Creating a covenant

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

I am now creating a summer covenant for my players (based on their wishes).

Covenant is early summer version and now, as I have been creating it for two hours, I can see that it is rather time consuming job to do.

I checked some premade examples from Covenant book, but it won't help. Their wishes were quite specific, which is good as they are interested.

So...are there any good program, software, spreadsheet which will guide me through the covenant creation.

It would be much easier, if they did not want economic part and political part to their covenant. Now I need to calculate a lot of things and rules are quite exhaustive, I would say. I like to create covenant, but I need some software to help me now and in future :slight_smile:.

Any ideas?

2

Shift some of the work onto your players.

3

That was in my mind too. Are there any fillable pdf to be used in covenant creation?

4

Shift all of the work for the covenant to the players. IMO the covenant is the central character of the saga, the shared vision of the players. The SG should handle the world at large. The primary reason is that players will generally select things that interest themselves and their characters. Divide the build points and grant them to the players to spend. Some players will then work with others to pool resources to get things they otherwise might not be able to get while other players will spend the points selfishly.

MetaCreator is great for managing characters and Ok at Covenants.

5

Metacreator. And get the Covenants extension as well. It takes care of things like the calculating the economy.

6

Yes, I have had success simply dividing the build points evenly among the players and letting them buy stuff.

For Hooks and Boons, I have done a "pick your five favorite" and then constructed a list from those suggestions, I have done a player meeting where we all talk about it and come to consensus, and I have done a game in which I picked a very few a Hooks and Boons based on what I knew about the setting, and then let the rest develop organically.

7

I do it in excel, but I do everything in excel...

8

Shifting work to your players is definitely an option, but it is also worth getting a rough feel for what the covenant is going to want/need based on its role.

My recommendation:

Get each player to pick a hook they think sounds fun; as in it exemplifies the kind of stories they would like to see in the covenant. Get them to pick a boon as well. Boons really are the opposite of hooks, they describe the kind of stories the players don't want to adventure to solve.

Example: Poverty means 'I want to participate in stories about struggling to survive and the hard choices involved therein' while Wealth means 'I don't want to have to worry about mundane resources.'

With BP, it's worth getting a rough idea of how much is library, how much is vis, etc. But you can honestly play fast-and-loose with BP; as soon as play starts, they become pretty meaningless anyway. People will trade, hunt vis, lose things, gain things, etc.

The library is often one of the biggest chunks of work. My recommendation for a mid-large library is this:

  1. pick one of the library 'sets' from the core book, deducting the appropriate BPs.
  2. have the group work out what the summae are; which arts are the good ones, etc.

For tractatii and for lab texts, leave them undefined aside from a few basics (Aegis level 20, Wizard's Communion 20). When someone wants a lab text or tractatus on something, have them roll a stress die and, if the roll succeeds, they find the appropriate text. Add it to the library, deduct the requiste 'amount' of tractatus or lab text points from the pool. If the roll fails, they couldn't find it this season. Doesn't mean it isn't there, just means it was misfiled or something. That way you don't have to track what isn't in the library, only what is.

For Wizard's Communion, my recommendation is make it a level 20 spell, but instead of a default 'at 20' version, go with an 'at 10' version of sun duration. It's the minimum required for decent communal ritual casting.

For difficulty targets, my suggestion is:
spell from core book: 3+
spell from non-core book: 6+
spell I made up myself: 6+ - 9+ (depending on the weirdness of the spell)
spell based on a mystery cult or virtue requirement: 12+ or higher, or maybe simply unavailable
spell of over level 50: 9+ or higher, or maybe simply unavailable

tractatus on an art, arcane ability or academic ability: 3+
tractatus on a supernatural ability: 9+ or higher
tractatus on any other ability: 6+

This is totally house rule, but it works great if you just want to delve straight into play without spending hours working out exactly what is in the library and also ensures the library contains mostly useful spells. I say mostly, because you can guarantee that people will look for stuff that turns out to actually be a bit stupid.

9

Thanks from the tips. I keep that hook / boon thing in my mind.

I think that I will get metacreator. I downloaded the demo, but there are rather limited choices for hooks and boons...so I guess that if I buy the software Covenants expansion will expand hooks and the boons quite bit and those are not included in demo?

10

You need to purchase the Covenants expansion for MetaCreator, too.

