Options for Reality

Classification: Union // Open Ref mage/location/reality_zone/options-for-reality

Reality Zone · Mage

Mage

Like many other elements of Mage 20th Anniversary Edition, the reality-zones concept is optional:

• Your group could use it to determine the sorts of Effects and practices that are coincidental or vulgar;

• You might simply ignore it and assume that the entire world operates under Technocratic Reality;

• …or you could deepen the game and allow your players to change their world by creating paradigm shifts that, in turn, alter capital-R Reality and literally change the rules in their favor.

The choice between those options, ultimately, is yours.

Reality Zones Within the Game (Mage 20, p. 612)

Simply put, magickal Effects that fit a place or culture work better than ones that go against its grain. If Jodi Blake wants to incite mass murder, for example, she’ll have an easier time doing that at a protest rally than at a Buddhist temple.

In game terms, a reality zone affects a mage in one of two different ways:

• Acceptance: Effects and practices that fit in with a reality zone are usually coincidental and might – at the Storyteller’s option – lower the difficulty by -1 if the Effect or practice suits the tone of that area. (See Appropriate Resonance on the Magickal Difficulty Modifiers chart.)

• Rejection: Effects and practices that clash with a reality zone tend to be vulgar and might add +1 to their difficulty if they go against the local atmosphere. (See Opposed Resonance on that same chart.)

What does that mean? Simple: if your beliefs and actions suit a reality zone, that zone accepts your magick; if you go against the grain, the local reality rejects you.

In short, it’s easier to work with Reality than to go against the flow. And if you want to change things, then that task is easier if you work with what you have than it is to force your Will down Reality’s throat.

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