Here's a question we were unable to answer in our troupe.
Can someone use a Muto ritual with a momentary duration to permanently change something, in the same way one use a Creo ritual to permanently create something ? (One of my players wants to play a Criamon who transforms the world around him.)
Can we do this with Rego ? If not, why ? We were wondering why rituals like "Aegis of the Hearth" or "Hermes's Portal" cannot have a momentary duration and then work permanently, like a "Touch of Midas" ritual.
I wasn't able to find the answer in the core book, thanks for your help.
It is an explicit exception (and anomaly) that Creo can be used in this way.
When a Muto effect ends, the Muto'ed "object" returns to it's previous state*.
*except as modified by circumstance, ie. turned to stone then smashed to bit will turn back smashed to bits etc.
Not really, see The Limit of Essential Nature, at the end of p.79.
In a nutshell, the target Nature tends to reassert itself, so as soon as the Muto effect wears off, the target reverts.
It's not clear what you mean in this case. You can certainly effect "permanent" changes to the world with Rego - for example, moving a stone from one place to another, or even turning raw wool into a fine cloak - and in general you do not need a Ritual (unless you exceed level 50, Moon duration etc.).
Well, first of all, these two are remnants of Mercurian Rituals and they do not perfectly conform to Hermetic Magic. But in general, ROUGHLY speaking, Creo is the only Technique where you can achieve "permanency" of something new brought into existence by using a Ritual.
I meant : why can a Creo spell that should be maintained, be made permanent with a ritual ; and a Rego spell can't.
I understand this is a exception in the rules, as well as I understand Hermes Portal and Aegis don't fit in the regular pattern of the Hermetic Theory.
I was wondering what "logical" explanation I could give to my player, who's asking for one, as I wasn't able to find one.
I would like to see a "background/setting related" justification of this.
Roughly speaking, Nature asserts itself. If you bend it with magic, as soon as you stop pushing, it reasserts itself. Creo Rituals slightly bend this rule; what they produce is "natural" and thus Nature does not whisk it away once the spell ends. No "in game" explanation is given. It's just the way Hermetic magic works. Note that other mystical traditions, as well as the powers of some mystical creatures, may operate under different strictures.
This is more like the kind of answer (idea, theory) I was looking for.
Thanks for this.
My Criamon player is going to work on a Hermetic breakthrrough that would allow magi to use Muto rituals the same way they use Creo...
As for the "Nature" issue, I think it doesn't solve everything. You can lift something in the air with Rego without violating its essential nature. Can't anything be lifted ? But you can't make it permanent...
That's because you are supplying magical force to hold it up. You have to keep the magic going or there's no force keeping it up. If you use Rego to put something on a table, then it does stay up after the spell ends, because something else is supplying the force.
A ward is a magical effect and only lasts as long as does the magic powering it. So the longest duration possible from a ritual is one year. You could, however, make an enchanted device with permanent Rego effect of non-ritual nature.
In previous editions permanent was the highest possible duration and momentary was the lowest. Spells that had a permanent duration had to have a "natural outcome" but the duration could be used for any type of spell muto, rego whatever. (So you could permanently muto a man into a frog but you couldn't use it to shrink him to the size of a frog permanently) Creo spells had to have vis to achieve a permanent effect thanks to the Limit of Creation but most other spells also needed vis to be permanent just because of the way spell design and casting worked.
Their are lots of reasons why permanent duration was taken out of the mix in fifth and we could fill up a hole thread listing (and debating) them all. I think most of them had to do with the shaky nature of what is natural in Mythic Europe. (If Dragons are natural why not 3 inch tall men.) Suffice it to say though the reason why momentary creo rituals have lasting effects and others don't is a hold over from that rules change. This way you can have your permanent creation and healing but still get rid of other permanent weirdness.
If you want an in-game 'logical" explanation how about this.
Raw vis is just a half formed piece of the universe that lacks a complete essential nature. Magic can manipulate it easily for that reason. Since it doesn't have an essential nature magic has to exert far less energy to control it. When they use it in most spell magic, they just tell it to be part of the energy that drives the spell. This is what Magicians do when they boost their casting totals or power most rituals. These are pretty inefficient brute force uses for vis and it tends to just burn up the vis when the spell expires. But Creo magic allows for an efficient little hack. Since vis wants to be a permanent part of the world with a complete essential nature all you have to do is "create" the essential nature you want for it and the vis does the rest, refusing to return to it's unformed state. This is why a Creo ritual with a momentary duration that creates a permanent object is easier then a ritual that creates the same object for only a day. The first uses the vis to build the object and the second uses it to power the spell.
The reason this works for Creo and nothing else is because the Limit of Creation isn't a limit at all but a loop hole in the greater Limit of Essential Nature.