Free-standing Passer Demons?

[DannyK]

Ron Edwards said in a different thread about why Demons don't just kill their sorcerers:
1) is the demon's Need. A demon Bound to a dead sorcerer does not have someone around who is meeting its Need. Some demons are capable of acting on their own to get it, but the way I conceive it, doing it for yourself (as a demon) just "isn't the same." And a demon who doesn't get its Need eventually sickens, drops in Power, and gets Banished.

2) is the "grounding" effect of Binding. An un-Bound demon also eventually sickens, drops in Power, and gets Banished.

So there's a bit of a trade-off. A demon with a dead master tends to stick with the Binding in order to remain in existence, but also to seek a new Binder in order to get its Need met (or met more consistently). The "window" of being un-Bound between the two masters is clearly quite a vulnerable time for a demon.

All of this becomes more interesting with a couple of other rules in action. The first is when we're talking about Possessors and Parasites, who suffer from the same sicken/weaken/Banish problem if they do not have a current host. The second is the possible role of the Contain ritual, which, as well as limiting a demon's movements and actions, provides an indefinite defense against the adverse affects of being in Need and being un-Bound.

OK, after reading these words of wisdom from Ron and re-reading the relevant parts of the book, I'm still having difficulty with this.  

I'm thinking of what surely must be a common Demon type, the Demon Lover.  I'm thinking of a Passer Demon that appears to  be a high-class Las Vegas hooker, hooks up with visitors that are there to gamble, shows them a good time... then drives them to ruination somehow, probably using Warp and/or Taint.   The Demon likes the good times, but gets its Need met when it can drive the john to ruin or death.  

So far, so good.  But then I'm thinking, where is the sorcerer here?  I guess you could say the john is the sorcerer, who summoned the Demon when he picked her up or called the escort service or whatever.  But that doesn't seem right; the john is a schmuck from the Midwest somewhere, no Lore at all.  

So, what possibilities are there to explain the D.L. within the rules?  
--I could see the D.L. being left out there after its sorcerer died, getting increasingly raggedy and desperate.
--I could see the D.L. being the bound Demon of a sorcerer who lets it do its thing with the tourists when it's not needed.  

Any other suggestions for how to make this work?  
I got the idea while reading Void Moon by Michael Connelly, by the way.  It's very Sorcerer-and-Soul-ish.

[Lxndr]

Its "pimp", so to speak, is its sorcerer.

Alternatively, under some interpretations of the rituals, the John has reached a point in his life where he's desperate enough that his gambling and other Vegas activities constitute a Contacting, and then a Summoning, ritual.  Remember, rituals can be ANYTHING.  And if Lore is defined properly, perhaps Joe Schmo from the Midwest has crawled close enough to the edge, while in Vegas, that he's picked up a point of Lore in the process of Contacting/Summoning.

Alternatively, perhaps everyone's Lore score is one higher in Vegas.  This can give the town a very dreamlike quality, and really feels like it fits in with the "what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" attitude.  Thus when Joe Schmo shows up, things get a little weird... Vegas-style... as he gets his Lore of 1.

[Ron Edwards]

The trouble with this scenario, Danny, is not "how can it be done," but selecting from among the dozens of different possible ways.

Can the victim be the sorcerer? Sure. Just put an element of a deliberate "going too far" into his actions that link him to the demon. This one time, he cheated, or this one time, he gambled something that a friend trusted him not to risk. Formalize or de-formalize the rituals involved to suit.

Can the sorcerer be someone else, perhaps far away, perhaps out of the immediate picture? Sure. Just have him or her make it possible for the demon to ply its pleasures, in any number of ways. Connect the demon's Need to the ruination of the victims, or don't - perhaps the ruinations have nothing to do with the demon's Need and/or Desire, and are actually straightforward tasks assigned by its master. Or maybe the master uses it for other things, very rarely, and its Vegas activities are all about its Desire and/or Need. Whichever.

Best,
Ron

[DannyK]

Hey, that's neat.  That would fit really well for the idea I was toying with, which is basically duct-taping Tim Power's "Last Call" to "Void Moon" and "Casino", asking my players to make gritty modern-noir characters, and run it freely from there.  

(Yeah, I've kicked around at least 3 other Sorcerer ideas, but I think now I should try something pretty close to "standard Sorcerer" before trying to jump genres.)