Precious Vis

Games Discussion Ars Magica
41

Also want to point out that my Covenant with the "high" Vis income I mentioned in my first post would not meet the Vis requirements in the Greater Alps. Our permanent Vis Sources are only 63p, with the rest coming from our book trade (not a permanent source) and a few collections that are variable (animals of virtue, flotsam, etc and not permanent). Compared that to what our requirement would be of 80p and we are two Magi over.

For the Greater Alps that 10p per Magi is the minimum, not the average. Just looking at the "Mother Houses" since there are no numbers on the "Chapter House" Vis income, we have 47 Magi with 1020+ pawns a year of income (21.7p+ a Magi). There are at least another 20 Magi in Chapter Houses and since those are normally setup somewhere that is good to collect resources their ratio of p@M should at least match, but most likely exceed, that of the Mother Houses.

If you play a game as a Chapter House in the Greater Alps, you should be collecting 20p+ a year per Magi. However much of that would be sent to the Mother House and so is not paid for with BP.

1 Like
42

For what's worth, all the information about the Tribunal of the Greater Alps found in Sanctuary of Ice (a 4th edition book) is no longer canonical in 5th edition.

I would add that in my experience 50 pawns/year definitely makes the "standard" 6-mage covenant well-off, but not extravagantly so (I cannot seem to find how many magi the spring covenant in the OP had).

The OP mentioned that the magi were never involved in a certamen contest. I wonder: do they every use vis to boost penetration of their spells, or to cast more powerful spontaneous magic in a pinch? Because vis makes one able to face more difficult challenges (and thus, crucially, gain better rewards). In this sense, young magi can burn more vis than their elders, to make up for their shortcomings. That's one of the reasons why I find the concept that a magus should not travel with vis in case it might be stolen a bit ... strange. Don't think of vis as money, think of it as a big gun!

1 Like
43

this is one of the many points where I think that players think very differently from magi.

Mechanically, vis makes a rather feeble bonus to the casting score, and a player will typically see the alternative cost of an enchantment not afforded or even a book. The short-term expenditure feels dear compared to the long-term investment.

Real people are less inclined towards long-term gaming of the system, and may value the increased chance in the immediate situation more highly.

Most sagas do not furnish the young magi with vis to spare either. Desperate to improve their arts, they need all the vis they have. The players may not be prepared to adjust their mindset to the saga where they do have vis to spare.

1 Like
44

I think this is the crux of the problem.

In previous editions, the bonus one could get from vis to "instant" magical activities like spellcasting or certamen was massive, enough to eclipse the skill of the mage; an insurmountable challenge became almost trivial if you threw enough vis at it (ignoring the risk of a botch). This was perceived as bad, and thus the vis bonus per pawn was significantly reduced in ArM5.

The result is that in ArM5 you can still get a lot of bang out of vis for instant activities, but you get very little bang for the buck, so magi unless desperate won't use it even if they have lots of it because of the opportunity cost (one could buy lots of nifty stuff on the Hermetic market for the cost of adding 3 magnitudes to a single spontaneous spell). In my view this is bad design-wise, because if you have a mechanical option in the game, you want it to be the sensible choice often enough (and the dumb choice often enough, too).

I suspect a better design choice would have been to keep the bonus from vis as high as it was, or push it higher, but drastically reduce the number of pawns that can be put to use. Say:

  • 1 pawn of vis provides +10 to the Casting Total (or Certamen Attack or Defense Total),
  • but one can only use a pawn of vis for every 10 points, or fraction thereof, in the relevant Art.
  • In fact, I would have added: at any time, you can instantly spend vis of any type to increase the Magic Resistance provided by your Parma Magica by +10 per pawn spent. This bonus lasts a number of rounds equal to the number of pawns spent. You can only spend 1 pawn per point of your Parma score.
1 Like
45

That sounds extreme, but it is a point well-made. The balance is not good as it is.

