How many wyters do characters sacrifice to?

[Brootse]

Do wyters have some sort of pyramid scheme going on with other wyters, or do they only associate with their worshippers? If a character joins the Wolf Pirates, does he sacrifice POW only to his own ship's wyter, or also to the whole fleet's wyter?  Or does the fleet wyter get its power from the ship wyters? And for how many wyters does a soldier in the Lunar Heartland Corps sacrifice to? Or a Sartarite farmer or city dwelling guild member?

[jajagappa]

2 hours ago, Brootse said:

Do wyters have some sort of pyramid scheme going on with other wyters, or do they only associate with their worshippers?

I don't know that there is a pyramid scheme, but clans will have wyters, and tribes or cities will too.

[Joerg]

I don't think that clan wyters have an uplink to tribal or national wyters (except when the clan holds rites/sacrifices especially dedicated to the tribe or the nation). The clan wyter usually serves as the conduit of the sacrificed magic to whichever deity (or deities) the rite addresses.

If you live in a city, you will attend rites where you sacrifice to the city wyter. When you visit a temple, you are expected to sacrifice some magic to the temple wyter. The tribal wyter is in the end just a special case of a temple wyter.

As part of a hero band or war band, you will sacrifice to that band's wyter. The smaller your band, the bigger your sacrifice... Similar if you join a warrior society or similar secret society.

 

A well socialized character may have half a dozen wyters he may give regular sacrifice.

 

I am not entirely sure that a POW sacrifice is required to become a member of a ship's crew or a warband. Lay members who contribute magic are usually welcome.

[soltakss]

Wyters don't worship, Wyters are worshipped.

Imagine a Great Temple, that would have a number of Minor Temples to different deities, as part of its collective worship, many of these would have Shrines to various Heroes and Subcults. Each Shrine or Minor Temple would have its own Wyter, as would the Great Temple. These Wyters defend their own areas and accept POW from their own cultists. However, a Wyter for a Yelornan shrine in a Yelmalio Temple would not give its own POW to the Wyter of the Yelmlaio Temple.

Cultists might sacrifice to more than one Wyter, though, so a Cultists who belongs to both Yelorna and Yelmalio might sacrifice to both Wyters.

Edited December 1, 2019 by soltakss

[g33k]

3 hours ago, soltakss said:

Wyters don't worship, Wyters are worshipped.

Dunno...  Some spirits offer worship; it's not clear to me that canon is clear on whether Wyters always/often/occasionally/never offer worship.

And when it comes to anything regarding a PC, of course all the norms are subject to one-off exceptions.

YGWV

[davecake]

A wyter normally is worshipped as part of the worship ceremony for associated clan gods. For most PCs, the worship of Orlanth or other major clan gods includes the wyter. Usually a person will give magic points like this only to the clan wyter and to temple spirits (that are part of the worship ceremony at the temple). 

If the wyter uses its power to aid the clan, it becomes weak. The 'priest' (usually the clan chief, for Orlanthi) may ask the community to give it power. This is a special thing, it doesn't happen all the time. This happens as often as the GM wants, and usually is not mandatory but voluntary. 

I don't POW sacrifice is usually necessary, having the appropriate Passion and participating in worship will do. 

[Lordabdul]

On 12/1/2019 at 5:59 PM, g33k said:

Dunno...  Some spirits offer worship

Errr whenever I read "Blah offers worship" in a book, I interpret that as "Blah offers you the possibility to worship him/her". Am I reading this wrong?

My understanding is that, indeed, wyters are worshipped -- they don't worship themselves or do much besides what they're being told to do, and they do that using the magic points given to them during worship ceremonies. I don't think wyters communicate with each other either -- in many cases, the wyter's radius of influence barely covers the clan's lands, and so doesn't overlap much with the neighbouring wyter.

[g33k]

1 hour ago, lordabdul said:

Errr whenever I read "Blah offers worship" in a book, I interpret that as "Blah offers you the possibility to worship him/her". Am I reading this wrong?

...

The worshiper "offers worship" to the worshiped -- "the faithful offered worship to their deity," or "they went down to the river and offered worship."

I can envision phrasing where the reverse is what's meant; but the default meaning (without semantic gymnastics) is that the offering is the act (just as coin or other sacrifice can be an "offering").

Edited December 6, 2019 by g33k
(paren

[g33k]

43 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

...

My understanding is that, indeed, wyters are worshipped -- they don't worship themselves or do much besides what they're being told to do, and they do that using the magic points given to them during worship ceremonies. I don't think wyters communicate with each other either -- in many cases, the wyter's radius of influence barely covers the clan's lands, and so doesn't overlap much with the neighbouring wyter.

Wyters are weird.

