Oakfed in play

[Kargzant]

Hey all. One of my players is creating a Shaman of Oakfed and I want one of the perks of their devotion being the ability to summon Oakfed himself. Does anyone know a template that I could use to make a spirit that is stronger than a salamander but weaker than a god? I would like the shaman to have to bargain with Oakfed rather than using Command Cult Spirit and make concessions to get him back to the spirit world through roleplaying. What would be a good offering to a spirit like Oakfed in exchange for service? I don't know if anyone has experience with Oakfed as a focus of worship, but I would appreciate some advice.

[g33k]

MP sacrifice is of small -- but real -- value.
POW sacrifice is worth more.
Service -- spreading fires, carrying fire to new places, etc -- is worth a varying amount.
Other services, as you & your player invent.

Roll or role-play or both, for bargains.

[Shiningbrow]

1 hour ago, Kargzant said:

What would be a good offering to a spirit like Oakfed in exchange for service?

An Aldryami forest 😛

[Squaredeal Sten]

3 hours ago, Kargzant said:

.... What would be a good offering to a spirit like Oakfed in exchange for service? I don't know if anyone has experience with Oakfed as a focus of worship, but I would appreciate some advice.

Thought #1:

If you take a look at Griffin Mountain pp.197-198 you will see some suggestions to the GM for use of a fire spirit who is much less legendary than Oakfed.  This spirit's first desires will be to be worshiped, a PC to essentially be her priest plus a regular MP sacrifice.    Oakfed, being a more significant legend, even a minor god, may already have worshipers, but IMHO will basically want the same sort of thing. 

Thought #2:

In the Cult Compendium, Oakfed is listed as as associated cult with Waha.  The entry is on p.78:

C. Oakfed
This god of Wildfire destroyed all of the once-lush
plant life of Prax. In the Darkness, Waha fought
with Oakfed and overcame him. Since then Waha
has known one of Oakfed’s spells, Cremate Dead.
Cremate Dead 1 point
Duration length of burning, Range 40 meters, Reusable.
This spell allows a priest to fully destroy the bodily remains of
any one cult member after death. It guarantees that the ghost
will not return to haunt the family. It also burns all. goods sent
along with the corpse, allowing the deceased to carry some
weapons and other supplies into the land of the dead as well. It
can be used on the skeleton, zombie, or even vampire form of a
previous Waha Initiate, Rune Lord, or Priest to burn it.

to me this implies that -

1) There is, someplace, someone worshiping Oakfed

2) Oakfed should be able to give other fire related rune spells than just this one.  Not many, it's just a big spirit or a small god, but still...

Thought #3:

Major arson is not necessarily limited to an Aldryami forest.  Setting fire to the chaparral of Prax might be equally pleasing to Oakfed.  Don't think of Prax as the Sahara or as Death Valley, most of the American southwest has considerable plant life, even if the trees look scrawny to folks who grew up in wetter areas.  And such fires do burn in the RW.   As summer comes you can verify what I write by watching this web site:  https://edac.unm.edu/new-mexico-watch-demonstration-project-statewide-webmap/

Thought #4: Oakfed is already in the Runequest in Glorantha rule book, page 379, as one of two sample spirit cults.

Thought #5: As far as summoning Oakfed, that might be like summoning Cacodemon.  In the latest version in the Glorantha Bestiary pp.196-197 you don't get Cacodemon himself but instead a very intimidating proxy.  For Oakfed I would suggest a less powerful proxy.  But however you want your Glorantha.

 

 

 

Edited March 21, 2022 by Squaredeal Sten
i read the book, often a good idea

[soltakss]

18 hours ago, Kargzant said:

Does anyone know a template that I could use to make a spirit that is stronger than a salamander but weaker than a god?

Give it a high POW and let it do 1D6 Heatshock damage per 10 POW, or part thereof with a minimum of 3D6. So, a POW 65 Oakfed would do 7D6 Heatshock damage.

Also, give it Oakfed Runemagic and allow it to Heroically Cast them, using its own Magic Points instead of Rune Points, making its POW a Rune Pool.

Let it spawn Fire Elementals by spending Magic Points, 1 for a Small, 2 for a Medium and 3 for a Large, sending them far and wide to burn things down.

It can cast Summon Wildfire on itself, sure it takes 1D6 damage per point, but it adds 1D6 Heatshock damage per point.

 

 

[Eff]

18 hours ago, Kargzant said:

Hey all. One of my players is creating a Shaman of Oakfed and I want one of the perks of their devotion being the ability to summon Oakfed himself. Does anyone know a template that I could use to make a spirit that is stronger than a salamander but weaker than a god? I would like the shaman to have to bargain with Oakfed rather than using Command Cult Spirit and make concessions to get him back to the spirit world through roleplaying. What would be a good offering to a spirit like Oakfed in exchange for service? I don't know if anyone has experience with Oakfed as a focus of worship, but I would appreciate some advice.

In Tim Powers' The Anubis Gates, the yags, fire elementals, demand payment for their services currently (early 19th century) in automata and elaborate dioramas, and in previous centuries demanded fine chess sets, sextants, and telescopes. So if you want to riff on this 1980s fantasy novel, perhaps Oakfed appreciates offerings of board game sets, as he tends to go through them like fire through tinder. 

[French Desperate WindChild]

On 3/21/2022 at 1:39 AM, Kargzant said:

I would like the shaman to have to bargain with Oakfed rather than using Command Cult Spirit

 

if your shaman is able to "command" Oakfed, she is already a semi god/great hero/etc...

