There is definitely space at this time...
A few quick questions:
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Do you intend this to be a long term campaign, or something of limited duration?
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Anything you would recommend SOMEONE have? I assume a high MT is suggested due to the focus on ancient magic, and I'd hate to have a faerie forest without a Merinita.
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I don't have the ancient magic book - should I get it, or can you let us know anything relevant?
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Nuts and bolts - aegis/wards need penetration? Amount per year for personal vis source? round seasonal exp multipliers or calculate total then multiply? Make a companion/grog? Build points of an item of quality (I assume 2, but hope for 1)?
My character concept is slowly coming together. I'm sticking with a Verditius focusing on rego craft with sculpting as his craft medium. His "shtick" is using MuFo to render non stone material malleable and hence sculpt-able. I'm still not sure what to spend build points on. Right now I'm thinking of investing in an item of quality, some specialists (especially a good tutor and maybe a forge companion or two), and invest the rest in vis, which is both portable and negotiable.
Thoughts?
Popping up a tower in Ireland, depending on where, is likely to get noticed by somebody, and you will have to acquire cattle before you can vote at the tribunal, but whoever's attention you draw will have other enemies. The same goes for Iberia, but it is less likely to be heavily populated in Hibernia,
I expect this game to be very long- multiple generations of magi hopefully, high MT is good, but the ancient magic was more a focus of what came before. Anything important I can inform you of- a lot of what will be important will depend on where we end up, but someone should have a high com and probably good teacher for strong writing...
My current leaning is a longevity specialist, thus covering high magic theory. Probably House Bonisagus. I am happy to shift to any number of other alternatives.
It seems to me that we probably want someone at least competent in Intellego. Assuming we have enough people, I suspect a Merenita would be sensible, but not mandatory.
Can you also cover healing rituals?
I think we should all have a little intellego - setting up a new covenant will require a LOT of investigating things.
Yes, the plan is to be able to cover healing rituals.
I will discuss his minor focus with the storyguide once we get far enough.
I also will have some questions about ways that non-ritual healing spells can be useful that need troupe and storyguide confirmation.
The basic design is Affinity+Puissance in Creo, Corpus and MT. Minor focus, inventive genius, skilled parens, plus two others. Fairly classic setup. To align with rule recommendations, Creo and Corpus will be at 15 (52 xp, + 50% +3).
I'm quite intrigued by the idea of multi generational planning. I've never gotten far enough in a saga to do the apprentice thing, but what you can do with mundane teaching is impressive even in a short term. It would make a lot of sense to have non-gifted research assistants trained in MT, scribe, teaching and a variety of other skills. They would also have the advantage of being able to pass their knowledge along at a faster rate than merely reading books. If we play multiple generations of magi, our apprentices could be very interesting!
I was going a standard crafting focused Verdi, but now I'm going to take a close look at the long term.
The question for multi-generational is what policy will we use for apprentices time. I was initially quite surprised (but realized it matches the book base numbers) that many folks assume that apprentices get one season of being taught, and otherwise are working for their master. If instead we allow them a season of book reading (assuming we have put together a half-way decent library, it dramatically increases the apprenticeship advancement. Good teacher is also far more valuable to the overall saga if one is multi-generational.
As do mundane teachers with unaffected by the gift...
Agreed, SilverOak. Which raises the question of what your plan is with regard to companions and grogs. Given the setup, I can see an argument for just focussing on the magi for now. But equally, I would be happy to craft a companion as well.
well, I don't see much point in running up the "power level" just for the sake of numbers, but it would be interesting to see under what conditions magi could work together for the betterment of the order/house rather than purely selfish motives. I've always thought that Tremere, at least, would have an organized apprenticeship program involving multiple tutors, both mundane and hermetic (and make advanced training available at any age - those 200 year old archmagi have got to be good for something, right?). Young Verditius, those without significant Hubris should also flock together.
