Modern Ars Magica....

No, not really. In Plato's time, architects didn't grasp the Form of a house better than anyone else, nor did weaponsmiths have a better understanding of the platonic form of a sword. It's a Philosophical pursuit, and a fairly obscure one to attempt to "master" - you could almost say, a "magical" one. :wink:

So, a magus cannot cast a Creo Mop spell? Mops were invented in the 50's.... :wink:

Xavi

Hi,

My own preference--not useful to the OP--is that magic and technology interact fully and well, with the exception of degenerate cases that simply ruin things.

I kind of think it's cool, for example, for a scientist studying a cadaver to be able to say, "This must have been created by magic; there is pretty much no Carbon-14...."

The problems that arise for me are not about technology but about basic chemistry and physics. A magus who Mutos your shoes into pure lithium or fluorine doesn't really need much in the way of technology or direct damage spells...

How about changing the air above New York into ammonia or methane? Both are perfectly natural...

Anyway,

Ken

I modestly think that generally all the magic would need stress die rolls, because as Ovarwa said there´s too much potential for abuse. And making the effect more blatant (or powerful) would require more botch dice. So a magus wouldn´t risk, for example, changing water to nitroglicerine every day. (Yeah, almost like that other game :stuck_out_tongue: , for balance purposes). If not, mages would be the secret rulers of the world. Hehe, even then...

Who says we...mmm THEY are not? cue dramatic music
:mrgreen:

(I"m reminded of a diff RPG we played, pulp detectives, and the wealthy character bought a 55 gallon drum of nitroglycerin during chargen "because he could afford it". Not everything that a character can do is something that should be done...) :unamused:

So, how big was the explosion of a 55 gallon tube of dinamite?

Hi,

To avoid confusion, I'd like to note that I do not consider the tactics I describe "abusive," but natural, reasonable--and unworkable.

Anyway,

Ken

A few things to throw out there --

  1. You don't necessarily have to get rid of the Houses, you could just explain that they've become much more diffused and unimportant. Dozens or hundreds of new Houses could have emerged, while some of the originals could have failed or gone under ground (like the Diedne). The secrets of houses could have been revealed over the centuries, eliminating their reasons to exist (at least in strength). Houses could have split, many times over. Doing this can be a way to have your cake and eat it too -- because no Houses means no free virtue and no mysteries, but making Houses unimportant allows you to tell the stories that you want as a Story Guide, while also allowing your characters to still benefit from Houses when and if they want.

If you just want to get rid of Houses altogether, there are two ways I'd consider doing it. 1) There could have been a "second great schism" caused by inter-house fighting (what else?) and the surviving members of the Order could have been so sickened by the Houses that many of them disappeared, or 2) your magi are a part of the Order that abandoned Europe for the New World in the 1700s, fleeing Europe either because of another schism or because they got sick of the old house-and-tribunal system, preferring instead centralized leadership governed by merit (mirroring the colonists fleeing for America for religious freedom). If you do decide to go a new-world route, I'd make the leaders of each form on the council be at least somewhat democratic to be in the flavor of the New World, because from the very start the New World was much more democratic (even before the US was created, the colonies generally governed themselves through fairly-democratic means).

  1. To explain away Mercere Portals, they could have have been destroyed in a 2nd Great Schism, or perhaps they're just so damn far away as to be irrelevant. My favorite solution, though? In 800 years, new magics have been invented that rendered those portals obsolete. Think Flu Powder like in Harry Potter.

  2. Completely changing The Gift will have unintended consequences. I don't think you should do it. For starters, you'd have to explain why The Gift stopped effecting people and started effecting machines in a way that doesn't feel contrived. Harder task than it sounds.

3a. Honestly, I don't find the Gift (-3 to social rolls) to be nearly as handicapping as some think it is, especially if you use (simple) magic to offset it.However, if players in your troupe don't want the Gift to be socially handicapping when interacting with NPCs, either house play it so it's just a minor nuisance (ie don't force social roles), or decide an easy spell was created that allowed people to be unaffected by the Gift, that was taught to all magi before they finished their Gauntlet -- ie a perfume, or pair of glasses, or a refinement to parma that blocks the Gift from escaping beyond Parma, etc. If you attach it to items or smells, there could be something universal about it that could be an interesting way to mark magi, too, for those who know how to look for them (which in and of itself would be a large enough mini story flaw to probably make up for the fact magi wouldn't be facing -3s on their social rolls anymore). With this change, you're avoiding any unexpected consequences from changing The Gift, while also making it easier to play in social roles -- the only people negatively effected by it would become those who decided to take the Blatant Gift, and even then a -6 could become a -3, so it wouldn't be nearly as bad.

