[pariah3j]

One of my magic players brought up the idea of having a free spirit as a contact today. He said he saw it as an example in the book from one of the pre-mades I believe. While I thought it was a pretty interesting idea, I was curious how a spirit contact would work ? Has anyone else had this in their game, how did you handle it ?

[ShadowcatX]

Much the same as it would for any other contact, though it might necessitate said magician traveling astrally to meet it rather than simply making a comm call.

[pariah3j]

Agreed - would definitely need to be an astrally. But the question that I suddenly had was, how would you get ahold of a spirit ? Is there a way to summon spirits without binding them ? Or would this more grey area and just come up with an idea between myself and the player ?

[firebug]

Well, you can just summon a spirit unbound, but I don't know if it's possible for a magician to try and call the same spirit each time.  Also of note is that, if it's a free spirit, I don't know it'd count as "your tradition" or necessarily even a specific type.

The one ritual that allows you to summon any spirit would make sense to be able to summon the same one repeatedly, but that's way more complex and doesn't take the roll for seeing if the contact is available into play.  It could perhaps replace it though...

I think having a spirit pact would be a bit more logical than having one as a contact--  Unless the spirit is one that is regularly manifested and heavily involved/interested in metahumanity.  The question of how the player made a good enough "friend" of a free spirit...  There's a lot of "How?" questions.

[pariah3j]

Yeah, magic is my weakest point of understanding in the SR universe so alot of hows and whys for me. But the idea was it was a free spirit of some sort (the casters tradition is chaos so maybe a chaos spirit ?), that has a particular stomping grounds - ie Redmon Barrens. He could use it for various information and going-on's in the area, or possibly help in locating a person/magical item in the district. So he would still have to locate/summon the spirit. My though was maybe rolling the connection rating would decide if the spirit had the information/location(or willing to share it) of whatever the character was trying to track down, since summoning the spirit would almost be a given. Thoughts ?

[ShadowcatX]

You can't summon a free spirit (specific metamagic's aside). I'd assume a free spirit taken as a contact would have a place that it chilled at more often than not, and would be contacted there. (I've thought about giving pcs a free spirit a contact and as a method of doing karma to nuyen exchange, a free spirit entrepreneur as it were.)

[Reaver]

Free Spirits are like any other contact... except that they are a spirit
Free Spirits can not be summoned nor bound except through a metamagic quest to the astral planes (see street grimoire).

Generally, when a player has asked this of me in the past, a little probing on my part found out that the player thought he would be able to basically get a extra spirit for powers. (Like quickened spells, or spirit services, etc). I had to point out that a free spirit contact would just be like any other contact, and would expect to be paid just like any other contact would.... It lead to some heated disagreements. So i encourage you to ask some probing questions first before you make a judgement call.

In the end, that player now has a free spirit bartender contact
Not exactly what he wanted, but still useful.

[pariah3j]

Free Spirits are like any other contact... except that they are a spirit
Free Spirits can not be summoned nor bound except through a metamagic quest to the astral planes (see street grimoire).

Generally, when a player has asked this of me in the past, a little probing on my part found out that the player thought he would be able to basically get a extra spirit for powers. (Like quickened spells, or spirit services, etc). I had to point out that a free spirit contact would just be like any other contact, and would expect to be paid just like any other contact would.... It lead to some heated disagreements. So i encourage you to ask some probing questions first before you make a judgement call.

We've already discussed it to some degree -  I don't see this as him trying to gain another/free spirit. The idea as I understood it was it would be similar to a street corner contact or something of that nature that he would use for gathering information. "Hey have you heard/seen where the Halloweeners are hanging out these days ?" "I'm looking for a missing little girl, have you heard anything ?" - It would be like you said, another contact but in spirit form.

So the contact works like normal, I roll his connection rating to see if the spirit is 'available' which would mean he's at or around their normal meeting spot. I may be wrong but I'm guessing a spirit doesn't need money, so it would want favors or would barter. What might be some good requests from a spirit ? Find me [insert reagent] ?

[Fizzygoo]

I second what Reaver just said.

I'd personally do some "hand waving" and say that the PC needs to go astral to search for the spirit-contact (aka "call them") and follow the connection rating rules for contacts on whether they are available when called. Or if the PC isn't able to go astral, then the PC and spirit have a system set up like go to a specific location and light a candle or something. But still use the connection rating rules.

