"probably"? Well you almost come out with the problem of the matter at least...
Because how will you know if a demon actually present isnt using illusion to hide itself burning while making it look like one or some others burns, or even gets destroyed?
How do you know a demon didnt come up with a way to fool the enchantment itself?
And then the important part:
The magic CAN NOT avoid being fooled by demon illusions, which means it wont be reliable no matter what you do.
Or, if a demon has knowledge of it, someone the demon wishes to get rid of. Just make them suspiciously catch fire in your anti-demon-room.
I don't understand that at all.
Situation 1, this man seems friendly, this deal seems good... oh wait maybe too good. Yea now I think about it this sounds suspicious. Maybe I'll cast detect demon... oh wait he is a demon... quick everyone gear up for combat.
Situation 2, this man seems friendly, this deal seems good... oh wait maybe too good. Yea now I think about it this sounds suspicious. Maybe I'll cast detect demon... oh wait I can't do that, now I feel paranoid. If he is a demon I'll have to think of a cunning idea to trip him up... oh wait maybe I'll just agree to the deal and take the risk.
Situation 2 is far more interesting.
Wow... I'd love to see what you would consider a 2D conflict.
Again I don't recognise any of that. Their ability to remain undetected by Hermetic Magic is major advantage, but they still need to actually trick and corrupt people. That is not a foregone conclusion. If Demons were simply the Predator, and simply desired to hunt and kill humans then you might have a point. But that sounds more like something you might encounter in D&D not Ars (not saying there is anything wrong in D&D, it is a perfectly enjoyable game).
The players also can't know whether or not the SG has decided that all magic is derived from ancient alien supercomputers orbitting the earth. Their characters can be forgiven however for working on the assumption that Christianity might offer protection however!
I'd probably leave an Ars game that did not have the infernal and it's requisite themes, because it's simply not ars. If you are going to do this it's probably best to admit it's a typical fantasy game that uses the Ars Magica rules. But again it's down to each troupe.
As long as a game like Ars Magica has ultimate good and ultimate evil in the form of the Divine and Infernal realms then the Limit of the Infernal makes some sense. Especially if you want to deal with themes of temptation and corruption. So that the drama of the story comes from the characters moral choices. For this you don't necessarily want characters making their moral choices based on their Intellego scores.
"Hmm This deal seams to good to be true" InVi "Oh no he's a demon it must be sinful" PeVi, PeVi, PeVi, PeVi, Whew it's not easy being virtuous
That doesn't mean that demons should be undetectable far from it. In my opinion you should always be able to spot demons via interaction and RP. Because they will always act sinful and be trying to get others to act sinful. Even if demons and the Infernal try to act virtuous to allay your fears there should always be some hint as to their true nature. This is the trade off for having an immunity to lie detection.
That being said not every gamer enjoys morality plays. (I actually do) And even when they do differences between the player's and story guide's interpretation of good and evil can create tension. Never mind trying to understand the morality of Mythic Europe. So the hints dropped by the story guide may not be spotted even by attentive players. "Wait saving money is sinful and being a spendthrift is virtuous? It would have been nice if someone had told me."
Of course Demon as corrupter is only one way to play the infernal. Demons can also be deceivers, plotters and planners. These stories amount to murder mysteries and puzzle quests. The Drama coming from the ability of the players (not the character's) ability to put the pieces together and figure out the solution. Again the limit of the infernal makes some sense here as having the character solve the puzzle by casting a few spells can be very anticlimactic.
InCo "Mustdoneous in the library with the terram vis, Wait" InVi "He's also a demon Next"
Again many gamers don't enjoy this kind of play. (In this case I'm usually one of them) But if people do enjoy it the Infernal limit makes this type of plot just doable. Of course story guides should be careful of taking up game time with unsolvable mysteries. Generally if you think to yourself "There's no way there going to figure this one out" while your creating a puzzle your only inviting disappointment by including it in a game.
