Covenant Rules External Relations

External Relations

These Boons and Hooks affect how the covenant’s members interact with each other and with powerful outsiders. Players should contextualize these choices by selecting a large geographical area in which their covenant lies. Selecting a large town and saying that the covenant lies a certain number of days’ travel from it is satisfactory. More detail can be significant if the troupe desires historical accuracy in their saga.

The covenant’s location is important if a troupe wants to use historical materials to guide the development of its stories. Some troupes feel this is too much work, and have English castles and people wherever their saga is set. There is a long literary tradition of this; Shakespeare does it in Romeo and Juliet, for example, and it is a valid way to play the game. Other troupes prefer to steal color and story ideas from the folklore of the places they choose. Many choose an area because a player has an enthusiasm for that area’s culture.

Ars Magica divides Mythic Europe into twelve Tribunals. Magi live slightly differently in each Tribunal and face different pressures and threats. Many sagas ignore these differences. Most of the supplements for Ars Magica assume that covenants built in one of the Tribunals are concerned with the issues described as pressing for that Tribunal.

Within each Tribunal, covenants develop rivalries. These can be based on differences of philosophy, such as those between House Jerbiton and House Merinita on the expansion of towns into the forest, on professional rivalry, or even on simple greed and fear.

Major External Relations Boons

• Autocephalous: Some areas of Europe are not ruled by any nobleman, or are ruled by smallholding nobles who have never bent the knee to an outsider. This Boon suits covenants in any place where they can, without question, claim the right to live without an overlord. A covenant with the Isolated Boon need not take this one.
• Dedicated Covenant: This covenant was formed to fulfill, or later chose to adopt, a difficult task. Other magi in the Tribunal, or the Order, feel the covenant’s work is so laudable that they have passed rulings to ensure that the cost is shared equitably. Many covenants are dedicated to research. In Ireland there is a covenant dedicated to researching spells that protect against the servants of the Infernal, while in the Alps a covenant continually seeks better longevity enchantments. A dedicated covenant receives money, vis, and other assistance from other covenants. While this does not make its research lucrative, it does prevent the covenant from sliding into penury due to its work.
• Exceptional Book: The covenant has, legally and legitimately, gained possession of a copy of the finest summa ever written on one Art. This book is an excellent addition to the library, of course, but it is also a powerful diplomatic tool and source of prestige. If you select this Boon, you need not pay Build Points for the book. The book’s (level + quality) = 35, with a maximum quality of 25 and a maximum Art level of 20.
• Favors Owed: The covenant is owed favors by someone or something, possibly another covenant, mundane lord, bishop, or mystical creature. The covenant can give the external party orders, although the external party decides the best way to carry them out.
• Hedge Tradition: A local tradition of minor practitioners of magic has fallen under the control of the covenant. These servants of the covenant can have mystical abilities, but their talents do not vary much between practitioners. They provide useful information about their activities to the covenant, and aid it in minor ways. For example, in Loch Leglean, a covenant controls all of the midwives in the Stirling area. They collect useful information and perform minor magic to aid the covenant.
• Prestige: The covenant is famous. Its members are well treated, as far as The Gift permits, and people are reluctant to cross the covenant openly. Within the Order, this applies to domus magnae, or to the oldest and most powerful covenants. A covenant that repeatedly aided and defended its mundane neighbors could get such a reputation in the mundane world, although that level of activity would draw the attention of the Quaesitores. The covenant has a Reputation score of 9. This Boon may be taken several times, with the prestige applying to a different group each time.
• Powerful Ally: The covenant is supported, covertly, by a powerful figure whose personal agenda, although separate, is not uncomfortable to the covenant. The ally might be a faerie queen, a powerful creature, a nobleman, a young covenant, or even a prince of the church. This alliance will fail if the magi act in ways their supporter finds noxious, or fail to provide support in return.

