One other option is to cast the ritual from a Casting Tablet. Casting Tablets can only be created by someone who has previously learned the spell from a lab text or invented it, and also Mastered the spell (each spell has a Mastery skill associated with it.)
This doesn't really apply in this case, though, since your character wants a fairly unique ritual.
Yeah, I looked there, and the covenant has 10 pawns recurring vis (but has boons such as vis grant & hidden resources). I was just wondering if the group thought granting 4 pawns for a 3point virtue was reasonable, especially considering the cat (for example) provides 6 pawns per year. I'm also trying to find out what the covenant's position would be if Myron brought in a vis-producing plant. Would he be obligated to submit it to the covenant? If so, would vis sources totalling eight (giving him four) be necessary and/or reasonable?
I am just throwing out ideas, but I do like the idea of setting up a protected garden.
Thanks for all that. I've read through the rules, but a few concrete examples have helped tremendously. After looking through the rules, I think it would be best if Myron develops this spell in game after setting up a lab. Any tips as we go along would probably be quite useful! And I'd like to add inventive genious balanced with susceptibility to infernal for Myron.
Also, does Myron really need warping points? Yes, he is five years post gauntlet, but I made him low powered so that I as a player could grow with the character. He only has 153 points in Arts plus the standard 120 spells. Does he really need more than a single warping point, if that? It seems silly for one so young + low powered.
Oh, right, sorry about that. I looked back earlier in the thread, and it looks like 3-4 pawns/year is the number we went with for Personal Vis Source. I suggested 4, but Salutor might have favored a little less. Salutor?
Scott
He should have at least a few Warping Points from botches, though yes, the standard number (2 per year) is a little high for young magi--but take at least 1 a year.
Scott
What's the word on Myron? I haven't heard about him in a coupla weeks.
Rather than posting the lab workup in the Chapter thread and possibly disrupt the roleplaying there, I'm posting it here:
Patrick's Lab
Near the (northwest?) edge of the plateau on which Tanais rests lies a grassy field suitable for grazing, surrounded by a makeshift fence. The ruins of a farmer's hut (really, two walls and part of a ceiling, supported with a post) houses Patrick's "sanctum" tent though he claims the entire fenced-in area as his laboratory. The ruin itself is encircled with several raised circles used to ward against various calamities, and the area inside the circle is etched with a hexagonal pattern due to a side effect of one of these wards. Dozens of small clay pot-lanterns keep the field lit and warm, apparently with an unending fuel supply. Two slop-troughs and a few large wooden cages can be seen, though the trained Hermetic eye would see their placement as haphazard. Much else is placed carelessly, as well : barrels of animal bones, corked clay pots labeled in Latin, and strings of drying herbs lay scattered about.
One of the feeding trough is magical, named The Trough of Alteration (lesser brother to The Cage of Changes), and it slowly twists and warps the creatures which feed from it with magic. A horde of voles discovered this daily feast shortly after Patrick arrived, and quickly transformed into a variety of useful, if pestilent, magically-warped animals. Some of these voles became twisted mutants, whose muscles, bones and humors prove surprisingly useful in laboratory work. Other voles grew cannibalistic and intelligent enough to start thinking about population density, and offered their services to Patrick as guards, runners, and herd-wranglers. Armed with metal shavings from the blacksmith's forge, they hunt down the more dangerous mutant voles and keep the population in check, and bring the magically twisted parts to Patrick for use in his lab work.
Virtues and Flaws
Immediately Available due to RolePlay/CharGen
Flawless Equipment, Flawless Tools, and Spotless - Provided by the initial lab creation, but doomed to disappear soon enough. Maybe Patrick can train the voles to do housework someday, and they can keep the place spotless.
Magical Lighting +0 : Patrick is capable of casting Ring of Candlelight as a rote, with no chance of failure or botch. He would use it liberally and intelligently.
Magical Heating +0 : See Magical Lighting.
Trough of Alteration +0 : Provides +1 Experimentation, per the rules on Covenants, pg 121, "Magic Items for Laboratories." It is not clear to me whether a Lvl 15 spell should give a +1 or +2 bonus.
Trough of Alteration CrVi 15, (Base 5, +1 Touch, +5 for 24 uses/day) : A small food/water trough which inflicts 1 warping point (see RoP:M 79) each time a creature eats food or drinks water placed inside it. On one side are several orifices in which you can place Vis, which fuels the device in unclear ways. It was the maker's hope that the vis would affect the nature of the warping, but he decided to trade it for a very nice wolfhound before coming to any conclusions.