Or you can just play demons as "THE ENEMY". After all like the Nazis in an Indiana Jones movie Demons are unremittingly evil so it's okay to kill them. One note villains maybe, but not necessarily boring. After all I've watched Raiders and Last Crusade dozens of times and loved every minute of em. I'm all for moral relativism and shades of gray in my games but sometimes you just want to hit some bad guys. Ars Magica with it's assumptions of an ultimately benevolent God and unquestionably evil demons gives you more clear cut bad guys then in many other games out their.
In this case the Limit of the Infernal exists in part to put the reins on this sort of play. If mages could both reliably detect and fight demons many of them would feel honor bound to do so constantly. After all if you see evil happening or about to happen, have the power to stop it and still do nothing isn't that in itself evil. Since demons are pretty much the definition of "evil about to happen" any "good" Magus who even sees one should probably throw down with it if he thinks he has a chance to beat it.
Now I'm not saying that the Infernal Limit is necessary for Ars Magica, I really don't think it is. But these are some of the reasons why it exists and some of the things you might have to deal with if its removed in your saga.
Except he isnt a demon... Because a smart demon would make sure he has a willing and totally noncorrupted proxy doing any dealings. Ie. complex plotting NEEDED, because otherwise people will notice demons easily.
However, in RAW, NOONE can reliably detect demons. So a city could have half its people replaced by demons, a country could have half its people replaced by demons and noone would be able to notice.
Why should any demons bother with any finesse or plotting then?
Thats why the RAW doesnt hang together, and is inconsistent. It has demons acting as if they COULD be detected when they cant be.
And MY preference is that demons should be hard to detect, but not impossible.
Situation 2 is zero difference from S1. You´re just not thinking it through enough from the "bad guy"´s side.
Why should they waltz around making themselves targets when they can influence someone to do it for them?
Try reading David Weber´s Honor Harrington series.
Thanks to Weber being so nice, all books except the latest one are freely downloadable and accessible online.
Mmm, lets see, ah yes fifthimperium was the name of the official host site:
baencd.thefifthimperium.com/22-M ... ofHonorCD/
(thats the directlink to the online version, there´s a zipped version of the cd on the site as well; just click on the link to a book there and then select the format and have fun)
Now, why do pick this series as an example of a 3D conflict? Because even though it starts out all small, nicely (at least seemingly) 1D and simple, even then it tries to show the conflict from the points of view of at least the 2 sides directly involved.
Once Weber got "worked up" properly, and later on with the 2 spinoff series and series of short stories, thats when his little universe gets VERY interesting. Villains always have a REASON for what they´re doing, even if its at one time nothing better then "oh crap we have nothing better than the DuQuesne plan, we´ll just have to keep it up, its another war or bankruptcy and revolution with our heads on the chopping block"(or at least, thats what the involved people at the time KNOW of...), and all people have motivations and personalities that are not just "must corrupt".
If they CANT be reliably recognised, they CAN run around freely, making their corrupting EASY, waaay tooo easy.
Ever thought about this, considering that the only decent way of spotting demons is by the divine one way or another, well there is no way of being sure that what you´re doing/using IS divine, and since you cant otherwise detect infernals, but there IS magic which can look like it does a lot of things, like emulating some divine way of detecting infernals... Man, if the infernal limit is in use as by RAW, at least I want to play on the side of the infernal, because unless they´re extremely stupid and incompetent they are going to win.
An assumption they have zero reason to believe in until it actually fails them. Who´s to say any demons around are not just simply toying with them, letting them believe they are getting some sort of protection?
Thats complete bullshit. You´re making the assumption that your OPINION on how the game should work, and YOURS ALONE is the only correct one? Nice, the sin of pride gets you good there. +1 infernal warping to you for falling into the embrace of a mortal sin.
Well, let me say this, in my game, an archmagi isnt going to be able killing off the devil. And the GMs i´ve played with, demons in their games are sneaky, effective and often outright damned scary.
And then let me ask you THIS, your "requisite themes" are they actually based on something solid or just the average religious indoctrination?
