Overall, I think what you've done is quite good.
My only complaint was that there was no incentive to take flaws to counterbalance virtues. I've posted my suggestions based on this and your ideas on Cult Lore on the other thread.
Oh yes, we think the same way!
Overall, it balances quite well, IMO. It is possible to gain important soak bonuses, but this require powerful spells, is far from total invulnerability (lvl 40 for an herbam analog to Ward against Heat and Flames, which gives +15 soak), and is overall well balanced against "avoid" spells.
On the Aegis, you may want to reconsider (but no problem if you don't): Aside from consistency, there's what's IMO a very positive side effect of having it needing penetration to ward of creatures: It means that magi need to use Wizard's Communion, which I find quite flavorful. In bibracte, most magi have it and we enter WC to cast our Aegis.
I put Cult Lore in as an add-on, lowering the xp cost by 4x the score (min 0).
I don't wanna fully change it for two reasons. 1st mainly that people have already started making characters (and it seems to work thus far). Second is that I want simple stystem that can accomodate things other than just mysteries.
You and Ken have many similar ideas though. Good ideas. I will keep them in mind.
you recognize the mundane substances rule because it is the same idea you gave me years ago
A WC Aegis sounds interesting. But still, it doesn't feel right to me.
Which leads me to a question. How high level should our Aegis be? We may nee WC anyway. Level 50? 60? 20?
This will also set the tone of the game.
So, I was skimming through the Covenant Information post, and got to the part about the Surroundings -1, the Elder Dragon that lives a few weeks away from the covenant, Sigmundo of the Pyrenees, Dragon of the Tome.
And, I remembered that Vibria has Mythic Blood, which I'd long decided was a dragon ancester.
The first scene in the backstory that I'm working on for her has her, in her family's garden in Calbinyà, looking wistfully at one of the mountains in the distance and asking her mother if that was where her great-great-grandfather (dragon's name) lived.
Is it possible, likely, or even probable that Sigmundo is Vibria's dragon ancestor from which she got her Mythic Blood?
That would be wicked-awesome! And the gap of generations is enough to where he won't remember what you are talking about at first. Until you show him the coin (or other token).
I now recall that I swiped the name from the ArM4 bestiary. Or was inspired by it anyway.
Sigmundo is a dragon of the Pyrenees, but there are others. SuGar is the Serpent of the Pyrenees, a Basque diety and consort of their goddes Mari.
No relation to you. That you know of.
Make sure your character takes Magic Lore
She has Magic Lore 4. Specialty Sigmundo, or Dragons of the Pyrenees, or something else for an appropriate specialization?
I can just see it now: Vibria clambering over the rubble into Sigmundo's cavern, a look of sheer unadulterated awe on her face. The wyrm turns to face her. "Who dares intrude on the sanctum of the Dragon of the Tome?" he rumbles, smoke wisping from his nostrils.
"Great-great-grandfather?" Vibria almost whispers.
We may want to revisit the rules for familiars, too. I'm thinking of this a lot while I'm thinking about Guillermo's familiar.
As for Guillermo himself, I should let you all know about my plans. Guillermo was apprenticed as a Squire of Seneca in the School of Delendo. Despite his specific training, he has a natural inclination towards understanding the intricacies of magic in general (i.e. things like Vim and Spell Mastery).
Do we need a healer in the covenant? That had not been my intention, but he will be decent at Creo and have some other things that lend themselves to healing rituals. But I frequently play healers in Ars Magica and so may well only give him one or two rituals as back-ups.
Just use RAW for familiars.
I swept away all my old HR's, and just reintroduced a few that work well (e.g. wards, 10xp season average, etc).
Vibria, well, we shall see what happens
awesome! i dig this chick
some abilities seem frightflly low though. particularly magic theory n parma magica and order of hermes lore.
I will go over it in more detail when i get off work (on break at the moment).
I finally came up with a great gauntlet for a Squire of Seneca to become a Knight of Seneca. Guillermo had to lead a volunteer group of four grogs through an obstacle course successfully (meaning complete it with all of them intact). The course included physical obstacles (like deep pits to cross), magical things to deal with (such as a wall of fire), and a beast to slay at the end. I figure this works especially well for the Knights of Seneca since Guillermo had to use physical skills (like Athletics), social skills (like Leadership), mental skills (like Profession: Tactics), and magical skills (combat spells, dispelling, etc.).
Minor Magical Focus: manipulating his own spells
This would apply to about half of MuVi. It would apply to a couple ReVi spells, like Maintaining the Demanding Spell. It might apply to a couple random spells elsewhere, but they would be few and far between. The only other one I can think of off-hand would be Boreal Flames, and that only when used on his own spells. That should keep it well under the single TeFo combination limit.
What do you think? As Mark finds it "tweaky" (not quite sure I'm interpreting that as he wants), I'll probably drop it. But I figured I'd do as he suggested and run in by you all first.
If the troupe says it is cool then I am fine. By "tweaky", I mean I dont understant where you are headed with it and I am suspicious. So I defer judgment to the troupe
It does seem sufficiently restrictive to fall under "Minor Magical Focus." And, since it only applies to his own spells, it would also only double the lowest art on a given spell some of the time, which could be tricky come time to figure the CT. Just want to be sure you're doubling when you're supposed to and not when you're not, and vice versa (which is the trap that I would likely fall into if I took that mMF).
I'm fine being upfront about it. I'm trying to get him doing meta magic well. There are too many MuVi variants, though. But with a good enough MuVi spont (plus the 4 botch dice if you want to do it in one round) you can do a huge variety of things with fewer formulaic spells. This does not require the focus, just that the focus could easily add a magnitude to a sponted spell.
Still, I'm tempted to drop the focus anyway, and I could shore up his defenses with a better Parma Magica.
At the same time I should run the guideline question I gave Mark to make sure we're in agreement on it. It's the last ArM5 MuVi guideline. Perhaps an example is best. Let's say I want to change a CrIg5 formulaic spell I'm casting on someone into a PeMe15 spell to erase a memory. What level MuVi spell do I need to use?
