I would note that for young magus, infernal creatures are dangerous creatures no matter their might.
Spontaneus spells are pretty much useless & most formulaic spells, unappropriate. In fact, by looking at the core book, very few level 10 spells would have a working effect to even hamper the creatures.
Big Ignem or Perdo Animal dammage spells are just of higher level & would hence not penetrate the MR of the hounds.
All this indicates to me that these hounds are the upper level of treat you can send to these young magus without ensuring a total party kill ( Grogs & companions can be great saviours for those dire times).
I don't see either the need to boost the ward above all other formulaic spells.
If you like sending stronger opponents toward your players & want them to be soly on the defensive, a good HR would be that if you have a ritual ward, A creature with might can not pass through or directly act to destroy a stationary ward of a level equal or greater than its might reardless of the penetration of the ward. This legacy was derived from the geat breakthru of the Aegis of the Hearth & will only work using the (Touch, Ring, Circle) guidelines.
IMS (plural) grogs and companions are the saviors in 99% of the situations. Magi simply tend to stand in the stage and botch
That is the arch-known peroblem with might in general, that magic is less effective than crude steel against those creatures because of their MR. But we are entering an other area here, so let's stay on the ward issue
How about this for an answer (regarding penetration and wards)?
Since the target of a ward is the person(s) or things being protected (pg 114 "...the target is the thing protected, rather than the things warded against...") penetration is not an issue.
I keep wanting to add something about similarities to creating a wall with non-ritual creo, but that would continue to confuse, I suspect.
Regardless, it seems pretty clear to me what the intention is.
Well, again I see the maximizing approach...Lets rewrite the above example..
Re: 5
Vi: 5
Stm: 1
Scream and Shout: 2
Confidence Point: 0
the character doesn' have any left because he has been using it so many times
Roll: 4
We could also point out the possibility of a botch (but that would be maximizing...) and being that he is likely in an Infernal Aura....(Oh yeah we should add that in to the spell total as well..what was it...-3, -8?)
I also would like to point out that you didnt state a duration (never do) ...how long can the magus wait?? I'm sure the demon can wait longer...then when the spell drops the Magus would be forced to use another confidence point and wait some more...repeat and rinse.
I would also like to point out that in the mean time, the Infernal creature has brought his minions.... Various things could be done to make the magus' life difficult if he wanted to 'hole' up and wait out the Demon.
An intresting point to all this is that if you need to penetrate with a ward, it is usually easier to kill demons with your spells than to hold them off... Demon's eternal oblivion can work over several castings to kill a demon, so you can easily use a single versjon of the spell against any kind of demon - and that means you could probably get around to mastering it (leading to higher penetration, multicasting etc).
A very good point. Which also shows that, if wards need to penetrate a beings might, the arcane connections would be given to the PeVi caster, who can make much better use of them than the ReVi warder (making poor overspecialized Miserabilis Exemplaris from https://forum.atlas-games.com/t/ogl-games-archive-links/120/1 even more miserable. ).
My take is that the SG is responsible for building the story around the characters. That's why I find this whole "it's too difficult" argument about ward penetration to be a bit of a smokescreen.
If I know I have a single magus having to defend the child after his grogs hold off the main villains at the ritual site (allowing the magus to flee with the child in the first place) then I'm not going to throw unreasonable foes at the players. It simply wouldn't be fair or fun.
Sure, there should be a threat and a sense of challenge and the risk of botching adds to that. If the magus botches when creating a ward... well, then, I'm afraid... time's up. That's the way it works. That's the game. As a wise man once said, sometimes you've got to roll the hard six.
If, however, I send a beast with might 20 after the magus I'm being unreasonable. Run the same scenario several game-years later and I might be within my gaming rights to raise the tempo and the threat level.
In the example someone posted above, a creature of might 20 was cited. In my opinion, that sounds like fourth edition thinking where your spell casting roll WAS your penetration roll.
Given the options we have (we could hole up in a chapel and take advantage of the aura, etc.) the magus could, given time (and that is down to the SG), work his environment to his advantage, and the SG should support that.
Of course, unless an "official" ruling comes down, I'm happy to enforce a "wards must penetrate" rule in my game. It makes (a kind of) sense just as much as any other option.
Some of the first opponents we faced were demons with might scores of 10-20. At the time we knew no wards, and fought them with Demons eternal oblivion (lvl 10). Since my magus is a vim spesialist this worked fine. Had he known a lvl 20 ward and tried to hold them of with that, then he would not have been able to penetrate their MR with it.
