Editing Verbena (section)

== Mysteries of the Druids ==
The Verbena are, as you probably guessed, the most crunchy-granola of all Traditions; with their paradigm being rooted in Nature being the ultimate teacher of all things. Through the Natural world, one can not just minorly influence it in order to gain great secrets and control over the world around you, but exceptional understanding of the way reality works. Most Verbena treat Nature itself as the very spark of divinity that the Hermetics or the Choir believe in, and often use similar terminology to describe it as like a god or gods, things that can be very capricious if it's asked to do too much, but generous when appeased. For this reason, they are the undisputed masters over Life Magic and hold it's seat; which allows them to do all sorts of OP things, like [[Cheese|causing all the implants in a Technocrat's body to explode out of them]] or rapidly heal near-fatal wounds in seconds. Verbena mages are not quite as tuned to the spiritual (being mired with Life) as the [[Dreamspeakers]] but are still strong advocates for the Fae and the return of "natural magic." Despite their herb-witch schtick, they care more for results and intent than ancient techniques, unlike some of the more hidebound traditions. 

Their bitter enemies amongst the Technocracy are the [[Progenitors]], and they also have a rather large hatedom amongst Ascension players for the same reason that the Progenitors hate them in-universe - namely, their strong association with "alternative medicine" like chakra alignment, crystal healing, herbalism, homeopathy, accupuncture, etc. You may ask why this is; after all, these methods ''work'' for the Verbena, and the only reason they don't work like modern medicine is because the Technocracy wrote them out of the Consensus... which, when you think about it, means that the [[Sons of Ether]] technically have the right to a Life-wielding faction who represent debunked medical theories and methods. 

The problem is, whilst "alternative medicine" '''can''' work in the fictitious universe of MtA, in the real world it's complete bullshit sold by the kind of poison-peddling quacks that think bleach enemas cure autism and conmen profiting off other people's fear, desperation, or stupidity; made all the worse by White Wolf's tendency toward sanctimonious, heavy-handed "Science is bad, mmkay?" moral-pushing in its writing. The M20 books try to balance it out by giving the idea that they indirectly helped modern medical science understand patient mental health and the fundamental concept of quality of life and remind people that the Progenitors can be about a half-step up from [[Haemonculi]] when it comes to their ethics, but the stereotype and biases still persist.