Has a supernatural creature 2 might scores or only one?

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

Hi,
I was thinking about a future familiar for a npc and reflected about the fact that most magical creatures cannot learn due to their might score.
RoPM p52: "This is not to say that a magic character cannot advance. It can, but it is much more difficult. Magic characters can accumulate and spend experience points just like normal human characters, save for one important limitation: the character’s Might Score is always subtracted from its Advancement Total."

Then I thought that when you cast a ritual power (or have it activated by default), either your might score is decreased, either you spend confidence to keep it. RoP:M:
"Besides reducing the character’s Might Pool, Ritual Powers also require the player to subtract one from the character’s Might Score for each point in the Might cost, whenever it activates the effect. This lost Might may return over time, at the storyguide’s discretion, but at a much slower rate than recovering lost Might Points. For example, each point of lost Might Score could require the character to rest for an entire season in a Magic aura of no less than (its Might Score / 5), or perhaps to consume vis of the same type as its Might, a number of pawns equal to its original Might Score. Alternatively, instead of reducing its Might Score, the character can lose one Confidence Point for each Might Point in the activation cost. It can do this whenever it has enough Confidence Points, even if the number of Confidence Points would exceed the character’s Confidence Score. If the character has Confidence because of the Ferocity Virtue, it can only use them to activate the Ritual Power in the specific circumstances associated with that Virtue."

Then I was asking myself: what if a smart magical creature had a ritual power she uses in key moments... when she wants to learn.
Imagine a ritual power for year duration, which cost 10 might and reduce the might by 10 too as stated in the rules.

The magical creature has a might pool of let's say 12. It casts the power, 2 might pool.
During the year, as stated for ritual effects, the might score lowers to 2.
Bam, that creature can learn quite easily.

Hence my question: do the rules distinguish the "normal static might score" and the "effective at a moment might score"? I read the RoP:M but it didn't distinguish, just saying what I quote before.

What are your thoughts about this?

Thanks,
Exar.

2

I don't know that it makes a ton of sense - irl, people learn better when they're at full strength (well-rested, full meals, no emotional distress, etc), rather than when they're exhausted (or underfed, distracted, etc). So, a Magic Creature burning through a lot of its power should, imo, be fragile and disinclined to learn things.

On the flip side, as Magic Might being low enough to count on a hand makes that character dangerously close to being mundane. I think there's something narratively compelling about the idea of a character going through cycles of mundanity, in which they can grow, and transcendence, in which they can't. It feels very perhaps a bit game-y to do this on purpose, but if it was part of the Magic Being's routine to the point where they perhaps don't realize that they need to burn Might through Ritual Powers in order to go about their day-to-day, or they're some sort of seasonal entity who burns a bunch of Might at the Vernal Equinox as part of a fertility rite, then spends the winter holed up in their lair with a book, that would feel satisfying.

I will say that if you treat Current Might Score as functional for advancement calculations instead of Normal Static Might Score, that runs the risk of applying also to acclimation - so, a Magic God of normal static might 50 could theoretically go around blessing/cursing a bunch of towns with Rituals to get themselves down to only 4 Might, and then nibble down just 2 Vis to avoid yearly acclimation, which doesn't feel right? Although I suppose that satisfies the "Affecting others with Magic to avoid Acclimation" requisite, so, perhaps it's fine actually. I take it back.

This does still feel like a strategy for a mid-Might creature, anything too strong would probably not consider learning 10xp worth of Flemmish worth the risk of being laid low after centuries of accumulating 40 Might or whatever.

3

Yeah obviously it something most creatures won't even consider. I was asking specifically for creature so smart that they may do the calculation and "game" their rules. As some faeries can happily do, I don't see why some magical creatures couldn't. But I wasn't sure about the "there is only one might score" for every calculation.

For what you described - a creature having lost might and becoming better at learning -, it's what my own companion has been doing; it all started with transformations lowering the might and the fact that he spend every season in practice of either single weapon or penetration (it's a magic sword wanting to become the only perfect magical weapon, above every other weapon).
Knowing it is not the best but hoping that when danger will come, it will strike first and kill it before it can do anything. Sometimes a transformation occurs, might rises or lower again, our aura is too weak to be really sure of a good roll. Now it is increasing so things may change.

So far, he has always won and didn't face a magical threat from too far away (which for a sword, may be a problem). When it happened, he transformed in the several years after the event; for example to gain a power to deal with petty bowmen after an adventure; and transformed to gain a power to teleport back to its owner hand after another adventure, because he discovered that he can't be wield when not in the hand of the poor holder.
Recently, magi in the covenant have started to speak enigmatically and say things such as "Sword, you are only a sword, not a threat to us". So he developed a power to put them into twilight (because after 70 years of living with them, he has understood they are weak in twilight) and hopes, again, if they become a threat, to hit first (for which the high initiative is hopeful) and that a cut will provide blood and that will boost the penetration ability (which he has also risen to high score after all this time) for that "on hit" fastcasting power with no cost. Or maybe the hit will kill but magi are really hard to kill from his own constatations.
(Personaly I hope I don't have to use it on PCs, and reserve it for NPCs but recent talks in game from the other players about this companion gave the roleplay reason for that transformation to happen.)

