Rival Magic: I has it!

Games Discussion Ars Magica
61

The magic of the Augustan Brotherhood is a bit difficult to summarize, but I'll give it my best shot...

Fluff: 80 or so years ago, a hedge wizard rediscovered Virgil's Tomb in Naples and found therein a magical book which he used to initiate himself into Virgil's magical system. He then recruited other Gifted scholars (like all the traditions in RM, the Gift is necessary to learn Virgilian Magic) creating a secret society dedicated to recreating the glories of Rome. They hope to accomplish this by serving as Court Wizards and subtly influencing their employers to support the Holy Roman Empire.

Crunch: Virgilian Magic is predicated upon three practices:
Animo: Allows the wizard to invest magical energies into items, effectively creating Magic Things with Vigilo effects as powers.
Sortes Virgilianae: A sort of beefed up version of the "Divination and Augury" virtue, using a copy of the Aeneid.
Vigilo: Spellcasting. All vigilo rites are wards in that they target places rather than individuals - they can either be straight up wards like "Circle of Beast Warding" or more like Watching Wards in that they cause a magical effect to occur when a specific condition is fulfilled.
Example: A wizard might perform a rite designed to cause heavy rain if his city catches on fire.

Initiation into the tradition grants access to the Animo and Sortes Virgilianae supernatural abilties and the six schools used in performing vigilo rites - School or Boreas, School of the Naiads, School or Prometheus, School of the Stones, School of the Sylvan Dryads or School of the Vigilant Bees (these are difficult arts and correspond to Auram, Aquam, Ignem, Terram, Herbam and Animal respectively). A score of 1 in a school allows a wizard to learn any rite associated with that school regardless of its EF, but each rite must be learned individually as an Art with it's score being the main contributer to the casting total.

Because their rites take a long time to perform and can't directly harm humans in any event, the Brotherhood aren't much of a threat in combat. Nevertheless, messing with them could be considered Interfering with the Mundanes due to their association with the nobility and they are good on defense - able to surround themselves with all sorts of magical traps in relatively short order.

I sincerely hope this helps, but these guys are difficult to summarize...

62

How do they gewt around the "Gifted people don't trust each other" problem? I can'y see their method. Presumably they are all Gently Gifted or have great Abilities, since they work as court magicians?

(In the Soqotran case, they communicate through their familiar spirits, and therefore do not meet.)

63

It's implied that the Gentle Gift is common, although not an absolute requirement - p66 mentions they can take the Blatant Gift. I'm not sure how this would work in practice but there is the trope of the evil soothsayer hermit that serves the baron living in a hut at the middle of the swamp beneath the castle grunds. The sample wizard, Bici, has the Gentle Gift. They seem fairly spread out - there is no mention of covenant living or huddling in covens like Folk Witches and the group is very academic oriented like the Learned Magicians so perhaps they communicate by correspondence?

They can possess Magister in Artibus and other Academic related Social Virtues and have a lot of XP in Abilities which might offset some of the Gift effect. Not all Jerbiton are Gently Gifted but these guys do seem to be far more involved in mundane affairs so I see your point.

Along these lines, there's not really a good metagame explanation why the Gently Gifted Augustans aren't all recruited into House Jerbiton upon manifestation of their Gift or adopted upon discovery into House Ex-Miscellanea for the others apart from the fact that they would breach the non-interference with mundanes and court wizard clauses of the Code. I think their interaction with House Jerbiton could have lots of story potential but it's not really expanded upon.

Their actual strength in numbers is left open - 12 to as many as 300 wizards. So all could have the Gentle Gift if it was a small group. I suppose an organisation of Gifted individuals without Parma Magica is not impossible, just improbable and unstable enough that its unlikely to last for a long time. The Cult of Mercury seemingly lasted a while (although perhaps that's just propaganda according to another thread, eh Timothy?

The Augustans are also comparatively the youngest of the rival traditions, as less than 80 years have passed since Ludowicus entered the tomb. Given that training a wizard takes 12+ years, there's probably been less than 6 "generations" of wizards, many of who would be master-apprentice pairs.

Their magic (in particularly their Difficult Art "Schools" coupled with their normal Art "Rites" for specific effects would be an interesting system to simulate Mercurian magic and covers the "traditional" elemental Forms of Mercurian Magic (at least from the way it was represented in the ArM3 adventure "The Tempest" and to date in the corebook). The major difference is the limitations, particularly their lack of metamagic (Vim), illusions (Imaginem) and their inability to affect humans directly - no Mentem, Corpus.

I think they're quite interesting - but I'm a fan of non-traditional styles of play, hedge wizards and the concept of a "Court Wizard" saga. Mixed in with some Mythic Alchemy, a Learned Magician Art or two and some of the natural philosophy effects from Art & Academe they could make interesting magus alternatives for some Saga styles.

I think some of their rationale for surviving despite the Gift is left a bit too open but that may have been deliberate.

Cheers,

Lachie

64

John, thanks for letting me know. If I need to buy something from amazon, I'll instead get it from WH23, as the prices are both MSRP.

65

It's more or less explicitly stated that they are fractious and distrustful, having already been through one Civil War. That being said, they have a fairly simple common goal to work towards (which doesn't require close cooperation or interaction with their fellows). It's also implied that the Brotherhood might be aware that their antipathy for each other is a result of the Gift (hence their concerted interest in learning Parma Magica) though I'm not sure to what extent, if any, that would help them resist the distrust engendered...

