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Abbott
2009-01-08, 10:50 PM
Are there any thoughts on this system? It looks interesting, but I have only seen parts of the crunch and read up on some of the fluff.

Grail
2009-01-08, 11:07 PM
each player, go build 7 characters.
I used to own it, was an interesting game, til some freak stole it off me. 4 RPG's I've had stolen, and this is the one that annoys me the most.

Leewei
2009-01-08, 11:08 PM
The game system is incredible for roleplaying, but has severe balance issues in the hands of anyone prone to powergaming. The rules system is a fairly archaic precursor to oWoD, albeit with a fantastic spin. The similarity between House Tremere and Clan Tremere is no coincidence.

bosssmiley
2009-01-09, 06:30 AM
RPGnow/Drivethru generally have 4E Ars Magica as a free download.

It is excellent. Cheese can be had, but must be sought out. The published adventures are good-to-fantastic.

"Ars Magica" and "Pendragon": my two favourite _medieval_ fantasy games.

Chromat
2009-01-09, 06:58 AM
I am currently dm-ing Ars magica 5th edition as a result of 4ed (D&D) disagreement.

My players and i love it. It took some time to setup the game, and re-learn the rules. It has very nice rules on magic, especially liked by my non system oriented players.

We put place of happening in our country in place that has very long and rich history and folklore. That took a bit of digging in the books and net but it was very fun ( at least for me :D )

All players (including dm) create covenant, a entity as well a location where all PC characters live.

There can be more than one DM. And there are rules to support that. It is one thing i imported from ars magica to my D&D games ( one main DM and other players occasionally DM few sessions)

All players equally participate in story creation by picking stuff like plots and hooks for the covenant and characters, resulting in very lifelike and breathing environment.

It can take some time to switch your mind from d&d to ars magica but i think it is worth it.

Of course it takes a little bit more creative effort from the players. So my lazy players kinda protested about time they had to put in all that creative stuff, but when you setup everything is easier.

Its not D&D, so its not so easy with this system to go from the job to the session evening to slay some monsters and grab some loot with some light story to put your mind off. It also takes different approach in story building.

I hope it helps

Satyr
2009-01-09, 07:15 AM
I have played tow campaigns of Ars Magica, one which was great an one which was torture. The great campaign was focused on intrigue, historical authenticity (if you play a game with a clear historical background, you have the most awesome background ever at hand. It is crime not to use this, even if this require a certain effort), where one character palyed a wizard and the rest most of the time played his followers. The bad campaign was a completely failed effort to try to bring the more traditional fantasy topoi into the system, with an all wizard party. That doesn't work.

From the supernatural Background, Ars Magica is somewhat behind Witchcraft or Unknown Armies, two games with a similar scope. The major boon the game has though is its setting in the middle ages, which makes for a great game, if you have a party of historically interested people.

Darth Stabber
2009-01-09, 09:10 AM
Love this game. The system is not as flexible as I would like but the amount of customization that you can do is incredible. Magic has the possibility to become increadibly broken, and being a non-magus is fairly underpowered.


Originally posted by Leewei
The similarity between House Tremere and Clan Tremere is no coincidence. Given that Whitewolf used to own Ars Magica, and before the dark ages series was printed, ars magica was the precursor to mage (once they split ars magica did a slight fluff rewrite and WW started on Dark Ages).

Tyrrell
2009-01-10, 08:23 PM
The game system is incredible for roleplaying, but has severe balance issues in the hands of anyone prone to powergaming. The rules system is a fairly archaic precursor to oWoD, albeit with a fantastic spin. The similarity between House Tremere and Clan Tremere is no coincidence.

IMO OWoD was a big step backwards from Ars Magica in terms of rules. OWoD was quicker to play but it suffers from more rules sillyness than Ars. Outside of Magic and character creation Ars Magica is at least as slick. While I'm no great fan of the Ars Magica combat systems in 4th or 5th edition I've never been fond of the WoD combat system either.

In any case the magic system,is phenomenal and when I've sat down at the table to play ars I , in general, have had more fun than with any other game.

As of Fifth edition the similarities between the Clan Tremere and House Tremere have become pretty weak.