11

The recent book Through the Aegis is invaluable for new covenants. It has five completely detailed ones. You're making your own, but you can plunder their libraries and save enormous time.

12

If you get the full metacreator (with the Ars Magica package) and Covenants, it will have all the hooks and boons from the core book and Covenants.

13

Oh, and if you do get the Covenant's add on, however you acquire it, remember that when you create a New Covenant that you have to pick the Covenants.cst template. Covenant.cst is from the original text, which is why you have a very limited list of boons and hooks.

14

I got covenant addon and I have started to create a covenant. How many points there are available in early summer covenat? I think that 1250 points is more likely late summer covenant?

15

As much as anything, that depends on the powerlevel you want for your saga.
In general, I've found that the values for how many points to spend are perhaps a bit low, but then I/we like a well stocked library.

16

Also note that some books seem to be a bit overpriced IMO, based on their availability. The Roots, for example, are the "For Dummies" books on each Art - general forum consensus has them at L5/Q15 or L6/Q21 (implicitly supported now in Thrice-Told Tales!). They're are the closest thing the Order has to a mass-produced trade paperback series. According to Covenants (Pg. 94, under "Standard Texts"), they are "...widely and cheaply available. A Redcap can arrange the delivery of any of these texts, for a very small consideration".

Unfortunately, "very small consideration" is not defined. So you'll have to define that in-game. Personally, I take the route of "they're so cheap you only have to spend money on them, as opposed to vis". Other forum goers prefer that they be a pawn of vis or two. Regardless, they should be easily available.

However, a Q6/L21 book, in build points, is just as expensive as a Branch (the standard summae texts) of say, L10/Q 17. And that's ignoring Nice drawings, good bindings, etc. Anyway...

Personally, I'd recommend taking a full set of Roots at a sharp discount, and using the Library Build Points to purchase the Branches instead. (Note that officially there are only 9 Roots, and they are technically undefined; however, other books unofficially fill in the role of Root for the other arts - or at the least, there's still competition for the title in those areas.) Or alternately, establish how much a full set would cost in vis, and then use the Build Points to have that amount in Vis Stores, and "buy" the books from the Redcaps before the game starts.

17

And if you're wondering what a solid beginner's grimoire looks like, here's the Book of Roaming - basically a solid list of spells that every Covenent should have access to:

https://forum.atlas-games.com/t/what-spells-should-every-covenant-have-arcane-connection/7833/99

18

A Branch is supposed to be the finest (combination of highest level and quality) summa on an Art, not the standard available text. The Covenants build point system has a, in my view, something of a tendency to make it easy to churn out a lot of L15Q15 books, because they are cheap when comparing the amount of experience points that they can create (assume a starting score of 0, L15Q15 book is 225 xp, and costs as much as a Q15 Tractatus, which you cannot even buy). It so happens that a lot of Branches hover around that L15Q15 mark. Later books, such as the Lion and the Lily define a branch (for Terram, De Lapii) as a L17, Q14 summa. Players will invariably min-max, and so I would caution that any library have few (if any books) that get to that L15Q15 +/- a couple of points in quality or level. I think Q10 summae are rather common, even up to 20th level. The key here, when building a covenant library is to think about who authored that particular book, go through a bit of rough design to see what it would take to create such a text. There are a lot of character resources tied into being able to write books: characteristic points, virtue points, and experience points getting to the necessary level to write such a book.

With regards to the Roots of the Arts, consider these carefully. I'm not sure that any of them are designed in canon. These are generally books that are used as primers, for magi to get to the point to teach an apprentice, or for an apprentice as a beginning lesson in an Art. The are useful for only one season, at L5Q15 or L6Q21. If it looks like a lot of magi have a certain Art covered, I definitely wouldn't pay build points for having the tome in the library, since it will be of little benefit to them for some time. And as KevinSchultz mentioned, the cost in play is considerably less than the cost in build points.

And now we are at the subject of build points. As they are presented in Covenants, they are simply flawed. The costs for things are outrageously different. It is quite possible to devote all of the build points to vis (not vis sources) and have a huge stockpile to begin play and start buying things. Also, the prices of lab texts are ridiculously expensive. My best advice here, is to use the build points as a guide, but really build out a few things for each player and what you think is reasonable.

19

Not by name, but they're implicitly mentioned in Thrice-Told Tales, on pg. 74, in the description of the Resources of the Servants of God.

20

Does that mean, then that there now Roots for all of the Arts?