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[kj1225]

For once I may make a character who isn't a sarcastic asshole. So this will be exiting.

[Fniff]

Well, good news is, I like me some good grimdark. Of course, my guy's probably going to be from my own imaginary mage society, at least in spirit. So you might end up with a hipster mage, your usual elderly wizard, or a magical cultist. All of whom would be Irish, since it's an Irish group of mages. So, I might end up brightening things up by accident when my hipster mage scoffs at the other mages and goes "I was using those spells before it was cool."

[Remuthra]

For once I may make a character who isn't a sarcastic asshole. So this will be exiting.

Same, actually.

[Kadzar]

The other quote I had was;

'They dragged themselves out from the corpse-piles of the Great War - spirits of steel and carnage, children of hate and fear. Their breath is poison gas, their flesh that of dead men. Pray you never meet them again.'

-Dead Hawk Atylumen, Shaman of the Three Corners

Which I don't think is any more cheerful. When your generic 'magical Native American' name is 'Dead Hawk' you're not in for rainbows and happiness. That said, I really welcome a 'brightener'. Just the concept brings a smile to my lips, hehe.

Well that's just talking about some sort of demonic magic warbots or whatever. So it's likely the Great War (is this actually WWI or a separate thing?) was terrible, and the things it produced were terrible, but that doesn't mean the whole world itself has to be grimdark. It may not be sunshine-and-rainbows land, but it could at least be somewhere in the middle of the two.

[Harry Baldman]

I'd certainly try to get into that Council of Mages thing, if only because fantasy politics are quite interesting to me.

If you run this, what would the mechanics be like - a lot of them, very few or somewhere in between?

[Digital Hellhound]

If you run this, what would the mechanics be like - a lot of them, very few or somewhere in between?

This is what I've been trying to wrap my head around all day. I don't want straight-up strategy as the personal level of the players should be important here, but going too personal might leave everyone having their own private adventures and cause problems with time.

The magic system needs adaptation, as it was more meant for a smaller-scale RPG. With the power level of the players they should really have an endless list of spells to use and a vast power reserve to use. As you can probably imagine, this is not the ideal thing to implement. On the other hand, just generic magic rolls for everything is pretty dull. A compromise could be giving the players a handful of useable powers according to how they describe their style of magic, and handling 'lesser' spells with generic rolls. But I don't think this is good either. I might just go for simple rolls, making it not-dull with the power of Narrative (and/or the players' own RP).

The difference
*Archmage A crafts together a Strangler Hex [Body 3, Primal 1] against the usurper. The poor man fails to counter the spell and goes down with invisible ropes wrapping themselves around his neck and body. [Damage: something something] [Probably some other mechanics here, too]
*Archmage A magics at the irritating usurper. (Magic Roll: 4) vs (Magic Roll: 4) He strikes fast, lashing out with eldritch lightning, but his opponent deflects it at the last moment with a shimmering ward. The two men begin crafting the Art at incredible speed, cascading waves of magic rolling against eachother between the duelists. They are evenly matched - when the Archmage calls down lightning, the usurper deflects it and follows up with a spectral lion of fire that nearly slams into the Archmage, but the older man disperses it with a snarl and a thrust of his staff. And so on and so on.

In any case, as the focus of the game is on politics/intrigue, though also magical discovery and investigation, combat need not play such a big role - so I think the latter approach might work better. Non-magic combat would work much the same, though just going with 1d6 vs 1d6 a bit oversimplistic, so I'd likely improved it somehow. Especially when modifiers come to play.

Social actions, like persuading someone, I'd generally fully do with RP rather than rolls. Always more fun that way. Most actions would be simple rolls, maybe with a Difficulty rating to beat. This generally works well enough.

Advice/criticism is welcome - I wouldn't have written any of the above otherwise.

[Kadzar]

Well, I don't know how you plan to do it, but I hope our magical research has some effect on combat magic (and non-combat magic, too, however that will be handled). And it would also be nice for wizards to have some sort of signature spells or whatever. It could just be that we roll for all spells, but signature spells get a bonus to the roll, which is slightly offset by the fact that they are predefined effects and you can't change them.

[Remuthra]

One thing that I recommend would be giving more traditional attackers advantages over mages, to provide challenge.

[Fniff]

What if a mage is trained in both magic and physical combat (Ala Skullduggery Pleasant)? Besides, I don't think that's needed as the focus of the game is on political intrigue, rather then combat.

[Remuthra]

Still, it's not much fun to play if there's no challenge.

[Fniff]

Still, there would be challenge. Whether you're a mage or a human, a bullet to the head is going to kill you unless you have a protective spell ready. So I don't think putting any advantages for traditional attackers is necessarily, really, since they already have one big advantage: bullets and knives hurt.

[Digital Hellhound]

Your challenges will be tackling armies of vampires and subduing dark gods, not worrying about some thug in a dark alley. No pressure, though. Though yes, a bullet to the brain you're not protected against will hurt, wizard or not.

@Kadzar: Of course there will be modifiers to said rolls and other stuff, such as bonuses for fields of magic you've truly mastered. I'm not just gonna roll 1d6 no matter what, that would be unimaginably dull and wonky. I'll keep working, but I'm probably going with 'mechanically simple, narratively rich'.

[Xantalos]

Your challenges will be tackling armies of vampires and subduing dark gods, not worrying about some thug in a dark alley. No pressure, though. Though yes, a bullet to the brain you're not protected against will hurt, wizard or not.

@Kadzar: Of course there will be modifiers to said rolls and other stuff, such as bonuses for fields of magic you've truly mastered. I'm not just gonna roll 1d6 no matter what, that would be unimaginably dull and wonky. I'll keep working, but I'm probably going with 'mechanically simple, narratively rich'.

*froths at the mouth in anticipation*
To say that I don't really care about the mechanics but the premise is delicious. 

[Harry Baldman]

I'd say to go with the opposed rolls plus signature powers thing, as it isn't too complicated, but also gives a certain uniqueness to each character, like a trait system in an RTD does.

And I am also rather interested in the whole magical politics aspect, though I do hope that there will also be plenty of domestic concerns as well, not just vampire armies and gods and whatnot.

[Remuthra]

I'd say to go with the opposed rolls plus signature powers thing, as it isn't too complicated, but also gives a certain uniqueness to each character, like a trait system in an RTD does.

And I am also rather interested in the whole magical politics aspect, though I do hope that there will also be plenty of domestic concerns as well, not just vampire armies and gods and whatnot.

I second all this.