Hermetic economy

Games Discussion Ars Magica
21

In this case I would disagree with you Nathan because as a buyer what you are concerned with is how does the item perform. If the product took one month to be produced or one month plus two months shipping time to reach the store does not really matter to you.

For example, if you go to the store and buy something ( say a saw ), you only really consider how well does this item suit your needs compared to the price. If there are two saws that are available and do exactly the same job and identical in ability then you are not going to pay more for one because the person that made the one saw considers their time is worth $40 per hour while the other considers their time is worth $20 per hour. You are going to buy the cheapest saw that does the job.

You rarely will consider things in terms of "brand" name unless there is a special history of reliability to back it up ( what is sometimes called goodwill ).

The time value is really a factor of the producer. The great master with arts that allows the production of an item in 1 season as opposed to another in 2 seasons gets the benefit of producing more in less time. His skills already are the compensation. His skills also are already compensated by being able to produce items that another could not produce.

For example the magus with a level of 40 in an art could write a book in an art at the level 20 that a magus with a lesser skill could never achieve. The suggested complensation of the ability to study longer from that text means that the greater skill is already being paid.

The same goes in the production of charged items where the higher skill is going to produce more charges which means more value is included in the suggested price.

The greater skill rewards the creator in more efficient production time and the ability to produce items that others can not produce ( like a lesser enchantment with a big extra penetration bonus ).

22

While I understand your position PhiliAtlas, and would agree with it when discussing 21st Century regular purchases. I do not think applies to longevity construction or any hermetic project.

Each of these products that is to be purchased is a custom order. It isn't an item produced on an assembly line where the buyer has the option to walk down an aisle and compare options to price and pick the product that best fits their needs and income.

Hermetic products, like todays customer orders are built to order. This means the artisans skill, the scarcity of resources, and the production time all become relevant.

In the past I've mentioned Murano Glass. While Murano Glass can be bought in a mall, it's production is still done by hand by artisans. The real pieces, the product not found in malls, but in specialty stores is always made to order. August is typically to hot for the artisans to work on glass products so production comes to a complete stop for the entire month.

So if a person wants to buy a high end torchier topped by a Murano Glass dome, June and July are the worse months to do it. The lead time for production is about 6 weeks. Add to that a month for August. Add an additional two weeks to get production started and to finish old orders. Add to that transportation from Italy to American.

The savy buyer of this custom order product will wait until November when production is smooth once again and production time is likely cut in half.

Because Hermetic Projects are made to order I feel that the production time is a relevant factor that should be considered. The shorter the better, which in turn is more valuable.

23

PhiliAtlas, I think we may be talking past each other.

True.

And that's just my point. Let's say magi with lab totals of 80 and 60 both spend a season making a level 30 magical widget. As a buyer, I really don't care too much who made it, but the opportunity cost for the 80-magus is a lot higher than the opportunity cost to the 60-magus since the 80 magus could have spent the same season making a level 40 magical widget.

Nathan

24

If you were to special order an item then I agree that you would likely pay an extra fee based upon the reputation of the person that was making the item.

Many items though are likely lying around in some stock pile that gets little attention. Items like a wand that shoots Pilums of Fire or casts Agony of Beasts or something that allows the user to fly. Some may have been made for apprentices or companions that through age or growth of ability have discarded the lesser enchantments. Some of these might be left over from various Wizard Marches.

Books have a certain amount of duplication and some would be more commonly found then others. Books by the Greeks in philosophy and liberal arts are likely quite common.

The example of the Murano glass order is an example of a specialty order but I do not believe Murano was the only source of glass in the middle ages. If you wanted some stained glass for the windows in your church then you would have a variety of choices of artisans that were roughly comparable and where you would not really be paying extra because of the time taken but only on how good was the finished product.

The longevity ritual would be another example where in each tribunal there is likely someone who is specially skilled at creo corpus ( this combination is fairly likely as it is the central component of most healing and longevity which makes even many covenants have at least one with some skill in this combination ). You could thus have a fair choice of nine to ten magus who might be able to do a really great job at the ritual. On the other hand if you were to choose the one person who was known to have supplied the longevity ritual for 5 or more of the primus of the order of Hermes then you will pay for that repuation.

