[Mage: the Awakening] Hitting the Higher Arcana

The thing about all Mage games is that when the players start hitting the higher ranks in the Spheres (for oWoD) or Arcana (for nWoD), things start getting pretty interesting… and by interesting, I mean spiraling towards directions you can’t really plan for completely.

While this is a negative for some GMs, I find that I usually love this sort of thing.  Mage is one of the games that truly rewards creative and well thought-out machinations, not only in a mechanical level, but also from the perspective of someone willing to truly use their imagination.  Of course, this distinction is suddenly remarkably clear, especially in my gaming group.

I have players that honed in on the best combinations of rotes, and started hammering out long term goals, while others, like stage show magicians, decided to hold their best tricks up in their sleeves, preferring to pull them out on the table just to see how I’d react.  It’s been a while since I’ve run a mage game at this level of play, and I have to admit that even if it took 4 seasons to get here, it’s remarkably rewarding.  Not only for the players, but also for myself, especially since I get to pull out some of my own tricks.

The fun part about Mage is that sometimes, it’s really all about finding out how your opponent thinks.  And because of that, I have to be careful not to make all my villains follow the same sort of paradigm, lest I get predictable.  My players will play dirty as sin in Mage, so I have to make sure that I give as much as I get, and keep the game’s sense of tension up and unpredictable.

It becomes extra important to pay attention to game balance at these parts, and mind some of the more insane Rotes such as Forge Godsend, Forge Doom, Gain Skill, Diplomat’s Protection and Shifting Sands.  All of these are powerful to the point of almost being game-breaking, but each spell has a way around it.  Even Diplomat’s Protection, as powerful as it is, can be circumvented, if you’re cunning enough… besides, what’s good for your players is equally good for your NPCs.  Two sworn enemies both with Diplomat’s Protection Spells up in the same room count for some very interesting Reed Richards and Dr. Doom moments.