With the kitchen in a separate building, it may be helpful to include more direct access to the Main Hall via a corridor on the south side, like the one on the north side. There are probably additional servant's quarters above the kitchen as well.
As another idea, if the main building as even a partial third floor, that would be the most likely place for servants' quarters in the building. I am not sure what to do with the additional space ...
If you look at the most recent maps, you'll notice that there is a door on the manor house that faces exactly with a door to the kitchen building. The "Servants quarters" of the manor house are not detailed but it would indeed make sense that there would be a reasonably direct path to the main hall. In fact, parts of the "Servants quarters" is probably a secondary kitchen -- no big cooking there, but enough space to assemble and serve the meals from.
As for a third floor, we don't really need it. And it might stick out too much from the surrounding forest, bringing attention to us.
Ok, here's the details for the vis sources from the Laacher Lake caves and the destroyed Romand bridge.ing 2 more vis sources. I did not assign a specific number of pawns to these sources, so that we can decide later on how many of each type we want.
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Heron Nests on the Roman Bridge Piles
In the middle of the Rhine remains a group of oak piles that were parts of the destroyed Roman Bridge. Every year a small colony of herons set up their nests on top of those piles. In the fall, when the herons migrate south for the winter, the remains of their nests can be collected for Rego vis. Although the birds themselves do not seem to be particularly magical by themselves, they seem to bring out some of the old Roman magic used by the Roman to shackle the Rhine River when they built the bridge.
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Gemlight from the Laacher Lake Caves
In the caves below the Laacher Lake, in the depth of winter a few small blue gemstones begin to glow with a cold blue light. The gemstones themselves do not contain raw vis, but the light itself may be collected into Ignem vis using an appropriate ReVi spell (a variant of Gather the Essence of the Beast with at least Voice range, since light cannot be affected using Touch range).
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I've also had the thought that maybe the Vim vis source from the Mercuralia ritual at the main site may be variable, producing 1 pawn of Vim vis for each gifted individual that participates in the ritual. This would provide a good rationale for all the magi to gather at least once a year.
(Moving the discussion here from another thread.)
Indeed, we should. However, I think part of it requires that each player fanilize their magus, since what they'll desire as covenant resource depends on their character. For example, Jonathan has indicated that we'll be able to add the lab text of spells we know to the covenant library for free (no BP), having scribed those before the saga starts.
That is not to say that we can't summarize what we want as general categories. For example, I've already indicated here a detailed list of what Petronius would bring. This will be updated and finalized before saga starts, but a summary of it would be:
As part of Octavius' political machinations to increase the influence of his faction (Oak Gild) within the Rhine tribunal, he decided to gather a number of young magi to form a new covenant. His own apprentice was soon to be gauntleted, and he'd heard about a number of peregrinatores that would like to settle. Octavius wanted his involvement to be subtle (to avoid interference from opposing factions), so he made sure that he was not directly identified as the initiator. He did, however, contact a few magi regarding the creation of a new covenant, either for those magi themselves or for their soon-to-be-gauntleted apprentices.
Using his contacts amongst the redcaps, he located a general location for the covenant with Koblenz, that had a number of potential sites where the covenant could be built. One of the magi that were contacted was Aedituus, who travelled to Koblenz to investigate the sites. Octavius' own filius Petronius was also a good candidate, as was the apprentice (Titus) of a fellow Bonisagus and Oak Gild member. While exchanging correspondence with a friend in the Thebes Tribunal, this magus mentioned that his filius Praxiteles wanted to relocate to the Rhine to pursue his artistic aspirations.
Correspondence was exchanged between the candidates and meetings were arranged. Things were put into motion and deals cut, so that at the Tribunal meeting of 1179 the formation of the new covenant was approved.
What do all of you think? Is that a reasonable starting point?
Here's a summary of the build points for the covenant resources. At this time only 2 players (myself and Kellopyy) has indicated how they would spend their build points, and some of them will need to be revised. Probable updates are noted in red.
Petronius (player Arthur)
Vidos (player Kellopyy)
Hippocrates (player Gulla)
Are we allowed vis reserves as private resources?
As the build points for the specialist could be reassigned (since he has been fleshed out), I was thinking having some vis would make sense for Petronius. As a Mercurian he would often share into parts of the savings from casting rituals for others, so having a few pawns would be logical. The rest could probably be reassigned to the library.
It's a bit of a nitpicky thing, I think the build points belonging to the covenant should be available to the entire covenant. The idea behind 175 covenant and 50 personal build points is that the 50 belongs to a specific magus, while the 175 build points is covenant property pledged by us or on our behalf for starting the covenant.
So, if you can switch the build points around to account for the "ownership" issue, I don't see a problem.
I'm thinking we need to divie up Kelloppy's build points (the 175, not the 50) and spend them in line with the current magi involved...
That would be no problem -- I had only spent 45 point for magus-specific resources, with the rest (180) being covenant property. Of the covenant resources, 6 bp were for a specialist that I fully detailed. So if I shift 1 bp to the library and the other 5 bp back to magus-specific resources, my magus could start with some vis reserves.
As for Kellopyy's build points, we can do that. However, what if he comes back? Would his magus brings even more resources or would he be stuck with what we picked? I don't think that in the end it will matter that much either way. 
