Comments on The Mysteries (Revised Edition)

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@Verticius

Hm.

Ken, I think that you and I disagree a bit on the Bjornear. The inner heartbeast virtues are definitely very good, though Saxonous raises an interesting concept on the Chimera, and I think that the other house virtues are pretty well thought out. I guess, just on reading and not having played a Bjornear, I feel that it just felt like there was not enough there. This may be more of a chicken-and-the-egg problem, though, insofar as it is not clear to me why I might want to play one and that skepticism prejudices my reading or that in reading the text I'm left not feeling terribly inspired and thus don't think about the possibilities much leading to a lack of desire.

Well, I do have to agree that the Bjornaer stuff isn't enough to offset the lack of a familiar. But that's not because I think Bjornaer don't get cool stuff but because having a familiar is completely awesome, especially in a saga that allows a magus to bind a familiar near the limit of his Lab Total.

I think familiars are so good, that if the Bjornaer Outer Mystery gave one animal shape per point of Heartbeast, as with the Shapeshifter but with the full advantages of being a Heartbeast, and also allowed the magus to subsume clothing and worn possessions when shifting, all at the cost of having a familiar, it would be still be a fair Minor Virtue. considers I guess I see "No Familiar" as a Major Flaw. It provides cord goodies, a bit of Magic Resistance when Parma goes down, a True Friend who might bring some special powers of his own to the party (especially for a magus optimized for a powerful familiar), and--this is often missed--the only way to have constant magical effects on a magus without incurring any Warping!

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that I'm a little hung up on flavor text revolving around the history and foundation for any mystery cult -- exoteric and esoteric. I know, that's on me and I don't think I'm saying anything bad about the authors. I guess I'm just hungry for more.

considers

Maybe I get what you're saying. There's nothing in the Bjornaer writeup that leaves me thinking "these guys have a cool background." Instead, I think "now, with New and Improved Heartbeast powers," and maybe even "These are the "Werewolf: The Apocalypse" magi; when will they rage?" Europe has a rich mythology of shapeshifters, but the Bjornaer writeup divorces the House from it, where the other Mystery House writeups find common ground with real-world myths and philosophies.

I don't find myself saying "meh" because of this; the Bjornaer don't feel bland or incongruous to me. But mmmm.... familiars.

Anyway,

Ken

[YR7]

@Verticius

it is not clear to me why I might want to play [a Bjornaer]!

I was on the same page until I read RoP:M. This led me to think of Magic as the epitomizing of the Essential Nature, and led me to view the Bjornaer mysteries as exposing the Essential Nature of the person and refining it, a kind of spiritual smelting process. And so now I play a (heretic) Bjornaer in a PbP

I don't care at all for the "ancestor cult", which I find silly, and the whole shapechange thing is more a weakness than a virtue. Powerwise, I think they're week, and their mysteries are weak too. Getting Qualities? Come on. That's great for mundanes, not wizards. The Inner Heartbest? Cool effects, not much magical power. Even their Immortality kinda sucks - it isn't clear what it's like, but it looks like going out to pastures as an NPC critter. Any mystery path from TMRE is superior, IMHO. But playing a spiritual Wilderist, looking after pure Magic and purifying himself spiritually - well, that I find appealing. YMMV.

[Ovarwa]

HI,

@YR7

Getting Qualities? Come on. That's great for mundanes, not wizards.

A Bjornaer with the Inner Heartbeast can accumulate 5 extra fatigue levels, which is kind of nice for a wizard, especially if he also has Life Boost or LLSM.

There are other goodies to be found among the Qualities.

In general, though, I agree that the fundamental Bjornaer power to be an animal has little synergy with the powers of a magus. (Although in one of your low-power sagas, the Bjornaer are nicer. )

Anyway,

Ken

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

Here's my take on the Mystery Virtues. Since coolness is in the eye of the beholder, I evaluate only what the virtues do. In general, a virtue that is easy to use and/or provides a great benefit is better, while a virtue that provides little or no benefit or is difficult to set up is worse. Virtues that inflict extra botch dice tend to receive my disfavor.

Solid: This virtue is worth its cost, but isn't special.
Excellent: This is one of the better virtues available, and is especially useful for certain magi.
Awesome: This is one of the very best virtues in the game, worth designing a character around.

Weak: This virtue is almost worth its cost, but offers some benefits that might be worthwhile.
Bad: This virtue is not worth taking. Some players will want it anyway.
Terrible: This virtue is worth avoiding.

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Common

Spell Binding: This virtue allows permanent effects without the need to create an item. It requires vis, an obedient spirit and a known ritual. When the spirit escapes (and what GM would resist this kind of story opportunity), it will be unhappy with you, as will its friends. Weak, unless you're a Goeticist, and unless I'm missing a particularly subtle use of the virtue.

Performance Magic: Use an Ability instead of Hermetic words and gestures. Solid if you're a bardic magus, bad otherwise.

Planetary Magic: Not nearly as good as Puissant Magic Theory, with a narrow application and an opportunity to ruin an entire season in the lab. Terrible for most magi; weak for a magus who already has Cautious with Artes Liberales and a very high AL score.

Potent Magic: Grants bonuses that aren't nearly as good as a Focus, and allows the invention of Potent Spells, which don't work without their components (and can be learned by anyone). Bad.

Vulgar Magic: Allows a magus to risk blowing up his lab in order when creating charged and lesser devices, in order to slowly eke out minor Shape and Material Bonuses. Terrible.

Withstand Casting: How often does a magus ever lose more than one fatigue level when casting a spell? Worthless as written. Terrible.

Astrological Magical Foci: Astrological foci are extremely wide, far wider than most normal foci, which are already fantastic. Awesome!

Astrological Potent Magic: Better than regular Potent Magic because the range is wider, but still. Weak.

(Astrological) Mutable Virtues: A magus who plans can use these to great advantage. If the period covered an entire season, affecting lab work, and if GMs did not tend toward throwing monkey wrenches into the best laid plans, this would be excellent. Solid.

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Hermetic Alchemy

Hermetic Alchemy: This essentially provides an extra pawn of vis when distilling vis, and allows Vim vis to be traded for Form vis at 2:1. Weak for most magi. Solid for magi who distill vis all the time, or who for some reason cannot trade Vim vis through the usual channels.

Philosophical Alchemy: As a minor virtue, a magus gets one extra season per year for vis distillation. As a major virtue, the magus gets four free seasons of vis distillation. This vis can either automatically open a device (without spending a season to open it), increase the amount of vis a device can hold or count against the vis needed to open a device. The minor virtue is solid. The major virtue is simply awesome, especially for a Verditius or similar magus. Awesome, except in sagas where the GM will punish you for distilling vis, and there are quite a few of these.

Lesser Elixir: Slowly accumulate bonuses for your own longevity ritual. Weak, since most LRs are already good enough.

Great Elixir: This is one of the better ways for a magi who does not want to engage in extreme behavior to gain immortality. It synergizes well with the other virtues of the mystery: Magi who create items will especially like Philosophical Alchemy, which provides the vis needed for the Great Elixir, and which will continue to provide its full benefit once the immortal magus creates magical devices every season in his lab, forever. Becoming immortal through this virtue does take a lot of work. Excellent.

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Hermetic Astrology

Periapt: Allows a magus who does not have a lab text for a charged device to still produce many charges in a season, provided the overall effect of each charge, including Penetration, is weak. This would be solid, except that the charged devices a magus would most want to create cannot be created with this virtue, and because using the already crippled virtue requires a stress roll that can ruin the season entirely. Weak.

Celestial Magic: This virtue expands the lab activities for which the bonuses of Planetary Magic and its botch opportunities apply. It also allows astrological durations that are usually shorter than Hermetic durations, that allow still more botch opportunities, yet are probably useful in niche circumstances. A few other marginal and dubious benefits are offered. Bad.

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Divination and Augury

Divination & Augury: Kind of like spontaneous Intellego, but requires its own pool of experience points. Weak.

Hermetic Dream Interpretation: An example of D&A. Weak.

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Hermetic Spirit Magic

Hermetic Empowerment: Allows a magus to invest ritual effects into an enchanted item. This is a unique ability, but requires a spirit and vis to set up. Solid, especially for magi with a MMF with spirits.

Spirit Familiar: Allows a magus to take a spirit as a familiar instead of an animal, providing various benefits above and beyond ordinary familiars. Excellent if your GM rules (as I do) that the Hekate Cord benefits apply to spellcasting. Solid otherwise.

Inscription on the Soul: Provides a Talisman without the Talisman. Note that the doubling of the Lab Total excess is often much better than S&M bonuses. Blending with Substance is expensive, and should be used sparingly, at least until the Great Elixir is ready. Awesome for characters who travel light or who cannot afford to lose their Talisman, or if the GM rules that a MMF in Spirits applies to effects invested in the Talisman (I don't); solid otherwise.

Living Ghost: A relatively easy but perilous route to immortality. Being bound to a place has disadvantages, as does being a ghost. There are also some advantages. Solid.

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Hermetic Theurgy

Names of Power: Useless on its own, sort of, kind of, vaguely ok in conjunction with other virtues from this chapter, none of which are very good. Bad.

Invocation Magic: After getting both this virtue and Names of Power, a magus can spend lots of time learning spells that represent various Powers in order to gain some negligible bonus to casting scores (not totals) that cannot exceed MT and take time to accrue. Note that the GM is encouraged to inflict especially catastrophic botches for magi who actually try to use this. Terrible.

Hermetic Theurgy: This virtue provides a whole bunch of very cool effects that are mostly not worth having, even for a character who also has a MMF with Spirits. Invoke the Spirit of (Spell) allows a magus to invent (or more rarely, learn) spells that require extra time to cast, are not likely to Penetrate, will fail whenever the GM wants them to, are subject to the usual level 50 rule, benefits little from Mastery and generally are not worth having, even considering the benefit of FFM that applies to the underlying effects, which is also less useful because Personal range doesn't affect the magus. Invoke the Spirit of (Form) is interesting, in that it allows variable spontaneous effects, but a character who acquires these at any useful level needs to design the character to take good advantage of this virtue, which is not worth doing. Invoke the Pact of (Daimon) allows interesting daimonic beings to be summoned, at the cost of lots of vis. Note that this virtue has surprisingly poor synergy with Goetic Magic. Bad for most magi, weak for magi who cannot cast spontaneous magic.

Theurgic Spirit Familiar: Like Spirit Familiar, but allows daimons too. Excellent.

