally for taking on lots of mooks quickly.
Split die pool for action between targets (does not have to be an even split)

+1 difficulty on each target after the first, cumulative.

Failing in an attack on one target my disrupt further attacks in the sequence.

Sanctums

As for Sanctum, we go with the Guide to the Traditions with the following modifications. Size goes from closet < decent sized room < house < extremely large buuilding < entire fucking forest, which you can trade off for smaller size and more arcane, AND. . . You get to have sphere effects up to the Sanctum's rating which work automatically within the Sanctum's boundaries. For instance. A 1 point closet sanctum where Billy is locked in by his parents when he's bad may have a 1 point magical effect where he can summon a small candle flame to banish the darkness (Forces 1) and keep the monsters at bay (impending Marauderism) Consider it just local reality bending to your will .

Creating Magickal Items

Crafting

XP Costs

TRAIT INCREASE

• Name Cost (current rating)
• Attribute x4
• Knowledge x1
• Talent/Skill x2
• Willpower x1
• Background D
• Trad. Sphere x7
• Other Sphere x8
• Arete x8

NEW TRAIT

• Ability 3
• Background D
• Sphere 10

Banality Ratings

• 0-2 Marauders
• 2-4 Mysticks (Vervena, Cult of Ecstasy, Hermetics, Dreamspeakers)
• 4-6 True Believers (Nephandi, Celestial Chorus, Akashic Brotherhood, Euthantos, most Craft wizards)
• 6-8 Modern Cynics (Sons of Ether, Hollow Ones, Virtual Adepts, many Orphans)
• 8-10 Technocracts. The Badguys.