Hello! First time poster, so I hope the topic is not repeated.
I'm a fairly new Storyteller for this game, we are still in the first steps of our Saga, and I'm always looking for inspiration to introduce different aspects of Hermetic Society to my players. One of this aspects is Wizards War.
Since my players are fairly conservative in risk taking (some more than the others) and no warmongering magus has been made, I'm afraid that setting up a wizard war will be difficult, so perhaps I'll try and present situations that could end in wizards war (not looking to enforce anything).
So, I was wondering: what casus belli for wizards war arose in your personal sagas? If you want to explain further the background of the conflict I will be pleased to read. I love reading other people's stories.
A long time enemity with an enemy covenant. Some of the mages took it more personally than others and scaled the conflict.
Stealing of an apprentice by a Bonisagus. it is rightful for the Bonisagus to do that, but he did so to spite the PC. That was a trick by the beta SG to make a player get out of the lab. it worked and the war was waged to recover the apprentice. It ended badly, with a lot of collateral, including the apprentice.
Your players do not nee¡d to be the active party, they can be the reactive one: Have the war be declared on them when they have acted smug and think they ahave done something real smart that beat an opponent. Then said opponent sends a letter and BAM! everybody scrambles for cover or indignation. Obviously the magus being targeted is the weakest magically even if what the guy wants to do is steal some books or vis from the covenant.
I like the ideas proposed by Xavi and in fact just might steal them for my own saga. When players are being assholes to NPC's or think they have outmaneuvered their rivals within the code that is a good time to declare war. But you can also remind your players if they are being assholes to an NPC that wizards wars are a thing that exists and might happen if you treat NPC's poorly.
I think that players should have a lot of options to avoid having wizards war declared on them. By that I mean that there should be a lot of steps leading up to the declaration of wizards war so that it does not come out of nowhere.
I think it should go both ways too. If your players are talking about declaring a wizards war without a casus belli remind them that even though they are within their rights to do so, the rest of the wizarding community will not necessarily respond well to a magus who declares wizards war out of the blue as such a character could well be seen to a loose canon and the NPC might well have powerful friends who will defend them.
In theory, a magus might declare a Wizard's War for any reason, including someone exercising their rights.
In practice, I suspect there should be a reason that has not otherwise been resolved to at least the declaring mage's satisfaction. Someone who declares at the drop of a snowflake will probably find themselves delivered a declaration by five or six magi simultaneously, irritated at the flagrant abuse of the traditions of the Order.
In my experience, WIzard's Wars are difficult to implement as activities. They are fine as deterrent, or as a backdrop by having two other parties war.
But it is difficult to to force a player magus into WW if they don't want to. They can just hide in their Sanctum the whole month, and have their sodales be vigilant and keep an eye out. The magus declaring the WW needs to be careful, because of he harms or threatens the resources of the magi he has not declared WW on, they can defend themselves. And if he commits any Hermetic crimes they can claim forfeit immunity and can retaliate, or lodge a complaint.
Sure, a determined magus, competent in the techniques of infiltration can propably sneak into the covenant, and attack the magus in his sanctum. Unless the covenant and/or sanctum have relly good defenses. But that seems to be forcing the issue to me, and not something I'd do...more than once perhaps.
If the conflict is about some McGuffin not inside the magus' sanctum, nor easily portable so he can grab it during his month of preparation, then the magus can't just hide.
Otherwise, forcing a magus in hiding for a month can be used as a political tool: If you hide, you can't go to Tribunal for some important issue. If you come out, you'll need to fight!
Although the magus in question can always use his sigil by proxy, by sending it with a sodales he trusts. If any.
Might I add a (slightly tounge in cheek) reference to the article Designing The Intangible Assassin in Sub Rosa #15, p. 60ff.
That said, I need to point out one detail, again.
There is no formal requirement for a Casus Belli for a Wizard's War.
There might be political advantages to having one, but there is no requirement.
True, there need not be any other argument than "Because I said so"
The reason however, may affect the public oppinion. Most of it should be 'indifference' because who would a magus care about a conflict between two other magi, unless the issue concerns one immediately or there is some kind of principle involved.
E.g. a magus Bonusagus snatches someone else's apprentice, which is within their rights. The magus losing his apprenticer is angry and declares WW. That would not be illegal, but other magi Bonisagi might be concerned, and support their house mate.
On the other hand, if a magus Bonisagus does this a lot, and doesn't seem to have good reasons or use the apprentice wisely (snatch as lab slaves, experiment with great risk and they die etc.), some magi might support the magus losing the apprentice. Even other magi bonisagi, if they feel their house mate undermines their rights.
IMS if you declare WW to prevent magi to vote at tribunal you can expect to be marched. Marching is basically the tribunal declaring WW on you with no time limit. It can be for a breach of the code of for just being a major asshole and breaker of the peace if enough magi vote for it. The thing about tribunal is that it can pass any regulation it wants if enough magi vote for it.
There is a wide variety of how Troupes interpret how Hermetic Law is enforced, going from something resembling (the ideal version of) modern justice with working laws and real proof to a popularity contest.
In my interpretation, if something is a clear Hermetic Crime, then yes a March is on. Or somethimes just the threat of one will force the offender to comply with other punishment.
But the Code is the Code, it can't just be changed like that. But a regional trubunal may decide on almost anything (unless gravely contradicting the Code) by majority vote and call it Peripheral Code.