66

Indeed. Thanks for the info. :slight_smile: I will try to get it o monday :slight_smile:

Cheers,
Xavi

67

Absolutely. That was intentional, but sadly confusing: the Musica, Statue with the Horn, palladium etc are all remnants of the ancient magic of Virgil: they are unique items, which break the rules in that respect. I shall create some more examples of animations that follow the rules (like the one on p.61) rather than the ancient artefacts of the magic of Virgil, and post them on here. My plan was to do some "ancient Magic" type stuff, maybe in an adventure, on the real power of original Virgillian magic. However on reflection it was dumb of me to not follow the rules I had written for the Brotherhood as t just confuses ; just give the Musica a might of 12? I'm just doing some errta now on the chapter, I'll try to address this if I can there.

cj x

68

They don't. Their history is one of factionalism, fighting and assassination, political intrigues and schism. Mainly working by correspondence, they get on badly with their mundane employers, and even worse with each other. Gentle Gift is very common however

cj x

69

Thanks to Gremlin for the excellent summary of the Augustan Brotherhood, better than I (as their author) could have managed. They made their first appearance outside my saga in a Live Action Freeform game at Grand Tribunal UK in 2008, when the Primus of House Jerbiton (who was that?) threatened to secede from the Order unless he got his way, and revealed his House's secret alliance with the Augustan Brotherhood, and plans to turn the Holy Roman Emperor's armies against the Order unless they complied with his demands (Llewelyn of Diedne revealed himself and exploded seconds later, and another Primus revealed his true demonic form dragged some of the survivor to hell, so it was never really resolved: it was that kind of game! Still the survivors had fun :slight_smile: )

The AB are very much based on real 13th century legend and folklore - see the bibliography in the chapter - but they do have the advantage they can rustle up an old style "D&D" dungeon very easily with their peculiar defensive magics and animations. That was not my idea of how to use them in a game, but I do think if they have access to the vis then trying to get to a Brotherhood member in their lair may be bit "Tomb of Horrors", and that was why I included the legend of Virgil's Tomb in so much detail because it is one of the few examples of anything like a "dungeon adventure" in the 13th century -- it also clearly is an inspiration for the later Tomb of Christian Rosenkeutz Rosicrucian stuff I guess? Actually the AB in my saga are supposed to be proto-Masons or Rosicrucian - real initiatory secret societies and Hermeticism in the Giordorno Bruno style come in just after the end of the Ars period, in the 15th century mainly and later, so this lot, riddled with the Gift and internal dissension ("who is the Emperor to come?") are a fragmented group of scholars protecting their courts and city's interests (as the magic of Virgil was ideal for according to the real legends), preventing Hermetic Magic easily overthrowing the courts and capitals of Mythic Europe yet never revealing their hand or existence: the victims of a Vigilo ward may never realise it was even magic that brought ruin upon them.

Vigilo rites are designed to be defensive: perverting them is possible, but given the time it takes to learn a single rite to be able to cast it in the Dominion aura of a city, they are extremely limited. and then remember that a rite configured for Naples won't work in Lyons or Barcelona...

Anyway I'll try to write some supporting material soon

cj x

70

With sincere thanks to Hermetic Merlin!

[b]P. 69-73 Note some of Virgil's Animations in the Virgillian Magic Landscape section p.69-73 break the (Ease Factor may not exceed Magic Might times two) limit: that is because they were designed by Virgil himself, and are magical devices fabled for their potency in Mythic Europe. Theoretically extending the limit to three time Might would be a probably be a Minor Breakthrough, a limit of ten times Magic Might a Major Breakthrough, and bring one closer to Virgil's own power. The Augustan Brotherhood's magic is possibly a pale reflection of Virgil's magical skill.

Pentagram against Swords, p.60 : Ease Factor should be 24, as the Base is 12 not 15 as given
"And snatched his gleaming sword from the sheath", p.60 : Ease Factor should be 27, as the Base is 12 not 15 as given
"Trojan walls, famous in war!", p.60 Ease Factor should be 30, as the Base is 12 not 15 as given[/b]

71

I'm curios, what are the potential breakthroughs listed for the Augustan Brotherhood?

72

Two are explicitly stated:

  1. Sortes Virgilianae can be integrated to yield the "Divination and Augury" virtue from TMRE. As noted above, this is a bit weaker than the version used by the AB.
  2. Hermetic Magi can also learn how to combine Watching Ward and another effect into a single (usually non-ritual) spell.

Ostensibly, one could integrate the Pentagram and City targets into Hermetic Theory as well, though I can't think of any particular hermetic usages for them right off the top of my head...

73

Animations could probably be done too actually. Not sure that would be a good thing, and would certainly be a major?

74

Today I went to my local gaming store. They didn't have Rival Magic nor the Sundered Eagle :frowning: I think I will have to buy them through warehouse 23, but they will not be around here before I am back to work. Damn....

Xavi

75

Wouldn't that mostly just be Automata (from HoH: MC) over again?

EDIT: though one minor breakthrough there might be to allow automata to learn abilities from others - not just their creator

76

The good news is that you can have a saga with cojones! You can pit the PC magi against some worthy foe. Someone who isn't just another demon, faerie, uncoordinated and unconnected hedgie and most importantly not someone who uses the same magic system as yourself. You can fight someone - politically or physically - with little regard to breaking the code and antagonizing your sodales. And create a conflict without fracturing the Order.

Playing a sage set in Denmark, we welcome the Muspeli...Actually we don't, because they are nasty - but it makes for great conflict. Or it should, it's still in the upstart phase.

77

UM, yes, sort of. Automatons aren't alive as such - whether animations are is contentious. See the inset on "pseudo-might"...

cj x

78

More like the anima ability from Ancient Magic then?

79

Probably, one of my friend borrowed my copy I think! Lucky I changed it to Animo then, I did not know there was an Anima in Ancient Magic. Which chapter? I'll have to borrow a copy or find mine then :slight_smile:

cj x

80

Fair enough, but if/when integrated into hermetic theory, that becomes...