When it comes to opportunity cost in acounting this represents the loss to the producer for not using their time more efficiently. Nathan gives the example of the lvl 30 widget. I agree the magi with the lvl 80 lab total is not producing as well if they produce only a lvl 30 widget but the consumer is only going to pay for a lvl 30 widget. The magi with the higher lab total either accepts the going rate of the lvl 30 widget which keeps them in the market or they decide to spend their time doing something else and refuse the contract ( or pass it on to someone who has less skills to complete like a "journyman magi" ). If the magi accepts the market rate then they do operate at an opportunity cost loss ( but opportunity costs are really theoretical losses compared to an ideal world which means they rarely reflect anything close to reality :wink: ). If the magi refuses then likely another magi will choose to pick up the contract with a lab total closer matching the minimum to complete the contract.

Opportunity costs for orders are related to what else the magi could be doing with their time. If they need resources to do some master project then they will likely accept even poor contracts to get paid but likely will not devote the full resources that they could to the project.

This though relates back to the originally posed question of how rare are specialists within the order of Hermes?

Creo Corpus specialists are probaly fairly common compared to a specialist in Perdo Imagenum.

A specialist in Regio that can construct Portals while not common likely gets a fair amount of business as does a Creo Terrum specialst that can handle construction work.

The house of Flambeau leads to a fairly common amount of Igneum specialsts while Aquam specialsts would seem to be more rare.

While there are likely many Herbam and Animal experts their are likely very few that specialize in Intelligo Herbam or Intelligo Animal ( talking is considered to something that is done but not usually the only thing that is focused upon ).

These suggestions are more my personal bias on thinking based on typical characters that I have seen made. Your own saga may have a very different bias for specialists.

25

Not really. Artists able to run a workshop making stained glass windows from the middle ages up into the 16th century were very rare and sought after professionals, called - with most of their workshop and often at great expense - also from afar for specific church projects. Kings and popes had some choice there sometimes.
When the Archbishop of Arezzo through intercession of the pope could get Guillaume de Marcillat to work for him and the Arezzo cathedral in the 1510s and 1520s, all the stained glass in the churches along the Val di Chiana came from his workshop.

To be good at longevity rituals, magi need to be really good at Magic Theory, too, or they cannot even attempt to perform longevity rituals for elder magi. If a magus has 100 years, you need e. g. a Magic Theory score of 10 to perform it for him.
Since Magic Theory takes lots of time to improve, the important longevity rituals require a very specialized magus: it's unlikely there is even one per Tribunal. I think that the oldest and most powerful magi of one powerful or several weaker Tribunals might indeed pool resources to allow one specialist to reach very high Magic Theory scores and thus be still capable of repairing their longevity rituals when needed.
And to make sure that they are not bereft of longevity rituals once the specialist succumbs to final twilight, these old magi will also sponsor apprentices for him, the best of whose is supposed to once take over, and in the meantime needs practice in longevity rituals. So this magus will likely make the rituals for those younger magi who 80 to 120 years from now will need him to repair these rituals.

In the end, the workshop of the longevity specialist and the one of Guillaume de Marcillat might have a lot in common ...

Kind regards,

Berengar

26

Aquam specialists: there is that Intellego Aquam scrying pool ritual. :slight_smile:
My idea for Mercere Mercurian ritual specialists keep running afoul of the difficulty of learning all the high-power rituals. I see a need for "Major Magical Focus: Ritual". Except that'd be two Major Hermetic Virtues.

2xMagic Theory is the season vis limit for enchantments; are longevity rituals bounded by that? The vis is spent in the actual Ritual, not the discovery process and seems more likely to run into the Art limits.

(Along similar lines: if you have the Lab Text for an awesome Longevity Ritual for yourself, do you need a comparable CrCo score to re-perform the ritual?)

Anyway, MT 10 from MT 3 is 245 xp, or about 120 seasons in the lab if you just rely on exposure. Puissant MT lets you cheat, and just need MT 8.

27

The Magic Theory limit is "The magus cannot successfully integrate any more vis into a single project." (ArM5 p. 94) The Longevity Ritual certainly is a single lab project, with a vis cost defined on ArM5 p.101. That the vis used is part of the lab project of ritual development is also shown by "When creating a Longevity Ritual for the first time, you can increase its potency by adding extra vis to the ceremony. ... For each additional pawn you add to the ritual add 1 to your Lab Total."

