Ah yes, those two. I believe both Christian and I are at least passingly familiar with those.
Right tool for the right job sort of situation.
And you might want to review 'similar spell' to make sure your magic resistance mastery works. 
Probably not, no. That would be a very hard sell indeed.
Very true!
I like aging as a weapon, but it's a lot harder to use than it was back in the 3rd edition when I first went over the idea.
Enjoy!
The core book says "Same effect, at a different Range, Duration, or Target. All three may differ." I was tempted to say an arcane tunnel is an arcane tunnel regardless of size. Is your take different?
That's my prefered take, but I'm pleased that others agree.
Oh, I think I see what prompted your suggestion that I check the similar spells rules. I had wondered why you asked.
Andreva's casting total in a +3 aura with words, gestures and a confidence point is only 36. If she somehow got a X 10 multiplier on penetration score through a fixed AC and lots of sympathetic connection work (that she might be able to do with enough work, she certainly has the tools to pull it off) she might get a 50 penetration with her present spell but an 80 penetration with a level 10 spell. These 30 points could make the difference if the target had prepped by learning spell defense on tunnels (but would be irrelevant if she could gather friends to do wizard's communion - But friends who know wizard's communion is a questionable proposition).
I didn't go that way for a few reasons:
*First, I don't think it would make her a better NPC.
*Second, vim isn't really one of her strengths, yet even without putting in the work on vim, with spell defense mastery her parma is 100 versus arcane tunnel spells. Others in her "weight class" might reasonably have similar defenses, and
*Third, it's her main goal to live through the experience and intimidate others into leaving her apprentice alone, she's not really into killing her opponent unless that's the only way to ensure she or her people don't die and there won't be more wizard's wars.
*Fourth, and most importantly, she doesn't have any seasons left. She spent them doing other stuff
So I'm going to sum up 76-90 but I'm still really eager to get feedback on the spells and enchantments.
Andreva would have wanted to spend this period creating sculptures that move the observer to awe, pathos, and joy. She would have liked to have created underground grottos so beautiful that they bring observers to tears, she would have liked to have spent time with the retired grogs fencing, drinking wine, flirting, and reciting poetry. Instead she spent it as a genderswapped Mad Eye Moody screaming "constant vigilance" over and over to her apprentice, (who stayed on for two extra years just for their protection).
It could make sense for her to die in a wizard's war here, she's done a great deal to make herself more safe and more dangerous but that's no guarantee. Of course that means I can't present you with a functional NPC, a detailed write up of a corpse isn't a great game aid.
One option that I've been thinking of is to give her a really tragic story.
Her apprentice passes his(?) gauntlet and at the next full moon gets a wizard's war declaration, Andreva has been vigilant about doing recon and collecting arcane connections so she is able to present the aggressor with a wizard's war declaration of her own within five minutes.
The defenses of the magi prove adequate to prevent arcane tunnel assassination. But the recently gauntleted young magus gets captured. His captor uses intellego mentem to determine that the apprentice, in fact, has no knowledge of the Confraternity of Roland initiations. the Verditious keeps his prisoner secured and goes to find Andreva to attempt to come to an understanding and prevent any deaths.
the Verditious finds Andreva who, believing that he has murdered her former apprentice slays him forthwith before the poor fellow has a chance to speak. By killing her attacker, she sets off several watching ward and waiting spells including spells that kill the imprisoned former apprentice. The Confraternity of Roland magus had set these "safeguards" up to ensure that Andreva didn't try to kill him for fear of the consequences, and that would have worked, if only he'd found a way to get that information to Andreva earlier.
Between reading letters that weren't delivered in time and repeated castings of whispers through the black gate everything becomes clear. Andreva is devastated. It doesn't even really end her issues with the Confraternity of Roland because while they now have evidence that she doesn't know their initiation, they also know for a fact that she murdered one of their members when he was seeking to make peace with her.
Of course a story of triumph with a happily ever after ending would work here as well.
