mMF in Legendary Beasts help with Familiars?

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.

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I was using Bjornaer as a reference.
IMS both Merovech and Maugris left bloodlines with MMF in Legendary beasts.

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.

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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?

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About the scope of the focus, I thought a little.

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 :slight_smile:

A white stag with Might can be a Legendary Beast.

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How can you tell?

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

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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.

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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.

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Note that I said CAN be a Legendary Creature.

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.

Thanks! I missed that!

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

I was under the impression that "creature" and "beast" were synonymous.
What is the distinction?

"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.

Well, the quinotaur, legendary ancestor of the Merovingians, is a legendary beast - while Melusine, legendary ancestress of House Lusignan, is a legendary creature, but certainly not a beast. :nerd_face:

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Okay, so back to square one.

A mMF needs to be under 1/5 of a form.

Creature = living being.
Magic things are probably out, but everything else is probably in. That's broad. If we consider it to be "Living beings with might", that's almost all of the "Supernatural Beings" MMF I discussed above.

So, this needs further trimming down, and that's where legendary comes in.

Legendary = ???

Thinking about it, I see 2 ways we can define it:

  • (1) A relative way, like "Creatures legends are told about"
  • (2) A modern way, like "creatures that we know only existed in legends".
    Okay, I see a third, similar way: (3) "Creatures that only exist in legends".

Going with (1): Is it narrow enough to be a minor focus, especially given the fact that you can just make anything a legendary creature by taking the time to spread story about it?
Sigh... I dunno. And this is very much saga dependant.
Note, however, that chances are that such creatures will be probably be more abundant in a Saga than in the game world (people seeking the aid of wizards against a well-known monster, wizards hearing about a famous beast and wanting to hunt it, whatever).

If we take Legendary in the (2) somewhat modern sense, we kinda fall back on the definition first outlined by ErikT.
Is it enough to make the focus minor?
That's a tough one. It is broader than my definition for "Beasts of Legends", as in includes spirits, angels, demons, giants, centaurs, dryads... No, better, simpler: This probably makes the focus into "Supernatural Beings save Things, Animals with might and maybe magic humans".
So, IMO, too broad. YMMV

Hey! An idea. Going back to ErikT's idea that these creatures must be "something special"...
Legendary could then mean it must either be one of a kind, or an exceptional specimen of it (For example, if the average might for its kind is X, it is ancient and has might X+10)
This fits Cerberus, Melusine, but excludes a lot of "ordinary" dragons. I don't know. Someone, ideas?

An aside for (3): That's a fun one. It only applies to creatures that don't exist in the game world, so, practically, creatures created by the caster, or faeries that, hearing such stories, decide to take the role of that creature.

Apologies.
Just grokked that I had the wrong Capitalisation in the thread title.
It has always meant to be Minor Magical Focus