The relevant chapter is not particularly well written indeed. But ArM p.101 states. "You must have the Laboratory Text ... from the original ritual to do this, and this is the only benefit from a Longevity Ritual's Laboratory Text." Since all the possible other benefits of a Laboratory Text do only apply if you have to generate a Lab Total again, I conclude that this is indeed the case, and since no other formula for the Lab Total is mentioned, I further conclude that it remains the same. So indeed, you need a comparable CrCo score again. But unless you were rather unlucky with your Aging stress die, you would normally anyway reinvent the Longevity Ritual once it failed, because otherwise it is likely to fail again soon.

120 seasons is 30 years of lab projects - so an awful lot of lab time. Even an extreme lab rat would also read books, study from vis, teach apprentices etc. - so it's some 70 to 100 years before a non-Bonisagus lab rat would have gotten that far on exposure alone. But then there are magi a lot older than just a mere 100 years, and their Longevity Rituals are even more in danger of giving way.

Kind regards,

Berengar

28

Definately you would want to find a compilation of Magic Theory Tractus to speed up the process ( I would like to take a seven year sabatical to Duremar to study magic theory :bulb: ). Still, it is plenty of study to get the magic theory to develop that ritual.

29

And the old fogeys of your Tribunal would second that wish ... provided that they can abort the sabbatical at any problem with their Longevity Rituals, that is.
Perhaps its even better for everybody if you set up the Longevity Ritual workshop at Durenmar from the start, or get a set of copies of Magic Theory tractatus from there. After all, its for the benefit of the :wink: most important magi of the Tribunal, isn't it?

Kind regards,

Berengar

30

I think this makes the most sense of all. While I was concerned with the fact that the magi of a covenant could pool thier resources to over time buy all the magi of a coveannt super longevity potions. What remains is the development of a super longevity potion 'maker' also requires the collected resources of a covenant.

This covenant, from a very early age, possibly apprenticeship has to see that a particular person with the gift has the potential to become a master longevity potion maker. Perhaps they have just the right combination of virtues and flaws. Perhaps other magi find such an apprentice and through trade get them to the 'right' covenant because they lack the resources to allow such a person to reach thier potential.

Having found this student, his strength and weaknesses need to be honed to allow him to reach his true potential, this can only occur at clearly focused covenant. Having gauntleted, this magus is just begining to take the steps towards becoming longevity maker extraordinarie. They must now gain access to the right books, in order to excell his magic theory as well as the appropriate arts. This process will take decades requireing an investment of time and resources to once again aid the magus in reaching his potential. Eventually the magus has the skills to create super longevity potions. Most likely he is the first rewarded for this investment. Then the magi of the covenant who sponsored the 'construction' of this magus. Later, his skills could be farmed out to magi who want a super longevity potion.

The one factor the above senario doesn't account for is the desires of the actual magus. I can not imagine anyone wanting to play a master longevity potion maker. This is likely the life a the ultimate lab rat, living the life of magus who is constantly studying or working as well as possibly being a 'kept' magus by his peers. For who in their right mind would want to encourage such a valuable magus to go out and adventure? He might get harmed or die! No better to keep him safe in the lab.

While this maker would likely have a long life, few are immortal? Another student, when found should be trained as an apprentice. Either by this magus or by someone capable of 'preping' the student for the life ahead. Perhaps a mystery cult exists around this premise? Rather than approaching the group on a spiritual or philosophical angle, the group exists on a very utilitarian angle. "We are naturally very good at making longevity- so that's what we do."

Again, because of the resources and time involved into creating someone capable of making these exceptional potions, the long term planing and resources of a powerful covenant are the only thing that make this possible. Because of this the covenant would need to be simular to Durenmar, a covenant with access to high level books, in possession of long term stability, and a reputation as a reliable trader of Hermetic product.

The short list of candidates in mind would include Durenmar as Berengar mentioned, possibly Verdi and Doissettep?

All of this veers away from the issue of cost, but I think it helps establish that a longevity maker isn't common. However it also establishes a path a covenant might take to create a longevity potion maker, which in time could be a source of high revenue for the covenant should they be able to succeed in the sponsorship of such a magus.

31

Great contribution, Tuura!

Neither can I. But I imagine that a lot of the more sedentary Hermetic magi would like to hold that post.

Exactly - provided 'kept' is meant as 'protected and honored'. His peers wouldn't offend or belittle the sodalis on whose skills they depend for their continued existence. He might indeed have a tribunalwide favorable Reputation of Longevity Master or such at +3 or +4.

Kind regards,

Berengar

32

While such a person would be very good for handling longevity rituals, they would still be very good at doing other things like healing verious sickness, disease, injuries, and helping augment physical characterisitics.

