Sun Mar 14 '21 Announcement
about 3 years ago – Sun, Mar 14, 2021 at 08:16:58 AM

Hello Extraordinary Benefactors!

A brief pause in our tour through Chapter 9 today, as we look at our latest Stretch Goal list.

Which I need to update.

Because we've just hit another Stretch Goal!

At $78,000 in funding – VICTORIAN AGE VAMPIRE TRILOGY – Philippe Boulle’s trilogy of Victorian Age Vampire novels compiled in a digital collection will be added to the rewards list of all funding contributors to this project.

That's right! I admit, I was confident that we'd reach this point, but I thought we were still a day or two away! But Magick happens when you get Mage: The Ascension fans together, and here we are!

By day, London is the greatest metropolis of the 19th century. By night, it is the hunting ground of monsters older than the empire itself. Above it all lurks Prince Mithras, Methuselah of Clan Ventrue and godhead of a cult infecting vampire and mortal alike.

This item will automatically be added to the rewards lists for all backers pledged to this project, and includes all three books in the Victorian Age Vampire Trilogy:

Victorian Age Vampire Book I of III: A Morbid Initiation

Regina Blake believes her mother to be the victim of morder and conspiracy. Forgoing caution and propriety, whe tries to uncover the truth and bring the culprits to justice. With every step, however, she uncovers more and more evidence of a secret world of danger, sensuality and sin. With the beautiful Vicotria Ash as her guide, she peels back klayer after layer of this benighted world, until the true horror of it all stands exposed.

Will discovering the truth be worth damning her soul?

Victorian Age Vampire Book II of III: The Madness of Priests

Regina Blake races into unknown territory to save her rnother from the clutches of the blood sorcerers who have claimed her. But with every step, she enters further into the benighted world of the d e a d . Her only guides are the seductive Victoria Ash and the mad priest Anatole, but each seems more interested in making her theirs than freeing her mother.

Meanwhile, her father and her fiance scour London to save her, but find themselves embroiled in the intrigues of the damned and the mad. Will Regina's quest cost the lives
of those she loves!

Victorian Age Vampire Book III of III: The Wounded King

Regina Blake is reunited with her mother at last, but it may be too late to save either of them. Amid the glories of Hapsburg Vienna, the two women are subject to the wiles of the Tremere warlocks with only the vampires Victoria Ash and Beckett as dubious allies. A return to London only makes matters worse, as an undead prince dips into madness and threatens to take the Empire with him

Can Regina hope even to survive, much less prevail?

And now, let's add a few more Stretch Goals to our list and see if we can add another achievement or two over the next week!

First up, we'll finish up our latest supplemental project. And then maybe we'll merge the past and future and have Onyx Path develop some assets to play the Victorian Age with modern methods...

At $82,000 in funding – Unusual Characters Expanded – Extra intriguing ne’er-do-wells will be added to the Bizarre Tales & Unusual Characters PDF supplement.

At $85,000 in funding – VTT Tokens Pack – Digital assets will be created to support online play for Victorian Mage, including character and antagonist tokens. This online asset pack will be added to the rewards list of all funding contributors to this project.

Can we unlock these goals and maybe reveal another target or two in the next 11 days? I think we can! Let's keep at it, and tomorrow I'll be back to look at the Ottoman Empire during the Victorian Age as we continue our sneak peek at our Week 5 draft manuscript preview.

#M20VA
#VictorianMage

Sat Mar 13 '21 Announcement
about 3 years ago – Sat, Mar 13, 2021 at 08:16:13 AM

Hello Extraordinary Benefactors,

We continue our tour around Chapter 9 with another quick stop, this time to look back at the Crimean War. As with the other previews we've shared so far, this is just 1% of the text in the Chapter, but enough to give you an overview of the times and places in this setting. The Victorian Age covered an extended period, and digging through the history - albeit with a Mage's viewpoint - helps establish hooks and stories for your characters.

The Crimean War

The Crimean War is the most technologically advanced engagement of its time. The conflict foreshadows aspects of warfare to come, including those later seen in the American Civil War and First World War. Its roots lie in the end of the Napoleonic wars and the web of diplomatic agreements and settlements, and later aggressive politics, that formed and followed the Treaty of Vienna in 1815.