3b. If you just want Magi to be generally bad with technology, I'd explain it by banning apprentices from taking any 'technology skills' for their 15 years of apprenticeship (at least unless you created a special virtue to allow it, like how my Flambeau character took Warrior so he could learn martial abilities during apprenticeship). That way, magi would be inherently bad at technology for the same reason that my 60 year old mother can barely access her email. She wasn't exposed to it at a young age. Additionally, if Magi spent 15 years learning magic and had little exposure to technology, many of them would probably have a strict prejudice against technology... deciding not to use it at all (that could be a great option as a minor personality flaw).

Doing it this way actually makes for a more dynamic game. Turn using basic technology, computers, piloting, driving, etc. into skills (they are) and ensure that no magi is able to use those skills until after their apprenticeship (again, barring a virtue). Your characters would be much more flexible --- you could have characters who range from having an Ability Block flaw in Technology and couldn't even walk through an auto-opening door without going in the wrong way, wondering why the damn door won't open, to characters who take puissants, affinities and focuses in them, essentially becoming Techno-magi, as well as all sorts of Magi in between. Much more interesting -- imagine a techno-magi and magus with a personality flaw against machines living together in the same covenant!

Finally, while it would seem to be unbalancing to allow some magi to eventually become skilled with technology and magic, remember that it all balances out in the end, because Magi who spend time learning how to use technology are not spending time learning magic. So, in general, any 'techno-magi' would only be as good with magic when it deals with technology compared to most other magi, while Magi who focus exclusively on magic would be much more powerful with magic in general (as they should be), while others are somewhere in between. Additionally, any Magi who took a virtue so they could use and learn about technology during apprenticeship would have one less virtue to work with and would have to divide their apprenticeship points by that many more skills, though to be fair any technology virtue should work similarly to the warrior virtue for magi (ie it would give them some additional points to spend during apprenticeship on skills dealing with technology). I believe this dynamic would, indeed, work to balance itself out like it does in Dresden, while also allowing for a more dynamic system so some characters could still use technology, very much in the same way that my sword-wielding ward specialist stinks at anything that doesn't have to do with wards or swords.

  1. Making the Order "secret" in the modern day isn't really changing much. It's mostly secret in 1220, anyway. Anything that attracts unwanted attention to the Order has consequences, up to and including a Wizard's March, from working with nobles to messing up economies by creating and selling mountains of gold. Therefore, I wouldn't worry too much about the Aegis. You can create spells and items that would hide your covenant just as spells and items hide covenants in the 1220 setting, or you could use mundane means to hide your covenant (ie maybe it's hidden in the basement of a mundane home, or housed and hidden by a corporation your covenant secretly owns a controlling interest in?), or you could go the fantasy route and build them inside regios and make regios that much more important to magi in that day and age.

  2. If you don't want level 50 spells to require rituals, I think there's a number of ways to go about it. For starters, you could just up the number at which the ritual-requirement kicks in. Maybe in 800 years, ways were discovered to avoid rituals up to level 70?

Just decide how powerful you want magi to be, because if magi can instantly cast spells at level 100, without needing vis and/or rituals, you're really giving them the powers of a god -- no hyperbole there. If that's okay with your troupe, go for it, but bear in mind that you're going to be much more powerful than the characters on Dresden (if that's what you're going for): a character, for example, could be sitting on the Brooklyn Bridge in NYC and in one breath destroy Manhattan and in the other destroy Brooklyn. Do you really want to give characters that kind of ability? And if you do that, can magic really be kept secret? Again -- I'm not saying you shouldn't go that route, just think very carefully about it before you do.

  1. I agree with the notion that you allow characters to start aging at 50, at least for magi who will allow themselves to use modern day medicine in addition to magic. That makes sense. That said, if you just don't want to do aging (very understandable), you could just decide that in the ~800 years since 1220, new longevity potions were discovered that are a) easier to produce in terms of time, resources and effectiveness and/or b) won't render characters infertile. That seems entirely reasonable to me: 800 years is a long time.

  2. 800 years gives you an opportunity to make a lot of changes to the game -- so I think you're on the right track -- but for as many 'boons' as the 800 years would bring, I think there should be a few more 'hooks.' If magi have discovered how to stop aging, stop ritual casting requirements, etc. what's happened in 800 years that hasn't been so good? What are the interesting hooks? The destruction or severe reduction of the Houses could certainly count as one, but you should also think about how technology and humanity's rapid growth have effected the other realms. Maybe the Fae realm has driven back to only one or two locations in the entire world. Maybe the divine realm is now no more powerful than the magic realm? Or maybe the reason why Magi are more secretive of magic in the present day is because there are secret orders or government cells of magic-hunters who hate the idea that magic exists or views it as an extreme threat (could make for some interesting stories).