Minor External Relations Boons

• Benefice: The covenant owns the land on which the local church stands, the church building itself, and the cottage in which the priest lives. This means the covenant can, if it wishes, refuse to allow a given individual to use the church. The assignment of benefices is a matter of some controversy, since bishops reserve the right to appoint priests to congregations, while the landowners reserve the right to refuse access to their buildings to unsuitable priests.
• Felicitous Tribunal: The covenants in your tribunal maintain a series of agreements. Even new covenants, if they abide by the agreements, are treated well, and consulted in important matters. The agreements usually cover political issues like vis harvesting, molesting the fay, and control of Hermetic populations.
• Informants: The covenant has a small network of helpful people who provide the covenant with useful information about its rivals. Companions usually contact informants, and sometimes rescue them, or smuggle them to the covenant. Some Bjornaer covenants have networks of helpful animals, instead.
• Local Ally: A person of prestige and power in the nearby area assists the covenant, covertly. A sheriff, local nobleman, or village priest would all be suitable allies, as would a powerful spirit constrained to a single location.
• Prestige: The covenant, and its members, is well regarded. This may be because of previous actions, such as defeating a monster, or because of continuing features of the covenant, such as a superb library. The covenant has a Reputation score of 3. This Boon may be taken several times, with the prestige applying to a different group each time. Marco, a Redcap many caution not to trust, claims to have visited a covenant whose women are as beautiful as a rainbow. Suitors come from far lands to seek the hand of scullions, maids, and washerwomen, and faerie princes send obscure gifts to the widow who owns the castle.
• Promised Favors: Gifts and assistance have been pledged to the covenant, provided they do something that they find simple. The gifts can take many forms: vis, money, books, servants, seasons of work, and political support are common offers.
• Ungoverned: Some parts of Europe have been in a state of anarchy so long that no one can be said to rule them. Covenants in these areas need only deal with minor, neighboring nobles, each of whom has many rivals.

Major External Relations Hooks

• Beholden: The covenant owes favors to someone or something, possibly another covenant, or possibly a mundane lord, bishop, or mystical creature. The external party can give the covenant orders, although the covenant gets to decide on the best way to carry them out.
• Center of Excellence: The covenant lies close to a mundane source of unusual goods, and employs specialists to make those goods. The rulers of the place that provides the materials, who are extremely wealthy, will grow to see the covenant as a threat to their monopoly. Examples include glass manufacture near Venice and silk near Constantinople.
• Ceremonies: The covenant hosts the major ceremonies of the Order on a regular basis, such as Tribunals, ceremonies of welcome, and Hermetic fairs.
• Hedge Tradition: The area in which the covenant lies is outside the usual sphere of Hermetic influence. It lies within the established territory of one of the hedge traditions that is active on the borders of the Order. Some members of the hedge tradition resent the covenant’s presence and its use of resources that they believe are rightfully theirs, but there is no formal state of war, yet.
• Hermetic Services: A handful of covenants survive by providing resources to other covenants. These resources include goods, like special inks and vis, and services, like creating longevity effects. These covenants are particularly dependent on Hermetic peace for their prosperity, which forces them to act as conciliators in difficult situations.
• Mundane Politics: The covenant is deeply ensnared in mundane politics and must keep the Quaesitores from becoming too interested in their activities.
• Rival: Someone or some group is working to destroy the covenant, and has the resources for this to be possible. Thus, the rival must be of comparable power to the covenant.
• Tribunal Border: The covenant lies outside any Tribunal, or in the disputed borderland between two Tribunals. Representatives of powerful covenants in the neighboring Tribunals attempt to sway the magi to join their Tribunal when the magi are forced to select one. Slighted suitors may be angered.
• War Zone: The covenant lies between two powerful noble holdings that are at war. Each side requires the magi to join it. Failure to assist, on either side, may lead to reprisal because the warlord considers the covenant in league with his enemy. This Hook may be Unknown.

