And yet another question

Games Discussion Ars Magica
#1

Thank you for taking time to review this thread.

I know I ask alot of questions for one so new to these boards but please bear with me. My newest question is one of raw vis. Can a raw vis source be created or developed by a magus?

By way of example please consider the following:

A magus of peculiar interests creates a ritual that creates a magical beast, specifically a magical queen bee. The bee has a might score, and the ritual has a duration of momentary, thus actually creating a magical creature. As part of the design of the ritual, the queen is fertile, (as I see no rules prohibiting creating actual animal life; whereas the limits of the soul prohibit actual creation of human life). A second ritual creates other magical bees, our peculiar magus in this hypothetical being knowledgable in bees, creates drones and workers for the queen to rule over and with which to establish a hive.

Now our magus designed these magical bees so that the queen would only settle in magical auras, and would only be fertile within a magical aura as well. The bees establish a hive, make more bees, honey etc. In the course of the natural lifecycle the queen creates a new queen to replace her as her life shortens. When the queen dies and the new queen develops fully the hive goes on.

Now, assume our magus designed his ritual well, and that the hive of bees continues to produce magical bees.

Would not the dead queens, possibly some of the honey, be appropriate for a vis source? The dead queen could be a potential source of animal or rego vis, the honey perhaps animal as well? Could this be created within the current canon so as not to be abusive?

Certainly not a huge source, but perhaps appropriate to a small amount harvestable? If so, would this not be the sort of development which could greatly aid the order as a whole?

Again thank you for your time in considering my question :question:

#2

"Abuse" is the key word here.

What you're doing is certainly creative, but it breaks a key concept of the game - that vis is not easy to obtain. But if your Troupe wants to go there, that's cool - let's touch on some specifics.

Magically created creatures can possibly be sterile - that's problem number one. Magically created creatures do not always act exactly as mundane versions do, which adds to the unpredictability.

Who's to say for sure? But I'd say "no", not reliably so anyway. If producing vis was that predictable, there would not be any demand for it in the Order, and every Covenant and Tribunal would have something along these lines on a huge scale.

You could place normal, natural bees next to naturally occuring magical vis-rich flowers, and build a screen so they could only use those flower to make their honey - and there would be no guarantee of anything.

If magic were easy, it wouldn't take 15 years of apprenticeship. :wink:

#3

Actually, I'd say yes on this.
However, the amount of vis would be small, (maybe a pawn a year - making it 10 years to recover the initial investment in just the queen).

You would also need to protect the bees... A lot of things could happen to them. The bees would protect their honey...

(The bees might steal from an existing source as well, which is worth noting...)

#4

The fact that the bees are magical animals with magic might does not mean they have to have vis or that the honey they gather will be magical.

Also, bees have a king, not queen (Thanks Pluny) in mythic europe.

#5

Agreed. Note also that bees can spontaneously generate from a dead lion (of course, first you need to kill your lion...) This effect can be duplicated with non-Ritual Rego magic. It might be that magical bees spontaneously generate from dead magical lions.

However, as has been pointed out, they might not contain vis; or maybe only the reigning king contains vis. When he dies, you can harvest the vis, but the hive may not continue without its king unless you take steps to help his successor. If I can see story potential in a scheme like this, I'll usually won't put obstacles in the way of my players.

Mark