Ascendency to the Hall of Heroes: The most durable of the immortal magi in this book, the most difficult to achieve, and the one that will usually take the character out of the game by its very nature. No more lab work, no fatigue to power spells, Might does not recover on its own, cannot return to the same place for a full day after dissipation (which means that recovering Might takes the character out of the adventure for at least a day), and it's not clear whether the daimon can send Aspects where it wants in the absence of a (very expensive) summoning. Excellent, for ending a character's career as a PC in style. Bad for characters who want to continue their career as a magus.

Hermetic Synthemata: This virtue allows a magus to spend lots of time learning spells for individual spirits, after spending more time in difficult research. Note that the magus doesn't know when he's finished. Better to spend 5xp and learn the thing's True Name; even Theurgists rarely need this, since their spells create a permanent AC. Terrible.

Synthemata Magica: Not for magi.

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The Great Talisman: Allows a Talisman to accrue extra components, and allows extra attunements without spending seasons. Great for a magus with a great Talisman. Excellent.

Consummate Talisman: Allows MuVi spells to effect the magus' formulaic magic, which is ok. Allows Names of Power to be automatically invoked, which is sort of ok, except that first an extra virtue is needed, then a spell for the desired Name of Power needs to be learned, and finally it needs to be enchanted into the Talisman. This is much better than Invocation, however, because no extra time is needed and no stress die is rolled. On the downside, the Deleterious Circumstances flaw that comes with this virtue is nasty, except for magi with Inscription of the Soul, who don't care. Weak.

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Arithmetic Magic

Hermetic Numerology: The Numerologist's book provides bonuses to numerology spells. It will probably become the magus' talisman, who will probably enchant it to change size to ease transport. Rotes are minor formulaic spells that do not need a stress die and have weak Penetration; these will need to be invented since there aren't many Numerologists around publicizing their spells. A magus has other ways to deal with this kind of issue, most of them superior to this. Weak.

Hermetic Geometry: Grants a few new ranges and targets, which are eh. Still, more spellcasting options are always nice. Weak.

Hermetic Architecture: Allows enchantments on a massive scale, including boosting the Aura. Awesome for that NPC magus who lowest Art is 40. Terrible for anyone else.

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The Mysteries of Dreams

Dream Magic: This lets a magus enter dreams and do a few things that might occasionally be useful. Note that this does not allow Robert Jordan style travel through dream from one person to another. Weak.

The Greater Dream Grimoire: This provides more options for a dream magus, though it's rarely clear why a magus would bother. Still, this and its companion virtue are easy for a Mentem and Imaginem specialist to use. Weak.

=======

There's a pattern here: I consider most of these virtues inferior to virtues that already exist. Potent Magic is much worse than a Focus; the bonuses of Astrological Magic have lower quality than Puissant MT or Inventive Genius; Hermetic Theurgy requires a lot of optimization (not covered) here to use effectively and will still fall short of traditional methods; a magus would do better to get Inscription on the Soul and a delusion that his investing effects in the talisman represent pacts with various spirits. The star here is the Alchemy Mystery, which is awesome for a Verditius or similar lab rat. Good synergy, good power, good grounding in real-world mythology about magic--the gold standard, as befitting alchemical virtues.

Anyway,

Ken

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

So here I am, a little bored, my job hunting not going very well, with nothing better to do than evaluate the Mystery Virtues of HoH:MC, because my comments about TMRE have inspired so much discussion!

As before, I focus more on utility than coolness or (as the Criamon might say) aptness.

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Bjornaer

Secret Name: Severs all sympathetic and arcane connections to a magus, but he becomes vulnerable to the Mystagogue and anyone else who knows the magus' new secret name. Terrible, except for that rare magus who actually needs this, for whom it is Awesome.

Theriomorphy: Lets a Bjornaer in human form gain a Quality or Virtue possessed by his Inner or Outer Heartbeast. Nothing stops him from having more than one of these at a time. The magus looks disturbing, and retaining virtues and qualities for too long incurs Warping. Great utility, and Qualities such as Tireless offer raw power even to a magus. There are some weirdnesses here: A Bjornaer can manifest Large Claws but not wings. Excellent, maybe even Awesome.

Sensory Magic: New Targets that allow a magus to affect targets that can sense him. This reversal breaks a usual limit of Hermetic Magic. Heartbeast score is added to a Bjornaer's Lab Total when inventing these spells and Intellego magical senses. However, a Bjornaer can only cast Sensory Magic appropriate to his Heartbeast. Excellent.

The Mystery of the Epitome: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast that is a perfected animal. The human form gains +1 to a Characteristic other than Intelligence (Sta, Com and Pre are good choices) and mythic feats become possible, costing Confidence. The magus also gains a Major Flaw of the GM's choice. Finally, the Bjornaer has an assured immortality as a Great Beast with Might, without any further effort on his part, though boosting Heartbeast increases final Might. A final Might of 60 is quite achievable, far better than most options available to magi. A Great Beast does not get to continue his career as a magus, and probably is out of the game. Solid.

The Mystery of the Chimera: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast that is a hybrid animal, like a Griffin, combining the best traits of each. Flaw and immortality like the epitome. Solid, almost weak.

The Mystery of the Anima: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast whose flesh becomes an elemental form, such as fire, shadow, earth or whatever. Flaw and Immortality like the epitome. Weak, almost solid.

Refinements: The Bjornaer can self-initiate improvements to his Inner Heartbeast, gaining Qualities, Virtues, Characteristics and even powers. There is no restriction on Qualities that can be gained. Powers are not that interesting to a magus who can cast spells, but this ability to self-initiate without experimentation is unique, and some of the Virtues and Qualities are very good. Examples of great Quality Synergy include LLSM+Tireless+Hardy+Pursuit Predator+Defensive Fighter, Imposing Presence taken 10 times (!!), Keen Eyesight+Smell+Sharp Ears.... Benefits are only available in Inner Heartbeast form, but many Bjornaer will spend much time in that shape anyway, and the benefits can be manifest through Theriomorphy. Awesome for the versatility.

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Criamon

The Perfect Tool: A Criamon gets to use Enigmatic Wisdom for Medicine and Chirurgy, and gains Potent Magic in a minor aspect of Corpus. He also incurs a Deleterious Circumstance while ill, a vow to treat his body well and Criamon stigmata. Weak.

Spiritual Nourishment: A Criamon has the ability to meditate instead of eating, drinking and sleeping. He also stops aging, but does gain Warping Points. These abilities don't work well in Dominion and Infernal Auras. It is not clear whether a magus who starts to age because of being in such Auras do so based on their chronological age or their age when their aging stopped (I'd rule the latter). Excellent in a long saga, solid otherwise.

Perfect Economy of Movement: A Criamon can automatically succeed on one Dex roll per day, but becomes Pious. Terrible.

The Microcosm: The magus gains an AC to mundane places he has been and mundane things he has touched that are in a mundane place, provided he has a good memory of them. This makes what would otherwise be an incredible ability useless except in mundane auras. 'Creative' GMs are likely to require a stress die when remembering, and to impose interesting side effects when these rolls botch. Weak, maybe solid.

The Threshold of Corporeal Repose: The Criamon stops aging entirely, and (probably) stops gaining Warping Points once per year because of aging, but does continue to gain Warping Points for any other reason. The magus' body heals completely and perfectly once per month, restoring missing limbs, healing wounds, gouged out eyes, everything except actual death. Negative physical characteristics are raised to 0. Awesome.

Differentiation of Seeming: The Criamon gains Clear Thinker, Common Sense and Keen Vision, but is also disfigured. Weak.

True Sight: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity and Second Sight, but makes a Vow to act like a Criamon. Weak, maybe solid.

Vivid Memories from Objects: The Criamon can recall the history of a touched mundane object as though it had human senses, and even tour the city of an appropriate object. Hermetic Magic is not very good at seeing the past, and less effective at communicating with the inanimate, though workarounds exist, tarnishing this unique ability. The Criamon is now Pious. Solid, maybe weak.

Passing through Seeming: The Criamon can travel around in spirit, but can only cast spells of Personal or AC range. The Criamon can pass through an Aegis unharmed because he does not have Might, but poking around a rival covenant in this way is probably a High Crime. Weak, maybe solid.

Ignore the Real: The Criamon can concentrate for around and ignore a single mundane object for a few minutes, though he may spend multiple rounds to concentrate on multiple objects. The need for concentration and the lead time make this less useful than it might be, such as in combat, though walking through walls can be fun. Weak.

The Eater of Sin: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity, but without the penalty, and with a single type of weapon (not the whole skill), at the cost of Blatant Gift. Few magi really need to use weapons, and Criamon on the Path of Strife have difficulty wearing armor, making weapons even less useful. Weak.

Blood and Bronze: The Criamon can perform a labyrinth meditation to destroy everything mundane and not human in a vast area, a powerful ability in isolation yet destruction is already easy for magi. The Criamon's favored weapon's attack bonus is multiplied by 4, which means that magi on the Path of Strife will almost always favor a Greatsword or other weapon with a large Atk. The Criamon gains a Higher Purpose. Weak, but cool.

Repel and Attract Elements: The Criamon can attract or repel mundane objects of a single Form, switching at will and without concentration once per round. The restrictions put the full suite of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" effects ever so barely out of reach, though other effects are available. Weak, though very cool and could have been awesome.

Charm the Elements: The Criamon can communicate and get along with objects of a pure, inorganic element, which are usually happy to help him, but becomes Pious and Disfigured. Weak but cool.

Golden Cider: The magi gains eight (!) minor Flaws, making Creo impossible except with Corpus and Vim, but can slowly make something magical mundane, including himself. Terrible.

Service to Harmony: The Criamon gains the Gentle Gift and becomes Pious. Solid.

Rice and Honey: The Criamon can fully restore and repair objects, plants and animals without vis, but becomes a Noncombatant. Note that this works even on objects and beings that are not mundane. Solid.

Expression: The Criamon gains Free Expression, Inspirational and can use Enigmatic Wisdom instead of one artistic skill. Most magi don't care about such things, but the ones who do will notice that the canonical rules make artistic expression through magic very difficult. Excellent for artistic magi, weak otherwise.

Exaltation: The Criamon can exorcise demons from people or imbue objects with a single positive quality. However, he also gains 8 (!) minor flaws, making Perdo impossible except with Vim and Imaginem. Weak, maybe bad.

The Threshold of Repose: The Criamon can change his age, gender and species at will. This does not affect wounds, but presumably removes the need for aging rolls, since he can simply keep his age constant. Awesome.

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Merinita

Alluring to (Beings): Gain +3 to Com and Pre rolls with one of mundane animals, Magical beings or Faeries. A magus must either have the Gentle Gift or be inoffensive to the chosen beings. Oddly, magi are considered magical beings, though Parma resists automatically. Solid for the right kind of magus, bad for most.

Enchanting (Ability): Like Enchanting Music, but using a different Ability. Bad.

