Lore of the Traditions for the Mage 20th Anniversary TTRPG
Created by Onyx Path - Lore of the Traditions
Pledge to help us create a beautiful deluxe edition of M20 Lore of the Traditions providing in-depth details for all Tradition Mages.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Mage: The Podcast interview
over 2 years ago
– Sat, Jan 29, 2022 at 07:18:51 AM
Hello Mages,
A bit of Look and Listen them with Mage: The Ascension today.
First up, the "look" - a reminder that Dork Tales is about to begin what promises to be a fantastic Mage: The Ascension chronicle to tie in to our current Lore of the Traditions Kickstarter! You can catch it tonight - January 29 at 7pm PST!
And secondly, our "listen" today is the latest interview from the Mage: The Podcast team. Terry Robinson and the team at Mage the Podcast have been chatting with just about all of the writers involved in the Lore of the Traditions book and we'll be able to listen to those conversations during this campaign.
Today's episode is now <available here - MAGE THE PODCAST> and features author interviews with Rachel Judd about the Verbena, Tyler Middleton about the Order of Hermes, and Theanos Thrax about the Society of Ether.
#LoreOfTheTraditions
#MageTheAscension
#MageThePodcast
Backers Only - Manuscript Preview #5 - The Dreamspeakers/Kha’vadi
over 2 years ago
– Fri, Jan 28, 2022 at 04:09:47 AM
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
Kha’vadi Preview
over 2 years ago
– Thu, Jan 27, 2022 at 09:37:21 AM
The Dreamspeakers/Kha’vadi Preview
Notable Personalities
The Kha’vadi don’t place as much importance on individual Medicine-Workers as the other Traditions might. Leaders come and go, and while their positions are important, and leave some lasting impact, in the end all their efforts are geared toward the next generation. So, while the Dreamspeakers commune with their own ancestors with reverence, they also do not dwell on great people of the past except as stories that further their teachings and beliefs.
Inarguably, the two most well-known Dreamspeaker ancestors are Naioba and Star-of-Eagles, the legendary founders of the Tradition who both died centuries ago. Each of them are spoken of with reverence, and Naioba in particular has had hundreds of stories spun about her and her importance in the unification of a Tradition that might not have otherwise ever remained whole. But both Naioba and Star-of-Eagles are gone. The power that they now carry within the Tradition is in what they stood for and what they believed. They were a symbol of the possibilities inherent in the marriage of disparate traditions and beliefs, and how they might come together in harmony, which today’s Dreamspeakers still seek to accomplish.
Walking-Hawk also hailed from the same era as Naioba and Star-of-Eagles, his participation in the March of the Nine sealed the fate of the Dreamspeakers’ connection to the Council of Nine Mystick Traditions for centuries to come. Like the founders of the Tradition, Walking-Hawk is gone, but his legacy is often misunderstood. Walking-Hawk was known to be a naysayer of the concept of the unified Traditions, and that was why he was chosen for the March. He did not believe that any good could come of the alliance, and the other members read this as him having a general bad attitude. But that bad attitude was also born of whispers of the ghosts of his ancestors, and visions of what his children would endure.
Even the Laughing Eagle, Tom Smithson, is but a memory now. His political presence astride the Seat of Spirit did not carry so much weight while he sat upon it, but he also did not care to use it. Like many members of the Four Winds, his interests were usually cast as far away from the internal structures of the Council as they could be. Laughing Eagle is considered another casualty of the Avatar Storm. The Lodge of the Gray Squirrel, once a bustling hub of activity created and maintained by him, is now merely a realm of forever rolling hills, covered in tall grass. From time-to-time herds of wild horses, bearing similarities to the spirit-horses he once tended, can be seen galloping in the distance.
Some of the old ones do remain, and the two oldest known members of the Kha’vadi, Tasygan and Adambara, heavily influence the contemporary affairs of the Tradition. Although she does not claim any kind of leadership role, Tasygan is the head of the Baruti in all but official title and none have made more efforts than she to recover the lost knowledge of Motlobo wa Poloto. Tasygan takes upon herself the impossible task of collecting stories from every Dreamspeaker there is. Once her realm was solely devoted to the protectorate of her homeland, Tuva, but now she is a world-traveler and story-collector. She’s almost always seen in the company of Adambara, the Spider, who has long been a traveler before she joined with Tasygan and the Baruti. However, her goals have always explicitly been the expansion of her web. Adambara is one of the primary forces within the Tradition working to keep individual Dreamcallers connected to one another. The Kha’vadi recognize these two elderly women, and know that when they come calling, the rainbow follows.
Politically, the two most active and prominent Kha’vadi are Rocio Medina-Carillo, a Cora Indian schoolteacher operating out of Nayarit, and Pulmari, a political activist who resides in the southern tip of the Andes. The pair of them have consistently presented a unified front to the rest of the Council of Nine and share the Seat of Spirit. Although the shared seat is unusual, they both point out that it is not without precedent, as the founders of their Tradition shared the seat as well. However, Rocio and Pulmari have severely different views on where the Tradition should head, and their infighting is infamous within the Tradition.
