Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (Holmes) vs Mage: The Ascension
Compare Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (Holmes) and Mage: The Ascension side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (Holmes) | Mage: The Ascension | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy, Modern, Horror |
| Tags | Classic Fantasy, Dungeon Crawl, Resource Management, Random Character Creation, Deadly, Vancian Casting, Descending AC, Map-Drawing | Freeform Magic, Character Building, Crunchy, High-Power, Roll to Cast, Skill-Based, Lore-Heavy, Fear & Stress Mechanics |
| Core Mechanic | Roll 1d20 and meet or exceed the target supplied by the attack or saving-throw table. Exploration, reactions, thief abilities, doors, and treasure use separate d6 or percentile procedures rather than one universal action rule. | Build a d10 pool from an Attribute plus an Ability and count each die that meets or exceeds the difficulty, usually 6. Each rolled 1 cancels a success, and a roll with no successes and at least one 1 botches. Magick uses Arete instead: the highest Sphere plus coincidence or vulgarity and witnesses establishes the base difficulty, with situational modifiers applied afterward. Successes determine the Effect, and vulgar casting risks Paradox. |
| Dice | d20 | d10 dice pool |
| Complexity | Medium | Very High |
| Accessibility | Very Low | High |
| Runnability | Low | Very High |
| License | Proprietary | All Rights Reserved |
| Third-Party Publishing | Not yet researched | Commercial publishing allowed — Storytellers Vault |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Cost | Unavailable | $$ |
| Publisher | Tactical Studies Rules | Onyx Path Publishing |
| Year | 1977 | 2015 |
| Languages | English | English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish |
| Best For | Groups who want a referee-led, map-and-torch dungeon campaign with low-level adventurers, treasure-driven advancement, tactical table-based combat, and room for improvised rulings. | Groups who want long-form modern occult campaigns about reality-shaping power, ideological conflict, and the consequences of imposing belief on the world. |
| Highlights | Ten-minute turns make mapping, searching, light, rest, and wandering monsters central expedition pressures. Worked melee and referee-player examples demonstrate combat, formation, secret-door searches, and encounter pacing in context. The included Zenopus dungeon and removable reference tables provide a ready starting site and consolidated table aid. | Nine Spheres combine to build open-ended Effects, allowing the same capability to emerge through different paradigms, practices, and instruments. Coincidental and vulgar classifications make subtlety a tactical choice because conspicuous magick raises difficulty and accumulates Paradox. Focus ties belief to procedure, so a mage's worldview determines the tools and rituals used to alter reality. |
| Considerations | The rulebook covers only the first three character levels and points longer campaigns toward Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. Combat, saving throws, thief abilities, doors, traps, and reactions each use separate procedures instead of one task mechanic. Low hit points, poison, paralysis, and other severe effects can remove characters abruptly, and no current legal complete-core storefront was located. | Improvised Effects place frequent adjudication on the Storyteller, who must apply Sphere permissions, focus, required successes, and consequences consistently. Vulgar magick generates Paradox even on success, so overt power can punish a mage through injury or metaphysical breakdown. Faction choices can make a cabal internally hostile, so character concepts need shared motives before play. |