In other words - if you need to penetrate with wards, it is easier to use magic offensivly rather than defensivly...
Agreed, where there is a single threat you probably have a better chance in using offence (assuming you are able to fend of any attacks for the one or two rounds it might take to finish him off).
Where there are multiple threats, even at low level, a ward is probably the best tactic.
Demons are subtle. Most of the time, unseen untill too late.
Let us establish the use of DEO vs WAD
DEO Level 10 (Base effect)
Reduce 10 of might from one infernal creature if MR is penetrated
WAD Level 10 (Base effect)
Keep out ALL (not just one) infernal creatures of Might 10 or less (If MR is penetrated) seen or unseen.
Protects from Infernal powers (If MR is penetrated) known or unknown.
Protects a group of people and or objects (Circle effect)
Indefinite Duration (Untill ring is broken)
I agree. Once the ward is casted, there is no reason for the warder to keep the arcane connection. So miserabilis at the end of the day saved his party & can return to his safe warded alliance. Quite rewarding I think.
I think you should go look at the example creatures in the 5th ed book with regard to their abilities. Might 10 creatures do not have abilities that compare to magi.
so is our storyguide going to balance the game based on warding or based on everything else?
That's not a smokescreen that's looking at the rules and their consiquences with an unbiased eye.
A difference you missed is that a DEO level 10 is useful against every demon that exisits and a WAD is useful against only the very weakest.
With penetration required for wards, it is always precisly as easy to destroy a creature utterly with a single spell as to hold them at bay with a ring/circle ward. It is always significantly easier to destroy a creature with two spells than to ward against it.
You seem to be concentrating on subtle demons, in adition to these subtle creatures there are un-subtile creatures of all realms. You need to find rules that work for them as well.
Do you really want to play in games where it is easier to destroy creatures than ward against them?
You wish to tell us that most of the time they don't leave a warder the time to draw his circle?
Miserabilis does not like to hear that.
Especially since his PeVi competitor now has bagged all the arcane connections, as she needs them to protect Miserabilis when he attempts to draw his wards.
...and I do not agree.
E.G.: A demon wants to use one of his powers across a ward (against demons of course). Does the ward have to penetrate the MR of the demon? Is there now a difference between ranged attacks and personally entering a warded area? This ruling causes more problems and not less! This problem exists right now for the ward against mundanes, but I used this only for "thou shall not enter" spells.
Since a house rule for Aegis is already necessary, I will house rule all wards (first time for a subject covered by ArM5 rules).
Adumbatus, post your FULL reply to the berserklist! I found that one to be highly enlightening The difference against creatures and might was an interesting concept.
No, the SG bases his stories and their threats on the capabilities of the player magi. Simple as that. The specific subject at the moment is warding and by extension how effective that is given two interpretations of the rules.
We could extend your argument to include the more powerful entities described in the core book or the other source books. Should then a magus be able to cope with a creature of might 50? Of course he should... eventually.
What I don't think I'm communicating very well is the "minion principle". Villains generally stack into a triangle. There are fewer powerful entities and many less-powerful entities. Each group poses its own threat; the single "overlord" has a high might and powers to match. The lesser beings make up in numbers what they lack in might.
So, the might 10 hell hounds are generic monsters sent by the villain. In a pack, they can take the magus apart and kill the child (going back to my example). But they have been given a low might not only because of their station but because the SG knows that the magus in question can deal with them. That's the most important rule; provide a challenge, not a bloodbath.
Regardless of the house rule applied with respect of wards, I'd be untirely unfair if I sent threats too great for the magus to deal with. If the official rule is that wards don't need to penetrate, then quite simply, the threat increases in line with that and the hell hounds gain another 10 might.
The Aegis of the Hearth is based upon Bonisagus' Parma Magica, thus it is a form of general magic resistance. As with all other magic resistance, it must be penetrated - it does not penetrate itself.
Wards - these may work either way... I will probably continue using them as passive resistance spells, as I'm likely to use similar effects for hedge wizards as their magical defences...
I read David Chart's statement as an explicit invitation to do so. Thanks for posting it.
My first take on a desirable houserule would be:
(1) Keep Aegis as is, and do not require it to penetrate Magic Resistance to affect somebody interacting with it.
(2) Use the ReCo15 Guideline to ward against other human beings as the guideline for all other Wards, and require them to penetrate Magic Resistance in the same way as well.
...how long can the magus wait?? I'm sure the demon can wait longer...then when the spell drops the Magus would be forced to use another confidence point and wait some more...repeat and rinse.
The difference against creatures and might was an interesting concept.