Inroduction

Whether it is a brand new foundation freshly hewn from the wilderness or an ancient wreck creaking under centuries of magic, the covenant is the center of most sagas. This supplement for Ars Magica Fifth Edition describes in detail five covenants, their resident magi, and the resources available to them, including vis sources, libraries, and enchanted devices.

Each covenant can be used as inspiration for your own saga, as a place to visit, or as the player character covenant. Your player characters can either replace or complement the described residents.

Although these covenants have each been strongly integrated into a particular location and Tribunal, all can be used wherever your saga is set. However, your troupe will need to modify the location and Tribunal-specific content accordingly.

The characters detailed for the covenants have in some cases been generated seasonby-season, taking into account the character's duties and the resources available at the covenant. The experience totals of such characters may thus vary slightly from that expected via the Detailed Character Creation method (ArM5, page 32). Life-events such as Twilight may also cause the Virtues and Flaws of some characters to be either unbalanced or to exceed the normal allotment. When this applies it has been noted.

When existing communal covenant resources, such as enchanted items, have been acquired or made by the current residents, then these have been effectively paid for twice: once in terms of seasons of work, and once in terms of covenant build points. On the other hand, resources personal to a magus, such as talismans and some enchanted items, have not been paid for out of the covenant build point budget. Generally, if a magus would likely take a resource with him if he left the covenant, it has been considered a personal resource. However, sometimes, it has been necessary to make an arbitrary decision as to whether a particular resource is communal or personal.

The five covenants detailed in this book make ideal starting points for a new saga. The magi resident in each serve equally well as ready-made player characters already embedded into the fabric of their covenants, or as suggestions to spark entirely new magi in keeping with each covenant. Similarly, the grogs, companions, and other specialists are all either ready-to-play or detailed enough that introducing them is straightforward. You could even take these characters individually and use them in your own saga if you wanted to.

The covenant as a character is also well-developed. From Hooks and Boons, to resources, allies, and enemies, and even the state of the covenant's coffers and the loyalty of its covenfolk, each covenant is already a living, breathing entity all by itself.

Each of the covenants is accompanied by a wealth of saga threads and story seeds that your troupe can explore over decades of game time. Some of these challenges are readily apparent while others are more subtle, leaving your troupe free to develop them in any number of ways.

Each covenant is also an example of one season in a covenant's life-cycle, from Spring, through Summer, Autumn, Winter, and back to Spring again. If you are creating your own covenant, then the covenants detailed in this supplement provide solid examples of the situations and challenges that each season brings.

For existing sagas, these covenants might be used as fully-detailed background covenants. Each provides information for using them in a range of ways, such as a source of information, political allies or opponents, or even naive young magi to manipulate. Their aims may coincide or cross with those

of your player magi, and finding the right way to deal with them provides challenging stories. As the covenants are well integrated into their different Tribunal settings, they also provide an impetus for magi to visit these different Tribunals, drawing them out of their own covenants and into a much wider Hermetic world.

Lastly, the vis sources, enchantments, and books described throughout this supplement can be used as a mine of ideas, or just statistics and book titles, for your own magi and their covenant.

Whether you are about to start a new saga or you are approaching the autumn of your current one, the covenants found in this book have something to offer, so populate them, contest them, spy upon them, or straight out raid them: the choice is yours.

Covenants are often classified according to their season, which is a complex measure of the age, power, and influence of the covenant. Both players and characters might refer to a covenant's season and the following gives an indication of its meaning. Of course, this can only be a guide, as the circumstances of each covenant are unique.

Spring

Spring covenants are young settlements, recently built or occupied, that pose many challenges to the magi taking them on. The main characteristics of a Spring covenant are:

Resources: Spring covenants have few resources, and many of these may be on loan or the personal property of individual magi. The search for new resources is therefore important and remains the focus throughout a Spring covenant's early years. They may also mistakenly take resources already claimed by others.

Generations: The founders of a Spring covenant are almost certainly still alive and living at the covenant and few, if any, apprentices will have been raised there. Familiars may be rare, and many of the original covenfolk are at least still in residence, if not still active as servants, grogs, and specialists.

History: A Spring covenant has little history of its own, and stories of other magi and other covenants may dominate. This serves to release the magi from obligations that might be held over those same magi were they to live in more established covenants. A Spring covenant's history is yet to be written.

Stability: Spring covenants are still exploring their boundaries and flexibility is more important than order and structure. Governance is usually consensual as the covenant lives from year to year, and often neither magi nor grogs cling to title or privilege. However, income (vis and mundane) may fluctuate.

Connections: A Spring covenant's main relationships are through the covenant's individual magi back to their parentes and former covenants. The covenant may have few allies, and their presence may be a concern for more established covenants. On the other hand, a Spring covenant is more likely to encounter mere reflexive resistance to its activities rather than true dedicated, implacable enemies. A Spring covenant is usually simply not important enough for powerful foes to want to destroy it.

