Using Vis in the Lab vs Assistants' MT

[Yirkash]

The core rulebook states, in page 103:

If the assistant has some appropriate Virtue, like Inventive Genius, that Virtue affects the primary researcher’s efforts, adding to his scores in the laboratory.

I guess it's ambiguous whether that means you'd only apply Virtues that affect the Lab Total (my interpretation), or any Virtue that affects Lab Activities. It also doesn't mention Flaws at all, though I would personally apply them as well.

[callen]

@Yirkash

The core rulebook states, in page 103:

If the assistant has some appropriate Virtue, like Inventive Genius, that Virtue affects the primary researcher’s efforts, adding to his scores in the laboratory.

I guess it's ambiguous whether that means you'd only apply Virtues that affect the Lab Total (my interpretation), or any Virtue that affects Lab Activities. It also doesn't mention Flaws at all, though I would personally apply them as well.

Yes, that's exactly the rule I was thinking of when I included the extension of the OP to explicitly include Virtues/Flaws (not just explicitly Magic Theory) with my comment.

Good point on the lack of a statement about Flaws. And, on Flaws, Exciting Experimentation would be another.

[Salutor]

@Yirkash

The core rulebook states, in page 103:

If the assistant has some appropriate Virtue, like Inventive Genius, that Virtue affects the primary researcher’s efforts, adding to his scores in the laboratory.

I guess it's ambiguous whether that means you'd only apply Virtues that affect the Lab Total (my interpretation), or any Virtue that affects Lab Activities. It also doesn't mention Flaws at all, though I would personally apply them as well.

Page 54 of Apprentices states:

"Like other laboratory assistants, an apprentice adds his Int + Magic Theory to his parens' Lab Total. The apprentice's Virtues and Flaws affect the Lab total, as do his paren's. For example, an apprentice with Inventive Genius adds to the Lab Total, while Waster of Vis imposes twice* the normal vis cost. All laboratory related Virtues and Flaws apply. If both parens and apprentice have Waster of Vis, for example, the laboratory activity costs three* times the normal amount of vis."

The vis costs seem to have got muddled here - there's an erratum which changes the second costing to twice the amount of vis, which is still not what I'd expect - but the general principle seems to be there.

[callen]

Thanks, Salutor! That's what we've needed!

So, yes, you could get Vis savings through Imbued with the Spirit of (Form).

[Yirkash]

Thanks a lot for that! I don't have Apprentices, so I didn't know that was there. It really settles the matter for good. Thanks for sharing.

[KevinSchultz]

@Salutor

@Yirkash

The vis costs seem to have got muddled here - there's an erratum which changes the second costing to twice the amount of vis, which is still not what I'd expect - but the general principle seems to be there.

As a guess, they were going with the "each person uses half the vis available, and they each need twice that amount." So it ends up being (21/2 ) + (21/2 ) = 1+1 = 2.

With the implication being that if only one of them had it, they would only need to use 1 1/2 times the amount of vis. Which actually seems appropriate, now that I think about it a bit more.

[Salutor]

Thinking about it a bit more, I think the way the erratum is working is as follows:

The Waster of Vis flaw has the effect that "when you use raw vis, you waste one quarter (rounded up) of the pawns you apply...You must use a third again as many pawns as usual..."

I'd been focussing on the "you must use a third again as many pawns" way of viewing it, which wasn't coming to twice as much regardless of whether you were applying the second person simply (1 2/3 of the base cost) or compoundedly (1 7/9 of the base cost). However, it works if you calculate the additional cost by scaling up the proportion being lost in a simple fashion - a quarter lost per person means a half is lost in total, which means double the cost.

Of course this does have the effect that 4 people with Waster of Vis working together in a lab would waste all of their vis without result, but if you actually try that you probably deserve it.