Does anyone have a Covenant charter that allows a maga to retire? To be cared for by the Covenant, without further required service?
Presumably after the maga in question is too old and decrepit to serve the Covenant.
Magi aging gracefully are a challenge to SGs. 
Wouldn't senile magi rather than retire take all the covenant's vis to Xenias at Epidauros for a last attempt at their Longevity Ritual?
Feeble voice from behind the Sanctum's door: "Me? Retire? Never! Certamen!"
Dang! That raises the thorny question of someone accepting the offer of Certamen. And Would they try to win?
Which, if they are at Decrepitude 4, might be their last one.
A very interesting concept. I don't think I've ever seen the issue of aging and retirement really addressed. Which it does seem like something that would contribute to realism. Practically for gameplay we are all worried about next week through the next five years if you will but dealing with generational cycles seem a very apt issue for a real community over time.
Retirement is barely a concept. Someone might stop doing something strenuous or dangerous, but turn to something related, until dotage sets in.
That said, Iāve seen Redcaps referred to as retired, so it may be a more common idea than I think.
In medieval europe there is no retirement. There is having enough wealth to not have to work, or there is working yourself to death. The closest thing to retirement is abdication. Then you are usually put up somewhere by whomever you abdicated to (which you may or may not be allowed to leave) and are taken care of until, well, until you are not.
For a magus it would simply be a matter of ascending to a position of authority where you have no more responsibilities to the covenant. the other magi donāt mind if you sleep through the council meetings or skip them, and you can spend your free time researching whatever you feel like researching, or whatever else you might decide to do in your sanctum.
This may well have been the case if you were alone and on your own in the country side.
But about every city had hospitals to make sure, that charity could reach those in need.
In the Medieval period the term hospital encompassed hostels for travellers, dispensaries for poor relief, clinics and surgeries for the injured, and homes for the blind, lame, elderly, and mentally ill. Monastic hospitals developed many treatments, both therapeutic and spiritual.[35]
During the thirteenth century an immense number of hospitals were built. The Italian cities were the leaders of the movement. Milan had no fewer than a dozen hospitals and Florence before the end of the fourteenth century had some thirty hospitals. Some of these were very beautiful buildings. At Milan a portion of the general hospital was designed by Bramante and another part of it by Michelangelo. The Hospital of Siena, built in honor of St. Catherine, has been famous ever since. Everywhere throughout Europe this hospital movement spread. Virchow, the great German pathologist, in an article on hospitals, showed that every city of Germany of five thousand inhabitants had its hospital. He traced all of this hospital movement to Pope Innocent III, and though he was least papistically inclined, Virchow did not hesitate to give extremely high praise to this pontiff for all that he had accomplished for the benefit of children and suffering mankind.[63]
Hospitals began to appear in great numbers in [France](https://
France - Wikipedia) and England. Following the French Norman invasion into England, the explosion of French ideals led most Medieval monasteries to develop a hospitium or hospice for pilgrims. This hospitium eventually developed into what we now understand as a hospital, with various monks and lay helpers providing the medical care for sick pilgrims and victims of the numerous plagues and chronic diseases that afflicted Medieval Western Europe.
A famous hospital specifically for old women in Venice was the Oratorio dei Crociferi. The place is still worth visiting.
But in general it was the duty of their families to take care of the elderly, as good as they could.
In particular, monasteries took care of their elderly members quite well. Well enough that wealthy people without much family - or just not trusting their relatives - made donations to monasteries so they could join them in their old age.
Indeed. Older people of all walks of life were entering monasteries and nunneries after active secular lives ā not retirement in the modern sense, but it has parallels.
And within the monastic system, there was something like retirement, in that officers could step down from their positions. For example, abbots and abbesses were normally expected to stay their for life, but they could petition the Pope (or possibly get approval from their bishop, Iām not sure about this part) to be allowed to retire on grounds of old age, ill health, disability or incompetence.
Ela of Salisbury is right in AMās starting period (Countess of Salisbury in 1220, wife of William Longespee), though I guess silveroak would file her under āabdicationā. She became a nun in 1238, became abbess in 1240, resigned in 1257 and died in 1261.
The Knights of Windsor (Alm Knights of St Georgeās Chapel) are later (founded 1348), but I wouldnāt be surprised if kings and lords were already pensioning off favoured elderly retainers in the 1220s.
