A mage with Minor Magical Focus in Legendary Beasts (as mentioned in Bloodline of Bjornaer) makes a creature with Magical Might into their Familiar
Their MMF should apply to the strength of the Familiat bond, wouldn't it ?
But what about reforging the bond later when the Arts improve? Is the Hermetic Familiar still considered a legendary beast?
How about bonding to a mundane beast? Or more specifically reforging the Familiar bond - is a Familiar more "legendary"?
Whether a Beast is considered "Legendary" or not does not depend on it status as a famiiar. Considering that a focus in "Familiars" is Major, one in "Legendary Beasts" should cover much narrower ground.
Birna had several natural children through her life, and her bloodline is carefully guarded by House Bjornaer, and watched for signs of The Gift. Magi of this lineage always have a bear heartbeast, but apart from this, the Founder’s bloodline may manifest in a number of ways. Most commonly, those of Birna’s blood receive a Minor Magical Focus in Legendary Creatures and acquire one of the Form of the (Temperament) Heartbeast spells as their magical feat.
So it is verrry rare - and bound to cause a lot of problems with House Bjornaer - to be descended by blood from Birna plus having a Familiar. The House closely guarded your upbringing and wished to keep you a Bjornaer. Woe to the Bonisagus trying to claim you and have you bind a Familiar before you underwent The Ritual of the Twelve Years.
This looks like a character with an awful lot of history before the gauntlet. She easily might have enough Flaw points from it to make her Focus on Legendary Beasts a Major one.
I'd say most creatures with Magical Might won't count as a Legendary Creature. The average familiar isn't legendary.
The creature has to be something special to be considered legendary.
A Dragon is legendary.
A Phoenix is legendary.
The Nemean Lion that Hercules killed as one of hos twelve labors, it was legendary.
Cerberus is legendary.
As others mentioned, not every creature with Might is a Legendary Beast. But unlike a Focus in Familiars, it boost your magic when casting any spell against say Dragons, or the Tarrasque. Not just to bind such a creature as a Familiar, or to enchant and improve the Bond.
I would imagine that someone like that might be popular in places where such Legendary Beasts exist, especially if they have high ReVi, so the penetration of the Aegis might be bolstered against such creatures.
Then you can decide IYS also the extent and specifics of those bloodlines' Minor Foci in Legendary Beasts, right? Hence there is no need to follow the very specific HoH:MC p.36 Mythic Blood of Birna for it.
An interesting tidbit about this that is sometimes forgotten in discussions like these: Vim is split between 4 realms.
To take the "Dragon" exemple, you may have dragons from each of these realms. And an Infernal dragon (Saint Michel, anyone?) would be no less legendary than a Magical one.
=> Someone with such a focus could also become a renowned monster killer.
a couple of years ago when I asked a question about how to define Legendary Creatures, this seemed to be the uncontested answe
now wondering, in addition to how this MMF affects spells, is how it might influence Familiar Bonds.
I am assuming magicians other than the descendants of Bjornaer may get an MMF mechanically identical to Bjornaer's
And one of the potential Familiars is a hippogriff.
If your familiar is within the scope of your Magical Focus, then your Lab Total for binding the familiar is obviously covered by the focus and the rules also say that
Foci that cover the familiar apply to the
investment of all powers, no matter what they
do. Foci that cover the power apply as normal.
If a focus applies when you first bind a familiar, then of course it will still apply if you reforge the bonds. How could it be otherwise?
A mMF is narrower than a Technique + Form.
A MMF is narrower than a art.
Given the whole of Vim, I figure "Supernatural Beings" would thus be a proper MMF.
Limiting this to Magical Beings cuts this by 4. Would this be OK for a minor focus? I'd probably say yes, but YMMV.
Now, "Beasts of Legend".
If we start with Magical beings but add another limit (like "Magical Animals"), this further cuts the focus, making it even smaller.
But, as I noted above, there is no realm limit to the focus. It acts upon all realms.
So, if "Supernatural Beings" is a MMF, how can an "accros the realms" focus in "Beasts of Legends" be minor?
Well, I'd define it as "Corporeal supernatural creatures that do not look like a mundane animal nor are human in form".
So exit spirits, exit white stags, exit giants too, but enter dragons, griffins, 3-headed dogs, that sort of things, from any Realm.
