Mage: The Ascension vs Shadowrun
Compare Mage: The Ascension and Shadowrun side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Mage: The Ascension | Shadowrun | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy, Modern, Horror | Cyberpunk, Fantasy |
| Tags | Freeform Magic, Character Building, Crunchy, High-Power, Roll to Cast, Skill-Based, Lore-Heavy, Fear & Stress Mechanics | Crunchy, Tactical, Heist, Character Building, Faction Play, Lore-Heavy, Skill-Based, Mission-Based, Urban Fantasy |
| 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 a pool of d6s equal to attribute + skill, counting 5s and 6s as hits. Meet or exceed a threshold to succeed. Situational advantages generate Edge points rather than modifying dice pools directly; Edge is spent on tactical effects like rerolling dice, adding successes, or imposing penalties on opponents. |
| Dice | d10 dice pool | d6 dice pool |
| Complexity | Very High | Very High |
| Accessibility | High | High |
| Runnability | Very High | Very High |
| License | All Rights Reserved | No open license |
| 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 | Catalyst Game Labs |
| Year | 2015 | 2019 |
| 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 cyberpunk-fantasy heists with deep mechanical subsystems for hacking, magic, and combat. |
| 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. | The setting fuses megacorporate intrigue with magic and metahuman races, so a single team mixes street samurai, mages, and deckers. Distinct subsystems model Matrix hacking, spellcasting, drone rigging, and astral space, each carrying its own rules depth. The Edge economy converts situational advantages into a spendable resource for rerolls, extra hits, or penalties on opponents. |
| 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. | Matrix hacking runs on its own timescale and can leave non-decker players idle during a run. Character creation spreads across attributes, skills, magic or resonance, gear, and lifestyle, making the first build long. Dice pools grow large at high skill, so counting hits on a fistful of d6s slows resolution. |