Ok, so get this. I was looking at the rules for Ally spirits and my conjuring and binding specilist. And I was thinking, after I've initiated a few times, how powerful could I make this thing and would it be feasible to summon and bind him.

So, I took my fox shaman and looked at summoning a man spirit. Jacked up my Charisma to 8, my Willpower to 7, Magic is 9, Summoning 7, and binding 7(9) for Beast Spirits.

Step One: Get a lodge of force 18. I think you can tell where this is going by now.

Step Two: Initiate three times. The metamagic I want to get are, in this order, Ally Spirit, Channeling, and Invoking. Mmmm....invoking....

Step Three: Get the money for a Binding foci, Summoning Foci, and a Power Foci. Preferably a combined force of 18. I'm gonna need that stuff...

Step Four: Research the Ally Spirit formula...and this is kind of a hard part and could take a while.

Step Five: Get some serious friends, one with high First Aid, and another mage with some healing ability. Friends are needed when you're sitting there, chanting, for 18 straight hours.

Step Six: The actual roll. By my estimates, to get the most out of my spirit, I need to roll like a mad-man, blow as much Edge as I can, and hope for good healing rolls by my friends.

Summoning the Spirit
My Magic + Summoning + Power Foci VS Spirit Force
9 + 7 + 3 VS 18
19 VS 18

On this one, I'm fairly decent against the spirit. We can buy each other a tie, but I need a net success to summon him. Assuming he buys out, I'm taking at least 5 DV in physical drain. If he rolls, I'll be taking A LOT more...so we're hoping he buys it. ^.^

Drain Test
7 + 7 = 14

That's a buy of 3 DV, but I'm rolling this, as I'll need no damage for the binding test. Right after this test, if I can't roll away the drain, I'm gonna have to hope that my friendly healing mage can pull something off. I'm holding my Summoning Foci 3 in case I have to roll drain like a mad-man.

Binding the Spirit
My Magic + Binding + Power Foci + Binding Foci VS Spirit Force X 2
9 + 9 + 3 + 6 VS 36
27 VS 36

He would be buying 9 Sucesses. That hurts and I have to hope to god the spirit feels cocky enough to buy the sucesses instead of rolling, cause that'll help me greatly. Otherwise, I'm in trouble. This is where I also blow half of my edge on exploding my dice. And hoping the spirit doesn't do the same. Oh please let it be a cocky spirit...

Drain Test
7 + 7 = 14

Again, only a buy of 3 DV. Assuming he buys his successes AND I didn't take any damage back in the summoning of the spirit...I can buy the successes and stay standing. If not, I have to blow the rest of my edge trying to explode the dice.

If everything goes well and I can bind that sucker without dieing in the process, what I'll have is a force 18 ally spirit that has been invoked to a Great Form spirit. And then I have channeling. After getting to know my walking god alter ego, I'd channel him into myself and...mmmm....fun times.

But this is all just me dreaming. Unless someone can figure out if this isn't possible or if it's more possible then I've listed here.

The money for the foci isn't an issue if you have Enchanting, but have you added up all the karma you'll need for all this? You'll be long sick of the game before you get anywhere near that much karma.

There is some debate on the Invoking as the writer of the Ally section didn't want to allow Invoking but a subsequent revision by other parties took out the verbage that would have prohibited Invoking.

Everything else looks reasonable based on what I remember of the rules since I don't have my SM book with me.

tone it down a bit . . force 15 . . or maybe even 10 . . it's bad enough that way and pretty much safe to assume that you could pull THAT one off . .

Oh, I understand that the only way this works is with a Karma of 300+. I plan on this guy being an NPC that my characters are going to work for. He's a fox shaman with a mission or quest to heal the world of the wounds what it has taken (ie toxins, radiation, trash). Borderline eco-terrorist...but kinder and gentler. ^.^

Can't the Ally also use Karma to prevent being summoned and bound? Such a powerfull spirit won't come like a dog just because someone calls...

Um, you can't magically heal damage caused by Drain or Fading...

You can't magically heal Physical Drain Damage? Page and book citation please? (I'm at work and don't have my books with me)

Even if true, you can still use First Aid and with high enough skill & hits, patch a person up back to normal.

You can only use one focus on a given test, this includes the associated drain test.
on the other hand, ally spirits are by definition willing partners rather than servants so you probably don't have to worry about the spirit spending edge.

http://www.shadowrun4.com/resources/faq.shtml#4

The answer to the first question makes the point very explicit.

Whenever I see the topic title, at first I always read "Making out (with) my Ally Spirit" and think "There's not dikote in SR4 (yet)!"

We're talking about an Ally here. It's a Loyalty 6 Contact. It's not going burn permanent Edge to fuck you with fire.

-Frank

Honestly, I think it all depends on how nice you make the spirit to you. Techincally (and this is as technical as I can get) if you're creating the spirit, it hasn't formed it's stats yet, just it's force. So that's why it's own stats are not factored into the initial summoning and such. But, that's technically. And I do agree with the loyalty thing. For my game, this character did indeed participate in a bunch of astral quests, all centered on getting access to the 18 force quest. After pulling that off, the spirit was impressed enough to allow itself to be summoned. The shaman just needs to finish the ritual. The spirit will still test him to see if he's still worthy, but it won't out-right kill him because he can.

