Salve all,
Magi being who they are, some are trying to learn more from a source than what they can naturally give.
Have you found ways to increase experience sources with magic?
What I have so far, within the rules...
CrMe ritual to permanently increase a teacher's Com
Teaching within a lab with a Teaching specialty (not itself magical, but a magi's solution)
Increase a book's refinement (not a spell, and can be applied to Arts, but it's a way)
Providing a teacher with an excellent piece of teaching equipment (blackboard? a stick?)
That's it
Now, with some extrapolation
InMe to learn directly from a teacher's mind, not being limited by how they communicate
MuMe to increase temporarily the teacher's ability to teach
Finding a magical creature that can provide Affinity with (ability) / book learner / Apt student / etc
From what I understand, experience is itself distinct from Me Art, so one cannot cast a spell on experience itself, but one could improve learning conditions.
It's not hermetic, but a number of hedge traditions have a form of grant virtue. If you use one to grant an appropriate learning virtue such as the appropriate affinity, secondary insight, or book learner that could work. Or the teacher the good teacher virtue.
Step 1: Use Vulgar Alchemy to establish a big Shape bonus for Teaching for some object, such as an academic gown.
Step 2: Get a Verditius to make an Item of Quality that increases the Teaching ability by the Shape bonus.
Step 3: Profit!
I don't have my books to hand, so there may well be a reason this doesn't work (maybe Items of Quality only modify dice rolls?). I rather hope there is.
First, an observation -- Learning a Spell From a Lab Text. The way the rule is written is bad.
A magus who has a Laboratory Text for a particular effect may reproduce it in a single season if his Lab Total exceeds the level of the effect. If his Lab Total is less than the level of the effect, he may not use the Laboratory Text until his Lab Total increases to be at least equal to the level. A magus may reproduce multiple effects if they are all of the same Technique and Form, and their levels add up to less than his Lab Total. The Lab Total is calculated in exactly the same way when working from a Laboratory Text as when working without one.
This is basically "The mage must understand a Lab Text to use it" and "The lab text adds it's level to the Mage's lab total (only for the specific purpose of inventing this spell)" -- but it is specifically worded to ignore all cases where the Mage's Lab Total is not exactly the same as the level of the Lab Text.
So -- my question. Mage A wants to learn spells from another mage, either Mage B or Mage C. Mage B has translated his lab texts for all the spells to be taught, so that any other mage may use them to invent the spells in question. Mage C also knows all the same spells to be taught, but all of their lab texts have been tragically lost. Mechanically, Mage A learns exactly the same material, at exactly the same rate, from both mages.
Would it make sense for Mage A to have some sort of advantage in learning from Mage B, rather than Mage C?
You are usually better off being taught spells directly by an experienced magus rather than trying to learn from lab texts. When being taught, how much you can learn largely depends on the teachers Lab Total - which for an experienced teacher is hopefully larger than yours, and you can learn spells of different TeFo combinations during the same season.
When learning from Lab Texts all the spells you learn in one season must use the same TeFo combination.
Inventing a spell (which you always do when learning a spell) with the help of a teacher should be a lot easier than inventing it with the help of a lab text since you can pose questions to the teacher that might not have answers in the lab text
Yes, but Mage B has his own notes on how he invented it that they can consult. Those Lab Texts are also written out so that Mage A can easily understand them; at the very least Mage B ought to be able to increase their own "Lab Total For Inventing This Particular Spell", which seems like it ought to be relevant.
Mage C is working purely from memory. It seems less good, but it is not reflected in the rules.
I mean, I took classes in algebra when I was in high school -- but that was decades ago. If I had to teach it, it would be useful to me to have the material which helped me to learn it, so that my instruction could be clearer.
Getting back to my first point about 'The rules describing Lab texts are rotten':
A mage has a InAq lab total of 40. This mage wants to invent L15 InAq 'Call Of The Rushing Waters'. Fine, their lab total is high enough to invent this spell in one season; with enough time left over to ALSO invent L5 InAq 'Clear Sight Of The Naiad'.
Now this mage (before they spend a season inventing these spells) gets lab texts for both of those spells. They get No Benefit; and maybe the L15 Lab Text prevents inventing the L5 spell -- because now 'inventing the L15 spell takes one season'.
If the rules spelled out 'Lab Texts which the Mage understands add to the Lab Total only for purposes of inventing that specific spell' more clearly instead of the weird current wording, then the Mage might be able to benefit. InAq Lab Total 40 +15 for 'Call Of The Rushing Waters' Lab Text +5 for 'Clear Sight Of The Naiad' Lab Text -30 to invent 'Call Of The Rushing Waters' -10 to invent 'Clear Sight Of The Naiad' = 20 Lab Total left unused, enough to invent either or both of L5 'Subtle Taste Of Poison And Purity' and L5 'Touch Of The Pearls'.
Oops.
It is also weird that a mage may translate the Lab Texts of another mage; and after translating those Lab Texts, not be able to use them.
[Edit:] And this carries me back to 'Should available Lab Texts reduce the time required to learn (those) spells from a teacher' ?
If the mage has lab texts to work from, they can invent the L15 spell, the L5 spell AND another 20 levels of InAq spells in a single season. As opposed to just the L15 and L5 spells if inventing from scratch.
Having a teacher with lab texts doesn't make learning any easier.
But let's do a more thorough breakdown.
Mage B has his lab texts translated, so he can each teach you, taking up another season of his time, or have you use his lab texts on your own, and learn some of his spells.
If he's teaching you, the max number of spell levels equals the highest Te + Fo lab total of the spells taught. (If his highest Lab Total is 60 for ReHe, but he's not teaching you any ReHe spell, then it doesn't count.)
The max spell level he can teach you in each Te+Fo combination is equal to YOUR lab total in that combination, but he can teach you spells from various Te+Fo combinations in that season.
If you learn from his lab texts, you can learn a total number of spell levels up to your Lab Total with that Te+Fo combinations, and all spells learned must be of the same Te+Fo combination.
Mage C doesn't have lab texts, for some reason. He can only teach you. Or, he can take a season or more to trasncribe his spells into lab notes, and then spend the time to write them in a manner so others can learn from them, and then give or sell them to you to learn from.
If you have the Adept Library Student Virtue, you get +6 to invent spells from lab texts.
And if the lab has the Texts specialty, it also adds to your lab total when inventing spells from lab texts.
Regarding Items of Quality, there is an interesting case for a Verditius from Tales of Power. His Chainmail armor is an Item of Quality, but they seem to add that value flatly to his Soak Total, rather than specifying it would only apply to Soak Rolls.
Which could mean the Items of Quality are also applicable to such things as your Teaching total.
Arachne’s Tuition is a canonical spell that allows you to improve the Training Source Quality by 1 for physical skills, using Rego Corpus. Covenants has a Magic Items for Laboratories section where effects can be converted into specialization points… this includes Teaching, though the overall bonus for the laboratory is limited to +3.
Imaginem can be useful to provide visualization aids which might improve teaching source quality, depending on how the effect is done.
Mentem magic could have many uses as well:
Intellego Mentem on a teacher to help figure out what they’re meaning, especially for a teacher who is Incomprehensible. On someone who isn’t actively teaching, a higher base effect prolonged through time can probably substitute for teaching.
Rego Mentem can force someone to teach you.
Creo Mentem could help a teacher remember better, and communicate more fluently (think Good Witness type effect)
