playing mages outside of Zalanthas

[Anonymous]

When I first started playing (table top) role playing games about twelve years ago, the first types of characters that I gravitated to were mages.  I liked them because at higher levels they had the most power.  With time, I learned to branch out into the insidiousness of rogues, the piety of clerics and eventually I even managed to feel attracted to some anti-hero type warriors.

Since my beginnings, I've experimented a lot around those stereotypes and have played a variety of warriors, clerics and rogues.  One type that I've never really gone back to in about eight years is the mages.  I don't really get mages.
I mean when you're playing warriors, you've got the man vs. man conflicts, and you've got the man vs. nature conflicts of rangers.  And when you're playing clerics, you've got this devotion that you can roleplay out, and experimenting with different religious ideas can be very fun.  And when you're a thief...well, you're always on the run, or involved in some plot or something.

But mages I don't understand.  After all, mages are expected to spend a certain amount of time studying.  I'd like to compare them to Medical Students.  Most medical students work all the time, never go out and party, aren't informed on current events enough to have an opinion on anything.  In essence, really boring.  And then one day the blossom into Doctors, and suddenly they're rich and don't have to worry about the things that worry most people (having money, having a job, having social acceptance.)  I feel like mages are the same way.  They suck until they're like level 20, and then all the sudden they have more power than the rest of the party put together.  Also, I tend to find most medical doctors to be somewhat spacey and aloof.  I'm not saying that to disrespect them...certainly there are some very fascinating physicians in the world.  But I think a quote in Mother Night Kurt Vonnegut summarized it best, when speaking about an engineer, "The man needed to put a large percentage of his daily brain energy into his work.  In the evenings when he came home, he was too tired to think much.  The job was the man and the man was the job."   
Similarly, I suspect that if a human being could learn a series of magic words that would allow them to bend reality, this knowledge would occupy a large part of their brain.  If you were to ask them who their favorite gladiator was, they wouldn't know.  They mike like going to the games, but they probably wouldn't have much spare "processor space" to take a serious interest in it.
I guess the image that I have of mages is nerdy spellcasting robots.  Not something I would want to play.

And so I ask, drawing from experiences outside of Armageddon, what would draw a serious roleplayer to a mage?  I'm sincerely asking.  I don't get it.

[Agent_137]

Outside of arm, I don't know. I never liked playing a full on mage.

But inside arm, the whole everything that surrounds a mage interests me. I would like to play one for the completely unique roleplaying it would provide.

[Xygax]

Interestingly, what you're saying seems to suggest (and perhaps this isn't your intent) that you don't like playing roles in which your character will face adversity, or roles where real power/knowledge is earned laboriously and through great effort.

In my opinion those are the roles that Armageddon thrives on:  seemingly mundane, or powerless individuals clawing for every additional grain of power they can obtain, and doing so by any means necessary.  The scope is different for mages...  the path to power is different...  but the "arc" of the story is largely the same.  It may be that what you're saying is that the path doesn't interest you, but then you may also not be interested in playing a merchant, or a burglar, both of whom also tread a different path than a warrior or a ranger.

[Bestatte]

Out of all the coded classes I've played, the mage has always been my favorite. Putting roleplaying aside for a moment (yeah like any of us could do THAT - scoff - but try anyway mmkay?)...

There's something strangely compelling about something like this:

prep implosion
cast enemy

A whirling vortex appears over your enemies head.
(pause 2 seconds for everyone to gasp)

A whirling vortex sucks your enemy through, shattering his bones and spewing blood all over the area!
A vorpal dagger gets sucked through a whirling vortex.
A purple-striped club gets sucked through a whirling vortex.
A pair of burnt yellow trousers gets sucked through a whirling vortex.

Joe Newbie has just arrived from the west.

Joe Newbie gets sucked through the vortex, shattering his bones and spewing blood all over the area!

etc. etc. etc.

Or how about a "limb disruption" spell where your magick dismembers the enemy's leg, and then you can pick his leg up and beat him over the head with it?

C'MON HOW KEWL IS THAT!

There's absolutely nothing more awesome than magick.

Nothing!

[Maybe42or54]

A whirling vortex disapates.
50+ Day warrior arrived from the west.
50+ Day Warrior picks up a dismembered arm.
50+ Day Warrior wields a dismembered arm.
50+ Day warrior bludgeons you, doing horendous(?) damage.
Welcome to armageddon!


Explain that one.

"I was killed after I dismembered someone's arm and then I was killed with that arm."

Back on topic.
I would love one day to create a magicker for the sheer versatility that I can have, that I never have had.

[Linedel]

Mages outside of Zalanthas?

Playing a Zalanthas-born preserver in a low-RP, high-magic LARP campaign world where the majority of the players aren't familiar with Dark Sun is... um...  somewhere between challenging and irritating.  The other players on your team are pissed 'cause you won't cast Crash Time (area effect sleep) in combat, and even if they can separate player and character knowledge, are wondering why this pansy arse is only hitting 30% as hard as the other fighter in the party...

But, I'm getting some stylized scimitars custom made for him, so at least he'll look good in his ineffectiveness...

(Of course, you probably meant high fantasy mages, in which case you're very wrong... even low level "AD&D" mages are built on variety, as long as you aren't a damage-hungry psycho loading up 4 magic missiles, 3 acid arrows and 2 fireballs.  Offense is one thing... but that's what the warrior is for.  Flexibility is power, and finding unintended ways to use a wide selection of basic spells is where a good mage player shines, even moreso in a GM-ed campaign than in Armageddon, where you're code limited.)

[jstorrie]

I tried to play a mage outside of Zalanthas yesterday, but people on the bus started looking at me funny when I shouted "LIGHTNING BOLT! LIGHTNING BOLT!"

[Angela Christine]

I tried to play a mage outside of Zalanthas yesterday, but people on the bus started looking at me funny when I shouted "LIGHTNING BOLT! LIGHTNING BOLT!"

Duh.  You were supposed to shout, "Cast Wek Un Elkros  ***  ***!"  So of course they were looking at you funny.  (Note: the ***s stand for words I didn't include because they would be IC sensitive, and because I don't know them).


Next time try playing a psionicist.  Like any newbie the contact skill can give you trouble, but at least there is no shouting involved.


AC

[Koala]

A few years ago I played a mage and it was a quite interesting experience because I usually don't play mages.. Actually that mage character was the first and the last one that I played

I and my friend were the only players till level 7 (then we continued till level 12 or 14 -that I don't remember well- with other players and each one of them was changing from one quest to another) in the game and both of us were playing mages, one enchanter (it was me) and one necromancer... We were from the same bloodline with a hatred against each other but we had to finish the quest together so we were acting peacefully, to some extent The level of difficult was very high because we were just two players and we were playing mages.. You know, surviving a mage during the first levels is quite difficult when there is no one who can stand at the front and give you some time to cast your spells.. So, being just two mages in the group was one of the most challanging times that I spent on tabletop roleplaying games... But it was fun. When something seems very difficult and at the end you succeed it, then the payoffs are higher...  

I think that if the scenario is good to play with a couple of friends then you may enjoy it even if you play a character that you usually don't like to play... Sometimes I try different roles if I sense that it is going to be a great game but otherwise I stick to my general choice, which is human male fighter...

[Linedel]

Zalanthian mages don't shout "lightning bolt," I mean.. people would know you're a mage.

(They wouldn't say 'cast' either :P)