IBT, I've tried a concept before of a magus who buffs grogs and uses grogs as the primary method of dealing damage. Would you be interested in having this companion have a close association with a magus? Perhaps this relationship is why the merc captain is here.
My magus concept is not set and I'm looking for something interesting that isn't already spoken for.
Heya JL - yes, darn interested. Let's throw ideas around!
As drafted the Merc Captain (Seamus the Red) has a few virtues to make him slightly more compatible with magi, Unaffected by Gift and Unaging, and he'd be looking to get some better living conditions too but nothing in stone.
I also thought that he might have connections in the Order using Social Contacts virtue to help explain. I took Wealth to get the larger warband and the XP is nice.
Interesting that you'd say that it is definitive the clans or nobles would never hire mercenaries. Is that a ref from a Ars rulebook / sourcebook?
Lords of Men has sidebar sections devoted to talking about mercs. I'll acknowledge that's not a book about Scotland but never? Not under some other guise as "hunters" or somesuch?
From what I remember of Lion of the North the area was pretty chaotic, which is just the type of environment for a warband to work. Or as mentioned a Magus or the covenant might take an interest.
I'm really confused on companions. It's not OK to have a Mythic companion (V:F = 2:1). It's not OK to have a Gifted companion that can become a Hermetic magus relatively immediately and learn Parma Magica. But it's OK to have a Gifted Companion with the same V&F value as 2:1 who can be accepted into ex Miscellanea immediately and learn Parma Magica? Are the actual cut-offs Hermetic Arts and the word "Mythic"? I'm fine if that's the case, that just wasn't how I'd understood the instructions.
Wasn't it a blanket kybosh on any mythic or magical companions slot characters?
Normally, Mercenaries want money. That is what is lacking in the area of the covenant. If we were closer to a city or the coast it would be a totally different story. Lots of lords and castles and money( well not lots).
But you could be hired by some clan to help fight another clan. We just have to hope that the mercenaries do not fight the local clan and loose.
What has been expressly forbidden so far is:
What is the ruling on magical characters with the Gift (i.e., those that take the Quality that gives them the Gift)? It hasn't been explicitly addressed, but I would assume that would count as a magus character and be forbidden as a companion.
But I figured it's best to double check first.
Yes, I agree. But here is my confusion on the two points:
Opening the Gift "allow[s] Gifted hedge wizards 'free' access to an entire suite of powers, Abilities, and/or hedge Arts." So by choosing the Gift and having it opened you end up with 10 Virtues + 10 Flaws + roughly 10 Virtues' access that aren't listed as Virtues. How is this not just using semantics to bypass the 2:1 Virtue to Flaw ratio?
So it's fine to make a Gifted Companion who's Gift has been opened to another Tradition. If we don't put a lot of points into their Abilities/Arts, they could also have their Hermetic Arts opened. Plus they can learn Parma Magica. This seems allowed. But how is this not allowing an Abandoned Apprentice on steroids?
There is a reason HoH:S states "troupes should consider whether a Gifted Companion should take the place of a player’s magus character." I can understand allowing Gifted Companions who are set up like having a Scinnfolk character with Control Fertility and maybe another paid-for supernatural Ability to two raised high enough that Opening the Arts is realistically impossible. So there is reason not to just disallow all Gifted Companions. I just don't understand those two points above.
because the hedge magic book specifically states that gifted hedge wizards are gifted companions, and being opened in a hedge tradition makes becoming a Hermetic wizard extremely difficult.
More to the point, hedge abilities /arts aren't automatically virtues. They're only virtues for ungifted, unopened characters who have been initiated into whatever hedge tradition we happen to be talking about. A hedge wizard with their gift opened treats their hedge abilities / arts exactly the same way a hermetic magus treats their arts.
Essentially, they're paid for by having an opened gift. And as a result, do not come out of your V&F budget. And because of that, the default assumes that gifted companions count as magi-class characters.
The 2:1 v:f thing is for mythic companions only (not gifted companions), and mythic companions cannot ever have the gift. Two completely different types of character here.
