Join me in Mythic Europe!
Allow me to tell you of my greatest RPG love, Ars Magica.
I am decidedly biased, as I've managed to make my way into the author's pool, which is by invitation only, but I love this game, so writing for the line was one of my personal triumphs.
Why is Ars Magica a fantastic game? Let's start with mechanics and move on to setting.
Ars Magica uses one die for resolution, the d10. Almost every challenge is a character's Characteristic (what might be called Statistic or Ability score in another system) + Ability Score (Skills in the most popular RPG) + a d10 roll. Now some rolls are "standard," they take the flat result of the d10 and add it to the Characteristic and Ability. Other rolls involve a "stress die," where the d10 can explode on a roll of 1, or botch with a roll of 0. When your dice explode, you roll a 1 and then roll again. Your next roll is doubled, unless you roll a 1 again-- in which case you double the result again. Continue this process until you stop rolling 1s. For a botch, you roll a 0, then roll again. If the second roll is also a 0, then you've botched, and something spectacularly terrible happens with your failure. All rolls are made against an Ease Factor-- in fact, Ars Magica is the game which introduced this mechanic; you might recognize it as a DC. Did I mention that Jonathan Tweet helped create Ars? Certain other rules modify this mechanic, but this is the core.
Characteristic+Ability+d10 roll.
Combat? Attackers use Quickness + Weapon Ability + d10 stress. Defenders use Dexterity + Defense Ability* + d10 stress. The attacker needs to beat the defender's roll to do damage. (*Defense Ability might be Dodge or Weapon Ability, defender's choice)
My personal best was a roll of 1->1->1->4, or 4*8, for a total of 32 plus the Characteristic and Ability, which came to a total of 43. That guy was pasted.
Initiative? Quickness + d10 stress.
Spells? Stamina + Technique&Form + d10 stress.
Ability checks? Characteristic+Ability+d10 roll, unless failure has terrible consequences, then d10 stress.
Notice the pattern? Sure, the formula might get an occasional complication, but that's it, at the very core.
And magic.
Oh, magic, you sultry siren.
The name of the game is Ars Magica, so the magic lies at the core of things. There are many ways to produce the same effect, and it very much allows for the creativity of the player. There are 5 Techniques (Change, Create, Control, Destroy, and Understand) and 10 Forms (4 Elements, Animals, People, Plants, Spirits, Images, and raw Magic power) which comprise the Arts. Your wizard can specialize, generalize, cast spells he's researched, cast an effect spontaneously (but that will likely be weaker than what he's researched and will tire him out faster), and even incorporate foreign magic into his own powers. Create charged items. Create enchanted devices. Create a potent talisman with many powers. Bind a familiar. Teach an apprentice. Write books. Study from texts or the raw stuff of magic. There are seven or so rules which Hermetic magic can't break; other than that, go nuts. The flexibility is absolute joy; play a few sessions and you'll grimace at the next time you need to make a "daily spell list."
Other fantastic aspects of the game? You have multiple characters. A magus or maga (your wizard), a companion (who might be a knight, a werewolf, a faerie, a magical beast, a merchant, a devout priest, a minor noble, a master craftsman, etc.), and any number of grogs (the meatshields, I mean, the men-at-arms) who protect the magus. Characters use virtues and flaws to determine the stories you want to actively pursue and the stories you want to be surprised by during gameplay. You can easily try multiple concepts because you have many characters who live together at the covenant.
Ah, the Covenant, the secret character. The covenant is the place the magi all live and share. It is the shared character of their home, a place that can be as fantastic as you wish to make it and develop. It might be in a hidden cave, an old castle, a lost temple that can only be entered during a thunderstorm, or a villa in the middle of Florence. Building it is part of creating a saga's legacy, the tenor of a covenant is reflected in their choice of home and the care they invest in it. Each choice has an impact on how we pay the bills, buy lab equipment, train and maintain the grogs, and relate with our neighbors-- all of which drive stories.
