The Covenant Assaulted

The magi of the Trattato are less concerned with Verona, even if the troupe magi are all holed up within the city. Their prize is the troupe's covenant and its lands and resources, and it is here that they concentrate their own assault.

A small force of 30 mercenaries are ordered by Avedutus to engage in chevauchee, a general raiding and scourging of the land around the player covenant. The intention is distraction and a feint to draw out some or all of the covenant's magi. After a day or two of chevauchee, Avedutus brings his main force within sight of the covenant.

As the duke's mercenaries gather outside the player covenant, Lucia and Avedutus, safe as it is the eve before the Wizard War begins, request audi-

ence under cover of truce. If the audience is granted, Lucia explains that the duke desires to make claim upon the land on which the covenant stands in recompense for the loss and insult caused to Casalmaggiore by the city of Verona.

But the Lady Lucia offers to make use of such little influence as she has with the duke and ensure that neither the covenant nor its lands are molested in the conflict with Verona. She urges that there is still time to accept the terms offered by the Trattato.

There is no mistaking the intention. This is a direct threat and ultimatum; submit or see the forces of Casalmaggiore unleashed upon the covenant. Lucia points out that her offer of friendship unfortunately expires with the rising of the full moon and commencement of Wizard War. She urges that the player magi find the strength to save the lives of their covenfolk.

The magi of Trattato are assuming that their targets will abide by Hermetic law and not assault them until the Wizard War officially starts. They are not so noble and as the sun sets, Al-'Aqrab, in concert with the Trattato, casts his Breaking the Shield spell, utilizing the Wizard's Communion, to bring down the covenant's Aegis of the Hearth. The spell has a Sight range, which means that the attacking magi are visible from the covenant. This provides the player magi an important opportunity to disrupt the spellcasting.

As soon as the Aegis goes down, Avedutus gives the order, a horn is blown and the crossbowman armed with the wall-breaching bolts moves into position. If the player magi are not prepared, the first volley breaches the covenant wall.

You should use the Standard Soldier statistics from the core rulebook (page 22) for Avedutus' troops. Treat Avedutus as both vanguard and leader of a trained group of five members.

Once the wall has been breached, the fight for the covenant takes place in three key locations.

The covenfolk must defend the breach in the wall against three times their number of enemy soldiers. One of the enemy combat units is led by Avedutus, another defends Al-'Aqrab, and another still defends Patronus and ensures he gets within the walls. Fighting during this event and at this location is on hazardous ground, which ensures that all rolls are stress rolls and adds an extra botch die. Troupe characters may choose to retreat from wall, in which case they move to the next event.

If Avedutus and his men force their way through the wall, they achieve the courtyard. It is here, assuming he survives the first event, that Patronus unleashes a swarm of faeries to add to the weight of troops that any troupe characters must defend against.

In addition to any preparations made to defend the central part of the covenant, represented by the idea of a "keep," the troupe characters receive a +1 bonus to attack and defense rolls while they defend the keep. Any troupe character in any part of the covenant during this event gains the bonus. If this event is lost, by the death of one or more troupe characters, or by the surrender of the troupe characters, then the Trattato have taken the covenant.

If the covenant surrenders or is breached, Avedutus leads twenty soldiers in search of the magi. He does not spare them if he finds them so this is a particularly dangerous part of the scenario. He can not be held by offers to talk or to surrender, and orders his crossbowmen to loose as soon as he identifies his targets.

Any who are able to disguise themselves as companions or grogs are able to surrender so long as they make a very convincing and prompt show of laying down their arms and yielding to Avedutus. They are then be rounded up and locked away in whatever passes for a dungeon or secure prison.

During this final event, any surviving magi may choose to face the magi of the Trattato directly. For the purposes of these dramatic scenes, the presence of enemy soldiers or troupe grogs can be considered to cancel each other out and the focus should be put onto the magi alone and either the troupe's magi or the magi of the Trattato fall.