Faerie-Raised Magic: Allows a magus to spend xps to learn spells, provided he has seen something like it before and it is not ritual effect. The xp cost is expensive, and a magus with a decent lab is far better off simply learning or inventing what he needs. However, the xp cost is very efficient for senior magi designed using the "30 points per year" rule, though these magi probably prefer a better Major Hermetic Virtue. The virtue Spell Improvisation is also included. Weak, maybe bad.

Independent Study: Gain 3 extra xps for a season of adventure or 2 extra xps for a season of practice. Even with these bonuses, most magi will do much better either reading books or doing lab work. Weak.

Inoffensive to (Beings): Like Inoffensive to Animals, but can apply either to magical or faerie beings, again including magi and anyone with an aligned supernatural virtue. Solid.

Spell Improvisation: Add the magnitude of a known Formulaic spell to the Casting Total of a Spontaneous spell. The addition to Casting Total is excellent, but it does not stack with the few other (and better) effects that add to Casting Totals, and the magus needs to already know a spell that is similar, and is probably better off casting that, or spending two more points to get FFM. Weak.

Binding the Gift: The Merinita's familiar, faerie or otherwise, gains the magus' social disabilities from his Gift, but the three Cords add their values to social interactions with magical beings, faeries and mundane animals respectively. Solid for a social magus in a saga where the GM pays attention to such things, weak for most magi.

Arcadian Travel: The Merinita can design and use charms that let him travel faerie trods. Unfortunately, the rules are silent about how long this travel takes, though activating the charm takes 10 minutes. This is a difficult ability to use because the totals needed are often very high, and involve a mundane Ability; magi already have other ways to travel quickly. Weak, maybe bad.

Animae Magic: Allows the Merinita to create faeries or change things into faeries. Depending on the saga, this can range from Awesome to Terrible, since the GM gets to run the faeries, who may not be friendly or useful.

Becoming: The Merinita becomes a Faerie. It is difficult for a magus of even moderate ability to perform these rituals, and his ability to perform magic is curtailed even by the standards of immortal magi. Weak.

Charm Magic: This poorly-written virtue allows a Merinita to improve the Casting Total of spells through the use of one or more charms, and also boost the Penetration modifier. Depending upon various GM rulings about how this virtue works, it is either Awesome for an expert in Spontaneous Magic and solid for other magi, or a Bad virtue that is usually useless. (I would rewrite the virtue so that the magus can employ one Charm per round using the same level of words and gestures used to cast the spell, including the round on which the spell is being cast, and does not need to wield the object associated with the Charm; this would make the virtue Excellent for magi who concentrate on Spontaneous Magic and solid for other magi.)

Story Magic: This major virtue allows a Merinita who has gone on an epic adventure to obtain a suitably legendary object and who spends a point of Confidence to gain some minor story benefits, which the GM is encouraged to nerf. Weak, maybe bad.

Symbolic Magic: The Merinita gains a new range, duration and target for ritual spells. He can also add charm bonuses to his Talisman. He can also use charms when designing invested devices, but this limits the effects to what the charms cover. Finally, he may design permanent Story and Arcadian Travel charms that can be handed to other people. Weak as written.

Spell Timing: This minor virtue provides some exceptionally useful spell durations. Awesome, maybe excellent.

Glamour: The Merinita can use Imaginem to create illusions that have substance, virtually eliminating the need for any other Form. However, they also gain Vulnerable Magic. Awesome, maybe excellent.

Perpetuity: The Merinita gains three new ritual durations that can last forever, but his Creo rituals can no longer have a permanent effect, and he cannot extract vis. Solid, maybe weak.

Nature Lore: There is no consensus about how this poorly-written virtue actually works. Awesome and more awesome if taken at face value, but many GMs will choose not to, and I find it hard to blame them.

Awakening: The Merinita can spend vis to grant Intelligence to something natural with Might. Weak.

Wilding: This major virtue allows a Merinita with Nature Lore to spend a season and produce twice his NL score in vis of any Form he wants, but that vis must be used immediately and cannot be used for any seasonal activity. Weak.

Guardian of Nature: The Merinita becomes like a genius locus of some natural place, but does not gain Might, continues to Warp, cannot study (and probably cannot perform lab work) and can be harmed either via Mentem spells or through damage to the location. This probably takes the character out of the saga. Solid for the right kind of character.

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Verditius

Enchant Casting Tools: The Verditius can spend a season and some vis to enchant the casting tools of a favored Formulaic spell and gain benefits similar to those of spell mastery. This is only effective on low level Formulaic spells. Weak, maybe solid.

Items of Quality: The Verditius can spend a season and a pawn of vis to grant an item a bonus equal to one of its S&M bonuses; the item remains mundane for the purposes of magic resistance. Craftsmen and hedge wizards would love a virtue of this kind, but Verditius magi are... magi. Weak, maybe bad.

Reforging Enchanted Items: The Verditius can repair enchanted items or render them into vis. This is a seasonal activity that can botch horribly. Weak.

Verditius Elder Runes: The Verditius can inscribe greater devices and talismans with up to two elder runes; each adds 5 to the base effect but allows the associated Art to be added again to the Lab Total; it is therefore useful only for a high Art score, typically greater than 10. Note that effects not governed by the rune do not get a bonus, but the base effect is still increased. Finally, the vis limit on any enchanted device increases from MT2 to MTPhilophiae. Solid, for an experienced magus.

Automata: The Verditius can spend lots of time and vis to create cantankerous automata that impress other Verditius magi and frivolous nobles, but are generally not very useful. Weak.

Bind Curse: The Verditius can enchant a device to inflict a Flaw upon its wielder. Note that any magus can enchant a device to kill its wielder, triggered by sunrise and sunset, just as Parma fails. Weak, maybe solid.

Bind Magical Creatures: The Verditius can use the Might of a captured magical critter instead of vis when enchanting an item, or steal one of its powers for himself. Note that some critters have powers that duplicate ritual effects or that allow variable effects similar to spontaneous magic, within a theme. Unlike Ablation, this is not Infernal. Awesome, though your GM is likely to send enraged eco-friendly terrorists your way.

Item Attunement: The Verditius can stuff a device with extra vis, gain Hubris and craft bonuses, but risk botches and Warping. There are other, better ways to get bonuses and stuff extra vis into an item. Weak.

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Wee! In general, I think the Criamon mysteries are the most atmospheric, very cool and flavorful, beautifully written, yet hedged with enough restrictions that I find myself almost wanting them and then thinking, "Grrrr." I am not apt! My adulteration looks like a munchkin! I like what Bjornaer get, straight and flexible and to the point.... but you cannot get any of it without losing the ability to bind a familiar. Merinita gets some weak mysteries, some very strong mysteries, some flavorful mysteries and some that are just there; what they don't get is sufficient editing for clarity (the fay are immune); the illusion mysteries are especially strong. House Verditius gets some interesting stuff, all of which fit squarely into their theme, but their best mystery toys lie outside their House, especially among the Hermetic Alchemy Mysteries.

Anyway,

Ken

[Verticius]

Ken,

Excellent critique. We could wrestle over your valuation of a few of these one step up or down, but by and large I agree with them when considering each virtue on it's own.

I think when taken in some combinations, though, there is a lot of synergy -- particularly with the Verditius Mysteries (for those magi) and if a storyguide or regular player devises a mystery cult that combines the right mix of Spirit Magic and Theurgical Mysteries, the potential is tremendous. Sprinkle liberally with a magical focus in spirits and add a Talisman mystery, well, Munchkinland here we come.

BTW, are you heading up to Tahoe for the Tribunal this August? It would sure be nice to have you up there.

-K!

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@Verticius

I think when taken in some combinations, though, there is a lot of synergy -- particularly with the Verditius Mysteries (for those magi) and if a storyguide or regular player devises a mystery cult that combines the right mix of Spirit Magic and Theurgical Mysteries, the potential is tremendous. Sprinkle liberally with a magical focus in spirits and add a Talisman mystery, well, Munchkinland here we come.

I am already including synergy (as I see it) in this, and assume that players can initiate any combination of these virtues, as they please, in order to leverage them best. I see this not as abusive or munchkinny but the way things should be, with magi doing their thing ICly.

Thus, I do not value Hermetic Theurgy in isolation, but assume that the magus will also have a Major Focus in Spirits and other virtues that attempt to leverage HT. This is a path not work taking even though the numbers at first seem droolworthy; I think I posted an analysis to these boards some time ago. This really isn't worth doing. It's even worth not doing.

Similarly, I assume that a magus who uses Astrology to get casting and lab totals will also have a high Artes Liberales score, Cautious with AL, and then, because Cautious with AL often makes Ceremonial Magic botchless, also take Mystical Choreography and LLSM. After all this, I think astrology remains a dubious investment.

Naturally, I assume that a magus going down the Alchemy path is a great enchanter but not necessarily a great caster of spells, but the opposite for those Living Ghosts and Daimonic Wannabees.

BTW, are you heading up to Tahoe for the Tribunal this August? It would sure be nice to have you up there.

-K!

Thank you for the thought, but I will not be there.

Anyway,

Ken

[ExarKun]

(Ovarwa, i find your reviews very interesting, especially because i can't read the criamon part of the HOHMC [it's so much boring in my eyes...]...). Could you do the same review (it's very interesting to confront opinion ^^) on the virtues from the corebook? especially the hermetic (major) ones

Exar Kun, off topic :p)

[YR7]

@Ovarwa

Here's my take on the Mystery Virtues. Since coolness is in the eye of the beholder, I evaluate only what the virtues do. In general, a virtue that is easy to use and/or provides a great benefit is better, while a virtue that provides little or no benefit or is difficult to set up is worse. Virtues that inflict extra botch dice tend to receive my disfavor.

Solid: This virtue is worth its cost, but isn't special.
Excellent: This is one of the better virtues available, and is especially useful for certain magi.
Awesome: This is one of the very best virtues in the game, worth designing a character around.

Weak: This virtue is almost worth its cost, but offers some benefits that might be worthwhile.
Bad: This virtue is not worth taking. Some players will want it anyway.
Terrible: This virtue is worth avoiding.

Wow, that's some impressive work there. Excellent categories, too.

Anyways, a few thoughts on your take...

Spell Binding: This virtue allows permanent effects without the need to create an item. It requires vis, an obedient spirit and a known ritual. When the spirit escapes (and what GM would resist this kind of story opportunity), it will be unhappy with you, as will its friends. Weak, unless you're a Goeticist, and unless I'm missing a particularly subtle use of the virtue.

I think the best use of this mystery is to cast permanent Mu or Re curses; finally, a Curse of Circe done right. However, I think getting the required spirits is rather hard and essentially means extra raw vis is wasted (you're binding them instead of rendering them). Not sure how useful this really is.

