Magus design for new Ars Magica players

Hi, and welcome. I’m Timothy Ferguson, and I was one of the most prolific authors for the last edition of Ars Magica. Here are some hints to designing a character you’ll enjoy.

Play style

Get your group to decide if they are going to do the suggested thing, which is that each story has one or two magi and companions, or the thing most troupes seem to do, which is that everyone just sends their magus.  This matters, because it determines what role your magus will play. Is the magus going to be in charge whenever he is on stage, or is he part of a group of equals? Is he going to be the heavy artillery, despite not being from a combat-ready House, or is there going to be another magus bringing the fire, so that yours can specialise on something else?

House

Which House you pick doesn’t matter, initially, but some bind your character development choices more than others. Houses Merinita and Verditus have inner mysteries which use a completely different sort of rule system, and most Criamons are pacifists. I believe the best Houses for new players are:

House Bonisagus: pure magical researchers and diplomats. They can be researching pretty much any style of magic, and this gives them a reason to be out in the world discovering secrets.

House Flambeau: There’s a philosophy behind it, but they love solving their problems by  killing things and breaking stuff.  Ars Magica can cause a sort of choice paralysis in new players. House Flambeau strips this away by essentially saying “Your options are the knife, the pistol, the grenade, or the flamthrower.” One the game rolls on there a lot about chivalry and flame mysticism, but as a new player, it’s a simple choice.

House Jerbiton, which just lets you pick a minor Virtue in lieu of a House virtue: in the setting they also don’t care if you later join another House. This is the one to choose if you don’t want to make a big deal out of your choice for now.

House Tremere prizes obedience. This means your character will always have something to do, and may be provided with resources to do it.  Sure, you follow orders, but so does James Bond, and he seems to enjoy his life most of the time.

Characteristics

Characteristics are a bad idea, and the game should not have them. As a magus, you’ll feel the need to put Intelligence at a minimum +2, so your character is not the stupidest magus in the group. This means you are all making the same boring choice, and when Intelligence is required, you all make the same Knowledge rolls. This leaves you enough points to put +1 against any other two Characteristics. There are rules to get extra points by trading down your physical Characteristics, but ignore them on your first go around. Just wade through this.

Virtues and Flaws

Virtues and Flaws are ways to make your magus unique, but their usual effect is to make them more like their Housemates. You’ll be given one free minor virtue based on your choice of House.  Most of these you can safely ignore in your first game, although the one for House Bjornaer (turn into a specific animal at will) is useful and fun.

As a rule of thumb, a virtue adds +1 to your dice roll if it covers an entire characteristic, +3 if it covers and entire ability, and +6 if it covers a specialised situation in an Ability. If you can’t find one you like, use this to just make them up and have your troupe approve them. Sometimes this is faster than wading through the book to find the precise name for what you hope to find. “I want to great fun at parties”, for example, is a +3, even if you don’t manage to decode it down into Ars-speak as a Knack in Carouse.

Just because you can choose a heap of Flaws doesn’t mean you should. Virtues can be earned in-game, so there is no need to make your character a one-eyed, kleptomaniac with a determined enemy just to afford another Major Virtue. Pick Flaws you will enjoy having and that signal the kinds of stories you want.

Similarly, don’t pick virtues because they maximise your killing potential unless you really want stories about your killing potential. Pick virtues for the fun, not the mechanical advantage. As an SG, I keep a copy of the VF list of each character, so I can make sure I hit those narrative marks.

The Magical Affinity virtue is the game’s way of telling you it will give you a bonus if you pick a character theme. Take it, but not at the Art-wide level: choose a motif that’s yours. This is far more important than most of the number on your sheet.

Spells

Pick spells you think would be fun to cast: your SG’s job is to give you great opportunities to cast them. In roleplaying games, the GM sets the size of the creatures attacking you to suit the power of the player characters. It doesn’t matter if you can deal +5 or +10 damage: that just means the enemy you are facing in the story looks a bit different. I’m not saying don’t take combat spells: I’m saying that designing for maximum killing power is pointless, and you know its pointless.

Don’t spread your build points across the Magical Arts.  Pick a Form (a noun) and one or two Techniques (verbs). Don’t choose Aquam, Auram, Imaginem or Vim. I love them, but they take a bit more getting used to than practical things like Herbam. A high enough Form will let you do minor magic in the other Techniques of that Form using the spontaneous magic rules.

My rule of thumb is cribbed from the Amber Roleplaying game: always choose at least one attacking spell, one defensive spell, and one spell that affects your surroundings. Sometimes spells do double duty. It’s great to have majestic spells: I loved playing a new maga who had Incantation of Lightning and a flight spell, but In Ars Magica, small spells get through magic resistance, or the diminishing effect of civilisation, better than powerful spells.  Think about clever ways to use spells in the 10-20 level range.

Abilities

Don’t get bogged down in Abilities. For new players I let them keep a pool of unspent points, and use them up as their idea of the character gels through play. Avoid spending 1 point on heaps of Abilities. Abilities are what your magi have servants for. Make big purchases in the Abilities you want to do cool things with during scenes in stories. Your character’s already a superhero: you shouldn’t care if they have 1 or 2 in their Area Lore skill..

I also have a “buyer’s remorse rule”. If you’ve spent points on something, and it’s never mattered to your character, you can cash it back in and spend it one something else. Did you buy Artes Liberales 6 to look wise, and then find out you wanted practical skills? Take your points back. I personally extend this to spells and Virtues, but your troupe may vary.

Each ability gets a specialisation, which is a 1 point bonus in limited circumstances. Again, fill them in as you go, and switch them under the buyers remorse rule. Don’t get bogged down on how to make sure you wring every advantage from the design phase.

Weapons

Most magi don’t use them. You’re a magician. You can kill people by waving at them for a minute or so. Even if your best combat spell just throws a rock, it’s still better than a dagger: just carry some really pointy rocks. You have a bodyguard. Let them do the weapons while you cast spells.

Suggested stat block for a new magus:

Intelligence +2, +1 in any two other Characteristics, all others 0, which is human average.

Virtues and Flaws: You get a free one for your house, which you can often ignore in the beginning. Take a Minor Magical Affinity, and a Story Flaw, at minimum. Work up from there if you like.

Abilities: You get 165 experience points to spend here, but there are some compulsory buys. At minimum the game suggests (Native language (specialisation)) 5, Latin (specialisation (specialisation) 4, Artes Liberales (specialisation) 1, Magic Theory (specialisation) 3, Parma Magica (specialisation) 1. Your native language is a free, so that costs 90 points, leaving you 75 to spend. That’s:

• two abilities at a score of 3 with three at a score of 1 or
• one ability at a score of 3, with three abilities at a score of 2.
• five abilities at a score of 2.

If you already have a score of 1 in something because of a Virtue choice, then just have a 1 in something else, to refund the point.

Arts: you have 120 points to spend on Magical Arts. Chose one noun and one or two verbs.

It costs 121 points to have a score of 11 in one art, 10 in another, and 0 in the rest. I’d give you the point if it were my game. Alternatively, two verbs at 7 and one noun at 11 (with two freebie points).

Pick spells. You have 120 levels of spells. Spells are the fun bit. Since you are limited, don’t browse the entire book. now: just read the bit that matches your technique and form combinations.  If you are specialised as above, each spell’s maximum level is Technique+Form + 8. Technically it’s 9 with a relevant Magic Theory specialisation. That means if you have only two arts, and a relevant MT specialisation, your maximum spell level is 30. If you have three arts as above, the maximum level is 26.

 

 

 

 

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