Upcoming Shamanic Content

[HreshtIronBorne]

I have a player that just rolled up a shaman as a PC. I looked through the core rules and have gone through some of my old RQ3 books for Spirit Cults and only found a couple including the ones in RQG.

Are the construction and maintenance of having a Shaman in play left up to the GM to figure out completely?

I have been using handouts from a previous campaigns generously donated from my old GM to flesh out the rolling on charts for spirit encounter and stuff. 

I guess I have to come up with an Agimori Ancestor worshiper's view of the spirit plane from whole cloth, then populate some of the charts from the core rules with spirits befitting that realm? On the note of Agimori Shaman, could an ancestor worshipping Agimori get magic from Lodril through Ancestor Worship? 

[metcalph]

6 minutes ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

On the note of Agimori Shaman, could an ancestor worshipping Agimori get magic from Lodril through Ancestor Worship? 

IMO yes but only from the ancestral version of Lodril that they worship, not the Dara Happan version for instance.

[hipsterinspace]

51 minutes ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I guess I have to come up with an Agimori Ancestor worshiper's view of the spirit plane from whole cloth, then populate some of the charts from the core rules with spirits befitting that realm? On the note of Agimori Shaman, could an ancestor worshipping Agimori get magic from Lodril through Ancestor Worship? 

As a people descended from fire and still very directly connected to it, I would think Oakfed will get some pretty significant veneration from such a tradition, as both one of the most important Fire spirits of Prax and as a son of Lodril and brother to their people.

As the primary god/spirit followed by their people, Foundchild probably gets veneration from shamans for teaching them how to hunt to survive, and if the old material is anything to go by, probably offers Sureshot as a spirit cult. I don’t know that the Men-and-a-Half use dogs, but Brother Dog is spiritually and mythically important to Foundchild’s cult and practices, and offers the rune spell Conquer Beast.

Perhaps a particularly powerful ancestor shaman might be able to connect with one of the great spirits/gods from their old home in Pamaltela to get access to Soulspear from Vangono or Fleetfoot from Jmijie, something like that, but that would probably be difficult to mythically reconcile in Prax where many of their analogues were destroyed by chaos.

[radmonger]

The rq;g rules re reasonable enough for the in-adventure activities of a shaman, but they are currently lack anything structured on the kind of things they would do in downtime. The same applies, of course, to sorcerers.

What you shouldn't do is use the in-adventure rules to run a minute-by minute simulation of every magic thing the character does during downtime.  Which i think is what you would get if you just converted the rq2 encounter tables. This is likely to be horribly broken, as 3 months of simulated adventuring would be the equivalent of 30 or so gameplay sessions.

if your pc says 'ok, over the next season i want to learn some fire magic', ideally there would be a table listing things that could happen as a result. in the absence of such a table:

1. have them roll a selection of shamanic skills, applying bonuses based on season and relevant spirit society membership.
2. count total successes (accounting for specials, critical and fumbles in the obvious way).
3. decide if that is great. good, mediocre, bad or terrible.
4. make up an appropriate result, something that wouldn't have felt out of place in the table, had it existed.

for example, if they get a truly  great result, then they may well establish friendly relations with a Great Spirit who may well be Lodril, or a close relation. They have the opportunity to learn a Lodril -only fire rune spell. On a mediocre one, they get a chance to learn ignite. On a terrible one, they get a curse, or fire-scarring.

[David Scott]

4 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

On the note of Agimori Shaman, could an ancestor worshipping Agimori get magic from Lodril through Ancestor Worship? 

The Men-and-a-half of Prax (are not agimori), hold Pamalt to be a great ancestor but worship him through the Daka Fal cult (you'll see this in the Earth cults Book). Likewise they can join the cult of Lodril as an initiate and Rune magic normally. Having Pamalt as an ancestor would likely put you on a leadership path, rather the the fire path of lodril. Shamans with Daka Fal as their Greater Entity would likely have Lodril as a spirit cult and vice-versa. Men-and-a-half shaman would be experts in Life, fire, and disorder vortices, likewise earth, and power from Pamalt.