Yes, exactly. Which is exactly why its not within your right to determine what is or isnt "ars".
Meh, thats boring.
Once upon a time i had quite a funny little surprise when seeing a bunch of players getting more and more "oh shit", until suddenly what happens? A big freaking, POWERFUL, demon pops up openly and rescues their characters...
Way too powerful for the characters to do anything to, and really, do you try to kill the thing that just rescued you?
Later on, the incident was used against them in tribunal... Ie., the demon had set the dangers up for them, made sure there were witnesses that would prefer to stay unseen, then gone in and rescued them, then spent months making sure the story got hooked up with the "right people".
Years later, new saga, a demon shows itself openly, players recall the above incident(same GM as that time) and burn through a hideous amount of Vis to get enough spellcasting power to destroy its earthly presence...
"-Aww, you didnt even let my infernal defector say hi, and he was going to tell you a bunch of important stuff!"
:mrgreen:
That makes the bad assumption that no limit equals EASY to cast such spells. What if you need seriously powerful spells to reliably spot demons? That is, as i mentioned before, the one version i really liked playing with.
Pretty much only highlevel specialist could reliably identify demons in that game, and that was cool.
reading information of infernal limit
infernal limit in hermetic magic is a minor limit but I guess the breakthrough to do that would be hermetic...
Which is even harder to detect.
Well for a start that would be pointless, it would be counter-intuitive. Though the medieval mind accepted that the world was swarming with demons to have half the population demonic doppelgangers is excessive so I can still fall back on theme. Also the Dominion and such like would also come into play.
Because loudly shouting at a devout Christian "give me your soul and I'll give you something shiny" does not work.
Is it not inconsistent, because they still need to be subtle in order to corrupt people.
The two are utterly different.
Okay thanks.
How does it make their corrupting far too easy? In an order of paranoid Magi and a society of pious Christians they need to be subtle. Obviously some people are already willing to sell out, every one else still needs to be manipulated.
Well they still have the incredibly difficult task of getting people to willfully damn themselves.
Whose to say the Magic are just brains in a vat wired to a virtual reality sim... wait this is getting silly.
I am giving my opinion, you are giving yours, I don't really see how that makes me the one guilty of hubris. Also I am talking about the Infernal and the limits of Hermetic magic, it's not like I am arguing that all Ars Magica games should involve detailed interaction with the flemish wool trade... it's the bloody infernal for the love of God. It's meant to be a game set in medieval Europe where the Christian/Theistic paradignm is strongly implied to have sort sort of validity or practicallity.
Seriously? When you read a piece of literature you can draw out the themes, when you read a game manual you can draw out the themes, when you read history you can draw out the themes of a particularly era. Again it's meant to be a game set in medieval Europe where the Christian/Theistic paradignm is strongly implied to have sort sort of validity or practicallity. Lastly I am an atheist.
Again it is my right to determine what is my Ars, and again when another interpretation directly contradicts with the clear original intention I can point that out.
This IS really boring and not my original intent. When I started this thread I just wanted peoples thoughts on what effect Hermetic Research that over comes the infernal limit would have on A game.
I wasn't arguing that the infernal limit didn't belong in the game. All the limits serve a purpose and help define the THEMES of the game. Hermetic Research is also a THEME and the "clear intention" of the rules is that it can break a minor limit, if (and this is important) that's what the people playing the game want. It doesn't matter whether your talking the Limit of Energy, The Limit of Vis, or The Limit of The Soul. They ALL could be broken because it's your game. The important thing to do is to understand where changing these things might take your story. That was the reason I started this thread.
If you can't imagine an Ars Magica saga where the infernal limit has been broken thats fine, but I don't see how saying that adds much to this discussion. Actually stating what themes the limit promotes and how the game might change if such a breakthrough where integrated into hermetic magic would be more constructive. Though if all you have to say is doom and gloom for the mages the order and the saga please keep it short.
