Disparate Alliance

The Disparate Alliance is a newly created network of independent Crafts that have chosen to take the matters of the Ascension War into their own hands, independently from the Technocratic Union or the Council of Nine Mystick Traditions.

History

While both the Council of Nine was a brainchild of the Renaissance and the Technocratic Union sprang from the Order of Reason during the Victorian Age, the Disparate Alliance came into being during the Information Age. During the events of the Avatar Storm, Armageddon seemed near. Many members of the Crafts deserted their brethren and joined the Traditions for safety. However, not all jumped at the call. The remainders concealed themselves even further, leaving no real evidence of their continued existence.

Even before, during the 1990s, many of these mages had made contact with other Crafts, utilizing the rapidly evolving global social media, virtual contact, and ideas of mutual protection to convince others to work together, outside of the Council. The first groups were those who had originally contact to the Traditions, like the Ahl-i-Batin, the Solificati, or the Hollow Ones. As the Ascension Warrior prepared to invade Horizon, the various orphans in Heylel's army started talking to one another. Sure, the Council was broken and the Technocracy was worse, but the concept of a Disparate Alliance began to make sense. When the Technocracy locked its sights on the various Crafts, the networks established by those meetings helped those groups survive the purge.

The Disparates believe that the Technocracy is part of a Nephandic conspiracy to dump the world and its various cultures down the gutter. The Pogrom was just another evidence of this. Most see the Traditions as likewise riddled with Nephandi and corruption, although some maintain contact to those who have left their original Crafts behind to join a Tradition.

The Disparate Alliance is a secret organization, its existence the knowledge of initiated, influential Craft members. Most do not flout this knowledge or even their membership within a Craft. Being overlooked and ignored has been their greatest weapon for decades, and they intend to use this knowledge.

Challenges

For all its faults, the original eurocentrism of the Council of Nine granted them a sense of unity and commonality that the Disparates - in their disparity - lack. Each group is proud of its own culture and independence, sometimes to the point of paranoia. Patriarchal millenialists clash with pre-islamic spirit-binders and neo-pagan feminists. It functions on a lot of promises and very little else. Still, some hope that in time, and mutual understanding, these differences will be bridged.

Furthermore to these challenges, they have no protocols, centralized leadership, common titles, Ascension ideals, and other complexities of the Council and Technocracy. Each Ally is a self-governing unit that cooperates voluntarily (or at least grudgingly) with the group as a whole.

Membership

Not every Craft has joined the Disparate Alliance. Below are the original members, as well its current inclusions and possible candidates for joining.

• The Ahl-i-Batin, searching for new allies to attain Unity
• The Children of Knowledge, claiming the title of true Solificati again in contrast to those who formed House Solificati within the Order of Hermes
• The Hollow Ones, sick of being treated as the fifth wheel of the Traditions (and possibly, to escape the wrath of their former allies following the revelation of the betrayal of the Hollow ambassador during the fall of Horizon)
• The Ngoma, mystics of Africa who had been much ignored in their history (a fraction left to found House Ngoma in the Order of Hermes)
• The Bata'a, practitioners of Afro-american religions who had lost a part of their members to the Dreamspeakers and Verbena

These five gathered additional allies, namely:

• The Kopa Loei, Polynesian mystics who had lost a fraction of their members to the Dreamspeakers
• The Knights of the Temple of Solomon, Christian knights who were once part of the Cabal of Pure Thought before they were betrayed (with a small fraction deserting the Craft to join the Celestial Chorus)
• The Sisters of Hippolyta, feminist holistics with roots in the lands of the Amazons
• The Taftâni, recently invigorated forcefully independent magicians with a disdain for coincidental magic
• The Wu Lung, Confucian dragon wizards who had lost numerous members to the Akashic Brotherhood and the new-founded House Hong Lei in the Order of Hermes

Other Crafts that have been considered for membership include:

• The Balamob, jaguar-priests from Central America
• The Thunder Society, North American native shamans that shun contact to the Dreamspeakers
• The Uzoma, Yoruban mediums and spirit intercessors
• The Navalon, breakaways from the Utopian faction within the Technocracy who revere the ideal of Camelot and King Arthur
• The Mirainohmen, Japanese technomystical tricksters who use psychic bonds with technological spirits in order to rearrange identities and undermine social preconceptions.
• The Red Thorn Dedicants, a cult of magic-using Bahari that revere Lilith
• The Itz'at, Mesoamerican seers and prophets
• The Go Kamisori Gama, technomantic ninja assassins with a vendetta against the Technocratic Union

References

• MTAs: Mage: the Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition , p.196-201