Rocio is a member of the Keepers of the Sacred Flame and emphasizes the importance of maintaining time-honored traditions. Chief among these is the Wise People’s responsibility to their own communities, human and spiritual alike. Despite her status in the Sacred Flame, she is also renowned for making unusual and unlikely connections. The circle of magi she leads are primarily Dreamspeakers, but her second is Marisol Coronado, a Yaqui Virtual Adept.
Pulmari, one the other hand, trained at the knee of Xoca, a Dreamspeaker once notorious for engaging with the Technocracy explosively and decisively. When Xoca left the Dreamspeakers, disgusted with the Council’s tightened reigns on war against the Technocracy, to join the Thunder Society, Pulmari took his place as one of the biggest firebrands within the Tradition. They are the nominal leader of the Red Spear Society (they’ve been challenged a dozen times since taking the role, but haven’t lost it yet), and unlike Rocio, they believe that the time for holding onto old songs and dances and making peace are over. They carry a strong hatred of the Union but an even stronger one of the Nephandi. They insist that Rocio and her ilk have the right to resist with non-violent prayer and ritual, but once that fails, the Red Spear Society will be standing right behind them, and they are prepared for war.
When the Thunder Society formed and expressed their disgust with the Dreamspeakers, they suggested that harboring ex-Technocrats was just as dangerous as harboring “reformed” Nephandi, accusing the Kha’vadi of both. The splintering nearly tore the Tradition apart, and many believed that the Spirit Smiths were the ex-Technocrats that the Thunder Society were pointing their fingers at. In fact, the Spirit Smiths were one of the few factions that hadn’t arisen from a history of colonization and as animosities grew, they nearly left the Tradition to form their own Craft as well. Instead, Sister Moriah stepped in.
Sister Moriah
Sister Moriah, an emerald-eyed Creole woman long operating out of New Orleans and tending to the impoverished communities therein, is the current head of the Ghost Wheel Society. Like many Dreamspeakers, she never sought that role, but it was given to her when she called the first Ghost Wheel Council and invited the remaining members of the Spirit Smiths to be one with them. The merging of these two factions was one of the first steps toward healing after the sundering caused by the departure of the Thunder Society, and since then Sister Moriah has expanded her influence from tending to Louisiana’s poor, to pushing the Ghost Wheel Society toward using their medicine-work in the inner cities to build support and infrastructure for those who need it most. After Rocio and Pulmari, she is one of the most recognized faces among Council mages, merely because the Ghost Wheel Society is more willing to work side-by-side with them than any other Dreamspeaker faction.
Spheres: Correspondence 1, Entropy 1, Forces 3, Matter 4, Prime 4, and Spirit 4.
Willpower: 7
Health Levels: OK, OK, -1, -1, -2, -2, -5, Incapacitated
Armor Rating: 1 (Layered clothing)
Powers: Bullet-Rider’s Blessing (p. xx)
Countermagick: 4 (Permanent effect)
Equipment: Rusted out pick-up truck, switchblade, Derringer, glass beads, backpack full of busted motherboards and spare clothes, jewelry made from shells, concrete, opossum bones, and copper wire, wire-wrapped raccoon claw earrings (Fetish which offers protection against hostile Numina).
Appearance: Sister Moriah is a tall and reedy Creole woman with sparkling green eyes. Her bone structure is fine and birdlike, but she is also over six feet tall. She is long of limb and in another lifetime, she could have modeled. Her ‘locs are graying and always decorated with various glass, bone, and metal baubles. She dresses eccentrically in long, draping, dark fabrics, but always wears sensible running shoes. Everywhere she goes, she carries a canvas backpack over her shoulder.
Roleplaying Notes: Although you speak with excellent manners and always show consideration and concern for whom you are speaking with, you also carry yourself with a constant sense of always having somewhere to go, or something to do. You genuinely care for those who need your help, but your sense of purpose keeps you forever on the move. Speak with a mild Creole accent and weave meaningless enigmas into your conversations when you are annoyed with who you are speaking to, or when you want to leave.
Focus:Creation is Innately Divine and Alive (Mage p. 569), Craftwork(Mage p. 574), and Blessings and Curses (Mage p. 588) and Devices and Machines (Mage p. 591)
... and speaking about online games...
over 2 years ago
– Wed, Jan 26, 2022 at 05:24:42 PM
Hello Tradition Mages,
Just sneaking in a real quick update to share two bits of news. I'm pretending they're related, but really it's all coincidence and just makes me look organized. Or maybe that's just how my magick is shaping things...
First off, we've unlocked another Stretch Goal! This one is our milestone marker on the way to expanding the Forgotten Ones & Forbidden Orders PDF, so let's keep at it!
ACHIEVED! -At $95,000 in Funding –Lore of the Traditions VTT Token Pack – Digital assets will be created to support online play for M20 games using the Lore of the Traditions artwork. This online asset pack will be added to the rewards list of all backers.
And speaking about online games...
Starting this week, Dork Tales begin what promises to be a fantastic Mage: The Ascension chronicle to tie in to our current Lore of the Traditions Kickstarter! You can catch it on January 29 at 7pm PST!
Just doing my part to keep the Virtual Adepts happy out there!
#LoreOfTheTraditions
Backers Only - Manuscript Preview #4 - The Cult of Ecstasy/Sahajiya
over 2 years ago
– Tue, Jan 25, 2022 at 02:44:01 AM
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
