Enchanted parma

More plausible: A cat that can confer "Unaffected by the gift".

No need for boni-cat shenanigans

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That depends on the desired effect, the "unaffected by the gift" part or the MR part.

If it's the MR, a divine or infernal cat (instead of a magical one) could have a R:Touch, D:Sun power that confers MR. Both could also confer "Unaffected by the Gift".

A magical or faerie cat could also confer virtues, but I don't recall a way for either one to confer MR.

Lets put it this way- the cat can confer unaffected by the Gift and Magic resistance in a manner such that characters in the game cannot distinguish the effect from Parma Magica.
Whether it is actually parma magica that these cats somehow instinctually use the same way they instinctually bat at string or if it is some more complicated magic animal based power bestowal is known only to the SG. The question remains how the order would act upon the situation.

IMO it is Parma if and only if the cat can teach Parma to others. If it can, it would be a threat to be slain.

That is not very plausible with Cunning, I think. Since I think magi can distinguish between Cunning and Intelligence, I think they can tell that this is an intrinsic power and not an Hermetic Parma.

If it is an intrinsic and unteachable power, I think it would be treated as any other beast of magic. Somebody would capture it, tame it, and use it for their own benefit, and no other magus could stop them without committing a High Crime by depriving them of magic power.

Cunning, in my mind, also means that it cannot speak, which takes care of some other caveats, especially Hibernian ones.

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Obviously there will always be disagreement with magi (especially with such trivialities as defining whether it is or is not parma magica). Speach is a sliding scale- obviously parrots can speak with cunning, for example, though the words may not make sense to the situation unless specifically trained to do so (incidentally IRL I have known cats with a limited vocabulary- they could say words such as "out" or "down" appropriately- certainly not well enough to teach anything, but they did functionally talk to demand what they wanted)
If the key question is whether it can be taught though you would have a point. On the other hand they can be bred...

I like to think that breeding with magic animals would be limited. There is something with the eternal perfection of the magic realm that tells me that breeding does not make complete sense. Even if it can be bred, there is nothing to say that the offspring have the same powers or even might at all.

Now somebody is going to tell me that there is a supplement that says otherwise, and that will only make me want to go back to 3ed.

My point wrt the ban on spreading parma was be if it can be taught.

The matter of speech is relevant to its status in Hibernia in particular, and to whether it can be offered to join the Order, and some such things. Those would be secondary points indeed.

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OMG I just had this image of the tribunal of Hibernia deciding tha a magical cat which could say "out" and "down" had to be offered membership, but it has to decline because it can pronounce "no" but not "yes"
Fortunately Hibernia doesn't really go in for the whole "join or die" bit.

Hey Loke, don't look up Hermetic Cats (RoP:M, p.70). They have Int rather than Cun and have been breed true since at least the founding of the Order.

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This specific cat was mentioned to have Cun.

In the end I still think it boils down to "can this somehow threaten the Order's monopoly on MR"? And we must remember that the concern here is monopoly in a very specific circumstance, that of gifted humans who know other systems of magic. The Order doesn't care if (Realm) creatures have MR, or if priests sometimes have True Faith, or about how many knights wander around carrying relics.

We also need to remember that Parma was pivotal in the developing of the Order. If the Order discovers a coven of witches who raise these cats, they have reasonable grounds to believe that in a couple of centuries we may have an Order of Witches who is as developed as the Order of Hermes.

So the key question is, "can this lead to an organization of cat-herders with reliable MR and not affected by the gift, so that it endangers the existence of the Order as it currently exists?".

At the same time, even if bred, how many of these cats can really exist? And can they actually be tamed and confer this "Parma Magicat" on demand (the answer to the last one is no, cats can't be tamed, just as you can't tame a natural disaster).

If this was Grand Tribunal I'd vote "No".

I was jokingly replying to Loke's comment about "somebody telling him there is a supplement that says otherwise and him going back to 3ed".

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Oh, sorry. I missed that.

Don't mind my ramblings.

To be precise, I do not mind some lineage breeding true, I object to a PC finding a magic cat to breed, insisting that the powers have to breed true, because that's RAW and they have the skills and breeding total and whatnot. Magic should be less predictable than that.

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The monopoly is on Parma, not on MR. Both the blocking of the effects of the Gift and the teachability are critical to its importance. Teaching is generally easier and faster than breeding.

A key question indeed, but the concern is here the cat herders and not the cats. The cat-herders are likely powerful enough, and certainly human enough, to come under the join and die clause. The Order has a much more well-defined policy wrt people than wrt animals ...

On what question?

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True. My mistake.

Partial agree. In the end, the cat that initiated the discussion is just a tool. As is Parma. The concern is not with who uses the tool, or about it's existence by itself, but with if and how it can be misused. The base assumption in the question is that while there is no organization that jeopardizes the Order now, there is a vague possibility that these cats, used as Parma was, can lead to such. So the problem is not actually about what to do with the eventual cat-herders if they come to existence, but if it is necessary to do something to control the tool (the cats) now to prevent such scenario.

My post became confuse towards the end.

If a magus comes to Tribunal and demands a position from the Order regarding the cats, out of concern that "they can potentially lead to an organization of cat-herders with reliable MR and not affected by the gift, endangering the existence of the Order as it currently exists", I'd say the chances of that are pretty nil and we don't need to act.

I say this because even if the cats (and this power/ability) breed true, one can't rely on it's availability on demand, not in the same way as Parma, and the cat population is unlikely to grow so much that every opponent of the Order would have one. While the concern itself is valid, analysis shows that the scenario is unlikely to pose real threat.

Assuming this is actually the concern, because the initial situation describes a mundane protected by a cat. Which is no problem at all, no more than if said mundane had a relic.

Even if the cat/cats pose a threat someday, it won't happen overnight. The Order just needs to watch and react as needed, when needed, if needed.

So, does the existence of the cats endanger the Order? No.


That all said, it's only my reasoning, and it's based on a few assumptions that might not be entirely true (for example, I'm assuming a cat can only protect one person at a given instant, that the effect can be rescinded at will and that it isn't permanent).


It might actually be worthwhile to answer this question in play, at Tribunal.

OK. Then we agree. I was considering the cat herder situation as real, rather than a hypothesis for IC argument. The Order does not usually take a position in relation to creatures of magic, but they do in relation to hedge wizards. Thus they are not very likely to act towards the cats, but once they become a tool for hedge wizards, the hedge wizards can no longer be ignored.

OTOH. Once attention is drawn to the cat, some magus is going to capture it, whether to domesticate it, familiarise it, or harvest the vis.

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Story seed: while a Guenicus argues about what should be done, a Bonisagus has already grabbed the cat and sneaked to the lab to discover what can be done.

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I was tempted to quote a few things as well, but I don't want my gamemaster @loke to go back to 3rd edition. :sweat_smile:

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Hmm... now that brings up a question I hadn't even considered, what happens if the cat becomes a familiar. I suppose it would fit with another unanswered question of what would happen if you attempt to share parma with someone who already has parma. Which of course nobody would bother to attempt, except maybe some Bonisagus researcher who just wanted to know the answer and wrote a parma magica tractatus on the topic which is buried somewhere in Duernemar,