1853 sees imperial tension between the Russian and second French empire played out in Ottoman territories. Both exploit Christian populations of the area’s heavily mixed religious communities in a power struggle to claim weakened Ottoman regions. This political maneuvering and military posturing turns into war with a surprise offensive by the Ottoman Empire, the “sick man of Europe”, against Russian aggression. Tsar Nicholas the First expects support from Britain and Austria — but neither wants a Russian-ruled Dardanelles and so both states side with Turkey and France.

While superficially resembling prior wars in deployment and tactics, the military technology employed by Britain and France is considerably superior. Logistics, the bane of any military campaign where multiple fronts are engaged, becomes a more flexible tool thanks to telegraph wires and photography. Naval vessels with modern guns provide artillery barrages and coastal mooring positions, while the smooth bore musket is replaced with rifled muskets, or simply ‘rifles’, providing greater range and accuracy. A new era of warfare begins.

Despite all this, the conflict itself is a muddled and confused mess. The British and French empires have very different objectives and desires, while sharing a few basic common goals, and neither of these fall truly in line with the Ottoman empire’s own agenda. The British Empire engages in limited war, placing a focus on the economic and political pressures its vast power can bring to bear, whereas Turkish, French and Austrian forces all possess an attitude of total war in this conflict. The use and implementation of new technologies is also often a complication as wrong orders are given to the wrong units, or a willful lack of communication between allied forces leads to uncoordinated engagements. The most famous of these, successful despite the fact it is an erroneous action, is the “Charge of the Light Brigade” at the Battle of Balaclava.

For the Order of Reason, this is the perfect time to prove their investment into British authority can yield dividends, and so too is it an opportunity to influence France and Austria. The new mundane tools of war are humble devices compared to what the Order of Reason can construct and deploy and though such things still lack stability on the battlefield, they can certainly sway the outcome of specific battles. The political confusion also offers a chance for the Order to gain ground amid fractious Tradition strongholds in and around Istanbul and other key areas in the Ottoman territories. The Choristers have long suffered divisions in the region, and the influence of Russia and France and pressure from the Vatican fans the flames of their internal conflict. So too with the Ahl-i-Batin, who are divided among their own ranks between those who desire to defend the Ottoman empire and those who object to its existence and practices. These fractious divides are the perfect target for an Order spearhead to claim Nodes and bring order to chaos. Such a heavy-handed, militant attitude sets the stage for Luminaries acting in this theater of war.

The militant imperialism of the newly reforming Conventions does not go unchecked. Divided they may be, but the power and presence of both the Chorus Celestial and the Ahl-i-Batin is still very real. The Chakravanti too see the conflict as a time and place in need of their knives, and as the Order of Reason scrambles for gains amid the struggle of colossal empires, every step they take comes at a heavy price in operatives and resources.

The roots of many Traditions, Crafts and Conventions are to be found in the lands that the Crimean War rages across, or that are occupied by forces of one side or the other. Old masters have left behind secrets in the ruins of Constantinople — now the bustling city of Istanbul — including wonders crafted during the fall of Rome itself. The wise and winding spirits of the Danube begin to whisper to passing magi, eager to share their insight and lore. Forgotten terrors are drawn to the newest conflict in this old hotbed of humanity’s bloodletting — ‘Dracul’ is a name whispered by Ottoman soldiers once more. Walking dead are spotted on some battlefields, while on others soldiers share reports of men who appear of out thin air, or have breath like steam and glowing eyes, and who can shrug off bullet and bayonet alike.

Again, just a short taste today of our Week 5 preview, which will be sent out to all who've pledged to support this campaign by March 24th. Join in so you can read the entire draft manuscript - and provide feedback! - before the campaign ends.

And we're so close to our next Stretch Goal target, joining in now will help us add another reward to everyone's list and allow us to unveil our next wave of goals! Exciting times! We may even be able to look at those on Monday or Tuesday at the rate we're going!

#M20VA
#VictorianMage

Fri Mar 12 '21 Announcement
about 3 years ago – Fri, Mar 12, 2021 at 11:17:49 AM

Hello Extraordinary Benefactors,

Yesterday we peeked at a bit about Canada in the setting chapter, and today we're going to go around the world and see a bit about Australia. But, before we move from one corner of the Victorian Age British Empire to the other, let's look at our latest achievement:

At $75,000 in funding – Bizarre Tales Expanded – Additional playable story options will be created and added to the Bizarre Tales & Unusual Characters PDF supplement. 

