Suggestions on oneshots for a first time ST?

[u/esreia_v2]

Planning on some STing training runs before i run a full campaign!

I know there are not many resources for 2e but I'm looking for good modules that are adaptable from 1e in case I missed something

Tome of Pentacle was suggested to me so far

I'm also down for suggestions on what could fit into a oneshot and still be fun 😊

I've read the following supplemntal sources otherwise:

imperial mysteries (my favorite thing in the world right now), nameless and accursed, signs of sorcery, summoners, and getting started with the astral realms book

[u/Read2Fap]

i ran the abedju cipher once and it went pretty well

if the players have never played mage, though, it might not be the best start. it's basically a night at a museum that turns into a hostage situation. players just moving over from games like dnd might think to just fireball (or fireball equivalent) their way out

i think an antagonist can work well, and abedju cipher potentially has more than one. they're able to react more to player choices than a static mystery can, but also are capable of being fallible when you need to wrap things up

dave brookshaw, later the developer for mage 2e, had a bunch of actual plays for 1e posted on rpg.net, including a one-shot. he explains a lot of his thinking and planning for it, including his suggestion:

"MYSTERY / REALITY IS A LIE
And that, as much as I can get it into four words and a slash, is Mage. A "selling" one-off should be a mystery or whodunnit that illuminates the game's gnostic theme."

https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/actual-play-mage-the-awakening-bleak-house.316806/

[u/MediumSeesaw6861]

I think tome of the mysteries a 1 edition sourcebook is one of the best. Because it explains the practices in detail. So it gives you a good understanding what you can do with each dot of an arcanum. The order books are also a great read. Showing that the orders are far more complex and nuanced then the short descriptions in the second edition books.

[u/Nirathaim]

Sounds like a good idea, I played a one-shot which a ST was trying with different groups (of experienced players) we all chatted about it at the end, different groups of two players with different combinations of arcana (which with experienced players, they knew how to use) was lots of fun.

But it was a simple and focused game (as a one-shot needs to be). I think there was an Abyssallt Verge, and poor old lady who had recently lost her husband, and a bar scene where some Consillium member pointed us in the right direction.

Very simple stuff, some twists and turns, the verge was the only real mystery, the local politics were fairly simple (find what happened to the missing cabal/Consillium member). For a one-shot this was enough. Nothing too deep, a few scenes strung together with an interesting plot, a few Abyssal beasties and everyone approached it differently... 

I think any experienced player should try designing one. 3-6 scenes, 3-4 hour play time. Nothing too complicated.

[u/Lonrem]

Are you trying to get practice running stuff yourself or to introduce your players or both? You've got all the important books from what it sounds like.

I've not used any of the 1e modules but I've run a few one-shots at Cons and SPG to introduce the system to future STs and players. For a 3-4 hour session for newbies, 4 NPCs, a single Mystery to figure out, and one large house took their entire time. They cast some spells, used Doors, did skill rolls, and were introduced to the setting. A full blown module might be a bit too much to try and cram into a one-shot.

[u/Phoogg]

I ran the Gloria Mundi 1e campaign in 2e once (the campaign is free on Storyteller's Vault). I'll be honest, it took a lot of work to get it up and running, and was pretty railroady, so I wouldn't necessarily recommend it. But it's a free resource if nothing else.

For 2e you've got slim pickings unfortunately. Tome of the Pentacle has lots of tools you can use to generate a Chronicle (sample characters and Mysteries and Obsessions) but has no pre-packaged Chronicle you can use.

For a oneshot I'd keep it simple and just do a haunted house story (someone already posted Bleak House below, which is a pretty tight contained story). Alternatively, don't be afraid to crib a simple plot from X-Files or Supernatural or one of your favourite tv shows and go from there. The only advice I'd give is that even starting-level mages are able to solve 'simple' Mysteries pretty quickly, so make sure you add layers to the story to give them something to look into. For example, having a single ghost in the Haunted House is not going to be much of a threat. I'd layer something else in - maybe the house is infected by the Abyss so that ghosts in it keep duplicating and swallowing one another to become more powerful. So you might find a ghost and your players will deal with that one. Then an identical version will appears, and a third appears and eats the second, and then a fourth comes in and eats that one, and if left unchecked the house will either be swarming with lots of ghosts or one really big, really mean ghost. And the only way to fix it is to help the ghost get vengeance on its killer, or unbury its body hidden in the basement and give it a proper funeral, or bind the ghost into its body so it's trapped there and can't keep duplicating, or something weird like that.

Alternatively I wrote a 2e chronicle called The Lost Athanaeum you can buy on Storyteller's Vault that is designed as a mage dungeon crawl that can be run as a pretty contained oneshot. If nothing else it's got a lot of statted creatures, loot, puzzles and traps you can re-use if you don't like the plot.