4

I don't think this works. If there is any way to recover the Might from a Ritual Power, you advance using the total it will recover to eventually. (So yes, you need to track two Might scores.)

If there is no way to recover, you advance using your reduced Might, which is the only score you have now. Congratulations: you have shed magical power in return for the ability to learn again. I think that's OK, and it feels like a good story.

5

OK I get your idea. I was actually thinking this way, and going the other way : reduce might score at creation to have a little score of 1, having a great power to boost your might pool in case of need and having a high ritual power to boost might score/MR by using vis mastery to not reduce might but spend vis as confident in place, considering the fact that your "real might score" is what would define your (in)ability to learn.

But I find it weird that the rules are not discussing this since a lot of creature should have (innate) ritual powers (at least on the Hermetic scale of power).

6

I think the rationale is that, if some troupes have high vis campaigns, and some troupes have low vis campaigns, then troupes may need to balance how often ritual powers can be used and how fast might regens. But yes, I agree, I would have prefered a clearer ruleset.

7

I agree it's a gap that the rules don't describe how long-term Might recovers. I take Temprobe's point that the numbers will vary from campaign to campaign, but I don't think they even promise that Vis recovery can work at all. I think they want to allow all kinds of approaches, maybe things such as draining blood to power recovery. But that's very loose for a player character (or close ally). I think for those you'd have to say it's always Vis recovery.

But generally, I think the Qualities system is very open ended. While it does let you produce interesting characters, it's also very abusable, to the point where people shouldn't even try. So I wouldn't produce tricks like lowering Might to 1, because that's not related to character concept or abilities: you're just dodging round the rules.

8

Of course there are attempts to abuse the rule, the point is that in the game you have to decide where your put a limit between abuse and fun.
As the SG, i'm seeing the fun. Obviously it's not something most creatures would do. As most faeries would not be able to abuse their roles. But there is a virtue for it, which as written, let faeries change themselves to be the best at what the story incurs.

Demons and angels do not even have rules (just do what you want) for their powers. I personaly use the Magic system as a base, without much "barrier" if I need.

Here for the magic, in our last sessions, I made an aspect of raw magic appears due to a laboratory accident. It got me thinking that if the material world has their elementary, I don't see why magic wouldn't have its own elementaries.
Then I thought that magic elementaries would be the perfect candidate to push the rules of magic to their limit.
And one of the limits is that the magical quality system is very loose after all for npc. THe first decision for PC (and NPC) is deciding the base might (from a meta point of view). From which you can pay for qualities and inferiorities, which would then be able to raise or lower the might in game (for the ingame value known to magi... except) that is used for constantly activated ritual powers that need to lower it again, so that the "in game" might is not the "true" ingame might but what is the difference from an ingame point of view since the "constantly activated ritual power" is part of the creature in every moment.
But nothing prevents the SG to decide that this dragon, elemental creature has a base might of 140. For example the dragon Polymates (the one who read books) is only might ... iirc 49? but is created with might 60+ iirc (serf's parma, I made the calculations for the first and only time at the release date of RoP:tM when I tried to understand the process of creating the magical creatures with retro-engeering their examples); so if a 50 might dragon ingame is constructed as a 65, I see nothing preventing the 100 protagonoi of Magic to be build as a ... (randomly saying a number here) 120 might creature.

So with that process, I'm deciding that I need to keep the logical inherently correct. That is best done by always having the same authority (= SG = me) do the process. If the particularities are done by me in each case, the overall process is quite similar.

So from my particular process, I see nothing in the rules against it.
My first idea was not very good because the fact the rules as written do not very much encompass the use of ritual constant powers (which is lame because they are what makes magical creatures so powerful. Like a constant "heal wound" effect, or a triggered effect "at the time of death, resurrect"; I used already both, first for a bone dragon, second for a phenix creature making both essentially immortal if you do not destroy the might itself (well the bone dragon could have been killed in one blast but it was a very hard feat due to being big and with a lot of soak)) and do not provide any example of it that I remember, nor is it discussed in the advancement text. But here there was a rather consensual position that it's too weird.

So in the end, of course not every magical creature will resort to the trick explained here. But I read nothing from the rules preventing a magical creature with like 6 in intelligence to have transformed specifically in that direction.

The fact that magical things are perfect example of what they are supposed to be, and most are "non changing" is not by itself blocking since it's a paradox if you apply it to "a creature of change". So I'm envisionning a Mentem spirit dedicated to change (I still need to find the good word in english to encompass their point of being, like a spirit of anger would be angry, that spirit would be changing, everytime). Being the perfect example of change, he has transformed/is "born" with the ability to change hence the ease to do it it acquired. Until the future (post story) millenium where it would change that, and start doing something else, like deciding to teach humanity and no more learn.

That's the kind of idea I had. Nothing set in stone yet, I'm still letting that ripen in my mind (not sure if "ripen" is the right word, the dictionnary say so but it's strange i think it applies to fruits, not ideas but you get the idea I hope).