  3. It would be neat to think of a way to 'explain' electricity and technology. Is it an entirely new Form? How does it interact with magic, and how has Hermetic theory developed to explain it? Personally, I'd create some new rules for it and categorize it under Vim, as it's sort of the mundane version of magic (borrowing some of the rule-sets from ignem for electricity, and maybe some of them from animal, terram, etc. for technology).


All in all, sounds like a wicked fun game! I'd take some time to really think things out, but allow yourselves the flexibility to play as you go and be loose with the rules. Be willing to 'edit' once you play to make things work, even if it goes against rules you started out with (and explain to players that if they abuse new rules, they can be "nerfed." lol).

That's because the gift's effects are not to give you -3 on social rolls. That's more of a side-effect of the gift: First, people react badly to you anyway, and then, in addition, you have that further -3.

To take the exemple of someone here, imagine a known thief and crook (that's the gift's effect) comes to ask you something, and then has bad breath and is ugly (that's the -3). He can use magic to make himself prettier (offset the -3 penalty), but you still know him to be a crook, and won't be eager to, say, lend him money. The only difference is that a good-looking known crook (penalty offset) will probably have more chance to obtain something from you than an ugly and smelling one (-3 to social rolls).

That's why the gentle gift and companions are precious: you'll react better to a normal guy with average social skills than to a charming known serial rapist and thug.

I think RAW is ambiguous on this (serf's parma). It gives examples and flavor text on how to treat someone with the gift, and also a -3 penalty. Is that penalty the mechanical representation of the flavor text, or a separate effect? I don't think that's clear. I do agree that in a canonic game, with companions running around, it's best treat it as two effects. For a game that has the magi interacting directly with NPCs, which is often the case for many groups - just letting the -3 penalty be interpreted as "he thinks you're a crook, that's why he didn't let you in" is actually probably better.

This is the reason we upped the penalty to -5 for normal Gift and -10 for Blatant. Much more difficult to get rid of this with just minor spells.

Xavi

Well, ArsM p 75 states that the initial reaction is bad. Whatever you do.
If you try to overcome that, then you've got a -3 penalty. Just to overcome that initial "automatic failure". It becomes clearer later on the same page: "If the maga manages to convince or coerce someone into interacting with her, she suffers the -3 penalty on all rolls". It says the same thing about the blatant gift: You've got a -6 penalty to overcome the automatic hostility.
Note also the exemples on p76-77 on relationships, especially established ones (when you overcame that initial hostility).

So, whatever your approach, it is clear that this is anyway a lot harsher than "-3 to all rolls": This is at least akin to "failure or botch (blatant gift) on the first roll, and then -3/-6 to all rolls anyway".

Clearer mechanics would have been probably better, though, as roll-prone groups often miss the "roleplay" part of the gift's description. Similarly, spells that overcome that -3, especially in HoH: S especially state how that interacts with the gift in a "bad" way (like, you don't look majestic but threatening, you get the idea), despite the penalty being mechanically canceled. But, as, just as the core paragraph in the book, it does this purely in terms of roleplay, this is often neglected.

Mheh, I didn't mean to side-track into a conversation about The Gift's effects; I just don't think The Gift is a deal breaker for me, in my campaign.

My main point about The Gift, IMO, still stands. If their troupe doesn't like the effects of The Gift, they don't have to altogether get rid of it, they can downplay it so it isn't so much of a hindrance. It just seems to me that changing how The Gift impacts the world would actually be a lot of work, for a problem that already solves itself given the nature of how magi spend their seasons. Questions like "What kind of machines would be impacted by The Gift and to what degree?" and "How would different-flavored Gifts effect different machines differently?" would all need to be answered. The Blatant Gift would impact a machine differently than The Gift, which would be different than a Faerie-flavored Gift. Could a character with a Faerie-flavored Gift ride a "punch" Buggie because VW Bugs tend to be a part of a lot of stories? Seems reasonable to me. Would someone with The Blatant Gift be able to flush the toilet?

