I’ve been doing some thinking about the lvl 50 creo animal guideline “create a magical beast”. Specifically if that means that hermetic magic is capable of creating beasts of virtue and what might be inferred from that.
Some effects that might be allowed by inference.
Create Herbs and objects of virtue. (Magic fennel, and bloodstones for all the grogs.)
Create Animal products of virtue. (One skull of a wise owl of the forest coming up)
If magic humans have no souls (as some magi believe) can you create living ones without violating the limit of the soul. Even if you can’t the corpse of a giant might be useful.
Creo magic could be able to make a normal animal into a beast of virtue. After all it is the nature of the magic realm to do such things. And one could say a wolf of virtue is merely a more perfect wolf.
Now if you really want to stretch that last bit of magic out. What about creo effects that turn normal men into Men of Virtue whatever they might be. Medieval transhumanism anyone.
The first few effects could fit into most sagas and some of the latter effects could be avenues for hermetic research. The last one, however is really probably just saga ending silliness.
Of course, that would probably be the end of the saga... but say some groups would rather this practice be hidden from the Order at large, as too many magi is not in their interest?
The gift is not magical human, so "why not"... but the base is still high (70), and with "virtue" in "human of virtue", you'll need Vim in addition with Mentem requisites... CrCo(Me,Vi) 75... ark, that's a project of research.
Go for gold ring do a target:bloodline and make a whole clan magical beings for under a 100
As I said your probably talking campaign ending sillyness. Or done right a dramatic finish. Though I'ld probably set the base effect a little lower, but only because I think reliably giving humans a might score with spell magic is probably a hermetic breakthrough by itself.
Well, let's take into account that magi who want to turn themselves into magical beings have to go through a long, arduous process involving one of a few deep mysteries. Why would they bother if it's really that easy? I'm inclined to believe that such a change is beyond natural, which would qualify it as Muto not Creo (such as making +8 Presence, for example) and prevent it from becoming non-magical.
It depends if you want CrAn ritual spells to create vis. Objects of Virtue begin life as vis which is then Enriched using Magic Lore (as per RoP:M). This would be an efficient way to convert one kind of vis to another - a CrAn(Vi) ritual spell of level 55 (base 50, +1 Touch) could conceivably create a creature with a 55 Might, that would contain 11 points of vis, the same as it took to cast the spell. However, that vis could be of any Art, depending on the creature created. Furthermore, a Mercurian magus would only need to use 6 pawns of vis to cast the spell in the first place. Of course, you would have the problem of being able to kill the Might 55 creature for its vis, but that's a different story...
Whereas there is no equity between the Arts, compare this with the spell to create an elemental (RoP:M). A level 30 Creo Element rarefies a Might 15 elemental, which has 3 pawns of vis within it. A Mercurian magus could break even here, and could profit if he was prepared to summon a Might 25 elemental, at Level 40 (this would be a Size +6 elemental, however!)
I guess it is down to personal choice. I wouldn't have too much trouble allowing a magus to create their own familiar with a CrAn(Vi) ritual spell, for example, although it does negate the potential for a story around that event. Whether you wanted to generalise this to Objects of Virtue as well, again, probably not saga-breaking. If you have a magus capable of inventing and casting such a spell, then they can probably do a lot worse as well!
Bleh! Altho' (perhaps) possible btr, that strikes me as a very sterile, dead connection between mage and familiar, a connection that is supposed to be "a mage's best friend". I know that an animal is not supposed to have "a soul", and therefore there is no diff between a magically created one and a naturally existing one, but when it comes to a familiar this seems not to fit the entire bill, which is in part "a soul mate", in one sense at least. As a SG, I would not want to see such a "formulaic" solution ims (pun fully intended).
And I myself have a Verditius who made his own familiar by summoning a fire elemental. A very Verditius thing to do, IMO. And if Pygmalion could find his soul mate this way, why not a magus?
