Magic devices to boost a character...

What's the book spell Guideline for that? I've missed that bit and would love to know.
I ask as I wrote up three variants of this type of warp reducing spells and thought it was significant rather than trivial change to a spell.
Seems plausible to me that a spell could tailor all effects cast for a specific person. Or even that a spell could tailor an effect for a target selected, perhaps that should be more complex again. Not sure. I kept my versions using the same guideline.

Well, technically, there's further justification: it's what the Ars Magica corebook says :smiley:
If a mystical effect is "designed specifically" for the target, that target incurs "less warping".
So, whenever a spell is invented, it makes sense to think for whom it's "designed", and write it down.

ArM5 p.168 certainly describes an activity that generates a spell designed for a particular target. This does not mean that being "designed for a particular target" is a state achievable only as a result of that activity. In fact, Longevity Rituals are not the result of that activity, and still end up being "designed for a particular target".

I do fail to understand what this has to do with whatever appeal our troupe's belief might have on others, though I obviously understand that, in general, someone's beliefs might not be appealing to others! Would you care to explain what you meant with your last sentence?

Well, the Muto Vim guidelines say, for superficial (which I incorrectly referred to as "minor") changes: "Superficially change a spell of less than or equal to twice the (level + 1 magnitude) of the Vim spell. This may not change the primary effect of the spell, or its power."

The one example for such a change is one where the sigil of the magus is altered. Tailoring an effect so that it counts as "designed for the target" neither changes the primary effect of the spell nor its power, so it should qualify as a superficial change.

If you look at significant changes, they allow you to change the effect as long as it stays within the same Form/Technique (and within one magnitude). For example, a Creo Mentem spell increasing the target's Intelligence could be changed into a Creo Mentem spell that instead increases the target's Perception. Changing whether a spell is tailored to the target for purposes of inflicting warping seems a far less significant and more superficial :slight_smile: change.

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Just compare this procedure to the requirement

.

You are correct here. Troupes can determine other such activities - but it is their decision then.

Longevity Rituals are effects specifically and carefully designed to work on their target, thereby providing an example for the meaning of these words. They are not Formulaic spells, so the explanation in Hermetic terms above cannot apply literally: instead of a special version of the Formulaic spell, a special version of the Longevity Ritual is invented.

Cheers

I have "compared" the procedure to the requirement. And I see no contradiction with what I said. When my maga invents a R:Touch spell to change into a dragon, she actually invents a special version tailoring the effect to her shield grog. So neither she, nor the grog, incur warping when targeted by the spell: she doesn't because she is the caster, the grog doesn't because the spell is tailored to him.
Perhaps you care to tell us what I should see that evidently escaped me?

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You are correct here. It is their decision to follow the rules as written. Just like it would be their decision if they chose to follow a house rule and allow no other such activities, thereby excluding Longevity Rituals from being "tailored to the target". I still fail to see your point, however.

Which words? Not the ones you quote above. There is no development of Formulaic spells involved. Hence, one cannot logically assume that an effect that (in the context of warping minimization) ends up "designed for a particular target" must be the result of an activity of Formulaic spell development.

So, we are left a bit to our judgement here. When can we assume that a mystical effect has the status of "designed for the target"? We know of two positive examples, and we can probably infer a negative one (spontaneous spells). But the question lacks a clear-cut answer.

Fortunately, the answer is totally irrelevant to what we are discussing here. Because no matter what activities would qualify as giving a spell the "designed for the target" quality, Muto Vim can give that spell the same quality. Occam's razor!

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This is getting weird. What you ask me for is still in the block of text you quoted above:

Cheers

The bolded ones.

Given, that our ArM5 chapter is (see https://forum.atlas-games.com/t/the-break-room/102/1) written to cover the warping by all Powerful Mystical Effects, it cannot and does not claim that Formulaic spell development is the only way to prevent warping by them.

Right so far. Just, that we still should at least read ArM5 carefully before veering to troupe decisions.

Just read these two quotes of yours together:

That Muto Vim can replace specifically and carefully designing an effect to work on the target is so far just an unproved claim.

