Vortex13 wrote...
Sorry quoting from my phone here:
1. I don't feel the Circle is useless now; obviously the Mages would view the system with suspicion and anger for what it was, but the foundation of the system does work, it just got corrupt and abused throughout the years. Wipe the slate clean as far as people in charge; restructure the Circle with respectable people (from both sides) in positions of authority. Implement more checks and balances into the system so abuse and corruption aren't allowed to spread. Hold people (both Mages and Templars) accountable if they break/abuse the rules. Give the Mages more freedom; allow them to see their family, let them marry and raise families of their own. The current Circle needs a complete overhaul, but the system itself is not evil, and Mages (if they were allowed to have more of the freedoms entailed) would see it as well.
I mean the current Circle (forgetig the abuses and negatives for a moment) offered free room and board to young mages; children from poor families, who would be beggers are cared for. A standardized (for a fantasy setting) teaching curriculum, not only of magic but the basic skills as well. The Circle is far from perfect, but I don't feel that it is void at this point because of the corruption.
What you or I might feel is irrelevant. There has been too much blood, and old wounds and hatreds have been allowed to fester too long. Even
IF you could convince the mage leadership that a newer, gentler circle system would be in their best interest (and good luck with that considering that it turned out to be a bill of goods the last time), the Templars under Lambert and his spiritual fellow travellers would never allow it. To their mind, how the Qunari treat their mages is just about right.
At mimimum the mages would insist that any oversight NOT be run by the Chantry and that would certainly be a non-starter for the Templars.
2. Your right, demon possession of a world threatening magnitude is rare, but you still have the issues of the Mages' power vs the non-magic people. Wynne's tale of how she came to be at the circle is a good example (also an example of a kind Templar) she set the bully's hair on fire, because she got angry with him. Did the bully deserve to be punished? Yes. But not by setting his head on fire. Yes I know that the boy was able to dunk his head in a through and not suffer any injuries; but you still have the issue with a child (potentially) killing or maiming another child with magic. Wynne was been picked on, but when you can set people's hair on fire because your angry, you have serious safety issues.
Now I will agree that the Mages have suffered persecution, including an exaggeration of their abilities in some cases, but the danger that one Mage can potentially posses, and not even be aware of it is cause for concern if left unchecked.
All of which shows that mages need to have special and mandatory training, and that acts of magic should not be treated the same way as mundane acts even if they are otherwise the same crime. I would treat the use of magic as an automatic aggravating factor, and THOSE mages that use their magic criminally
should be locked away and locked away very security (if not outright killed in some cases).
That does not justify putting all mages into what amounts to concentration camps though.
3. I used wh 40k because of the similarities between the two, and the issues that the respective universes face. Mages/Psykers both are a danger when untrained, both have a possiblity of being possessed by demons; and even the Demons/Deamons of the Warp are the same, they are based/created from human emotions, and the Warp/Fade is an alternate reality that Mages/Psykers draw their power from. Also humanity in WH 40k have been living with Psykers for almost 20,00 years so, yes their society has had to adapt an evolve in reaponse to Psychic individuals; but this is getting off topic so...
Yes but in WH 40K the ability developed in humans AFTER many thousands of years of civilization. That's a very different dynamic.
4. I misspoke here, I didn't mean that the Mages would forsake all rules and training, I ment Mages training Mages without any input of non-Mages. Yes I know that only a Mage can really know what another Mage is dealing with, but I am against of the total isolation that some have proposed. Having a group of (essentially) super human people only interacting with one another with no imput from the regular people will inverably lead to a schewd world view. Yes I know that the Circle has that issue as well, but at least there Mages could be trained by fellow Mages and have interaction with people without magic in a teaching environment. It may seem paranoid but, I would prefer a Templar or some non-Mage to be privy to what is being taught.
I never suggested that mage should be isolated from non-mages and I also think that a strong part of a mage's education should be how magic affects and interacts with mundanes. In fact I'd try to integrate magic and mages as much as possible and make people with magic a part of society that would be invested in society. That in no way means that mages should be free to do as they like, and that magic shouldn't be strongly restricted....but that's the common pro-Templar strawman I hear....mages want no restrictions at all. By and large that isn't true.
-Polaris
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