I'm referring to this place specifically. From everything I can tell, 'Castle' is more of a title than what it actually is, a major house. With it being a manor house, would it count as Average, Large, Huge, or even Stupendous? Since it's stone, it's at minimum Superior quality.
Residency; how many magi would/could live here? How much space if each magi also has a lab?
Similar question for something equivalent to Gammel Estrup, sans moat.
The problem is the labs, really.
500 square feet is quite a lot as it turns out.
I visited Rosenholm a few years ago, and was actively evaluating it for use as a covenant.
But aside from the main hall, very few rooms were big enough for a standard lab. Ofcourse, if small-than-standard labs are acceptable, it could work.
Also please notice the small "tower" in the left side of the picture above. It is called the "oldest university in Jylland (Jutland)", but you couldn't have a modern class in there!
it is as I recall, something like 3-4 meters to each side, measured on the outside, with nice thick walls.
I was a little sad, it would have been a nice place for a covenant.
PS: Rosenholm floorplans, in case anyone are interested.
Likely what would be two or three "normal" rooms would have walls knocked down to become a proper lab. 500 ft square is a 10'x50', 15'x33.3', 20'x25' or 22.4'x'22,4'... Can get pretty hefty in a time where I think a lot of rooms were more in the 10'x10' size.
I think the problem isn't the lab but the lab rules.
I'd recommend playing without them, until these are rewritten: A magus' lab is what it is, based purely on MT, per core rules. If you want to handwave bonuses or penalties, great, but hardly needed.
The result is both more interesting and more playable.
The 500' square lab is the core rules.
Covenants atleast lets you deal with a smaller lab.
Does the lab have to be in one room ?
Otherwise, the examples given above could easily contain several labs of 500sqf split in several connected rooms. For instance, a scriptorium in which to write the experiment results without breathing mercury vapors, a cellar where the experiment material is safely stored (you wouldn't wand a small experiment gone wrong to corrupt all of your vis, right ?), a small room specially designed as a fume hood, etc.
There's a minor structure flaw specifically citing partitions as a cause for its penalty. This implies that labs are optimally designed with a fairly open floorplan.
According to covenants, one lab must be contained within one chamber. I'm not exactly what the limits are for something to stop being considered one chamber, but the relevant example was that installing lab equipment on one floor as well as a floor higher in a tower would count as two labs.
Besides, storage is one thing, but I'd hardly imply that something like a fume hood or separate scriptorium are necessary or even useful unless you're experimenting or have an otherwise unsafe lab.
I think the Awkward Shape Minor Structure Flaw from Covenants page 115 would be good for describing a laboratory spread among two adjoining rooms. I've always interpreted the rule in Covenants about having to have the laboratory in one room as meaning a continuous space, and that adjacent rooms would count, whereas separate rooms would be two different labs.
It's allowed some of my players to use an awkward shaped lab while waiting for the right time to leave the lab so the intervening wall could be torn down by covenfolk (i.e. while they were away on some business).