We've doubled the size of our next supplement of new content! I'm sure we'll revisit and increase it again before the end of the campaign, but here's what's next on our Stretch Goal target list:

At $78,000 in funding – VICTORIAN AGE VAMPIRE TRILOGY – Philippe Boulle’s trilogy of Victorian Age Vampire novels compiled in a digital collection will be added to the rewards list of all funding contributors to this project.

Australia

Australia presents an especial challenge to colonists, an unforgiving frontier quite unlike anything that they have encountered. Rule here is far more militant and restrictive than that which occurs in Canada at the same time. With the official end of slavery in the British Empire, wealthy Australian settlers overestimate their ability to tame the lands and, without free labor, many of their initially successful endeavors fall into difficulties. This lead to the governors using convict labor from Britain to work the lands and farms of Australian colonies as their penal sentencing. While a number of these convicts face sentences for political activism, a great majority are convicted for violent crime to one degree or another. For some the violence is simply a necessity of survival; for others, it’s just an imagined brand of condemnation from the upper classes rather than the reality of their actions. This legacy of violence continues to run through life in the colonies, however.

The prejudice and aggression shown to indigenous populations throughout the colonial era of the 1700s and 1800s is heartbreaking. Hundreds of indigenous Australian people from populations of one or two thousand die in land clearing exercises, and many more succumb to disease while they are kept in manners more fitting for livestock than people in resettlement camps. Slavery may be officially over, but techniques to control and move native peoples have not changed. In Australia the Aborigines suffered regular and repeated persecution and attacks from settlers, and are ill set to defend themselves against this assault. Often this is attributed to the convict populations and their supposedly violent ways, but the truth is that imperial expansion is at work, rolling out the tool of strategic genocide to serve the greed and racial bigotry of its masters.

The infamous Black War of 1830 in Tasmania reduces the Aboriginal population of the isle from around 2000 individuals to less than 200. The Aborigines have bounties placed on their heads, dead or alive, for simply being found outside of the areas where they are forced to live. Cordons of soldiers and settlers sweep miles to round up or force native tribes into designated settlement zones, killing many as they went, in an operation known as The Black Line. By 1832 the Aboriginal tribes have surrendered and been moved to Flinders Isle and Hunters Isle. Disease kills many more, and entire communities all but vanish.

In the mid-1800s, gold rush fever sparks as with the discovery of gold fields, copper deposits, and other mineral wealth. Mass migrations of prospectors flood into the country and more violence erupts, this time between Chinese gold diggers, British farmers, and other miners and prospectors from across Europe and Asia. These conflicts reach a head with the Buckland and Lambing Flats riots, with a few later conflicts carrying the point home. The government response leads to a xenophobic outlook on newcomers to Australia, so that only those from within the British Empire and parts of Europe are considered settlers or immigrants. Anyone else is there illegally, and fair game for colonists and authorities alike. For some time, only a single community of Asian settlers remains from the original Chinese gold-diggers that come to Australia in the gold rush, although the ‘Chinatowns’ in Brisbane, Melbourne and Cairn do persist.

Australia is a land of unique creatures and some special qualities that lends itself perfectly to the Dream-Speaker Tradition. The veil here is very thin, and absent in places, with many Aboriginal tribes acutely aware of this fact. The opposition that the British Empire and the Order of Reason faces in Australia is perhaps rawer than anywhere else in the world. Here the Dream-Speakers, Verbenae, Ahl-i-Batin, and Order of Hermes form something of a united front, in a desperate attempt to stem what becomes a monstrously violent act of expansionism — and a front that acts in flagrant disregard for the relationships and interactions between the Traditions in many other parts of the world. Faced with atrocity, these magi forge a new alliance; but as inspiring as this may be, the loose coalition of cabals and Chantries faces not a single Convention of the Order of Reason, nor even a single Bloc, but all of it. Every part of the Order has its eyes set upon Australia — and will expend the resources required to see its goals achieved. The Australian regions, especially the Outback, are haven to many Bygones and breaches in the Gauntlet. Unimaginable things slip between the real world and the Umbra here, dreams themselves can twist reality according to local lore, and the existence of such a place horrifies the masters of the Order of Reason. The magickal territories that the Dream-Speakers have nurtured are utterly anathema to the encroaching Consensus. The Luminaries believe Australia must be pacified and controlled, utterly, and its remoteness in the empire and its closed borders make it a perfect testbed for the new technologies and pogroms of the coming Union. It is here that the changes in the Albertian reforms can be witnessed and tested in practice, as they take effect away from the hallowed halls of Britain’s institutes and in a very different environment.

