Indeed. This is not the RAW in the core, but it is the implication of later books. The spirit magic rules in HoH:S and also in RoP:M state that the guidelines either summon or affect creatures of a given Form, independent of Realm, or a Realm independent of Form for Vim.
Thus, a caster might try to summon a fire spirit and have one of any Realm show up depending on circumstances. Naturally, I imagine that few Quaesitores will take ignorance of the infernal nature of your most recent summoning to be any defence. The Intellego guidelines in RoP:M also state that the spells don't detect demons, but I choose to interpret that as "don't reliably detect demons" because they can always choose to decieve Intellego spells if they so desire.
Either way, having Form spells cross Realm and Vim spells cross Form makes them balance nicely. It also makes sense, since when warding against fire, it seems a little silly to stop and ask it if it's infernal or divine fire first.
The only clear thing is that the rules are not widely appreciated. Everyone and his dog has hjis own HR here.
We applya system where personal/group etc wards give a soak bonus (+5 soak per magnitude, at personal/mom range and duration), and where only circle wards provide a 100% protection; these do not need to penetrate, only be equal or superior to the creature's Might.
So yes, for us circle wards are very powerful, but plenty of sneaky ways to force the magi and their companions out. The later is a question of simple roleplay.
We are not talking about RAW here, just House Rule ideas. I am saying Ward Penetration would be more fair if Forms did cut accross Realm, and my HR is that if the Ward matches both Realm AND Form, then do not subtract Level from Casting Total.
True - what we seem to have here is multiple supplements and authors disagreeing as to their vision of the rules. For myself, I don't much like the HoH:S rules for wards because I don't like their flavour. It seems right to me that a fire mage should be able stand whilst dragon fire and a demon alike bounce burning from his wards. Likewise, a ward against demons should stand against everything from an infernal rat to a fallen seraph.
And it seems silly to me that it's easier to use ReCo to bind a faerie lord into a circle by commanding him not to move than by making a ward. (Ward against the Curious Scullion, ReCo10, Covenants p104). That can bind any humanoid faerie (albiet without preventing from attacking the ward itself but that's another comparitively easy spell) of Might 10 or more far more effectively than can any ward spell and can use arcane connections to aid it. Using the bones of a dragon's spawn to etch the circle should help me bind it, just as the entrails of his son bind Loki. I like the idea of the Columbae, but I feel that the author was too cautious in his approach and fit them to the letter of the RAW, rather than the spirit.
Agreed. Warding is going to be a problem area for a long time, I get the feeling, but I think your vision is relatively close to my own. Personally I'm in the 'fixed guideline' camp for the ultimate fix, but how/where to set that guideline I'm not certain. I do however think it should be fairly standardized like the hermetic summoning/spirit magic, a cross-form guideline with it's efficacy based on the rest of the spell's parameters and penetration.
I'm also not sure I agree with the view that circle wards should be so substantively better than all others... though I can see why people might feel that way.
Basically I think the magic system should be consistent and uniform cross-form and regardless of individual effect. A given spell range/target/duration, aside from the obvious intrinsic differences there, should not be different mechanically based on what effect it is used with. Circle spells should all function the same. If you want circle magic, all of it, to be more powerful than other magic... I could see that argument. Applying this ruling to only the circle use of warding seems rather arbitrary and 'band-aid' like to me.
I agree. My point was just that a Circle spell can be aided by Arcane connections since it targets things within the circle whereas ... a circle Ward can't because it targets the area within the circle not the contents? I favour a fixed guideline (Possibly something like 4 for 1 realm, 10 for all four realms, so that specialist wards have use).
As for personal wards and soak ... Difficult one. I think, for all that it arguably raises problems, wards against creatures and wards against effects should be considered different. As is they're almost random anyway; just compare warding (armouring) against wooden weapons to warding against steel ones. Then the soak effect can also be standardised and the magic system becomes more coherent.
The only (yes, the ONLY) thing I see wrong with circle warding is that, as I understand it, the RAW prohibits the use of Arcane Connections to boost penetration. I don't have a page reference for that, it's just something that I've picked up here so apologies if that's wrong. But I'll continue whinging anyway.
Wards aren't easy. As far as I'm concerned, they're not meant to be easy. They stop whatever's on the outside getting inside. And that inside can be pretty big. Which means you get to protect a great deal.
So you have to penetrate Might resistance. So what? You have to do that with other spells anyway. My house rule is that you CAN boost ward penetration using arcane connections. That adds to the flavour and adds to the story. You can cast the ward, but not have much left over? Easy, find something you can use as a connection. If you really can't do that, either fire the SG or look for another solution (churches and heartfelt prayers are a decent combination).
The guidelines for wards don't need monkeying around with (bar AC). If anything the Demon's Eternal Oblivion rules are the ones that need a bit of a looking at. For my money they're the ones that are out of balance; You get to kill a Might 10 demon with a single level 10 spell under most conditions. What does it take to kill a human or animal opponent with a single direct spell?
I respectfully disagree. You yourself are an example of how Wards are inneficient, as even you yourself require a HR for them for AC's. You say "So you have to penetrate Might resistance. So what?". I say that the fact that you are being double charged really rubs the wrong way, and it makes it virtually impossible to Ward against a might higher than 30. With the Casting Total required to Ward and Penetrate, you can wipe the opponent out in a single round. Level 30 DeO and level 30 CWaD, both need Penetration 30 to be effective. The thing is, you can use an AC on the second without a HR.
But anyway, looking at it from either angle, your's or mine, we seem to agree that there is something imbalanced about the RAW. What is exactly out of whack, we may differ on, but we each and all have some kind of House Rule to deal with this.
I agree that they should penetrate - I just don't think they should do so twice. There's nothing inherent in having more Might than makes you more resistant to magic save that you have more Might. The system currently gives spells an effect and what they can affect is determined by penetration. The only thing which breaks this is the warding rules, which give a level based effect which is then also level dependent via penetration. It's inconsistent. Wards are powerful, by all means give them a high baseline, but make them consistent.
As for DEO, I agree to a certain extent, but that's trivially fixed by making Might stripping spells strip Might Pool, and giving a higher level baseline for stripping score. Thus that DEO at PeVi10 can greatly hinder the demon and stop his using his powers, but not destroy it - for that you need bigger magic.
As with all Ars Magica editions, there are a lot of legacy effects in 5th. But it is getting better.
