Malkoni and Familiars

[TRose]

 Was wondering if there any information on what types of Familiars if any are approved of in Malkoni society.

 Familiars( Or as they are called Allied spirits) are common in other religions in Glorantha but are limited in types to certain animals. And I was thinking Malkoni might have a list of what is and is not acceptable in polite society for familiars.

 As for  My players, One had a Zombie, Herd men(Pre nerfed) where the favorite because of their high int and hands, and I heard in other games people  liked dinosaurs. But in Malkoni society I was thinking undead might not be socially acceptable( Except for the Vadeli), Herd men not much better, and dinosaurs just considered too dangerous.

[soltakss]

I'm not sure of the official position, but I wouldn't have a problem with Malkioni familiars.

Each Malkioni sect might have views on what is/is not acceptable as a familiar, though. 

Zombies might be OK if they were covered up, perhaps in full armour or behind a veil. Herd Men are OK if they appear to be human, but mating with humans could produce Herd Men offspring. 

Having a sorcerous familiar as a mount is a bit odd, so horses, herd beasts and dinosaurs would be rare.

Familiars are often used as scouts, spies and for fine manipulation, so birds and monkeys would be quite normal.

[metcalph]

There's been no official justification for familiars in glorantha.  If familiars do exist, the best explanation would be that the wizard uses the power of creation to create an animal (or spirit) in order to better understand the Invisible God.

[TRose]

 The awaken Herd beast among Praxian, Shadow cats with Orlanthi, Bats with some Lunar cults and Hawks with the Yelmalio are in effect Familiars even if they are called Allied spirits instead.

  And human nature being what it is, if one groups has a nice toy, other will try to get something similar for themselves.

[Joerg]

Given the Malkioni magics to dominate even deities to do their bidding, I think that there will be some wizards employing magical slaves, or temporarily indentured otherworld creatures. Whether these magical slaves will be familiars or rather "bound spirits" remains to be seen.

Much will depend on the denomination of the wizards. I expect henotheists to employ familiars similar to those of the related theists. Boristi will capture and then tap Chaos creatures, possibly including spirits in "energy prisons" (matrices).

Vadeli are likely to have all manner of RQ3 familiars, they love enslaving others. Fonritians are their ambitious imitators. (A bit like Pan Tang aping Melnibone.) Rokari and New Idealist Hrestoli wizards may shun the practice in public, and may breach it in secret (at least in secret from the muggles). As the conflict with the Kingdom of War escalates, I expect a general adoption of combat-oriented familiars/enslaved magical entities among the Loskalmi wizards, carried into the public.

Waertagi wizards might have water elemental familiars, or at least allies.

 

I don't think that Glorantha wizards should approach the amount of familiars as in Jim Butcher's Alera setting, though (which resulted from a bet whether a cool fantasy setting could be created from two lame ideas combined - Butcher said yes, and got "Lost Legion" and "Pokemon" to work with).

[scott-martin]

Arlaten and his familiars back in Strangers in Prax are probably due a fresh coat of detail to conform to current views of post-RQ3 Rokari magic, but I always liked little Nailhead.

In that book, we learned that the Rokari prefer animals or enchanted creatures as familiars -- dryads and griffins are mentioned as unusually dangerous but alluring options -- and that both artificial objects and disembodied spirits are considered unorthodox familiar forms at best. So at least at that time there were socially / philosophically accepted norms within familiar practice. 

Edited February 28, 2016 by scott-martin
new paragraph for those without SIP

[davecake]

I discussed this in the G+ group a while ago. The general consensus was that familiars, though vital to RQ3 sorcery, no longer were considered something Malkioni sorcerers (or most other sorcerers) did.

Arlaten in Strangers In Prax is interesting, but his familiars etc are basically extrapolations from RQ3 sorcery, and I'm pretty sure canon sorcerers work nothing like that. There is no mention of familars in HeroQuest:Glorantha, for example. 

They may have bound spirits, but they bind them into inanimate objects generally. They may even bind spirits into objects that are enchanted with spells for various purposes - I think if you really wanted to recreate Nailhead for Arlaten, you could, but it would be a weird thing he did. 

They may also magically enslave creatures. 

Sorcerers (Rokari and other traditionalists, anyway) use staffs a lot according to Revealed Mythology and MSE. 

[David Scott]

Sidekicks in HeroQuest Glorantha allows sorcerers to have familiars. That's what they'd look like to outsiders, even if not called that. Theists get allied spirits, shaman get a fetch, sorcerers get a familiar imo.

[davecake]

I mentioned I had previously started a thread on this on the G+ group - its here https://plus.google.com/u/1/106541352279675586776/posts/4M9PNpSnGGF?cfem=1

(also contains Malkioni heavy metal) 

 

To recap and expand on what is said in that thread:

Familiars aren't mentioned in the description of HQG sorcery. They aren't mentioned in Revealed Mythologies. They aren't mentioned in the Xeotam dialogues. The only mention I could find of a familiar in the Guide was the daemon familiar of Jannisor, who is presumably theist. So there is basically no Gloranthan source reason for them to exist, other than mentions of them in RQ3 products that derive directly from the RQ3 rules. 

Jeff said quite unambiguously that "Familiars are not a component of Malkioni sorcery and won't be in any rules treatment." and further clarified "What I mean is the RQ3 style familiar as a significant element in the development of a sorcerer." So sorry David Scott, I think the idea that a familiar is as significant as an allied spirit or fetch is absolutely ruled out as a concept that is still considered part of Gloranthan sorcery.

That said, it was also clear that sorcerers use bound spirits, just as other magicians do, and that it is possible for a sorcerer to have a bound spirit in the body of animals that can act in many ways as a traditional familiar would. This is not normally an orthodox Malkioni practice as far as I can tell, and not a common one among sorcerers, which is in contrast to RQ3. But there is a story of Malkion taming a lion, which I'm sure is used by some sorcerers to justify the practice of having a bound spirit in an animal companion. The sidekicks rules in HQG are perfectly appropriate for such bound spirits.

Personally, I think that wizards staffs are a much more common thing, and are more commonly used by some orthodox Malkioni (there is the School of the Iron Staff mentioned in Revealed Mythologies, for example, who are orthodox Rokari wizards). And if you assume a sort of POW economy like RQ3 had, where priests are always putting POW increases into getting more Rune magic, and Shamans are always stacking it into their fetch, I think most likely sorcerers are stacking their POW into having more enchantments than everyone else. But there are certainly some schools of sorcery that think would use animal familiars (naughty hint - a wicked sorcerer could Tap the existing animal spirit into non-existence and then place a different spirit within).

 

[soltakss]

On 6/7/2016 at 6:28 PM, davecake said:

Personally, I think that wizards staffs are a much more common thing, and are more commonly used by some orthodox Malkioni

 

But do they have a knob on the end?

[SDLeary]

4 hours ago, soltakss said:

 

But do they have a knob on the end?

They are Malkioni... the Knobs are holding the staff!

SDLeary