Opportunities exist for both the Traditions and the Order of Reason to once again shape the course of history. Easy access to the Umbra can open worlds for those willing — a path that plenty of members of the Traditions and Conventions have a vested interest in. Spirits manifest here like nowhere else on Earth, and while in the secluded or hidden and unexplored parts of Europe, Asia, Africa and America legends may wear flesh and bleed, in the dreamscapes of the Australian Outback new stories and mysteries take form as swiftly as they can be spoken. Many of the Traditions see a chance to tip the scales in their favor; if the magick of Australia can be protected and empowered, it could change the world.

The Akashayana present a divisive presence during this time. Those that come with the Chinese gold-diggers in the initial rush and the other Asian communities that try to establish themselves feel little kinship with the loose alliance of Traditions already active in Australia, especially given the overwhelming hostility shown to their respective communities of Sleepers. Euthanatos and Chorister involvement in matters on the continent serves to only muddy the waters further, as both seem to be pursuing very personal agendas at odds with both the Order of Reason and the other Traditions.

Australia has become a war-zone for the Awakened and the Enlightened, and the terms of victory seem to shift from day to day.

Again, this is just a small piece of a large setting chapter, which we'll see in it's entirety when the Week 5 preview is sent out to backers! Tomorrow, we're going to read about the Crimean War! It's like a Mage history class!

And so, with another Stretch Goal unlocked and a fresh goal on the horizon, let's keep up the good work! Please remember to share info about the campaign in your social circle and on your social media, and let's ensure that all Mage fans have been invited to join in!

#M20VA
#VictorianMage

Thu Mar 11 '21 Announcement
about 3 years ago – Thu, Mar 11, 2021 at 08:06:38 AM

Hello Extraordinary Benefactors,

We've got 2 weeks left in this campaign! Our Week 3 manuscript preview went out to backers yesterday (check your filter folder if you didn't see it!), and now we're going to jump ahead to share some snippets from our Week 5 preview, which covers Chapter 9 from the Victorian Mage draft manuscript.

This chapter delves into the geography and history of these times and places - as seen through the lens of Mage20, of course. You'll get to read the complete chapter - and share your feedback on a special form for the developers! - in a few weeks. Until then, let's see if we can take a quick tour around the world (and time) in the next 8 days.

We're going to start with Canada today, because that's where I begin all of my journeys (because that's where my home is.) 

The reign of Queen Victoria begins on the 20th June, 1837, and lasts until the beginning of the 20th century. During those long years, change wracks the world — often with a terrible price in human lives, suffering, and dignity. The last days of piracy upon the high seas play out to their bloody conclusion under imperial cannonade and shot. The spark of revolutions ignites many times across the globe, all too often to gutter out as the pendulum of civic oppression swings back and forth; some inspire great change, others end in crushing defeat upon blood-slick streets as a stark warning, and others yet are simply forgotten. Gunfighters exchange salvos of lead in gripping stories of the Wild West, but the backdrop of such derring-do is an industrial-powered military machine grinding through a body count of native populations. Across the world, that which has gone before and is now deemed as “primitive” is crushed and brushed aside for the new order.

Along with the carnage comes the infrastructure of imperial control and exploitation. Education spreads, but in a form approved of and controlled by authority; the halls of academia and power see an effort to chain languages in new, standardized forms, even as handwriting itself is meticulously curated into strictly set cursive styles. The Industrial Revolution burns at the era’s heart, a rabid expression of new (and sometimes stolen) technologies utterly changing innumerable lives at an incredibly swift rate. Smokestacks rise, tools split mountains, and machines cut the earth open to feed the belly of the industrial beast; cities, packed so full they must bulge and spill and spread, swallow whole villages and communities like ravening beasts.

Among magi, the era is just as fundamentally transformative. The Order of Reason metamorphoses into the Technocratic Union, and its rivalry with the Traditions begins the Ascension War in earnest. Rigid systems of formality and propriety let the will of the powerful and the state press down on the individual, caging them in the foundations of the Order’s paradigm. A precious few rise against such magickal and mundane systems, but all too often become consumed by the very things they struggle against.

This chapter presents a broad sweep of the world during Queen Victorian’s reign, including viewpoints of events through the eyes of various observers. It covers both the magickal and mundane, delving into the fall of nations and the advance of imperial power alongside the trials and tribulations of magi across the globe. Key events shape the attitudes, actions, and beliefs of the people of the day — and the consequences thereof.

