Everspark vs Mage: The Ascension

Compare Everspark and Mage: The Ascension side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.

	Everspark	Mage: The Ascension
Genre	Fantasy	Fantasy, Modern, Horror
Tags	Rules-Light, Solo-Friendly, GM-Less, High-Fantasy, Improvisation, Player-Only Rolls, CC-Licensed Rules	Freeform Magic, Character Building, Crunchy, High-Power, Roll to Cast, Skill-Based, Lore-Heavy, Fear & Stress Mechanics
Core Mechanic	Skill Checks roll a single d20 with no modifiers and read the result in five tiers: 20 is Very Good (success plus an Opportunity), around 15 is Good, around 10 is OK (success with a Complication), around 5 is Bad, and 1 is Very Bad (failure plus serious Complication). Leverage and Drawback shift the interpretation rather than the roll. Sparks track progress on anything in the fiction (combat, projects, threats, conditions) by drawing rays of a 5-point star on a sticky note; after each advance, roll a d6, and if it lands at or under the rays drawn, the Spark resolves. A 6 on the final check of a closed 5-ray Spark Overturns it, flipping the expected outcome.	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, d6	d10 dice pool
Complexity	Very Low	Very High
Accessibility	Medium	High
Runnability	Medium	Very High
License	CC BY-SA 4.0	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	$$	$$
Publisher	Cezar Capacle	Onyx Path Publishing
Year	2025	2015
Languages	English	English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish
Best For	Solo players or groups who want zero-prep fantasy adventures with maximum narrative flexibility: especially anyone drawn to GM-less or solo play, brand-new players, or experienced groups looking for a relaxed alternative to crunchy fantasy systems.	Groups who want long-form modern occult campaigns about reality-shaping power, ideological conflict, and the consequences of imposing belief on the world.
Highlights	Sparks abstract every progress system (combat damage, long-term projects, looming threats, resources, lasting conditions) into one shared mechanic, so the rules stay tiny while still tracking long-arc events. Skill checks are player-facing only: monsters, traps, and NPCs act fictionally and the player rolls a d20 to react, removing GM-side rolls entirely. Four built-in modes (solo, GM-less coop, parallel where each player runs their own protagonist, and hosted) let the same game work whether one person sits down alone or six gather at a table. Character sheets carry no numbers: Ancestry, Background, and Class drawn from 20 entries each yield 8,000 baseline combinations and can be rolled randomly in seconds or written out over fifteen minutes through question prompts.	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	No combat mechanics, hit points, or numerical traits: players who want tactical positioning, action economy, or character build optimization won't find any of it. Sparks are freeform: when to create one, when to advance, and what counts as resolution are constant judgment calls rather than rules questions. No published setting: every world, faction, and pantheon must be created on the spot or imported from another game's material. Without DCs or modifiers, two characters with very different fictional competence still roll the same; mechanical differentiation is replaced entirely by Leverage/Drawback rulings and narrative description.	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.