# Mage: Ascension vs Awakening



## lightgun_suicide (Mar 13, 2010)

Assume you're new to both World of Darkness and Mage. You've read about Mage and want to read the material and start playing it. You don't know which to go with, Ascension (and thus oWoD) or Awakening (nWoD). You know people who are willing to play in a game, but first you have to pick which system to get going with.

Which would you reccomend?


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## Mark Hope (Mar 13, 2010)

Although I'm an Ascension player, I'd probably have to recommend Awakening, mainly because you'll find it hard to locate copies of the Revised Mage: the Ascension rulebook for sensible prices.

However, it's not a simple question.  Ascension comes in different flavours - there are enough differences between the various editions of Ascension to make that a valid factor as well.

Playstyle is a factor - what kind of occult game do you like?  The various iterations of Mage take different approaches to the subject matter and you need to look at that before you decide.

How do you like your crunch?  Awakening is crunchier than Ascension (although its systems are more streamlined and unified).  You'd need to take that on board or be happy with stripping out rules that you don't like.

Cost is a factor.  None of the core rules are entirely complete (with, perhaps, the exception of Ascension 2e) - in all cases you really need some other books to flesh out the material in the core book.  Are you willing to locate nd buy them, especially as some are out of print?

That said, if you're willing to hack and mod and change, you can get equal mileage out of both.  They're both excellent but flawed game systems.  Although I'd be happy playing either, I'd be _most_ happy combining the two into something else.  I run Ascension but have incorporated rules and setting elements from Awakening.  You could as easily do the opposite - play Awakening and incorporate stuff from Ascension.  I stuck with Ascension as my base because I'm more familiar with it.  Both approaches would work.

No, it's not really a straightforward answer to your question, but I don't think that there is one.  I'd need to know more about your tastes and desires for the game before being able to recommend one over the other.  And even then I would probably recommend that you combine elements of the two.


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## Kobold Avenger (Mar 13, 2010)

I found Mage: the Ascension went with the approach of occult practices of various cultures that existed out there.  It was about belief and mysticism, and generally took a one-sided view of technology and modern society, until they bothered to show the Technocracy's side of the story.  Some of the traditions were very strong in concept, others maybe needed a bit of work.

Mage: the Awakening is more flexible and open-ended in the type of chronicle you want to run, but is more about Gnosticism and a mythical ancient civilization.  There's certainly room for Ascensions detailed cultural practices.  And the magic is a bit more codified in what you are and aren't allowed to do.

There both good games, though each one has it's own strengths and weaknesses.


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## Crothian (Mar 13, 2010)

I always liked the flavor of the Ascension better, but the Rules and organization of Awakening.  Ascension is an easy game from what I've seen to abuse.  I haven't seen as much of that with Awakening though I've played it a lot less.


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## Wayside (Mar 14, 2010)

Mark Hope said:


> Although I'm an Ascension player, I'd probably have to recommend Awakening, mainly because you'll find it hard to locate copies of the Revised Mage: the Ascension rulebook for sensible prices.



Although for people who don't mind PDFs, Whitewolf has kept most of the old books (1st edition may be an exception) available through places like DriveThru and RPGNow at half the cover price of the hard copies. The Ascension revised core rules also seem to be fairly common used in the low $20 range.


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## thecasualoblivion (Mar 14, 2010)

Mechanically, I'd use Awakening 8 days a week. With some minor interpretations, I don't see how you couldn't use Awakening's rules with Ascension. 

That being said, the main issue is flavor. As has been stated above, Ascension is a grab bag of familiar mystical traditions, while Awakening is kind of a new age Atlantis feel. Ascension in my opinion has a more interesting if uneven flavor, but is very specific. There is a very definite war going on, and there are sides and armies, and you're a part of that picture. With fluff like that, the high points are interspersed with some real duds. Awakening lays out a background, and then lets you take it wherever you want to go. It doesn't have quite the compelling flavor that Ascension has, but it lacks the issues of the former and grants the game a lot more freedom. 

I'd recommend using the system of Awakening, with whatever flavor/setting you find more compelling/appropriate.


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## ProfessorCirno (Mar 14, 2010)

Crothian said:


> I always liked the flavor of the Ascension better, but the Rules and organization of Awakening.




More or less this.  Ascension has much better fluff, Awakening has more or less better rules...but I think Ascension's amazing fluff beats out the rule changes.  I perfer oMage.


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## Tiberius (Mar 14, 2010)

I haven't tried nMage, but own the majority of the oMage line. If I were to start a game of Ascension, I would use the Revised rules with the Second Edition fluff. Revised attempted, for reasons that are unclear to me beyond someone saying "You're having badwrongfun!", to constrain the focus of the game to Earth by making travel to the spirit world difficult and, eventually, fatal. As many Reality Deviants mages escaped into the Umbra to escape the Technocratic calcification of reality, this was a substantial shift.

