Spirit magic

[Minx]

Hi I've lurked a bit here and thought it was time I shared my thoughts with the community. I have a few thoughts on the subject of "realistic" spirit magic. This is sort of an animistic approach.

(snip)

I would like to see a roleplaying game based on these principles. I guess the campaign would have to be centered on a tribe or such. I haven't yet an idea for the system, but i guess I could use the skill system from Ars Magica for simplicitys sake, the magic system I don't know yet.

It´s funny, because thats pretty much what I´m working on right now. It´s not a complete game, but it could be used in one. It´s, at least at the moment, an animistic magic system for a GURPS fantasy game.

It´s centered around the following ideas:

1. Everything has either a spirit or at least the shadow of a spirit.

Not every blade of grass has his own spirit, but the whole meadow would, with a shadow for each blade.

2. Shamans are the link between mortals (be it orks, humans or whatever) and the spirits. They communicate with them and have the ability to aks them for favors. Which directly leads to

3. Everything has a price.

While there are spirits who are actively trying to help mortals, most of them don´t really care, as long as they are not angered. (Which they are more easily than pleased) Shamans may ask for favors but every favor comes with a price.

System-wise, this means that a shaman asking a favour will pretty much always get what he wants, if he is willing to pay the price.

At the moment the basic concept and the mechanics are pretty much finished, but I´m not yet sure how the various spirits interact with the "normal" world or how their power interact with the shaman. My current thought is that nature and the spirits of the dead have to work though the shaman itself (ie posession), while animal spirits are able to physically interact with the normal world. (Animal spirits would appear as very big members of their species)

If you want to know more I´d be pleased to send you my current notes. (Also, help and reamarks are, as always, appreciated. )

M

[Bevan]

Hi I've lurked a bit here and thought it was time I shared my thoughts with the community. I have a few thoughts on the subject of "realistic" spirit magic. This is sort of an animistic approach.

Though my magic system derives more from the occult philosophies of such sects as the Hermetics and Kabbalists, tribal shamanism certainly plays a role.

All of the three factors that you've mentioned are part of the system, particularly taboos. I like the idea of magicians being forced to behave in bizarre ways in order to utilize their magic, such as always needing to sleep on their left side, never allowed to eat salt, or required to always walk on the left side of the street. It makes the magicians more alien and unnatural, and forces their magical beliefs to become a continual part of play.

One of the ways that it occurred for me to support the taboo idea is to allow magician characters to purchase taboos either at character creation or during play. The taboos grant character points like the flaws in a lot of games, but the points must be spent on magical abilities (new spells, summoning skills, etc.). This represents the power that magicians gain by binding themselves further to spirits or the Spirit World in general. The taboos also have to relate to whatever spirits the magician deals with, possibly with various spirits having a list of taboos that they can give magicians.

[Bevan]

It would seem that the only magic covered is the ability to summon the spirits.

How do the spirits do whatever it is they do?

For the purpose of this thread, I was classifying magic as the supernatural powers performed by humans, and thus the player characters. The spirits would have a wide range of defined powers to choose from, and so would be a lot less free-form in their abilities than the magicians, rather like the powers of demons versus the powers of sorcerers in the Sorcerer rpg.

[Harlequin]

Another angle for you to consider:

Not all "spirit magic" paradigms revolve around the spirit accomplishing the deed.  The spirit's assistance is required, but the actual effect may either be a deed done by the practitioner and made possible by the spirit's presence or intervention, or an "underlying spiritual physics" consequence of the spirit's actions.

An instance of the first one: a shaman calls the spirit of a man's father to him, and stabs it with a spear of bone.  The man dies, or forgets his father, or betrays his family.  This example uses sympathetic magic but that need not be the case; the technique merely lends itself to sympathetic magic.  Nonsympathetic magic: the shaman calls mother death to him and makes love to her, thereby averting his first death.  It's not that mother death possesses the power to make him immortal, it's that this is the effect of his deed.

An instance of the second one: a talking weaverbird (effectively a spirit) flies to the sun and retrieves a berry by request.  The shaman gives the berry to his foe, that same night.  When the sun rises, it is angry, and burns the enemy village to the ground.  The shamanic magic is the invocation of the weaverbird.  The sun's anger is the consequence of the weaverbird's deed.  It's not that the weaverbird had the ability to obliterate villages by fire, it's that the spirit world isn't isolated and has laws.  Another example, commonly used, is to invoke one spirit to serve as a guardian, or boundary, or intermediary, or representative, before further interaction with the spirit world.  The spirit's power over the material world is not the point, and it is not the spirit accomplishing the deed desired.