Summer

Summer covenants are established settlements, which have usually been continuously inhabited by magi for thirty or more years, though occasionally high levels of resources can help covenants reach this maturity early. After the perils of Spring, Summer marks a period of the covenant's life where the magi have a secure home, though not all challenges are yet addressed. The main characteristics of a Summer covenant are:

Resources: The covenant has established a claim to enough resources to support the magi, though some resources may still be contested or hard to collect. New magi and apprentices may have access to significant resources in the form of a library and Lab Texts. The established magi may well have developed Talismans, Familiars, or both.

Generations: Summer covenants often have a very simple structure, often with the only residents being the founders and their current and former apprentices. As new magi join the covenant, stories about how access to resources and library are distributed and managed arise. The covenant has probably seen apprentices Gauntleted after study here.

History: A Summer covenant may have a short but colorful history, with the founder's personalities still stamped on every aspect of covenant life, even if they themselves have now died or passed in to Final Twilight. Summer covenants often have a defining theme or goal, originating from the founders' plans, though this may be challenged or replaced by a new generation.

Stability: Summer covenants have established simple routines and customs that govern how things are done, and attempt to regulate life to maximize opportunities for study and research. Covenfolk have grown more used to the Gifted magi who have long been present, and relations with the surrounding population are now established, although stories about problems still arise as unexpected crises challenge the peace.

Connections: The covenant will likely have relationships with several other covenants in the Tribunal, both positive and negative, and a growing reputation. They have not yet reached the level of political influence and respect associated with Autumn, but are regarded as more important than a shortlived Spring covenant is.

Autumn

Autumn covenants are mature settlements, which have usually been continuously inhabited by magi for at least a century. If the magi of an Autumn covenant can successfully deal with occasional crises the covenant's Autumn may last for hundreds of years. On the other hand, either a single catastrophe or the cumulative failure to deal with many seemingly minor problems could push the covenant into Wintery decay. The main characteristics of an Autumn covenant are:

Resources: The covenant should have plenty of established resources. However, some resources may be diminishing or peaking, so some stories may be focused on conservation, finding new sources, or regenerating old sources.

Generations: Apprentice, filius, parens, and grand-parens may all live at an Autumn covenant. Thus there could be a wide disparity between the power and interests of the individual magi sitting at the covenant council table. Succession - how, whether, and when the senior magi pass power and responsibility down to the younger magi - may be an important and contentious issue. Similar issues may apply to the coven-folk.

History: Much of an Autumn covenant's locality, mundane and supernatural, will be shaped by decades or centuries of influence by the covenant itself. Of course, the historic tapestry spread around the covenant probably includes rich threads of compromises, cover-ups, and catastrophes. Inevitably as time passes, some of these plots threaten to unravel.

Stability: Autumn covenants have established routines with duties, responsibilities, and the available magical assistance all well understood by the magi, grogs, and the locals that the covenant interacts with. This is an advantage, as it allows the magi to focus on laboratory projects and esoteric mysteries, but it can be a disadvantage if a crisis requires rapid change and innovation.

Connections: The covenant probably has numerous relationships with the other covenants of the Tribunal (and quite likely even further afield). Individual exapprentices may be obligated to their parens' covenant, and an Autumn covenant may have founded colony covenants.

Some connections between the covenant and the rest of the Tribunal may be antagonistic, and the covenant may be enmeshed in a web of political alliances and feuds.

Winter

Winter covenants are mature settlements, which have been continuously inhabited by magi for long times, normally in excess of two centuries. Winter covenants are in decline, and may be approaching catastrophic collapse which the current inhabitants need to prevent, if they can foresee the coming danger! The main characteristics of a Winter covenant are:

Resources: Winter covenants can expect to have considerable resources to their names, but many of these will be damaged, failing, or lost. In particular, auras and vis sources may be on the decline, enchanted devices may be broken, loaned books may not have been returned. While the laboratories of senior magi may be highly-developed, they may be maintained at the cost of other buildings. New sources of vis, covenfolk, and money may be hard to come by.

Generations: The precise membership of a Winter covenant may be vague, tenuous, and hard to determine. Elders may have fallen into Twilight, perhaps unknown even to their proxies; masters traveling abroad may settle elsewhere without sending word back to the covenant, and apprentices and younger magi may come and go unnoticed by those elders who remain. Governance is typified by indecision and councils are rarely quorate. It is unlikely that the any of the original founders are alive.

History: A Winter covenant is a slave to its history. Old bargains, dark secrets, and near-forgotten obligations are a draw upon the covenant's energies, and the young pay for the actions of long-lost elders. The ghosts of former inhabitants and mourning familiars may be found within or near the covenant. Beyond the covenant, the world has likely moved on and the covenant is the subject of tale and rumor.

Stability: Winter covenants have longestablished traditions: roles, duties, and behaviors that go beyond simple routine, though the decline of the covenant members may leave important roles unfilled. The traditions of a Winter covenant are inflexible, and those in authority likely see no convincing reason to change them. Covenfolk may harbor negative feelings towards the magi while at the same time having no means to change their lot. A Winter covenant is not yet dead, but its future is on a knife-edge.