By necessity, this chapter can only serve as a starting point for games set in the Victorian era; to cover in detail the entire world’s worth of rich cultures, dramatic turning points, courageous struggles, and brutal atrocities is far beyond the limitations of any single text. Take what is presented here as a source of inspiration and plots for your own chronicles, and invent or research as you need.

Furthermore, a Victorian Mage chronicle need not follow the rails of the past, whether it be historical events or already-established fictional happenings in other Mage: The Ascension products. The World of Darkness is a shared fiction, and each chronicle the possession of its particular players. Be adventurous, and do not feel limited by what has gone before. Magi have the opportunity to change the world, after all.

Canada

Canada is born in the 1830’s, right at the start of Victoria’s reign, with armed and political rebellions led by activists collectively called Reformers — mostly French Catholics looking for a stronger democratic government in place of the government of largely British oligarchies, with parliaments with limited autonomy. Come 1841, the Act of the Union is passed in Britain, forming the United Province of Canada. This unites the northern and southern colonies of Canada under one body, but is a political move to annex the French presence out of what is a now British state, with the scattered parliaments operating under a much looser guidance. Less than 20 years later the British Empire leaves the parliamentary bodies to almost full autonomy as the interests of the Empire now lie fully elsewhere. In 1867, the three largest colonies formally create the Dominion of Canada under a single governing body.

In the course of the Victorian era, Canada goes from being a collection of colonial towns and a few small cities to a nation in its own right. While the path of doing so is hardly smooth, it is successful. This success is largely off the backs of those living in the would-be nation, and from learning the lessons of the American Revolution and the Civil War. For the Traditions it’s a time to flourish, as the lands of Canada are largely ignored for a period by the Order of Reason as a whole. Tradition magi speculate as to the reason for the Order’s absence, but the focus of the Order within the British Empire remains in places like Britain itself, and the Indian and Australian territories. This is not to say the Order of Reason is completely absent, but the technocratic paradigm continues to lack elegance in the Canadian wilderness — a problem they will look to resolve only in the latter part of the century.

The Traditions seek legends, mysteries, and local lore here that might just help tip the balance in their conflict with the Conventions. Potential allies, new enemies, and a wealth of surprises calls to European magi just as the Wild West does, only without the Order of Reason having anywhere near as much a presence. Canada presents a golden opportunity for any cabal willing to reach out and take it. It also presents the possibility of massive failure bound up with arrogance and hubris. Their eager rush to exploit the region’s magick often casts the Traditions themselves in the same imperial mold as the Order of Reason elsewhere, and the native magi and mysteries of the Canadian landscape rarely offer second chances to the foolish and prideful.

However, the legends and myths that perpetuate the colonies carry just enough weight to draw the attention of elements of the Exploratory Society and the Ivory Tower, keen to discover and label what’s there, and get rid of that which humanity no longer needs. These groups of Enlightened often skirt the edge of their own practices, drunk on the freedom of being so far from the Order’s centralized authority and engaging in uncanny and even catastrophic acts with regularity. Later in the era, a few other select Luminaries see the changing sociopolitical environment of the burgeoning country as good soil for the Technocratic Union’s seed. 

Canada’s political changes over the century offer an array of possibilities for both sides to gain influence and direct matters. The Nephandi, too, are never ones to pass up an opportunity to set the world to greater strife, and the blood that has spilled between natives and settlers is no less in the northern colonies than with the rest of the American continent. The desperation often found in this time of upheaval and change proves fertile ground for the children of Descension. Acts of violence and desecration of native sacred land are far from uncommon, and the trees and the snow hide many sins. Whispers of wendigo activity can so very easily be the result of a Nephandus at work.

#M20VA
#VictorianMage

Tue Mar 9 '21 Announcement
about 3 years ago – Tue, Mar 09, 2021 at 10:47:04 AM

Noted Innovations of Victorian Occultism

Metaphysical practitioners of the 19th century enjoy an apparently bottomless bag of tricks. While many of those beliefs, practices and tools have been around for centuries if not millennia, Victorian occultism features several important innovations — movements and disciplines that attain great significance during the 1800s even if they have far older origins. The vast majority of the people and groups involved in these movements have not a magickal bone in their bodies; each movement, though, attracts Awakened practitioners and sects, provides focus for Awakened Arts, and spreads — if only through the cracks of mainstream society — the idea that there’s more to life than the industrial grind.

