Mage Reference

Quick Example of how to cast a spell in Mage.  Let's Say Ana Frost a mage with Gnosis 3, Fate 4 is trying to cast Superlative Luck on herself and her Cabal.

Before you Start determine the Spell you want to cast (Fate 3 Superlative Luck) and your Mages Arcanum Level (Fate 4 for Ana).

Spellcasting Steps:

1. Determine Reaches you want or need for your Spell
   1. Standard Reaches for Advanced Factors - Each of these costs 1 Reach:
      1. Advanced Potency - Increase Withstand Rating of  your Spell (make it harder to dispel it).  Only important for spell that last a while so your enemies can't dispel it.
      2. Advanced Sensory Reach - Without this you must touch your target or shoot an Aimed Spell (Gnosis + Athletics/Firearms) at your target to affect them.
      3. Advanced Instant Casting Time - Without this a spell takes Ritual Casting Time (1 hour at Gnosis 3) to cast.  With Instant Cast your spell takes one turn unless you use more than 1 Yantra, each Yantra after the first adds a round to the spell casting time.  IE if you use 3 Yantras your spell takes 3 turns total.
      4. Advanced Scale - Without this your spell affects small number of people or applies to a relatively small area.  You need this to affect lots of people or a large area.
      5. Advanced Duration - Without this your spell lasts a few turns, use this if you need your spell to last hours, days, months or more.
   2. Extra Reach per Spell - Each Spell may have custom Reaches that allow you to cast a more powerful version of the spell
   3. Other Reach Uses - Change Primary Spell Factor, Make a spell Indefinite, Cast Spells above your Spell Control limit.
   4. Determine Free Reach - You get Free Reach equal to your (Arcana Rating - the Arcana Rating of the Spell) + 1.  I.E. Ana with Fate 4 gets 2 Free Reaches casting a Fate 3 Spell.  (When using a Rote Yantra your Arcana Rating is considered to always be 5 regardless of your actual Arcana Rating, for the purpose of calculating Free Reach Only)
   5. Every Reach Above your Free Reach will add Paradox Dice to the Spell Paradox Roll
   6. Example: Ana Is casting this spell outside of combat (so doesn't need Instant Casting).  She's casting it on herself only (no need for Advanced Scale or Sensory Reach).  She does want it to last a while so she uses 1 Reach for Advanced Duration.  This is well within her Free Reach of 2 (Her Fate is 4 and she's casting a Fate 3 spell).  IF Ana also wanted Superlative Luck to apply to spell casting rolls, she'd also need 2 Reach as listed for said Spell.  This would bring her at 3 Reach, 1 Above her Free Reach for this spell (so she'll incur Paradox)
2. Determine your Dice Pool
   1. Base Pool = Gnosis + Your Arcanum Level (for Ana it's Fate 4, her Arcanum level not Fate 3 the level of the Spell)
   2. Add Yantras - You can have 1 Yantra per Gnosis Level added to a Spell.  Each Yantra adds a number of dice to the Pool. 
      1. Example: Path Tools add 1 Dice, High Speech Adds 2, Shadow Names adds up to 3, Rote Casting Adds your Skill Level in dice
      2. Remember if Instant Casting each Yantra after the first increases casting time by 1 turn.
   3. Add Dice from Extended Ritual Casting Time - If you're not Instant Casting, your spell normally takes your Gnosis derived Ritual Casting time to cast.  For Gnosis 3 this is 1 hour.  Each Ritual Casting Time Interval above the first you take (up to 5) adds a die. So if you take 6 hours to cast a Spell when your Ritual Casting time is 1 Hour you add 5 extra dice.
   4. Use Willpower.  1 Willpower = 3 Dice
   5. Add Extra Dice from Spells or other Bonuses. (IE Maybe you cast Fate 2 Exception Luck to give yourself 5 extra dice to spell casting rolls prior)
   6. Example: Ana's Base Dice Pool is Gnosis 3 + Fate 4 = 7 dice.  She has Gnosis 3 so she can use 3 Yantras, she uses Material Sympathy 2 dice (a lock of her own hair), High Speech (2 dice) and Shadow Name with Cabal Theme 4 dice for a total of 8 extra Dice.  Her total Pool after Yantras is Now 15 Dice.  She Takes the full Extended Ritual Casting time of 6 hours for another 5 dice and blows a Willpower for 3 more dice.  Her total is 23 Dice for this Spell.  
3. Increase Factors:
   1. There are 3 Spell Factors you can tweak to determine what your spell ultimately does, Potency, Duration and Scale.  Increasing Potency makes the spell Stronger.  Duration makes it last Longer.  Scale Makes it affect more people or a Wider area. 
   2. Without increasing Factors all Spells Start with Potency 1, Duration 1 (1 Turn for Regular Duration, 1 Scene for Advanced Duration) and Scale 1 (1 Person for Regular Scale, 5 Persons for Advanced Scale)
   3. Each Step Increase in one of these Factors makes the spell more Powerful and costs 2 dice.  I.E. Moving Potency from 1 to 5, requires 4 Step increases for a total of 8 dice.  Increasing Duration by 3 Steps from 1 turn to 5 turns (4th Duration Factor Level) costs 6 dice, etc.
   4. Determine Free Steps in Primary Factor.  You get a Number of Free Steps in the Primary Factor of the spell equal to your Arcana minus 1.  Ana with Fate 4 gets 3 Free Step increases in the Primary Factor of whatever Fate Spell she is casting.
   5. Example: Ana is casting Superlative Luck above.  The Primary Factor for that is Duration so Ana with Fate 4 gets 3 Free Step Increases.  Since she also used a reach to Advance Duration she gets Duration increase from Level 1 to Level 4 for free or 1 Month Duration.  She Only Casts this on herself so no Factor Increases needed for Scale.  But she wants this spell to be Extra Potent, so she spends 16 of her 23 Dice for 8 Potency Level Increases. Her Spell now goes from Potency 1 to Potency 9.  She is left with only 7 Dice in her Spell Casting Roll (23 - 16)

