Raising the mental characteristics of a familiar

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

So, when an animal with Cunning becomes a familiar, it gets an Intelligence of -3. Per the Form guidelines for Animal, since the familiar now has Intelligence, a maga would use Mentem to affect its mind, not Animal. But that still leaves a question -- to what levels can those characteristics be raised?

For example, an average crow (using the qualities and stats from HoH:MC) has mental stats of Cun 0, Per +3, Pre -1, and Com +1. After being made a familiar, it now has Int -3. So, are the maximum stats it can be raised to with CrMe:

  1. Int +2, Per +8, Pre +4, Com +6, where each is an average crow-turned-familiar +5, following the CrAn guideline of no more than 5 higher than an average for that kind of animal;

  2. Int +5, Per +8, Pre +4, Com +6, as above, but we use the pre-familiar crow's Cun 0 as the base for the familiar's maximum Int;

  3. Int +5, Per +5, Pre +5, Com +5, following the CrMe limits for a person;

  4. Int +5, Per +8, Pre +5, Com +6, using the higher of the CrAn and CrMe limits; or

  5. Int +2 (or possibly +5, from the Cun 0 base), Per +5, Pre +4, Com +5, using the lower of the CrAn and CrMe limits.

(I note that if the answer is #3, you effectively get #4 if the maga raises a to-be-familiar's start-above-0 mental stats five points with CrAn first, and then, after binding, raises the other stats to the limits of CrMe.)

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2

I have no rules or mechanics to cite, sorry. I would house rule in favor of #5. The familiar is an NPC, and it should be possible for human characters to outshine it.

{Edit:} I tend to think the crow is already super-human in several ways -- it flies much faster than a human (or even a horse) can run; flight can take it places no human can reach; and it can travel much further in a day than any horseman. Other animals will have different advantages; even basing their limits around the most disadvantageous of the base-animal / newly-linked familiar scores still leaves them with awesome utility. They really do not need to have stats to rival the best archmages.

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3

If the would-be familiar was already intelligent, would its Int score be limited in any way?
Why would a Cun creature have a different limit once it turns familiar?

I believe a familiar gains its understanding from its companion, and therefore has the same limitation as a human.

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4

Presumably there'd be some limit. CrAn can't raise a characteristic to more than the kind's average +5, CrCo can't raise a human's characteristic to more than the human average (0) +5, and CrMe can't raise a human's characteristic to more than the human average +5. But it doesn't seem to be clear what limit they'd reach.

It's entirely sane to say that the same limit for an animal that has Int naturally would also apply to a familiar. But the problem is that the limit for CrMe on intelligent animals is not specified. We've got a rule for CrAn for animals with Cunning, and we've got a rule in CrMe that seems to be implicitly for humans (since it's written the same way as the CrCo one).

(Really, what ArM5 need[s/ed] was an actual book specifically on familiars [with extensions to animal companions and a bunch of statblocks also useful for Heartbeasts], instead of the inadequate patches that were the appendix to the Bjornaer chapter in HoH:MC, the five-page Mundane Beasts pdf, and the Magical Animals chapter in RoP:M.)

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5

Realms of Power: Magic has none of those constraints.
For cat, they even call it "a free choice" and the dragon uses the typical Great Intelligence.
The Int beasts of virtue listed there have a spread of 0 0 0 0 +1 +1 +2. Only some Cun ones have a negative score.
(Later in the chapter, neph birds have Int -2 using the standard 7 points)

6

A system for a Storyguide to generate an NPC's stat block before play is utterly different from a PC magus using Creo ritual magic in play to raise a specific existing character's characteristics.

I mean, are you really suggesting that a PC maga should be able to use a 90th-level CrMe ritual to raise the Communication of a Raven of Virtue to +12 so it can write a slew of Quality 18 tractatus?

7
  1. there are no spell to raise above +5
  2. you'd need Great Intelligence to start beyond +3

Anything but your #3 is a fantasy.
Only Str/Qik may reach +6 and above by playing with Size.

That's my take and I'll stick to it until I see a +6 somewhere else.

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8

The Creo Animal guidelines all base stat-boosting on "no more than [number] higher than the average score for that kind of animal", topping out at "five" at level 55 because "A greater increase is not within the natural range for the animal, and thus cannot be effected by Creo magic."

That's not "to no more than +5" like over in Corpus and Mentem, that's "five higher than the average". So a mundane adder can have its Quickness raised by CrAn to +8 (+3 in the Book of Mundane Beasts, plus five), a mundane bear can have its Strength raised by CrAn to +11 (+6 in the Book of Mundane Beasts, plus five), and a mundane falcon can have its Perception raised by CrAn to +8 (+3 in the Book of Mundane Beasts, plus five).

CrAn continues to apply to physical stats after a creature gains an Intelligence score from some source, so a magus with a good-enough CrAn, enough vis, and the will can raise her falcon familiar to Str -1, Sta +7, Dex +6, and Qik +11. Absolute, plain, simple Rules-As-Written.

So, we now turn to the mental stats. Before binding the falcon as a familiar, this same maga could raise the falcon to Per +8 with CrAn, per RAW. That isn't going to happen often, but it's possible. Afterword, she'd has to use CrMe, since it now has an Intelligence score instead of Cunning.

Now, the CrMe guideline as written says "Increase one of a person’s mental Characteristics by one point, to no more than +5." If it said "being" or "character", there'd be no problem; it would be a little perverse that you'd be better off using CrAn on the critter before binding rather than CrMe afterward, but a little perverse in an edge case is okay. The trouble is, the guideline says "person". Does "person" include everybody with an Int score, or does it mean humans?

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9

There's plenty of animal examples, they're just spread across many books.
Check out my Animals of Mythic Europe PDF, it has all the official animal stats, plus many fan made ones.

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10

I have seen and like that PDF! But 1) it wasn't available in 2006, and 2) there's still a whole pile of issues around familiars that are not addressed by simply collecting the scattered mundane animal stats (though it helps a lot for Bjornaer). And while "make something up" is certainly something I can do (after decades of playing and running RPGs and a handful of minor RPG writing credits), more support would have been very welcome.

(Also, an actual dedicated book could well have caught and sanded some of the rough bits that got through the piecemeal approach. Like, "Okay, are mundane crows really supposed to have Second Sight, or should that have been reserved for Crows of Virtue? If they're supposed to have it, what's their score in the Second Sight ability? And are Bjornaer with crow Heartbeasts supposed to get it? The rules on HoH:MC, p.23 say 'Supernatural Abilities can always be used', does that just mean human form abilities in animal form, or both ways? It sure seems odd to get such an ability from the Heartbeast, which is explicitly not a magical animal . . .")

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11

I would like to apologize for not doing the Animals of Mythic Europe back in 2006.... :rofl:

Are there issues? sure.
Would I LOVE an official book on Familiars and mundane animals? Yes, please! I already have money set aside for it...

There's plenty of material for Ars Magica that I would want to see done. And if I could somehow get a job doing the layout, I would be a very happy man...

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