The Covenant of Caepernum: Samual, a Bjornaer follower

Games Discussion Ars Magica
1

Character concept: A Bjornear predator, seeking to fight the enemies of the Order, and protect it and commoners from evil.

Why has he come to Capernum?: To work along side the members of the Order mixed up with the Crusades, the Templars, and the Order of Sulemon.

Background: His early life was spent within the turmoil of many skirmishes and wars in Cyprus, seeing first hand the impact on commoners that changes in leadership and uncaring diplomacy can have. Cyprus was regularly fought over and has been either ruled or occupied by many factions, including the Templars. Conquest was performed through battle and politics.

Like most other young folk in wartimes he had to survive as best he could, and often fled into the countryside living by his wits and stamina. His family was separated many times during his childhood, and these repeated experiences have given him an elevated awareness for the impacts of war. When he reached adolescence he was conscripted into a militia tasked with defending the Cyprian villagers and coastlines, which while dangerous did suit him. While too young for battle directly he was often working and eventually leading small parts of the supply train or clean up activities. His temperament grew to accept that through his actions (even if violent themselves) he could affect change, and to recognise that not all people can protect themselves.

Apprenticed late after being discovered by a member of Clan Sirnas who recognised the gift and gathered him into the House. He was taken into Levant where he continued his military training, the covenant facilities able to formalise his training, and teaching him in turn how to teach and protect others.

Appearance: Samual is a typical Cyprian man who is tall and thin, with long drawn back dark-brown hair and beard, and tanned skin. He has a quick wit and resonant voice. He often dresses in robes of earthy colours and walks with a thin undecorated staff. When travelling he carries a set of tools and a large pack. He will sometimes wear jewellery made from wood and leather, but finds it encumbering.

Sigil: tbd,

Goals:

  1. Establish a save haven for his dependent followers (develop covenant buildings / resources)
  2. Remove evil influences in the region, and protect the Order, and House Bjornaer
  3. Develop more elegant magic for living and travelling factoring in his wolf form

New Spells

Advancement

2

Have you decided about the sigil yet?

3

I haven't thought through the sigil, or much of the aspects which would be very important to a character used in real play. Looking from a artefact and spell effect perspective at present which is slightly different from a character who would be used in-play. I'm also considering a set of changes in the spec above too. e.g. the level of Voice for the Bjornaer needed to be increased +1 mag due to he size of the Lion form, which in turn made me reconsider a few spells which could be learnt later in this NPCs career progression. I'm also re-thinking taking the Warrior virtue as it might actually distract from the character in the long term.

I find the Bjornaer Mysteries really confusing too, which I think is due to a general unfamiliarity with mystery cult initiations. I'll have to read more.

4

Question about the spell effects similar to Perceive the Change (in GotF p.96 Falke's Talisman, and HoH:MC p.24) which both use InCo or InAn to test if the target is either a human or an animal.

Why can't this same information be determined by an Intellego spell asking if the object is touching a an animal or human? As an effect enchanted into a wristband which InTe the band to see if it is touching an an animal. "base inTe2 - Learn one visible property of an object."... Could answer is the earth wet?

I think Tread the Earth allows the caster to determine information by casting on the earth, as "can tell the direction, distance, weight, number, and manner of movement of moving things. For instance, you might sense “a single 50-stone creature slithering toward us, a hundred rods in that direction.". EYES OF THE TREACHEROUS TERRAIN (InTe base2) can tell if the area is dangerous.

This approach would ignore all potential warping. Why isn't that possible?

5

That is what the original does. Whether the thing it's touching is an animal or a human is a property of the thing it's touching, not a property of the item.

6

So the InAn or InCo effect needs to be active pretty consistently, is there a consideration to allow that an InCo effect will not cause warping on the Bjornaer while it is in an animal shape?
I read that in one of the older threads, but wasn't sure that is the right way to think about spells and warping.

7

As this is meant to also be about new spells and such, versions of Wizard's Sidestep and Gift of the Frog's Legs for large animal shaped Bjornaer magi. Based upon Ars Core and Transforming Mythic Europe (TME p.107) guidelines for teleportation and instant transportation.

8

The guideline for this jump should be base 15 +1 size. 10 is 5 paces and 15 is 50 paces. It is the same than teleportation, just a cosmetic effect. Also, you should roll finesse 6+ to land safely. Same than the wizards leap.

I have a question related to bjornaer tribulations. If you cast the gift of the bear endurance (MuCo25) in human form and then shapeshift into animal, does the effect persists? I always ruled yes, but I don't know RAW about it.

9

I don't think the mechanics of these two spells are the same, for two reasons; (a) a regular teleportation spell has no finesse check, and (b) Gift of the Frogs Legs (Ars p.134) uses a Base 10 InCo for the spell.

If they were the same teleportation spell effect with different cosmetics then the mechanics would also be the same. One spell moves the target through the space between two points and the other teleports them.

10

Some Teleportation examples:

Jumping examples:

You are right, they don't seem to be the same. The second one is from the great Stallion of the Camargue. I thought that it was an oversight not to include a +1 size (the stallion is size +2), but it seems that the base is only 10 modified by size.

But, in all cases, they include a similarly easy roll (eventually, a 6+ in Intelligence+Finesse for a Maugus will be trivial, perhaps more than a dexterity - encumbrance one at 0+). I have seen teleportation effects without a roll in Transforming Mythic Europe, designed to cover the function of a bridge. It can be argued that, in that case, no roll is necessary because the landing place is always the same, so can be scrupulously calculated beforehand. Guidelines don't have the necessity of rolls included in the text.

11

Yes, it does persist.

12

You put down the combat stats for the human form and not for the lion form. I would think that the lion form's numbers will be at least as relevant. Could you please include them?

13

Fair point well made on the Finesse check - I’ll add that into the spell text in the next iterations so it’s clear. Thank you for the help.

14

Will do. My suss was to take the stat block from the beasts book.

15

Why? Sure, lion's aren't cougars, but they can roughly do this jump without enhancement. I can't speak to male v. female nor Asiatic v. African, but it's quick to find the biggest jumps by lions are a bit shy of that vertically and a bit over that horizontally.

16

IMHO it won't work while in animal form, because it is a Corpus spell. But the spell doesn't end just by changing, if changing back the effect sets back in.

17

This is what I expected too. Sure the spell is still present but you have transformed the body. It’s similar to having multiple transformation spells in effect each with different durations.

18

There are rules in HoH:S to calculate the mixed statblock of the heartbeast. Looking at your stat distribution I thought that you already knew.

19

The books show that line of reasoning is incorrect. That it is a Corpus spell doesn't mean its effects won't continue on the non-Corpus form. We can see it in spells like Form of the (Temperament) Heartbeast (HoH:CM p.36), which explicitly states the effects continue in human form even though it's an Animal spell and that is not a valid Form for use on the human form.

Yes, this multiple transformations bit can show up. For example, you transform your eyes into a cat's eyes and then transform them into an eagle's eyes. This is what needs to be examined rather than the Form of the spell.

It seems as though as long as the change of form hasn't specifically changed the prior transformation, then the effects keep going, not just the existence of the spell. For instance, if you grow bigger as a human and shift to animal form, you're probably a bigger animal. But if you turn into a monkey and then shift to eagle form, you should just be an eagle.

20

Although I completely understand the argumentation of Christian, the RAW seems to disagree. It states that it remains in effect. Not suspended, or without effect.