Heya,
I need some inspiration to title some Tractatus, and their authors.
We play in 1150, so no reference to future NPCs.
Any idea welcome, I will have to name 7 to 10 Vim tractatus rather fast as my players are organizing a huge purchase !
Thanks for your ideas,
François
I don't know if it is what you are looking for but in my sagas Ad Fons and Novus Mane there are a few book titles. Perhaps they can be useful if you don't find anything else. One tip is to make up a title that comes in several volumes. E.g. Perspecitves on the magical realm Vol. 1 by Bonifatius Ex Jerbiton and so on...
Awesome thread idea - it would be really good to see a list of book names if only for populating NPC libraries!
Naming books after the authors is an obvious solution, but it's still useful then to have a decent list of authors,
For Vim how about (latinned up of course):
"On the Nature of Magic"
"Magical Interactions"
"Magical Influences"
I also had the idea of naming some books about specific Vim activities:
On the Art of Regulating and Destroying Daemons
On the art of modifying spells as they are cast, or before, or after.
Etc...
A Tractatus tends to be about one very narrow aspect related to an Art, rather than on the Art itself. "On the nature of pearls and their creation", rather than "On Aquam" or "On Creo", etc. (Summa tend to be more all-encompassing, as the word "summa" implies, esp higher-Level ones.)
So, let your imagination have full rein, and simply play free association with the Arts/Topics you want Tractatus for. Any aspect that any mage might possibly have been excited to write about is valid.
Also remember that library texts can be used as reference material to solve problems that the magi face, without the need to formally spend a season "studying/learning" them. So, if your magi have a Vim Tractatus, "The Fabric of Vim", that's fairly generic, but that same text could be "On the Nature of the Fabric of Demons and the Supernatural" and act as a plot element if the magi find themselves facing some creature with Magical Might that they do not fully understand. So if you have some future plots in mind, weave some answers/hints for those into the titles of the texts, or have text titles that could be used a number of ways - planning your plot elements well in advance is never a bad thing, is another way to give away clues, and makes you look like a Master SG. 
Nasty idea, I should have come up with it meself !
F.
I tend to think of a tractatus as a sort of scientific article - very narrow subject!
ie 'On the Interaction of Hares caught in vegetable Gardens, as seen through the Tytalian Perspective' for an extreme example.
Note that many are more poetic than this.
Summae are more like text books 'Introducing The Art of Terram'.
It still represents quite a few XP so the sujects could also cover more ground. I would say that a poor writer would write really speciylized articles (giving for example 4-6 xp) and then the more XP it gives the broader the scope covered by the writing.
It must somehow make sense in a RP-view. A poor writer would take more time to write something meaningful thus managing to produce less for the same investment. At this point, we might also want to consider allowing some really poor writers to spend more time on a sinlge tractatus to allow them to offset their negative Com scores ? Well, it's a can of worm better left closed.
F.
Nah, why restrict it just too the poor writers? That makes little sense.
Wormcan? Only if you have too many munchkins out of control and a SG that cant handle them.
These have worked very well for us:
[i]Greater Tractatus, normal tractatus +2+(Ability/2 rounded up)or+(Art/5 rounded up) quality
Write Cost +100% from base cost
Greater Summae, Write Quality= Basic Summae +3+(Ability/2 rounded up)or+(Art/5 rounded up),
Write Cost +100% from base
Thorough Tractatus= Quality +3, Write Cost +100% from base cost
Meticulous Tractatus= Quality +6, Write Cost +200% from base cost
Thorough Summae= Quality +4, Write Cost +100% from base cost
Meticulous Summae= Quality +8, Write Cost +200% from base cost[/i]
This allows a writer to improve quality quite alot, but the "price" in time spent is quite steep.
A Meticulous Greater Tractatus will have a minimum of 9 higher Quality, but you will spend 3/4 of a year on just that single tractatus!
Totally disagree. A poor writer wont be writing more narrowly on subjects, they will write poorer articles on the subject.
Both points stand, its a flavor thingie and it was just an idea.
François
Please quote properly if you can? I missed 3/4 of your reply, and basically thought a big "HUH?!" due to the disconnectedness of what looked to be the only reply.
Eh, you DO realise that even using nothing but AM5 RAW, you can get a Summae with Quality 28?