Clearly define the roll/"occupation" of the spirit-contact. Is it just playing metahuman for a while and, like Reaver's example, is a bartender (or a fixer, johnson, taxi driver, etc.)? Or is it an astral information broker keeping tabs on what spirits are doing what where, or something else.

And the key to remember is "FREE" spirit. It's not there to offer services. It will want payment and compensation just like any other contact (though it may have strange ideas as to what that is, e.g. "if I'm going to tell you who is murdering people in the park, first you must give all the children at the day care on 5th and Merced lunch and presents."). But if the player has it at high loyalty, it will bend over backwards to help just like any other contact with high loyalty.

[Reaver]

Free Spirits are like any other contact... except that they are a spirit
Free Spirits can not be summoned nor bound except through a metamagic quest to the astral planes (see street grimoire).

Generally, when a player has asked this of me in the past, a little probing on my part found out that the player thought he would be able to basically get a extra spirit for powers. (Like quickened spells, or spirit services, etc). I had to point out that a free spirit contact would just be like any other contact, and would expect to be paid just like any other contact would.... It lead to some heated disagreements. So i encourage you to ask some probing questions first before you make a judgement call.

We've already discussed it to some degree -  I don't see this as him trying to gain another/free spirit. The idea as I understood it was it would be similar to a street corner contact or something of that nature that he would use for gathering information. "Hey have you heard/seen where the Halloweeners are hanging out these days ?" "I'm looking for a missing little girl, have you heard anything ?" - It would be like you said, another contact but in spirit form.

So the contact works like normal, I roll his connection rating to see if the spirit is 'available' which would mean he's at or around their normal meeting spot. I may be wrong but I'm guessing a spirit doesn't need money, so it would want favors or would barter. What might be some good requests from a spirit ? Find me [insert reagent] ?

Well, Free spirits are funny that way. Unlike other spirits, Free Spirits choose to stay on or near the material plane, and when they do, they usually start to assume a "normal" life. (or, at least, try to have a normal life for a Free Spirit) Buttercup for example is a free Spirit that sits on the board of directors of a MegaCorp! Other free spirits in Fluff have been hobos, or Talisleggers, or shop keepers.

Generally, Free Spirits "fixate" on some aspect of humanity and try to emulate that in their lives on the material plane to some degree. A free Spirit that fixates on physical love for example might be an escort, or a Pimp. It might run a brothel, or be trolling the clubs for some fast and easy sex. A Spirit that Fixates on wealth might play the stock market, or become a thief, or even just open up a shop


From what you say about the player, you have the right idea. The only thing that really changes is that the contact is also a Spirit, it still has a Personality and it's own desires and ambitions. So play it like any other contact.... Except that it can travel the astral planes to get anywhere it wants in the speed of an eye.

[pariah3j]

So free spirits can/do take corpreal form ? I totally missed that fact... I'm rereading the magic section in detail, but haven't made it to the spirit stuff yet.

[Reaver]

So free spirits can/do take corpreal form ? I totally missed that fact... I'm rereading the magic section in detail, but haven't made it to the spirit stuff yet.

Well, all spirits (ok, MOST spirits) can Materialize, which is giving them a semi-solid body. (They can still be identified as spirits as the Materialization leaves them "whispy" for lack of a better description.
But, Free Spirits can get the ability of "Real Form Materialization" (or something like that) that allows them to materialize a solid, non spirit like form. (they look and act as real as anything else in the physical plane).

Buttercup stayed hidden as a Free Spirit for years, until someone pissed her off during a board meeting, and she literally floated over the table while berating the individual. (and Thus revealing her Spirit true form to the entire board of directors)

[pariah3j]

Cool - Thanks ! Learn something new every day - that opens up the possibilities and suddenly makes a free spirit a much more likely contact for a magically inclined character - sounds like it doesn't add much more then flavor then at that point.

[Reaver]

Cool - Thanks ! Learn something new every day - that opens up the possibilities and suddenly makes a free spirit a much more likely contact for a magically inclined character - sounds like it doesn't add much more then flavor then at that point.

Which is kinda the point. Basically instead of being "Hank the orc bartender" its "Sam the free spirit bartender".

[ShadowcatX]

It adds more than flavor. Spirits, despite their ability to manifest on our plane, are not metahuman. Sam the free spirit bartender will never be able to enteract with AR, he'll always be dual natured (on our plane), he will be effectively immortal, he won't have metahuman needs or desires, etc. Sam, the free spirit bartender may very well have stood behind the bar 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365.25 days a year for the past 50 years for reasons known only to it.