Demesne (mage V20)
Demesne
A mage’s mind is her castle. There, she can get away from it all to a world of her own making. Classical and Renaissance treatises refer to memory palaces, wherein a person builds a structure in her mind as an aid to meditation, study, reflection, and, of course, memory. Shaped from the builder’s consciousness, these constructs have no physical form, yet they offer a type of refuge. With this Background, you have such a place.
Cosmologically, a Demesne exists in the Maya as a semi- permanent Dream Realm inspired by your dreaming mind. This Realm might be something you created intentionally with the Talent: Lucid Dreaming , or it might exist in a place conjured by your subconscious imagination. Either way, it follows cues from your consciousness and features elements of personal significance for you. Your mind might build a temple that no one can defile, a field of flowers in honor of your beloved, a gallery of pictures that immortalize people or places you wish to remember... if you can dream it, you can create it... though you might not actually control your creation once the Demesne exists.
This Demesne might not be a pleasant place. Nightmares, Quiets, suicidal thoughts, or other dark neuroses can spawn a Demesne too. Maybe you want to craft a nightmare realm, either a testing-ground, a purgatory, or a reflection of your love for horror films. Pleasant or otherwise, the Demesne could be small, impressive, or vast. You yourself might not know just how expansive it can be. Our minds, after all, are full of surprises...
In game terms, the Background rating reflects the degree of control you have over this place once it’s established. At low ratings, you can visit the Realm but not command it, while at higher levels you determine almost every detail of your Realm. (Again, see the Lucid Dreaming entry, p. 294.) Figure out your Demesne’s appearance and nature, probably in collaboration with your Storyteller... who’s bound to add a few elements of her own.
When dreaming or meditating, your character can go visit his Demesne with a successful Perception + Demesne roll. The difficulty depends upon your situation: directing yourself there under normal circumstances would be difficulty 5 or 6, whereas trying to reach it under distressing circumstances (say, while enduring torture or other challenges) would range from difficulty 7 to 9. Once he’s arrived, the character’s consciousness is free to wander around the Demesne. Although physical or mental distress can disrupt the Realm, it’s still a familiar – if not always welcoming – space.
There’s nothing physical about a Demesne. You don’t go there physically, and you cannot take anything physical from that Realm. Instead, a traveler sends his astral form into that Demesne, leaving his body behind. For details, see Astral Travel in Chapters Four and Nine, (p. 87) and (pp. 476-478). That said, you don’t need Mind 3 or better to enter your personal Demesne – the Background Trait takes care of the travel arrangements. A mage who can travel astrally, though, may wander out of the Demesne and reach other Dream or Astral Realms from there.
In the Demesne, your appearance reflects your state of mind. If you’re calm, you’re lucid dreaming, or have managed to project your ideal astral form, you look however you want to look. Under other circumstances, your visiting form might betray whatever stress, fear, or insecurities you’re facing in the physical world. A successful Wits + Demesne (or Lucid Dreaming) roll lets you adjust your appearance at that point, though... and similar rolls can help you change the dreamscape too. Large changes, of course, demand several successes – see above for potential difficulties.
Because the Demesne itself reflects its creator’s mental state, you can also confront internal issues within the Dream Realm’s boundaries. A successful Perception + Demesne roll allows you to puzzle out subconscious conflicts and figure out what’s going on beneath the surface. On a related note, you can try to access memories that might be hidden throughout the Demesne. In this case, roll Intelligence + Meditation or Demesne (whichever is higher), with the difficulty and numbers of successes based upon the obscurity of that information. The name of your last girlfriend would be easy to find, but the name of the kid who sat next to you in third grade would be significantly harder to recall.
A skillful Mind mage (that is, Mind 3 for a sleeping subject, Mind 4 for one who’s awake) can draw other people’s consciousness into his Demesne too. If that person doesn’t want to enter the Demesne, they have a Willpower-versus-Willpower contest (see Resisted Actions in Chapter Eight, p. 390), with the winner achieving his objective. A person who’s fighting the dream can roll every few turns to leave the Demesne; until the roll succeeds, however, that character is trapped. Again, this is not a physical trap, though being stuck in someone else’s nightmare can be pretty horrifying...
If your mage falls into a Quiet, you can roll his Willpower (difficulty 9) in order to go into your Demesne; there, he’s still trapped in the mindscape, but at least it’s familiar territory. A few successful Perception + Demesne rolls could lead him back out again. See Quiet in Chapter Ten, (pp. 554-561).
- X -- No Dream Realm to speak of.
- • -- Occasional visitor to the Realm. You have a name for it and recognize a few significant features.
- •• -- A regular visitor, you’ve traveled extensively through the Demesne.
- ••• -- In your dreams, you know this place quite well.
- •••• -- This is your Realm, and though you don’t command its every feature or resident, they know and recognize you as someone of authority there.
- ••••• -- Lord or Lady of the Demesne, you know and command this Realm as if it were your kingdom... because it is.