Performance Magic: Use an Ability instead of Hermetic words and gestures. Solid if you're a bardic magus, bad otherwise.

Well. hiding your casting is only really useful for magi that want to work subtle magic in mundane society IMHO; other magi and supernatural critters won't fail to notice you've cast a spell just because you haven't used Hermetic words and gestures, usually. Given that, I think other Abilities can be pretty useful; especially Charm, if it's on the list (can't remember), but also Hunt, Etiquette, and Carouse. Music is good too, but can be less so. Considering the standard Quiet Magic and Subtle Magic, however, I'd say this is still at best Solid.

Two things really bother me about this mystery: first, your use of the Ability doesn't matter, so you can end up telling very good jokes (Profession: Jester ?) and thereby drop a Weight of a Thousand Hells on everyone... I understand the mechanical reasoning of just replacing the words and gestures, but thematically it just doesn't work.

Also, the bit about martial abilities is weird. I can swiftly produce an intricate wooden carving (Craft: Carpenter ?), a masterful work of attention to detail and fine craftmanship, and still cast a spell - but I can't wield a sword effectively, at all, while casting one? It doesn't compute.

Planetary Magic: Not nearly as good as Puissant Magic Theory, with a narrow application and an opportunity to ruin an entire season in the lab. Terrible for most magi; weak for a magus who already has Cautious with Artes Liberales and a very high AL score.

Hmm, I haven't considered botching. Assuming lab safety specializations can remove that risk, I think it's Solid to Excellent - the right magus will regularly get a +5 bonus with it, which is more than Puissant Magic Theory.

Potent Magic: Grants bonuses that aren't nearly as good as a Focus, and allows the invention of Potent Spells, which don't work without their components (and can be learned by anyone). Bad.

What's bad about getting a +3 or +6 to your magic? Sure, it pales in comparison with Magical Focus, but what doesn't? MF is Awesome. I think this is Solid.

Also, potent spells fit rather nicely with Verditius magi, that use spell casting tokens anyways, and probably have high Magic Theory too. For them, I think this is probably an Excellent mystery.

Vulgar Magic: Allows a magus to risk blowing up his lab in order when creating charged and lesser devices, in order to slowly eke out minor Shape and Material Bonuses. Terrible.

That's an excellent summary.

Withstand Casting: How often does a magus ever lose more than one fatigue level when casting a spell? Worthless as written. Terrible.

He does when casting high-level rituals from a casting tablet, without Wizard's Communion. Which shouldn't be often at all. Terrible, I concur.

Hermetic Alchemy: This essentially provides an extra pawn of vis when distilling vis, and allows Vim vis to be traded for Form vis at 2:1. Weak for most magi. Solid for magi who distill vis all the time, or who for some reason cannot trade Vim vis through the usual channels.

I think this is even Bad - distilling raw vis is just not worth it, and the benefits of HA are minute and don't change that (although Verditius do benefit more from it). I think the proper way to think of HA is as a price to be paid for Philosophical Alchemy or the Greater Elixir.

Awesome, except in sagas where the GM will punish you for distilling vis, and there are quite a few of these.

There are? Seems rather silly to punish someone for performing a certain standard lab activity... I can see sagas where vis distilling is removed from the rules, since it's boring, but sagas that punish you for it are a rather new concept for me.

Lesser Elixir: Slowly accumulate bonuses for your own longevity ritual. Weak, since most LRs are already good enough.

Even Bad. Again, this is a price paid to get to the Great Elixir.

Periapt: Allows a magus who does not have a lab text for a charged device to still produce many charges in a season, provided the overall effect of each charge, including Penetration, is weak. This would be solid, except that the charged devices a magus would most want to create cannot be created with this virtue, and because using the already crippled virtue requires a stress roll that can ruin the season entirely. Weak.

Terrible. Why would anyone want to create weak items without a lab text? What, they have taken a vow against reading? This is really only useful for the first season, and assuming you can't get your hands on a lab text. It can have its uses, but spending time and gaining flaws to initiate this thing? No thank you.

Celestial Magic: This virtue expands the lab activities for which the bonuses of Planetary Magic and its botch opportunities apply. It also allows astrological durations that are usually shorter than Hermetic durations, that allow still more botch opportunities, yet are probably useful in niche circumstances. A few other marginal and dubious benefits are offered. Bad.

Well... again, I see this as providing an almost-straight +5 bonus to your lab total, and even casting totals for some spells. The limitations can be annoying, but still, I think it's an Excellent mystery.

Divination & Augury: Kind of like spontaneous Intellego, but requires its own pool of experience points. Weak.

Yep. Rules question - does non-ceremonial divination use only the Method(s) you know, or can you use any Method?

I repeat my suggestion to let Criamon initiate into Dream Interpretation, using Enigmatic Wisdom instead of Divination. That alternative is probably Solid for them, since they'll be increasing Enigmatic Wisdom anyway so it isn't a new experience sink.

Hermetic Empowerment: Allows a magus to invest ritual effects into an enchanted item. This is a unique ability, but requires a spirit and vis to set up. Solid, especially for magi with a MMF with spirits.

Creating those ritual invested powers costs more vis than casting the ritual (especially if the spirit's vis is considered), and only works for a few charges. I think that drops it to Weak, and I also think it's thematically not appropriate.

Invocation Magic: After getting both this virtue and Names of Power, a magus can spend lots of time learning spells that represent various Powers in order to gain some negligible bonus to casting scores (not totals) that cannot exceed MT and take time to accrue. Note that the GM is encouraged to inflict especially catastrophic botches for magi who actually try to use this. Terrible.

But so cool

Hermetic Theurgy: This virtue provides a whole bunch of very cool effects that are mostly not worth having, even for a character who also has a MMF with Spirits. Invoke the Spirit of (Spell) allows a magus to invent (or more rarely, learn) spells that require extra time to cast, are not likely to Penetrate, will fail whenever the GM wants them to, are subject to the usual level 50 rule, benefits little from Mastery and generally are not worth having, even considering the benefit of FFM that applies to the underlying effects, which is also less useful because Personal range doesn't affect the magus. Invoke the Spirit of (Form) is interesting, in that it allows variable spontaneous effects, but a character who acquires these at any useful level needs to design the character to take good advantage of this virtue, which is not worth doing. Invoke the Pact of (Daimon) allows interesting daimonic beings to be summoned, at the cost of lots of vis. Note that this virtue has surprisingly poor synergy with Goetic Magic. Bad for most magi, weak for magi who cannot cast spontaneous magic.

I think just the spontaneous spells make it Solid; come on, you can cast high-level spontaneous spells without fatigue! The formulaic-spell spirits are far less useful, although having FFM on utility spells is nice. The daimons are too much of a wild-card to evaluate, but are definitely an advantage also. I'd say this is a Solid virtue.

Theurgic Spirit Familiar: Like Spirit Familiar, but allows daimons too. Excellent.

It isn't clear what this means when you Ascend. I suggest it means you're part of the daimon's pantheon, subservient to him, and still get your Aspect-Familiar up there in the Hall of Heroes.

Ascendency to the Hall of Heroes: The most durable of the immortal magi in this book, the most difficult to achieve, and the one that will usually take the character out of the game by its very nature. No more lab work, no fatigue to power spells, Might does not recover on its own, cannot return to the same place for a full day after dissipation (which means that recovering Might takes the character out of the adventure for at least a day), and it's not clear whether the daimon can send Aspects where it wants in the absence of a (very expensive) summoning. Excellent, for ending a character's career as a PC in style. Bad for characters who want to continue their career as a magus.

I think RoPM said daimons regain Might and self-improve in the Magic Realm (slowly), no? I guess there is some ambiguity, at the least. At any rate, it's still Excellent/Bad

Hermetic Synthemata: This virtue allows a magus to spend lots of time learning spells for individual spirits, after spending more time in difficult research. Note that the magus doesn't know when he's finished. Better to spend 5xp and learn the thing's True Name; even Theurgists rarely need this, since their spells create a permanent AC. Terrible.

Not all things have a True Name. I can't see how basically getting a "MR doesn't count" advantage against any spirit you want, with a season's effort, can be considered anything below Solid, and very possible Excellent.

Hermetic Numerology: The Numerologist's book provides bonuses to numerology spells. It will probably become the magus' talisman, who will probably enchant it to change size to ease transport. Rotes are minor formulaic spells that do not need a stress die and have weak Penetration; these will need to be invented since there aren't many Numerologists around publicizing their spells. A magus has other ways to deal with this kind of issue, most of them superior to this. Weak.

I'd say even Bad. The rotes are nearly useless, and the other bonuses just won't be worth the initiation costs.

Hermetic Geometry: Grants a few new ranges and targets, which are eh. Still, more spellcasting options are always nice. Weak.

I can't see many scenarios where the added ranges will be really worthwhile. Not non-contrived ones, at least. As written, I'd say it is Bad, unless the SG allows you to use the ranges with Intellego magic, in which case it's Weak.

Hermetic Architecture: Allows enchantments on a massive scale, including boosting the Aura. Awesome for that NPC magus who lowest Art is 40. Terrible for anyone else.

It's still unique in allowing regio-level manipulations, though. If the massive-enchantments mechanics are corrected, this can be an interesting choice.

Dream Magic: This lets a magus enter dreams and do a few things that might occasionally be useful. Note that this does not allow Robert Jordan style travel through dream from one person to another. Weak.

That option is dearly missing. With good cause, I guess, but still. If it's added to The Greater Dream Grimoire, it makes it much more attractive.

I'd also note that it isn't clear why vanilla Hermetic magic apparently can't affect dreams in this way...

Also, I hate that Imaginem affects dreams. That's absolutely doesn't work; there are no species in dream. That everything is Mentem I can get, but not Imaginem.

The star here is the Alchemy Mystery, which is awesome for a Verditius or similar lab rat. Good synergy, good power, good grounding in real-world mythology about magic--the gold standard, as befitting alchemical virtues.

Rather poor grounding in mythology IMO, but otherwise - yes, Philosophic Alchemy and The Great Elixir are both excellent.

[YR7]

Moving on...

@Ovarwa

Theriomorphy: Lets a Bjornaer in human form gain a Quality or Virtue possessed by his Inner or Outer Heartbeast. Nothing stops him from having more than one of these at a time. The magus looks disturbing, and retaining virtues and qualities for too long incurs Warping. Great utility, and Qualities such as Tireless offer raw power even to a magus. There are some weirdnesses here: A Bjornaer can manifest Large Claws but not wings. Excellent, maybe even Awesome.

