I would love to have different time periods. It does not necessary need to be the Order or have the houses.
Pirates in the caribbean - mix in some voodoo.
Previously mentioned Aztecs
House Bjornier moving to America and clash with the Native Americans ( who have very similar abilities).
Modern Ars - Lots of change here. Are there any houses? How does Nationality effect the Houses. Perhaps only training is via apprenticeship. No Covenants.
Spellbattle at Mt. Skullzfyre could easily be reworked into a Certamen substitute/alternative.
The art/card flavor would need to be adjusted to the setting and the system, but the mechanic of it would work beautifully.
-Ben.
I worked on a Modern Ars setting and ran several campaigns, it included rethinking forms, traditions, houses and such. I struggle with the Divine part, but found a solution which suits my need.
What I would like to see to thing:
A whole setting based on Edge wizards, set prior to the Order (3-6th century ? to include the fall of Rome). It almost exists in the sense that Edge Wizard provides a lot of mechanics, but to make a whole campaign about it, it would required some refinements to allow more powerful effects (to simulate the ability of some Founders) and probably an overhaul to balance every traditions.
A setting in a very different environment: Asia (Old China or Feudal Japan), with the same care taken to describe Mythic Europe.
Any chance you'd be willing to share, Ezechiel357?
Gladly, but it is in French and 200 pages long, spells included.
I do not know what would be the best way to share it. Creating another topic and translating the most important part there ?
For several years I've been running a game based on Ars Magica, uncreatively called Mythic Britain because it is set in a Mythic Europe version of England (without the Order) starting during the reign of William (II) Rufus. The game is centered on manor holding, with the players taking the roles of the knights, ladies and officers of the court. It has involved dealing with both medieval politics and supernatural events... everything from bandits to werewolves, rival barons, ambitious churchmen, angry witches, scheming faeries and a few really evil ghosts.
Certamen as the aim of the game doesn't thrill me. It should form part of a broader game, just as duels do in L5R. That game, for me, is pretty close to how I'd see an Ars Magica deck game working.
It sounds excellent. This is exactly the sort of game that would go down well with my gaming group.
How about a new RPG?
Based on and derived from the mechanics of Ars Magica and Mythic Europe. Yet not Ars Magica and not actually Mythic Europ. A sequel game, the potential futuar history in the multiverse. The Atlas answer to Mage (akin to Macross Plus and Macross Seven versus Robotech). Try out some of these innovative and crazy ideas people are suggesting. It won't "taint" the game or setting because this is not Ars Magica. Set it in the age of enlightenment. Magic is lost and people are rediscovering it. Base it on the physics of their day, which is still not accurate but closer and interesting to explore. Deephicize magic. Mage it about an age of adventure and exploration. Mythic Europe is in the dim murky past, and many mysteries and secrets lay in wait to be rediscovered and adapted. Ancient artifacts and casting tablets are powerful, modern magicians not so much. And they are no longer the focus type of characters. This isn't Ars Magica. It is a possible future.
Someone needs to read "The Rivers of London"
Elements of that feel VERY ars magica to me.
My wife's listening to the audiobook now. It's on my list. I liked his "The Also People". It's how I discovered Iain Banks.
I need to listen to "A Wrinkle in Time" for work, first...and finish "The Great Zoo of China" which is a bit of a chore...
I mentioned it in the GenCon Panel discussion as a possible setting for a modern Ars.
This kind of puts me off, actually...
I can try and find material to use, or I can see something someone else has already done, which I can't steal stuff from...
I’m not sure how popular the idea would be here, but considering that there is 13th Age in Glorantha, it’s not outside the chances of possibility to do a D&D game based on Ars Magica? Swap out the Classes for Houses, and include Mythic Europe as background material and you’d be mostly there.
The thing is, there are several different directions to take this idea.
You seem to be describing putting on a veneer of Ars Magica on top of a D&D (or 13th Age, Pathfinder, or so on) game. In that case I think the best approach is to convert the Magus into a class, complete with the Hermetic magic system, and you're basically done. You can play D&D using Ars Magica's magic system in any setting - one set in Mythic Europe or Glorantha or whatever. The different Houses don't work as separate Classes IMO, but they do work as Magus subclasses (you can have other classes in addition to the magus=wizard).
A more radical approach is to play D&D-like characters using Ars Magica rules. Increase the benefits from adventures and related perks like studying from unique-books or significanto (unique vis) or being initiated into virtues and mysteries, add in character defenses as well as offense (by boosting MR and/or making it dependent on a general "Level" stat such as Warping), and you're basically done.
I think I would have fun at playing a "Civilization"-like videogame in which I play a covenant struggling with other covenants for domination of the Tribunal 
I would also love to play a pen-and-paper game of Cults & Conspiracies (a name I made up now, and did not bother checking if already in use) set in the Mythic Europe of the Order of Hermes. Ideally with mechanics compatible with those of Ars Magica, the "characters" would be not be individuals but the various mystery cults, monastic orders, hermetic lineages, covenants, mundane guilds etc. Something a little like Reign, but slightly more crunchy, with the benefit of an already existing background far, far richer than the rather threadbare one (at least for my tastes) of Reign.
A long time ago, I played in a saga in which Faerie and Magic did not exist, and the Divine existed only in the afterlife and as the "spark of conscience" all humans have. Everything supernatural was Infernal; although the Order of Hermes, the Arts etc. existed, every Gift was False. It was a sufficiently small rule-change that this paragraph probably doesn't belong in this thread, but it changed the mood of the game so much that the World of Darkness was never again dark, at least for me.
One type of game I've thought about, but never got to playing, was one inspired by Chronica Feudalis: basically a game where the supernatural does not exist at all, but it is believed to exist. The Order of Hermes is a simply a society of scholars who pretend they are powerful wizards and thus cow the nobility and the church into leaving them well alone, and trick a bunch of superstitious folks (their covenfolk) into serving them.
I think it would be possible to come up with a contribution by each of the founders that is perfectly mundane, seen as "supernatural" by the ignorant (particularly back in the 8th century, and after it's been made tall by retelling) and somehow correponds to what the Founder is associated with in Ars Magica canon. For example, Flambeau brought the secret of gunpowder, which the Order jealously guards. Criamon brought Enigmatic Wisdom, the ability to spin portents and prophecies that sound mystical and always appear true after the fact. Bjornaer brought herblore and initiatory mumbo jumbo that essentially gives one the ability to call upon the Berserk, Tough and Reserves of Strength Virtue when clad in a bear skin. Guernicus brought precious knowledge from the Roman times: that of agricultural techniques, which eventually got lost, and that of Law, which allowed his House to give magi rules to minimize their internal conflicts and cooperate efficiently (and possibly allows them to wiggle out of mundane justice). Etc.
How about a "railroad" style game, based on the Redcap network?
You have covenants as destinations. Messages and vis to be delivered. Regularly scheduled Tribunals that can act similar to stock rounds. Vis trading vs. a stock market.
The setting is scalable in that you can go Mythic Europe-wide for a map or focus on a smaller area of one or more Tribunals.
Elements of Hermetic magic like Mercere Portals could be incorporated to provide special/unique rules with an ArM "feel".
That actually sounds promising
It does, you could even add in a bit of the health of the Redcap and dangers found on the road.
-Ben.