Your change effectively means that even the beginner can get two magnitudes extra on most spontaneous spells for 2p vis (one for the technique and one for the form). Suddenly a lot of AC range spells come within reach.

Or +20 penetration to whatever formulaic spell. Suddenly most faeries, magic creatures, and princes of the church have no MR to speak of.

My may concern is not that this is necessarily bad, but I am totally unable to predict the ingame effect.

1 Like
46

Another way to improve the +2, replace it with "double the dice roll". Improving dice explosion is terrifying.

1 Like
47

It might sound extreme and it's certainly not deeply thought out, never mind playtested, but note that compared to the current rules (disregarding the "rounding to the next +10" which simplifies things and doesn't add that much in absolute terms):

  • The maximum boost to fatiguing spontaneous magic remains the same (because it's a bonus to the casting total, not to the casting score: so 2 pawns yields 4 magnitudes, not 2).
  • The maximum boost to penetration is halved.
  • The maximum boost to certamen totals is halved.

So it can be argued that the (most extreme) outcome is more limited than under the current rules. The fact is that what under the current rules is prohibitively expensive, now becomes ... just expensive. You can see it this way: with the rules above a young magus who in a pinch adds +20 to Penetration (or to the final level of spontaneous magic) three times effectively gives up forever possession of three sound tractatus, or of a useful enchanted device (final Level 30, costing 3 pawns to enchant and thus 6 to commission to another mage). Worthwhile often enough that it might happen in most stories, but still costly enough that it's done only for really important stuff when no other options are available. Under the current rules, the young magus can can still do it, but it means giving up fifteen sound tractatus or five enchated devices (or thirty tractatus and ten devices in the case of spontaneous magic); it is thus probably reserved only for life-or-death situations. Furthermore, it is costly enough to transform any victory into Pyrrhic one, which can be deeply unsatisfactory from a player's point of view.

Actually, I dislike stuff that increases randomness, in particular for costly "get-out-of-trouble" options: I think these should be reliable rather than "terrifying". But I acknowledge this depends very much on individual taste.

2 Likes
48

+2 is ridiculously weak and near pointless. Vis being used for an alpha strike again enemies with magic defence is what it should be used for.

I'd go with +2 and +(spell magnitude) penetration. That way 4 vis is +8 and +28 penetration for incantation of lightning. It means instead of a bunch of multicast Pilums, Crystals darts and slings of Vilano in wizard combat which looks underwhelming, using vis for a big flashy alpha strike is viable.

1 Like
49

We're four players each playing a magus, plus the Story Guide's test magus (Veriditus) who doesn't do much, and generally stays home. We moved pretty much fresh out of gauntlet into a dilapidated mansion (Manor House, Free Choices Boon, Cp11) bordering aura rich (Aura (x2)
Minor Site Boon, Cp8) swampland disregarded by the local population (Hidden Ways, Minor Surroundings Boon, Cp23). The mansion could support 6 magi. We also have four companions and about a dozen coven folk, including the grogs.

For full disclosure, we also chose a legendary income source (Wealth, Major Resources Boon, Cp16) which we decided to only use for improving our labs, but which after six in-game years we haven't done yet. This is exactly the same problem: what use do we have for money? For me so far it's only a fun story background, where a few coven folk take out our herd of sheep to graze into the magical but otherwise economically worthless wetland, and produce fantastic raw parchments. Three different abbeys in nearby counties fight over our yearly production, shooting up their value.

I don't think we've ever done that. We never had to. A potential explanation is that we generally adventure with three or four magi, something the rules argue against doing. But who wants to leave their supercharacter home while the rest is out having fun?

My Merinita magus has two long-term goals. She needs to find the trod to Tír na nÓg to redeem her banished parens, and she has aspirations of starting a faerie realm of her own. Two goals for which she is not equipped yet. In true spirit of the Ars Magica guide lines, each time someone asks her to go out on an adventure, she has a fit over leaving her studies.