Among the most notable of those innovations, we’ll find:

Decadentism

Named for the louche behavior and dissipated impression of its devotees, the Decadent art movement prizes crime, transgression, intoxication, blasphemy, “the derangement of the senses,” and a self-destructive pursuit of sublime revelations through profane activities. The movement kicks off with the Romantics of the late 1700s, then deepens in intensity until the early 1900s, when the Fin de siècle (“End of the Age”) frenzy surrenders to the 20th century. Epitomized by the saying, “Live fast, die young, and leave a beautiful corpse,” the Decadent lifestyle buggers propriety for the sheer hell of it. Beneath that hedonism, though, runs a rich metaphysical undercurrent. Ghosts, dreams, metaphors, spiritual hunger, and willfully outrageous fashion and behavior drive Decadent philosophies, art, and magic; the latter is an obsession among Romantics, Decadents and the capital-B Bohemians of Russia, who often view themselves as fallen angels reflecting a broken world.

In Mage terms, Decadent occultism is a sort of bardic gutter magick laced with crazy wisdom, witchcraft, and often demonism. The later trinity of sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll is presaged by Decadent occultism’s favorite tools: sex and sensuality, drugs, artwork, and music. The Hollow One sect originates within this movement, and the Ecstatic Tradition is balls-deep in it. Nephandi, of course, employ Decadent philosophies in the mode of the Marquis de Sade, and handfuls of Verbenae, Hermetics, and perhaps even Etherites can be found downing a few pints while arguing drunkenly with artists and poets and muses and cads. Chaos magick swirls up from the Decadent underground, with future icons like Aleister Crowley, “Pixie” Colman-Smith, and Austin Osman Spare emerging from the later era of Decadent occultism to lay the path toward modern magick.

Demi-Hermetic Societies and Their Secret Masters

Victorian gentlemen love secret societies. Despite heretical trappings and ominous initiation rites (or, more likely, because of those things), European cellars, drawing-rooms, lodges and groves host thousands of demi-Hermetic occult societies. A handful of such sects appear in North America, India, North Africa, and other places where Empire rests its head, but although secret societies are common worldwide the wave of European occult fraternities that greets “the Age of Reason” casts a heavy shadow on global politics… especially when the Awakened are involved.

In later years, conspiracy theories will whisper about groups like the Bavarian Illuminati, the Hell-Fire Club, the Theosophical Society, the Kabbalistic Order of the Rose + Cross, the Hermetic Brotherhood of Luxor, the Ancient Order of the Aeon Rites, the Enlightened Society of the Weeping Moon, the Skull and Bones Society and, of course, the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Connected by a common thread of alchemical symbols and quasi-Egyptian rituals filtered through Catholic and Jewish ceremonial mysticism, these societies supposedly plot world domination and govern the tides of commerce and politics. A few, notably the Theosophical Society, speak of benevolent Secret Masters whose mystic enlightenment grants them inhuman powers and global influence. On a darker variation of that theme, antisemitic blood libels spawn rumors of malign Jewish sorcerers seeking global domination through forbidden magicks. Composer Richard Wagner (himself a Christo-Pagan mystic) propagates these rumors, which combine — by the 1930s — with a late-Victorian Czarist Russian forgery called The Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion; the results of that unholy synthesis include Nazism, the Holocaust, and anti-Jewish conspiracy theories which persist to this day.

For the most part, these Demi-Hermetic groups are drinking societies with pretentions of importance; a few feature sincere metaphysical pursuits, and a number of them plot altruistic social reforms. Most of them exclude women, though a few — notably the Theosophical Society, the Hell-Fire Club, and the Golden Dawn — accept, welcome, or are founded outright by “the fairer sex.” The modern Western occult ceremonial tradition is constructed through concepts and rites credited to (or blamed upon) Rosicrucians, Freemasons, Illuminati, Templars, and so forth, with their influence discernible in the American and French Revolutions, the Unification of Germany, and the eventual emergence of Fascist and Nazi ideologies. In the Victorian era, any White European gentleman of means belongs to at least one of these societies. Most have nothing whatsoever to do with True Magick.

But a handful of them do.