The game is deadly, too, but mostly for grogs and occasionally companions. Magi often have spells which make their survival more certain. However, it runs on a seasonal time-scale, so you see a real passage of time. People start to suffer the effects of age after 35. Our last campaign covered 11 years of time, from 1153 to 1164.
Ars Magica also encourages "troupe play," meaning we take turns being the GM. This is useful, too, because it means when Sam is running a story with my magus and Jim's werewolf companion and some grogs, and Jim can't make the session, well, I can run a different story with Sam's magus and Ben's companion, and Tracy can try running a grog to get a feel for things with his teenage son. When one of those arcs is done, Jim might pick up the Storyguide's role, and we can continue with the threads discovered in Sam's or my stories.
In terms of setting, Ars Magica is played in Mythic Europe of 1220. Angels, demons, dragons, faeries and magical beasts are real and true. Crusades. The Reconquista. Mongols. Pagans. Jews. Christians. Muslims. Templars. Feudalism. The growth of commerce. The rise of guilds. Pirates. Explorers. Missionaries. It's all here. You don't reskin it because you're getting it straight from the source, you might just twist it with a bit of magic, be it Infernal, Divine, Faerie or even non-Hermetic. The whole history section of the library and bookstore is your supplement shelf. Sure, there are quite a few good books from the line, but you can spend 45 minutes drifting through wikipedia and be set for your next session, with NPCs written by *history.* The Order of Hermes provides twelve different "Houses," providing ample fodder for internal wizard politics and complications, and the Code of Hermes (along with the power of the Divine) prevents your players from simply walking all over the mundane world. There are *consequences,* whether they're delivered by nobles, fellow magi, or God's Angelic Host.
The system's been around for nearly 10 years now, so it's been pretty well tested-- there are a couple of well known loopholes (with suggested workarounds), a (mostly) quarterly fanzine, and a product line that's projected for at least another three years.
That's Ars Magica, and I love it. I think you will, too. Give it a try...
-Ben.
NOTE: This Entry is part of the February Blog Carnival. You can see the other entries linked in the comments here.
I am decidedly biased, as I've managed to make my way into the author's pool, which is by invitation only, but I love this game, so writing for the line was one of my personal triumphs.
Why is Ars Magica a fantastic game? Let's start with mechanics and move on to setting.
Ars Magica uses one die for resolution, the d10. Almost every challenge is a character's Characteristic (what might be called Statistic or Ability score in another system) + Ability Score (Skills in the most popular RPG) + a d10 roll. Now some rolls are "standard," they take the flat result of the d10 and add it to the Characteristic and Ability. Other rolls involve a "stress die," where the d10 can explode on a roll of 1, or botch with a roll of 0. When your dice explode, you roll a 1 and then roll again. Your next roll is doubled, unless you roll a 1 again-- in which case you double the result again. Continue this process until you stop rolling 1s. For a botch, you roll a 0, then roll again. If the second roll is also a 0, then you've botched, and something spectacularly terrible happens with your failure. All rolls are made against an Ease Factor-- in fact, Ars Magica is the game which introduced this mechanic; you might recognize it as a DC. Did I mention that Jonathan Tweet helped create Ars? Certain other rules modify this mechanic, but this is the core.
Characteristic+Ability+d10 roll.
Combat? Attackers use Quickness + Weapon Ability + d10 stress. Defenders use Dexterity + Defense Ability* + d10 stress. The attacker needs to beat the defender's roll to do damage. (*Defense Ability might be Dodge or Weapon Ability, defender's choice)
My personal best was a roll of 1->1->1->4, or 4*8, for a total of 32 plus the Characteristic and Ability, which came to a total of 43. That guy was pasted.
Initiative? Quickness + d10 stress.
Spells? Stamina + Technique&Form + d10 stress.
Ability checks? Characteristic+Ability+d10 roll, unless failure has terrible consequences, then d10 stress.
Notice the pattern? Sure, the formula might get an occasional complication, but that's it, at the very core.
And magic.