You confound

  • carefully analyzing the vulnerabilities and needs of the target (as required in Powerful Mystical Effects)
    with
  • applying a more or less specific MuVi spell ""just right" for the target" - trying to avoid adressing how it could be found, and why so.

Cheers

Not all effects need to be tailored this way. This is one of three standards. The Familiar Bond is another, but goes beyond. Even if we ignore that, spells a magus casts on him/herself, even if tailored for another, only cause long-term warping.

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The "significantly change" guideline mentions "the change of target, if the target was possible for the original spell" as being a significant change. Aren't you technically making a kind of "change of target" for Warping purposes? If the affected spell is designed to target Bob with no Warping issues, but you've changed the designed target to John with no Warping issues via a MuVi spell, it sounds like a significant change, not a superficial one. Which should make a lot of this moot, since the spell that tailors the warping would often end up causing warping in and of itself without tailoring because of the higher spell levels required by the guideline versus the superficial one?

Personally, I'm more in favor of a Spell Mastery ability that would allow a magus to tailor the mastered spell in this fashion at a much faster rate, say in ((10 or 11) - Mastery Score) days per target - It still takes some time, but can be fit in as a Distraction instead of a full season of lab work.

Hmm. I don't see it that way.

You are targeting John with a spell. A Muto Vim spell, cast by John on your spell, could make the spell hit you, or your grog. That would be a change in target, and a significant change.

But if you are targeting John, and you are "adjusting" the spell to what the spell would be if you had designed it with Bob in mind, you are not changing the target. You are changing how the spell is affecting the same target. Since the primary effect of the spell (let's say, transformation into a dragon) isn't modified, magnitudes aren't taken or removed, and you are still targeting John, it's a superficial change only.

Suppose a Muto Vim spell is cast on a ... say, Shape-of-the-Auld-Wyrm spell, that is cast on John. The Muto Vim spell affects the Shape-of-the-Auld-Wyrm spell, not John. So it does not warp John.

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This is definitely weird. As I said, I don't see what problem you see with the fact that, whenever a character invents a spell, we write down which target it is tailored to (for purposes of warping). I even asked my fellow players, and there's not a soul here who understands what you are trying to say :frowning:

I'm afraid, however, we won't get out of this quandary. From my point of view, when I asked what was the problem you said "It's up there". When I asked "where exactly up there?" you said "Up there, I keep telling you". So, I guess we'll have to keep disagreeing, even if I don't really see where you are disagreeing in the passages you keep citing.

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One Shot, I'm afraid it's you who are experiencing a bit of confusion. Nowhere in the Arm5 book I see anything about "carefully analyzing the vulnerabilities and needs of the target" in relation to "Powerful Mystical Effects". Are you referring to some house rules?

In any case, remember how Hermetic Magic works. To make a spell that turns a man into a raven, you need not know anything about ornithology. To make a spell that increases your Intelligence, you need not know anything about how the mind works. Or, rather, you need not know anything beyond what your knowledge of the specific Arts already tells you.

Our troupe interprets those rules in the same way ezzelino does: that changing the 'designed for target' counts as a superficial change to the spell, as it does not change the R/D/T, who is being targeted, what the core effect is or any other spell parameters.

We also use the ruling that you need a specific MuVi spell for each individual you intend to tailor to, meaning that in most cases you have to invent the MuVi spell yourself.

Despite having had this ruling in effect for what is approaching a decade of real-time play of 5th edition (including mature-magus sagas where primary arts scores in the high 20s was the norm), the number of times this has actually come into play is zero.

The reasons this never happened are:

  1. the caster gets the effect for free on themselves anyway
  2. it requires a bit of MuVi specialisation to develop a relevant spell, which itself needs to be over level 25.

The high spell level means that either:
a) it's the purview of a specialist, and a specialist should be able to pull stunts like that.
b) the saga is sufficiently high-powered that people are throwing level 30+ spells around outside their area of specialty, in which case everyone can probably cast the source spell anyway!

This interpretation really doesn't break anything. It just gives the MuVi specialist another arrow in their quiver. One that is very thematically appropriate, at that.

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I refer to

The phrase I boldened stresses, that careful design for a specific target is required.

