I know you can swap around the apprenticeship points. I'm fine with where things are for now.
So, am I good to continue character creation?
[size=150]Asena, at gauntlet [/size]
Notes: Feels (to me) much better than the other character. Playable as she is (unless my math is as flawed as it was in the last post). If she is too weak for the saga, I can give her 3-5 years in the lab, mostly to create her Talisman
Characteristics: Int +2, Per 0, Pre 0, Com 0, Str +2, Sta +2, Dex +2 Qik +1
Size: -1
Age: 24
Decreptitude: 0
Warping Score: 0
Confidence: 2(5)
Virtues and Flaws: The Gift; Hermetic Magus; Affinity with Animal, Cautious bows, Improved characteristics (2x), Inoffensive to Animals, Minor Magical Foucs: Canines, Puissant bows, Puissant Parma, Self-confident, Subtle magic, *Warrior; Rigid Magic, Restriction (no permanent meat eaten since sunset); Driven minor (protect the Kipchaks), Overconfident (minor), Small Frame, visions (story: of the wolf who will become her magical animal companion)
Reputations:
Personality Traits: brave+2, Protective (Kipchaks) +2, Overconfident +2
Combat:
Brawl (dagger): Init +1, Attack +7, Defense +4, Damage +5
Horse Bow: Init -1, Attack +15, Defense +8, Damage +10, Range: 15
Soak: +2 (total: +5 with Doublet of Impenetrable Silk, usually active)
Fatigue Levels (human shape): 0, -1, -3, -5, Unconscious
Wound Penalties (human shape): -1 (1-4), -3 (5-8), -5 (9-12), Incapacitated (13-16), Dead (17+)
Abilities: Animal Handling (horses) 1, Area Lore Lower Don (geography) 1, Artes Liberales (ceremonial casting) 1, Athletics (climbing) 1, Awareness (long distance) 1, Bows (Horse Bow) 4+2, Brawl (dagger) 2, Code of Hermes (hedge practitioners) 1, Concentration (spells) 1, Craft: Bowmaking (Fletching) 2, Etiquette (Mongols) 1, Folk Ken (Kipchaks) 1, Hunt (tracking) 1, Kipchak Language (storytelling) 5, Latin (Hermetic) 4, Magic Theory (spells) 3, Mongolian Language (warriors) 2, Parma Magica (Mentem) 1+2, Ride (battle) 2, Scribe (carefully) 1, Survival (Lower Don) 1, Swim (river) 1
Arts: Cr 7, In 3, Mu 5, Pe 0, Re 7, An 12, Aq 0, Au 1, Co 1, He 0, Ig 1, Im 0, Me 1, Te 1, Vi 1
Twilight Scars: none yet
Equipment: Superior Horse Bow, quiver with arrows, dagger, practical clothes, dried meat
Encumbrance: 0
Spells known:
Wizard’s pony CrAn30/+21 (ArM5, p. 117, pony sized wizard’s mount)
Call of the Wolf Cr(Re)35/+28 (spellswiki: Summon the Alpha woodland prowler normal wolf)
Speak to Animals InAn25/+17
Doublet of Impenetrable Silk MuAn15/+19
True Sight of the Air InAu15/+6
Vis: currently none
Appearance: Asena is a small woman with long raven hair and black eyes. Her voice is surprisingly deep for a woman her size. She wears practical clothes of good quality.
Voting sigil: An arrow with a bodkin tip. A closer examination reveals that the stuff on the tip is the blood of a hedge magus
Spell sigil: hairy
Early childhood (Years 1-5):
She grows up in the Lower Don region. Parents are shepherds. They attack wolves and are killed by them shortly before she turns 5. Strangely, the wolves do not harm her. She is found by two Mongol scouts who take the child with them.
Kipchak (storytelling) 5, Area Lore Lower Don (geography) 1, Athletics (climbing) 1, Awareness (long distance) 1, Brawl (dagger) 2, Folk Ken (Kipchaks) 1, Survival (Lower Don) 1, Swim (river) 1
Childhood (Years 6-9):
The Child is kept as a servant of a Mongol Chief. She starts dreaming about a wolf. In the end, she steals a horse and runs away – west, because her people live there and because the wolf dreams say so. She was found by Pjotr, a Flambeau magus from the Novgorod Tribunal and apprenticed there.