I don't get why getting a few Qualities is Awesome. Sure, if your heartbeast is right you can get a perk or two that will be good even for a magus. But it's so... random. You probably didn't choose your heartbeast just for its Qualities, after all. And Bjornaer will be in their heartbeast form lots of the time anyways. No, I can't see this as anything beyond Weak.

A Great Beast does not get to continue his career as a magus, and probably is out of the game.

Yes. The rules are unclear here.

The Mystery of the Chimera: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast that is a hybrid animal, like a Griffin, combining the best traits of each. Flaw and immortality like the epitome. Solid, almost weak.

Can be rather cool, but also effective - combining (say) both flight and large claws.

The Mystery of the Anima: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast whose flesh becomes an elemental form, such as fire, shadow, earth or whatever. Flaw and Immortality like the epitome. Weak, almost solid.
[/quote]
Being made out of shadow or fire has advantages, I think the Anima is at least Solid.

And since all Refinements depend on an Inner Heartbeast, and refinements are Awesome...

Spiritual Nourishment: A Criamon has the ability to meditate instead of eating, drinking and sleeping. He also stops aging, but does gain Warping Points. These abilities don't work well in Dominion and Infernal Auras. It is not clear whether a magus who starts to age because of being in such Auras do so based on their chronological age or their age when their aging stopped (I'd rule the latter). Excellent in a long saga, solid otherwise.

Solid in a long saga, Weak at best otherwise. Deprivation hardly ever comes up, and longevity rituals convert aging to warping just fine.

The Microcosm: The magus gains an AC to mundane places he has been and mundane things he has touched that are in a mundane place, provided he has a good memory of them. This makes what would otherwise be an incredible ability useless except in mundane auras. 'Creative' GMs are likely to require a stress die when remembering, and to impose interesting side effects when these rolls botch. Weak, maybe solid.

Combined with a good Art of Memory and a few memory spells, this can be very effective - but not much more than simply picking up arcane connections. I'd say Weak.

True Sight: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity and Second Sight, but makes a Vow to act like a Criamon. Weak, maybe solid.

I think solid, at the least. Magic Sensitivity and Second Sight are effective, and not always replicable with Hermetic magic.

The Eater of Sin: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity, but without the penalty, and with a single type of weapon (not the whole skill), at the cost of Blatant Gift. Few magi really need to use weapons, and Criamon on the Path of Strife have difficulty wearing armor, making weapons even less useful. Weak.

I think magi on the path of strife will wield greatswords, as you note below, and this will make this rather useful. They'll get the issue of armor. Also, Magic Sensitivity is effective in of itself. I think this is Solid.

Alluring to (Beings): Gain +3 to Com and Pre rolls with one of mundane animals, Magical beings or Faeries. A magus must either have the Gentle Gift or be inoffensive to the chosen beings. Oddly, magi are considered magical beings, though Parma resists automatically. Solid for the right kind of magus, bad for most.

Solid for the kind of characters that will be interested in something like this - so, just Solid.

Enchanting (Ability): Like Enchanting Music, but using a different Ability. Bad.

Why is Enchanting Music a bad virtue? I think it's a Solid one.

Arcadian Travel: The Merinita can design and use charms that let him travel faerie trods. Unfortunately, the rules are silent about how long this travel takes, though activating the charm takes 10 minutes. This is a difficult ability to use because the totals needed are often very high, and involve a mundane Ability; magi already have other ways to travel quickly. Weak, maybe bad.

IIRC, this mystery allows you to reach places in regios and arcadia, which are hard to reach otherwise. This makes it Solid IMO.

Becoming: The Merinita becomes a Faerie. It is difficult for a magus of even moderate ability to perform these rituals, and his ability to perform magic is curtailed even by the standards of immortal magi. Weak.

If your group allows partial transofmation, you can stop aging without accruing more Warping at little cost to your magic. Then, it's Awesome.

Story Magic: This major virtue allows a Merinita who has gone on an epic adventure to obtain a suitably legendary object and who spends a point of Confidence to gain some minor story benefits, which the GM is encouraged to nerf. Weak, maybe bad.

But cool.

Symbolic Magic: The Merinita gains a new range, duration and target for ritual spells. He can also add charm bonuses to his Talisman. He can also use charms when designing invested devices, but this limits the effects to what the charms cover. Finally, he may design permanent Story and Arcadian Travel charms that can be handed to other people. Weak as written.

Huh? The range allows you to affect an unseen target without an arcane connection! Awesome! Too awesome - game breaking. This mystery should probably be broken down, and the stronger options left as a crowning Major mystery of the path.

Spell Timing: This minor virtue provides some exceptionally useful spell durations. Awesome, maybe excellent.

But annoying.

Glamour: The Merinita can use Imaginem to create illusions that have substance, virtually eliminating the need for any other Form. However, they also gain Vulnerable Magic. Awesome, maybe excellent.

And ugly. There is a reason other Forms exist, just uniting them into one Form makes a mockery of the whole magic system. Oh well, faeries.

Nature Lore: There is no consensus about how this poorly-written virtue actually works. Awesome and more awesome if taken at face value, but many GMs will choose not to, and I find it hard to blame them.

What's the confusion, again? Seems rather straighforward to me. Many GMs will indeed probably not work this as written, though, but as written I'd say it's just Excellent. Good for the right magus, but difficult to set up (need a high Nature Lore ability, and to have a good home-locale).

Awakening: The Merinita can spend vis to grant Intelligence to something natural with Might. Weak.

Notice this can kinda work as a surrogate Familiar for a Bjornaer.

Guardian of Nature: The Merinita becomes like a genius locus of some natural place, but does not gain Might, continues to Warp, cannot study (and probably cannot perform lab work) and can be harmed either via Mentem spells or through damage to the location. This probably takes the character out of the saga. Solid for the right kind of character.

Solid?! How is this any different than secluding yourself in your lab and writing limmericks? Cool flavor, but you get NOTHING. And you don't even get immortality out of this deal. Yeesh.

I think the Warping needs to be dropped from this. Then this gives you a "time out", where you hardly progress but you keep on living, possibly eternally, as a genius locus. Either that, or have the maga be stuck as a genius locus upon reaching Warping 10; that will at least make it a path to immortality, of sorts.

Reforging Enchanted Items: The Verditius can repair enchanted items or render them into vis. This is a seasonal activity that can botch horribly. Weak.

But can be very useful in a vis-poor saga.

Automata: The Verditius can spend lots of time and vis to create cantankerous automata that impress other Verditius magi and frivolous nobles, but are generally not very useful. Weak.

Very weak, and complicated too.

Bind Curse: The Verditius can enchant a device to inflict a Flaw upon its wielder. Note that any magus can enchant a device to kill its wielder, triggered by sunrise and sunset, just as Parma fails. Weak, maybe solid.

I rule that Parma takes time to fail, so you can erect another on Twilight while the other one still works, just like you can with Sun duration spells.
But yeah, inflicting a measly Flaw on someone? Bah. That's for hedge wizards. Magi kill, dominate, burn down his whole city - not lay a measly curse. Weak, weak.

Bind Magical Creatures: The Verditius can use the Might of a captured magical critter instead of vis when enchanting an item, or steal one of its powers for himself. Note that some critters have powers that duplicate ritual effects or that allow variable effects similar to spontaneous magic, within a theme. Unlike Ablation, this is not Infernal. Awesome, though your GM is likely to send enraged eco-friendly terrorists your way.

Also very suitable for any magus involved in Hermetic Empowerment, flavor-wise.

Item Attunement: The Verditius can stuff a device with extra vis, gain Hubris and craft bonuses, but risk botches and Warping. There are other, better ways to get bonuses and stuff extra vis into an item. Weak.

There aren't many ways to stuff a device with extra vis, and this is rather important for a Veritius. It's also risky, but effective. I'd say at least Solid.

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@ExarKun

(Ovarwa, i find your reviews very interesting, especially because i can't read the criamon part of the HOHMC [it's so much boring in my eyes...]...). Could you do the same review (it's very interesting to confront opinion ^^) on the virtues from the corebook? especially the hermetic (major) ones

Exar Kun, off topic :p)

There's a lot of complex stuff being said in the Criamon section, yeah. As for the core virtues, I think I did a writeup once in the way back when.

I generally disdain Diedne Magic (with virtues like this, who needs flaws; it really isn't very good), Elemental Magic (choose an element and a technique instead and optimize) and Secondary Magic (I'd rather have Book-Learner). I generally love Puissant MT, Puissant Parma, Affinity with Art (taken twice for a TeFo), Magic Focus, Book-Learner (only in a saga I expect to run for a long time or that used detailed character creation), Puissant Art (taken for the TeFo that has the Affinity), Cyclic Magic (taken seasonally; spend at least two seasons reading and up to two seasons in the field or lab), Good Parens (60xp!!! 30 spell lvls!!!). I like Flawless Magic, LLSM (need to be careful with this one, which deprecates it) and Cautious with Finesse (think about it). I'm ok with FFM (maybe ok+), Silent/Subtle, Deft Form, Cautious Sorcerer, Inventive Genius (Puissant MT is far superior). Mythic Blood is weak, as is Gentle Gift (which would be strong, except most GMs allow and even encourage players to ignore the effects of the Gift), Mercurian Magic (can be ok, but requires careful design work to make it shine), Life Boost (a magus with an optimized TeFo and Focus doesn't need this) and the four House Outer Mysteries, on their own. Strong Faerie Magic is surprisingly good.

I'm also very much of the belief that most parens will ICly help their apprentices optimize Arts. That Flambeau who wants his buddies to be impressed with his apprentice knows that only two Arts matter: CrIg. The apprentice who Penetrates most with the biggest fire first wins; he can learn the gay (I'm speaking for the Flambeau here, who likely have a very medieval idea about flaming, so cool it) Arts later. The high Creo score has other uses too. That Guernicus who emerges from Gauntlet with InMe and nothing else is fine! Etc. A master who sends a new magus into the world with 10 in each Art is stupid, and is doing his apprentice a grave disservice. Magi know well that raising Arts from 0 to 5 is trivial, but the real work is getting an Art to 20. A great master sends apprentices into the world who are good at something.

Anyway,

Ken

[Xavi]

This is why I liked the rules that someone posted a while ago where in apprenticeship you get ZERO in each art, and then a total in a couple arts.

+15 in a single art (120xp under XP system)
+10 in 2 arts (110)
+5 in 8 arts (120)

You could chose which one of the combos above you preferred. It also marks that a magus will always excel in a certain area above others and is way less time consuming (and powergamer-friendly) when building a character.

Cheers,
Xavi

[mean_liar]

A few personal notes on Verditius:

Minor Magical Focus (shape/material) is obviously the lead Virtue. Puissant Magic Theory, Minor Potent Magic, Planetary Magic, Inventive Genius provide static Lab Total bonuses of +3 apiece (or higher, for Puissant MT). Affinity with Magic Theory is probably too good to pass up.

