> I'm still in doubt as to the extent to which Praxians even HAVE personal runes.
> Does the Praxian also have three personal rune affinities? I thought not.
> If she does she can presumably use them to augment mundane abilities just as a Theist can?
> This would mean that there is no inherent difference between theists and spiritists
> (and by extension westerners) before they begin to advance in their magic use.
> I'm not sure whether I like this better or not.
I suspect that they do, but that one of the things that joining a theist religion does is broaden how useful those personal runes are. I think of it as your initiation ceremony expanding your mind. So, here's how I'd play it for an animist.
In creating a Bullman, you decide to take the Air, Eternal Battle, and Death runes. (Yeah, he's a PC all right.) They influence your Bullman's personality. You could also take one narrow augment for each. You'd have to give it a name, not just "Eternal Battle affinity" -- which is what you'd get is you went theist. Instead, it would need to be something like "Sniff out the broos." And you could only use it as an augment, not an active ability. And since it's so narrow, I doubt you'd ever spend an HP improving it, so you will gradually cease using it.
> As I've understood things, a typical Praxian will practise spirit magic to some greater or lesser extent.
> They will know the rules of a particular spirit tradition and they will collect spirits associated with that
> tradition and these will tend to be spirits linked to particular rune(s) associated with that tradition.
I agree. So, your Bullman would join the Praxian tradition. When he did, he could get spirits from the tradition. He'd probably (but not necessarily) select spirits that reflect his personality and his Great Spirit. So, I'd expect charms that focus on combat. But joining the tradition wouldn't necessarily get him Storm Bull spirits. (He could get some by way of a relationship to a shaman or a Bullman leader, of course.) When he does the equivalent of joining the spirit cult of Storm Bull, then he gets access to Storm Bull spirits. Pretty quickly, the improvements to his specific animist powers make his personal runes irrelevant to game-play.
Chris Lemens
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