Riding (battle) 2, Animal Handling (Horses) 1, Hunt (Tracking) 1, Etiquette (Mongol) 1, Mongolian Language (warriors) 2, Craft: Bowmaking (Fletching) 2
Apprenticeship (years: 10-24)
Pjotr is a follower of the school of Ramius who quickly recognized her talent for using bows and allowed her to make the longbow her weapon of choice. The covenant where she was apprenticed studied and fought hedge magi (“Join or Die!”) and consisted of two Flambeau, a Magus Trianormae and a Pralician.
Skills: 105xp: Artes Liberales (ceremonial casting) 1, Bows (horsebow) 4+2, Code of Hermes (hedge practitioners) 1, concentration (spells) 1, Latin (hermetic) 4, Magic Theory (learning spells) 3, Parma Magica (Mentem) 1+2, Profession Scribe (carefully) 1
Arts 135xp
Future plans:
- move to the covenant in her home region (reason: wolf dreams, speaking the language, protecting the people)
- some more spells (the classic repertoire)
- improve MT to 4, Parma to 2
- find white wolf familiar (replace story flaw with magic animal companion flaw)
- bind wolf as familiar (and ride it into battle)
- create bow talisman (probably a ring that can assume bow form)
- enchant bow to give it more range and more power and to call it and to have it create arrows
- compete with the amazons in a bow contest
- stop the Mongols, protect the Kipchak people
Asena, they called her, Asena, the wolf-child. It’s a name of honor: a Mongol scout had given it to her, the one who found her playing peacefully with a wolf pack, the one who had probably saved her life. Even if the wolves hadn’t turned on her before, unlikely, for wolves are merciless killers, she would surely have perished in the cold season.
And yet, she must have had a different name once when she was still a Kipchak. She couldn’t remember. She had few memories of that before: A mother’s face, a father’s strong arm and sweaty smell, the herds and the hut halfway up the hill, and stories, many, many stories, told in a woman’s voice in the dark.
A tear ran down the face of the little girl sitting in the yurt. Her nimble hands were sorting arrow feathers for the Horde, who always needed more arrows, many more than she could count. Sometimes she tried and failed to imagine the warriors on their horses and their enemies, stuck with arrows. She heard steps outside and wiped away her tears, focused on her work: They’d beat her if they caught her dawdling.
That night, she had her first wolf dream: She was running through the gnarled woods towards a hill through the silvery moonlight, naked. The fresh night air stung in her lungs, a welcome pain. As she reached the top, she saw the white wolf: His green eyes were looking at her curiously and his red tongue was hanging out of his mouth. In the language of her ancestors, he said: “I’m Albo and I have been waiting for you. How much longer are you going to stay in the treeless plains of the east. Don’t you see it is time to go back. I will guide you in your dreams until we meet in the flesh.”
And she knew, with instinctive certainty, that the wolf was telling the truth. So, carefully not to wake anyone, she snuck out into the night, climbed a young horse, and started her journey west.
I do like the concept better as a Flambeau (although I note this version has moved away from the trick arrows).
I think the language of the Mongols is Mongolian (at least according to the Mongol stats in Ancient Magic).
Have you got the lab totals necessary to learn Wizard's Pony and True Sight of the Air? I'm making you 2 short for both.
It's not an inherent problem, but you should be aware there's already one white wolf at the covenant (Alcimus, Gregorius' magical animal companion / familiar just as soon as he can manage the lab total).
Feel free to advance her past gauntlet if you want to, but don't feel you have to. The saga power level is probably at the low-mid power level, with a range of different ages for magi. I'd recommend having a niche you can fill competently, but there's no need (and indeed, little want) for hyper-optimisation.
I feel like Timaios is ready, if there are no further objections.
Still thinking about a companion. I'm leaning toward some kind of talented person, maybe a really skilled woodsman or boatman? Shall I make a pair of grogs as well?
Yep, he looks pretty much there. Only minor comments are that you need to record the reputation he gets from Hermetic Prestige (probably "Quaesitor in Good Standing"), and decide upon his Magic Theory speciality.
For reference, there's a letter from a Magvillus Quaesitor to Gregorius in the aftermath of the Tasia incident here: Card & Board Games ARCHIVE & LINKS (with a not-terribly-subtle reminder to Gregorius about the mundane interference clause), which might be helpful for ideas for the quaesitors' current attitude to the situation.
The skilled woodsman is likely to fit more naturally into existing stories than the boatman, although either could work. You're welcome to make up some grogs - I'd suggest they're new to the covenant rather than existing ones at this point in the saga.