Together you're looking at five Minor Virtues that collectively, for a magus with 5s in all Arts, allow one to generate Lab Totals in the 50s regardless of TeFo combination. It'd be one case where one TeFo combination isn't really necessary.

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@YR7

Excellent categories, too.

Thanks. I was thinking to maybe grade each one numerically, based on "how many seasons is it worth losing to acquire this virtue?" but that was too hard.

Anyways, a few thoughts on your take...

I think the best use of this mystery is to cast permanent Mu or Re curses; finally, a Curse of Circe done right. However, I think getting the required spirits is rather hard and essentially means extra raw vis is wasted (you're binding them instead of rendering them). Not sure how useful this really is.

Well, a character optimized to get any use from Spell Binding ought to have no trouble finding and commanding spirits. ReVi lvl 40 says, "Ooh, there's a lake; gimme that lake spirit! Ooh, there's a fire; gimme that fire spirit! Ooh, there's a book, gimme that book spirit!" The Goetic Art of Summoning can also scour up stuff, and it's not even Infernal.

Well. hiding your casting is only really useful for magi that want to work subtle magic in mundane society IMHO;

Or while doing something else at the same time! slow grin I just thought of this one: Try Brawl! A magus gets to fight while casting spells! Two actions at once! Take it with a weapon that provides good initiative, go first and smack em with both a weapon and a spell! How about a Criamon on the Path of Strife, taking this for Enigmatic Wisdom? He can cast spells during his labyrinth meditations... and while putting out the smackdown with his Greatsword. Magi usually have suckful initiative. I think this one deserves a solid solid.

other magi and supernatural critters won't fail to notice you've cast a spell just because you haven't used Hermetic words and gestures, usually. Given that, I think other Abilities can be pretty useful; especially Charm, if it's on the list

I don't remember the mechanics for that offhand, but... are you sure?

(can't remember), but also Hunt, Etiquette, and Carouse. Music is good too, but can be less so. Considering the standard Quiet Magic and Subtle Magic, however, I'd say this is still at best Solid.

grin I think that's what I said.

Two things really bother me about this mystery: first, your use of the Ability doesn't matter, so you can end up telling very good jokes (Profession: Jester ?) and thereby drop a Weight of a Thousand Hells on everyone... I understand the mechanical reasoning of just replacing the words and gestures, but thematically it just doesn't work.

I do see what you mean. But I see this as a more general problem with Hermetic Magic. It is no harder to create rain in a desert than in England....

Also, the bit about martial abilities is weird. I can swiftly produce an intricate wooden carving (Craft: Carpenter ?), a masterful work of attention to detail and fine craftmanship, and still cast a spell - but I can't wield a sword effectively, at all, while casting one? It doesn't compute.

Oops, you pre-empted me. Hmm. If the mechanic was explicitly nerfed for combat abilities, it is probably because of the stuff I described above. AM has a lot of nerfing of the small stuff, while ignoring some of the larger issues (Hermetic Magic and interaction with spirits is terribly thought out, imnvho; spirit magic ought to be its own thing, foul sorcery that is mostly alien to magi practicing the wholesome, natural goodness of Bonisagus' legacy.)

Hmm, I haven't considered botching. Assuming lab safety specializations can remove that risk, I think it's Solid to Excellent - the right magus will regularly get a +5 bonus with it, which is more than Puissant Magic Theory.

Lab safety specializations don't help much here. They help with experimentation, not with AL rolls. I already assume that the guy going down this path has Cautious with AL. But the roll in question doesn't benefit from any other reduction in botch dice--check it out; to gain that +5 bonus requires a total of 15 (your Int+Astrology is how big? is it really worth your time to have AL 8?) and still risks 3 botch dice. Here's another way to look at it: Unless your AL is huge, say, 10, which itself is a Bad use of xp, there are two kinds of seasons: In some seasons, the +5 bonus doesn't matter, so this virtue was worthless. In the other seasons, the +5 bonus is important, and you lose a season if you don't hit your target of 15. This is not a good virtue. It requires a lot of set-up and is not reliable. There are better ways to boost Lab Totals.

What's bad about getting a +3 or +6 to your magic? Sure, it pales in comparison with Magical Focus, but what doesn't? MF is Awesome. I think this is Solid.

I'll stand by Bad for Potent Magic. For a Minor Hermetic Virtue, I can get +3 to an entire Form. For a Minor Hermetic Virtue, I can get +3 for half the year. Sure, +6 is nice, except investing a major virtue for it when there are better alternatives is Bad. That said, there's always going to be that magus whose focus is so perfect for him, that the +6 in it is good. But it's generally Bad.

Also, potent spells fit rather nicely with Verditius magi, that use spell casting tokens anyways, and probably have high Magic Theory too. For them, I think this is probably an Excellent mystery.

Except that Potent spells must be specifically invented to be used with specific items, and don't work without them, whereas Verditius casting tools are cheap and quick to make. Got another ruby? Except that a Verditius magus can ordinarily simply learn regular Formulaic spells, of which there are many in the Order, rather than search for or invent a Potent spell. I place a high value on being able to learn standard spells rather than have to invent your own from scratch.

Vulgar Magic: Allows a magus to risk blowing up his lab in order when creating charged and lesser devices, in order to slowly eke out minor Shape and Material Bonuses. Terrible.

That's an excellent summary.

grin

Hermetic Alchemy: This essentially provides an extra pawn of vis when distilling vis, and allows Vim vis to be traded for Form vis at 2:1. Weak for most magi. Solid for magi who distill vis all the time, or who for some reason cannot trade Vim vis through the usual channels.

I think this is even Bad - distilling raw vis is just not worth it, and the benefits of HA are minute and don't change that (although Verditius do benefit more from it). I think the proper way to think of HA is as a price to be paid for Philosophical Alchemy or the Greater Elixir.

A magus who is good at distilling vis can make it worthwhile. Some sagas keep vis in short supply, and every pawn is precious. considers I should note that I am assuming the brain-dead Aura rules in RoP:M are not used. If they are, distilling vis is a High Crime.

Awesome, except in sagas where the GM will punish you for distilling vis, and there are quite a few of these.

There are? Seems rather silly to punish someone for performing a certain standard lab activity... I can see sagas where vis distilling is removed from the rules, since it's boring, but sagas that punish you for it are a rather new concept for me.

Check out the RoP:M section about Auras. The upshot of those rules is "there's no such thing as a stable magic Aura, and if you distill vis you will destroy your covenant." But even before those rules came out, there have been quite a few people who believe that distilling vis should ruin your covenant's Aura. I'm very much not of that school. Distilling vis, if anything, increases the Aura, as does any continued magical activity. Drill, baby, drill!

Lesser Elixir: Slowly accumulate bonuses for your own longevity ritual. Weak, since most LRs are already good enough.

Even Bad. Again, this is a price paid to get to the Great Elixir.

Maybe even bad. Except... this can be interesting for a magus whose LR Lab Total isn't very good. Lesser Elixir changes that. But still, yeah, you're probably right. Bad.

Periapt: Allows a magus who does not have a lab text for a charged device to still produce many charges in a season, provided the overall effect of each charge, including Penetration, is weak. This would be solid, except that the charged devices a magus would most want to create cannot be created with this virtue, and because using the already crippled virtue requires a stress roll that can ruin the season entirely. Weak.

Terrible. Why would anyone want to create weak items without a lab text? What, they have taken a vow against reading? This is really only useful for the first season, and assuming you can't get your hands on a lab text. It can have its uses, but spending time and gaining flaws to initiate this thing? No thank you.

I'll send it to Bad, but not Terrible. The guy with Periapt can probably produce items of lvl 25 or 30. Being able to produce something weird to hand to each grog for a specific adventure has a real place. But yeah, Bad. considers Maybe Terrible.

Celestial Magic: This virtue expands the lab activities for which the bonuses of Planetary Magic and its botch opportunities apply. It also allows astrological durations that are usually shorter than Hermetic durations, that allow still more botch opportunities, yet are probably useful in niche circumstances. A few other marginal and dubious benefits are offered. Bad.

Well... again, I see this as providing an almost-straight +5 bonus to your lab total, and even casting totals for some spells. The limitations can be annoying, but still, I think it's an Excellent mystery.

Try using it. The xps and virtues invested are way too much. And lab safety stuff does not apply! An unreliable bonus that can blow up in your face... with virtues like this, who needs flaws?

I repeat my suggestion to let Criamon initiate into Dream Interpretation, using Enigmatic Wisdom instead of Divination. That alternative is probably Solid for them, since they'll be increasing Enigmatic Wisdom anyway so it isn't a new experience sink.

Agreed. Which path would you put it on?

Hermetic Empowerment: Allows a magus to invest ritual effects into an enchanted item. This is a unique ability, but requires a spirit and vis to set up. Solid, especially for magi with a MMF with spirits.

Creating those ritual invested powers costs more vis than casting the ritual (especially if the spirit's vis is considered), and only works for a few charges. I think that drops it to Weak, and I also think it's thematically not appropriate.

I'm not worrying about theme much; that's in the eye of the beholder. For a goodly sized spirit, it doesn't cost extra vis. Imprisoning a level 30 spirit involves the use of 6 pawns. Installing a level 20 ritual costs 4. I can now invoke the ritual 6 times, which would ordinarily cost 24 pawns. This is a net gain of 14 pawns. If this is a Talisman--and it should be--I can increase my benefit by imprisoning relatively more spirits than I install rituals. What's not solid about this?

Invocation Magic: After getting both this virtue and Names of Power, a magus can spend lots of time learning spells that represent various Powers in order to gain some negligible bonus to casting scores (not totals) that cannot exceed MT and take time to accrue. Note that the GM is encouraged to inflict especially catastrophic botches for magi who actually try to use this. Terrible.

But so cool

Yes. I keep trying to make theurgy work, because it's kind of cool. But no. Hermetic Magic and spirits combine to either be broken (in the sense of literally breaking the way the world should work) or weak.

I think just the spontaneous spells make it Solid; come on, you can cast high-level spontaneous spells without fatigue! The formulaic-spell spirits are far less useful, although having FFM on utility spells is nice. The daimons are too much of a wild-card to evaluate, but are definitely an advantage also. I'd say this is a Solid virtue.

I initially thought so too. But consider. You will have to invent your own spells. So your lab total needs to be four times the level of the spontaneous spells you obtain. Now, Lab Totals do gain all kinds of good bonuses, but still. Four times. Those high-level spontaneous spells aren't going to be as high as you might expect. Then, you have to invent a new spell for each TeFo you want; worse, you need a new spell for each unique set of requisites you need. That's a whole lot of work.

