What do Adepts get from having a Mentor Spirit? Options

[HappyDaze]

It's noted than any Awakened character can take a Mentor Spirit. Most of them seem pretty pointless for Adepts although a few grant useful skill bonuses (like Rat) and some have meaningless penalties. Is this intentional?

[Demerzel]

[Glyph]

The rules say that a mentor spirit can be taken by any awakened character with the mentor spirit quality - but the mentor spirit quality is limited to characters with the Magician or Mystic Adept quality. So no ordinary adepts with mentor spirits according to the RAW.

That said, if a GM did allow adepts to take mentor spirits, a number of them would be useful for an adept to take. Even if you only get half of the normal benefit, +2 dice on a skill is a big thing when it stacks with specialization and improved ability. Also, some, like Rat, have a full set of advantages useful to an adept. Others, like Moon Maiden, give a boost to a skill and are offset by a penalty to an awakened skill that doesn't affect the adept. Nothing horribly unbalancing, but for 5 BP, you could certainly get more than your money's worth.

[Squinky]

Per page 192:

"A mentor spirit can be taken by any awakened character with the mentor spirit quality"

Interpret that as you like.

Edit---Guess this was said already :)

[Whipstitch]

Sorry, but I just have to muddy the waters even a li'l more. This little beauty is the paragraph immediately preceding the one Squinky just quoted:

Page 192:
Each mentor spirit embodies an ideal, a mythic image or
archetype. By seeking to embody the same ideal, the magician
gains magical power. Members of any tradition may have mentor
spirits, including adepts.


Seriously, how in the hell fanpro managed to keep contradicting themselves despite putting out several bits of errata as well as an awakened source book is beyond me. The Shamanic Way path described in SM deals with how many Adepts relate to their totems or how asian martial artists or western berserkers model their behavior and fighting styles (some going so far as taking geasa) after particular animals in order to channel their power, spirit and ferocity. Granted, this could easily be handwaved off as something that was really only meant for mystic adepts, especially since the page 192 line from the MB cites traditions, which adepts technically do not have to follow. And yeah, as the OP noted, there's also the niggling issue that the spirits certainly don't seem balanced with adepts in mind. Anyway though, since mentor spirits aren't anything that can't be rendered balanced simply by mixing and matching the bonuses and penalties to keep people from the pure min-maxing Glyph described, my GM allows them in modified form. Really, anything that helps remind people that Adepts are magical in nature rather than just another gunbunny or social butterfly is welcome in my book, even if it's most likely not intended by the RAW.

[pbangarth]

I asked about this on the SR help line, and was told that Adepts can use Mentor Spirits, and that it would come out in a future Errata.

[Synner]

[DireRadiant]

You get any decent GM's approval. Something not to be scoffed at.

Any Adept that spends BP on a mentor spirit is going to get something out of it, even if it isn't as concrete as a couple added dice. Might turn out to be divinatory dreams or spiritual guidance of some kind.

[Kyoto Kid]

...I was considering making any spell bonus granted to be a resistance bonus for the adept.

e.g the Trickster adept gets + 2 dice to Con tests and +2 dice to resist illusion spells.

[TBRMInsanity]

I see two reasons that Adepts would have mentor spirits:

1. RPGing; first and foremost SR is an RPG game and there has to be something in the rules about adepts that want a spirit guide rather then looking in a book or having a "teacher". This allows adepts to do this.
2. Initiation; in SR2 and SR3, initiates got help from their totems. I'm assuming that more about this will come down from FanPro/WizKids. Adepts who want to go through initiation would get from their mentor and would not need to find a teacher to help them out. This could also extend to learning new adepts powers and magical based skills. In that case the 5BP cost is well worth it.

[Whipstitch]