Uillorard looks over the list. “Since it’s just for furnishings, I don’t think we need to go to that length. I probably shouldn’t have brought it up. Bricks and ceramics are actually better for managing heat than stone is, anyway. If I’m asked to put up a new tower, we can revisit the question of masons and quarries. But frankly, I’d rather find it myself with magic and save the expense. I’m going to rewrite this list in the best order for setting things up, and divide it by days of work, you can use that for a schedule.”
Uillorard sets to writing the list in an organized way that will allow him to do all the labs’ crafting at once, by having the materials for each type of object prepared at the same time; managed so that it will be about an hours’ spellcasting (including 2 minute rest breaks after each spell) per day, spread across a season. (meaning about 90 classes of object, with twenty castings each to get the crafting done; and since it only takes an hour it won’t impact the standard hermetic 6 days 10 hours per day seasonal schedule.)
I’ll ask you to make the rolls when we commit to doing the job.
First I think you need to get your colleagues decision on whether they will be leaving the covenant this season or can stay to join you in the set up of their laboratories.
Actually, I think I said that your own lab was mostly set up didn’t I?
Yeah, it’s the Flambeau’s but since he refined it it will take a season to adapt.
So do you wish to get your own affairs in order first?
Probably easiest to set up a new lab first, and use the same space for the daily crafting since it will be nice and empty, then servants can deliver the extra stuff around to the other places. It sounds like it will be several seasons before he can do his own lab work anyway, so the order isn’t that important.
OK.
I’m going to need to see what the others are planning to do with their plot lines before I can move you forward in time to the end of the season. If we get entangled in detective work and fae diplomacy too much would you prefer to play Companions in their adventures or what?
I think I should probably discuss this generally: how to handle differing flows of time…
I’m taking a laid-back approach, I don’t mind waiting. I do have a Companion, I’m not sure if he fits in to any of the ongoing storylines; I expect he will come in when the specter of mundane politics rears its head. I’m not sure if you’re suggesting we share Companions, I rather think they should belong to set people (unlike grogs who get passed around more.)
I have just had to apologise to DJCT for my lack of focus on Hubertus.
My apologies to you too. In your case it isn’t inattention but a little bit of bafflement.
A question I should have asked you before agreeing to the outline of your character:
What is it that you want to get out of playing an enchanter?
I ask because though it is inevitable for a magus in ARS MAGICA to spend a lot of time out of the world, delving into mysteries in their laboratory, for a Verditius that is true in squares and cubes. Time must necessarily skip by as they do season action after season action.
The other characters are easier. We have a lawyer/detective. We have a diplomat for dealing with humans and one for dealing with the fae.
But your character is going to be sitting back and doing things… that I can’t specify in great detail because I don’t know how magic works except from an external point of view. It may be fascinating… but I can’t imagine it clearly.
Help me please: what did you imagine that character doing?
In the meanwhile I’m aboout to force-cut Hubertus to a new thread called THE FIRST AFTERNOON which will start with him in the dining hall chatting with you about layout of labs. You may tag along for as little or as much of the subsequent events as you please.
Well, I didn’t intend for him to be extremely lab-bound. Like any magus at gauntlet, he’s not great at anything yet; but I built him to be reasonably able in combat, and he has a chance at solving problems that could crop up in any story, though less so for social ones.
The character will grow into being a very capable magical combatant, and an investigator of magical mysteries, but he’s not there yet (especially on the second part). To speak of his interests; this may not be helpful for you, but I see him as a generalist. So presented with an array of static problems in the world, he can come up with an approach that works for him, for at least some of them.
My approach to roleplaying is that I have an idea for an origin of the person, and I have a personality sketched out that will develop more detail over time, and I take him into the world and see what happens. In this case I didn’t have a particular direction planned out for him, other than being a curious and friendly sort, with a bit of a hoarding problem (which will take time to become apparent.) Anything interesting that comes across his path will catch his interest, rather than a more typical Verditius who might just not care about random mysteries or curiosities.
In a more general sense, in terms of what I want from the game; the thing I enjoy the most about Ars Magica is the time-span the game can cover, the opportunity for long-term growth and long-term stories is unique to this game, as far as I know.
If you think I should have a character with more direction, I don’t mind coming up with someone different, but I’m not sure if that’s more disruptive, so up to you.
It also wouldn’t be wrong to call him a Flambeau artificer. Though he needs development before he can go after big threats.
Sorry, not sure why I’m revisiting this other than I wanted to put that out there.
Well, any sort of enchanter is even more lab centred than the average magus…
I’m aware that my plan to manage this campaign isn’t going as I envisioned it. It moves at an immensely slow pace and all of the wizards are currently active. The standard pattern of AM is not thus.
I take it you are not asking to retroactively change the character? Or have I got that wrong as well?
No, not trying to change anything, just revisiting the old question that we sort of addressed already. (Of what Uillorard “does” or “is”.
I don’t think it’s all that strange for all the wizards to be active; people like playing their wizards best.
It’s an online game, they move slowly, part of the territory. Ars lends itself better than some games for stories being told narratively at a high altitude, I think, that can help to move things forward.