DO compare the fact that my bonus means you have to write THREE TIMES as long to finish it, while those others(which i might add WE dont use), "skilled collaborators" and "mystical resonance" can be handled without taking any time from something else.
And these being valued is exactly the point! I created this addition exactly to make it possible for someone insane enough to spend the time to write superior books. And because its realistic. A writer who is a natural talent will always produce good stuff in the game, but this way, anyone who accepts the severe time penalty can write something as good or even better.
How exactly is that different from what anyone can do?
If the writer wants to spend almost a year instead of just a season for each tractatus, thats a HUGE amount of time to spend on it.
Unbalanced? Think about the time it takes! Only someone fanatical about it will use these bonuses all the time, and that person will very soon fall WAY behind those who doesnt. Any magi using these to gain political advantage, they totally DESERVE it!
The potential for "unbalance" lies not in a Player Character mage taking the time to create these, but in assuming they exist in the first place, that NPC magi can create them, and so presumably have already, that they exist in circulation and are available for access without the need for any more time than it takes to read any other text.
The fact that a Q28+ Summa can exist doesn't refute that its inclusion in a Saga might be unbalancing. 28 xp/season = balanced? And more outside the core rules? And you're arguing that even more isn't more unbalanced, or potentially so? 
(So if you're laughing, be sure you're also laughing at your myopia to this little aspect of your proposal.) 
For covenant creation reasons, anything exceptional SHOULD cost more than the average stuff anyway.
And while in play, any SG that doesnt make darn sure the players pays through the nose the way any really valuable books are worth isnt doing a good job.
Available yes albeit in a very limited way(because only the fanatics will have made good use of the possible bonuses), avilable without effort for the players not a chance!
No it isnt. And even if you think it is, its much less so than many other things you can pick out of the RAW supplements and abuse without paying anything as substantial for it. That i can say with total certainty.
Except i hadnt overlooked it... Its one of the very first housemods i added, its been playtested several years.
Actually its in essence an adaption of the housemod i created originally for 2nd edition...
It worked great with 2nd, and then with 3rd, then with 4th and im not seeing it work any less well so far with 5th edition either.
Having the ultimate 7q28 is not that unbalanced, but anyone who could write this would rather go for the perfect 20q15. Still, losing 4 seasons to write is nothing compared to going from 30 to 42 in an Art.
Coming very late to the discussion I think I'll leave the old debate alone and instead introduce a set of book titles from our Saga:
First the general books:
So a rather ambitious writer. First the start of the philosophiae series
Then the books of rhetoric 
:
I can provide personalities and names for the authors for most of these as well.
Please? 
I'll second that. Little details like that are great for getting players to think a bit more in character.
Oh i LIKE those!
Please! Ill third the petition for that.
No reason you couldn't write both - especially since the 7q28 one would take (less than) a season to write, given the Communication you'll likely have.
You'd be able to sell both like hot cakes.
OK, I'll provide the authors and a little background on each:
Augustus Hippocrates ex Misc.
A strong faerie blooded Ex Misc who was apprenticed in Merinita but lost his Master in Arcadia and was gauntleted by an Ex Misc friendly to the Master. Is obsessed with living forever (and being forever young). In the faerie mirror of Constantinople he was tricked by a trader to pay one year of his apparent age for 10 pawns of Corpus vis. He now looks 22, and after that he wrote:
A beginner's view into the ailments of ageing - Corpus Q6
When his god friend Kiri Silverwing of Bjoernar got pregnant (a well planned stunt involving a templar "good breeding stock", wine and a helping of Augustus' Corpus magic) she didn't like the prospect of painful childbirth. So he cooperated with the Mentem specialist Andrea of Tremere to make pain feel like flying (a positive feeling for Kiri) and eased the physical processes himself. Then the two helpers wrote:
Easing Childbirth, a practical of application of combined Corpus and Mentem magics - Corpus Q6 and Mentem Q9 (bound together)
The Bishop of Ulm (which we discovered after some more research never existed) is a very scholary man. He has a weakness for discussions and delights in visits from the covenant's Jerbiton mage, and even more their (secretly) female scholar. After losing a formal debate and receiving "On the logic of Plato" he donated two of his own books to the covenant and later we also traded a third book:
Church choirs through the eyes of Boetius - Artes Liberales Q11
