Editing Tradition Politics (section)

===Certámen===

Two mages who exhaust normal channels of resolving a dispute sometimes turn to certámen, a wizard’s duel that pits the mages’ skill with their Spheres against each other. Certámen is traditionally performed with at least one witness who acts as a judge, and it is almost always non-lethal. Indeed, it was invented as an alternative to the blood feuds that were too popular in darker times. To avoid Paradox, certámen is almost always performed in a Chantry, although Hollowers and others without many mystical resources occasionally practice so-called“gutter cert6men” in back alleys and smoky clubs. Within a proper certámen circle, k however, mages have free rein to conjure all manner of Effects, since certámen never incurs Paradox. The ultimate goal of a certámen is simple: You do not attack your opponent directly, you destroy his reservoir of Quintessence Traits.

To this end, each mage uses his Spheres to form a gladius, an aegis, and a locus. The gladius is the attacking Sphere that the mage uses to launch his assaults on his opponent’s Quintessence. The aegis is his defensive Sphere, and it governs how he must attempt to thwart his opponent’s strikes. The locus is the Sphere that represents the mage’s Quintessence Traits. A mage may switch which Sphere he is using for any one of those three purposes at any time, but doing so takes up his action for the turn. In addition, a given Sphere cannot be used for more than one of these purposes at a time. Finally, for each successful attack that slips past an opponent’s defenses, the attacker destroys one of his foe’s :: Quintessence Traits, and the first person to destroy all of his opponent’s Quintessence is the winner. As part of the certámen oath, the loser is expected to accept defeat graciously and live by it.

Running certámen is primarily a descriptive exercise, based on the Spheres each mage is using. For example, an attacker using a Forces gladius may declare that she is manifesting it as a bolt of flame and lashing out at her foe, while her opponent (using Matter as his aegis) declares that he is conjuring a wall of water to douse her flames, and so on. Certámen can be over in seconds or hours, but it is seldom dull to watch. Regardless of what dramatically descriptive forms they take, though, all strikes, blocks and dodges are resolved like normal magical tests and retests using the Spheres involved. The order of challenges likewise proceeds normally.

Storytellers should emphasize the wits and ingenuity of the mages involved over strict systems as much as they can, however, and possibly even offer bonus Traits or other benefits to players whose attacks or defenses are particularly clever. Certámen is supposed to be a battle of wits and magical prowess, not a showcase for brute force and Trait-stacking.