However, I agree with Cuchulainshound's point, and would discourage a player in my saga from taking this route (but it would not be forbidden, with an appropriate story).
It's taken me a little while to figure out how to say why this bothers me. The problem I see is that it is not the nature of the animal to do such a thing. Thus I would consider this a Muto effect.
I look at this in a similar way to how essential nature is used for CrCo and CrMe effects to boost characteristics. Up to +5 is natural because that is within normal human nature to potential mature to that point. Persons can become stronger, quicker, more commanding, etc. But there is a limit (+5) to this. So up to +5 can be handled via Creo while +6 and beyond require Muto.
Normal animals do not become magical or beast of virtue. The grow, become tougher, faster, etc. But they don't become magical. The Magic Realm may transform them, but it can do that. Just because the Magic Realm can do things doesn't mean Hermetic Magic can; we have plenty of examples of this.
A frankenstein monster does not strike me as filling the same story function as a "familiar", not even close to parallel.
And summoning a "spirit", or an elemental (a "spirit of fire", in one sense, altho' iirc there is a distinction in canon between elemental spirits and elementals) is different again than a "beast of virtue".
But just because it doesn't work for some doesn't mean it can't work for others. It should always go without saying that the story is what is important, not a detail of the rules - not a detail that forbids, nor one that allows.
I'ld be prepared to go as far as saying there should be no way to profit on vis via these sort of spells. Vis conversion is a neat idea I might be able to live with. Profit though no that way lies madness.
Figure it this way throw on the target group onto one of these spells. So you could make a spell that looks like this
Plethora of Feathered Vis (Base 50, Touch +1, Group +2)
This spell creates a group of magical goldcrests the smallest bird native to Europe. Each bird has a single golden tail feather that contains 1 pawn of vim vis. Let's see a goldcrest weighs about 1/4 of an ounce so that’s 64 birds to a pound. Standard target for animal is a size +1 creature so lets say around 400lbs. Keep the math even so a quarter of a million birds give or take. I say summon them inside a ward circle and let the grog's kids go to town with boat paddles. Cast this spell four times and you get to come up with the term for 1,000,000 pawns of vis.
My personal solution is to say that creatures created this way never contain more vis in total then the amount of vis used in the ritual -1. So yes the results of the above spell should be impossible.
I do agree with this actually. When I said hermetic creo magic “could” do it, I was thinking in more theoretical possibilities. Original research or perhaps something integrated from a hedge tradition. Or some other pretty saga specific rulings.
My rampant theorization mostly comes from a lot of the background stuff on the magic realm. As in the magic realm naturally makes things better and improves things inherent nature. To me when the magic realm produces something of virtue it does not a change it's essential nature it empowers it. I’m also a big believer that with enough research hermetic magic can copy any magical effect. Be it another tradition or just a power of the realm itself. But thats the sort of stories I like to tell
So considering all that, if such effects where part of hermetic magic it sounds more like creo magic then muto to me.
So if you where trying to find a way to push the limit of essential nature but not break it. This might be a path of original research.
That being said I do think the first two if not three effects should be possible with standard hermetic theory. Namely creating herbs and objects (unrefined) of virtue with creo rituals. Not sure if they’d be good for every saga though.
Question answered rereading the beasts of virtue section of RopM. Nope all hermetic attempts to create a beast of virtue have failed. I stand by my theories on what it will mean to Hermetic magic if it's ever accomplished though.
Already assuming that a CrAn spell can only create animals with as much vis as was invested in the spell, whether you allow Mercurian magi to double their investment or not, there are still magi who profit.
Verditius magi with inner mysteries.
Create magical animals, suck the Might out of them for enchantments, profit. There is much to be said for this approach. Confining a griffin in the lab is a lot messier than Producing the Pigeons of Power....
What I like about the pigeons is that they are easy to confine. After all, they are pigeons that have Might. Since they are created via spell, their powers are stuff like "Coo of Warbling" and "Detect Breadcrumbs." An ordinary cage suffices.