They would also be very good at handling those crisis that occur due to aging when a longevity potion fails dramatically.

The location of this person would thus tend to gather a retirement home for magus around this person. It would be dangerous for a magus beyond a certain number of years to be too far from this longevity maker because they are the one to cast replacement spells and resolve any dangerous crisis that occur.

A place like Duremar might compete heavily to get this longevity maker and fight violently to keep them under their covenant roof because if this magus were to leave then it would force a large number of powerful magus to follow where this person went. The covenant could also make a considerable business in "rental" fees to magus forced by need to settle at the covenant to stay close to their "doctor."

These two elements could make for some interesting plot lines as really powerful magi fearful of their mortality might put severe restrictions on the longevity maker or even attempt Regio Mentum spells to keep the person from getting any "ideas." While the roll might be prestigious, it would also fall into a very thin line of how much freedom they would allow this person ( like a phyisist working on the Manhatten Project ).

33

I suppose in the carrot and stick method we shouldn't forget the carrot. In addition to possessing the esteemed reputation Longevity Master, perhaps instead of Rego Mentem Magics being used to keep a magus in line is the presence of luxury.

It's likely that such a magus, while highly skilled in the arts involveing longevity knows little about the other arts. The covenant that sponors this magus wants him to want to be a 'kept' in order to keep him out of harms way and to use if not exploit his rare skills.

Perhaps this magus is overwhelmed with indulgences in order to encourage them to stay at this covenant and not adventure. This need not only be magical gifts, but mundane vices, liquor, women, art, spices. Really whatever the magus fancies. If he has a nice home he enjoys, the need for rego mentum magics becomes unnecessary. However these indulgences could add to the cost of the potions as either the hosting covenant or the eager buyer needs to foot the bill to entertain potion maker extraordinarie.

As its likely the potion maker will live a long life, the indulgences of the potion maker could become more and more ecentric and rare. If the potion maker collects say... pillows. Showing up with two hundred pillows simply might not cut it. But a pillow from a foriegn land that still holds the smell of the queen's hair who slept on it. Now you can't get that anywhere. Perhaps one unquie pillow will earn his interest where gold and vis will not. Who knows what this person might want after 100+ years of bargaining for his services. I can imagine an ecentric selfish brat of a lab rat withholding his services unless his demands are met. Which I suppose brings up back to the Rego Mentem option. Hmmmm.

I see a story developing here. (Hey you- Get me out of here!)

34

Heh... in two different sagas I've had two different players with that goal. (And possibly a third in my latest saga.)

35

Continuous Rego Mentem means warping, shortening the lifespan of your carefully nurtured specialist.

My new saga is starting with a fair bit of Creo Corpus expertise, perhaps as several mages think in terms of their own longevity potions instead of a market. Both of the elder magi I designed for the Winter phase were Corpus experts, for their own reason, e.g. the Bonisagus trying to research the heartbeast from scratch.

Even a very specialized expert who only knows Creo and Corpus... well, they know those two arts pretty well, scores of 30-40, plus Puissant bonuses. The Corpus side leads to Perdo and Rego effects; the elder specialist could be a half-decent combat mage. Creo has even more uses -- someone with a Creo of 30 can conjure mystic towers or storm systems readily enough, even without any Terram or Auram, though they'd probably want to get the spells from texts, not original research. Not to mention CrIg, CrMe... it'd be a mistake to think of this mage as defenseless. They're a Hermetic magus, not a hedge wizard, and that means flexible.

Now, if you've controlled their entire education and life, you can have limited the spells they've seen, and even given them deficiencies in spontaneous spell casting. But this would be fragile situation; some people in the Order are sufficiently ruthless to do all this, but others are sufficiently moral to object. Dark Secret for the covenant and lose public cooperation benefits, I'd say.

36

True enough no Hermetic Magus is defenseless, even the ultra specialized one. I guess I was just thinking that if a huge amount of time was invested into makng this guy the best guy, then efforts will be made to keep him around rather than have him leave be it because of a bad taste in his mouth or the desire to check out other things. Again carrots over the stick typically would help make the magus want to stay. I mean any magus that has been groomed to be this ultra specialist knows this. He is aware of his nature. That's why imagined the 'brat' factor. A person who knows his own value may begin to exploit that factor. On the other hand he could see this as his devot duty and his part to advance magi and magi of the Order. Such a view would let him see this position as a honor and pride. So one isn't obligated to do the brat version of this character.