Also saying that the result of such a breakthrough would be the universe giving the character the cosmic bitch slap is also not constructive. It IS the same thing as saying it can't be done and therefor not really part of this conversation. While doing something like that to an NPC is a fairly reasonable and yes THEMATIC way of warning a player off from research you don't wish to explore in your game, doing it to a PC without warning is just being a prick. THEMES like that might better be explore in Cthulu.
Furthermore arguing that the limit of the infernal doesn't even belong in the game also misses the point of the discussion. If your saga doesn't have it or doesn't use it then the effects of such a breakthrough would be minimal.
BTW My use of boldfaced and ALL CAPS was me being sarcastic and yes probably a little bitchy.
Didnt say it didnt belong. I pointed out that the way the infernal behaves is more consistent with the "limit" partially broken already than as if it was "solid".
And you did it very nicely. 
Yeah, i did get that, but its hard to say specifically really. Because the first VERY big question is, if its broken, did it break in a way that made detection EASY or HARD?
If the only ones who can see through the demon fakery reliably are 100+ year old specialist magi then i think the effect will be fairly close to almost none.
If it becomes so easy that any hermetic apprentice can do it(which means lots of nonhermetic magic users will find or already have found ways to do it as well) then the infernal is going to be in for a tough ride where they will be forced to stick even further in the background and use puppets, messengers or proxies to get anything done.
My own preferred level is slightly below the very hard. Once you start looking at InVim casting totals of at least 60, maybe more like 70-80, thats when it starts looking fine for a magi to be able to start seeing through demon trickery.
Or maybe not make it a digital effect, maybe make the spell so that it gives a bonus for seeing through, which is still not guaranteed...
I gave you my response on that, if you want to me to develop that further I will. If you don't like this tangent then don't feed it.
I did both.
I did that as well.
I gave a number of potential consequences, if you chose to fixate on the one that you least like that is your problem.
The presumption was that is was an NPC, I mean generally they are the people who will be attempting to break the limits. Not always as obviously the game does allow for the PC's to challenge the limits.
So anyway again, breaking the limit of the infernal should have the following consequences (plus some new ones)...
1: The credibility of fellow Magi. Sure if would be great to detect demons... but seriously are you ever going to believe someone who says that they can?
2: Diabolist Magi attempting to kill the discoverer (tricky as he should be fairly powerful but seriously what have they got to lose).
3: 'Repented' Diabolist Magi attempting to use the discovery to undo their foolish mistakes.
4: The reaction of hell, I think it is safe to assume that the Devil if no omniscient is still very well informed. If he does not instantly know that this breakthrough has been acheived it probably won't be long until he does. And he won't like it much. He will react as severely as you envisage the forces of hell are able to do so.
5: The reaction of heaven, if we assume a sort of dualist set up in which God and the Devil are effectively equals engaged in a war then heaven will probably not be seeking to smite the Magus, possibly, if we assume the more theologically 'correct' view that Demons operate under and as part of Gods law then heaven may well be angered because it destroys the ability of hell to weed out the sinners and to test the faith of mankind. Of course the latter possibility suggests that the limit of the infernal and thereofore also the limit of the divine and therefore argubaly unbreakable.
You could extrapolate such a saga to bring the world close to the apocalypse. The Players could seek to use the discovery, or suppress in order to achieve victory for heaven or to avert the final war between heaven and hell. That could be quite an intense saga (I prefer smaller plots but hey).
From a story perspective, the person trying (and maybe close to succeeding) might be expecting to be attacked by the infernal as he's coming close to breaking their best weapon, but no infernal agents (or none of real threat perhaps) comes to stop him or interfere. The powerful agent that comes to interfere though is from the Divine. The magus is mystified, alarmed, perhaps thinks that it's an infernal trick, but it really is an agent of the divine trying to convince the magus to stop the research.
The magus explains all the good it would do, the infernal could be rooted out and fought, its deceptions laid bare.
