And that's where the demons come in on their own accord? Providing many decades of service in a quite quickly changing world, while waiting for the undetermined big catastrophe to happen and allow you to come out as the saviour of the Order? Yikes!
EDIT: Read again ArM5 p.88: "To avoid arousing the envy of their poorer sodales or tempting supernatural powers that punish such wealth, the Redcaps periodically assist deserving magi by leaving gifts of vis during their visits." So the Redcaps know this problem.
I stand by my statement that the plan you describe is exactly a ploy to get control over the order. What you describe, would if it was successful give house Mercere the ability to shut down any covenant, magus, house, tribunal or even the entire order at will if any of those groups displease the house. As a result magi would have no choice but to accept Mercere overlordship explicit or not. It doesnt really matter that the Mercere are not planning to openly demand overlorship but are content to merely play along with the idea that they are providing a service.
I dont think that your comparison of a niece offering her uncle to clean the house is a fair one. A better comparison is if someone offered to cover all of your expenses forever on the condition that you let them handle buying and selling everything you need and produce, in the hope that you would over time become financially and practically dependent on them. As I have said before and will repeat here, it doesnt really matter that the instigators of the plan have good intentions when the goal that they pursue is total power.
You yourself even admit that this is a plan to "isolate" the order in a later post. I find that given that choice of word it is quite apparent that this is a plan that needs to remain hidden because if it were public it would be stopped by its intended victims.
Other have also chipped in on this but I think I do have something to contribute anyway. I think you overestimate the popular support that is present for allowing house Mercere to monopolize wealth and mundane interaction in the order. The Trianomae are against allowing any house to gain too much power. The Apple and Ash guilds in the rhine tribunal want to pursue more interference with mundanes not less and the entire Normandy Tribunal could not exist without mundane interference at every level.
Likewise I think that house Tremere would oppose this plan because it would allow house Mercere to achieve the Tremere goal of domination over the order, which would in turn prevent house Tremere from achieving that goal.
These are only a sampling of factions that are against.
Personally I see the entire order going more towards integration than isolation as time goes on, for the simple reason that the population of Europe is growing and magi can either flee to the fringes or stand and fight for their magical resources. Standing and fighting (not necessarily literally fighting) would mean more mundane interference and I think it more likely that magi would try to protect what is theirs than to flee.
I think that those offers can appeal some magi and some covenants. With time, and crisis, the initial hostility of others may curb, pressed by young magi not wanting to spend time on those matters. However, a non negligible percentage of covenants will never want such matters to be handled by others. Finally, a small subset, probably Tytalan magi, will use the money to undermine house Mercere, thinking that it's a plan (and frankly they are right).
Decades from the start of this project, there will be a fracture between covenants. Some magi won't understand why others still want to spend time on those matters, risking mundane interference. Perhaps a couple case will be brought before tribunals.
But the plan will stall. And house Mercere will make more and more moves, to promote its policy.
One day, they'll subtly force a covenant to rely on them. Perhaps they will help a magus botch on the mundane relations part, to have his covenant to push him aside on those decisions and take the offer of Mercere. But a clever Tytalus, or a stubborn Quaesitor, let's call him Hercules, finally sees the hand of house Mercere in this.
And crash! The plan is foiled.
This is how I see it. I can understand why individuals in house Mercere could believe they'll take over the Order on this topic at least. But I do think this is because they overrate their own image. However, I think they cannot win. They also underestimate the liberal ways of the Order. They also underestimate the number of magi always thinking a plan against them is on the move, or ready to use an advantage against any house, including house Mercere.
One last word: I would like to thank you for posting this interesting subject. It is nice to confront views on such topics. Perhaps, I'll use this idea in the future myself. However, I'll rather try it on a tribunal, given that the head Mercere of the tribunal is proud and devious enough to think his plan will promote him to the lead of the house. Hopefully our magi will see through his machinations.
Covenfolk are different. They hide the revulsion of the magi the gift creates, because they decide the lifestyle benefits the covenant provides, is worth dealing with bosses who are all a bit creepy. I was not suggesting no mundane interaction whatsoever.
Nearby mudane actors with some degree of power need to be handled carefully. A local lord, merchant guild, bishop, etc, deciding the covenant is an enemy due to a poor intereaction can have huge consequences.
If you know a Redcap well trained in social graces with no gift will smooth the path, it's tempting.
There seemed a lot of kneejerk, "No way, I'd never give away my autonomy for some comfort". I wanted to show the benefits, and highlight the unique problems the gift causes.
That is utterly trivial. Still, you argue differently above, and like Redcaps are the only remedy:
Or ask your 'tame' knight, scholar, steward, legist? These typically can handle mundane problems as well as Redcaps or better. No need to do it yourself!
But this is not an argument for letting House Mercere do it for you.
How did you get this tame knight, etc. How well can you trust them?
We've got all these magi worried about demons, and plots by wizards, but they implicitly trust the coven folk, even thought they know the gift makes the mundanes distrust them?
On a meta level, the PC magi trust them because they are PC companions, however, one should try to avoid meta thinking.
On a game level it is illogical for the magi to trust non-magi unless there is a ridiculously strong connection. Magi should assume some mundane coven folk are selling them out, as who wouldn't sell out people who are clearly creepy and a bit off, especially if the offer to sell out the covenant came from a lord or a priest.
To say there is no argument for Mercere getting involved undersells the effect of the gift.
Imagine every single day through no fault of your own, you are involved in a road rage incident. That's a magi walking through a village.
The magi can avoid the equivalent of a road rage incident by sending someone to act on their behalf. They have a choice of sending someone who they know thinks they and their friends are creepy, and has a significant chance of putting his local lord and or god of higher importance than the magi; or a Redcap of House Mercere, who puts the order as his highest priority.
It doesnt have to be either or. Some magi absolutely would trust redcaps over their companions but the opposite is also true.
Magi have ways to determine the loyalty and reliability of their covenfolk by using magic, or better, normal abilities like empathy. Companions (here broadly defined as any mundane that the magi need to rely on) have a significant advantage over redcaps in that they are not magi-by-law and are not entangled in hermetic politics. The loyalty and reliability of companions can be assessed with a reasonable degree of accuracy. Companions can stay with covenants or magi for long periods of time and often have the opportunity to throw magi under the bus or form true (and even True) friendships with the magi, the safety and livelihood of their families might depend on the wellbeing of a covenant, etc. all of these can be understood and used as a gauge for a canny magus to get a grasp on the trustworthiness of a companion (and a redcap too for that matter)
On the other hand redcaps have the advantage that they are magi-by-law and are entangled in hermetic politics. They understand the magi and their desires much better than companions.
Sometimes one is better and sometimes the other is better. As far as I can tell no one has claimed that: "There is no argument for Mercere getting involved..." and you are arguing against a position that no one has taken.
You are building your argument on a false dichotomy of redcaps who prioritize the order highest versus companions who are more loyal to external parties above the imagined magus of the argument.
Obviously any sane magus who pick a redcap who puts the order first over a companion with divided loyalties. But not all redcaps prioritize the order highest and not all companions are loyal to god or a mundane lord above magi.
Another point to consider in all of this- redcaps do not universally have unaffected by the Gift, and cannot have parma magica, which means that all of the issues of distrust that hold true for other mundanes does hold true for redcaps as well. Presumably they learn to deal with the effects of the Gift in some way, but they are not inherently (probably with some exceptions) unaffected by it.
Magi have many ways to learn how their companions think, and how to influence them. The best are not mind magic, but plain common sense. An important means is, to share their Parma with them before discussing serious matters. Another is, to learn their past and the reasons, loyalties and enmities which brought them to apply at the covenant. Yet another is, to understand what their prospects are outside of the covenant: make sure, that their current position remains appealing. Keep a clear and transparent hierarchy and distribution of responsabilities in the covenant. And finally, have someone trustworthy subtly keep an ear at the gossip in the covenant. Then you can reserve mind magic - which btw you mustn't use on Redcaps ever - for the really egregious situations.
If you need rules for recruiting specific important persons, you can use HoH:S p.140ff Agencies. Rules for general loyalty are in Covenants p.36 Prevailing Loyalty. With a good Aegis and these rather basic precautions, you can trust your covenfolk over outside magi and vistors in general.
I disagree on this one. Fishy has explained it better than I could:
Basically, the sort of power that House Mercere would gain would be pervasive, but very soft, in the sense that the maximum amount of damage they could cause with a "switchoff" would be bounded. It would force all the magi of a "victim" covenant to spend a few seasons to develop a new source of income -- which is basically what the covenant is saving upfront by accepting the offer. That's why it's insidious: I think most magi would grow dependent on Redcaps thinking "sure, it's just silver after all, I can stop taking it whenever I want!".
Let me add this. Redcaps already control correspondence within the Order. They already control a significant portion of the vis trade (as primary actors) and book trade (as intermediaries), see Covenants. They already, by custom, often represent covenants at Tribunals casting sigils as proxies, see HoH:TL. Canonically, they are already trusted with all this! I think that if the Ars Magica sourcebooks had added that House Mercere also provides the income for most covenants in the Order, nobody would have said "inconceivable!".
"We can take care of getting that grain, that timber, that steel, those horses, and sure, yes, the same high quality glassware we got for the labs of Next-Door Covenant! Sure, no problem, really, it's our job, we appreciate the vis you offer as a token of gratitude but really, there's no need." I mean ... sign me up! And indeed, more than 80% of the respondents seem to agree.
I emphasized two crucial issues in your post:
Now, there's a difference between gaining control of mundane interaction de facto (in practice) and de iure (by law). I.e. Redcaps have a de facto monopoly on correspondence delivery, not because other factions in the Order can't set up a competing service, but because nobody bothers. That's quite different from the right of Bonisagus magi to take apprentices.
Redcaps would start softly by taking de facto control of mundane wealth. There would be no victims any more than magi who rely on Redcaps to deliver their mail are victims. I mean, want to deliver your mail yourself? Just do it! What? You grew accustomed on relying on me for your mail, and now that I am telling you to do it yourself if you are not happy, you are saying I am going for total domination of your life? Come on...
Eventually, and that's something not in the present, but in the future, House Mercere may want to try to transform that de facto control in a de iure control. If most magi are happy with the de facto control exercised in the last few decades, and view others who are unhappy with it as dangerous threats to the Order's stability, I don't see it as impossible.
But really, for the purpose of this thread the question was just about setting the plan in motion. Would most covenants accept the offer of House Mercere? Apparently, yes (and it makes sense, I have to say). This means de facto control of the majority of the Order's mundane wealth over several decades, and that's already a lot of power for House Mercere with full consent of all parties involved!
(And a lot of power within House Mercere for the faction that makes it happen).
I think that ultimately many would flee, and many would stand and "fight", as it's always the case when a group comes in conflict with another. Who would be more successful, the brave or the prudent? These are questions that are really hard to answer to, even in real life. For the game this uncertainty is a good thing, because it means that the SG and troupe can choose either outcome (and have "smart" NPCs defend either outcome) while maintaining suspension of disbelief.
That's an excellent, and often underestimated, point; but it does ignores a crucial fact. Most individual Redcaps are intensely loyal to House Mercere (I mean, they are literally one big family), and House Mercere, as an abstract entity, is deeply loyal to the Order.
That's very different from a knight who's directly loyal to a bunch of magi. Instead, it's the same situation one would have with ... uh (just making things up) a knight who's loyal to his kingdom and king, and that kingdom has been for long centuries a staunch ally of the Order. "Man, I so much hate those arrogant, devious bastard sorcerers... but it's my king's honour that's at stake, for he says those bastards did repel the Usurper two hundred years ago. So I'll do my duty. But oh, I do hate it.".
If individual Redcaps have a desire for money to the point they resent not being provided a tip, the Idea that the house would provide vastly more funds to the covenants in the order rather than distributing the money to the Redcaps seems strange, and likely to be resented by the rank and file.
[quote="ezzelino, post:34, topic:168727, full:true"]I mean, imagine if you had a nice ... niece of yours who said "I am into house-cleaning. I do it for a living. I like seeing houses go from dirty mess to spotless. And honestly, uncle, I mean no offense but yours tends to gravitate towards the first group. I'm of half a mind, on my way to work on Thursday afternoons, to spend an hour at your place just giving it a quick fix. How about it? It would help me discharge my debt to you for all the times you've baby-sat me when I was a small kid." Would you see that as a nefarious plot to gain control of your entire life?
[/quote]
I have a couple of nieces and a nephew who my wife and I gave a monthy allowance to growing up. If any of them made an offer like that, I would turn then down flat. Not because I thought that they had anything nefarious in mind, but because I would not feel comfortable being as messy as I wanted to be if someone else was going to have to clean it up.
Which sort of corroborates my point. If House Mercere made such an offer, it would not be seen as a nefarious plot to control the Order, though some covenants might turn it down out of sheer pride/sense of independence. "We really would not feel confortable splurging on courtesans and wine and minstrels if these poor Redcaps would have to ... see and foot the bill." I doubt it would be the majority though.
Arguments aside about what you think mages would do you have seen a consensus quite clearly- nobody would take the money who has commented in this thread. The idea that "they would never see the really obvious nefarious plot coming" is a common one in literature, albeit generally bad literature, so if that's what you want to do in your game, go ahead.
Actually, I have seen the consensus quite clearly. More than four people out of five who have voted so far (and I am not one of them) would take the money. It's 81% vs. 19%.
Perhaps you have missed a few posts of this long thread (which would explain why you claim all comments are against accepting the offer, while there are several in favour). So let me summarize: while some people are convinced there is an "obvious nefarious plot", some think there's a "nefarious plot" which is not obvious, and others think there is no "nefarious plot" at all.
The way the question is phrased you really cannot draw any of the conclusions that you want to from the people who answer that they would take the money.
Your question is put like this:
Would you:
a. Not take the money or
b. Take the money
If someone answers, yes, you cannot know what they would do with that money and thus how your plot would play out.
For your plot to work the people who take the money have to use it as they would any other source of income and grow to become dependent on the money. However those who answered yes could just as well take the money and save it up or invest it into gaining another source of income that is truly theirs. Your question cannot distinguish these from each other and thus you cannot use the answers given to support an argument of one occurring over the other.
I have done you a favor and done a little survey on top of yours, in this thread.
you have 26 votes in your poll.
of those 5(19%) reject the offer outright and 19(81%) accept it.
there have been 3 posts here explaining why they would reject the offer. All three of those answer to some degree that they are afraid of a nefarious plot to gain control of their covenants finances and/or to isolate them from the mundane world.
just 1 person states that they would accept the offer outright, because the player wants to see the consequences. (meaning they expect that there will be consequences).
1 persons answers yes without stating their reason.
8 people answer some degree of: "I would take the money and use it to gain another source of income" or otherwise voice concerns about the redcaps using the money to gain control over the covenant and/or to isolate the covenant from the mundane world/mundane personnel of the covenant.
thus we have only 9 people who voted to take the money not accounted for in the forum answers. What the motives of those 9 people are is hard to say. I am willing to entertain the opinion that they are more likely to simply accept the money with no questions asked than the average poster in this thread, based on an assumption that someone who has problems with the offer would be more likely to voice their concerns via a post in this thread. However I dont think it is reasonable to assume that all 9 of them would accept the offer no questions asked either.
I also feel that it must be mentioned that you, @ezzelino have been active in the thread guiding people on how to answer and even edited the question once. This is obviously fine for a forum survey of a game about fictional wizards. However it also means that the results were almost certainly skewed towards whatever result you hoped to gain. I obviously dont know what you hoped to gain out of this but it is just about impossible not to affect the behavior of test subjects when you interact with them. This is important to consider when looking at the results of the survey.
Ultimately that gives what is in my view a slight (keyword: "slight") edge to the suspicious crowd, among those who would take the money. If you then include the 3-5 people who would not take the money things look even worse for the redcaps trying to control the orders finances. In the end the best you can manage is a 50-50 split between people who would accept the offer and those who expect the plot, and that is only assuming that the people who have not explained their answer beyond casting a vote have the motives that you need them to have.
Then there is another issue which is worth commenting on. As mentioned above there are several answers to the effect of "I would take the money and try to use it to gain an independent source of income." However a very important word here is "try". Some covenants might well try and fail to establish another source of income with the gift-money. What they do then is of course further not clear, some might well just give up and use the gift money as a source of income but some might also forego it and live a poorer life instead.
Ultimately I think that the picture that can be gained from surveying your poll results and the forum posts is not quite clear cut in favor of the hypothetical redcaps that you present.
Unfortunately another poll with more possibilities for answering would be necessary and as the current one does not provide insight into peoples motives for answering as they do nor into what they plan to do with the money.
The plot you describe is dependent on certain motivations but especially certain behaviors in regards to the money for the plot to work.
Ultimately there is, so much data that we need to form informed opinions that the true answer is that there is no data-driven support for any conclusion either way here. What we choose to believe is mostly just a personal opinion based on whatever we each use to form such opinions. It is by no means certain that such a plot as described by the OP, will happen in the core setting nor that it will succeed if it does happen.
Ultimately the most important factor for whether or not this plot will happen and can succeed in each of our games is whether we want it to succeed or not.
It's free money, so IC, I'd take it. Though I would not rely on it because by its very nature it could just disappear, and I would not want house Mercere to just turn the tap off when there is a change of leadership (who no longer supports this policy), when there is a disagreement etc I don't think that you can rely on them as a financial source, and the mages (like a lot like professors) being forced to spend all their time writing grant application just doesn't sound like a very interesting thing.
I would invest the money as it comes, buying mills/inns/ bakeries/workshops/olive presses/a fleet of trade ships etc Obviously there needs to be some form of expertise for this to be more than speculation (owning 20 side by side mills just wouldn't be financially viable). There will be a viable form of investment in most locations, so the Covenant would need a Factor to act like it's capitalist, but that could be a side job of the Verditius' factor for example.
I am deliberately running my current game with scarcity as a theme, so my party is earning it's keep however it can. With 100 pounds, they could buy themselves a fleet of fishing boats and rent the entire fishing rights from the count of Nassau, to force local fishermen to work for them or face consequences. They could reopen the roman lead mine with that kind of capital, including greasing the count's palm. If nothing else, they could have just hired a large builder's crew to build them a massive Covenant and nice houses using imported wood and stone, rather than have to work themselves and casting rock of viscid clay to get themselves solid houses.
I think that a fresh spring Covenant simply would not have the luxury of turning down that offer.
Showing up at the Oculus Septentrionalis with an offer of 100 pounds free money would also be met with acceptance, since they'd just invest it directly into their preexisting money making schemes.
Some Covenant would find the free money just too easy and might end up relying exclusively on it, but that is the dangerous path. IN general, I think the most reasonable course of action would be to accept and invest.
The other issue with this, is that if House Mercere is just "minting" endless amounts of gold/silver/spices from the relevant Vis, there will be (hyper) inflation, much as would be observed in Spain with the influx of new world gold bullions.
Another effect would be a drain on the order-wide Te vis supply as more and more is turned into gold/silver. one way to spread this would be to use He Vis to make spices.
Although this probably would not be a concern for most mages, over time using vis to produce a ton of Ginger/cinnamon/cloves/chili powder or whatever would cause a crash in its price as they flood the market.
Overall, it's a deal worth taking but not one worth relying upon. All it would take is a public case of house Mercere flexing it's financial muscle over a covenant relying on its grant for a shockwave to reverberate through the order, with those who don't need the 100 pounds just starting to refuse out of principle, which would then split the Order into the poor Covenants who need the grant but want to get out of that hole and those who made it out.
I answered yes, and I mentioned I'd try to achieve another income source, however, I am in a campaign and the Magi I play has the Gentle Gift, so he is happy talking to the peasantry, the merchants, etc. I'd think most spring covenants would take the money without a second thought.
The other thing with Mercere they'd have the whole thing set up. Casting tablets, or specialists in covenant creation. They could do in weeks, what would take a spring covenant with newly gauntletted magi years. It's a trivial investment for Mercere.
Imagine you are a Spring covenant living in the ruins of an old covenant, you've not got the right Rego Terram or Herbam specialist, or not much craft skill so any work would look ugly. You are living in drafty ramshackle hovels. Mercere shows up and says we can magically move around stone and wood to make lovely buildings (we can even put a mosaic there for you), set up the crops, bring in some locals to tend them.
The magi are going to live in their windy hovel? It's easy to disregard character suffering. A character having diarrhoea, lice, bedbugs, a crick neck from sleeping rough, whatever, for some people only matter when it gives them an in-game penalty. Think to yourself, how much effort we put in for simple comforts? Think of the toilet paper hoarding during Corona.
If Magi are doing it a bit rough, especially when they aren't used to it (which is likely the case as the covenant they came from had the resources to support a magi taking an apprentice.) only the most die hard individualists in a spring covenant would say no.