50

This sounds great. It looks like you've really thought about a working Vis economy. Would you mind telling me how you spend your Vis over an average year?

But was it wrong for us then to build a spring covenant as a base of operations? We used the standard Covenant rules.

51

Of course it is not wrong.

What is possibly wrong, in the medieval setting, is not to spend the wealth. This is discussed in C&G and I think upstream in the thread. Hoarding wealth is sinful. Magi with a normal medieval mindset would spend the silver on throwing parties, and excess vis to buy beautiful items which serves no other purpose than comfort and joy.

What I love about Ars Magica is the ambiguities, but the ambiguity is also a source of grief, particularly when it tears us between story and mechanics. In real life, the magi would face challenges and trouble every year, spending silver and vis and even time to solve problems. But we want a fast pace and see the magi develop over decades, so we only tell stories about some of the problems. When the story is not told, the magi can effectively stockpile the silver and the vis, as the mechanics go, while in real life, real people would have spent some to meet challenges and the rest for comfort and joy. This is wrong from a narrative perspective, but everybody makes the same wrong and it is hard to avoid, given the mechanical nature of the game.

You would make vis more precious if you tell more stories which take vis to solve, and vis expenses could take any number of forms, from vis and Hermetic procurement, via spell boosting and rituals, to tributes to powerful beings and theft. But if you tell all those stories, you slow down the pace, and that is not necessarily the right approach.

You could spend the vis by buying books and enchantments, but that sooner or later that means stockpiling books and items that nobody has time to read and use, and I fail to see how that's better than stockpiling vis.

The logical result in the setting, of throwing parties, buying items which provide the ultimate party entertainment, and spoiling the redcaps, is not going to happen anyway. We are players, after all, and live to game the system.

52

I disagree. For example, there was a thread about every duration spell can be dispelled by an apprentice, because they just keep casting Unravel the Fabric of Form and sooner or later roll enough exploding dice. As a SG, I say start rolling, one dice at a time. If they get bored, so does the apprentice.

The players should think about character comfort. Think in the modern world of all the pointless stuff we do for fun and comfort. An example. I love board games, but they can be tedious to pack away. There are guys that within days of a board game being released, use their expensive engineering, architecture, whatever, degrees to create a 3d printable insert, to make packing the board away better. (As an aside, for those who love board games, the Ark Nova insert is beautifully designed).

Less niche. People create decks and outdoor entertainment areas when there's a perfectly good dining table. People buy fashion when they have perfectly good clothes. Every now and then the players should do comfort stuff.

A magi spending a season making light sources for the covenant; another magi making privies that have creo imaginem to smell like roses, and perdo or rego teleport the poo; Cooking pots or a fancy table setting that cast sun duration muto imaginem to make the food taste and smell better.

If the saga is moving seasons at a rollicking pace, the magi should "waste" a season here or their on frivolous things.

3 Likes
53

Reading through snippets and responses just now I had this image. "No, we've never fought certamen. We just give them some vis and treat them like beggars until they slink away in embarrassment."

2 Likes
54

If you look on my Covenant's Collection of Enchanted Items thread, you will find several that are just for comfort. There are well over 100 different enchantments in the thread. It is nearly 3 years old now and a little outdated, since we have continued expanding it (Note to self, update thread).

A few from there are good Vis sinks for comfort/beauty/ease:

