RE: Animists and ancestors

From: Andrew Dawson <asmpd_at_...>
Date: Thu, 24 Aug 2000 21:38:20 -0400

At 09:38 AM 08/24/2000 -0700, James A. Holden wrote:
>Peter corrects me:
>> >(1) There is no Bargain with Spirits ability in any HW shaman's >keyword
>> >that we've seen so far.
>>
>> Because none is needed. Simply use ordinary Bargain, Intimidate
>> etc. There's no HW skill called Bargain with trolls but we don't
>> go around assuming that the Fight Troll skill is used instead on
>> the spurious grounds that it's badly named.
>
>You miss my point. There is no Bargain skill whatsoever in any HW shaman's
>keyword that we've seen so far. Warriors have combat skills presumably
>because they fight as part of their occupation. Hunters have hunting skills,
>based on the same rationale. Shamans bargain as part of their occupation
>(and I agree this makes much more sense than lumping everything under Spirit
>Combat), but no shaman-related keyword lists a Bargain ability (or
>Negotiate, or Deal, etc.).

Here is a solution that I use:

The [Spirit] Tradition Knowledge ability works just fine as the basic means of peacefully dealing with spirits. Due to the lack of another peaceful-interaction-with-spirits ability in a shaman's keyword, this seems like the best ability from the keywords. I also add [Spirit] Tradition Knowledge to the Grazer Shaman keyword on HW:RiG p. 108. (A trained shaman can lack tradition knowledge? Is this errata, Roderick?) The extended description of Tradition Knowledge on HW: RiG p. 207 gives some nice guidelines for improvisational penalties for dealing with spirits outside of the tradition.

I also suggest requiring the Ally Spirits and Enemy Spirits abilities to augment the ability level of [Spirit] Tradition Knowledge when it is used in this fashion. (Example: A beginning Kolating's ability of Ally with Wind Spirits 17 positively augments his Kolat Tradition Knowledge ability when used to peacefully persuade wind spirits to help him.)

Thanks,
Andy