[Notion]

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[Reaver]

from my reading of the rules:


1: Wild Spirits are there own category: They may be similar to spirits, but the write up of them make it very clear that they are indeed different than other spirits. They are also the return of something "old"..... (This is an edition thing, and something in the lore of the universe and not covered in the books. As such you need to be an 'old skool' player to follow.) Since they are so 'new' (as in returned from being away for longer then the UMT, and many characters have lived), it could bee argued that none of the usual items that involve Spirit category would even work - or could be created for Wild spirits at this time. IE: Foci and qualities need not apply.

However, at many points in the Wild Spirit, they encourage you, as the GM, to explore options as you are comfortable. So, if you want the categories to apply for qualites and foci, then do so...

So for what works for Missions play, see the Missions FAQ. I don't play missions and don't keep up on what is allowed and what is not allowed.

Wild Sommoning:

The Opposed Test using Summoning + Magic [Force] vs. the Wild Spirit’s Force is just to get their attention IF they are in the area. Its akin to standing on a street corner and yelling "Taxi!!". A taxi only comes if it can hear you - and you still havn't agreed to a service yet....

So I doubt that the Foci would apply.


From there, EVERYTHING changes. Services are not determined by an opposed roll, but by the Spirit Maker and the desires of the Wild Spirit in question.

A wild spirit decides
what Rating of a spirit marker it will offer, which
is usually equal to the character’s Wild Reputation
+ 1.

They give a guide as to what MAY be acceptable to the Wild Spirit (GM's call)

A Performance doesn't have to be linked to the Perform skill, but linked to the something the Spirit enjoys. So a Wild Spirit of Air may enjoy and accept your dance (gymnastics) performance, while a Wild Spirit of Ceramics may be insulted by it. Maybe if you built that Wild Spirit of Ceramics a statue out of debris using artisan skills...

Or, it doesn't care about art at all, and just wants you to pick it up a dime bag of crack from the dealer down the street....
Or, it could demand you stand on your head for 24 hours.
Or, it could ask for a favor at a later date...

Unlike ordinary spirits, wild spirits are not beholden
to any magician and have their own agenda,
be it as simple as frolic in the sunlight or as complex
as masterminding an expansion of corporate
influence.
Each wild spirit should be treated as an
NPC in their own right, with wants, desires, and
fears, and they should display all the agency that
comes with these traits.
The spirit will be willing to
make deals, as long as it gets something in return,
but it may value things in a way different than a
metahuman.
Deals are considered made when a
wild spirit generates a spirit marker with someone.
While the currency of choice when dealing
with the spirit world is Karma (which always bears
a small token cost of physical, emotional, or mental
material),most are willing to bargain for other
things.
Some are fond of physical material, such
as sugar and tobacco often coveted by Caribbean
spirits of man. Reagents are useful almost all anywhere
in the world, while some spirits are fond
of tasks, such as destroying a nearby toxic spirit
or preventing a local garden from being paved
over, while others have more exotic desires.

The only thing that the book makes clear is that when dealing with Wild spirits, the normal rules of Mage/Spirit interaction are much different. In fact, They are not even needed....

It should be
reminded that anyone, magician or not, may call a
spirit and negotiate for a spirit marker. It’s entirely
possible for a street gang member that’s wearing
a dog collar around his neck is friends with a local
wild dog spirit and can call on them for help,
or that a scared child could attract the notice of a
powerful spirit that will trade her tears in exchange
for destroying the scary people hurting her family
in the next room. Some wild spirits are noble,
some sinister, and a wise person will get to know
one before entering agreements.
Let the buyer beware.

 

[Reaver]

you are thinking purely in mechanical terms of characters and dice pools and limits.

This is not what Wild Spirits are about. (again, this is mostly a throw back to earlier editions.... and would take a long time to explain....)

You are missing the forest for the trees.....


but you probably won't be satisfied until you get some background on what is happening here.  So here is the background in a nut shell:


From Editions 1 to 3 magic was split into 3 different camps, with little overlap. The camps were:

Hermetic magic.
Physical Magic (Physical Adepts)
Shamanic Magic.

Hermetic magic systems ran off of mental stats, had astral travel, summoned Elementals in a ritual casting.
Physical Magic is pretty much unchanged through the editions, except for the expansion of mystic adepts...
Shamanic magic ran off of personality stats, had astral travel, and could summon Spirits on the fly.

The BIG difference was in what was a spirit and what was an elemental. Spirits showed independent thought and Sapience, but where tied to a location.
A hearth spirit couldn't ever leave a house for example, They were tied and bound to the limits of their domain. Which really didn't bother a Shaman too much ass he could just whip up a new one in the new domain in a few seconds.

Elementals where more like robots, in that they had no personality and where pretty mindless, but could go anywhere.

