After many years of fruitless searching, i am thinking about just running fith edition. Aside from the main rule book, what supplements do you advise getting, and what pregenerated story book for a new group is best.
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If it is the first time you are running an Ars Game, I would suggest to go with main rule book (but if you have the choice, not the Definitive edition) and a Tribunal book of your choice (because you like the area/setting/history).
Why not start with the Definitive edition ? It is a very detailed book that goes into great length (yes, I already read most of it...) into every aspect of the game. It is designed to contain almost all answers when there is a point that could seem unclear in the original 5th ed book. However, because of that, it is a daunting task to learn Ars with it. Start with the regular 5e, it is a lot more palatable. And once everybody at the table start to be well acquainted with the rules and push the boundaries, look for answers in the Definitive edition.
Why a Tribunal book ? It will provide you with a complete background: history, culture, hermetic organisation and story seeds. Enough to keep you busy for a good chunk of a Saga. Don't burden yourself with knowledge of all Tribunals, and every interaction possible.
Once your Saga starts to grow, the characters and the players become more knowledgeable and want to explore specific area (and yourself at ease with the base rules), then consider dipping into the Mysteries (for self development within the Order), any Realm of Power related to the main intrigue of your saga, some House of Hermes to detail specifically a house. Consider Rival Magic and Edge Magic to spice up encounter with non-hermetic magic user. If you search this forum, there are a few topics where people express their preferences and comments regarding all 40+ published books, it can help you choose where to go.
Consider that each of these books adds depth and opportunities, but also additional rules and layers of complexity (for example, Rival magic contains four different traditions, with their specific rules and spells). So make sure you know well the basic before you add too much on your plate. Too rich of a meal and you have an indigestion.
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Hello and welcome! My heretical answer is start with the Definitive Edition and add other supplements if and as you want. Start small, design your own covenant, and run adventures you write?
For adventures the book Thrice Told Tales is a good choice. If you want a setting book The Lion and the Lily is a great setting and my covenant of La Jardin in it might prove fun!
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well i don't think the definitive core rule book is availabe, I appreciate your suggestions. There is a lot of information out there, just trying to get a few suggestions on how to procede forward.
there are really great answers thank you. for your feed back. I am looking forward to this.
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I definitely think the next mist useful book to get after the fire rulebook is Covenants, followed by the Houses of Hermes series as they provide a lot more details and ideas for creating magi of particular houses. Otherwise pick whatever you think will be useful for whatever kinds of stories you really want to focus on, e.g. Realms of Power: Faerie if you want to have stories about faeries. The core rulebook gives you plenty to get started with though.
My suggestion, in order, would be:
- Core (not DE)
- Tribunal of choice (where your game is)
- Covenants (Just use it for expansion, don't try to incorporate everything in the first game)
- Houses of Hermes (whichever you are interested in/have players of)
- Books that match stories you want to tell
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I believe the DE manuscripts were emailed to all backers last night? They are just document files in a .zip?
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Strongly recommend using Definitive Edition. It sure is chunky, but the original core book was already a steep learning curve, and I think Definitive is overall more clearly written and laid out. It also has a lot more Storyguide facing stuff - an expanded bestiary for one - and rules for things like shapechanger stats which are necessary for some character types but are not in the original core.
I would second the recommendation of Thrice Told Tales as an adventure book, especially as an "easy" way to get stories that develop and recur over time. For setting books I would actually recommend Guardians of the Forest. It was the first setting book published for 5th ed, covering the Rhine Tribunal (modern Germany, for the most part), and so makes fewest references to all the other supplements.
I am biased - the above two supplements were my starting point, alongside the core book, so though I now own most of 5th ed I still have a special fondness for them
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I concur with most of the advice above. I'd recommend:
*Core Book
The most important bit is the core book. I'd recommend using the standard core book, rather than the Definitive Edition - which I undestand is what you ahve anyways. The Definitive Edition does offer great stuff like that expanded bestiary, but it's also huge and has many options some of which you'd probably not want to include, at least initially.
You would also want to download the Book of Beasts to have some beast stats, just in case. If you have shapechanging player characters, you will also need to figure our their statistics - just use those in this booklet, if you don't have the Houses of Hermes: Mystery Cults rules.
Anything else is optional, but if you have the money and desire to spend it...
