Spirit-world politics from Andrew Solovay on 2002-07-24 (HeroQuest RPG)

From: Andrew Solovay <asolovay_at_...>
Date: Wed, 24 Jul 2002 11:03:24 -0700

giangero <giangero_at_...> wrote:
>> [Speculation alert!] Quite possibly, a lot of the
>> organization--especially the jockeying for position, seeing who's the
>> Big Khan--would take place in the spirit world. A warchief and his
>> shaman would spend a lot of time lining up support from important
>> spirits. One day, every shaman in the area goes to his chief and
>> says, "Your ancestors say, send ten warriors to Fuzzy Bison clan for
>> a raid against the hill-people, and do it NOW". Voila, suprise
>> attack.
>
> I don't know. I think it is practically impossible to coordinate an
> attack in the middle world through an internet of shamans/spirits in
> the spirit world. IMO, the nature, foggy and temporally instable, of
> the SW makes the attempt largely unpractical or less reliable than a
> mundane web of messengers.

Point well taken. Actually organising the raid on the spirit plane probably wouldn't be a good idea. "Um, Mr. Khan, our ancestors say we should fight 'those guys with the sort of crinkly auras' when 'the sun shines through the DeathBringer' but only if 'the Bull's breath is pungent'. Or else."

But I still suspect that a lot of the Praxian power-politics takes place in the spirit world. i.e. [still just a proposal] Which khan is most important will be settled, in large part, by shamanic stuff; but once a khan has established his importance that way, he's going to actually organize the raid by sending messengers on bisonback.

And if those spirit-quests have political consequences, there's lots of room for spoilers to mess things up. Orlanthi heroquesters might sabotage a dangerous khan's spirit-world jaunts, to make him lose face (or possibly lose head). The Lunars might covertly meddle to make sure that friendly khans get more power, or that unfriendly khans get weakened or influenced. (..what if lots of lunar spirits start showing up in Prax, ready for integration? The nomads could get lunarized without realizing it...)

--AMS