Well, they aren't strange to them. They might not even have been strange to medieval European peasants let alone American Indians, Afro-Caribbeans, or any other RW animists that you can might know about.
> So. Anyone got any classic spirit likes/dislikes that
> they have used with animist adventurers?
Simple place to start:
Spirits are analogs of RW objects. Some are animal spirits like
mundane animals, some plant spirits like mundane plants, some rock
spirits, etc. There are spirits that are not analogs, but they tend to
be too difficult for non-shamans to handle (and tend to be labeled
"hostile" or "enemy" because of the difficulty involved).
Animal spirits will like and dislike what the RW animal would like if it could talk. Frex, rabbit spirits will not like it if you also deal with wolf spirits, frog spirits like occasional offerings of insects, etc.
Rock spirits might insist that you include a small shard in their fetish (eg, as eyes, so they can see beyond their own locale). Sea spirits might like offerings of rum or singing chanties (or Jimmy Buffett), etc.
Plant spirits might want the spiritist to cultivate a small patch of their particular type of plant, or include sprig in their charms, or drink an infusion made from the plant before contacting it.
The trick for you as Narrator will be to see that the spirit types offer certain "spells" appropriate to their type, rather than certain "spells" can be available, and you attach weird taboos to them for cool gaming. The next trick will be to teach your spiritist-playing players to think the same way, and ideally start giving you the spirit and its spells and its rituals all in the same package.
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