[g33k]

4 hours ago, David Scott said:

The Men-and-a-half of Prax (are not agimori) ...

WaitWHAT??!?

What strange retconning hast ye wrought this time, O people of the Chaosium?
(Thou art not -- as all the world knows -- people of the Orderium)

[dumuzid]

Yeah, if that's the case then somebody's gonna need to update the Bestiary entry on the Man-and-a-Half, homo sapiens agimori:

"These are the Agimori, the Men-and-a-half, one of the ten independent tribes of Prax. Great hunters and deadly fighters in any land, they are considered by many to be the finest infantry of Glorantha." (RQ Bestiary, p. 48)

Edited April 19, 2023 by dumuzid

[Squaredeal Sten]

17 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I have a player that just rolled up a shaman as a PC. I looked through the core rules and have gone through some of my old RQ3 books for Spirit Cults and only found a couple including the ones in RQG.

Are the construction and maintenance of having a Shaman in play left up to the GM to figure out completely?

I have been using handouts from a previous campaigns generously donated from my old GM to flesh out the rolling on charts for spirit encounter and stuff. 

I guess I have to come up with an Agimori Ancestor worshiper's view of the spirit plane from whole cloth, then populate some of the charts from the core rules with spirits befitting that realm? On the note of Agimori Shaman, could an ancestor worshipping Agimori get magic from Lodril through Ancestor Worship? 

Since you have thought about the subject, and you appear to have a full shaman player while I only have a very new apprentice, would you kindly tell me:  What prep do you think is important?  What have you decided is needed, for what contingencies?

Edited April 20, 2023 by Squaredeal Sten
Several typing errors

[HreshtIronBorne]

42 minutes ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

What prep do you think is important?  What have you decided as needed, for what contingencies?

I have been trying to prepare a suitably engaging Shamanic Landscape for him to explore. I am building off the basic encounter charts and tools from the core rules. 

 

We played with a Dala Fal Praxian in the last campaign and so put together some charts for different regions of rhe spirit realm that were familiar to that tradition. 

We created a chart for Random hostile spirit types that first determines type of spirit like animal spirits or plant spirits. Then another chart that determines what specific spirit within a type like amphibians or crustaceans from the animal spirits. 

 

We used rhe Basic Outline of a Spirit Journey from the Core Rules to create a framework for spell/spirit seeking. Basically:

Determine the goal of the journey; spell, spirit, new pact, contacting Great Entity

State whether Extending Discorporation

Starting ritual magic and prep spells

Discorporate (1d6 hours)

One Spirit Travel Roll (may move to new region)

One planned encounter

Each hour roll for a hostile spirit encounter.

Extend spend 1mp and roll extra 1d6

Repeat 1 travel, 1 planned encounter, and a random encounter each hour. 

 

We used the Great Herd and Daka Fal's Fire as Praxian Spirit Places that the Shaman new. We generated a list of sensible spirits that may be encountered when in those specific regions. 

 

Mostly I would like to have a better idea of what spirit places are and how they connect and interact. Maybe an example or two of different Shamanic journeys and their resolutions. 

I am trying to piece together how the Men-and-a-Half would view the spirit world and make it compelling and fun for my adventurers. 

[David Scott]

2 hours ago, g33k said:

WaitWHAT??!?

In my Glorantha, the men-and-a-half are separate from the their southern cousins by at least 1600 years and their problems with having children. Ignoring the god learner scientific names makes it all much easier. For me, it’s a bit like the Welsh settlers in Chile, who went there 100 years ago. They have the same history and language, but an entirely different locale with its own customs and languages. So in my mind men-and-half aren’t Agimori. 
 

please note this not @Scotty

Edited April 19, 2023 by David Scott

[French Desperate WindChild]

23 minutes ago, David Scott said:

please note this not @Scotty

once we understand that Scotty is in Pamaltela and David is in Prax, everything is clear !