Minor External Relations Hooks

• Ancestral Error: One of the magi who founded the covenant made a grave error that harmed many people, or willingly performed a deeply sinful act. The covenant must eventually face the consequences of this mistake. This Hook may be Unknown.
• Centralized Kingdom: In some parts of Europe, England for example, it is perfectly clear who owns every bit of land. A newly founded covenant in such an area will need to explain its presence to, and come to terms with, its putative noble lord.
• Church Territories: Large parts of Europe accept a representative of the Church as their mundane noble. This is a Minor Hook, rather than a Free Choice, because the Church is less tolerant of heterodoxy — thoughts that may lead to sin — in its territories than lay rulers are. This Hook may be Unknown.
• Favors: The covenant owes favors to someone or something, possibly another covenant, or possibly a mundane lord, bishop, or mystical creature. This person cannot give the covenant orders, but the covenant is really obliged to help if he is in difficulty.
• Hangout: There is a place outside the covenant where many of the player characters go to unwind. It might be an inn, a brothel, a church, a mundane scholar’s house, or any similar place. Many stories start there as the characters meet other attendees and are drawn into their lives.
• Hermetic Politics: The covenant is engaged in the elaborate game of trading of favors that passes for politics in some Hermetic Tribunals. When the saga begins, the covenant owes favors to three other covenants, but is owed three favors as well.
• House Covenant: A single House rules this covenant; the other magi who live in it are its servants. The leaders of the House appoint the leaders of the covenant, and the covenant’s charter forbids local magi from assuming greater control.
• Infamous: The covenant is mistrusted, has a checkered Hermetic record, or is held in contempt. This mirrors the Prestigious Minor Boon.
• Itinerants: A mobile community visits the covenant every year. This might be a wandering group of minstrels, a family of merchants with their servants, or bands of farm laborers looking for work. Some covenfolk welcome these arrivals, with their news and money, while others find them a source of endless trouble. While they may pick fights and engage in petty theft, they also carry rumors, trade goods, and money.
• Missing Founder: One of the covenant’s founders slipped from Hermetic history indecisively, and this causes the covenant difficulty. For example, rumors emerge that the founder thought gone lives on in Faerie, or someone appears from Arcadia claiming to be his son. Alternately, a will might be found in a book in at Durenmar that gives many of the covenant’s goods to an heir, debtor, or cause. This Hook may be Unknown in the sense that the resumption of the founder’s estate is unexpected.
• Public Vis Source: One or more of the covenant’s vis sources has had its location and method of harvesting precisely written into a ruling of the Peripheral Code. The covenant unquestionably owns the source, but any enemy wishing to make mischief knows exactly where the covenant’s vis comes from.
• Rival: Someone or some group is working to undermine or stymie the covenant. This rival may be much weaker than the covenant, as long as he is capable of causing problems worthy of stories. This Hook may be Unknown.
• Slavery: Your covenant has slaves in its population. It is illegal, in Europe, to enslave Christians, so enslaved populations are rare in Hermetic covenants. There are some Hermetic slaves in the Baltic, and others in the Levantine and Theban Tribunals, purchased after the fall of Damietta to the Crusaders last year. Slaves who convert must be freed.
• Undemocratic Tribunal: Your Tribunal is dominated politically by an Autumn covenant, which is not interested in your welfare.
• Unsafe: Redcaps do not visit your covenant. The usual reason the House gives for this lack of service is that the way is too unsafe even for the brave and resourceful servants of the House, although this excuse occasionally hides another motive. Instead of direct delivery, the covenant’s servants collect messages at a Mercer House or secure drop-off point. This delay means that the letters are sometimes worthless, opportunities for action having passed. The covenant can have normal deliveries if it can deal with its problems and then demonstrate this to the House.
• Unsubtle Predecessor: One of the covenant’s founders funded its early work by pretending that the covenant had a gold mine or similarly enviable source of portable wealth. The covenant has claimed, for many years, that things have changed and they no longer have unending reserves of this commodity, but many local nobles do not believe them, or believe that they have maintained a sizable treasury of the stuff.