Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere. I did search this forum but found nowt.

As a Tremere, I have a sigil but it is held by my parens. My parens may exercise my vote through my sigil.

My question is...

If parens hold the sigils to both his filia, who reside in two different Tribunals from their parens, does that parens have one vote in each of the three Tribunals or does he have three votes in his own Tribunal.

I can see it working both ways. He has one in each Tribunal because that's where the magi reside. On the other hand, he has three in one because the filia official reside where their sigils are held.

I don't remember seeing this addressed in the lineages book or on the new mailing list or on this forum. Anyone know the received wisdom on this point?

I believe the parens might find it more advantageous to have the votes in his own Tribunal rather than that of his filius. Therefore he could make sure that the filius is inducted into the Order in (pater's Tribunal), grab the sigil, and let the filius wander freely. He could argue that the filius still has fair representation in the Order because he has voting right (by proxy, of course) in his "home Tribunal" even though he (ahem, "temporarily") resides in another Tribunal.

Anyway, that's one argument in favor of it being in the pater's Tribunal. I have never seen anything "official" on this so I believe it's up to you.

Yes, I agree that it would be a big advantage for the parens to retain and use the sigils in his own Tribunal. That's what prompted the question. What is seen as an advantage by the parens is a threat to others in the same tribunal.

It suits my saga to have the residence of the magus decided by where his sigil is held but I wanted to check whether there was an "official" word on how this works. I was surprised not to see it in the lineages book actually.

A sigil can only be used in the magus's residential tribunal or the Grand Tribunal.

If they are residents of different tribunals, the Tremere fili will proxy their sigils to magi of their master's choosing who are residents. i.e. Senior Tremere of the fili's Tribunal.

Regards

- David W

I've just reread the Tremere chapter in the lineages book. The content on the Exarchs is interesting and does tidy some of the issues away. By giving sigils to the senior magus resident in the tribunal, we avoid the problem of working out where the votes count.

That works for me. My player Tremere's parens is resident in the same tribunal (Roman) but both their sigils are held by a higher magus in another tribunal.

From what I now understand, the PC magus and his parens would effectively hand their sigils to the Roman exarch instead of the senior magus of their line away in the Alps.

Which reminds me, didn't I read that there are now (1220) no Tremere left in the Alps? We're playing about twenty years before then and there are a couple still clinging to their Alpine status.

>From what I now understand, the PC magus and his parens would
>effectively hand their sigils to the Roman exarch instead of the
>senior magus of their line away in the Alps.

They hand their sigil to the senior magus in the Alps, who then lends them to the Exarch of Rome. To get them back, they need to defeat the senior magus, not the Exarch.

> Which reminds me, didn't I read that there are now (1220) no
> Tremere left in the Alps?

In 4th edition, this was true, yes.

> We're playing about twenty years before then and there are a couple
> still clinging to their Alpine status.

Frankly, here we strike a bit of a difference in the editions. In ArM4, there was no sane response to the Tremere other than to watch them eternally, because they were the sort of world-dominating fascists who would tell you to your face that life would be better once they ruled the world. So, when I wrote the Alps book, I wrote the Alps (and Novgorod) as resisting Transylvanian expansionism. When I wrote the Tremere for HoH:TL, I wanted to step past the idea that Tremere are always megalomanical villans. The new house believes it is doing the right thing, and their morality lies close to medieval morality (and even closer to Classical Spartan thought). This makes the Alpine resistance to the Tremere less obviously the logical response, and more of a cultural thing.

I know some people think I screwed around with them unnecessarily, but this was a great opportunity ot reimagine the House. I like how the Tremere have turned out. There are little things I've learned about Transyvania in period that, if I knew them back then, I'd have included, but I really do enjoy the added cultural bits, like the wolf banners and spidersilk cloaks. The balancing of creepy, "Transylvanian" elements with period beliefs and a desire not to be gothic was also a lot of fun. So, vampires, but not what you expect. Werewolves, but not how you expect. It was a lot of fun to think through.

"They hand their sigil to the senior magus in the Alps, who then lends them to the Exarch of Rome. To get them back, they need to defeat the senior magus, not the Exarch."

Yes, thanks for that. I pieced it together after reading back over the TL book.

I did notice that Tremere were changed quite a bit in the transition between editions. A change for the better in my opinion but I've still got all those fourth edition style plots running around. I'll square it all up soon I'm sure.

I'm certainly still running with the ostracism of the Tremere from the Tribunal. I'm taking the opinion that grudges up there take a long time to play out and those magi that harbour the deepest grudges are now in a position to do something about them. Those Tremere that have found themselves isolated paid the price thus isolating those left behind.

Thanks for the response.