My plans for the next period, (which I can't help myself making even if it is unlikely that I'll ever flesh them out). Are to create enchanted sculptures that act out scenes for their observers, create
a series of caverns that represent the epitome of beauty and comfort; filled with aquam and ignem leser enchantments to make them impressive. She'll also spend a lot of time in study, I think she's done a lot of lab work the past few periods and she'd be well served by taking a little less intense schedule.
For her aging roll the first year she has -11 from her ritual, -2 from her bronze cord -2 from her living conditions and -1 from her lab for the first year at 102 years old so 1 year at -5
then she gets the new longevity ritual at -29 so she gets 8 years at -23
and then 6 years at -22.
She'll end at 116 years old and take one year of apparent aging so she now looks 44
With Andreva's time with her apprentice and the lab periods when she didn't need Grace's help, Grace has 16 seasons unaccounted for. I'll say she spent 4 with the apprentice and I'll give her another 60 xp for the remaining 12. Here's how she'll spend it
Teaching 2 (apprentices) for 15
Magic lore to 3 for 15
Infernal lore to 3 for 15
Faerie lore to 3 for 15
Talk about going out with a bang!
Upon reflection, I probably dropped off the board for a year and a half in order to avoid maiking this character sheet, a million little numbers, enough to drive one mad
Here is Grace
Here are the unique spells, I'll try and get the enchanted devices up soon
Animal Spells
Aquam Spells
Auram Spells
Corpus Spells
Herbam Spells
Ignem Spells
Mentem Spells
Creo Terram Spells
Intelego Terram Spells
Muto Terram Spells
Rego Terram Spells
Vim Spells
Here are the enchanted devices. Andreva is finished through 90 years (although I may do another post collecting all of the sponts that I wrote up in the last 26 pages, no promises). I'll just add that I'm pretty pleased with how she turned out all things considered.
The following five enchanted devices (through the Wand of Titanic Sandcastles) were created for use on the Covenant’s ship.
I did not include the statue of Peter and Patricia that she created for Bausas
and thinking more about a next period, Andreva might be a good fit for The Knights of the Green Stone. It would be interesting to have a wealthy ~120 year old maga in the role of the new initiate, because power changes personal dynamics even when it shouldn't.
If I did that, I'd need to deal with the fact that the knights teach free expression which she already has, magical memory which might be the weakest virtue in fifth edition, and vulgar alchemy which has messy rules that don't work as they should.
sigh yeah... I know just what you mean.
Errata says its Puissant Art of Memory (plus teaching in the Ability), not the Virtue Magical Memory.
Should Grace's Might be associated with a Form?
Also, is it worth re-forging the familiar bond yet?
I associated her might with Terram, that's what 2 of her 3 initial powers are associated with and she was bound with ReTe.
She has bond scores of 2,2, and 3
Total 89
If they did an early riser routine they could change their bond scores to 3,3,3 that might be worth it.
With further thought on Grace. I had never calculated her human characteristics. Looking at getting characteristics from human to animal on p 23 of HoH: Mystery Cults the general method is if both are positive or negative then use the greater absolute value, if not add them (intelligence is an exception and doesn't change between forms). I looked at the characteristics of a human when compared to the baseline of a horse but that got weird.
I just took Grace's deviation from a standard Destrier and used that for her human values
Int +3
Per 0
Pre +2
Com +2
Str 0
Stm +1
Dex 0
Qik 0
So having (for now) completed this big project I went back to read through it. I found that during the 60-75 period I had already had Andreva learn wind of Mundane silence, Revoke the protection of Bonisagus, and Sight of the Molting Magus.
this made two of the 76-90 seasons redundant. (although in the later period she learned higher level spells and did sight of the molting magus as a talisman enchantment rather than a spell).
To correct this mistake I'm changing those two seasons in 76-90 and instead of putting Search for the Keys to the Castle in her talisman she'll do this
I'll have made the changes to the above posts before you read this.
I didn't notice this post earlier. That's good news indeed.
We (the community here) should really get a good alternative rule set developed for Vulgar alchemy. It would make so many things easier.
Seconded