Which groups, what Awakened factions, and how much influence they exert upon those secret societies is a matter for the Victorian Mage Storyteller. The Order of Hermes is certainly involved, and employs such societies as vessels for training, recruiting, and weeding-out potential allies and magi while propagating dangerous ideas in willing minds. Every Luminary Lodge has its fingers in the local occult orders, of course, if only to keep track of who’s saying what about whom. The Craftmasons practically built this network during the High Middle Ages, and their decline seems especially tragic in light of the prevalence of occult societies. And though few occultist “Templars” hold any connection to the true Knights, a few Enlightened warriors of Christ still watch from the back of the room in the orders that bear their name. Batini and Ecstatics, Solificati and Etherites, Fallen corruptors and the occasional Bedlamite… the demi-Hermetic underworld shelters them all. Each True Magus or Luminary involved nudges their fellowship a bit closer toward the Awakened group’s agenda. It’s a treacherous dance with occasionally fatal missteps; meanwhile, these clandestine fellowships gather, most members unaware that True Magick sits right next to them, often plotting greater things than these robed pretenders can possibly imagine…

Focus-wise, these societies favor alchemy, High Ritual Magick, occasionally maleficia, sometimes sex and sensuality, and quite often the Art of Desire. Their tools are legion but favor the trappings of Greek, Egyptian, Orientalist and Kabbalistic traditions as viewed by European gentiles who seldom understand them at all. For more information about Theosophy, occult fascism, and Ascended Masters, see The Book of Secrets, Chapters Three and Five (pp. 205 and 289). Regarding the influence of Awakened sects among the Masses, see the same book, Chapter Four (pp. 219-222, 230-233, 237-240, and 242-243).   

Invention, Hypertech, and Weird Science

This is the age of wild science; technologies of earlier eras combine with industrial production, the budding scientific method, and an anything-goes approach that’s brilliantly bizarre. Historically speaking, innovations of this century provide the best and worst elements of the coming ones; from a Mage perspective, the Victorian heyday of weird inventions might be the last time science allows for such radical extremes. The Technocratic Consensus of the 20th century has not yet ossified, and so technomancers of all kinds — most especially the Etherites — can unleash their strangest theories and machines.

Depending on the Storyteller’s wishes, this aspect of Victorian Mage could involve exaggerations of mundane technology appearing a decade or more earlier than they do historically — Gatling guns, for example, mowing down the Light Brigade, or Mississippi riverboats with electric power. Alternately, your chronicle could veer into outright steampunk on a scale too vast to address in this book: dirigible gunships, lightning-powered HIT Mark prototypes, the works. Shelly, Wells, Verne and Burroughs might reflect the reality of hypertech in a Victorian Mage game in which subtle occultism gives way to steampunk technomagick.

Focus-wise, Victorian hypertech essentially is weird science, and vice versa. Cybernetics are rare but possible, and body modification is frighteningly common. Modern hypereconomics originate in the Gilded Age, and craftwork of all kinds achieves spectacular results. Although specifics will depend upon the Storyteller’s plans, technological constructs and reanimates (detailed in Gods & Monsters, pp. 85-91 and 184-186) fit perfectly into Victorian fiction tropes. Depending on the Territory (detailed earlier in this chapter), wild technology might be uncanny, catastrophic, or perhaps — in a steampunk-flavor chronicle — even elegant.

This was another segment from our next manuscript preview, which will be e-mailed to all backers tomorrow! If you've been thinking about joining in, I'll be using the contact info for all backers that have pledged by midnight to build my manuscript preview mailing list tomorrow. So, if you want to read the fancy words, please back today!

And everyone who backs will get to share in our latest Stretch Goal achievement and help us unlock our next! We've just unlocked some brand new content coming for Victorian Mage!

ACHIEVED! – Bizarre Tales & Unusual Characters – A small companion book with playable stories and intriguing ne’er-do-wells will be created and released in a supplemental PDF, which will be added to the rewards list of all backers receiving the Victorian Mage PDF.

Let's see if we can't expand that further in our next goal:

At $75,000 in funding – Bizarre Tales Expanded – Additional playable story options will be created and added to the Bizarre Tales & Unusual Characters PDF supplement. 

At $78,000 in funding – VICTORIAN AGE VAMPIRE TRILOGY – Philippe Boulle’s trilogy of Victorian Age Vampire novels compiled in a digital collection will be added to the rewards list of all funding contributors to this project.

Some come on and join in the fun! I'll be sending out the next manuscript preview tomorrow, so remember to check your spam filter and folder if you don't see it in your inbox.

And let's keep this campaign rolling along!

#M20VA
#VictorianMage