> I think it's the word spirit that's giving me problems.
> If you defeat a leopard spirit and stuff it in a fetish you should
have a
> leopard spirit in there since a leopard spirit is a singular thing.
>
I think you're right. This is the way I think of it: the shaman (or the
person on whose behalf he is working) determines the skill or passion he
wishes to receive. He then determines (within his tradition) the most
applicable spirit type to receive such an ability from. Once his target
has been selected, he enters the spirit world in an appropriate place
with appropriate preparations, and seeks out a spirit of the appropriate
type. Once he has bargained with or defeated the spirit, it is bound
into a fetish (or integrated), and the process of binding causes the
spirit to offer one of its abilities when called upon (but only that
ability - it would need to be defeated again to give a different
ability, which is not an option whilst it is bound).
Thus a fetish may in fact contain a wildfire spirit which has been
forced to grant flaming arrow to its victor, but the system simplifies
this by calling it a flaming arrow spirit. When, after using the flaming
arrow, the fetish is filled with a start fire spirit, it could be the
same wildfire spirit, bound with a different constraint, or it could be
a different spirit entirely. Gamewise, it's not really important, as
only disembodied spirits can manifest more than one ability, and these
can happily be referred to by type (eg wildfire spirit).
Richard
richard.sands_at_...
richard_at_...
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