  • Magic Ovens (we already have unlimited firewood magically produced)
  • Magic Lanterns (Over 100 now)
  • Magic Lights (variation of above, for lighting important but not so important locations)
  • Sun Stones (Fully light a structure and keep it at about 75f/24c)
  • Stone of Spring Breezes (whole structure breeze control)
  • Stone of Summer Breezes (above plus humidity control)
  • Magi's Enchanted Seats (Magic chairs, pure comfort item)
  • Miniature Army of the Magi (Miniature War Gaming, automated)
  • Illustrative Paintings (Magically animated paintings)
  • varies magic Maps (useful, but ours are overkill in size and appearance)
  • animated library (varies enchantments to sort, fetch, store, etc books)
  • The Eternal Flame (stone that always has fire, in temple and important fireplaces)
  • fully enchanted Roman Baths (creates water, controls temps, etc)
  • fully enchanted Water System (pumps water and waste over several square miles)
  • Animate the Fountains (Magical water fountains)
  • varies Travelers Gear (magic tents, ground cover, etc just for comfort of Magi)
  • Magic Cat Toys (literally just toys for Hermetic Cats)

[There are a lot that are practical, these are just beauty/comfort currently in thread]

We also have things like enchanted rose gardens, enchanted oak trees, etc. Much of our Covenant feels more like a park than anything else.

To answer your question on yearly Vis breakdown from income.
60p (7.5p per Magi, requires a season of work to get)
8p (4p per Redcap)
13p (AotH)
3p (Herbam Truffles, to charge 3 levels of Regio)
12~20p (to Covenant stores) [Can be 40p+ depending on gather rolls, book trade, and animals]

The Covenant gets everything not a share to the Magi and Redcaps, which includes 'wild Vis' we collect. It pays for the AotH, and also pays 3p of Herbam Truffles to ensure the crops grow well and more Truffles form.

If a Magi does not do a season of work they get no share that year. If they do multiple seasons in a year, those seasons pay for future years. Covenant pays for any enchantments made for the Covenant during a Magi's "season of work", which is how we have so many enchanted items.

Odds and ends Vis cost include:

  • Gifts of Vis and simple Enchantments to new Covenants. About once per decade of 10~100p. Also includes a collection of Roots. This depends on us not having expensive projects or bad Vis rolls.
  • Covenant Enchantments. 0~50p, normally towards the lower end though. Recently we have been doing things like writing books more often than enchanting.
  • Aura Manipulation Rituals. 5~10p, though we carefully monitor how stable our Aura is first.
  • Hermetic Architecture, which is very expensive. Easily two or three Queens worth per project.
  • Magic Structures/Projects. A Rook to a Queen each. Magic Shipyard, Roman baths, Medicus and water works are examples. We do about one of these per decade.
  • Enchanted War Ships. About half to a whole Queen each. We are up to 5 of these (one more than in thread). If we build a new one depends on the pirates activities.
  • "Chapter Houses". Not actually true Chapter Houses, these are locations in cities around ME where we buy warehouses and setup a portal to (30p), along with varies enchantments of protection. Somewhere between half to a whole Queen each.
  • "Expedition Camps". Similar to the above but setup near places we want to study. We use a custom version of 'Conjuring the Mystic Tower' at ones we plan to be at a long time, along with varies enchanted items. Cost from a Rook (no Portal) to a Queen each.
  • New Industry. Any time we start a new industry, once it is solidified we spend up to a Queen to magically improve it. Woodworkers, metal works, and brewers & distillers are examples.

If you do the math, on average we have about two Queens extra a decade from our normal income (plus any random collection and high rolls). So we can cover about two expensive things from the list per decade. However in the last two decades we have been over collecting and storing since we want to do several very expensive projects and are preparing for a possible "shadow war" with the leadership of Bonisagus. The entire 1,600p+ could easily be drained in the next decade.

We also have nearly 3,000 pounds of silver which sounds like a lot until you realize our yearly expenditure (without cost savings) is ~977 pounds, higher than our income of 804.3 pounds. We have had story events where we lost a good chunk of that cost savings so try to keep some reserve. Also the same as Vis we have been saving up for those expensive projects and the possible conflict.

EDIT: For anyone wondering about the 7.5p per year, that is the maximum average rather than the actual. If a Magi does a season of work, they get 7p if they got 0p or 8p the previous year and 8p if they got 7p the previous year. It was to encourage the Magi to do a little more consistant seasons of work

6 Likes