Editing Mage: The Awakening (section)

==The Crunch==
It's a fucking chore trying to understand these rules straight out of the book.

As it goes with [[White Wolf]], the book itself jumps all over the place when it comes to explaining both [[Fluff]] and [[Crunch]]. Rules for casting magic can be found in sections about awakening and vice versa. Not only that, but it doesn't help that the entire wording of rules in the book goes along the lines of "this doesn't matter and is abstract but also important," while burdening the newbie with additional information that they shouldn't have to worry about just yet.

All this means you better pray to [[Tzeentch]] that he puts you in a really understanding group (or one made up of similarly new player) with a GM who knows what the fuck is going on and is able to clearly explain the rules and can help you with casting the spell you want to cast.

Most of your first sessions will be spent adding up and subtracting the numerous amount of dice you'll need in order to cast spells and also buff them so that they can actually DO something, and if you've got a shitty GM, referring to the scattered rules of magic that are found all throughout the book, one which doesn't have a GOD DAMN INDEX!!!

That being said, though, once you get used to the layers of complexity and the mechanics of it all, you have quite the comprehensive magic system that allows for some fun adaptation and dickery and still manages to be less complicated than its oWoD counterpart. The flexible and abstract depictions of magic means that you can really do anything with magic and also means that you can imagine how magic looks in your own head, and also means that spells aren't bound to their simple descriptions.

Just because it's a level one spell, doesn't mean it's useless at higher levels.

Once you get the right amount of Yantras, dedicated tools, power and other such aids, you can turn a passive first level spell into a real magic monster, just by roiding it up a little.

All in all, it's a complex, but worthwhile system, and it's better than its [[Mage: The Ascension|predecessor]].