Immediately Available and Balanced By Other V/Fs
Outdoors -3 : The lab space is a ruined farmhouse and grazing field
Vulnerable -0 : The makeshift fence is easily thwarted by creatures of meager cunning
Uneven Floor -0 : A field, overrun with burrowing rodents, contains many trip hazards
Disorganized -0 (Experimentation): Patrick's just messy like that. The voles, later, will not be helping this.
Missing Sanctum Marker -0 : Lacking any single entrance to the lab, the sanctum marker is only visible to those approaching the sanctum from the main path
Requiring a Story
Greater Horde +3 (Rego): The Vole Wranglers, armed with metal shavings, feasting on their unthinking brethren, and (eventually) loyal to Patrick, thanks to his help in The Great Field War of 1226.
Inexhaustible Supplies +0 : Magically transformed vole parts are surprisingly useful, especially when someone else gathers them for you.
"Faerie" Ingredients +0 : While vole parts are useful, it is not always clear how they are useful, and they are already tainted by magic. While supplied by magical animals and not faeries, their beneficial yet unpredictable properties provide the same effects, bonuses, and penalties.
Other Things Patrick Will Probably Get For The Lab Someday
Greater Feature/Focus - Cage (Rego)
Greater Feature - Trough (Experimentation)
Greater/Lesser Guardian (Rego?) (captured and tamed Magic Beasts is his business)
Extensive Stores +1
Spacious +1
Idyllic Surroundings +0 (with SG permission)
Other Notes
Obvious choices which I didn't pick up, but bring up in case people want to suggest tweaks:
Natural Environment +3 - Though suggested when you pick Outdoors, I opted to balance that flaw with Greater Horde instead, since Natural Environment didn't provide bonuses Patrick was interested in, so while he is in a Natural Environment, he doesn't get those bonuses. I suppose technically you could add this to the lab as a Greater Illusion, but....meh. Maybe he'll add it someday.
Restriction -1 - I thought about taking a restriction from binding familiars, as a side effect to the inhumane and torturous aspects of the Trough of Alterations, and Patrick's general attitude towards beasts, but frankly, I want him to have a delta-based familiar someday.
Idyllic Surroundings +0 - Seemed like cheating to start with it, somehow.
Infested -0 - Felt redundant
I was thinking that we'd be keeping some livestock here as well (chickens, cows, etc), but what with the vole infestation, I doubted the place would be suitable for grazing anymore. Then I found this article that suggests grazing actually impacts vole populations, not the other way around. So if we get some livestock, we should put them in/near Patrick's Field. Thus, bringing me one step closer to raising an army of mutant chickens!
Stats
Before the Voles
Upkeep 5
Safety -3
Health -1
Aesthetics -4
Warping 0
General -1
Experiment 2
Texts 1
Vis Extraction 2
Items 2
Creo 1
Rego 0
Terram 1
Imaginem 1
Ignem 1
After losing spell benefits and gaining Horde story stuff
Upkeep 1
Safety -2 (Assuming the Greater Horde has Int 1)
Health -2
Aesthetics -3
Warping 2
General 2
Experiment 3
Texts 1
Rego 3
Terram 1
Imaginem 1
Ignem 1
Actually, if JM isn't with us any more, does anyone mind if I take over his Companion character, Miklos?
I've no objection.
Gregorius' initial lab in the caves. Note that his current plan is that this is only a temporary placeholder, and that in time he will have a custom built building/sanctum housing his lab and living quarters. It's a medium term plan, though, and not really top of the "getting the covenant up and running" list.
Gregorius' lab is situated on the first level of the caves. It was previously occupied by a Flambeau magus with, apparently, a certain sense of humour - visitors to the lab are met by a curtain of illusory flame as they step through the door. The lab also contains a hypocaust enchanted with a Creo Ignem effect, which Gregorius has not yet investigated in detail (and, with a lab investigation total of (20 + stress die)/2, isn't likely to any time soon).
Characteristics
Size: +4
Occupied size: +1
Refinement: 0
Safety: +2
General Quality: +2
Aesthetics: -3
Health: -3
Upkeep: -1?
Warping: 0
Terram: +2 -1
Items: +2 -1
Vis Extraction: +2 -1
Virtues
Spacious, mStr. +2 Safety, +1 Aesthetics.