Hope this was useful / of some interest to someone
I may be missing something, but, as far as I can tell, we have nothing more on this issue that a name, and the knowledge that it is minor
Starting from that, and going by the rules for MMF and mMF, I gave a reasoning, and possible definition, on what this focus may precisely cover.
As noted, this is how I would have defined it.
Now, you object, with a somewhat bold assertion.
You may have information that I, and other posters above, missed, in which case it would be great if you would share it with us, if only because this focus has apparently been the subject of at least 2 threads.
Otherwise, your opinion holds no more weight than my own.
In which case, it would have been less more productive and constructive to say something along the lines of, well:
I don't like this definition. To me, white stags with might should be covered by a focus in Beasts of Legends. What about this: This focus applies to any supernatural being with Animal Might. So, exit spirits, giants, but enter white stags dragons, griffins, 3-headed dogs, that sort of things, from any Realm, unless their might is not aligned to Animal.
I don't like this definition. To me, white stags with might should be covered by a focus in Beasts of Legends. What about this: This focus applies to anything that has the same form as a mundane animal and might. So, exit spirits, giants, dragons, griffins, 3-headed dogs, but enter white stags, fiery dogs, spiritual birds, that sort of things, from any Realm
You may, of course, have other ideas, in which case I encourage you to state them and explain them
A white stag with Might can count as a Legendary Creature, but not all white stags with Might need be so counted.
The name of the focus in question is "Legendary Creatures". Not Legendary Beasts, nor Beasts of Legend.
So what is covered by this focus? We can make two observations based on the name of the focus
a) It must be a creature to be covered.
b) It must be legendary to be covered.
Note that there is nothing inherent in the name about mundane/supernatural status, nor anything suggesting a specific realm.
So what makes a creature legendary? It obviously have to have legends attached to it. Stories.
Either about the specific individual, or about that type of creature.
For mundane creatures it must be the specific individual, since every type of mundane creature is featured in one story or another.
A random white stag with Might probably isn't legendary, but some specific such stag might be famous enough to count as legendary.
Dragons on the other hand are special enough and subject to so many stories, that all dragons should automatically count as legendary even if a particular individual dragon might not have done anything noteworthy.
A normal horse isn't legendary. Bucephalus, the horse of Alexander the Great, is legendary.
I have to say, the whole focus is weird to start with. Getting better to affect something because legends talk about it, rather than some objective definition that is inherent to the creature itself, leads to the counter intuitive idea that you should hire a bard to spread tales in order to help you focus.
Not every creature with Might is Legendary, and I am not sure how to draw an exact line here. But it definitely doesn't cover every Animal with Might, and yet, at the same time, I don't think it needs to have legends attached to it, to be Legendary, but it definitely needs something "Extra" that I am not sure how to quantify, to count.
So a Frog of Might that lives in a far off swamp, might be a Beast of Legend even if humans don't live nearby, and haven't heard of it. But a Dragon that just hatched, might not be a Beast of Legend, yet, though it certainly has the potential for it, in the same way that not every Pegasus is Legendary, but the first one, that sprung from Medusa's blood, definitely is.
"Legendary" does make it very saga-dependent. If everyone around your gaming table has been watching "Shadow and Bone" (where a big white deer is the most magical creature in existence) then a white stag will probably be legendary. If you're playing in a heavily celtic-inspired game (for the otherworldly symbolism of a white hart) then most white deer are likely to provoke awe in peasants. If you're playing in the England of Richard II (heraldic symbol: a white hart) then it probably is.
If you're playing in a part of Mythic Europe where white deer don't have much mythical significance, they probably won't.
Well, at least, it entertained me for a while, thinking along the lines "Ok, is a centaur or a harpy a beast of legend? IMO, no, but then, we need to have a definition that excludes them. Same with awakened items".
@Red-Shadow-Claws Thanks for the clarification. I'm sorry, I didn't understood "can" as "may".
Personally, I don't like the "relative" aspect outlined by temprobe.
I'd much prefer it to be more cut-and-dried.
Although... There's something in it.
A maga who's able to harness the power of legends to bolster her magic when used on creatures. So she would hire bards to make a creature famous
Now... It must be under 1/5 of vim. Is it? I am too tired to think about it, sorry
"Creature" can be used with many different meanings.
At its broadest it refers to just about anything created.
More commonly, any living being. (Humans, angels, and demons can all be considered "creatures")
Sometimes "creature" is used to refer only to animals, but just as often humans are included in the definition.