So yes (except if you go far from [what I believe] Glorantha, our glorantha may vary) of course your shaman has to bargain:

1) go to a right place (travel or big fire ceremony) to enter the spirit world and find as quickly as possible Oakfed

2) start the bargain "give me an allied spirit and I will give you what you want". More powerful is the allied spirit, bigger must be the sacrifice (oath, pow or other characteristic, etc)

3) then build the allied spirit like @soltakss describes (well, if you want - but you won't 😛 - play with me the pow max must be 30)

 

some ideas for the bargain :

To identify the cost, I use DC ("divine currency")

for each D6 in the allied spirit characteristic, 1DC (aka POW = 1D6 --> 1DC, INT = 2D6 -> 2DC, ...)

for each special power (like soltkass' spawn fire elemental) between 1 and 3 DC (1 for a small elemental, 3 for a big one)

 

Then start the bargain, how devoted was your shaman previously, how was the ceremony to enter the spirit world, etc..

The cost may be reduced but not too much, I would say min 30% AND for such an allied spirit, 3DC (probably more)

Then how to obtain DC and "buy" your spirit ?

sacrifice 1 POW /  DEX / STR gives you 1 DC

1 SIZ / 1 INT gives you 2DC

CHA ? depending how easy it is in your campaign to get it, 1 or 2 DC per point

 

and now see humakt, yelmalio, and others geas . For example

never have a bath : 1DC

never drink water : 2 DC (water, or beer, or anything made with water are prohibited, but you may allow wine, fruit, blood,  ...)

maintain a great fire every wild day : 1DC

maintain a great fire all your life (aka stay 90% of your time near the fire) : 10DC

no wear except ash: 1DC

kill any water cultist on sight: 1DC *

sacrifice a water cultist every season: 2DC *

never let a fire be extinguished by a mortal : 1DC

etc...

 

* well reading my answer... it depends how psychopath is your Oakfed 😛

[David Scott]

On 3/21/2022 at 12:39 AM, Kargzant said:

Hey all. One of my players is creating a Shaman of Oakfed and I want one of the perks of their devotion being the ability to summon Oakfed himself. Does anyone know a template that I could use to make a spirit that is stronger than a salamander but weaker than a god? I would like the shaman to have to bargain with Oakfed rather than using Command Cult Spirit and make concessions to get him back to the spirit world through roleplaying. What would be a good offering to a spirit like Oakfed in exchange for service? I don't know if anyone has experience with Oakfed as a focus of worship, but I would appreciate some advice.

The easiest way to do this is to make Oakfed, the shaman's Greater Entity (see Stage Two—The Crossing, RQG, page 354). Then when choosing Shamanic abilities, give them all are Fire bent where possible, (Fire Spirit) Affinity is the most obvious, along with Show Spirit. Next, Create Wildfire summons Oakfed (used to be called Summon Oakfed). Shaman don't use Command (cult spirit) (expensive) they use Control (entity). Combined with (Fire Spirit) Affinity makes summoned Oakfeds friendly. With friendly spirits you are effectively gifting them with magic points in return for help, that can be roleplayed.

There are a couple of ways of approaching Summoning Oakfed, Gaining a new shamanic ability is the key:

Have the shaman journey to Oakfed's home in the spirit world, and make a new ability called something like Summon Oakfed (to actually bring down a fraction of Oakfed) or Embody Oakfed (to become Oakfed), etc. Have each point of Summon Oakfed brings an Oakfed starting at 96 on the Spirit Contact table (page 359).

Alternatively the new shamanic ability could be a more powerful version of Spirit Pact (page 358) (call it Fire Spirit Pact or Oakfed Spirit Pact). Use it to reduce the POW cost for the shaman - each level adds +10 POW to the spirit's POW threshold, so normally 1 point of POW per 10 points of POW the spirit possesses, but works as

• Level 1 - 1 point of POW per 20 points of POW the spirit possesses
• Level 2 - 1 point of POW per 30 points of POW the spirit possesses
• Level 3 - 1 point of POW per 40 points of POW the spirit possesses

The adventurer should be able to have a 5D6+6 POW (Ave 18) Oakfed for a single point of POW for starters.

Just treat the oakfed as an elemental. In these versions Oakfed is alway with the adventurer (use Show Spirit to scare people)

[Nick Brooke]

One critical point to make: Oakfed is the god of uncontrollable wildfires. You can easily use his powers to start stuff burning, but good luck trying to stop it, or controlling where those fires go and how fast they spread once you've started them. Play with wildfire, get burned.

[Darius West]

Try pages 306 which mentions Oakfed as a Waha associated cult and 379 on RQG for the write-up.  Page 325 has the Create Wildfire Rune Spell.

His cult write-up in RQ:Gods of Glorantha is on page 206 of the Preview Edition.  It specifies that Oakfed is known as Envirinus by the Pelorians, and that initiates may not learn Extinguish or allow a fire to go out completely, and may only learn Rune Spells if they make a 100L donation (presumably burned?)

You ask how to empower a Salamander, well Create Wildfire enhances a Salamander's damage.

Interestingly Cremate Dead seems to be able to destroy any Undead, even vampires, if they overcome the Undead's magic points.

Oakfed isn't quite a 1 trick pony, but it isn't particularly versatile either.

I would suggest that you can play a Waha Shaman and take Oakfed as a spirit cult on the side as they are associates.