I, for one, loved the idea that there existed fully-explorable realms created by human belief, and that mages could find sufficiently sympathetic ones in which to set up shop. I enjoyed the idea that one side or another could still win the Ascension War. The post-Revised setting seemed to take all the cool, hopeful, and generally non-WoD elements of the game and smash them. This led to a game that felt to me to be counter to the spirit of the prior editions. While the mechanics were tightened up, I didn't think the tradeoff was equal.


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## Wombat (Mar 14, 2010)

I play a lot of NWoD and some OWoD and, to reiterate what others have said here, Awakening has much better mechanics and Ascension has much better fluff.  

The original magic rules were very poorly balanced and open to a lot of abuse and min/maxing; the new magic rules are very sleek and work well on the fly, as well as providing more reason to learn rotes.  Conversely, if you just go by the core book of either iteration, there is very little impetus for adventure in Awakening, while there is tons in Ascension.  If you get into the supplements for Awakening it becomes better, but still I prefer the Technocracy as bad guys to (at first) very vague shadowboxing with fellow mages in the current rendition.  

Then again, with very little work you can combine the two, so then you can have the best of both worlds!


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## pawsplay (Mar 14, 2010)

I want to like Awakening, but first they would have to print it in something other than that illegible gold stuff.


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## Mercule (Mar 14, 2010)

As others have said, Awakening has significantly better mechanics, but Ascension had stronger fluff.  I'm not sure I'd call Ascension's fluff "better", though, just because I strongly dislike technomagic and the Technocracy is difficult (at best) to marginalize in Ascension.

For Ascension, with or without the Technocracy, you have a fairly compelling system for exploring worldviews, philosophy, and the nature of self using the nature of reality as proxy.  As a philosophy minor in college at the time of the original publishing of Ascension, I thought it looked fairly interesting.  In practice, however, it only took one player who didn't want to navel gaze to break things.  

That isn't to say it's wrong to not navel gaze, just that a lot of the rules issues that were fixed with Awakening make the game more difficult to break.  A lot less is left to vague questions of paradigms and "what does your character believe".

My recommendation is, if your group is fairly into character-building and open to philosophy and metaphors, Ascension would probably be a pretty fun game.  Doubly so, if you want to reflect on how technology can starch the soul or how your worldview can affect the way you do things.

If you just want to play wizards in the modern world, and don't care if everyone has personalities and motivations that require some fairly deep thought from the players, then Awakening is probably a better choice.  Awakening has the capability to add some of the paradigm-oriented pieces from Ascension, along with the variety of magical traditions.  It just doesn't assume them.  An experienced GM could probably duplicate the Ascension fluff, almost exactly, with Awakening.  It'd take effort, but (IMO) it takes a fair amount of effort to hold an Ascension game together, anyway.


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## lightgun_suicide (Mar 14, 2010)

Thanks for the replies. 

As it happens I've acquired virtually the entire Ascension back catalogue of books from a friend (the amount of splatbooks and fluff is daunting, this campaign won't start for a while). This has effectively made the decision for me, the first campaign I run will be Ascension although having read more into Awakening I would love to run an Awakening game at a later stage. I can't comment on the mechanics but I'm new to both in any case so it doesn't matter too much.


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## ShadowDenizen (Mar 14, 2010)

> As others have said, Awakening has significantly better mechanics, but Ascension had stronger fluff. I'm not sure I'd call Ascension's fluff "better", though, just because I strongly dislike technomagic and the Technocracy is difficult (at best) to marginalize in Ascension.




I'm an "Ascenion"-er all the way; I think the quality of the books they put out make it some of the best of the oWoD material.  And "Guide to the Technocracy" remains one of the best RPG sourcebooks [/i]ever[/i] IMHO.



> This has effectively made the decision for me, the first campaign I run will be Ascension although having read more into Awakening I would love to run an Awakening game at a later stage. I can't comment on the mechanics but I'm new to both in any case so it doesn't matter too much.




Keep us infromed of your progress; it's been quite some time since I've seen someone new take up the mantle of DM'ing Mage.  I'd be curious what the learning curve is for you, and how the players enjoy it,


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## ProfessorCirno (Mar 14, 2010)

oWoD vs nWoD is a funny thing all around.  My views:

oMage > nMage
oVampire > nVampire
nChangeling > oChangeling
nHunter > oHunter
Promethian > Mummy
Geist >>> everything else holy crap this is awesome.
Never played either werewolf herfadurf


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## Saeviomagy (Mar 15, 2010)

Kobold Avenger said:


> I found Mage: the Ascension went with the approach of occult practices of various cultures that existed out there.  It was about belief and mysticism, and generally took a one-sided view of technology and modern society, until they bothered to show the Technocracy's side of the story.




