Hi there,
I was wondering if some of you tried to create a new art (probably a new form) in one of your campaigns.
I know that you can find in one of the official books an "Aether" form and i'm searching for other examples of this.
In one of my very old campaigns (Back in Ars v2) I created a "moon" form that ended up to be just a bad copy of Vim (and breaking a law of magic for that is a pity).
So, any better ideas ?
What about time? - Tempus - see Sub Rosa 17
I tried to get a new Art: "Continue", an adverb rather than a verb or a noun.
The idea was to change the instantaneous Creo spells into a continuous flow, while still creating the same amount of stuff.
So a Creo (Continue) Animal spell to create 28 gallons milk with duration moon would create a stream of milk at a rate of roughly 1 gallon a day.
This was to open up whole new class of adverbs to the verb-noun system, but the campaign never got off the ground so the others didn't see play....
Bob
I was trying to figure out how the integrate the Learned Magician's Fortunam Art into Hermetic Magic.
I don't recall an "Aether" form, but don't know the older editions very well as I starting playing Ars Magica 4E during '96.
My friends and I in high school theorized about an "Electricity" form of some kind. Similarly, when I played Mage the Ascension, played with the idea of a "Fate/Probability" form. We never sat down and actually made any spell guidelines, however.
Aethera is 5E, in Dies Irae.
Also, where does one find a copy of Sub Rosa 17?
Yup, looking at Mage the Ascension we could create some fun art like Time (I really need to find this sub rosa), Space(more or less already in some arts for teleportation) , Energy (maybe too technological approach), or Fate.
I really like that last one.
You should contact the editors directly.
Didn’t want to link directly to facebook but this page has a link as well as some info on what is in each issue in case you want others:
https://www.redcap.org/page/Sub_Rosa_magazine
The core 15 Arts are the same in the 5th edition as in my copy of the 1st edition, save for corrected spelling.
Both troupes I've designed modern setting sagas with have opted for the approach to manipulate electricity via the medium it is moving through. So, lightning in air remains Auram, but current in a building or device becomes Terram.
Similarly, anything extracted or refined from the earth (e.g. plastic, petroleum products) remains Terram.
These seem far simpler (and more intuitive to us) than creating new forms for these cases.
Our Bonisagus in my current saga has that precise form on his to-do list.
After:
designing, then optimizing, a spell called Yondu's Arrow, so said effect will take up less space in the item he intends to eventually enchant with it
enchanting said item, and probably rename the spell
enchanting his talisman, and attuning a few bonuses
interspersed here and there for study time or vis distillation
...then comes the Original Research into Tempus.
I've had the thought before that you could have a "spirit" form, which covers effects involving the essential nature of the target. The idea being that the limit of essential nature is much less restrictive than hermetic magi think, and a hermetic breakthrough could give them the missing method to do a lot of essential nature related stuff. This would include something like:
That sort of thing.
Of course this would up the power level of magi a lot unless it were balanced carefully, and arguably most of this stuff could be covered by vim and other forms. If you keep adding to vim it gets sort of bloated as a single form, though.
Never actually did anything with it in a game myself, just a passing idea.
At first glance Time would seem like a good candidate for a new Art, but time travel (in either direction) typically causes way too many logical problems to be worth adding to what is possible.
Scrying backwards or forwards in time likewise is connected with too many problems - forward because if you have reliable scrying forwards in time then events become deterministic. Backwards because it ruins all kinds of investigation plots.
Fate/Luck is a great idea though - and much inspiration can be had from the Fortunam technique of the Learned Magicians.
Something which could be intersting to add is a Form for Information. WIth that you might, for example, use magic to translate books. One would have to be very careful defining it though, because I have a feeling it could very easily be abused by clever players.
Mage have already ideas for:
Tempus (Time)
Spirit
Fate (once Entropy)
I like also a new form Spatiae, with manippulate the space. Once we had a story with an weird mage, who invented tempus and spatiae - unlucky all his research was destroved.
what about a form "Voco" to call "otherdimensional" entity like elementars, demon, angel ... or even "create" them - the summoner decide the values of the entity. Nice examples for an build-up system can be found in Stormbringer RPG or Legend of the Burning Sands RPG
I think that can be done in the existing rules via Rego (Form). Want to summon a fire elemental? Rego Ignem. A faerie of the woods? Rego Herbam (Animal or Corpus requisites possible). Careful what you do with Rego Vim, though. Summoning with that combination isn't a good idea in Mythic Europe.
Yes, but there are other possibilities. For example, Creo Tempus R: Personal, D: Concentration, Target: Individual . You give yourself extra time to act "in between moments" during a time-sensitive situation, most likely a fight or escape. The downside is, you accumulate those extra moments as part of your aging. Eventually the after-effects could add up to a lot, if used often enough.
Space is a common question I see on Discord and on here. Questions like Bags of Holding or TARDIS rooms.
Time is a choice I see but don't like, for reasons as a storyteller.
If I were a Bonisagus, I would be looking into Knowledge and Thought. Mentem covers all things of th e mind, but the ability to temporarily give someone the skill of a swordsman are great. Also, a spell can tell you physical information about a strange device, but What If... You could cast a spell to learn how it actually functions. What if you could give a little bit of thought and will to a spell so it'll could make judgements and decisions.
Does anyone know how long it typically takes them to get back to you?
Within a few days, IME. This weekend is a holiday here in the U.S. though.
Has anyone actually included Tempus in a game? How did you go about the breakthrough?
I've come up with several ideas, but I've discarded them as being a side effect of time or simulating the effects of time on an object, not working on time itself directly.
How do you effect time without magic that can operate on time? I suddenly have a great deal more sympathy for Hermetic Researchers 