At risk of pissing off anyone who works with leather-- I am skeptical as to whether dunking a hide in a barrel of boiling oil should be called a "skill" at all. cough
That said-- I could see a case for curing hides being a separate skill from making armor out of hides... Which makes me also wonder whether metallurgy (refining ore and smelting alloys) should be a separate skill from blacksmithing.
I can drop a season from Vulcanus (that longsword doesn't need to be opened for enchantment yet because I have no plans for what to do with it) to make an Excellent Item of Quality for Bernhard. Armor or shield? (Swords are the only weapons with a Shape bonus, so if you fight with a hammer or axe there's no point in having a weapon IoQ 
)
Sweet! Needs to be a heater shield. Is it safe to assume we could make an excellent quality (not IoQ) axe for him?
Yes, no problem on the axe and shield. Though are you sure you'd prefer a shield over armor? An IoQ shield adds 5 to your defense rolls, while an IoQ armor adds 7 to your soak. I like soak a bit better than defense since you can soak things you can't necessarily defend against. Also armor is Vulc's crafting specialty >.<
Good point. I guess he doesn't really need a +21 to defense. 
However, the IoQ bonus can't exceed your Philosophiae, so (I think) the armor bonus will be +5 to soak.
Scheisse, I'd forgotten that 
better fix ny own armor.
It'd be 6, though, as my specialty in Philosophy is runes.
I was going to make the same comment. (BTW, if that's what you meant for your specialty, I would write "Verditius runes" instead if "Iberian runes" because I thought you meant something else.) It could be better to do the shield because the armor could be done after Philosophiae is raised.
I called it Iberian runes because as I understand it (and I could be wrong) the Valdarian lineage uses Iberian runes in lieu of the standard Verditius runes, not just for the elder runes mystery but also for our less mysterious rune stuffs.
As far as I understand/remember (more of a challenge!) it, Ryu is right. This is one of Marko's HR. Works like Verditius runes, but with a different set. Now, I was sure this was written up somewhere... That, or I am confused 
OK. I didn't see anything about those runes when I went back to look at the School of Valdarius in Mark's Sub Rosa 3 article. I could have missed it. Or maybe it's elsewhere?
OK. I didn't see anything about those runes when I went back to look at the School of Valdarius in Mark's Sub Rosa 3 article. I could have missed it. Or maybe it's elsewhere?
I seem to have made a phantom post. It's there when I reply, but I don't see it otherwise. Here's what I wrote:
OK. I didn't see anything about those runes when I went back to look at the School of Valdarius in Mark's Sub Rosa 3 article. I could have missed it. Or maybe it's elsewhere?
I am not certain but I believe if you're Pessimistic at -2, that means you're optimistic at +2.
I thought I put it in there. I know I introduced the concept in this game years ago, but no one went for it. When I first learned of the existence of Iberian Script, I was surprised and amazed, and I knew I had to use it some how.
Check it out...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iberian_scripts
I would imagine they would be used (in magic) exactly the way as the Verditius (Futhark) Elder runes.
A lot of us are having similar problems with double posts, phantom posts, 404 and SQL errors
Good point.
I'm going to rework Bernhard with the new companion mustering options. I don't anticipate any substantive changes beyond aging him a few years and buying a LR and maybe an item or two.
Ok, my only enchanted item idea for Bernhard is a suit of armor (lesser enchantment) that changes to appropriately sized barding(?) when he turns into a bear. I'm still trying to find the line between 'playing with power' and 'munchkinism', so I'll pause here for the argument that the Skinchanger virtue already adds 3 to your soak in animal form to offset the fact that you can't wear armor. If the group thinks Bernhard having +22 soak in bear form is too much, I won't object. 
I'm assuming that using Skinchanger to turn into a large animal destroys mundane clothing and armor worn at the time of the change. This means he can't be wearing anything other than his enchanted armor when he changes (or at least anything he minds losing). If I've misinterpreted Skinchanger, let me know.
For the enchantment itself, I'm looking at...
MuTe(An) 50 [Base 4 (Makes something grow to eight times its previous volume), Touch +1, Conc +1, Group +2, affect metal +2, change shape +1(?), An casting requisite +0, item maintains concentration +5 levels, 3 uses/day +2 level, environmental trigger +3 levels]
When Bernhard triggers his Skinchanger cloak, his armor increases in size and reshapes itself to fit his bear form, granting him the same protection as he normally gains in human form (6 soak, +6 more as an item of quality).
Thoughts?
I don't think it should take Target: Group to affect a single suit of armor.
First, I agree with Ryu on T: Group. T: Group makes sense for me with a bunch of bars of iron that are going to be turned into a suit of mail, for instance. But once it's a single suit of mail, it's a single object.
Second, that should be R: Personal. The magic in the armor is affecting itself, not something else. The trigger is a whole different issue and has nothing to do with Range.
D: Concentration makes sense with Maintains Concentration because that will allow you to turn the effect off at any given time.
Changing shape makes sense because you won't just be a big human but will actually be in a different shape. If the armor hasn't adjusted shape a little bit, it won't accommodate the bear's movements.
The Animal requisite makes sense since there will be some leather backing and the like.
Environmental Trigger makes no sense at all. You don't want this thing triggering off of sunset or the change in an aura you pass through our something else like those. You want it to trigger off the use of the Skinchanger cloak, which is not at all an Environmental Trigger. I highly recommend against the Bjornaer item-sensing-shapechanging thing. It's inefficient and causes a lot of Warping. Rather, just go with a regular trigger, but design the trigger to coincide with the Skinchanger cloak's trigger. For example, if you trigger the cloak by pulling it around you and saying a word, then make the armor's trigger to wrap it with a bearskin cloak and say the same word. Thus you trigger both at once.
Also, you added incorrectly to get level 50.
This should leave you with something like:
MuTe(An) 30 [Base 4 (Makes something grow to eight times its previous volume), Personal +0, Conc +1, Individual +0, affect metal +2, change shape +1, An casting requisite +0, item maintains concentration +5 levels, 24 uses/day +5 level]