The funny thing is that even without the technocracy books, plenty of people I knew still saw the technocracy as the good guys...


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## kigmatzomat (Mar 15, 2010)

The overarching metaplot of Ascension makes it easier to align a campaign.  Awakening is, IMO, a better system.  Ascension 1 had issues with flavor text contradicting mechanics and Ascension 2 seemed to nerf the power of the magi, probably after mixed-setting games.  

Part of the reason I like Awakening is that it is very close to the house rules I used for Awakening in the late 90s, which had been influenced by Deadlands' magic system.  

Ascension's setting is much harder to get players to buy into.  The line between individuality and rigid conformation is easy to identify.  And, IMO, you can run either side of Ascension.  Either you hunt "reality deviants" who are out to destroy the clean, healthy, well-fed, well-educated, long-lived world that most of the industrialized world lives in, or you are fighting against a rigid shadow autocracy that is destroying individuality, spirituality, and  literally killing the human spirit.


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## Kobold Avenger (Mar 15, 2010)

The best mechanic that Awakening has, are the Legacies.  Essentially Paragon Paths or Prestige Classes for a Mage, that gives them rotes they can do freely without getting any paradox because they crafted their souls that way.  It's something that I wish Ascension had.


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## Crothian (Mar 15, 2010)

ProfessorCirno said:


> nChangeling > oChangeling




You got that one wrong!


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## Jhaelen (Mar 15, 2010)

Crothian said:


> You got that one wrong!



Actually, it's spot on  oWoD Changeling wasn't something I'd have considered playing. The nWoD version is a lot better.

For me oWoD Mage was excellent - it's one of my all-time favorite systems.
nWoD Mage is terrible. Everything I liked about the system was thrown out. I'd rather play a pure nWoD campaign (i.e. everyone playing normal humans) than Mage.


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## Nifft (Mar 15, 2010)

I loved oWoD Mage. The system could have used some revision, but the setting was awesome.

I've only read nWoD Mage, but I don't much like what they did with the setting -- to the point that I haven't really given the system a chance.

I hope Ascension gives you as much fun as it gave us!

Cheers, -- N


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## ProfessorCirno (Mar 15, 2010)

Crothian said:


> You got that one wrong!




nChangeling is far better then Otherkin: the Glamourbombing


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## Crothian (Mar 15, 2010)

ProfessorCirno said:


> nChangeling is far better then Otherkin: the Glamourbombing




Playing abuse victims is more fun them other world creatures that have power in magic and imagination?  

Should this be in its own thread?  Would this kind of edition Wars be allowed here?


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## Wombat (Mar 15, 2010)

I'll stick happily with my current character from NWoD:CH -- Max Drengle, Beast Pigeon and would-be private eye  

OWoD: CH never really did it for me, but I'll leave it go after that


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## Umbran (Mar 15, 2010)

In my humble opinion, Mage: the Ascension is one of the best and one of the worst games ever written.  In the wrong hands, it is a mess and a half and more easily abused than just about any other game I've ever seen.  In the right hands, it is a thing of beauty.

In my humble opinion, Mage: the Awakening fixed most of the bad things in the previous game, but in the process they destroyed all the good things about the game as well.  The result is to my eyes a mediocre game.  It is probably far easier for a new player or GM to work with, but I am not sure that makes up for the loss.


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## Umbran (Mar 15, 2010)

Crothian said:


> Playing abuse victims is more fun them other world creatures that have power in magic and imagination?




Insofar as the old Changeling really isn't so much "World of Darkness" as it is "World of Insufficient Light" yes.  And mechanically speaking, the old Changeling has issues.  I'm convinced they refer to "bunks" so much because much of the magical system is, well, bunk.  

Not that the nWoD is perfect.  The morality system, for example, needs a bit of work.  I am not happy with any system that can technically lead to a character needing psychiatric care for forgetting to pay for a lip balm.


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## Crothian (Mar 15, 2010)

Umbran said:


> Insofar as the old Changeling really isn't so much "World of Darkness" as it is "World of Insufficient Light" yes.  And mechanically speaking, the old Changeling has issues.  I'm convinced they refer to "bunks" so much because much of the magical system is, well, bunk.




Old Changeling could be very dark, or insufficient light.  It was all over the place depending on what books you read and sometimes even in the same books it was very inconsistent.  You had groups of child serial killers pages from lighthearted Nockers making Dr Seuss like contraptions.  Mechanically the game had issues but IMO all the oWod games did.  But of those old games it is my favorite.