I'll throw another wrinkle into the argument on Gifted companions. Let's say someone else wants to create a companion using Hedge Magic. (I'm considering the possibility of taking a hedge witch as a companion.) If we have the precedent set for allowing GIfted companions, now we have two GIfted companions. In the alternative, the second person has to make a non-Gifted hedge magician, while jebrick has a Gifted hedge magician. That result would seem to me unfair.
The rules specifically allow for un-Gifted hedge magicians as companions. Why don't we use those rules?
I'm fine with Gifted Companions such that they can't ever be a Hermetic Magus.
Edit: Gifted companions taking a companion slot, not a magus slot.
What about a Redcap, is that a companion level character?
But right now they're not being considered magi-class characters.
See, this is exactly where things are without a new wrinkle; it would be three with the new wrinkle. I thought I was following the rules. I was making an unGifted Learned Magician. Almost my entire Virtue budget was being spent on just getting access to one hedge Technique and two hedge Forms plus required Virtues. The Gifted route would leave room for Gentle Gift, still have some spare points of Virtues, and allow for learning Parma Magica while also opening up the full suite of Techniques and Forms. Or I could skip Gentle Gift and just get tons of points of Virtues freed up for the equivalent of having chosen Magical Air and not have it count against my Flaw limit, plus being able to learn Parma Magica and the full suite of Techniques and Forms as a bonuses.
In terms of fairness, there is also the question of the other companions. Will any other companions be on the scale of a Gifted Companion whose Gift has been opened? Even the magical human won't be. The magical human is more akin to an unGifted hedge wizard.
Which, technically, means no Gifted Companions. Even a house rule that the Gift can only be opened once wouldn't be sufficient. "Won't ever" instead of "can't ever" can be handled via meta-gaming.
I would think so, assuming you're not talking about a Gifted Mercere. Like a magical human and unGifted hedge magi, they get a lot for the companion level. But they're still far below the magus level.
I am quite happy with my magical human companion and do not see the gifted companion hedge mages as an issue. In fact I think if I had gone a different direction with the magic human it could easily have been overwhelming to the gifted hedge mages.
Still could be with the current route: Spend Might for Vis to get rid of the learning penalty. Transform to have the Gift. Have the Gift opened, which is pretty easy with no or essentially no Magic Might.
I will request that the Conachar Mor - Companion - Development thread be deleted. i already stated I would not go in this direction. I do not think the Troupe wants to add more Gifted hedge magi to an already crowded cast.
I had intentionally not mentioned the really good route with a Magical Human with 15 Might, not wanting to hint at what could be done. But since it's basically set up already I should let everyone see:
Reduced Might x10, giving 25 points of Qualities
3 points on No Fatigue (unless you want Imbued by the Spirit of (Form) along with Improved Fatigue)
3 points on Natural Appearance
1 point on Minor Virtue: Independent Study
3 points on a Ritual Power, Vis Mastery, etc. - something that costs Might Score, the best possibly being Improved Characteristics
The result? You have a seemingly normal human with magic resistance, immunity to aging, and immunity to warping. The character takes a small benefit from the Ritual Power and then can learn at 0 or 1 penalty. (I forget for sure if you can safely drop to 0 this way, but you certainly can with Acclimation; it's anything past 0 that is a problem.) Due to the low Magic Might you're not very restricted by Acclimation. You get 6 seasons per year, which could could spend as 4 normal seasons per year with essentially no penalty (0 or -1) while also taking 12 or 14 experience per year toward Transformation. Meanwhile you start with the experience score of a 21-year-old companion with a full 10 V&F slots available, plus you have 15 points of Qualities to use as you please, whether for powers, more Virtues, or just 750 experience.
This may seem like a lot, but it can be done after the fact. The real key to ultimate power is Reduced Might or a Quality that lets you spend Might Score. Reduced Might doesn't quite cut it on its own when you start above 10 Magic Might, but it gets you the most bang for the buck up to there. The Quality that lets you spend Might Score is the only thing needed past 10 Magic Might.
Can you just make Conachar Mor as an unGifted hedge mage? I don't think there is anything wrong with that. I'm perfectly happy with people finding interesting ways to get a ton out of something they're focusing in, exploiting it as best they can like someone with that real talent might well do. That is the point of things like Magical Focus existing, after all. Then you can keep all sorts of ideas you had, just not on the magus level.