The angel explains that all it would really do would be to devalue faith and discourage man's pursuit of it. Faith is the best weapon against the infernal, for a faithful person will stick to virtue and be harder to deceive. One that is faithful is difficult to trick into sin. But with the magus's accomplishment, where then shall man turn? Why bother living virtuously when the test of the infernal is easily laid bare? (Easy of course is relative, no doubt the magus put in a ton of research, but is it easier than acquiring real faith?)
With the breaking of the imit the magus could also be risking sin, the sin of pride for seeking to step above divinely ordained limits (this of course would mean then that the limit of the infernal is a divine limit and not a limit on Bonisagus's theory).
Just some story ideas, not presenting these as absolutes or anything, but could be a story element to use, which is what you were looking for anyway right?
EDIT just wanted to plug that Simon laid out this idea above, I should have read it first.
I like the idea of the Angel sent to warn him, however I probably prefer it if it were more of a spiritual attack then a two way conversation. By which I mean the Magus should get horrifying dreams and visions of a divine nature?
You know how in the film excalibur where Galahad gets his grail dreams? Something a bit like that?
That sounds good. I was actually thinking of something like Christmas Carol, where the magus does get visited and gets to converse with the angel, but also get to see the results of his research. At that point the angel is trying to save the magus's soul as well as humanity's. By devoting so much to magic in his quest to fight the infernal he ignores the best and most readily available (doesn't mean easy though) by turning to the divine.
Or perhaps it's neither the divine or infernal that tries to impede this research.
How about this a hermetic researcher sets his eyes on the limit of the infernal. He starts his research and almost immediately makes a breakthrough. With the aid of a trusted companion who has sense holiness and unholiness he test his results. Against every test he can conceive of his magic seems reliable. Surely it couldn't be that easy, it's almost as if Bonisaugus just missed something obvious. An infernal plot? perhaps the researcher is being deceived, but something about that just doesn't feel right. So he decides to investigate Bonisaugus's original intellego research to see how the limit of the infernal originated.
After a few adventures the Magus eventually secures some fragment of the founder's original notes and is stunned to see that in it's original form Intellego had no problem discerning the infernal. Obviously the limit of the infernal was artificially introduced into hermetic magic after the fact.
However as the researcher prepares to reveal his discovery to the order as a whole he is quietly approached by a couple of famous Quaesitors and a Bonisaugus Trianoma. They explain to him what was going on. There never was a limit of the infernal. In the very first days of the Order of Hermes the founders realized that given the ability to detect demons and the power to fight them, Christian wizards might feel compelled to seek demons out and destroy them. If such demon hunting became common this could provoke a war with the infernal that would annihilate the nascent order. So it was decided that all reference of detecting the infernal was taken out of hermetic theory and all future magi where told that it just couldn't be used on demons. So was born the lie of the infernal limit. It's perfect as long as Magi believe that the best result they can get is what the demon wants them to see they will never bother to use intellego on Demons.
The other Magi don't threaten the researcher merely point out the potential damage he might cause his reputation if he shares his findings nearly unbelievable findings. Or worse yet the damage he might do the order if he is able to convince enough Mages that what he says is possible.
So what is this researcher to think. Is this a demonic trick to keep him from publishing his findings. Should he share his knowledge even if it isn't. Could the ability to track and hunt demons destroy the order. Even if it could threaten the order wouldn't it be wrong not to give individual magi the choice.
Given this idea the process of integration would probably require repeated successful uses of intellego magic to route out demonic influence in a wide range of situations. The more successes you have the less likely it's a demonic con job. (As I said in a previous post not all demons have the self control or sense of cooperation necessary to pull off the long con and some one would slip up eventually) Eventually though the truth might rule out. What then for the order certainly the Quaesitors and Hoplites would hunt down the diabolists within the order. Lets say they clear infernal corruption out of the order would they stop there. Would the Order of Hermes continue to ignore the mundane world around them now that they can clearly see the Demonic forces that prey upon it.