IMHO preventing someone from going to Tribunal is not a breach of the Code, since it doesn't threaten the life of magical resources - directly. Unless done clumsily, but WW is a tool for that. Although certain tribunal issues may have that consequence, so the magus might subsequently raise the issue. And I like politics to function that way.
Probably agreed. But!
My point was that no sane magus declares "declare WW to prevent magi to vote at tribunal". Why would you. A magus would simply declare Wizard's War! There is no requirement to provide a reason.
Now, if your target (or someone else on his behalf) could make the case to the tribunal that it was a political move to prevent him from voting, you'd probably get in trouble. But that is a separate matter.
Expect all time members of your main rival covenant to declare wizards war on all the members of your covenant to coincide with the next tribunal, then You arrive at tribunal, salute a few magi and BAM! you get jumped by enemy magi and grog assassins. Nobody is breaching the code there, and this would be the case if WW were not restricted by the treat of tribunal retailation. Tribunals would suddenly become a death trap for a few magi every 7 years. If a DUEL TO THE DEATH is not wielded carefully it spirals out of control very fast, so WW should be far between and few in number or the Code ceases to exist in practical terms.
Yup. you can do some stuff there. What then? the threat is still there and free for alls around tribunal meetings should be common. They are not, so something must be done differently. peer pressure, customs and "if you are an ass you are marched even if you do not break the code" threats are certainly ways to prevent that situation.
I've always like the background that before Bonisagus developed the Parma and Trianoma forged the Order, magi were basically just gunning each other down in the streets due to lack of trust (hello social effects of the gift), desire for vis or secrets.
The Order and Parma meant that magi could interact and get more out of peace (selling books for vis, trading, discussing your theories) than by outright murder.
However (!), thats not to say that everyone is lovely now. Medieval society was a violent one and people were accustomed to violence. War was common and a warrior caste ruled over everyone else. Magi have their own violent histories that really aren't that long ago.
So I'd fully expect powerful and anti-social magi to be happy to declare Wizards War when they think they might benefit. After all, if you are a 100 year + magi with a suite of good kill-from-arcane-connection-range spells, then why not use them every now and then. You need to pick your targets though. Keep the other older magi sweet, trade with them, make them know that you are no threat to them. Its the middle aged magi you prey upon. That small covenant in the vis rich area. Why not declare wizards war on all the magi there and take all their vis? Maybe kill one as a lesson for them not to seek revenge. That covenant with the top notch book, why not declare on them and take it. That researcher with the nearly complete discovery. Kill that guy, take his notes, finish his work and fame and glory await! After all, magi are generally secretive. No one knows what that reclusive lab rat is actually doing. And who wants to appear weak and tell everyone that that old magi just took all your stuff. That invites further aggression. Better to pretend victory as you survived the war with the more powerful magi.
I can well see other powerful magi ignore such predation as long as they get a benefit (whats that, the aggressor is happy to let you make a copy of his new book, thank you very much). And why should you stick your neck out for those lesser magi? Where is the benefit?
That said, I'm certain that such behaviour could be taken too far. There is only so much predation possible before you start stepping on powerful toes. But a careful magus could be a real predator, even within the code.
So our game recently finished a story arc, not of a wizard's war but a March. So related, if not the same.
Our game takes place in the Baltic region, and the freshly established Covenants there banded together and declared the formation of the Riga Tribunal.
An evil Guernicus noticed the lack of strong magi in the region and started to bully his way around, using blackmail to force some Covenants to hand over items and books of dubious legality. This peaked with him leading his mini Covenant (him, his current apprentice, his gauntleted apprentice and a fellow robber mage, as well as 30-50 or so mercs ) feigning an attack on a lone magus in the region. The threatened mage he called back up (including the PCs), and while 8 or 9 magi had congregated, he hit a lightly defended Covenant with his troupe. The party and most of the magi got on our flying longship to break the siege. A battle ensued where two of the enemy magi were killed or grievously injured, unfortunately one of the defending magi was killed by a PC in a dumb Arcane connection without line of sight accident...
An emergency Tribunal was declared; the result was Marching sentence for the Guernicus and the PC was ordered to be at the forefront of this March.
This ended a few years later when the Guernicus came back with four freshly gauntleted magi, tried to set up his own Covenant in Finland and we mounted an assault. He was knocked out by a piece of ReTe flying masonry and offered as a sacrifice to Odin (hung and speared).
Tl;dr Trigger the players WW by having someone steal their shinnies.
I imagine something like that before they split off the first waves of Tribunals in the Order. So that it is Grand Tribunal Peripheral Code. So you can technically be jumped just before and just after but at the Tribunal and nobody else better get inconvenienced.
The only Wizards War we had in my home saga was the Quaesitor declaring against Lucien the Scholar in Thebes, along with a few other idealists, in response to him getting only a mild punishment after guiding a communion of younger magi into summoning a giant hurricane-force storm over Thessaloniki.
Sounds pretty cool. How did they pull it off? Was this cutscene magic or did they just have a whole bunch of ReAu magi gathering clouds for days in the region to create the best possible storm?
You arrive at tribunal, salute a few magi and BAM! you get jumped by enemy magi and grog assassins. Nobody is breaching the code there, and this would be the case if WW were not restricted by the treat of tribunal retailation. Tribunals would suddenly become a death trap for a few magi every 7 years. If a DUEL TO THE DEATH is not wielded carefully it spirals out of control very fast, so WW should be far between and few in number or the Code ceases to exist in practical terms.