Rules and Continuity
The core rules of the game are similar to those in other World of Darkness games; see Storyteller System for an explanation.
Like other storytelling games Mage emphasizes personal creativity and that ultimately the game's powers and traits should be used to tell a satisfying story. One of Mage's highlights is its system for describing magic, based on spheres, a relatively open-ended 'toolkit' approach to using game mechanics to define the bounds of a given character's magical ability. Different Mages will have differing aptitudes for spheres, and player-characters' magical expertise is described by allocation of points in the spheres.
There are nine known spheres:
Read more about this topic: Mage: The Ascension
Famous quotes containing the words rules and/or continuity:
“But suppose, asks the student of the professor, we follow all your structural rules for writing, what about that “something else” that brings the book alive? What is the formula for that? The formula for that is not included in the curriculum.”
—Fannie Hurst (1889–1968)
“Continuous eloquence wearies.... Grandeur must be abandoned to be appreciated. Continuity in everything is unpleasant. Cold is agreeable, that we may get warm.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)