Flawless Equipment, FSu, from Portia's spell. Gregorius is not intending to maintain this rigorously; however, he is also not intending to use the laboratory very often, so hopefully breakages will be slow. +2 GQ, +0? upkeep, +2 vis extraction.
Flawless Tools, FSu as above. +2 Items, +0? Upkeep.
Familiar, mSu. Alcimus isn't actually a familiar yet, and spends minimal time in the lab, but he does need the space left for him. No bonus yet.
Magic Item, FSu, curtain of flame. +1 Aesthetics.
Magic item, FSu. The hypocaust. No impact yet, as Gregorius hasn't got it working.
Flaws
Empty, FStr. It's a big cave. -1 Aesthetics, -1 Health.
Subterranean, FStr. It's a cave. +1 Upkeep, -1 Health, -1 Aesthetics, +1 Terram.
Uneven Floor, FStr. See above. +1 Upkeep, -1 Health, -1 Aesthetics, +1 Terram.
Missing Sanctum Marker, FO. The lab isn't actually Gregorius' sanctum at all - that's his room in the main building. -1 Aesthetics.
Undecorated, mO. Gregorius, spending little time in the lab and in any case viewing it as a temporary set-up only, has not spent much time personalising it. -1 Aesthetics, -1 Upkeep, subtract 1 pt from any speciality with a score of 2 or more.
I don't think this is a good assumption - remember, cunning creatures that gain intelligence usually start at -3.
Would that end up being a penalty to the Safety? Cuz with Int -3, that'd give the lab a Safety of -6, and I'd be better off with a Lesser Horde.
Sorry for the delay in replying on this. I think there was some confusion on how much vis the covenant has and will get. As already stated, the covenant has 10 pawns in recurring vis sources built with build points. On the standard "1/10th of covenant income" scale, this would imply Personal Vis Source only gives 1 pawn a year. However, MTKnife has said that the covenant will gain more vis sources than implied by the build points quite quickly. I'm not in a position to judge how much extra or how quickly. My inclination is to say "1/10th of the sources expected at the end of the first year", but I don't know how much that is.
On a more general point, 6 seems a bit much, and 3-4 more reasonable, but that's all subject to the point above.
Basically, yes.
Well....then I'd shift it to Lesser Horde (+1), Spacious (+1), Extensive Stores(+1), and Idyllic Surroundings (+0). Call the Extensive Stores part of a barn that gets built, and pick something a little less reproductively enthusiastic for my horde. Mutant chickens, maybe? No, the idea of smart chickens is just too unlikely....
Before I count all that out, can I get people's opinions on the new draft?
Flawless Equipment
Flawless Tools
Spotless
Outdoors -3
Vulnerable -0
Uneven Floor -0
Disorganized -0
Missing Sanctum Marker -0
Extensive Stores 1
Spacious 1
Idyllic Surroundings 0
Lesser Horde 1
Faerie Ingredients 0
Inexhaustible Supplies 0
Magical Lighting 0
Magical Heating 0
Trough of Alteration 0
Both Callen and Salutor have designed labs much less supernatural in scope, so I'm not even sure if this lab design is thematically appropriate for the saga.
Spotless is the thing I'd query (even if it's briefly attained, an outdoor lab doesn't seem somewhere it'd last. I did briefly consider making my lab haunted (which is the really obvious supernatural flaw to take, given the covenant's circumstances), but didn't due to a) not knowing what the local ghosts are like yet and b) only intending to have Gregorius in the lab temporarily(ish).
Hmmm... Yes, that does seem like it would take some work to accomplish, especially in a run-down building.
Chris
True, especially given his Disorganized habits. Do I need to construct a coherent timeline, or try to balance the VFs at the different stages?
Virtues, in most cases, take time to add; if there's a good reason to delay the Flaws, you can do that, though obviously no one will complain if you take them immediately.
Scott
I see that it is apparently going to be spreadsheet time 
How about this?
Flawless Equipment
Flawless Tools
Spotless (disappears soon, maybe after a season?)
Outdoors -3
Natural Environment +3 (auto-available
Vulnerable -0
Uneven Floor -0
Disorganized -0
Missing Sanctum Marker -0
Spacious 1
Undecorated -1
Idyllic Surroundings 0
Magical Lighting 0
Magical Heating 0
Trough of Alteration 0
Outdoors gives me as much Size as I need, but without Spacious, I'd be at Safety -3. I could ditch some of the free flaws that are cutting into my Safety....
Oh, if this is after one season setting it up, it should be Basic, too. It takes two seasons to finish setting up a lab.
Chris