I think we're waiting for MTKnife to confirm on the Parma 2 at gauntlet point.
Also, did you ever come to a final decision on the nameless malediction and "grey man" approach?
The final resting place of those 10 points isn't a huge deal one way or the other for me, it's +-1 season of reading in one book or another.
Yes, I'm going to go with INDESCRIBABLE FACE (MINOR GENERAL VIRTUE) in place of Mastered Spells and INSCRIBED SHADOW (Minor Supernatural Flaw) in place of the Malediction.
He is very plain other than his Criamon tattoos that cover his hands and spiral up his arms in a wavy spiked flame pattern. The Tattoos manifest in his shadow (or burn brighter when it is dark). People can't describe him other than that feature, so he is the magus with tattoo'd hands.
This means he probably has a name. In the first iteration of the character the apprentices were all named after knives by their master to hammer in that they are living weapons. His name is Kris. Apparently his master was very well traveled.
She speaks Kipchak (native) and Mongolian (childhood).
The lab totals do not fall two short because the character creation thread says we are to assume an Aura of 5, which I did (apprenticed in Nowgorod).
Actually, Alcimus inspired me to go looking for another white wolf.
I would rather see her develop in game than before game: More fun!
OK - I think Nyktophylax is worth it, but there's no point making Gregorius less special. I can go without it.
I can put the 1 xp back into Finesse (I think one of us made a rounding error? Probably me, not to worry).
150 levels of spells - Skilled Parens gives you the extra 30.
Because Aedificator is mostly ReTe with a little Creo at gauntlet, he's more suited to smashing a battlefield or enemy fort up and would take Creo Terram later. However, if I drop Nyktophylax for Puissant Creo I may be able to cast some decent CrTe as well. A simple method of rapid vallation is CrTe 35, and as Tremere already have a magical focus in certamen those level 35 spells require serious min/maxing to get at gauntlet.
Let me juggle some arts points and spell levels around, I'll see if I can get an architect more to your taste.
Woha hold on, you are ReTe with Finesse Affinity, aren't you doing craft with ReTe and the actual Crafting spells from Covenants? I assumed this is what you were thinking since your character is ideal for it...
You need somthing along the lines of, The Phantom Blacksmith, but with the +2 mags for Metal turned into +2 mags for size. That's only level 20.
CrTe of like 5 is a big enough ritual to make as much flawless raw stone as you could ever want in your lifetime.
EDIT: The biggest ReTe Craft spell you can do is
Base 2, +1 Touch, +2 Group, +1 Flexibility, +1 Stone, +4 Size = 35 for crafting a group of Large stones. Into something approximately Conjuring the mystic tower size.
Base 2, +1 Touch, +0 Individual, +1 Flexibility, +1 Stone, +6 Size = 35 for crafting a giant (probably ritually summoned stone) into like a city...
Base 2, +1 Touch, +1 Part, +1 Flexibility, +2 Metal, +4 Size= 35 For crafting part of a structure, Basically manual non-creo repairs.
Nyktophylax has a nice Tremere flavour, but it gets less useful the more people have it, until you reach the extreme of everybody having it to absolutely no benefit.
I'm going mad. Or possibly blind. I'm sure I doublechecked that he didn't have Skilled Parens before I made that comment, and yet there it is. And he's spent the xp from it, as well.
Agreed the Vallation spell is quite high level (Wall of Protecting Stone is easier). Obviously neither of them are permanent rituals, so neither of them are directly relevant to CrTe fortifying the covenant - but right now, whilst all Tremere want some martial capacity, your magus is coming across to me more as "Terram combat specialist" than "builder". This may be less relevant if you're planning to advance him past gauntlet focussing him more on building things.
For reference, there's a copy of the letter Gregorius sent to the local Exarch requesting the assistance of an architect here: Card & Board Games ARCHIVE & LINKS
Could you post an updated version at gauntlet for ease of reference? I generally prefer new posts to edits of old ones (and they should be roughly equally easy to do if you start by editing then copying the old one), as they're easier to find and mean that we don't end up with a bunch of comments that make no sense in relation to the final version of the post they follow.