I think you've described them OK, above, but let's deconstruct one element, a bit...

Quote

wyters ... don't ... do much besides what they're being told to do

So they're... like machines?  Or ... slaves?

And we... worship them???   buuuhhhh...     🤯

  

[g33k]

On 12/1/2019 at 2:22 PM, soltakss said:

Wyters don't worship, Wyters are worshipped.

Imagine a Great Temple, that would have a number of Minor Temples to different deities, as part of its collective worship, many of these would have Shrines to various Heroes and Subcults. Each Shrine or Minor Temple would have its own Wyter, as would the Great Temple. These Wyters defend their own areas and accept POW from their own cultists. However, a Wyter for a Yelornan shrine in a Yelmalio Temple would not give its own POW to the Wyter of the Yelmlaio Temple.

Cultists might sacrifice to more than one Wyter, though, so a Cultists who belongs to both Yelorna and Yelmalio might sacrifice to both Wyters.

We do know that some spirits worship up the food chain.  For example, a Rune Lord's Allied Spirit is an Initiate exactly like any other, including IIRC worship of the deity, sacrifice for Rune Pool, etc.

We do not know that wyters do or don't -- or even can or cannot -- follow this model.

Without any unambiguous canonical/official answer, I will presume the "official" position is, "we don't see it as a detail that's important to pin down.  either way is equally 'Gloranthan' in character."

But it really doesn't matter what's canonical/official -- YGWV after all -- but what you prefer at your table, in your games.

===

For me, it seems really unlikely that a major spirit of a temple or shrine is NOT one of the worshippers of the deity it's dedicated to!  Mostly, those wyters DO worship upward to the deity.  For clan and military wyters, it's much more variable and case-by-case; some do, some do not.

YGWV; mine certainly does!

 

[Lordabdul]

2 hours ago, g33k said:

So they're... like machines?  Or ... slaves?

And we... worship them???   buuuhhhh...     🤯

Well yeah, I mean, they're bound to a sacred object in the mundane world, and if that object is destroyed, half your clan goes on a quest/heroquest to go recapture the wyter. Sounds like "prisoner" to me. Plus, the wyter is bound to a priest who gives it orders... but I guess the wyter finds some advantages to this arrangement, like a steady supply of power, and a cozy home away from hostile spirits.

I'm wondering about how "independent" wyters and allied spirits are, though. My instinct would be to play them a bit like an AI assistant in a cyberpunk game, or a genie from a bottle, i.e. capable of intelligence, but not necessarily sentient, let alone sapient... after all, it seems like you can order them around and don't need to "convince" them, no? (it might be embarrassing when the clan's wyter refuses to do whatever the chieftain says) Do shamans or Rune Lords ever fight with their spirits? It seems to me they follow orders, until they're somehow released.

[Qizilbashwoman]

5 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

Do shamans or Rune Lords ever fight with their spirits? It seems to me they follow orders, until they're somehow released.

You struggle to become a shaman, not with your fetch. Your fetch stands in for your soul when you spirit project, so it better not be able to fight you.

Linked spirits are ... indeed, like friendly AI, in a weird way. They're sentient, but they're also limited by rules. A wyter can't attack a tribal member - but it can bite someone declared outlaw.

[soltakss]

16 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Your fetch stands in for your soul when you spirit project, so it better not be able to fight you.

I've never liked that.

Your fetch is yourself on the Spirit Plane, your Spirit-Self. Why shouldn't the Fetch be the one gallivanting on the Spirit Plane while you are sitting down, banging drums, shaking rattles and mumbling incoherently to yourself? That makes a lot more sense to me.

[Qizilbashwoman]

1 minute ago, soltakss said:

Why shouldn't the Fetch be the one gallivanting on the Spirit Plane while you are sitting down, banging drums, shaking rattles and mumbling incoherently to yourself? That makes a lot more sense to me.

I think the idea is you are able to swap places and "lucid dream", unlike normies

[Lordabdul]

7 minutes ago, soltakss said:

Your fetch is yourself on the Spirit Plane, your Spirit-Self. Why shouldn't the Fetch be the one gallivanting on the Spirit Plane while you are sitting down, banging drums, shaking rattles and mumbling incoherently to yourself? That makes a lot more sense to me.

You could actually play it like that -- whether the shaman's body is unconscious, protected by his fetch in spirit form, and his discorporated mind is wandering the Spirit World, or if the shaman's body is in a trance (dancing and mumbling), protected by his own mind's limited abilities during a trance, and it's the fetch doing the work in the Spirit World... well... it's almost identical in terms of game mechanics I guess? The only difference is that the player would switch over to the fetch's stats (current POW/magic points, etc.) instead of carrying on with their shaman's stats.