Art glorifying God - Theology Q11
Advanced arithmetics - Artes Liberales Q11[/list]
Donar ex Misc. was a guest at the covenant. He represents a non-hermetic weather mage tradition and was at the covenant to extract revenge (by humiliation, not by breaking the code) against the resident Flambeau (who had killed off most of his tradition's future by killing young mages and apprentices when they didn't want to join). The book was payment for staying over winter and getting a lab. The revenge was crushing the Flambeau in Certamen and making him smell foul for a moon. The book has an exotic take on how to use weather to harm your enemies:
Storms and Lightning - Auram Q8
NN of Guernicus was the representative of Greater Alps at the Grand Tribunal arguing that our covenant is actually not in Greater Alps, not in Rhine. We don't have a copy of the original argument ("On the superior suitability of Mountains as Borders", Hermes Law, Q10) but after winning at least a delay in the grand tribunal "our" quesitor felt we deserved the counter arguments as payment for his quick rise in status after arguing (and winning) our case:
Why rivers are better borders than mountains - Hermes Law Q13
Magister Ester Nussbaum (don't remember the correct last name, but it shouldn't matter). Of course only known as "Magister Nussbaum" in all correspondence and while travelling is always disguised. She was an apprentice of great potential of one of the founders of the covenant, but had (most) of her gift destroyed in a major lab accident involving much vim and mentem vis. It seems you cannot make a goat into a magical animal with the gift in a lab ritual. Specially not when the goat refuses to stand still and topples most of the lab. After that she was nursed back to (mental) health by the (then) resident Jerbiton. She never recovered fully physically being frail and motion sick. Having a very keen mind still she has developed quite a reputation as a scholar and is an invaluable resource with her very good (theoretic) understanding of magic. Her first two books describe her accident and her (failed) attempts to recover her Gift:
On the burning of the Gift - Magic Theory Q11
Salvaging the magical residue - Magic Theory Q11
After settling in at the covenant as head of teaching and scribes she started reading Artes Liberales and philosophiae. And she started writing letters to learned men all over Europe. She has friends and connections in most universities, but almost none have ever met her. She started out trying to align the theory of Plato with elementalist experiences and started on a long series of books on the philosophical nature of elements:
On the nature of Water - Philosophiae Q11
On the Nature of Fire. - Philosophiae Q11
On the Nature of Air - Philosophiae Q11
On the Nature of Earth - Philosophiae Q11
On the interaction of Fire and Air - Philosophiae Q11
The plan is to have this as a 10-volume set, and then write an over-arching summae on the subject. Paying for a longevity potion by selling seasons as a lab assistant puts this within (theoretical) reach, provided she can keep up book exchange through correspondence.
And then she probably need to get on better terms with Magister Arundo Carriati of Genoa. He seems to (pretends to?) really dislike anything she does, but is a very active correspondent. After a few letters and when tempers started flaring the first time he sent her:
A study of Human Morale - Philosophiae Q7
as a nicely camouflaged insult. And after that they have been (mostly friendly) rivals. Doing formal debates by letter takes time, and they have been at it for many years now. Ester secretly envies Magister Arundo his university position and most of all his large access to students and academic sparring partners. She has collected and refined her arguments with Magister Arundo into her Rhetoric series:
On the Logic of Plato - Artes Liberales Q11
Why you are wrong - Artes Liberales Q11
Why you are still wrong - Artes Liberales Q11
Why you can never be right - Artes Liberales Q11
The underlying faults of your logic - Artes Liberales Q11
In between all the other writing she has been teaching the magi Greek, but during this process she was appalled at the low level of their Latin, so she wrote them a book to improve themselves:
On the Structure of Irregular Verbs - Latin Q11
And finally an old book I found in my archives written by Sigismund von Eiswald ex Jerbiton. He was a gentle gifted magus trying to increase his abilities in Mentem magic by increasing his understanding of the human nature. So to get some insight into the processes and going ons at a University he spent 3 years studying to get a Magister degree. Being a brilliant young man, and with a weakness for the good things in life he spent much of the time in taverns and other buildings of variable reputation. When he was about to return to his covenant he remembered that he had promised to bring some books. His thesis was one, but he could only get one more from the university. So he decided to stay over winter and wrote this one:
101 places to find friends and have fun - Local Lore (Paris) Q10
Hope this was what you were looking for.