Things stayed pretty separate until FASA died and FanPro took over Shadowrun. One of the things they did to "Streamline" the game was fuse the Hermetic and Shamanic traditions into one collective whole divided only by resistance stats and combine elementals and Spirits in just "spirits". and to explain this away in the Lore, they gave us:

Universal Magical Theory!

The premise of which is that since all magic comes from Mana, its all the same! all that changes is how you use it


Which, when you get right down to it, just really screwed not only with the lore, but with game mechanics they later tried to introduce by way of "Traditions".... after all, how can every tradition re-invent the "wheel" when its a "wheel"..... (UMT basically says that traditions don't matter.....)


Now what you are seeing is a slow, in game correction of the UMT in game by saying "hey, we fucked up and don't know as much as we thought we did!"....As such, expect the rules for wild spirits and more info on them to trickle out in other books over the months years and editions, but I wouldn't expect anything overnight.

*****


In short, they are there as an option for the GM and not really there for the players to just jump in and pick up and use. For that there are the regular spirits that are supported by UMT that every mage knows and the player to abuse as normal.

Some things are just not there for the player's investment (at least not with out direct GM approval)....
Corruption magic
Blood magic
insect/shadow/wild/free spirits
AIs

These are generally the realms of the GM to use and interact with the players, and not for the players themselves (again, without direct GM approval)



edited for spelling

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Some things are just not there for the player's investment (at least not with out direct GM approval)....
Corruption magic
Blood magic
insect/shadow/wild/free spirits
AIs

These are generally the realms of the GM to use and interact with the players, and not for the players themselves (again, without direct GM approval)

Yea, this is what GM-Strong-Fanboys talk all day about. I really dont care though, since it is just your very personal opinion, that those things do not belong in player hands.
I hate nothing more, than the feeling that you have to beg to be able to play a concept you like which is covered by the rules, because some nerdy GM with a god-complex enjoys to hold down their players. I think this is disgusting and unpleasent for both sides: The players just as well as the GM.

And we are not talkin' bout scenario-limitations here. To make it clear: There are scenarios, which become a no-brainer if someone plays a mage, nothing wrong with telling players to not play mages for those scenarios. But this is something totally different from "You cant play this, because it's evil/rare/unique".

This wasn't directly quoting me, but given the "Strong GM Fanboy" language I'm suspecting it is indirectly so

Needing GM permission to play certain concepts isn't a case of a GM forcing you to play "Mother, May I?"  Things like GOD Agents, Red Samurai, and Toxic Shamans are codified in the rules so that they may oppose the players.  Shadowrun is not a universal roleplaying rules system- it's meant to govern one thing only: playing a Shadowrunner.  For example: look at the rules for creating a Fake SIN.  It's a terribly useful piece of gear for shadowrunners, yet the rules are basically "you can't ever create one yourself.  Creating a SIN is beyond the scope of shadowrunners."

So lets say you want to play a Blood Mage or Toxic Shaman.  It's a disruptive thing to ask not just of the GM but also the other players.  You're playing the enemy, and the nature of shadowrun requires the characters to rely and trust one another.  Why should anyone trust your character?  Why should the other players not geek you the instant they get the chance?  Having a good, clever concept that explains why your enemy of shadowrunners is a shadowrunner could certainly work, but it's not up to you to judge whether or not your concept passes muster for the group/campaign.  The GM is.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Needing GM permission to play certain concepts isn't a case of a GM forcing you to play "Mother, May I?"  Things like GOD Agents, Red Samurai, and Toxic Shamans are codified in the rules so that they may oppose the players.

Alright, you cant play Sauron in a LotR-"we-are-the-Heroes" RPG. Gotcha, and I totally agree. But...

First: in Shadowrun, the stuff which is (implicitly or explicitly) labeled as "only if GM agrees" is HUUUUUGE and not limited to "evil forces" or something, there is really "legal" stuff, or stuff that makes a lot of sense for shadow RUNNERS to actually have/be, which is considered "under GM control". (tbh I would love to give some examples which show the cheesyness of those "only if GM"-Remarks, but I do not want to spend too much time on that topic, there are much more useful topics to discuss I think)

If this isn't a topic you want to discuss, I'll just be brief and attempt to clarify what I'm saying.  We're clearing coming from two very different perspectives.

Second: Why cant you play a Blood-Mage-Runner? Where does it contradict? Do all Runners have to be White Knights in Shiny Armor? Sounds not only boring AF to me, but forthermore is neither reflecting the setting, nor the description of what shadowrunners are and do.

Could you try, for further discussion, to reflect on your own VERY STRICT and VERY PERSONAL interpretation of the setting, and maybe try to understand, that yours is not the only legal interpretation of the source material?