Connections: The covenant has numerous lapsed relationships with other covenants, the church, nobility, and hedge traditions. These are most likely to have lapsed through the death of key contacts and increasing political isolation. Relationships with allies are unmaintained, while enemies remain unvanquished. Past apprentices have died or trained apprentices of their own who now feel no connection with their ancestral covenant.

Second Spring

The ruins of a collapsed Winter covenant - maybe centuries old - are taken over by a new generation of young magi, who try to salvage what they can before all the buildings fall to rubble and the musty tomes decay forever. The main characteristics of a Second Spring covenant are:

Resources: The covenant has lost almost all the resources of the previous generations. The fragments which remain may surpass the resources of a typical Spring covenant but are of failing quality, dangerous to use, or even totally unusable until repaired. The laboratories of departed magi can be difficult to take over if they are over specialized, suffer warping, or otherwise haunted by former residents. Vis and mundane income is minimal due to long neglect, and must be re-cultivated or re-discovered, or new sources must be found.

Generations: Few (if any) members of the covenant's elder generations remain, and any who do hover hazily between the grave and Twilight. Most of the new residents are young, or perhaps elder, wandering magi of the covenant's lineage who have returned to save (or claim) their ancestral covenant. If the covenant died completely before being resurrected, the current magi may have no connection at all to the earlier residents.

History: The new magi may be held to many of the debts, slights, and enmities of their predecessors, despite being unaware of the precise circumstances under which these were incurred. Problems arise when old rivals and antagonists return, but clever young magi may be able to search ancient texts and interview ghosts to discover hints for overcoming old foes, consolidating old resources, or reestablishing forgotten relationships.

Stability: If the covenant is populated with young magi who have ties to the past generations then it may be more stable than if the new magi are all outsiders. However, the world outside the covenant has changed significantly since its original foundation and an inability to cope with such changes may have shattered the original covenant. Restructuring the covenant may be a critical task for the new magi, who have the opportunity to start again, beginning with the covenant's charter.

Connections: Most of the covenant's alliances and contacts have atrophied through lack of use, but the gravitas of the covenant's name may still carry some residual influence. The new magi may be able to capitalize on and rebuild these ghostly, tenuous links, or they may prefer to forge new ties.

The covenants in this book are as follows.

The Northern Seas

Northern Seas is a foam-flecked flotilla of ships that charts a wild course through its surging, eponymous waters. This mobile fleet is a Spring covenant of the Normandy Tribunal.

Boons and Hooks: Mystical Allies; Criminals, Difficult Access, Famous Resident, Healthy Feature, Informants, Local Ally, Ungoverned; Sailors; Missing Aura, Tribunal Border; Erratically Mobile, Gender Imbalance, Possession Victim, Poverty.

Build Points: 1088

Jardin

Built on a rocky bluff, on top of an ancient fortress, Jardin is a sumptuous Summer covenant in the Provençal Tribunal. The covenant dominates its landscape and is resplendent with terraced gardens, ripe vineyards, and a library in the form of a domed, red-brick basilica.

Boons and Hooks: Autocephalous; Increased Aura, Edifices (x2), Loyal Covenfolk, Prestige, Vivid Environment, Wealth; Regio, War Zone; Crumbling, Faerie Aura, Faerie Regio, Road.

Build Points: 1466

Didyma

Founded at the outbreak of the Schism War, Didyma is an Autumn covenant in the Theban Tribunal. Many of the covenant magi trace their lineage to an ancient oracle cult that has foretold futures amongst the crumbling columns of pagan temples for millennia.

Boons and Hooks: Powerful Ally (x2); Edifice, Increased Aura, Right, Secondary Income, Veteran Fighters; City, Road, Monster (unknown); Crumbling, Faerie Aura.

Build Points: 2536

Longmist

Shrouded in damp mists and sustained upon stale centuries of echoing ritual, Longmist is a Winter covenant in the Hibernian Tribunal. The covenant is riven by conflict between the elder magi, with a younger generation of magi struggling in their elders' misty shadows.

Boons and Hooks: Aura (Major), Magical Fortress, Mystical Allies; Aura (Minor) x2, Seclusion; Small Tower; Divided Loyalty, Fractured Council; Contested Resource, Crumbling, Deathbed Visitor, Dwindling Resource, Faerie Court, Superiors.

Build Points: 2185

Collem Leonis

Nestled in a densely forested valley in the hinterland of the city of Dortmund, there has been a covenant at Collem Leonis for almost four centuries, but the work of previous generations has been largely lost to the ravages of time and Twilight. Now, new magi, descendants of Collem Leonis' original founders, are determined to rebuild their ancestral home. This is a Second Spring covenant in the Rhine Tribunal.

Boons and Hooks: Tame Nobleman; Aura (x2), Chase, Hidden Resources (x4), Strong Community; Manor Hall; City, Mundane Politics; Uncontrolled Portal (x2), Rights and Customs, Suffrage, Vis Salary

Build Points: 650 + 1000 (Hidden Resources)