I don't want to write a post about Magic: Deeper Secrets (Morgan Weeks with "additional writing" by Ashwath Ganesan). It took me two weeks to read and most of that time was dull, dull, dull. I get to chapter three and I see an improved spell knack that increases the duration of the Air Fortress spell and it just takes up a couple of sentences, but then I glance back at the table of contents and see that there are 150 more pages of that shit, just one very brief, incredibly dry entry after another.
Obviously, there's a niche for rpg books like this. In fact, I'd say it's one of the most essential Earthdawn, 4th edition books thus far. But sitting down, reading it end-to-end, that was the wrong way to experience it. And what do I have to gain by writing about experiencing a book wrong? What do you have to gain from reading about me experiencing a book wrong?
Don't read the dictionary cover-to-cover! Is that something you need to hear?! Apparently, it's something I needed to hear, because I just got done reading the fucking dictionary cover-to-cover. But I'm dismayed to think that the lesson is very obviously not going to keep. Somewhere, in my future, is a book that's going to be extremely useful and informative when dipped into carefully, as a reference, partitioned and rationed according to the immediate needs of narrative and strategy, and I'm going to fucking ruin it by reading five hundred variations of the same exception-based-design jargon in a fucking row, flaunting good sense, critical best practice, and the implicit intent of the creators for . . . pride? Internet points? The immortalization of my name in the annals of misguided stunt bloggers ("John, for all his faults, committed to his gimmicks and no one can take that from him, despite the bizarre and sinister circumstances surrounding his unexpected . . . retirement.")
Anyway, the fun part is speculating about which precise book in my collection is going to be the next one I ruin with this stubborn brand of strictly chronological reading. My money's on the Fiasco playbooks.
As far as Magic: Deeper Secrets is concerned, it's fine. I'd need to sit down and compare texts, but I'm pretty sure most of its best elements are inherited from 1st edition's Arcane Mysteries of Barsaive. Which isn't exactly a problem - reprinting 30-year-old material for a new generation is generally a good idea - but it's not entirely to the book's benefit to invite comparisons to a time when the line as a whole was more open to experimentation and audacity. Don't get me wrong, I love me a Greatest Hits album, but they are always an example of curation in hindsight. They'll never be as electric as being there when the lightning strikes.
I guess what I'm saying is . . . if you're a fan of Earthdawn, 4th edition is the best way to play the game, and Magic: Deeper Secrets is an essential part of any 4th edition toolkit. Get yourself a copy. Stick it on your shelf. Consult the parts you need, when you need them. Look elsewhere for exciting lore.
Ukss Contribution: There was one thing in this book that was new to me (though whether it's "new to 4th edition" or just "not in 1st or 2nd edition" is not apparent) - the Binding Secrets rules. The way they work is that they're basically just improved spell knacks, but you get them by making pacts with individual Named Spirits, who lend their energies to the casting of the spells. A lot of these Named spirits were interesting characters in their own rights, and though the section was tragically shorter than some of the other, drier sections, it was a welcome bit of lore in an otherwise pure reference book.
My favorite of the Named Spirits was Halcyon, the badger spirit. He's "particularly fond of children." He "believes in the power of community." "His favorite haunts are the boundaries between wild and cultivated land, with sun-dappled forest on one side and golden fields on the other. Here, he writes poems of simple and sincere beauty no one will ever hear."
It's all painfully cozy-core, but it's a hint of the Earthdawn I fell in love with. Just a little bit of "genre on purpose."
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