On another note, I've ran across an interesting idea on these boards - the idea of a Verditius investing his lab as an item familiar, than binding his spirit into it to make a Great Work (would require breakthroughs, if possible at all). I have this image if a phenomenal lab imbued with an awesome lab "assistant", but he's so cranky (being over a century old) and hubri-ridden that no experienced magi wants to use it. Just for example, you couldn't ever change anything in the lab without sending the know-it-all spirit into a snit!
Personally, I was thinking of someone who's a scholar first and a mage second. She's a concept I've had before, but which never really got used properly - Persian Syriac Christian brought to the levant during her childhood by her father to escape local persecution (not the best of choices), snagged up by a visiting magus (who Totally Wasn't in the area because of rumours of a weird child) and brought further to the west. She'd have been with the caravan because her language skills and whatnot made her useful, less so than for her actual magic - her Parens presumably having been one of the founders. Rather fascinated with the mundane world, and would likely be at risk of Interfering With The Mundanes if her complexion didn't stop her from doing so. Pious to a fault, but getting heterodox after years without guidance from someone of her own creed.
In game terms, she's a well-travelled, afrit-blooded inventive genius of great intelligence, a cautious sorcerer with a penchant for book learning. She's a good teacher and a fine author, proficient in several languages of religious significance, and always the optimist. There's the tiny little problem that she's completely awful at any spell she hasn't practiced, and that her understanding of Essential Nature has seemingly left her quite incapable of mastering the art of Muto, but I'm sure that nobody in a Covenant of mages struggling for survival would care about one of their number's ability to actually cast spells ...
I like the idea of a bunch of horribly disfunctional peeps having the power of the gods at their fingertips. Oh, wait, that's every Ars game, isn't it?
Exasperated, that sounds like an interesting character to have in the mix, and I like your writing style. I hope the story guide agrees.
Given the point and purpose of the caravan a heavily academic magus would certainly fit well.
One more thing I will bring up- if we decide to have a covenant outside the tribunals, we can alsways place it somewhere that might exist in mythic Europe but not necessarily in the real world. For example Greek legends speak of an island past the pillars of Hercules (aka out in the Atlantic somewhere) which need not be the size and distance of North America... Plus we can always add an island to the Mediterranean... or perhaps there is a land north of Scotland and Ireland with a faerie region and a man in a red suit- scratch that one, Santa isn't that widespread a legend yet...
Given the overlap between Odin and SinterClause, that might be a dangerous regio.
being somewhere that can have commerce with the order seems useful.
Thank you for the compliment, though I'll hurry to note that my style in-game generally will, for what I hope is obvious reasons, be somewhat less footnoted and parenthetical. As for the character, like I said, she's an old concept, so she's had a fair bit of thought put into her; enough so that I'm now struggling to see if I can rescue her natal chart while having it fit with her adjusted backstory.
Concerning the tribunal, like I said, I like the Mediterranean. What about Malta? It's nominally Christian at the start of the game (though Muslims have yet to be expelled), there are no other covenants there which I know of, it's got a very convenient location for the purpose of travel, and it's out of the way enough that nobody really cares about it.
EDIT: Heck, I think that many of the small islands around Sicily would be awesome. Levanzo happens to have La Grotta del Genovese, which is a cave chock full of paintings (Fertility Magic, anyone?). Stromboli has a volcano which has been erupting at regular intervals for the last two thousand years (hello vis, hello aura). Most of the islands are also small enough that it's likely that they've fallen into disuse after the Norman-Arab conflict, so we might be able to get an entire little island of our own, and almost all of them were inhabited in Roman times, so if anyone's interested in Defixio stuff, it's not implausible that they would find something there.
I like the Med. Malta is actually a pretty good suggestion, although I'm pretty vague as to what tribunal it would fall under - probably Rome, or none at all?. I know it famous as being the headquarters of the Knights of St. John (Hospitalers), but that's not for centuries to come. Resource poor, but good trading possibilities. I think it also has good background for ancient magics, having been settled dating back from before the Phoenicians. If we have someone that could make it rain regularly we'd be golden.
I believe that it ought to be Rome; they do, as I recall it, claim even some old Carthaginian possessions in Northern Africa. Still, outside of selling magic items to mundanes, the Roman laws aren't awfully restrictive.