Well, since it was proposed to cover a +4 Upkeep in some original estimates (probably far too generous), I was thinking that we might end up covering +3 Upkeep as a compromise.
That possibility was suggested in one of thompsja's posts. That's why in my minimum numbers the two craftsmen I proposed were a glassmaker and a tool maker.
I totally agree. Any kind of weaponsmith or armorsmith is never going to be cost-effective for the covenant.
I guess it comes down to personal preference. Certainly every magus is entitled to a full-time devoted shield grog if he wants one. And the question remains whether we'd want any additional fighting grogs. As an aside, we'll probably want a turn captain to get the bonus for loyalty. He ought to have some sort of a turb to lead.
with our Veteran Fighters boon I think we should have at last 10 grog with weapons for the overall security of the regio and our asset in the city. With 10 fighter we should also have enough to provide 1 shield grog to a magus when ever (s)he need one without weakening the over all protection to much.
Also keep in mind we probably will have some things pushed on to slave labor despite our religious focus.
I agree that there is no guarantee that dependents will exist at a covenant. I could easily see a spring covenant that didn't have any dependents. My point is that we're a strong summer covenant and given how long we've been around, our status, etc., we should have some dependents in the covenant.
As for figuring out how many we have, aside from making up stats for the entire 100 members of the covenant, we'll have to do some kind of estimation. Yes, there is not a defined minimum ration like for servants and teamsters. That puts the burden on us to figure out what a reasonable number might be. If we like, we can then work backwards to figure out who they are. Some examples, I can think of are:
Elias' daughter who would be about 5 and still not able to do the work of a full adult;
A member of the coven who suffered a terrible injury some years back and who can't work because of it; and
An elderly member of the coven whose mind has faded to the point where he or she can't do any work.
That's just what comes immediately to mind, and that gets us to three with just one child, one infirm, and one elderly (though kind of infirm too). It seems like others would come up quickly as we filled in the covenant.
There's a lot of space between 300 MP and 850 MP. It's not one or the other. A tertiary income source would bring our income up to 382.5. Making our secondary income source greater would bring us up to 425 MP/year. I'm sure other combinations are possible. We don't need to be super wealthy. But it would be nice if we were comfortable with reasonable expenses and weren't having to scrimp.
We don't have the money for everything we want to have, so we need to make some choices. We either need to put more boons towards our income, spend some BP on silver reserves that will dwindle while we try and prop up our income, or start cutting expenses off of our wish list.
perhaps we should trade the veteran fighters boon for greater income. to me it is another thing that costs us that can be covered with character creation, unless it actually gives some benefit to the turb grogs we create.
As for income, 1) I always tend to optimize, and 2) amongst the legendary sources of income it lists custom duties at Venice or Constantinople, so we are in the right neighborhood.
I guess I've always assumed that if you're making up more than a handful of skilled fighters as grogs, you really ought to have the Veteran Fighters boon. It seems odd to me that you might make up ten grogs that were veteran fighters, but not have the relevant boon. I mean, either the covenant has a bunch of skilled fighters as grogs or they don't. It doesn't seem to me to matter whether they're fleshed out or not. So I don't think it exactly gives us a benefit, except for the benefit that we're allowed to make more than a handful of grogs who are veteran fighters.
That's a very good point. We are the second city next to Constantinople (and things haven't been great there lately). The customs duties at Thessaloniki might well be a legendary income source at this point.
Of course, that puts all our eggs in one basket. Anything happens to that income source and we're in real trouble.
You make a good point. We have the regio to defend. Anyone could show up in the regio, potentially, and there are no other people there to put a check on the visitors' behavior. It'd be nice if there was a guard or two to help keep the peace. Yeah, that won't be a common occurrence. But it's good to plan for the worst.
If we want to keep the veteran fighters boon might I suggest that it have the meaning that all turb grogs can have one of the virtues: warrior, turb trained, or knight for free? We can always pull points from hidden resources to cover our extra income...
it seems somewhere in here I assumed that the school was our secondary income source as well as our obligation. Without this caveat the teachers would certainly count as covenfolk...
@Trogdor can you for now not create a toolmaker because I think I will make the ghost familiar a toolmaker who died during the fight 1205 in Constantinople at the age of 21 (that 360 exp) and never got buried.
I still have to check if Paulos can handle the corporality enchantment (muto isn't his strong point) but if that is the chase his familiar would do this job.
This discussion got me thinking about what you get for your boons and whether there are any required boons. Here's what Covenants has to say, in general, about Residents.
Not much to work with, but we can glean something from it. First, it implies to me that you have to pay for any special covenfolk you have with the appropriate boons. This section talks about having to pay for a tame nobleman with the boon of the same name. This implies that you can't have a grog or a companion who fills the role of a tame nobleman without paying for the boon in your covenant build. Multiple roles for a single grog/companion only require one boon paid for.
So, it seems to me that if we have martially trained grogs, we have to reflect that fact by buying the boon that goes with it. It doesn't seem that we can get any bonus Virtues from that. Just like the Tame Nobleman boon doesn't let your noble companion have the free Virtue Landed Noble, so too I surmise that no other Residents boon should give you free virtues either. The boon are simply there to accurately reflect the makeup of the covenant that you have.
