So you have a mage in your game ready for a Seeking, and you really want to do it up right. Unfortunately, you don’t know where to start. Well, here’s a few steps to take that will help you craft an experience that the player, let alone the character, will not soon forget.
First off, study the character’s background. Without a background, a Seeking will not have a deep and lasting impression, so they really need to be required before a mage can gain any further enlightenment. Any successful Seeking is going to have a strong emotional and possibly psychological impact on the character, or it is no Seeking at all. Plan a time when you and the player can get together with the Avatar Guide to run it; before or after a game or during downtime is good, but in the middle of the game is not.
Does the mage have a severe intolerance of phobia that impedes his or her growth? Now’s the perfect time to force the character into facing the consequences of that belief or fear. Something that the mage loves too much or too well? Here’s your chance to break that down, too, because being too attached to material existence can slow him or her down just as much as not being attached at all. Look at the Nature and Demeanor of the character as well. Maybe the mage has a fear of enclosed spaces it’s time for her to overcome, or a childhood tragedy he’s blocking; maybe he pays too much attention to the opinions of others, or she dislikes an ethnic group. Get an idea of what particular stumbling block the mage has to overcome this time around, find some things that will make that block damned hard to bypass without confronting the problem fully, and you’re halfway home.
Next, get with your Avatar Guide and go over the character’s chosen Avatar. What’s its Essence? This will provide strong hints into how the mage thinks, and more importantly how the Avatar THINKS the mage should think. Resonance plays into this too, coloring the Seeking with a touch of the mage’s own magical flavor. Bring the Avatar Guide along to the Seeking, too; the Avatar can offer aid in subtle or obvious ways, depending on the story you tell.
Dynamic Avatars start with a new task each time, frequently changing the environment or purpose that the mage thought he was dealing with in mid-Seeking and forcing the mage to look at a new way of dealing with stuff. An example might be going to a party in the mindscape, trying to avoid social faux pas, and then realizing that he’s actually standing in a courtroom and all of the other guests are jurors. The mage might complete his defense of the witness, which is himself, only to find that he’s running toward the finish line at the Olympics with only himself to beat before he takes the race.
Pattern Avatars require the mage to complete tasks, and frequently such an Avatar sets a “starting point” that the mage will begin with in every Seeking. Such Avatars make the mage complete prior tasks each time, on the way to the new trial, to make sure the past messages are still locked in. Perhaps there’s a cave the mage has to enter, and she starts there each time, having to make it past the creature that dens there and navigating the enclosing passages; eventually escaping the claustrophobic tunnels to a new part of the mindscape on the other side.
Primordial Avatars make mages question themselves through exploring their own lives, past or present. The purpose is to refine the parts of the mage that serve his higher nature, and work through the parts that don’t. Consider the mage as a child, riding in a car with his family up winding mountain roads; the Avatar could be forcing him to relive a family vacation from his childhood, forcing him to realize that it was his own childish rambunctiousness that led to the wreck that paralyzed and eventually killed his kid sister. Then the mage might be in the hospital room, with his parents at the rehab clinic, and eventually in her assisted living center. He has to accept his guilt and show remorse to win through.
And Questing Avatars involve solving some, well, quest, usually in a rather orderly but new way. These ordeals usually will involve conquering something within the mage, externalizing it so it can be dealt with. Perhaps the bigoted mage finds herself walking the streets of the Warsaw ghetto at the initiation of Krystallnacht, and it is up to her to lead some Jewish women and their children out of the slaughter. Looking back at the troops, the character might see her own face peering out from under the brim of the SS officer’s cap.
Finally, make sure that the Seeking has a definite feel of closure to it. After he mage has been put through these emotional stresses, it’s important to make sure that the character sees a real and tangible symbol of success within the mindscape. He breaks the ribbon and finds himself clutching the Gold Medal while getting a drink at the original party, noticing for the first time that the other guests are not focusing on him after all. The cave opens up onto a ledge and she’s facing a view last seen in another life, gazing out at the Horizon Realm her last self designed. His sister smiles at him in forgiveness as she steps out of the wheelchair, takes a few tentative steps, spreads her wings and flies toward her reward. The children, having been led outside the ghetto, suddenly turn and embrace their savior. Always give the character the feeling that this positive end isn’t a reward; it’s a payment for services rendered, and best of all they were rendered to the character him or herself.
But what if the mage can’t overcome the obstacle, won’t face the limitation, chooses to ignore the stumbling block? Turn the vision around. The price of a failed Seeking is incalculably painful on the emotional scale, and it’s imperative that you bring that failure to the surface. He loses the race and everyone laughs at him. She panics in the caverns and runs away, then becomes pinned in a narrow tubule, trapped in darkness and unable to move. His sister dies painfully without ever speaking to him again, and his parents disown him. She stares down at the bodies of the children she failed as the Nazis congratulate her on her work. Make it real for the character, so that the next time the mage must face a Seeking it isn’t done easily or lightly.
Further advice can be found in The Bitter Road, a sourcebook for Mage: the Ascension table-top. Chapter 4: A Magical World, especially the boxed text entitled “Going With The Mindless Spirituality”, will provide insights into doing the Seeking up right. There are also hints and suggestions in the core TT rulebook and the Storyteller’s Companion. I heartily recommend all of the above to the serious and dedicated Mage Storyteller.
A final caveat here: there’s a fine line between challenging the beliefs of the character, and offending the beliefs of the player. Seekings can and should get emotionally charged for the character, but make certain that the issue you’re addressing isn’t going to cause emotional harm to the player. Know your players, know their characters, and most importantly know the difference. Do this, and Seekings in your Mage game will be intimate and intense, frightening and moving, and best of all remembered long after the character is retired.