In this setting the divine sees magical detection of the infernal as perfectly ok after all sense unholiness is a power granted by the divine realm. Using magic is only fair given demons natural powers. After all who do Magi think gave them The Gift to begin with. As far as moral choices go God gave every man a conscience he only has to listen to it to avoid corruption and temptation. Using magic to avoid things like that just over complicates a simple thing and probably fails because of it. The real moral questions the divine worries about are ones Intellego spells can't answer. Like when do you become involved and fight evil even though you might endanger yourself.
What I would be eventually going for with a plot line like this is an "Evil prospers when good men do nothing" theme. The basic idea is that evil can always be seen for what it is if you look for it. And people only fail to see evil when they choose not to.
If it's as easy as that then how has the charade been maintained? You should make it a breakthrough of some sort of dificulty otherwise the illusion would have crumbled long ago. It also seems unlikely that the Order would actually chose to blind itself in this way, the rationale for doing so is not strong.
Another sure way to root them out? Relics. With their "scourging the infernal" power, they'll quickly make short work of any demon.
By the way, to come back to the room, there's already a demon's detection spell: It's called DEO. Just multicast one at everything you suspect to be a demon. If, say, your demon detection spell is lvl 30, you can get away with 3 lvl 20 DEO, giving you way better penetration as well as obliterating anything save a lord of hell. If it's anything save a demon, loss of infernal might won't hurt it. If it is, whether you know it or not doesn't matter. If your detection spell can penetrate, so can a DEO
There's also the Aegis. Sure, you're not certain it's a demon if it can't enter your covenant. But you should be wary.
Demons being impossible to detect as such through intellego magics also don't mean you can't discover or foil them mundanely, just as, in any detective story, the detective uses his wits to solve the problem
That's not how T: Room works: it targets everyone in the room, magi included. The fact that losing infernal might causes them no trouble at all is just a side effect. Which is also why, in retrospect, the Ignem requisite is a Bad Idea of major proportions 
. A regular T: Room DEO should be enough. Stay in it 2 minutes, and, with any penetration, any demon is toast.
A prick GM, or one that overestimates the demon's ability might say that the demon fools the magic somewhat so that he ain't affected, but he could just as well do the same for your regular DEO and say it doesn't work on the fiery fiend standing before you.
=> IMO, when dealing with magi, demons are better of doing as in your game anyway, using proxies and all.
IMO, relatively minor. Demons are already pretty vulnerable and unable to affect magi directly, forced, like DW pointed out, to work through proxy when dealing with mages unless more powerful than them.
They'd just get a little more cautious, that's it.
For the mundanes, this'd change nothing.
Of course, if the discovery extend to the mundane side of Mythic Europe... Now that's something else!!! If anyone could get the equivalent of Sense Holiness, you'd probably see mass hysteria (demons everywhere!!!) and witch hunts.
I love qcipher and Maine ideas, btw 
No i meant that if you´re just randomly targeting everything in a room, then it should be "foolable" because it isnt aimed at a demon(real or suspected) by the caster, then its up to the magic to be intelligent...
Its also a matter of avoiding people going around flinging DEO randomly around them with Sight Range and Group Target.
Otherwise, as you said, you´re using DEO to detect and im not at all very fond of that idea.
Edit: Ie. anytime a DEO targets something other than infernals, it will fizzle.
Or... have the detection of demons be a minor breakthrough already achieved by Bonisagus but he actually made a pact with hell. This would be obscured, and the Order left alone for certain period of time perhaps?
Gives a rather darker twist to a saga should the PC's ever find out.
Regarding casting DEO at random, there are other considerations. For starters, hardly anyone likes to have a spell cast on them, even if it's "Just checking". Warping could, and likely would result. A clever demon with some skill at this could also use that to advance his cause. A magus for example who is paranoid enough to actually cast DEO on people that he meets might still miss the demon that is watching this, who then uses its maleficarum to create the illusion of some kind of reaction to the DEO that was cast on an innocent person, possibly triggering an actual attack. Plus, as has been pointed out, demons work through proxies, DEO wouldn't do anyhing to them.