Though there is that reference of "must buy any communal Virtue independently" to deal with. That implies that some category of resident might have a communal Virtue. The fact that we have Literate Covenfolk means that most of our grogs have Educated or something else that grants access to Artes LIberales. The fact that we have Veteran Fighters means that some of our covenfolk have access to Warrior or something else that grants access to Martial skills. But does that just reflect that a communal Virtue has been bought normally, or do the boons actually grant the communal Virtue for free? By that argument, all of our grogs should get the Educated Virtue for free from the Literate Covenfolk boon, which seems a bit extreme. I'm curious what the others think about this.
I know I asserted somewhere that the school was our secondary income source. I doesn't have to be, of course. We could easily pick something else if people would prefer to have the school be more of a covenant thing.
TL;DR:
1.) Should boons grant free communal Virtues or not?
I have two issues with the rules cited. The first being that they are contradicted in city and guild where it states on p. 62-63 "Most Ars Magica covenants include a handful of craftsmen either specialists bought with covenant Build Points or players grogs and perhaps companions." which pretty well states that player created characters do not have to be paid for with build points.
Also the text you quoted from p. 17 refers to background characters, which is presumedly something different from PC characters, and whether you have to pay build points for PC grogs really doesn't seem to be addressed here...
The second is this is, as written, overly obligating. If you make a character you have to pay for it with build points, and if you spend boons on an advantage you have to pay for it again with your character when they are created. You are essentially paying in boons to limit your options, which seems wrong on a level so fundamental it makes me want to throw out the system that insists on it- though I generally opt for simply throwing out that section and cursing the editor who ever allowed it to be included.
Sometimes I feel like planning a saga in ArM is like trying to navigate a hedge maze on a dark, cloudy, moonless night where all you have are occasional flashes of lightning to light your way. There always seems to be another rule out there that contradicts what you're looking at and shows up when you least expect it to.
I think I've previously said that I've grudgingly come around to the fact that grogs we make up are not going to cost us BPs. That's going to mean we spend zero BP on specialists and craftsmen, which doesn't sit right with me. But no one else seems bothered by it and this is not the hill I plan to die on.
I didn't think we were talking about BP anymore, just boons.
If I understand what you're saying correctly, I'm not sure that I agree with it. I don't see how you're paying boons to limit your options. As I see it you have all options open to you for making characters (subject to limitations imposed by the troupe, of course). Make all different characters to your heart's content. It's just that if you select certain types of characters, you have to pay for the corresponding resident boon.
I suspect we'll disagree on this as well, but my take is that if someone wants their companion to be a noble who serves as a front for the covenant, that you would still have to buy the Tame Noble boon. I'm guessing that you'll take the position that since it's a PC character, you don't have to take the boon. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that and see what the others in the troupe think.
As it will affect the Budget 1213 Paulos installed the Minor Virtue Slaves to his lab for the Mentem Bonus. I think this also means the Teamster and Servant for him and his apprentice are slaves.
The rolls for the refinement: roll.coyotecode.net/lookup.php?rollid=193472
Also I managed to do the Corporeality enchantment (TMRE 68) with the help of Planetary Magic in 3 season (rolls: roll.coyotecode.net/lookup.php?rollid=193473) so we get our toolmaker during 1215 but he don't have the time before 1216 to add the tools for other labs.
I hope no one have problems with me using Planetary Magic on the low level where only botch matter during character creation.
Presumably that means we can lower our outlay for wages a little bit - not sure exactly how many slaves Paulos will have - though it won't help with provisions, etc., since the slaves still have to be fed and housed.
I don't have any problem with the use of Planetary Magic. That's what it's there for.
Actual in the end its probably more expensive to have the slaves thanks to the +1 Upkeep then just have normal workers do the job. But its something from the original book covenant I picked up here with the slaves. TSE 70 write:
right there, at the end- you have to (options are limited) pay for the corresponding resident boon.
So because we spent points on the boon educated covenfolk my grogs who are covenfolk must use one of their virtues to be educated.
If I choose to make a tame noble character, we have to pay boon points for the character I made.
When a supposed benefit has the effect of limiting how you can spend your design resources it is not a benefit, but a cost. We are paying to whitewash the fence.
I suspect that this is another place where we'll have to agree to disagree.
As for literate covenfolk, they don't all have to be literate. The boon only says that the local people, "for the most part," are able to read." Individual grogs may vary. So if you want a grog that can't read, feel free to omit Educated. I know I did with a serving maid I've written up. And if it turns out that when we make up the 80ish grogs in the covenant that few of them know how to read, then we'll know that we don't really need to take the literate covenfolk boon.
But as I see it, having the boon justifies us to have a larger percentage of covenfolk literate than would normally be acceptable. It would strike me as very odd to have players make up the grogs such that a large percentage of the covenant could read, yet for the covenant to not have the literate covenfolk boon.
I'm curious, though, are you proposing that if we take the literate covenfolk boon that each grog get the free virtue Educated?
That would be appropriate in my mind, though just allowing normally restricted abilities (weapon abilities for seasoned veterans, Latin, Ancient Greek and Artes Liberales for educated covefolk) without the full virtue and free ability points might also be a good way to handle it...
I agree. With our Veteran Fighters Boon, we can freely make grogs with martial abilities. With a turb captain, they can be considered to be trained together. Our educated covenfolk can buy Academic abilities.
Nothing prevents us from purchasing the Minor virtues of Warrior or Educated, which simply say that they've had additional, specialized training, with the +50 XP for doing so.
Okay, I guess the troupe ha spoken. I still think this is an overreach on what the boons are supposed to grant. But if that's what the troupe wants, then that's what we'll go with. I shall build my grogs and companion accordingly and offer no more objections.