[Qizilbashwoman]

1 hour ago, David Scott said:

In my Glorantha, the men-and-a-half are separate from the their southern cousins by at least 1600 years and their problems with having children. Ignoring the god learner scientific names makes it all much easier. For me, it’s a bit like the Welsh settlers in Chile, who went there 100 years ago. They have the same history and language, but an entirely different locale with its own customs and languages. So in my mind men-and-half aren’t Agimori. 
 

please note this not @Scotty

I have to tell you that the people of y Wladfa would not appreciate that dissociation from Wales. They might be rough and tumble gaúchos, but they sure as heck are Welsh

[Squaredeal Sten]

A map of spirit places sounds great to me, thanks for the thought.  A set of spirit encounter tables, OK.  But how about a planned, coherent spirit world adventure?

I do see a problem in that the Adventurer has to plan to leave his body and go into the spirit world.   You can't randomly throw him into it.   So like any other adventure, the first thing to create is the adventure hook.  Maybe someone is possessed, maybe they come to the shaman for help, maybe the group's larger adventure requires the shaman to go get a spell from x to solve problem y.

Of course I see this drawback to doing a shamanic adventure at all: If the Adventurers are not all shamans, then what do the rest of the table do while the shaman is having his private adventure?  So personally I would keep that private adventure short.

Thanks for starting these trains of thought as well as your thread.

I am curious about what the voices of experience will say.

[French Desperate WindChild]

2 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

A map of spirit places sounds great to me, thanks for the thought.  A set of spirit encounter tables, OK.  But how about a planned, coherent spirit world adventure?

I do see a problem in that the Adventurer has to plan to leave his body and go into the spirit world.   You can't randomly throw him into it.   So like any other adventure, the first thing to create is the adventure hook.  Maybe someone is possessed, maybe they come to the shaman for help, maybe the group's larger adventure requires the shaman to go get a spell from x to solve problem y.

Of course I see this drawback to doing a shamanic adventure at all: If the Adventurers are not all shamans, then what do the rest of the table do while the shaman is having his private adventure?  So personally I would keep that private adventure short.

Thanks for starting these trains of thought as well as your thread.

I am curious about what the voices of experience will say.

I fully agree

In addtion  I would add a part of this adventure to  involve pc who are not shaman (= not able to discorporate for enough time by themselves).  Not only the preparation but, if we want the shamanic/spirit plane experience as a real part of the travel (not only 30min - 1h irl but sessions), the scenario should propose some great and consistent explanation to see all the players playing this adventure

 

[Squaredeal Sten]

It looks as though David Scott has put considerable thought into this.  Look at these threads:

Middle World and Spirit World Location Correlation

https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/15548-middle-world-and-spirit-world-location-correlation/#comment-244221

 

and here is an example from play

also Contacting spirits to solve a crime...https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/12879-contacting-spirits-to-solve-a-crime/#comment-201255

---

[HreshtIronBorne]

I had not seen the second post you just linked but David Scott's many posts about Shamanism and bringing into play were how we managed to put together the charts and Spirit Maps we are using right now. 

[Darius West]

On 4/19/2023 at 7:44 PM, hipsterinspace said:

As a people descended from fire and still very directly connected to it, I would think Oakfed will get some pretty significant veneration from such a tradition, as both one of the most important Fire spirits of Prax and as a son of Lodril and brother to their people.

You'd think so, but the Agimori only seem to worship Lodril, their Hunter God, and Helpwoman.  By the same token, you'd think that Praxians would have help from dogs in their herding, given that they venerate Brother Dog like the Balazarings, but they only have dogs as camp guards.  Go figure...

[Joerg]

21 hours ago, David Scott said:

In my Glorantha, the men-and-a-half are separate from the their southern cousins by at least 1600 years and their problems with having children. Ignoring the god learner scientific names makes it all much easier. For me, it’s a bit like the Welsh settlers in Chile, who went there 100 years ago. They have the same history and language, but an entirely different locale with its own customs and languages. So in my mind men-and-half aren’t Agimori. 
 

please note this not @Scotty

"Not agimori" in terms of Doraddi culture with medicine plants and all that, I'll grant you that. Not in cultic practice, either, since I guess it would be hard to worship Pamalt in the ruins of Genert's Garden.

The lack of medicine plants may go a long way to explain their procreative problems, alongside with their extremely reluctant drinking.

