Learning Spirit Magic

[Shiningbrow]

On 4/20/2020 at 6:11 PM, GAZZA said:

Shamans are a different matter, since as you point out the fetch, once awakened, can never be "put back to sleep" (as it were).

Why not? I can easily see Grandfather Mortal (or Daka Fal, or maybe even Kigor Litor... Whichever god helped you to awake your *connection to* your Fetch).to be very unhappy with leaving, and you losing that connection, awareness, etc. 

After all, if a fetch can be attacked in spirit combat, and can watch over your body while you discorporate, and can cast spells independently of the shaman, then it's also a spirit that could also be bound.  And shut down. By a god - permanently.

[Joerg]

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

Why not? I can easily see Grandfather Mortal (or Daka Fal, or maybe even Kigor Litor... Whichever god helped you to awake your *connection to* your Fetch).to be very unhappy with leaving, and you losing that connection, awareness, etc. 

Because whether the deity aided the shaman or not, the Fetch is not the deity's gift, but an awakened part of the self of the shaman. It remains even after a shaman has been made into a ghost.

 

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

After all, if a fetch can be attacked in spirit combat, and can watch over your body while you discorporate, and can cast spells independently of the shaman, then it's also a spirit that could also be bound.  And shut down. By a god - permanently.

Only by binding the shaman's (disembodied) spirit as well.

And gods don't act directly in the world of mortals. They may send lesser minions (or instruct their priests to do so), but that's the extent of their involvement.

 

[GAZZA]

1 hour ago, Shiningbrow said:

Why not? I can easily see Grandfather Mortal (or Daka Fal, or maybe even Kigor Litor... Whichever god helped you to awake your *connection to* your Fetch).to be very unhappy with leaving, and you losing that connection, awareness, etc. 

I mean, obviously YGMV, but the rules (RQG pp356) are pretty clear that once you have a fetch, you always have a fetch. In addition I don't think shamanhood is something your god is all that involved with; most cults that allow shamans say something along the lines of "any initiate of X who becomes a shaman ..." (e.g. Yelm). Canonically shamanhood is a spiritual process, not a divine one, and the Horned Man is the guardian rather than any particular god.

(Though I suspect there are certainly exceptions; off the top of my head I think that Kyger Litor and Aldrya might qualify or at least give a slightly different process).

I see it as similar to cult spirit magic - your god can't take that from you either. (My knowledge is not exhaustive by any means, but I am unaware of any spirits of reprisal that grab your spirit magic, even if it is unique spirit magic (not that I'm sure that even exists any more in RQG; even Sleep is apparently open to anyone that will teach it).

[Thaz]

I think that if you 'Give up' on being your community's Shaman and wander off then it's going to be role-played consequences. If you're off to murder hobo then there will be negative consequences. If you're off serving the greater good as guardian of some mystic area or guarding against some greater threat...well then.

The Shaman in the Conan movies would have got away with it. 

 

[Shiningbrow]

4 hours ago, Joerg said:

Because whether the deity aided the shaman or not, the Fetch is not the deity's gift, but an awakened part of the self of the shaman. It remains even after a shaman has been made into a ghost.

 

4 hours ago, GAZZA said:

I mean, obviously YGMV, but the rules (RQG pp356) are pretty clear that once you have a fetch, you always have a fetch.

I'm not saying you would *lose* the fetch. I'm saying the connection gets broken (or interfered with).

As both a real world and probable Glorantha world, if the shaman over does it with drugs or alcohol (intentional or not), that connection is affected. So, logically, it's possible. Same as if the shaman or fetch get dropped to zero MP.

[GAZZA]

1 minute ago, Shiningbrow said:

I'm not saying you would *lose* the fetch. I'm saying the connection gets broken (or interfered with).

That looks to me to be a distinction without a difference.

[Shiningbrow]

Just now, GAZZA said:

That looks to me to be a distinction without a difference.

If you atone, the connection can be resumed. Just as Rune masters drop to Initiate level, and lose the mystical benefits... But, once the requirements are met again, the benefits return automatically.

[GAZZA]

47 minutes ago, Shiningbrow said:

If you atone, the connection can be resumed. Just as Rune masters drop to Initiate level, and lose the mystical benefits... But, once the requirements are met again, the benefits return automatically.

