Reading about Folk Witch Bouda in Mythic Africa, Ars Fabula in RoP Divine, Ars Goetia in RoP Infernal and Ars Notoria- I am wondering about the possibilities of more complicated and potent traditions of non-magical Realms.
Not to imply the current traditions are weak, but most traditions have a set of favoured abilities as their thing- the exception perhaps being the zoraztrians whom have unique mysteries, but I doubt that is exclusive to them.
Similar to how each magical tradition has a unique set of Arts and/or Supernatural Abilities, I am curious as to whether similar non-magical traditions exist. Folk Witch Boudas are arguably an example of such, but they're a spinoff of folk witches so I'm uncertain.
Most Faerie, Infernal, and Divine traditions have a set four Favored Abilities/Arts. Nothing says they can't have more, but most published don't.
They can of course learn other abilities as well, but with the usual difficulties of learning non-Favored supernatural abilities.
If a character from one of those traditions want to start with any of their Favored Abilities they have to buy the corresponding virtues, so they probably can't afford more than three or four of them anyway.
You get a little bit of unique powers with Kabbalists who have their own variants of several Divine Methods that have special extra powers. They are one of the most detailed non-Magical traditions.
The game is Ars Magica after all, so it is only natural that the magical traditions get a lot more attention devoted to them.
The Folk Witch Bouda are a magical tradition, despite the fact that their abilities are mostly aligned to the Faerie realm. (Don't ask.) This is seen by the fact that most of them are Gifted, and that they in most aspects are treated like just another hedge tradition - like regular Folk Witches.
I'm pretty confident the other traditions being weak is a deliberate design choice. The Order's early "Join or Die" mantra weakened other traditions. While the Order is not so zealous on the Join or Die now, if any tradition got too strong, the Order will shut them down.
The Order has had centuries of continued growth and stability. The Summae, tractatus, lab notes, breakthroughs, vis income, over those centuries has strengthened the order. The other traditions are continually falling behind.
That is true. The order won't be attacking a part of "The" Church. They will likely be attacking a bunch of Heretics the Roman Catholic Church has denounced.
Ehh- a solid chunk of christian divine traditions aren't heretics. I'd have to double check, but around half iirc are within the Church's graces and at least one is outright endorsed by them.
That's a big if.
One major reason for the strength of the Order of Hermes is that it is organized.
Almost any tradition can be powerful if they have many members that work together.
But, most of them have only a small number of members that live far from each other without much contact.
Not counting hermetic divine traditions- the cantores are explicitly said to gather, the fransciancs are deffo organized, the cathars aren't organised but they aren't part of the Church proper, the Debterah are implied to be organised and so forth.
The factors that make magical traditions unorganised- the Gift and the lack of an overacrhing body like the Church- doesn't really exist for christian Divine Traditions, except non-catholic ones.
Besides- I would like to cast doubt on the idea the Order is more organised than all traditions. It is more organised than most, but there are some whom I would argue are more organised like Learned Magicians or the Augustan Brotherhood. An organisagion that only gathers once every seven years, and even then sometimes some members don't come, isn't particularly organised imo. More organised than say the Muspelli, but thats a low bar.
Fundamentally the Order's biggest advantage is social- due to PM they can both meet in person (in large numbers) without undue conflict and have the Gift. Other traditions either do not have the Gift but learn mundane magics (often involving difficult to initiate virtues) or they are not well organized. The biggest potential threat to the order's pre-eminence would be either 1) a tradition of Gifted magi who initiate the Gentle Gift, or 2) a mundane tradition which allows for accelerated initiations without the limitation of corresponding flaws (which would have to involve some kind of breakthrough that disregards current rules).
Of course Divine traditions exist that transcend these limitations, but require True Faith, which is far less common than the Gift.
Most members in a divine tradition don't have True Faith but initiate- some of the "flaws" may also be seen as a positive (I mean come on- anyone in a divine tradition will see Pious as a benefit)
They can also work around the flaws by using spiritual paths or pilgramages instead, though afaik no Divine Tradition uses that as their main thing. Still, it isn't exactly implausible.
Edit: on a funky note, sahirs have sort of achieved number 2. Its restricted to virtues related to the solomonic arts, but they can initiate others without a flaw. Strangely, hermetic integration allows for initiation of any supernatural or hermetic virtue the initiator possesses.
Should have been clearer- requires true faith to transcend those limitations.
Which is where the concept of an infernal False Faith becomes truly terrifying...
Well ... a single Volkov can GrantCeremony to all mundane members of his pagan village ... and then lead them in a massive rite (which is actually perfectly in character, since Volkhvy are known for leading their flocks in massive rites). The result can be ... literally a game-changer.
I remember this discussion from when Hedge Magic was first released 25-30 years ago.
Is Ars Magica going to be the game about Hermetic magi that it used to be, or is it going to simulate every conceivable supernatural power to the same degree and make them suitable for player characters? The scope used to be well-defined and quite manageable, and the rules, while complex, quite contained.
Sure, there may be traditions and powers more powerful than Hermetic magic, but they were supposed to have gone under the radar, and to maintain the mystery, they should be made fiat when needed. Divine powers are subject to God's will, and frankly, any player mechanics for God's will necessarily breaks every part of the concept of the Abrahamitic God.
So the answer to your question is that a large faction of players simply want Hermetic magic to be the strongest tradition modelled, to keep the game simple and well-defined. They have been losing, but only slowly. New rulesets were piling up throughout the first decade of 5ed, but not quite to the point where other traditions surpass the Order.
I believe it's a good place to apply Occam's Razor: Do not multiply entities needlessly.
My rule of thumb: Everything in the core book defaults to true, and everything in every other book defaults to false.
If someone wants to bring in something there's rarely any discussion beyond, "Okay," and SGs will bring in elements without discussion, but there's always some positive act of inclusion, a choice being made.
David Chart shared the guidelines he was sending to authors writing for Ars. You should not take that as a limit to what you should be writing or not, more as a guide to understand why Mythic Europe and the range of published books is like that, and what was the intend of the editor.
You will see clearly some limits set in stone.
The more you move away from this status quo, the more likely you might have to adjust other aspects of the paradigm, you might find incoherent situations and you will have to do more finetuning. Not that you should not do it, just that discussion might become more challenging as you move away from the paradigm people are used to work with.