Dante, born Desmond Collingworth, is an Archmage and the signature character of the Virtual Adepts.
Dante was created by Travis Williams. Travis also intentionally put Dante's Tarot Card on the front cover of the Mage: The Ascension Rulebook.[1]
Biography[]
Even before Desmond was born, the Technocracy was aware of his potential. They persuaded his mother that he would be born mentally deficient and that by joining an experimental program, she could help others in her situation. During the program, she died during his birth.
Dante is a rare phenomenon, having been born with his Avatar already Awakened. Under the Progenitors' surveillance, he was placed with a foster family. He finished high school at eight years old, and he finished top of his class at Harvard Medical School in only five years.
After running off with a Virtual Adept faction called the Lab Rats (all Progenitor-born and bred), he was educated on the "true nature of reality". Currently, he concerns himself mostly with freeing other children from the hands of the Technocracy.
The Elite of the Elite, he is widely known as one of the greatest Virtual Adepts alive.
Metaplot[]
Dante took a greater role in the leadership of the Adepts for a time following the Conflagration. He was ardently opposed to surrendering to the Technocracy and officially ending the Ascension War. However, sometime after that event, he disappeared into the Digital Web.[2] Subsequently, he reappeared as an Oracle aligned with the Rogue Council in one of the Time of Judgment scenarios, "Ascension".[3]
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Travis Williams's whole point of adding Dante's Tarot Card on the front cover of the Rulebook was a point on the importance of representation in the roleplaying hobby and industry back in 1993 (Howling at the Moon: Word of blacks in roleplaying). Every Subsequent Edition of the Mage Rulebook (Second, Revised, Mage 20th) has honored Travis Williams' intention by keeping Dante on the cover.
References[]
- ↑ WWM: White Wolf Magazine 39 (Howling at the Moon: Word on blacks in roleplaying)
- ↑ MTAs: The Bitter Road, p. 20
- ↑ MTAs: Ascension, p. 83, 200
- MTAs: Hidden Lore, p. 21
- MTAs: Virtual Adepts Tradition Book, p. 64
- MTAs: The Horizon War Trilogy 3: War in Heaven, p. 351-352
- MTAs: Digital Web 2.0, p. 78-79
- MTAs: Time of Judgment 3: Judgment Day, p. 61-66, 69, 72, 75, 78, 81-83, 88-89, 180-183, 203, 208, 292-293, 334