Now, a magus might take a Focus with Spirits and then Theurgy rocks, right? Well, no. Said magus does better to simply learn lots of ReVi. Then he learns some very standard spells to summon and command spirits; summoning is a mere level 40, but I'd take it to 45 for Sun. Between the focus and the automatic AC, it will Penetrate. There are usually spirits around too. But if there are not.... get a great summa on Magic Lore. Spring for the best, you'll want it. Quality 15 level 4 ought to be achievable, maybe even better. You have Book-Learner, right? That's 18xps/season. An Affinity with Magic Lore instead of that crappy Theurgy stuff? Ok. So a season reading this book produces 27xps, all of which go toward deducing the True Names of cool and powerful spirits--not Daimons--that can be summoned without a ritual. That's 5 spirits, with 2xps left over (to be used for the next season of learning spirit names). This causes 5xps to be devoted to Magic Lore. So there's plenty of reading to be gained from this summa; it'll be 50 spirits before this magus reaches ML4. Now, these spirits are far more useful than those spell spirits. Why? Because they have real spirit powers, some of which offer non-Hermetic effects, some of which offer ritual effects, some of which offer far better spontaneous magic than those spell-spirits. They can also fight for you, teach you, chat with you...

There's your Hermetic Theurgist, sans Hermetic Theurgy. Five spirits per season. Not limited to spell-spirits. Groovy.

With a cooperative GM, this might be my next character. Aff+Pui ReVi, Major Focus: Spirits, Book-Learner, Puissant MT, Affinity with ML... Spirit Familiar, Inscription on the Soul....

Theurgic Spirit Familiar: Like Spirit Familiar, but allows daimons too. Excellent.

It isn't clear what this means when you Ascend. I suggest it means you're part of the daimon's pantheon, subservient to him, and still get your Aspect-Familiar up there in the Hall of Heroes.

Or it might mean that you are the daimon's lover, or beloved rival or whatever the relationship happens to be.

I think RoPM said daimons regain Might and self-improve in the Magic Realm (slowly), no? I guess there is some ambiguity, at the least. At any rate, it's still Excellent/Bad

The daimon itself loses no Might when an Aspect loses its Might. The Daimon can have many, many Aspects. Harming the Aspect does nothing to the Daimon.

Hermetic Synthemata: This virtue allows a magus to spend lots of time learning spells for individual spirits, after spending more time in difficult research. Note that the magus doesn't know when he's finished. Better to spend 5xp and learn the thing's True Name; even Theurgists rarely need this, since their spells create a permanent AC. Terrible.

Not all things have a True Name. I can't see how basically getting a "MR doesn't count" advantage against any spirit you want, with a season's effort, can be considered anything below Solid, and very possible Excellent.

Because it doesn't really work that way; one season of effort is quite likely to produce nothing at all. Also, because a Theurgist worth his salt is going to Penetrate MR no matter what. Consider: To summon a spirit he already needs an AC, which provides a Penetration multiplier. For spell-spirits and daimons, that is always a True Name, which is a very good Penetration multiplier. A Theurgist who wants more Penetration might consider Life-Boost, or even Charm Magic!!! (Charm Magic ftw.)

I'd say even Bad. The rotes are nearly useless, and the other bonuses just won't be worth the initiation costs.

Probably, though I place a high value on not botching. Hence my higher rating.

Hermetic Geometry: Grants a few new ranges and targets, which are eh. Still, more spellcasting options are always nice. Weak.

I can't see many scenarios where the added ranges will be really worthwhile. Not non-contrived ones, at least. As written, I'd say it is Bad, unless the SG allows you to use the ranges with Intellego magic, in which case it's Weak.

I can see Bad.

Hermetic Architecture: Allows enchantments on a massive scale, including boosting the Aura. Awesome for that NPC magus who lowest Art is 40. Terrible for anyone else.

It's still unique in allowing regio-level manipulations, though. If the massive-enchantments mechanics are corrected, this can be an interesting choice.

Yes. Meanwhile.... Correction: Awesome for that immortal NPC magus whose lowest Art is 40.

I'd also note that it isn't clear why vanilla Hermetic magic apparently can't affect dreams in this way...

No guideline for stepping into a dream.

Also, I hate that Imaginem affects dreams. That's absolutely doesn't work; there are no species in dream. That everything is Mentem I can get, but not Imaginem.

Point.

Now, if the writeup suggested that there is a dream world to which people travel in spirit, there could be species.

Anyway,

Ken

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@Xavi

This is why I liked the rules that someone posted a while ago where in apprenticeship you get ZERO in each art, and then a total in a couple arts.

+15 in a single art (120xp under XP system)
+10 in 2 arts (110)
+5 in 8 arts (120)

You could chose which one of the combos above you preferred. It also marks that a magus will always excel in a certain area above others and is way less time consuming (and powergamer-friendly) when building a character.

Cheers,
Xavi

That was me.

But there were 10 points to spend, and virtues could provide more points. This allowed +10 in 3 Arts and +5 in one, or +5 in ten Arts. A Tremere could spend two virtue points to get his tines, +10 in four Arts.

These rules came with an alternate xp progression for Arts, which were an important component of that system.

Anyway,

Ken

[mean_liar]

Positive Safety scores subtract dice from "all laboratory activities". Considering the ties between the Planetary Magic and your Lab I don't think it would be a major stretch to have that Safety rating apply to your Laboratory Horoscope.

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@YR7

Moving on...

@Ovarwa

Theriomorphy: Lets a Bjornaer in human form gain a Quality or Virtue possessed by his Inner or Outer Heartbeast. Nothing stops him from having more than one of these at a time. The magus looks disturbing, and retaining virtues and qualities for too long incurs Warping. Great utility, and Qualities such as Tireless offer raw power even to a magus. There are some weirdnesses here: A Bjornaer can manifest Large Claws but not wings. Excellent, maybe even Awesome.

I don't get why getting a few Qualities is Awesome. Sure, if your heartbeast is right you can get a perk or two that will be good even for a magus. But it's so... random. You probably didn't choose your heartbeast just for its Qualities, after all. And Bjornaer will be in their heartbeast form lots of the time anyways. No, I can't see this as anything beyond Weak.

For a Bjornaer who is always in his Heartbeast, it is weak. But for a Bjornaer who is not, it can be very strong. Some of the Qualities are boring, but some are very nice to have. Tireless? The keen sense Qualities (manifest them all for an effective +6 to all Perception).

A Great Beast does not get to continue his career as a magus, and probably is out of the game.

Yes. The rules are unclear here.

The flavor text is clearer. Great Beasts show up very rarely, the last around 50 years ago.

The Mystery of the Chimera: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast that is a hybrid animal, like a Griffin, combining the best traits of each. Flaw and immortality like the epitome. Solid, almost weak.

Can be rather cool, but also effective - combining (say) both flight and large claws.

I think that combo is less good than the benefits of looking like a normal animal, getting a mythic roll and improving a characteristic.

The Mystery of the Anima: The Bjornaer gains an Inner Heartbeast whose flesh becomes an elemental form, such as fire, shadow, earth or whatever. Flaw and Immortality like the epitome. Weak, almost solid.

Being made out of shadow or fire has advantages, I think the Anima is at least Solid.
[/quote]
Eh. The probablem is that it's always on. A lot of the Bjornaer advantage is that he shows up as a normal animal. A beautiful normal animal is still an animal. But a chimera and especially one of these.... Meh.

And since all Refinements depend on an Inner Heartbeast, and refinements are Awesome...

Yes, but I considered that separately.

Spiritual Nourishment: A Criamon has the ability to meditate instead of eating, drinking and sleeping. He also stops aging, but does gain Warping Points. These abilities don't work well in Dominion and Infernal Auras. It is not clear whether a magus who starts to age because of being in such Auras do so based on their chronological age or their age when their aging stopped (I'd rule the latter). Excellent in a long saga, solid otherwise.

Solid in a long saga, Weak at best otherwise. Deprivation hardly ever comes up, and longevity rituals convert aging to warping just fine.

I hate rolling dice. If the Aging Table did not have that 13, I'd agree with you. Though on reflection, I amend: Excellent in a long saga, bad otherwise, since aging rolls might never happen.

True Sight: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity and Second Sight, but makes a Vow to act like a Criamon. Weak, maybe solid.

I think solid, at the least. Magic Sensitivity and Second Sight are effective, and not always replicable with Hermetic magic.

Maybe solid. Sure.

The Eater of Sin: The Criamon can use Enigmatic Wisdom as Magic Sensitivity, but without the penalty, and with a single type of weapon (not the whole skill), at the cost of Blatant Gift. Few magi really need to use weapons, and Criamon on the Path of Strife have difficulty wearing armor, making weapons even less useful. Weak.

I think magi on the path of strife will wield greatswords, as you note below, and this will make this rather useful. They'll get the issue of armor. Also, Magic Sensitivity is effective in of itself. I think this is Solid.

I think it's Weak. Armor is a problem, and magi tend not to need weapons. This also doesn't even apply to an entire combat skill. Meh.

Alluring to (Beings): Gain +3 to Com and Pre rolls with one of mundane animals, Magical beings or Faeries. A magus must either have the Gentle Gift or be inoffensive to the chosen beings. Oddly, magi are considered magical beings, though Parma resists automatically. Solid for the right kind of magus, bad for most.

Solid for the kind of characters that will be interested in something like this - so, just Solid.

Most GMs ignore the Gift, and even ignore social abilities and scores, in favor of roleplay. So the right kind of magus is not just interested in social abilities but has a GM who enforces these stats.

Enchanting (Ability): Like Enchanting Music, but using a different Ability. Bad.

Why is Enchanting Music a bad virtue? I think it's a Solid one.

Because it won't Penetrate, requires a pool of xps and simple ReMe is so much easier. Deft Form Mentem ftw. Or Performance Magic.

Arcadian Travel: The Merinita can design and use charms that let him travel faerie trods. Unfortunately, the rules are silent about how long this travel takes, though activating the charm takes 10 minutes. This is a difficult ability to use because the totals needed are often very high, and involve a mundane Ability; magi already have other ways to travel quickly. Weak, maybe bad.

IIRC, this mystery allows you to reach places in regios and arcadia, which are hard to reach otherwise. This makes it Solid IMO.

If you make the difficult roll. There are other ways to do this, and if the story demands such a way, the GM will include it.

Becoming: The Merinita becomes a Faerie. It is difficult for a magus of even moderate ability to perform these rituals, and his ability to perform magic is curtailed even by the standards of immortal magi. Weak.

If your group allows partial transofmation, you can stop aging without accruing more Warping at little cost to your magic. Then, it's Awesome.

I stand corrected! Transforming the Body alone, ftw! Awesome.