And then the woman you turn into a raven (say, with a touch version of Cloak of the Black Feathers) gets warped. To avoid warping her, you need to specifically and carefully design the effect for her (s. a.) - because she otherwise is vulnerable to your roughshod magic.
To design something specifically and carefully for her, you have to know her reasonably well. Your troupe needs to decide, whether and how long she needs to be present in your lab, when the effect is designed, or whether perhaps an Arcane Connection to her is sufficient to provide you with the information you need for it.

This is quite different from just attaching to each invented spell the name of a being which it does not warp.

This looks, like you are circumventing the factor I outlined above in your saga. Maybe it is too cumbersome, and the troupe does not wish to bother. You are of course most welcome to your workaround - just do not claim it as "tha RAW".

Cheers

Which could have been much simply stated as the following. Like a Longevity Ritual, designing a spell to not warp a specific individual requires the presence of said individual. And then quoted the rules as the source for your conclusion. I know I was as confused as ezzelino was about what you were stating, but at the same time, I already knew that the person needed to be present.

You went about your point like a car stuck in a roundabout.

This may well be. Did that roundabout have a name? We might look for this at https://forum.atlas-games.com/t/the-break-room/102/1 .

Going by the MuVi guidelines on p159, it looks like it should be a superficial change because it is not changing the Technique or Form, nor is it changing the magnitude of the spell, nor is it altering the end result of the spell.

Some may argue that the end result of the spell is being changed. Is it the same as changing a sigil? Or is it the same as changing the magnitude of the spell? That's honestly for you to answer for your own saga.

If it isn't superficial, then it is assuredly significant. It certainly doesn't sound like the kind of thing that would require a total change of the spell, since total changes are for things like changing Pilum of Fire into Veil of Invisibility.

Now because MuVi specialists exist somewhere (theoretically), it being superficial or significant is not actually important. The reason it isn't a huge deal is because, for the most part, the spells that people are interested in avoiding warping on tend to be of the level 30-40 range, and these spells can be MuVi'd without a ritual MuVi effect even if you are in the 'significant change' school of thought.

So this raises the real question: not whether it can be done, but instead asking yourself what the reasonable limitations are assuming that it can be done.

This goes outside the scope of RAW, because RAW provides no sample spells with this effect in mind.

There's pretty much two options:

  1. allowing the caster to MuVi the spell and picking the 'designed-for target' on each casting, or
  2. requiring a separate MuVi spell for each designed-for target, with the MuVi spell needing to be designed in the same way as you would for tailoring any other spell.

Personally I am in the option-2 camp, but not entrenched. I could honestly go either way on it.

As for superficial/significant, I'd lean towards superficial. Ars Magica is a game about powerful magi doing cool things with magic. A MuVi specialist should be able to twist magic itself, and for that reason alone I'd err on the side of generous. It makes magi cooler.

Note that even using the superficial guidelines, the minimum spell level is still above level 30. So such effects will remain in the hands of specialists and arch-magi. Which is fine, in my opinion - that's where such effects belong anyway.

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My primary issue with regards to the superficial vs. the significant change is that it requires a fairly low level spell to change the spell to fit the designed for case. I would rather that the Muto Vim or vim specialist be able to adapt his spells (or others' spells!) easily than any magus be able to adapt their spells easily. Does that make sense?

My general feeling is that The Corpus specialist shouldn't be able to learn a MuVi 20 spell (which is really a low hurdle) that can allow warping free healing (Incantation of the Body Made Whole) or transport (Touch version of Leap of Homecoming). I suppose that my only consolation here, is that the Muto Vim specialist can create many of these spells in a season. Of course, that creates the issue of does he really require the persons these spells are designed for to hang around for the entire season, or just the time he's designing the spell?

Ewww, a can of worm!

I think using the MuVi superficial Guideline to disregard Warping is a prime material for The Central Rule. Its impact is way out of line compared to any other superficial changes. If it worked it would have large effect on the Order and is of the caliber of Transforming Mythic Europe changes. At the very least, I would lock it behind a recent Breakthrough to explain why the Order hasn't changed yet.

Now, I think it is a fun road to explore and I wonder what other obstacles would become trivial. It is only as a fun experiment that I would allow it in my Saga and would disregard any attempts at calling it RAW.