That's IT!  Now roll your Left Over Dice to determine Success or Failure, and deal with Paradox if you incurred any.  

Introduction

This write up clarifies how combining spells actually works.  This follows the system as written in the book with one clarification which the book doesn't go into, which is how to select the primary spell factor of a combined spell

Basic System and Spell Types

Your Gnosis will determined the number of spells that can be combined into one casting. It is two at Gnosis 3, three at Gnosis 6, and four at Gnosis 9.  
You may not have a rote in your combined spell. 
You may combine Praxis spells if all spells involved are Praxis spells.

Determining Reach

Free Reach: Free reach is calculated normally for each spell involved and then you take the lowest number, that is the number of free reaches available.
How to  use a reach.  

• When using a reach it affects all component spells of the combination.
• Spell specific reaches can be purchased on a per spell basis and affect only the spell they were purchased for.

Spell Factors

Primary Spell Factor - If the combined spells have different spell factors then the mage chooses the primary spell factor. That becomes the Primary Spell Factor for all component spells of the combination.  Free Spell Factor increases for the spell are factored based on the highest Arcanum in the combined spell
Scale - Multiple spell effects must use the same scale unless the mage uses a Reach to separate the effects.
Potency - Is figured the same a normal, increasing the spell factor with either a reach or by taking a negative to the dice pool. This affects the Potency for all component spells of the combination.
Duration - Is figured the same a normal, increasing the spell factor with either a reach or by taking a negative to the dice pool. This affects the Duration for all component spells of the combination.
Range - Is figured the same a normal, increasing the spell factor with either a reach or by taking a negative to the dice pool. This affects the Range for all component spells of the combination.
Casting Time - Casting time is unchanged and the entire combined spell uses your Gnosis derived casting time for a ritual or if you spend a reach to make it an instant spell then the entire spell is an instant.
Mana - You must include all mana needed for each component spell used in the combination.
Suggested Rote Skills - Since a combined spell cannot have a rote in it this doesn't come into play.

Yantras and Dice Pool Modifiers

Yantras affect the dice pool as normal. If using a Yantra it must be relevant to all component spells of the combination.  If you take a negative dice pool modifier to increase a spell factor it increases that spell factor for all component spells of the combination.

Dice Pool

The entire spell has one dice pool and it is figured as follows. Gnosis + Lowest Arcanum + Yantras + willpower (if used) -2 for each spell after the first - Spell Factor modifications.

Withstand:

Each spell in a combined spell is Withstood separately. If a spell has multiple Withstand ratings (for example, a Withstood spell cast with the Sympathetic Range Attainment) it uses the highest rating, +1 for every additional rating.

Example

You have Gnosis 6, Fate 4, Life 3 and Death 2. If combining Touch of the Grave (Death ••), Grave Misfortune (Fate •••) and Transform Life (Life •••) it would look like this:

Primary Spell Factor: The mage would choose this, smart thing would to choose Potency.  Since the Highest Arcanum is Fate 4 the spell benefits from 3 Free Step increases on the Potency Table if you picked Potency as your Primary Spell Factor.
Free Reach: 1 free reach (2 free reach from Fate, 1 free reach from Life and 1 free reach from Death, take the lowest one)
Dice Pool: Gnosis 6 + 2 (Death) - 4 combining 3 spells, +/- Yantras, Willpower and Spell factor modifications.
Withstand: Touch of the Grave is not withstood, Grave Misfortune is withstood by Composure and Transform Life is withstood by Stamina.
Scale: The scale for all components is 1 person unless modified.
Potency: The Potency for all components is 1 unless modified.
Duration: The Duration for all components is 1 round unless modified.
Range: The Range for all components is touch unless modified.
Casting Time: The Casting Time for all components is 1 round (plus Yantras used -1) unless modified.