Spells you need for spirits(not ghosts)

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

I have second sight but am looking for the other “must haves”.

I’m focused on non ghost spirits.

Thanks in advance!

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2

That depends on what you want to do with spirits

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3

And which spirits. You negotiate with Djinn, hopefully you destroy demons.

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4

I have shir and am perusing hermetic thergurey.

I have wards and ways to harm them. But what am I missing?

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5

Things one can do with spirits: (probably an incomplete list)
Summon them
Bargain with them (this doesn't require magic)
Control them magically
Protect against them
Destroy them
Drain their Might into vis
Use them to power enchantments
Bind them as a familiar
Cast spells through them (if you use Solomonic Magic)

Several of the items on the list require specific virtues, some of them mystery virtues.

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6

This may depend on how your troupe defines Second Sight. In my game, I would allow its use to see if a spirit is present... but it would not tell whether a thing has a spirit that might reside in a Regio or in the Magic Realm. For that they'd need to use an appropriate Guideline -- like InAq base 5 to tell if a pool of water has its own spirit. Some of the Forms don't have equivalent Guidelines to discern magical properties (e.g., Herbam), but I'd allow extrapolation.

So, in my game you'd probably want some formulaic Intellego spells for "does [thing] have an associated spirit?"

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7

What is used to drain their might into vis?
I think I have a lot of these things covered.

Thank you!

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8

I am able to use second sight for much of the spirit detection and seeing. Any other inteligo effects that would be useful?

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9

There are a few ways of draining Might into vis:
The Verditius mystery of Bind Magical Creatures
The Goetic Art of Ablation
(Theurgical) Refining of Elementalists

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10

IIRC Sihr gives you several benefits around finding out information on the spirit, when you study and observe the spirit.

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11

The ability to convert non-corporeal vis into corporeal vis. Many destroyed spirits leave their vis behind in a form you cannot just 'pick up' off the ground or use Gather the Essence of the Beast. You basically need a custom version of Gather the Essence of the Beast that's designed to suck up spirit vis (should be a straight ReVi spell with the same level as GtEotB).

Some means of gathering an Arcane Connection. Spirits of Place are easy, their place is the AC, but lots of other spirits gets more difficult. True Names works on named spirits but it's not something you can get off the cuff, but brief ACs might be more accessible, like the air that passes through an air spirit.

Opening the Intangible Tunnel can be of great assistance when targeting spirits as they can evade a lot of kinds of targeting very easily, but Opening the Intangible Tunnel needs an AC.

Charged devices with PeVi effects to destroy Might with high Penetration. If you need to destroy a spirit, you may only get one chance. Whatever you can do with PeVi, you can do more of with PeVi charged devices..

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12

While that's true, a simpler route would be to invest heavily in Mastering such a spell, and have one of the Masteries be Multicast. That allows you to cast a low level-high Penetration spell several times in one round, stripping more Might, than a high level-low Penetration spell.

And if one of the other Masteries is Penetration, then you get more than twice the benefit from increasing Mastery.

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