But atone to whom? The god didn't give you the fetch, and the Horned Man isn't someone you have a connection to (i.e. you don't sacrifice POW to the Horned Man). Atone to the community, I suppose? But that's a mundane duty, not a mystical one; that would be akin to saying that refusing to muck out the stables could strip you of your initiate connection to a god of horses.

[jajagappa]

10 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

and you losing that connection, awareness, etc.

As it says on p.355: "A fetch is a portion of the shaman’s soul." and on p.356: "A fetch can never be Dispelled, Dismissed, or Neutralized, and it can never be awakened accidentally. If the fetch is ever destroyed, the shaman dies."

It may be visualized in a number of different ways, but it is still a part of you that has been awakened - it's not a "link" in the way that an allied spirit is connected.

10 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

then it's also a spirit that could also be bound.

This is incorrect.  It is not a spirit.  It is your awakened ability to see into the Spirit World as well as to maintain an awareness around your body while you traverse the Spirit World.  It's not something that can be separated from you without killing you and destroying that part of you which is the fetch.

10 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

And shut down. By a god - permanently.

By awakening your fetch, you expose yourself to more dangers from the Spirit World.  This includes from the Greater Spirits which are or can be (or are a portion of) deities.  The best time to attack a shaman is when they are discorporate and then you can attack their sleeping form and the fetch.  Which is why a shaman generally wants community support so that they can help protect them while they are seeking aid from the spirits.

 

[g33k]

8 hours ago, Thaz said:

I think that if you 'Give up' on being your community's Shaman and wander off then it's going to be role-played consequences. If you're off to murder hobo then there will be negative consequences. If you're off serving the greater good as guardian of some mystic area or guarding against some greater threat...well then.

I think it puts a fair onus on the GM to figure out consequences, unless the player is willing to put in a fair degree of metagame effort into making the character's life harder...

Daka Fal, for example, CARES about this stuff.  He taught the mortal world how to separate the Living from the Dead, and he's a primary figure in the (very community-centric) process of ancestor-worship.

If your shaman turns his or her back on the community, you're turning your back on a lot of stuff that Daka Fal cares about, stuff that -- presumably -- you (at least claimed to) care about when you first presented yourself training as an assistant Shaman, and faced Bad Man to become a full Shaman.

At the VERY least:  I expect a bunch of the spirits you used to have friendly & neutral relationships with, will now become hostile.

OTOH if you Initiated via Jakaleel... 

J: <cackles madly> "You wish to leave your home and go be murder-hobo-y?  Yes yes, by all means!  Fly, little birdie, fly free!  May I suggest you look into the matter of those nasssty White Bulls who were left infesting Sacred Moonbroth, when that Arkat-hole moved on to Sartar?"

[g33k]

This question -- the separate-ness or severability of the Fetch from the Shaman -- raises an interesting parallel to me.

So IIRC the Fetch can guard your body while you go into the spirit-realm, letting you take your full attention and core identity with you -- your POV, your POW, your MP's, etc.  You are unaware of what happens with your body; you aren't THERE.

Except you are there, in some metaphysical, divided-consciousness sense; because your Fetch is there and your Fetch is you; but you aren't aware of your otherself back watching your body; we'll return to this point below.

If somebody manages to KILL your body, and you return from your spiritquest to an uninhabitable corpse, you're a ghost.  You and your Fetch go, "Well, this sucks!"  Hopefully there's someone working on a Resurrection spell, etc...

If instead someone comes and attacks your Fetch, and destroys it... You die.  Out there in the spirit-world, wherever you are... Suddenly, you feel the pull of the Path of the Dead.  You're a ghost, again; but far from your body, with no clear path back, and no Fetch to be your ally.

(I think, as an aside,  that it's this "sepatateness" of experience -- that the Fetch can do other things and be other places &c, and neither the Shaman's spirit, nor the Fetch, is terribly aware of what the other one is doing -- contributes to some people suggesting that a Fetch can be disconnected from the Shaman:  you just take that separation (where neither is in contact with the other) and make it permanent).