This combines nicely with Mythic Blood and with Weak Spontaneous Magic, but poorly with Strong Faerie Blood.

Story Magic: This major virtue allows a Merinita who has gone on an epic adventure to obtain a suitably legendary object and who spends a point of Confidence to gain some minor story benefits, which the GM is encouraged to nerf. Weak, maybe bad.

But cool.

I'll change this to Bad, maybe Terrible. But cool.

Symbolic Magic: The Merinita gains a new range, duration and target for ritual spells. He can also add charm bonuses to his Talisman. He can also use charms when designing invested devices, but this limits the effects to what the charms cover. Finally, he may design permanent Story and Arcadian Travel charms that can be handed to other people. Weak as written.

Huh? The range allows you to affect an unseen target without an arcane connection! Awesome! Too awesome - game breaking. This mystery should probably be broken down, and the stronger options left as a crowning Major mystery of the path.

Yawn. It's a great effect that costs vis and a lot of setup, so it won't be done all that often. Hmm. It's also not usually that hard to get an AC. Maybe solid because of the high powered parameters.

But Yes, I'd like to see this broken down. This virtue has a lot of stuff that I'd want to combine differently.

Glamour: The Merinita can use Imaginem to create illusions that have substance, virtually eliminating the need for any other Form. However, they also gain Vulnerable Magic. Awesome, maybe excellent.

And ugly. There is a reason other Forms exist, just uniting them into one Form makes a mockery of the whole magic system. Oh well, faeries.

This is my thought about summoning spirits easily. Way back when I was on Berklist, I said that I considered the whole of Hermetic Magic to be a kind of glamour.

Nature Lore: There is no consensus about how this poorly-written virtue actually works. Awesome and more awesome if taken at face value, but many GMs will choose not to, and I find it hard to blame them.

What's the confusion, again? Seems rather straighforward to me. Many GMs will indeed probably not work this as written, though, but as written I'd say it's just Excellent. Good for the right magus, but difficult to set up (need a high Nature Lore ability, and to have a good home-locale).

No, no, no. You want but don't need a good home-locale, except to the extent that your locale has to be natural enough for Nature Lore to work at all. But once you have this, the virtue provides free vis every season. It gives you Area Lore for the kind of nature specified, not just your home terrain. You can command and befriend denizens, ignoring social effects of the Gift. These denizens include the fluffy bunnies, but also the lezhy and the witch and the holy hermit deep in the forest... You can reach out with the Force. It's not just your home region. If you have Forest Lore, this works in any forest, though less effectively. It gives and gives and gives. Target any part of the mountain range as though I have an AC to it? Yes please. The dragon beneath the mountain is compelled to obey me and follow my commands faithfully? And I can communicate my wishes telepathically? Yes please. And more.

This Ability is so good that you want a high Nature Lore score. At Nature Lore 9, the Merinita of the Priepet Marsh owns it. At Nature Lore 12, she owns all the marshes. How about them Alps?

And it's terribly, terribly written. Forest Lore... ok, that let's me deal with the denizens of the forest, but the rules explicitly allow me to take Animal Lore...

Awakening: The Merinita can spend vis to grant Intelligence to something natural with Might. Weak.

Notice this can kinda work as a surrogate Familiar for a Bjornaer.

Meh. Such beings can be found. And... no cords.

Guardian of Nature: The Merinita becomes like a genius locus of some natural place, but does not gain Might, continues to Warp, cannot study (and probably cannot perform lab work) and can be harmed either via Mentem spells or through damage to the location. This probably takes the character out of the saga. Solid for the right kind of character.

Solid?! How is this any different than secluding yourself in your lab and writing limmericks? Cool flavor, but you get NOTHING. And you don't even get immortality out of this deal. Yeesh.

Weak, then. But this character can last for aeons. Who cares about Warping unless you go Twilight?

Item Attunement: The Verditius can stuff a device with extra vis, gain Hubris and craft bonuses, but risk botches and Warping. There are other, better ways to get bonuses and stuff extra vis into an item. Weak.

There aren't many ways to stuff a device with extra vis, and this is rather important for a Veritius. It's also risky, but effective. I'd say at least Solid.

I wouldn't. The best other way to stuff an item with extra vis is.... Philosophical Alchemy. And why waste time initiating this when you're gonna be initiating that? Between Philosophical Alchemy, a high MT, and the ability to simply embed a gem in something, to gain its extra slots, meh.

Anyway,

Ken

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

@mean_liar

Positive Safety scores subtract dice from "all laboratory activities". Considering the ties between the Planetary Magic and your Lab I don't think it would be a major stretch to have that Safety rating apply to your Laboratory Horoscope.

I would. There's a list of Laboratory activities, and this isn't one of them. No lab is needed for this activity.

By this logic, a positive safety score subtracts from any spell cast in the lab too....

Anyway,

Ken

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

EDIT: Checking some math.....

@mean_liar

A few personal notes on Verditius:

Minor Magical Focus (shape/material) is obviously the lead Virtue.

I know that some people think that a focus in, say, wands, applies to any enchantment instilled in a wand, whether or not it affects the wand, but I've read the rules a few times and I don't think it works that way. But if it does.... yeah.

Puissant Magic Theory, Minor Potent Magic, Planetary Magic, Inventive Genius provide static Lab Total bonuses of +3 apiece (or higher, for Puissant MT). Affinity with Magic Theory is probably too good to pass up.

Puissant MT provides a static bonus of +2. But this also boosts the amount of vis usable in a season, and applies to everything. I consider this the bedrock lab virtue.

Planetary Magic does not provide a static bonus; it can easily provide no bonus at all, or a botch.

Inventive Genius is usually good for a Verditius.

Affinity with Magic Theory is surprisingly unimpressive. It's not terrible. But it does not yield a +2 bonus until MT has 183 natural xps. That is, it doesn't pull even with Puissant MT until both magi have devoted 183 xps to it, when they both have effective scores of 10. Few magi will ever see that Affinity yield a +3, but a dedicated Verditius might do it, I suppose.

Together you're looking at five Minor Virtues that collectively, for a magus with 5s in all Arts, allow one to generate Lab Totals in the 50s regardless of TeFo combination. It'd be one case where one TeFo combination isn't really necessary.

Well.....

03: Int 3
05: MT 5 (includes an Affinity, there have been 50xps spent here)
10: TeFo (this represents 225 xps)
05* Minor Focus--if it is allowed.
03* Potent Magic--if it is allowed.
02: Puissant MT
07: Add MT again for S&M or Philosophiae bonuses
00: Affinity with MT (a +1 has been included in MT)
03: Inventive Genius (only when inventing something new, but let's assume that's so)
03* Planetary Magic (but this might also yield a 0, or even a triple botch; note that a good LA is needed to even think about it; AL4 is an investment of 50xp)

This is a base of 30, plus an extra 8 that some GMs will not allow, plus the Planetary Magic lottery. So you're calling this a 41, and I call it a 30. Lab and Aura increase this. So does a Familiar, and this magus won't have a good one. BTW, a Puissant craft can add another +2, iirc, and reduce vis expenditures.

This guy has spent 225xp on Arts, 50xp on AL, 50xp on MT, for 325xp. He has other xps, of course, but these aren't considered here.

I'm counting 6 minor virtues.

Cyclic Magic (seasonal) is better than Planetary Magic. Spend two off seasons reading books and get +3 for lab work in the other two, no muss, no fuss.

A Verditius is probably better off specializing rather than being bland all around; he'll never impress his housemates. Those 225xps in Arts, plus the two virtue points of possibly illegal focus and potency, and even the Affinity with MT might go away. Then, the magus dumps those xps into a single TeFo, gets Affinities in the TeFo and a good Spirit Familiar, who happens to have a high Int and Magic Theory and other lab virtues. This is more likely for the spirit of a promising apprentice who died 100 years ago in a terrible lab accident (brought about by using Planetary Magic ) than for a ferret with Magic Might. This guy has, say, Int 3, MT 3 or better, Puissant MT and Inventive Genius, for +11.

This does take a cooperative GM. However, this Verditius has a binding TeFo of 38, before Int, lab, Aura, virtues, MT and so on, and can justify a good familiar. Waving hands for a good background story grants +5 to convincing the GM. Maybe he's your dead older brother, and working together, you will avenge....

We put 75xp in MT and 5xp in AL, for 80xp. 127xp*2=254xp in a TeFo, for 19s in each. We've spent 334xp and 6vp. We have:

03: Cyclic Magic
02: Puissant MT
05: MT
07: MT again, for S&M
11: Familiar (maybe better)
03: Inventive Genius
03: Int

That's 34 before Aura and Lab, when TeFo=0. But if either the Te or Fo apply, we're at 53 before external stuff, and if both apply, we're at 72. This version also has a cool familiar, with cord goodies, and the 34 applies to more than just, say, wands or just rings. If the TeFo is CrVi, this guy is also good at distilling vis, which will come in handy when he goes for Philosophical Alchemy. CrCo also makes him excel at LRs. This version does require some GM acceptance, but your version requires the GM to agree with you about the game rules.

Which would you rather have?

Anyway,

Ken

[YR7]

I won't allow a Magical Focus in some material or shape to affect all enchantments of said shape/material either. The focus is applied for magical effects that fall within its area, not for other magical effects that happen to be instilled into devices that fall within the area.

Planetary Magic - rereading the text, I can see why disallowing lab Safety makes sense. If this is indeed the case, the virtue is not a very good one, I agree. If the SG rules that lab safety can drop the botch dice, then Planetary Magic/Celestial Magic becomes much more workable.

Spirits - I agree, on re-reading RoPM, that spirits should be fairly endemic and easy to get. However, the SG must maintain that spirits cannot be rendered for raw vis (although RoPM explicitly says otherwise), barring unique mysteries such as Hermetic Empowerment or Bind Magical Creature. Otherwise, it becomes a raw vis all-you-can-eat buffet. I mean, really - why spend your time bothering with Philosophical Alchemy when you can invest a day off (a "distraction") to go outside your lab, summon the airy spirits of the earth you're walking on (or whatever), kill them and take their stuff, erg, I meant vis, and rinse-repeat until you get all the raw vis you want (in a single day, seemingly without any limit whatsoever)?

Also, it isn't really clear to me that powerful spirits should be easy to get.

What bothers me about all of this spirit-kidnapping is what happens to the things left behind. If you take the spirit of the hearth fire, what happens to the fire? It seems like it should fade, at least becoming luckluster without its spirit, like a man might fall comatose without his. But that seems rather... unreasonably powerful, and vague. And if it doesn't fade, why isn't a new spirit dwelling there? Why can't you kidnap it too, then?

The whole spirit thing is weird. I need to think more about it.