Here's an example of old elven lore. Look around in June for the "# of true
mages" and other elven related threads.

Randax
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It's nice to be remembered although I have to say that I'm a Dutchman, not a
Great Dane.
Randax, you're right to assume a threeway split in mages. You should divide
them in magicians, true mages, and realmspell capable mages.
magicians being the practioners of the 'lesser' magics
true mages being blooded human mages and all elven and half-elven mages
realmspell capable mages being blooded mages with source holdings.

I had tallied all the mages mentioned in the different publications which
means that ofcourse the emphasis is on those mages with source holdings.
There are only a few elven mages mentioned but that is partly because there
are so few elven realms. I think it is safe to assume that the humans don't
know how many unblooded elven mages there are, this is one of those things
every DM has to decide for himself.

When you take the approach that the number of elven mages is unknown you got
a bit more breathing space in your demographics. When I reread the section
on the number of wizards (page12Rulebook) before replying to this post I
noticed that it actually says:
"In all of Cerillia there are no more than six or seven score true mages;
less than half of that number are regents capable of wielding realm magic"
This would mean 120-140 Human true mages (i.e.blooded),
of which around 65 are sourceholding mages.
This corresponds to the tally of human mages published.

I agree with the sentiment that there is virtually no way to get an true
mage lieutenant. (The only exception I might make is for an elven PC, or
when somebody really has adventured for it)



Sorry, I must not have the precise memory trait. Besides both beginning with a
"D", bordering the North Sea and having a great naval tradition, Danes and
Dutch don't have much in common. :)

I think everyone here is in agreement about the impossiblity of hiring a Regent
Wizard because they're rare. HOW rare are non-regent elves is now the issue.
The text on page 12 of the rulebook, and repeated in the BoM, refers to ALL
wizards, regardless of their race. I would say we should make allowance for a
few more non-blooded elven wizards, but I'm very wary of any increase in the
amount of magic in BR. Why? I've seen a disturbing trend over the past 3
years. This new mighty spell, that new way to get regency or bloodline, this
new imported race or monster.... In short, Birthright is becoming more generic
and overpowered as time goes by. If you breach the barrier by saying "Oh yeah,
it was only humans they were counting in the 120." You open the door for things
like "Well, there's thousands of Drow magic users living under the surface
driving the Orogs to the surface. We just didn't know about them before. Buy
our new supplement!"

It's probably appopriate to up the number of true mages in the world by about
20 to 160 or so to allow for the non-blooded elves- say 2 per kingdom (though
I'm sure the Tuar sourcebook mentions many more than that) for eight elven
kingdoms with a couple roaming about. I'm sure the thing that led us to this
predicament is the various BR authors made no attempt work through the exercise
we're performing right now. This lead to a published total that's out of line
with the basic design premise (120-140 total true mages) of the world.

In summary, up the number of Cerialian true mages to about 160 to allow for
those darn uberelves, but lets be careful not to have "our" world devolve into
Birthrealms.

Realistic Fantasy Randax
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