37

Ahh, the age old question. To whom does God entrust the keys of heaven.

Unfortunately, even Saints like St. Peter were known to have their failings.

Consider the problems that could occur if someone starts to consider they have "ultimate" power!

One thing I learned when our group started to discuss the running of our covenant was how many had little regard for other human life.

I posed a couple of moral questions that involved the question of whether a problem was a punishable offense. The majority were well on the side that a magi can do no wrong and that using grogs as testing tools for new spells was perfectly fine ( one scenario had a Flambeau test a newly invented spell like Coat of Flame on a pregnant scullery maid ).

The player's justified this with a view that might makes right in the middle ages. The trouble with this is that it colours or slants all their interactions.

This leads me to think that thoughts of altruism in a magi would be a rare event and more so in a magi that had a serious bargaining chip like the ability to help keep other magi alive. Such an ability would also tend to be used by an established older cadre of magi to keep them and their cronies alive while denying the access to their enemies. The sooner that the trouble makers die of old age the better for the friends of the longevity maker.

This then again leads into an interesting power struggle between older magi who will use the ability to reach old age as a weapon to prevent younger magi from challenging their position. This then leads to an interesting counter arguement to why every magus cannot buy a longevity potion of "ultimate" strength. If the youth don't cater to the old court then they won't be given better longevity potions ( holding the purse strings of the empire ). Even if the old court gives out a longevity potion then it will likely be only alloted in a strength that they feel is sufficient for the younger magi to live longer but not too long; so, they need to keep coming back to the source every twenty to thirty years.

This thread of thought taken farther leads to a dark counter for anyone that was an anounced longevity specialist. Such a person would be given a special once in a life time offer to join the old guard's program or else be eliminated ( can't have people have an alternative choice of lifestyle :smiling_imp: ). Since any questions of such a thing being a crime would eventually need to be taken before the "grand tribunal" which is composed of three magi from each tribunal which likely will be mostly composed of the most senior and powerful magi who have organized this situation; there will likely be no fine handed down. Any investigation will conveintly report finding out that either a wizard's war had been recorded or that the person had broken the code or that the person was a diabolist ( or other convient excuse ).

This could also but an interesting emphasis on mystery cults to find a way for imortality because the hermetic method is already "known" by a select cadre that is keeping it to themselves ( maybe this was really the reason for the Schism War as the Archmagi were stealing the secret of imortality from the Diedne ). It might also lead to those that found "success" in their imortality searches having "accidents" arranged to prevent the spread of the news.

Let's face it, longevity is the most addictive drug going and those that control it can control the purse strings of the Order. :open_mouth:

38

I think it's going to be very difficult to "keep" a longevity ritual maker in the manner described. As others have noted, any magus who specializes in Creo and Corpus has access to some fairly lethal spells. However, that magus also has the potential to be a powerful political force. Consider:

  • The Tribunal's other magi will take a powerful interest in your ritual-maker and will want very much to curry his/her favor.
  • Anyone with the ritual-maker's abilities will develop a (beneficial) reputation.
  • You won't be able to control his access to other magi too extensively. Other magi will routinely spend whole seasons with him while he's making their rituals.
  • A magus who's made a longevity ritual for someone else should end up knowing quite a bit about that person. Excellent blackmail potential.
  • The ritual-maker will most likely be one of the better informed magi in the Tribunal - an advantage accrued from having made longevity rituals for most of the redcaps.

I played in two of RARodger's sagas (albiet only briefly in the first), and if he's talking about who I think he's talking about, both of those magi dabbled in politics (one of them very successfully) and had a slight reputation for violence.

Nathan

39

Something slightly different.

The discussion has mentioned the offering of carrots.

Given that patronage is a big item in this period of time. Would you see that various covenants and houses offering patronages or scholarships to magi that have projects that the houses or covenants had interests to be developed?

Might there be some standing "X prizes" for magi that came up with a particular solution to a problem?

40

We have a small spring going to summer covenant that has recently discussed working together to make longevity rituals for us all. While not as cost effective time wise for a singe magus (you now need to spend 4 seasons so all 4 of you get rituals) the benefits can be great. (lab score into the 100s after all bonuses added at this time). This also draws the covenant members a bit closer together since they all owe each other for the many extra years. You still have the status problem of working for another magus, but the chances of them telling can be reduced if you care about that.

-Ag