It's not my 'headcanon' that the Shadowrun rules system is only designed to cover Shadowrunners.  It's obvious that an alternate campaign where the characters are a team of Red Samurai, or Lone Star Detectives, or even a hive of Bug Spirits is technically possible, but it'd require quite a bit of House rules from the GM to make it work. You won't find (m)any published adventures or materials to support such campaigns, however. The "default assumption" is the characters are Shadowrunners.  It's prima facie.

So lets say you want to play a Blood Mage or Toxic Shaman.  It's a disruptive thing to ask not just of the GM but also the other players.  You're playing the enemy, and the nature of shadowrun requires the characters to rely and trust one another.  Why should anyone trust your character?  Why should the other players not geek you the instant they get the chance? 

Why would Shadowrunners EVER trust each other? Again, reflect on your interpretation of the setting, it seems to be quite far off, from what the source material presents.

Because you have to if you want to succeed.  Not opinion, it's stated more than once in the fluff.  Want to keep an enemy decker off your stuff? It's assumed you'll trust your own decker and invite marks on your gear you want him to protect.  It's stated that noone gets by on their own or without help from the shadow community when they stress how important it is to maintain your rep inside the shadow community.  Et cetera.

Certain campaign types where the runners are all out to frag each other over could work.  Heck, I love the Paranoia RPG.  However by default Shadowrun is assuming a cooperative team.  Pushing the boundaries on what's plausible to cooperate with is disruptive to that paradigm.

Having a good, clever concept that explains why your enemy of shadowrunners is a shadowrunner could certainly work, but it's not up to you to judge whether or not your concept passes muster for the group/campaign.  The GM is.

Well, like I told, I am fine with "Scenario Restrictions", but right here you are not making clear, if you mean those or the "No-that-is-evil"-veto.

For the latter: Why would you say it is up the GM? It's up to the party, isnt it? If a GM is not allowing me to play a concept that is reasonable and fits the scenario restrictions, why would I play with him? I tell him to get the fk out of my house and get some GM-obedient slaves for his god-complex-bullshit. How is the GM in that situation any more privileged than the player lol.

The disruption in playing "Get GM's approval first" concepts isn't about evil.  As you noted, shadowrunners can already be highly morally dubious.

It's about disruption.  Let's say you have a wiz idea about a X who's in the shadows now.  But you don't know that the adventure/campaign focuses on Xs being the climactic opposition.  If the team finds out "oh drek, Xs are behind our troubles..." it's just for your own good when a GM says no you can't play an X.

Besides, some "evil" archetypes are just completely implausible to have a reasonable campaign concept.  Toxic Shamans, for example, have all the same long-term prospects for campaign development as suicide bombers.  For all the same reasons.

[Jayde Moon]

You're really combative!

The point SSDR is trying to make is that the rules are hazy because of a few reasons, many of which boil down to GMs getting the opportunity to sort of decide how they work in their story without forcing them down a specific path.

Given the vast multitude of potential types and reasons and what ifs for wild spirits, it's less attractive for developers to try to codify every little thing and allow GMs the freedom to work them in as plot devices... I think it was an ambiguous use of terms to call it 'strong/weak GM' system... I think it's better to say some systems empower GMs, some systems don't really empower GMs, and some systems force GMs to be empowered (which is different from the first in subtle ways).

Which ties into SSDRs idea about not meaning to put certain things into the hands of players as a matter of course.   Blood magic, sure... that could be a special thing someone plays in a specific campaign, I mean you could ostensibly play a dragon in DnD, for example...

But wild spirits are just really overly varied... each one becomes it's own sort of specific thing...

Which is how this all ties back into your original question...

To which the actual answer is, *shrug*.   You and your GM should work it out.

Which I totally understand is not a satisfying answer for you, especially in light of what you are trying to build... but there it is... and some of it can be attributed to game design philosophy rather than 100% poor technical writing.

[Reaver]

Build your Wild Spirit mage and play him if you choose.

Just understand that EVERY Wild Spirit interaction is entirely GM Fiat. Including if it wants to deal with you, offer you a Spirit Mark.... or just pound you to sand....

[Reaver]

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I tried....

[Michael Chandra]

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I tried....

♫ So hard, and got so far ♪ but in the end it doesn't even matter ♫ You had to fall, to lose it all ♪ but in the end, it doesn't even matter ♫

[Reaver]

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I tried....

♫ So hard, and got so far ♪ but in the end it doesn't even matter ♫ You had to fall, to lose it all ♪ but in the end, it doesn't even matter ♫

There is now 16 very large, very tired workers who hate you

(I'm at work, stuck in the crane for the next 6 hours with 0 lifts to do, and nothing other then Ipod..... and a loudpeaker....


So the daughter's teeny bop music is currently blarring at them


Remember, it was YOUR idea!

[FastJack]

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