[size=150][strike]A Magus[/strike] Kris ex Criamon[/size]
Age: 27 (year 1223)
[size=120]Characteristics:[/size]* Intelligence (INT): +1
- Perception (PER): +0
- Strength (STR): +0
- Stamina (STA): +2
- Presence (PRE): +0
- Communication (COM): +0
- Dexterity (DEX): +0
- Quickness (QIK): +2
[size=120]Arts:[/size] - Techniques: [list][*] Creo: 5
- Intellego: 1
- Muto: 2
- Perdo: 2
- Rego: 5
[/:m]
[] Forms: * Animal: 1 - Aquam: 1
- Aurum: 1
- Corpus: 5
- Herbem: 1
- Ignum: 5
- Imaginum: 1
- Mentum: 1
- Terram: 1
- Vim: 3
[/:m][/list:u][size=120]Abilities:[/size] Artes Liberales: 1 (Arcane Texts) - Athletics: 2 i[/i]
- Awareness: 1 i[/i]
- Bargain: 1 i[/i]
- Charm: 2 (Gathering Information)
- Concentration: 3 i[/i]
- Finesse: 1 i[/i]
- Guile: 2 i[/i]
- Latin: 4 (Arcane Texts)
- Latvian: 5 (Nursery Rymes)
- Legerdemain: 2 i[/i]
- Magic Theory: 2 (25XP) (Similar Spells)
- Parma Magica: 1 i[/i]
- Penetration: 3 i[/i]
- Stealth: 3 i[/i]
- Swim: 2 i[/i]
Virtues: * The Enigma (Minor,Hermetic) - The Gift (Special,Hermetic)
- Flawless Magic (Major,Hermetic)
- Affinity With Penetration (Minor,General)
- Affinity With Rego (Minor,Hermetic)
- Indescribable Face (Minor,General)
- Independant Study (Minor,General)
- Minor Magical Focus (Dispelling) (Minor,Hermetic)
- Fast Caster (Minor,Hermetic)
- Lightning Reflexes (Minor,General)
Flaws: * Magic Addiction (Major,Hermetic)
- Infamous Master (Minor,Hermetic)
- Inscribed Shadow (Minor,Supernatural)
- Fury (Major,Story)
- Humble (Minor,Personality)
-
Lecherous (Major or Minor,Personality)
"
And a blob of unformatted spells
Wither Assailant (Target loses control of one of their arms) 5
Lesser Pilum of Fire (B5 [+10 Damage],V,I,M) 15
Curse of the Unruly Tongue 5
Endurance of the Berserkers (Dia variant) 15
Blink Stride (50 pace personal Teleport) 15
Bind Wounds 10
Purification of the Festering wound 15
Lamp Without Flame 10
Unraveling the Fabric of Corpus 10
Opening the Intangible Tunnel 10
Circular Ward Against Magic 10
Updated with changes to my virtues and flaws.
The CrTe 5 would only get you about 10 cubic paces worth of stone (a base individual of stone is only 1 cubic pace) - it would be Base 3 + 1 Touch + 1 Size. That said, the spell would need to have a minimum level of 20 anyway, due to the minimum level for rituals, which gives you +4 size magnitudes. The covenant also runs a quarry, but only for limestone.
Note that the Finesse requirements for Rego Crafting are quite high, especially for things that would take a long time to build normally. For a Standard Quality Wall, you'd be looking at Base 6 + 3 Rego Crafting + 3/6/9 Month's / Season's Work Year's = 12 / 15 / 18. A Superior Wall would be 18 / 21 / 24. You can bring that down a bit by breaking it down into separate tasks taking less time (which will start requiring Craft: Mason to put them together), and there are various ways to get bonuses, but generally Rego Craft is something you have to really focus on if you want to do it. Creo Crafting has the advantage that you get Standard quality stuff automatically, plus I think you don't get the time addition to the EF (the Rules aren't completely clear on that one - just looking at HoH:S page 60 - 61, page 60 says Cr crafting has the same EF as Rego crafting, whereas the next page says you only have to roll Finesse for Creo crafting if you want a result higher than 9, i.e. standard quality).
Have you picked up an advanced version there? You've got 300 xp just in Arts.
Yes, and my script isn't playing nice with the new flaw, Going to jsut copy the previous post.
Like I mentioned I assumed he was focusing on it. Getting a +12 base is pretty straight forward if that's what you are shooting for.
EDIT: The Precise Mastery Ability also applies to Rego Crafting, presumably. Splitting your total between two abilities makes life much simpler.
The ArM5 Parma thing makes my head hurt. Can I please wish it away?
I can't seem to find the explanation for it--what was the story again?
Scott
So can I keep my character's spells or do you want me to juggle arts and spells a little?