So any spirit magic system which confines itself to calling spirits to take direct action is missing much of the meat of things, IMO.  This is a mild dissatisfaction of mine with Sorcerer as writ; it focusses on this aspect of spirit magics as the primary thrust of power, when if anything I'd say it's frequently a minor element of the tales.  Wouldn't take much drifting to get this, and in fact one could use Boost(Lore) and so on as being direct implementations... but by hiding that application within a subset of a direct-effect power it is nonetheless downplayed.  And some of these "not the demon taking action" effects, most notably the possible restriction that one can summon a particular greater one only through the agency of his lesser representative, are relegated to GM invention and ingenuity altogether, not supported in the text at all.  Not a flaw, as such, but a definite bias in focus.

- Eric

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Eric,

You might want to review the term "user" in Sorcerer. The subtle ways in which it may apply to most of the abilities in the game address your concern fully, I think.

Best,
Ron

[Mike Holmes]

I know that I've already mentioned it, but all of the criteria that people are putting out there for animist systems is precisely how HeroQuest does animism.

Spirits are potentially everwhere, and come in infinite variety, and Animism is about performing rituals to "befriend" them. Shamans have Fetches that guide them to the spirit world. You have to placate spirits or they either won't work for you, or may even be hostile to you. Taboos are written right into the description of the tradition in question. Shaman can cause spirits to inhabit folks in a process generically called "heroforming."

Etc, etc. My current character in one game is an animist, a member of the SurEnslib tradition, and a member specifically of the Agsargon Practice. Agsargon is a majestic spirit of tradition, and I have one of the smaller spirits of protocol - one that looks like a blue heron to those who can see into the spirit world, and who embodies protocol and the importance of places in diplomacy. He resides in the character's headdress fetish. The befriending happened as part of chargen, but I look forward to obtaining more spirits in fetishes (and more in charms, too, of which my character already has many), and am contemplating one day having the character move on to perhaps becoming a shaman.

If you're going to make a game about animism, I'd strongly suggest checking out HeroQuest as part of your research.

Mike

[Daniel Solis]

Etc, etc. My current character in one game is an animist, a member of the SurEnslib tradition, and a member specifically of the Agsargon Practice. Agsargon is a majestic spirit of tradition, and I have one of the smaller spirits of protocol - one that looks like a blue heron to those who can see into the spirit world, and who embodies protocol and the importance of places in diplomacy. He resides in the character's headdress fetish.

Well poop. That's pretty much how I pictured spirit magic some day working in Gears & Spears. I've gotta check out this game.

[Bevan]

Another angle for you to consider:

Not all "spirit magic" paradigms revolve around the spirit accomplishing the deed.  The spirit's assistance is required, but the actual effect may either be a deed done by the practitioner and made possible by the spirit's presence or intervention, or an "underlying spiritual physics" consequence of the spirit's actions.


- Eric

Well, in "Spritus Mundi," there is sympathetic magic as well as spirit mastery, and some of the rituals for sympathetic magic use invocations to gods and spirits, which seems to relate to what you're talking about. Though the sympathetic magic is generally not as effective (though a good deal safer) than spirit mastery.

[Mark Causey]

You might want to consider what I do for spirit magic in the new world I'm coming up with:

Why bother with a new spirit every time you want an effect? is what I said to myself. If the spirits in your world can somewhat easily travel from where they are to where you are, begin forming a relationship with one. Make some deals with it, make it want to be around you and stick around your area. Then, let it deal with spirits for you, pick and find who you need to summon (if it can) or even manipulate some mindless spirits for you (if such things exist). Then, if for some reason you got attacked, it might be able to help in a pinch, and if you allow it, it can learn some abilities and do things you find repeatedly necessary, such as a fireball or healing. And if the spirit of some nearby object or spirit summoner is attacking it, you might be able to help *it* out, do things *it* needs on a repeated basis (burn the correct incense, maintain a grave, etc.).

Hope this helps!

Faithfully Yours,

Aman the Rejected