I want a highly invested core group, a good way to achieve that is to have everyone at the start feel like they "own" the saga, and that includes the build points spent. Since beginnings are such a delicate thing and it's been my experience that players can drop off with little or no warning, I'd like those of us who are (more) active spend build points on the things we want. I started Bibracte with a fairly and similarly long covenant build process, but immediately after play began two players essentially disappeared on me, out of the 5 who originally signed up. Then a third became essentially inactive a few months later. So, 2/5 of the covenant wasn't really representative of what the players wanted. While I cannot do anything about players leaving, I can ensure that, at least at the start of play, the covenant is representative of the starting players.
We can hash it out if he comes back. What's on the back of my mind: he's stuck with the allocation we've selected, but we slightly increase his personal build points he can bring into the covenant.
I second this notion
That also works for me.
Excellent stuff, folks! Love the detail and, were I not stuck at work, I would have more to contribute. But for now...
1) Build Points
-Do I get any?
2) Shared Lab
-I think a lab requires one season of familiarity (in lieu of two to set up) between magi? Serf's parma as I don't have Covenants with me. I think it's also mentioned in Hermetic Projects under the Shipbuilding chapter.
3) Private Labs
-Didn't see a definitive on this... can we choose to set up a private lab in the aura/2 area?
Of course! Given that I think we're in consensus about Kelloppy, we now have 210 covenant build points and 50 personal build points. The 210 is things we've discovered/earned and pledged to the covenant. The 50 are yours to share or not as you wish.
Acclimation/familiarity is only necessary if the lab is not set up as transient use and has a positive Refinement score.
Yes, there is plenty of room, Arthur has done up several drawings.
I should hope so! I certainly plan to have one of my own.
though it might turn a tad... esoteric* 
My understanding is that since this is a new covenant, we'll each have to set up our own labs from scratch. We can do that either before the saga starts (by slating that time in our pre-saga advancement) or in-character once the saga has started. Unless we want to describe a reason for basic labs to be already set up.
Personally, I've kept the last year of my magus' pre-saga advancement free for such things as setting up his lab, as well as gathering the last-minute resources.
The last update of the covenant's layout is in this post. As you can see, the labs are identified with numbers, so we can discuss who wants which lab.
There are 6 sancta at the main site location, and there were also plans for a secondary location a few miles away from the main site (I'm no longer sure who would use it). Other small auras also exist throughout the area. So we can always detail another area if some of the players want something special for their magus.
I need to restate this a bit, as it could cause some confusion.
As long as a lab is setup for transient use (meaning it's been stated as such) anyone can use a lab, regardless of the positive refinement of the lab. So one could have a supper buff lab setup for transient use that is good for something (good discussion topic here, which I don't think we've had in full).
Given the format of this saga, I don't think that there's a strong reason to hold off on that year of development. Things that your character will do are likely of your own desire and you write it out. It may come to pass in OOC discussion that we may come up with some interesting story ideas and someone may want to run a particular story. It may be that someone wants to make sure they're kept super honest and ask someone to run a story for their magus, too. But by and large, we're all kind of editors here, write a story and then leave it to get critiqued and edited and then post it as a final. I dunno. This is an experiment, and I may not have explained my concept well enough early on.
An update of the covenant build points. I will update as other players chime in and/or review their contributions.
So for the politics of establishing the covenant and getting sponsors: Oculus wants another city covenant, one who understands what they go through as a city covenant, while Crintera wants a check on the temporal power of Oculus. Since we are going to have a measure of trade, I can envision that being used as a tool to strike at Oculus indirectly. Maybe we agree to sponsor a few Bjornaer peregrinatores for some period of time, say 20 years?
Proposed Sponsorship Requirements
[tableborder][tr][td]Sponsor[/td] [td]Requirement[/td][/tr][/tableborder]
I'll come back to this post and update it as we move forward and agree on what the sponsors are requesting of us.
How would Crintera know that we may be aligned with Oculus at the Tribunal meeting of 1179? Since having Praxiteles as a member is what we promised Oculus Septentrionalis, it's doubtful that Crintera would have been made aware of it, and Prax probably arrived in the Rhine only after the Tribunal meeting.
But the sponsorship of Bjornaer peregrinatores may still be a good idea. It could be linked to the secondary covenant site, who could have been build as an aerie for Bjornaer with bird heartbeasts. So they would have a resting place when travelling long distances, safe within an Aegis and with their mundane needs easily met. Our covenant will be easy to find, with the Rhine and Mosel rivers, as well as the city itself.
Crintera may also have asked us to support their charges against Oculus Septentrionalis of helping the Danish invasion of Rügen. In that case, our votes were not enough to make a difference and the vote failed anyway. Our vote would have angered Oculus slightly, making future relations with them a bit strained.
So we have:
About Triamore. Since both Aedituus and Petronius have spent some time there as peregrinatores, they probably were able to form friendships there. I don't think the matter of the Lotharingian Tribunal is something that's been brought up yet. Just having another city covenant that is not too far may be a good thing for Triamore.
Furthermore, I had previously thrown the following ideas earlier in the thread: