I came out to LC +8 (EDIT: in play) without actually realizing it since they are broken down into Lab Health, Healthy Features, and Lifestyle. Only have a Lab Health of +4 from Virtues though, with another +2 from enchantments.
You are correct that getting all of the virtues is mechanically possible but to do it you would have to devote a great deal of time, effort, and narrative explanation to it. Much easier to get the Virtues that make sense and enchantments to go higher.
Very, very fine bread 
Yup. I did that, and in the process discovered a big problem with Faerie Sympathy's lack of limit on gaining experience from 1s. That character by RAW would have been providing +20s or +30s in short order.
I'd agree with this, with the slight modification that I (also) think the descriptions of the parameters on pages 111 - 112 should explicitly state for each parameter how many magnitudes it adds. Yes, you can work it out if you read the earlier text and then work through the list, but I've had new players refer to the descriptions and then go "okay, but how does this actually affect the spell level?".
Having charts when it comes to how Levels and Magnitudes are added for various side effects would very much be helpful.
Honestly, one of the hardest things for me to figure out when I first got into Ars Magica was how spells are calculated. While it seems logical in hindsight at the time the epiphany was like a bolt of lightning that made the whole game just flow.
So yeah charts on such things would be quite useful.
Can't believe I didn't mention this one earlier:
A lot of people get confused about general spells, even though there are core general spells that do not use any general guideline, really just because "general spell" and "general guideline" both have "general" in them, despite the definition of a general spell being written in the core rules. Part of this is because of how the guidelines are written. Some are written as "general" with a formula. Some are listed with starting levels and then given a formula to alter them (e.g. most of non-Creo Ignem). Some are listed with a whole sequence of individual guidelines that could easily have been written with a formula (e.g. Creo Ignem). All of these fit the general spell definition, but there aren't very good examples. What could really help is to have some example general spells using these other methods rather than just having some general spells that don't use a listed guideline. For example, write Pilum of Fire as "general" and write its damage based on its level. Do the same with Ward Against Heat and Flames. Then people will have examples of several types for clarity.
Here's something I saw in another thread from another poster:
- For Pilum of Fire , our troupe was confused for quite a while about whether or not a stress die was added to the victim's static Soak Total. The full rules for this are split, with damage dealt detailed under the Description header in the Spell Format section, and resisting damage nearly 70 pages away under a section detailing non-combat damage.
- For The Invisible Sling of Vilano and other spells that require an aiming roll, our troupe thought it was obvious that the aiming roll generated an Attack Total that would be compared to the victim's Defense Total, thereby generating Attack Advantage that would apply to the spell's damage. Otherwise, how the heck could you tell if you hit, given the lack of rules for an Ease Factor for an aimed spell? Even now, after having stumbled onto a thread about aiming spells in which Mr. Chart stated that the intent was otherwise, I have no idea how RAI would derive an Ease Factor for an aimed spell. (just Defense? stress die+Defense? something else?)
If an item maintains concentration (with that +5 levels) on a Concentration effect and it has many uses per day, can it concentrate on a whole bunch at the same time, or are those uses per day just how many times it can be activated if it's being turned on and off while only one can be active at a time?
I don't think there is actually a printed answer to this. I think I know the RAI from the description and from the assumed idiocy of so many canonical things if it's otherwise, but it should be clearer. My interpretation is that it is the number of activations and only one can be active at a time because that fits the example and because otherwise this is nearly always (always so long as the modified level reaches 10+) far superior to Sun to the extent that the magi inventing the many Sun items (not constant, just sun) must be stupid despite their high Int scores. But this is just my interpretation, as it's really not stated anywhere.
When I first wanted to understand how to enchant items, I read the "Magical Enchantment" section of the Laboratory chapter. I found the "Talisman Attunement" section very confusing. That's because a talisman is a special case of an invested item. If the "Talisman Attunement" section was moved to just after "Using Enchanted Devices", I think that section would be an easier read.
The rules on warping (page 168) specify that a power enchanted into a familiar link doesn't cause warping. I think it would be useful to also state this in the "Empowering the Bond" section of the familiar rules, on page 105.
The full requirements for Ritual Spellcasting. As it is written now, the true requirements for what constitutes a ritual spell is scattered around the core rule book. There is a section on P. 114, P. 115, a blurb in Momentary on 112, and a blurb somewhere else on grandiose effects.
The requirements appear to be:
I would additionally explicitly clarify in the same section that you cannot replicate Ritual-requiring effects with Spontaneous magic in any way, if that is indeed the correct intention from the writers.
This thread is continuing to be extremely useful. Thank you, everyone. If you have more, please post them.
I started a group of all new players to Ars last year. One common thought we all had is that it seems like the book is very clearly laid out for veterans of the game, especially when it comes to character creation. Making a magus involves flipping between 4 different chapters of the core book. Specifically, having to flip between the advancement table on 31, experience from apprenticeship for character creation on 32, and the other chapters had comments from everyone in my group.
Yesterday I just realized, after consulting a few books looking for it, that Forceless Casting option is on HoH: True Lineages (on a box between spells). Being such an important concept for how magi cast spells that might affect other magi, I would think about moving it to the corebook.
Forceless casting also says you can choose to cast a spell at penetration 0, but it doesn't really clarify that you can choose to cast at, say Penetration +6. Does it allow you to choose at any time?
Huh? I’ve never taken from what was written that you could choose a penetration outside 0 or less (forceless casting) or your normally determined penetration total.
I have seen people interpret that mixed with the spontaneous spell casting rules as 'choose a penetration value'. Since with spontaneous you can say before rolling 'this will be Penetration +6'. This needs clarification, IMO
Where does it say you can set penetration for Spontaneous spells?