These are questions that would have to be answered if The Gift would be changed, even if the troupe's desired goal -- of Magi generally eschewing technology -- would inherently be a part of the game, so long as the troupe ensured using technology would involve the skill system (as it should). If players wanted to be even more inherently worse at technology, the game still provides those options through flaws. Ability blocks, maledictions and prohibitions are already there, beyond the inherent difficulty of learning lots of additional skills with Magic characters who tend to want to spend time learning Magic.

In any event, it sounds like a real, fun campaign. Even going so far as to make The Gift impact technology would be fun -- but definitely put the work into fleshing out the system if that's the route that's taken. I'd also make current virtues and flaws available apply to technology in that sort of system -- ie creating an automotive alternative to Animal/Magical Companion, or creating Inoffensive to Technology version of Inoffensive to Fae or Animals, to give players options that would make the game more dynamic. Honestly, that would probably be the best way to handle The Gift in the modern world if the troupe's willing to put the work into fully flesh The Gift's new impacts out.

I don't see why Hermetic magic needs to change. It may not quite keep up with modern day thinking but it doesn't have to--it's magic and it's laws are ancient and eternal. This gives magi an antiquated feel when they talk about your iPod as being an object creatable by Terram with Auram requisites. "Young apprentice, are you saying that because Ben Franklin flew a kite my lighting spell is now Creo Electricity and not Creo Auram? Electricity is clearly Auram. Always has been, always will be." There might well be new guidelines to handle lesser amounts of electricity but I don't see a new Form as necessary.

"Technology" is a vague term. What's the difference between a jet plane and a printing press? Both are clearly items made of Terram. There are areas currently that Hermetic magic does not encompass, see various Hedge Traditions or the RoP books. Similarly, there might be things in the modern age that Hermetic magic doesn't touch, like nuclear physics, nanobots, virii, and so forth.

Anyway, my two cents.

Rich

The very fact that it doesn't translate well is what makes it cool. These are not Technomancers, this is not Internet-summoning nor bio-chemical-sorcery, this is the Power of the Elements, a tradition that is thousands of years old and larger than (most of) the tricks of modern man!

Perhaps there are hiccups and jarring paradoxes and frustrating disconnects - that's good, magic should have that. It should not always be a nice grid and perfect table where everything fits in its predictable pigeonhole.

Gunpowder - is that Terram, or Ignem? Electricity? Nuclear Power? Radiation, from radio to TV to microwave and beta-rays? Space travel - so much for the "lunar sphere'! If Bonisagus didn't incorporate these into his GUT (which never really quite was one anyway), then tough luck for those who use it, and for their sake I hope they can think outside the box. 8)

Gunpower is terram in it's unlit form, like coal.

Electricity, strangely, is Auram, since the only prior example is lightning.

Nuclear power... well, the uranium and such are Terram, and probably an additional magnitude above gems and precious metals. Or several. The radiation... is outside hermetic theory, until someone works it out. Have fun with that. Or the radiation causes Warping in mages, which is LOTS of fun :stuck_out_tongue:

Radiations for transmission are outside the area of hermetic magic, and may need a new form to affect them. Someone say Major Breakthrough? :stuck_out_tongue: But it's possible to disrupt them, mundane science knows that. Auram to create a thunder storm, etc.

Space travel: Unless you REALLY let players get away with stuff, they won't be pulling this off. If they do, you've a choice: Either the 'luna sphere' is actually where magic stops working, at the distance the moon orbits the Earth (which allows you to prevent mages affecting the Sun, etc.) or it's discovered to be significantly none-existent, and mages can carry on going wherever they like.
-- Or the third, and fun option :stuck_out_tongue:: For every multiple of the distance of the Luna Sphere you travel from the Earth, multiply the number of botch dice a magus gets, with a minimum of 1 automatically imposed. The magi who goes to Mars, even assuming he had ALL the virtues negating botch die, would STILL (at closest approach Earth and Mars) have about 120 botch dice to roll :stuck_out_tongue:

When it comes to electricity, I feel that the Form should be the object where the electricity is found. Lightning is Auram, but electricity in wires would be Terram. If we were using a strict Mythic paradigm, Lightning should be Ignem and not Auram. The ancients thought that Lightning was fiery plogeston falling from the sky.

That makes sense, though I can see WHY Lightning is Auram. Of course, I also suggest the form be dependant on what the electricity is meant to do. For example, Electricity in a lightbulb is in fact meant to make light, and thus, is Ignem.

Which leads to the question, considering that lightning can be created in other ways than through weather, even if much, much weaker, what Form is it then?
(wether it was thought that electricity and lightning was the same or not is arguable, but knowledge of electricity isnt even if such wasnt exactly accurate)
Its what spawned theories about the element Aether in reality.