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Sorceror by White Wolf Not to be brusque, but haven't I seen this before?

Sorceror was originally listed as part of White Wolf's Year of the Ally series. This would list an ally for each game race (Vampires, Werewolves, etc), and Sorceror was to be the release for Mage.

I assume the developers saw that there really wasn't that much in common between the average Mage character and the types of PCs you'd create with Sorceror, and reprinted some old Material as 'Mage Chronicles'. They then released this as a World of Darkness release, making it a sorta/kinda stand alone product that you'd need one of the main rulebooks to actually use.

The one problem is that Sorceror is mostly old ground. Hedge magic has been gone over time and time again (almost all of the Year of the Hunter books reprinted them). About half the book is material that's already been seen in one place or another.

The first chapter is a flavour piece on 'the path of the sorceror'. It gives some info on how people become sorcerors, etc. It gives a brief nod to the eternal question "Why do only Mages suffer paradox when everyone else does bizzare stuff too?", but doesn't offer an answer.

The second chapter details a series of magical groups (not magickal groups. There's a difference, and not just a 'k'). Some are interesting, but none really catch fire in the imagination. And, of course, there's an uber-wonderful group of celtic magicians with power in their bloodline and werewolf and fairie relatives, pardonez moi while I vomit.

Following that, we enter rerun land. The character creation retreads and revises info from a dozen different sources for Sorcerors. Most seem to be cut n' pasted from previous supplements. One difference is that Sanctuarys aer a lot better pointwise than Chantries. And you can play an immortal (but I think there should only be one, anyway). Thirty-Five pages of Paths and Rituals later, you arrive at the templates section of the book (which, once again, make the minor mistake of not conforming to the character generation rules).

The templates are actually the most interesting part of the book, mechanical quibbles aside. The Street Prophet in particular is an interesting example. Of course, the fact he posses a point of the True Faith merit (not mentioned in this book) will just give you a headache.

All in all, sorceror isn't a terrible book. In fact, if you don't possess too much White Wolf material, it would be a very useful supplement, full of good information. Unfortunately, if you've gotten Mage, the Players Guide to same, and Halls of the Arcanum (which was part of the Year of the Ally reprint supplement for Mage), you'll end up with little more than some interesting background infomration.

Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 2 (Sparse)

World of Darkness: Sorceror
Author: James Estes Looking Eagle and Phil Brucato Category: game Company/Publisher: White Wolf Cost: $16.00 Page count: 134 ISBN: 1-56504-451-7 Capsule Review by Justin Mohareb on 12/04/97. Genre tags: none	Sorceror by White Wolf Not to be brusque, but haven't I seen this before? Sorceror was originally listed as part of White Wolf's Year of the Ally series. This would list an ally for each game race (Vampires, Werewolves, etc), and Sorceror was to be the release for Mage. I assume the developers saw that there really wasn't that much in common between the average Mage character and the types of PCs you'd create with Sorceror, and reprinted some old Material as 'Mage Chronicles'. They then released this as a World of Darkness release, making it a sorta/kinda stand alone product that you'd need one of the main rulebooks to actually use. The one problem is that Sorceror is mostly old ground. Hedge magic has been gone over time and time again (almost all of the Year of the Hunter books reprinted them). About half the book is material that's already been seen in one place or another. The first chapter is a flavour piece on 'the path of the sorceror'. It gives some info on how people become sorcerors, etc. It gives a brief nod to the eternal question "Why do only Mages suffer paradox when everyone else does bizzare stuff too?", but doesn't offer an answer. The second chapter details a series of magical groups (not magickal groups. There's a difference, and not just a 'k'). Some are interesting, but none really catch fire in the imagination. And, of course, there's an uber-wonderful group of celtic magicians with power in their bloodline and werewolf and fairie relatives, pardonez moi while I vomit. Following that, we enter rerun land. The character creation retreads and revises info from a dozen different sources for Sorcerors. Most seem to be cut n' pasted from previous supplements. One difference is that Sanctuarys aer a lot better pointwise than Chantries. And you can play an immortal (but I think there should only be one, anyway). Thirty-Five pages of Paths and Rituals later, you arrive at the templates section of the book (which, once again, make the minor mistake of not conforming to the character generation rules). The templates are actually the most interesting part of the book, mechanical quibbles aside. The Street Prophet in particular is an interesting example. Of course, the fact he posses a point of the True Faith merit (not mentioned in this book) will just give you a headache. All in all, sorceror isn't a terrible book. In fact, if you don't possess too much White Wolf material, it would be a very useful supplement, full of good information. Unfortunately, if you've gotten Mage, the Players Guide to same, and Halls of the Arcanum (which was part of the Year of the Ally reprint supplement for Mage), you'll end up with little more than some interesting background infomration. Style: 3 (Average) Substance: 2 (Sparse)

World of Darkness: Sorceror