IMG they are fairly similar to some of the more primitive hunters of Tarien, if there are any men-and-a-half left among those. The only Pamaltelan men-and-a-half explicitely mentioned in the Guide live in Laskal.

 

Agimori in terms of phenotype (to avoid that four-letter-word) still applies to them, unlike the other dark-skinned Praxians who would be of Wareran phenotype (even if of diminuitive stature), with the possible exception of the Basmoli whose ancestral migration may have started in Tarien and may have led them through Seshnela.

 

On the other hand, I find it extremely hard to think of people with a few generations of living in the USA as German or British, regardless of their families' roots.

[Squaredeal Sten]

3 hours ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

I had not seen the second post you just linked but David Scott's many posts about Shamanism and bringing into play were how we managed to put together the charts and Spirit Maps we are using right now. 

Have you flowcharted the sequence yet?  Handy to keep everyone under the same understanding.

As i look at it the GM should keep two counter tracks:  The original 1D6 of time rolled/used, and  Extension Time bought & rolled and time used.  The total of the two used figures will be needed for that hourly roll vs. POWx4 or hit point loss.

[David Scott]

2 hours ago, Darius West said:

You'd think so, but the Agimori only seem to worship Lodril, their Hunter God, and Helpwoman.

And 5% other. There are about 2900 Men-and-a-half (half can be considered children, leaving 1450 x 0.05= ) 73 who are members of other cults.

It's likely that many are also lay members and initiates of Oakfed, or its spirit cult, and many other spirit cults.

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Go figure...

Waha's brother was turned into a dog.

[Squaredeal Sten]

I think this (uploaded file) flowchart matches the Spirit world / spirit travel rules on pages 371-375.  If you see an error in it please tell me.

Sorry for the crude quality of the flowcharting, that is as good as I can do with MS-Word.

 

 

Flowchar in spirit world.pdf

[jajagappa]

20 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

I do see a problem in that the Adventurer has to plan to leave his body and go into the spirit world.   You can't randomly throw him into it.   So like any other adventure, the first thing to create is the adventure hook.  Maybe someone is possessed, maybe they come to the shaman for help, maybe the group's larger adventure requires the shaman to go get a spell from x to solve problem y.

Of course I see this drawback to doing a shamanic adventure at all: If the Adventurers are not all shamans, then what do the rest of the table do while the shaman is having his private adventure?  So personally I would keep that private adventure short.

Thanks for starting these trains of thought as well as your thread.

I am curious about what the voices of experience will say.

I've had a shaman bring non-shamans into the Spirit World to aid his task at defeating a foe. It entails risk for the non-shamans as they have no fetch to protect their bodies (though I think in the adventure I ran the shaman's fetch nominally protected the others, or else I had an NPC stand watch).

I play that parts of the Spirit World are ever-shifting. There are "wars" between rival spirits when encountered. Some spirits try to insert themselves in certain points in the Spirit World.

In the scenario I ran, a vough (nominally associated with dark marshlands of Darjiin) was brought by the Lunars into the Guardian Woods of the Colymar and began blighting the waters and the woods (and spawning brollachan, of course). Once discorporate, the PC's worked their way through the Silverwoods (a "borderland" between the mundane and Spirit Worlds), then into the Spirit side of the Colymar lands (a very vivid, colorful land where some features were familiar (i.e. Kero Fin exists in the Spirit World) and others were non-existent (i.e. no Red Moon)). The PC's found a twisting trail that led deeper into the Spirit World and eventually found the Assembly of Small Spirits (they were able to gain spirit allies/spells from them). They went deeper into the land of the Heavy Earth (giant earth spirits - one PC discovered her inner bear to defeat them, and transformed herself in the process into an Odaylan). Eventually they came to a dismal swamp where the vough dwelt (and a portal between their current "place" and the Dismal Swamp). They defeated the vough and destroyed the portal, thus removing the link between those Spirit World locations.

I've run other scenarios where the PC's pass in body into the Otherworld (Spirit World? Gods World? - some lie in both or along the borders). The danger going bodily into the Spirit World is that if you "die" or get trapped, you don't return and your body dies in the Other Side without opportunity for resurrection.