When it comes to rotes, are we limited in how many?

Question

I'm new to Mage and we're doing a Mage 20th game. I'm wondering if we're limited in how many rotes we have in any way or any how, just to make sure I'm doing stuff right.

Answer 1

There are no rules limitations on the number of rotes a character may learn

You don’t mention which edition of Mage you’re playing, but in the twentieth anniversary edition of Mage: The Ascension (M20) at least, there’s no limit. From the M20 core rules, page 529 (emphasis mine):

Beyond the story-based opportunities to learn such tricks, there’s nothing special about a rote. You do not need to spend points to learn one, nor are you limited to a certain number of rotes.

As long as you can justify learning them, your character can know as many rotes as you want. There’s no experience cost, either, which is why rotes do not appear in the experience cost table on page 336. (From memory this is a change from previous editions, in which rotes did require experience expenditure to learn, but I’m pretty sure there was no limit then either as long as you had the XP to spend.)

The paragraph quoted above does go on to give optional rules for a roll a character may be required to make to represent the effort of learning a rote, but again, assuming you succeed, there’s no other limitation.