Mistridge and Triamore

To make a short story long, I managed to get my live game group to try out Ars Magica. I have been making cheat sheets and notes in preparation to guide them through CharGen. I work from PDF alot. My hardcopy of ArM5 core RAW is beat to $#!+. It is held together with duct tape and has errata notes scribbled throughout (it is a first or second printing I think).
So I dropped the coins and bought a new copy from this very web site. But, you know, I shopped around comparing prices and shipping. Found some used copied that I did not feel were worth the bargain. But what I did find relates to the title of this post.

I found a lot of six 3rd & 4th ed books at a cheeep price. Houses of Hermes (my old copy is gone), Mistridge and Triamore (both of which I have read but never owned), and three others that I can't remember. I will find out in two weeks when they get here.

Anyways, thinking about Mistridge and Triamore, I am interested in what others think of these. Has anyone ever tried using either with 5th edition? I think there is a Mistridge inspired saga on the PbP forum, I should read up on that.

Now to make the long story short. I am starting a new game with players new to Ars. I want to keep it somewhat "vanilla" so that they get a base understanding of the game. But I want to make it new and interesting for myself. I have never used either of those two classic books. I am thinking that this may be a good approach.
I am hoping for your thoughts, ideas, and input :slight_smile:

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I've recently (last fall) started a campaign using Mistridge. We are all new to Art Magica, but I have been studying the game for over ten years (and have all the books). We are starting the saga in 1200, so the crusade (and thus events in Midsummer Night's Dream) are on the horizon.

*** Possible spoilers ahead for anyone playing in a Mistridge campaign ***

I re-worked the current situation at Mistridge. The elder magi destroyed their rival covenant of Windgraven in 1191, but since then almost all the wizards have suffered from final twilight (perhaps), death or have mysteriously disappeared. Over half of the covenfolk abandoned Mistridge which is on the verge of financial collapse. Only Felix (who I've renamed) remains and he has sent out the call for young magi to join the covenant. Felix is only interested in his own research and is happy to let the player characters run the place as long as he receives 5 pawns of corpus vis each year.

This way players new to Ars Magica have some immediate concrete goals of saving the floundering covenant. I can teach how varied the magic system is and how characters need their labs in order develop the magic that will help solve Mistridge's problems. In the meanwhile I can drop in stories that can further take the saga in a direction my players find fun (and since most of the players are new to me, it often takes some time to discover what they want out of a roleplaying game).

If you are familiar with your players, I'm sure you can jump right into to what kinds of stories they like, but finding a way to teach the Ars system while keeping adventures from getting bogged down in reading the rulebooks I find is a challenge.

We're not using Triamore as the home of the saga, but we are using it. They are our closest neighbour aside from Collem Leonis, after all.
Also, our Tremere member is the former apprentice of Daria leGris, as I recall.

At Grand Tribunal in the UK, they made a wooden replica of that tower with the square outside and the circular floorplan to use in a game. I think it still exists but is very battered after several years stuffed in the corner of a room. The setting itself is atmospheric and works OK with any edition of Ars.

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I used Triamore in ArM4 and ported to ArM5. http://www.scorn.me.uk/ars/ars_magica.html There were no system-related issues.

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