See also corrody and life-lease arrangements, though those are more late medieval, I think.
It has been a few years, but here in one example of āmage who cose to retire to a religious placeā that i wrote up and published here:
Iāve played a few where thereās the status āMagi Emeritusā which has, in theory, allowed a Wizard whoās served for a century to semi-retire
They wouldnāt have gotten to vote in council but would be allowed to speak
No requirement to serve, no vis allowance and a general expectation theyād do their own thing and not be too much of a problem
Havenāt ever had a saga run that long though
As a lover of Winter covenants, I prefer to not have magi retire but to keep on doing more and more bizarre things in their lab, or to sit around the hall demanding more and more elaborate dinners. When they entire final Twilight or die, it adds to the history of the covenant and creates adventure opportunity. Not being sure if an elder magus is alive or not gives room for adventure.
My take on it:
Old Magi have lots of knowledge and expertise; the value of their time is immense and Covenants know that. One season of work from a mage with 100+ years of experience is worth a lot more than one season of work from a freshly gauntleted mage, and covenant charters account for that, at least to a degree. So they donāt fully retire, but but they end up working less when they get older and spend more time on their own projects.
Another factor is because of magic most old magi donāt suffer much from old age until they are really old(decriptude 4. between longevity rituals working better on the young and that level 30 CrCo and CrMe rituals can keep the worst of aging at bay before then), virtues/flaws and very good luck at end of life non-withstanding. Then they are usually 1 roll of 13 away from death. They donāt need to retire for health reasons until near the end, and most magi are willing to cut an old coworker, if not a mentor and friend, a break at the end of their life.
More pragmatically, a decrepitude 4 mage often has a bunch of knowledge and items that are valuable, and there is an understanding that a mage will leave some of their possessions to the Covenant and thus pay off thier last dues to the covenant postmortem. Or they throw themselves into a last project they put off for fear of warping or death but at this point āsafeā is relative, and often end up... not retiring.
The key point is that there was no real retirement. If you joined a convent or monastery there was still work you were expected to do. My previous description was oversimplified, some people were imply unable to work before they actually died but it still amounted, logistically, to a similar outcome- you worked until you couldnāt (then depended on charity) or you had enough power and wealth to simply stop working because you didnāt feel like it.
Fundamentally it wasnāt based on age and wasnāt something people planned their lives around trying to achieve. It wasnāt a term that was used. Whether you are a person who abdicated from authority (secular or ecclesiastical) or someone more used to working physical labor your continued well being was reliant on either the kindness of others or (if you had real power) their desire to keep you happy so you didnāt step back up and assume the power you had given to them so you could relax.
And heaven help you if there was any ambiguity which of the two paths appliedā¦
I don't think it's common for magi to retire from doing magic, but something along those lines is an approved path for Jerbiton magi. And some Criamon out magic by before they die.
Is there any canon assessment of the "best wayā to go out for magi? Would an old magi at Decripitude 4 keep casting more and more epic spells in a high dominion aura to hit final twilight instead of die of old age? Would that be avoided by some, as they see final twilight as a poorer option than mortal death?
As with many things, which House? Flambeau magi want to have a glorious last battle; Criamon magi actively seek Final Twilight, as do Bjornaer magi in their own way. Researchers probably just circle their studies like vultures.
Cannonicly that is a question magi dissagree on. Some magi view dying and recieving the last rites of thier faith as important for reaching the dominion. Especially holy magi. Bjornear perfer final twilight as it allows them to become a Ancestral Great Beast and Criamon have a more convoluted final twilight preference. Several mystery cults have a form of immortality and many of their practitioners believe the answer is 'neither'; Merinita has the becoming, Alchemists the great elixir, Theurges Ascendency to the hall of heros, though that doesn't mean every initiate thinks that is the best fianl destination -- A Merinita Maga could decide that heaven is better than faerie.
How they go about spending their last warping/aging points is also going to differ widely. There are lots of causes, risky or just expensive projects, acts of charity, and more metaphorical methods of immortality (Writing a classic, creating a masterpiece, legendary acts, etc) and of course the option to just enjoy your last years.
Given the power levels of elder magi I expect the most common response would be to look for a non-dying option. Hence a large number of mystery cults and processes leading to something that isnāt quite deathā¦
So itās live forever or die trying.