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## Mark Hope (Mar 15, 2010)

lightgun_suicide said:


> Thanks for the replies.
> 
> As it happens I've acquired virtually the entire Ascension back catalogue of books from a friend (the amount of splatbooks and fluff is daunting, this campaign won't start for a while). This has effectively made the decision for me, the first campaign I run will be Ascension although having read more into Awakening I would love to run an Awakening game at a later stage. I can't comment on the mechanics but I'm new to both in any case so it doesn't matter too much.




Awesome.  Do keep us posted.  I'm prepping a Mage: the Ascension game myself at the moment.  Would be cool to hear your thoughts on getting into the game for the first time.

Also, +1 for a nice, vicious Changeling edition war! Would make a change from the 3tard/4ron treadmill...


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## Umbran (Mar 15, 2010)

Crothian said:


> It was all over the place depending on what books you read and sometimes even in the same books it was very inconsistent.




This is not what I'd call a positive selling point.

I haven't read all the supplementary material - I'm simply going on the basic book.  It seems to me that while in theory you could have some dark stuff happening, the goofy magical system would make such seem a bit incongruous, to me.  Especially the first edition - "Now, to complete my fell magics I will... make moose antlers at you!  Mongamongamong!"


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## Mercule (Mar 15, 2010)

ProfessorCirno said:


> Geist >>> everything else holy crap this is awesome.



Why?


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## Crothian (Mar 15, 2010)

Umbran said:


> This is not what I'd call a positive selling point.
> 
> I haven't read all the supplementary material - I'm simply going on the basic book.  It seems to me that while in theory you could have some dark stuff happening, the goofy magical system would make such seem a bit incongruous, to me.  Especially the first edition - "Now, to complete my fell magics I will... make moose antlers at you!  Mongamongamong!"




I wasn't trying to be ad for the game.  It has flaws and after years of running it I ran into most of them.  Second edition did a lot to help with the themes and bring it more in line with oWod.  There are some pretty well done crossover books as well that mixes games and shows how they interact.  It became much more of Changelings are the last bit of magic in the world and soon the mundane nature of reality will kill what you are and turn you into one of them.


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## ProfessorCirno (Mar 15, 2010)

Mercule said:


> Why?




Geist is the counterpart to Wraith and Mummy (sorta)

Wraith was grim and gritty to the point of having an actual Angst stat.

Geist on the other hand is built off of Carnival and El Día de los Muertos.  You've died and come back - so eat, drink, and be merry, for you've already seen beyond!  Why worry about stress when you're so alive?  Sure, it's about death, but it's about celebration too - less woe is me wangst, more audacious jazz funeral.  The opening fiction is titled "Rum is the Drink the Dead Like Best"  That's not to say the game doesn't have horror - just look at the arbiters and law enforces of the Underworld, the Kerberoi, and their Lovecraft-mixed-with-Clive-Barker feel.


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## Hereticus (Mar 16, 2010)

Saeviomagy said:


> The funny thing is that even without the technocracy books, plenty of people I knew still saw the technocracy as the good guys...




What... no love for the Nephandi?


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## Hereticus (Mar 16, 2010)

Nifft said:


> I loved oWoD Mage. The system could have used some revision, but the setting was awesome.
> 
> I've only read nWoD Mage, but I don't much like what they did with the setting -- to the point that I haven't really given the system a chance.
> 
> I hope Ascension gives you as much fun as it gave us!




We had an incredible old mage game going, getting to an arete of 6 and all seven players reaching one sphere at five and another four. The epic highlight of the game was when we had our three character groups (mage, vampire & werewolf) descend on Mexico City at once.


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## pawsplay (Mar 16, 2010)

Umbran said:


> This is not what I'd call a positive selling point.
> 
> I haven't read all the supplementary material - I'm simply going on the basic book.  It seems to me that while in theory you could have some dark stuff happening, the goofy magical system would make such seem a bit incongruous, to me.  Especially the first edition - "Now, to complete my fell magics I will... make moose antlers at you!  Mongamongamong!"




Talk about your vulgar magick.


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## Umbran (Mar 16, 2010)

pawsplay said:


> Talk about your vulgar magick.




That would be the "Flip 'Em The Bird" bunk


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## Votan (Mar 16, 2010)

Saeviomagy said:


> The funny thing is that even without the technocracy books, plenty of people I knew still saw the technocracy as the good guys...




That was one of the wonderful things about that game -- there was a real sense that the technocracy was doing the wrong thing for the right reasons.  It made for wonderful conflict and plots.


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