*A Tribunal Book
If you're anything like me having a firmer grasp of the surrounding setting and some adventure hooks from it can really help. So I recommend getting one tribunal book. There are lots, each with its own quirks and atmosphere. I'd suggest scanning the tribunal book's blurbs on the Atlas website to see what strikes your fancy. You can also look up the entry "Which Tribunal to Choose" on Project: Redcap (link) (I wrote some of it, so I'm biased).
I'd personally recommend picking up The Rhine Tribunal as it inlcudes what is basically a nice starting mini-saga (the PCs starting a new covenant in the Rhine Gorge) and it works well with saga motiffs I like such as struggling against mundane / faerie encroachment on magical forests.
*Covenants - optional
Having a session zero where you and your players plan out your troupe of characters and the covenant and talk about what kind of adventures you'd be interested in playing out I think helps a lot. The Covenants book can help flesh out the covenant and thus the expected adventures, but is not at all necessary. I wouldn't use anything else from it initially unless the players want to, but would suggest they might aim to improve their labs as personal goals in the future (whether by the rules in Covenants or not) as that both provides them with some goals and just adds color and flavor.
*Initial adventure ?
Frankly, I think ArM works best by inventing your own adventures based on your group's particular story flaws and character goals, and the covenant hooks and setting hooks.
Of the official adventures, I personally like The Pact of Pasaquine as a starting Faerie or Magic adventure, but it's ancient (2e) and as such some of the setting / rules no longer makes sense in 5e. I'd suggest just using it for inspiration, and modifying it heavily to make it a 5e Faerie or Magic adventure that hits your intended saga themes.
*Everything else is secondary.
Other useful things include Realms books to increase your bestiary (I especially like the Magic one), and Houses of Hermes books to expand on your player characters' (or NPCs) Houses. And lots of others, of course, according to your tastes. But all of that I think is quite secondary, and I'd recommend getting only the above initially: the core book, a tribunal book, and optionally an advneture and/or the Covenants book.
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Welcome! Ars is a delightful game that rewards us in many ways.
I wrote long answers to the questions you pose.
This essay is about early questions like “how many players?” and “what books do I need?”
This one is specifically about “Which Tribunal should I set my game in?”
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Actually i haven't backed the DE project, I have some ancient books from when white wolf ran the game and i am just in a position to run this game on Foundry VTT. I haven't been able to find a GM for Ars Magica in thirty years so i figure there must be other players like me who want to play it. So i am starting it. I just need to get the basics for 5e i got the core book, and from your feedback i will get thrice told tales and covenants.
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I wish that I had those when I got started...
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While I may be late to this, my suggestion is to just get the 5th edition corebook - not the Definitive edition, which is too cumbersome as a beginner's resource. The corebook is entirely self-contained, and you do not need anything else; in fact, other stuff may just "slow you down" with too many additional options.
If there is a supplement I would acquire, it would be indeed a scenario book, so that you can get a sense of how Ars Magica can feel like in play. The Atlas Games website lists nine, but Fallen Fane is a Larp scenario, while Black Monks of Glastonbury is really a 4th edition/OGL scenario, so I'd immediately remove them from the list. I'd also remove Dies Irae ("end of the world" scenarios, not really introductory ones!), Tales of Power (again, not quite beginner stuff), Thrice Told Tales (scenarios for long term sagas, so not the best to get a taste of the system), and Antagonists (great book that details a number of potential antagonists, and provides great ideas to build stories around them, but a bit too "open-ended" if you want a ready-to-play scenario).
This leaves three possibilities:
a) Calebais, a scenario written very early in the line that is a remake of an ancient scenario from over 35 years ago. Ok, particularly if you like a "dungeon crawl"; but not at the level of the other books in my view.
b) Tales of Mythic Europe, a great book with several ready-to-play scenarios that provide a great sense of the setting. One of my top two choices.
c) Hooks, a book of short scenarios specifically written for players starting out with just the corebook, with the goal of getting them interested in various aspects of the game that are detailed further in other sourcebooks. A "wet-your-appetite" book of scenarios that would be my first choice.
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Great answers, I for one am interested in seeing more of the same.
If you are interested in setting up a blog for that, I might be able to help you.
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Thank you so much, i have ordered the core book to reaquaint myself with the rules, I am looking forward to seeing what will happen. this will be great.
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