Hey all,
Looking into more magic items, Mercere's portals eventually came to mind. A question about them - when they are created, do they have to link just between a pair (meaning Harco is full of portals), or can one portal go to any other portal (aka stargate style)???
Cheers
Kal
Yes.
No.
Thanks for the info.
So my next question is; do you think any magi have done any research to improve upon the portals, to make one connect to all the others - ''stargate' style? Would be pretty cool....
Kal
I don't think so. But your magus can perform the rechearch. It's a major breaktrough.
But the ptolémaïc magic could be more useful.
Hm, I might be wrong, but isn't current hermetic magic unable to create mercere portals? AFAIK the secret of their construction was lost when Mercere died.
So, before magi can improve the portals they'll need to understand how they work. And since nobody has found the solution in the past centuries, I doubt that it will be an easy task. Not impossible, but difficult enough that you can make yourself a name by rediscovering this enchantment.
I believe the Mercere lineage in the House, of actual Magi, is still capable of producing them... and jealously guards the techniques for doing so. To the point of not wishing to give anyone a portal that is out of their control as well, so you can't study it to try and reproduce them etc. They are, IIRC, lvl 75 effects. So... there are likely only a couple of people in House Mercere that are capable of building them at any given time in Hermetic history.
Yeah, i agree - reading true lineages does seem to indicate that new ones can be built, but house Mercere guard the secrets of their construction - so yes, you would either have to be a Gifted Mercere to research them (and a skilled one at that, as lvl 75 isnt easy to do) or somehow gain a very large favor from the house and promise to give your research findings other to them (and probably only them...)
But then again, one of the greatest secrets of the Verditus, Automations has been 'leaked' to the Order in general, so it could happen with Portal knowledge as well (especially as the spell which the portals are based off is already in wide circulation within the Order)...
Kal
You could simulate the idea by using a hub style. Say you want to interconnect Thebes, London, Shrewsbury, Rome, and Dublin. You can't have a portal in London that leads to both Dublin and Shresbury, and it's prohibitively expensive to have a pair ofportals connecting every pair. Instead, design a hub that's very carefully maintained by trusted guardians. Locate this hub in a neutral ground in Rome, for example. That hub system has a portal that goes to Shrewsbury, London, Thebes, and Dublin. So somebody in Shrewsbury that wants to go to Dublin would take one Hermes Portal to Rome, and then simply walk 100 feet across the room to the portal that goes from Rome to Dublin.
All roads lead to Rome 
.
And no, I didn't realize until towards the end of my post just how close to airline travel this is.
You mean like Harco? 
I think there are some portals that do not connect to Harco. Covenants have paid to have a portal to another Covenant but not many.
Well, isnt that a simpe and elegant solution.....DOH!
A central hub is a very neat idea and i suppose that Harco does forefil that role - but thanks for pointing the hub out, as I can use that concept for an idea of my (n)pc magus in my game.
Cheers
Kal
From memory ( which is faulty at best) I think Mercere connected all the Covenant's of the founders together. Or at least connected them to Durenmar.
Harco? My memory fails me; I don't know what that is.
Is that a 5th ed term? I mostly only know 4th ed.
Harco is Domus Magica of Mercere. They make the portals so moist portals go to Harco.
Herme's Portals,
ahem, excuse me...
Mercere Portals had linked Val-Negra with Barcelona and Jafariya. IMS, I added one to Durenmar as well. Then I destroyed all three 
There was a plan to link all the covenants of Iberia with portals just after the Shadow Wars. But that was 3rd edition. IMS, there was such a plan, but they never got around to fully implimenting it.
couldn't hermetic architecture effectively do the same thing?
If you can make permanent portals to other regios why couldn't you do it mundanely as well?
to reply to my own post...
then again if your going down the route of numerology / geometry and hermetic architecture,
its but a small side hop , skip and jump to Ptolemy's coordinates... all that obsession with ancient geometry.