Hey, everyone, here's my first post - I hope it's in the right place? I have never actually tried to learn the Ars Magica rules just because I have so many roleplaying games, but I own the core, Town & Guild and the Medieval World Guide. I bought them on the recommendation that they were useful for historical RPGs, and I am impressed with the production quality.
I am currently researching/developing a RuneQuest 6 campaign based in late antiquity or the middle ages; I started compiling a list of game books I have which are useful for developing a historically plausible setting. Though most of it is aimed at d100 (i.e. RuneQuest/BRP) games, there are several non-d100 games on the list; and many of these books are useful for informational content quite aside from their game system.
I can't post links, but the list is being maintained and updated at my RuneQuest blog Perrinoia-dot-blogspot-dot-com, titled Resources for Late Antiquity to Renaissance Gaming.
Please let me know, here or on my blog, if you have any suggestions. I am looking more for campaign building/historical content rather than magical and adventure resources, so while a guide to a particular city would be totally appropriate many otherwise decent pre-modern supplements (such as Pendragon adventures) are deliberately excluded.
I'm afraid I'm not sure exactly what you're looking for.
I get that you aren't interested in rules "crunch" because of the system you're working in, but it seems a shame to deliberately exclude almost every gamebook because it might have some rules in it. You also don't say WHERE you're setting this. There's kind of a big difference between 9th century England and Greece, for example, not to mention Iraq, India, China, or Japan.
Or is this a purely fantasy setting, just at the same technological level?
That all said, if you really don't want ANY gamebooks, try the Osprey Publishing book line:
What I meant is that I don't want adventures, or stuff that's about magic. I am including some Pendragon stuff on Saxons, and so forth, I'm just not interested in specific adventures (for tone reasons) or wizardy stuff.
The County of Leuven, 1050 A.D. Right after one rebellion (against the King of Germany/Emperor) in the Low Countries and right before another.
In this case, as indicated above, it's to be based on a specific historic date. Granting that plenty of vaguery exists about 900 odd years ago.
I like Osprey, I intend to use their gear, campaign and miniature warfare books for the campaign, in fact!
To research a campaign, you best start with the wiki. You likely got already the basic information about Leuven and Brabant: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counts_of_Leuven.
Once you laid that groundwork, specialized tourist guides and local books on legends (like la.wikisource.org/wiki/Vita_Gudilae ) come in handy to add anecdotes and flavor.