The "Limit of Magic Resistance"

A good Golden Cord Score/Cautious Sorcerer solves that little issue really quickly. And I really think you're giving the army a stronger Aura than I would. One, maybe two baring a Crusading Army or a King leading it. Having something mastered to 5 is a bit much in terms of xp? We'll have to disagree there mate. That and most of the combat-monkeys I know tend to pick up Flawless Magic at some point in their career.

My understanding is that you add a botch die for each point of aura raiting. So a Divine aura of +3 would be 4 botch dice. Someone with a 5 mastery wouldn't roll any botch dice, and could even go up to +4 Aura. Since Multicasting is separate castings, the botch dice still wouldn't apply on each multicast. Yes, he has negative to his CT, but the negatives to the CT are separate from botch dice.

Also, Flawless Magic...Mastery to 5 XP is dirt cheap.

Ok, now I'm confused. Doesn't each casting of a multicast roll separately for its casting total. If you roll a d10 five times the chances of it coming up 0, requiring that you roll botch dice, increase over rolling a d10 once. If there are an insane number of botch dice, the rolling any 0's on the casting has a pretty high chance of generating a botch.

Also one botch die/aura (regardless of type) seems a bit harsh for a covenant in a magic 7 aura. Also how does magnitude of the spell fit in? I keep remembering an earlier edition where it was 1 die/5 levels. That would give you 8, minimum, if things went wrong on a level 40 spell.

On flawless magic, you only get to start the game with one major hermetic virtue. Flawless magic is not a mystery virtue. I'm sure you could initiate it but I'd look real hard at somebody looking to pick it up (not the automatic veto I'd give initiating the gentle gift but I wouldn't allow it as an early initiation, maybe third or fourth). I suppose it could be picked up as a twilight effect, though an XP booster is pretty far down the list of things I'd allow as a twilight effect.

As for XP cost 75xp in a specialty spell that doesn't have any books written on it? At 5XP a season that's going to take a bit of time. Mastering POF is one thing, there are probably summa taking that spell up to an absurd mastery level. Not so for less common spells.

Now if a character wants to take CS, a high golden cord score and master a spell, I say go for it. At that point he's one of a limited number of specialist in the order. If the character wants wipe out an army and get himself marched well that's one way to go out in a blaze of glory.

Yes, but!
Each casting takes a seperate casting roll, each of which may turn up a 0, and so be a potential botch. However!
The basic situation (ignorng auras for a moment) cause only a single botch die, see p. 7 - still ignoring auras, 3 botch dice is farly normal in my experience.
More are rare.

Now, the Cautious Sorceror virtue allows you to roll 3 fewer botch dce (to a minimum of 1), while a Gold Cord tied to a familiar similarly subtract it's value from the number of botch dice, again to a minimum of 1.

So with Cautious Sorceror and a familiar bond with a gold cord of 2 (easily enough achieved by almost any gauntleted magus who chose that virtue), the first 5 dice are discarded, to a minimum of 1.

Combine this with a single level of mastery, and you discard 6 dice, to a minimum of 0.
Again ignoring Auras, that's usually everything - no risk of an actual botch!

Time to re-read the Realm Interaction section on p. 183 of the core rules again.
Hermetic magic is attuned to the magic realm, and so recieve no extra botch dice from a magic aura. "Only" from the other 3 realms.
Also, 7 is an extremely strong aura, even for a covenant!
Remember that living in an aura of 6 or higher causes warping (except for those attuned to the relevant Realm, ie Hermetic Magi in a strong magic Aura).

Remember story XPs - they are often spend on spells in my experience.
Also, can I interest you in a level 4, quality 8 summa on Ball of Abysmal Flame? Written by a character without Flawless magic.

Agreed, though I must say that Flawless Magic seems to be one of the more useful Major Virtues - not even as an XP booster so much as for the initial free level of mastery.

Also, just quickly, Mastery reduces your botch dice total by it's score. So in most cases, the more you're casting, the nearer to impossible it will be for you to botch.

Example - Casting Pilum of Fire - Mastery 4, with a bronze chord familiar of at least 2 is -6 botch dice. So thats pretty much zero botch dice, even when fast casting IN combat; which guarantees all casts to be successful.

No, this is correct, each multicasting is a separate roll for success. I didn't think I was suggesting it wasn't.

To be clear you gain botch dice and reductions to the CT from the aura.

The botch dice can be mitigated through virtues like Cautious Sorcerer, having a familiar with a strong GOLDEN cord, not a bronze cord. These cannot be used to reduce it below 1 botch die. Then Mastery can be applied, which can reduce botch dice to zero.

My fault - yes, gold chord.

A general point

I'm always a little worried when, while discussing a particular point about a generic magus, people start throwing around virtues to explain how things are so easy. The same goes when discussing LR, of course.
Sure, there are magi with Cautious Sorcerer. There are magi with Flawless Magic. But you can't expect your average magus to have there, even less both virtues.
Even specialists can't be assumed to always have an applicable focus: The rarity of foci and their prevalence is heavily saga-dependant, after all.

So, although this changes little, for discussions like this one, considering the golden cord and a few mastery levels for a "normal" magus is probably appropriate, with specific virtues coming in only to showcase particular magi.

IMO, of course.

IMS one of the most used things in combat if the magus is not very profficient there (read: not a combat junkie) are magic items. They do not botch and can accumulate quite high penetrtion even with a x1 multiplier instead of the official x2 penetration multiplier. A non specialized penetration 30-40 item is fairly normal IMS. They are never in the hands of Grogs, btw. Grogs have penetration 20 items at most.

IIRC no combat junkie (or otherwise) magus has flawless magic IMS. Familiars and some los mastery levels are common, though, and they are quite powerful in keeping your magus kicking around. All magi have a (generally minor) focus as well since we practically demand it

Cheers,
Xavi

I think it is reasonable, even without virtues, to create a magus who can cast selected spells without having to concern themselves with botch dice in hostile auras. A golden cord of 2 and mastery of 2 is fairly easy to get to (saga dependent, of course). Such a circumstance, of course, has to have had stories, stories that allow points to be added to mastery (alternatively finding a book on mastery) and then also a story to find your familiar and the time to bind it.

As with all things, if you design a Magus to make combat easier and take away botch dice, you're likely giving up something else in the process. There are always tradeoffs. My commentary was more a response on the "effect of botch dice as a check on power level." Sure it can be a check, but then again, a magus can be designed to counter that check. And he indicated that he was gearing up to run a saga, so he should be fully aware of the ways players can counter botch dice.

Regarding the botch dice, don't forget that the more stressful the situation the more botch dice (see p.7). 1 (plus aura modifiers) may be appropriate if your combat junkie casts from atop a hill overlooking the battle, but if the enemy general notices you and send one hundred Mongols galloping toward you and firing arrows all the way, suddenly the spell to take them out is a lot more stressed.

Apologies for the threadomancy, but do you remember which one? My google-fu has failed me miserably, and I'm working on a saga set there, in which this could be of some interest.

Perhaps this one.

undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/h ... index.html

undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/u ... oulis.html

I've used Soulis in Ars campaigns.

He has a reputation in Ars books already. Last one being ROP:I (page 15) and LOTN before that (don't know if he was in HtM as well). It is a character that is so cool and fits so well with the setting that it is no problem that he is anachronistic for Ars

Another nice source of legends on castles in the scottish isles is Hermes Portal 14 and 15, specially the later, since there skye, islay et al are described quite in detail. Some fae-aligned castles and the like are present in the isles.

Cheers,
xavi