Oh, magic, you sultry siren.
The name of the game is Ars Magica, so the magic lies at the core of things. There are many ways to produce the same effect, and it very much allows for the creativity of the player. There are 5 Techniques (Change, Create, Control, Destroy, and Understand) and 10 Forms (4 Elements, Animals, People, Plants, Spirits, Images, and raw Magic power) which comprise the Arts. Your wizard can specialize, generalize, cast spells he's researched, cast an effect spontaneously (but that will likely be weaker than what he's researched and will tire him out faster), and even incorporate foreign magic into his own powers. Create charged items. Create enchanted devices. Create a potent talisman with many powers. Bind a familiar. Teach an apprentice. Write books. Study from texts or the raw stuff of magic. There are seven or so rules which Hermetic magic can't break; other than that, go nuts. The flexibility is absolute joy; play a few sessions and you'll grimace at the next time you need to make a "daily spell list."
Other fantastic aspects of the game? You have multiple characters. A magus or maga (your wizard), a companion (who might be a knight, a werewolf, a faerie, a magical beast, a merchant, a devout priest, a minor noble, a master craftsman, etc.), and any number of grogs (the meatshields, I mean, the men-at-arms) who protect the magus. Characters use virtues and flaws to determine the stories you want to actively pursue and the stories you want to be surprised by during gameplay. You can easily try multiple concepts because you have many characters who live together at the covenant.
Ah, the Covenant, the secret character. The covenant is the place the magi all live and share. It is the shared character of their home, a place that can be as fantastic as you wish to make it and develop. It might be in a hidden cave, an old castle, a lost temple that can only be entered during a thunderstorm, or a villa in the middle of Florence. Building it is part of creating a saga's legacy, the tenor of a covenant is reflected in their choice of home and the care they invest in it. Each choice has an impact on how we pay the bills, buy lab equipment, train and maintain the grogs, and relate with our neighbors-- all of which drive stories.
The game is deadly, too, but mostly for grogs and occasionally companions. Magi often have spells which make their survival more certain. However, it runs on a seasonal time-scale, so you see a real passage of time. People start to suffer the effects of age after 35. Our last campaign covered 11 years of time, from 1153 to 1164.
Ars Magica also encourages "troupe play," meaning we take turns being the GM. This is useful, too, because it means when Sam is running a story with my magus and Jim's werewolf companion and some grogs, and Jim can't make the session, well, I can run a different story with Sam's magus and Ben's companion, and Tracy can try running a grog to get a feel for things with his teenage son. When one of those arcs is done, Jim might pick up the Storyguide's role, and we can continue with the threads discovered in Sam's or my stories.
In terms of setting, Ars Magica is played in Mythic Europe of 1220. Angels, demons, dragons, faeries and magical beasts are real and true. Crusades. The Reconquista. Mongols. Pagans. Jews. Christians. Muslims. Templars. Feudalism. The growth of commerce. The rise of guilds. Pirates. Explorers. Missionaries. It's all here. You don't reskin it because you're getting it straight from the source, you might just twist it with a bit of magic, be it Infernal, Divine, Faerie or even non-Hermetic. The whole history section of the library and bookstore is your supplement shelf. Sure, there are quite a few good books from the line, but you can spend 45 minutes drifting through wikipedia and be set for your next session, with NPCs written by *history.* The Order of Hermes provides twelve different "Houses," providing ample fodder for internal wizard politics and complications, and the Code of Hermes (along with the power of the Divine) prevents your players from simply walking all over the mundane world. There are *consequences,* whether they're delivered by nobles, fellow magi, or God's Angelic Host.
The system's been around for nearly 10 years now, so it's been pretty well tested-- there are a couple of well known loopholes (with suggested workarounds), a (mostly) quarterly fanzine, and a product line that's projected for at least another three years.
That's Ars Magica, and I love it. I think you will, too. Give it a try...
-Ben.
NOTE: This Entry is part of the February Blog Carnival. You can see the other entries linked in the comments here.