The thing I want to focus on, however, is the duality of the Shaman/Fetch experience; the splitting that isn't actually a separation, or a separation that doesn't split, or... something something metaphysics weird <waves hands vaguely> and then you have a Fetch... erm... not have, because it's you... you ARE a Fetch... no, wait, that's wrong too...

WHATEVER.  Stop confusing me, y'all!

The POINT is -- my original point, back when I began this accursed digression -- is to look at this split, this duality, and ask:

is this another form of -- or closely related to -- a draconic split consciousness?

[Shiningbrow]

12 hours ago, jajagappa said:

As it says on p.355: "A fetch is a portion of the shaman’s soul." and on p.356: "A fetch can never be Dispelled, Dismissed, or Neutralized, and it can never be awakened accidentally. If the fetch is ever destroyed, the shaman dies."

It may be visualized in a number of different ways, but it is still a part of you that has been awakened - it's not a "link" in the way that an allied spirit is connected.

This is incorrect.  It is not a spirit.  It is your awakened ability to see into the Spirit World as well as to maintain an awareness around your body while you traverse the Spirit World.  It's not something that can be separated from you without killing you and destroying that part of you which is the fetch.

By awakening your fetch, you expose yourself to more dangers from the Spirit World.  This includes from the Greater Spirits which are or can be (or are a portion of) deities.  The best time to attack a shaman is when they are discorporate and then you can attack their sleeping form and the fetch.  Which is why a shaman generally wants community support so that they can help protect them while they are seeking aid from the spirits.

 

And yet... It's not so much a part of your soul that when the shaman discorporates, the Fetch remains behind... 

I do see that the "A fetch can never be Dispelled, Dismissed, or Neutralized" first two (I'm not sure what the third is supposed to refer to... Neutralize Spirit sorcery???). I expect that the Fetch will suffer through n some form not unlike the person when its Magic Points fall to zero.... But, directly in reference to the quote, I'd also presume it is only referring to "normally", and gods and great spirits don't fall into that category...

Also, choosing not to commune with one's fetch, via drugs for example, should be legitimate. (Perhaps because having the Fetch has driven them mad, they had a horrifying experience, etc)

Finally, since the Fetch does remain behind to look over the body, (and the shaman doesn't use the Fetch's MPs to attack or defend), there's clearly some way to, at least slightly, "separate" the "two".

[Joerg]

14 hours ago, g33k said:

If somebody manages to KILL your body, and you return from your spiritquest to an uninhabitable corpse, you're a ghost.  You and your Fetch go, "Well, this sucks!"  Hopefully there's someone working on a Resurrection spell, etc...

A shaman should have (or acquire) the ability to self-resurrect. Repairing the body may be troublesome, but that's what possession of other beings is good for.

 

14 hours ago, g33k said:

If instead someone comes and attacks your Fetch, and destroys it... You die.  Out there in the spirit-world, wherever you are... Suddenly, you feel the pull of the Path of the Dead.  You're a ghost, again; but far from your body, with no clear path back, and no Fetch to be your ally.

This is an interesting quandary. Can your core self continue to act independently while your fetch is in the process of being destroyed?

 

14 hours ago, g33k said:

(I think, as an aside,  that it's this "sepatateness" of experience -- that the Fetch can do other things and be other places &c, and neither the Shaman's spirit, nor the Fetch, is terribly aware of what the other one is doing -- contributes to some people suggesting that a Fetch can be disconnected from the Shaman:  you just take that separation (where neither is in contact with the other) and make it permanent).

Is there a separateness of experience? Discorporation is pretty much shutting down the bodily experiences, possibly including pain, hunger etc. The Fetch only prevents spirits from taking over the prone body, it doesn't have any control over bodily functions.

 

14 hours ago, g33k said:

The POINT is -- my original point, back when I began this accursed digression -- is to look at this split, this duality, and ask:

is this another form of -- or closely related to -- a draconic split consciousness?

The split brain of draconism sort of reduces the apartness of the self from the All, IMO. It takes the experience to an outside perception, an outside ultimately beyond the borders of Creation. But that's just my personal opinion, not necessarily a cosmic insight.

[PhilHibbs]

Dreaming is an analogy that could be useful. When you are dreaming, you aren't always aware of everything that your waking self is aware of, and vice versa. They are both you, but there is a barrier between the two consciousnesses.