Mage: The Ascension vs RuneQuest
Compare Mage: The Ascension and RuneQuest side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Mage: The Ascension | RuneQuest | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy, Modern, Horror | Fantasy |
| Tags | Freeform Magic, Character Building, Crunchy, High-Power, Roll to Cast, Skill-Based, Lore-Heavy, Fear & Stress Mechanics | Crunchy, Tactical, Lore-Heavy, Deadly, Character-Driven |
| Core Mechanic | 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. | Roll d100 under your skill percentage. Criticals at 1/20th of skill, specials at 1/5th, fumbles at 95+. Seven characteristics (STR, CON, SIZ, DEX, INT, POW, CHA). Combat uses hit locations (d20) with per-location HP and armor. Strike ranks determine action order. Runes are percentile-rated cosmic affinities that fuel magic and shape personality. Passions (Love, Hate, Honor, Loyalty) augment skills when invoked. |
| Dice | d10 dice pool | d100 |
| Complexity | Very High | High |
| Accessibility | High | High |
| Runnability | Very High | High |
| License | All Rights Reserved | All Rights Reserved |
| Third-Party Publishing | Commercial publishing allowed — Storytellers Vault | Not yet researched |
| Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing. | ||
| Cost | $$ | $$ |
| Publisher | Onyx Path Publishing | Chaosium Inc. |
| Year | 2015 | 2018 |
| Languages | English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Spanish | English, French, German, Spanish |
| Best For | Groups who want long-form modern occult campaigns about reality-shaping power, ideological conflict, and the consequences of imposing belief on the world. | Groups who want deep mythic fantasy where characters are embedded in cults, clans, and cosmic forces: with tactical hit-location combat and a world steeped in decades of lore. |
| Highlights | 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. | Glorantha is one of the most detailed settings in RPG history, Rune and Passion mechanics tie characters to the mythic world, hit-location combat adds tactical detail, skill-based advancement through use, three distinct magic systems |
| Considerations | 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. | Very steep learning curve, tightly coupled to Glorantha setting, combat bookkeeping is heavy, expensive to collect all sourcebooks, dense lore for new players |