So in the definitive edition there are rules for teaching your Apprentice hermetic virtues
This at least implies that you can teach other Magi hermetic virtues.
I would think this could, with a slight change to hermetic culture, result in a collection of hermetic virtues that permeate the order.
What are some hermetic virtues that are good enough that your Magus would be willing to learn them from someone else?
I'll start: Dark Magic - Minor Virtue from Faith and Flame p 29 - allows you to take advantage of the full bonuses from Fay, magic and infernal auras.
Gentle Gift!!
A related Question:
What hermetic flaws would become common as part of this package?
My guesses:
Twilight Prone especially paired with Gentle Gift
Teaching Hermetic Virtues
Teaching a Hermetic Virtue combines aspects of learning a Supernatural Ability (page @@) with learning a Mystery Cult Virtue (page @@). The instructor, typically an apprentice's parens, generates a Teaching Source Quality total that is compared to a required target level. Both teacher and student must be Gifted individuals trained in Hermetic Magic Theory. A magus cannot teach a Gifted hedge wizard a Hermetic Virtue because the two men do not understand magic in the same way. At the end of a season's instruction, the parens generates a Teaching Source Quality just as if he were teaching an Ability or an Art.
Teaching Source Quality: Communication + Teaching + 3 + bonus
The bonuses for the Instruction Total are the same bonuses that apply for every teacher (page @@). Like Arts, Hermetic Virtues can only be taught one-on-one, so every parens' Teaching Source Quality receives a +6 bonus. Virtues that affect teaching also apply.
An additional bonus can be included if the teacher includes a Hermetic Flaw along with the Hermetic Virtue. Mystery Cult initiations sometimes include Ordeals, which add a bonus to learning the Mystery Cult Virtue. In its roughest sense, an Ordeal is a Flaw. For whatever reason — magic being quixotic at its core — it is easier to teach a Hermetic Virtue if one includes a Hermetic Flaw. Including a Minor Hermetic Flaw adds a +3 bonus. Including a Major Hermetic Flaw adds a +9 bonus. A teacher can only include a Hermetic Flaw that he has.
Like Mystery Initiations and regular teaching, there is no die roll. The Hermetic Virtue is taught in a single season if the Teaching Source Quality meets or exceeds the Target Level.
The Target Level is 15 to teach a Minor Hermetic Virtue
The Target Level is 21 to teach a Major Hermetic Virtue
The more Hermetic Virtues a Gifted student has, the harder it is to teach him new Hermetic Virtues. Learning Supernatural Abilities is also hindered by knowledge possessed in other Supernatural Abilities, and Hermetic theorists speculate that whatever nuance of The Gift so limits learning Supernatural Abilities also limits learning Hermetic Virtues through instruction. Each Minor Hermetic Virtue the character already possesses adds +3 to the Target Level, and each Major Hermetic Virtue adds +9.
A teacher can only teach a Hermetic Virtue that he has. If he decides to include a Hermetic Flaw in the instruction, to make the process easier, he can only include a Hermetic Flaw that he possesses. The student cannot instruct himself, another difference between learning Hermetic Virtues and Mystery Cult Virtues. Not every magus teaches Hermetic Virtues to his apprentice, although doing so does fulfill the annual requirement of one season of personal instruction due the apprentice. If a magus would rather teach Hermetic Virtues than Arts or Abilities, the apprentice may end up with less knowledge (fewer experience points) than his peers. Like most of apprenticeship, it is the parens' decision. It isn't unusual for a parens to teach Arts, Abilities, and spells during the required seasons of instruction, and spend additional seasons teaching the apprentice a Hermetic Virtue or two.
Training is not the only source of Hermetic Virtues; some Gifted individuals have Gifts that are naturally apt for certain areas of Hermetic magic. In game terms, they take the Hermetic Virtue before training
Those rules are nothing new. They first appeared in Apprentices over a decade ago.
Some hermetic virtues should not be teachable. I am thinking of virtues like Mythic Blood, or Hermetic Prestige. Not Gentle Gift either - if it was teachable, House Jerbiton wouldn't have need to search for apprentices with it.
Note that it can be quite difficult to generate a sufficiently high Teaching SQ to teach a hermetic virtue. In particular if the student already has some hermetic virtues and/or don't accept an Hermetic Flaw.
Your second point -- about teachers having a difficult time generating enough SQ -- makes the first point less of a problem. Jerbiton could seek out apprentices with Gentle Gift to reduce the trouble of teaching (and sometimes attempting to teach & failing) Gentle Gift.
Flawless Magic is amazing; but it is major virtue. I think minor virtues -- being easier to learn -- might be better candidates for virtues which are becoming more widespread in the Order. Affinity with Art, Deft Form, and Puissant Art are all strong but maybe too munchkin -- so Cautious Sorceror and Inventive Genius are my nominations.
IIRC, the last time this was mentioned, the authors stated that it was designed for Apprentice teaching only, rather than general magus-teaching. Generating the total for it isn't TOO bad if you design a character for it - lets be honest, anyone who's looking to teach people like this are going to do that. I wouldn't expect it from an NPC though.
That stated, if we expand the rule to include Magus on Magus teaching, the suggestions already offered are amazing. Deft Form, Cautious Sorcerer, Inventive Genius. Affinity and Free Study can get you a lot of experience points. Subtle Magic is something I think is pretty good as well.
And that in turn implies ... after only about 3 more steps ... that the Order's Mystery Cults are all secretly headed by immortal magical beings who use the mages as pawns in their Eternal Jyhad. It's just 3rd edition all over again.
You may not have more than one Major Hermetic Virtue. (Ars Magica Core: 37)
So, any value on this if it is valid would primarily be from Minor Virtues.
As a Storyguide, I wouldn’t allow this to get out of hand. I’d either hard cap extra virtues or scale up the difficulty and/or time required based on the number of virtue points on the non-apprentice student.
All the places where you can get extra virtues. Like Mystery Initiations, or Twilight effects.
The guidelines you quoted from only make sense at character creation.
As an example of an official magus that has more than one Major Hermetic virtue, see Scipio of Merinita from Magi of Hermes. He starts with Gentle Gift, and as he grows older also gets a Major Magical Focus.
It is RAW for creating characters; not for what characters can accomplish in-play. In Legends of Hermes (p 26 & 43), Concietta of Bonisagus has both Major Magical Focus (Auras), and True Understanding of the Realms. Granted, this is for an NPC which is dead at the time -- but other examples may be available.