And I like the idea of the Sacrificing. ^.^

Actually, according to the rules you summon a normal spirit and the binding ritual transforms the normal spirit into an Ally based on the template you choose. It is the spirit equivalent of ordering a pizza and then biosculpting and permanently p-fixing the deliveryman into your own personal bunraku slave.

Reasonably, very few spirits would appreciate someone attempting to transform them at such a fundamental level.

Page 52, SM (Under "Ally Conjuration"): "This Metamagic grants her the power to mold and enhance a bound spirit she already possesses according to the 'blueprint' of the ally spirit formula."

The bound spirit is not yet an Ally spirit.

Page 104, SM: "If the binding is unsuccessful, the ally spirit never takes shape ... the character must spend the predefined amount of Karma or the ritual fails."

The ritual is not complete until the Karma is spent. Until the ritual is complete, there is no Ally spirit to make decisions, only a spirit.

hyz, if it is that bad for a spirit you might as well add "burn 1 permanent edge to counter the spirits burned edge" to the cost of binding an ally because if it is that horrible a thing then EVERY spirit is always going to burn edge to resist it.

Chris

Well.... except the ones that like to be dominated.

alternately . . magician with bioware, specifically pain editor, which let's you ignore ANY stun damage and gives you +1 on willpower, while engaged . .

Pai Editors do work to soak large amounts of drain. But um... we're dealing with overcasting here. The Pain Editor is useless (except for the +1 Drain Resistance die).

-Frank

oh, yeah, been a long day at work x.x . .
*shrugs* with that thing just go as high as you can while staying in stun and you're all set . .

true enough, and pretty broken...maybe not as much as the radar implant though.

I thought most NPCs didn't get edge? I know spirits have it, and prime runners, and I vaguely remember some suggestion that a group of bad guys get a pool of edge = to the highest(or maybe it was number of guys) edge there, but for some reason I thought your average joe on the street did not get edge.

Chris

Speaking of making out with an ally spirit...should someone become intimate with a spirit, can a child result from such a union? Merlin, for example, was said to be just that. And what about children sired by possesing/inhabiting spirits? Are there any Qualities that result from having a spirit "parent", assuming it's even possible in the SR mythos? Imagine the "Spawn of Verjigorm"...I imagine it as being along the lines of HP Lovecraft's "Dunwich Horror".

My understanding is no, in the Sixth World you can't have children with spirits although if I remember correctly it has been stated that Astral Sex is a viable option.

However, I've been told that in the Fourth World it was possible, but I'm not really all that familar with Earthdawn so I could be easily mistaken...

whyt's it with people screaming bloody murder about Bionic Dix and Cyber-Tits but wanting to have sex with basically everything ?
and would that be necrophile as ghosts are technically not alive?

Why do you think you're supposed to get your Ally dikoted before having sex with it. For protection.

A hybrid-merge Fly-woman-man (male spirit in a female body) gave birth to a half-Invae baby in canon. So yes, it is possible for spirits to reproduce with metahumans. At this point in the mana cycle it may be limited to Inhabitation spirits in metahuman bodies, but it is possible. At any rate, it'll probably only work if the mother has a physical body, but one can't be certain.

Ah yes...Universal Brotherhood. The artwork for that baby was interesting.

Well I have always personally classified beings from the Deep Metaplanes apart from spirits as they tend to follow slightly different rules.

This thread is made of win and nightmares.

At least there are (apparently) no rules for enslaving a free spirit as an ally... yet.

I will note that with some extra abuse (stat buffs sustained by something as simple as a F1 housecat ally), an ordinary human can soak (assuming edge spend, not burn) an average of 10DV (+5/9 of their initiation level if they have centering, plus foci) per drain roll and tank 13S+22P DV (depending on whether you're overcasting) between both drain rolls. I'm not totally certain if you have to be conscious when you spend the karma; if you overflow on the bind drain (*after* succeeding on the roll), does the ally still go poof?

Now, if you have karma to burn, pain editor+high initiation+centering lets you almost summon Cthulu as an ally; add in sacrifice, and you might get Hast--err, that guy.

A few things:
1) I don't believe ally spirits can be spirits of man. SM isn't explicit, but it does seem to state that you summon and then bind the spirit and that it doesn't have a form before the binding is successful and you spend the Karma. Further evidence: allies' stats are straight force instead of using spirit type modifiers to each stat. Thus specializations and summoning or binding foci wouldn't work (a power focus though, should).
2) Allies don't by default have possession. Of course if you are of a possession tradition you can give it possession as one of its powers since it is normally available to spirits you summon. But why bother? Inhabitation is way more hardcore .
3) Where is this burning edge for exceptional success rule? I don't remember that one.
4) Unless I remember something completely wrong, Binding drain is usually twice summoning drain (unless you're binding an invoked spirit, in which case it is THREE times the summoning drain)
5)Um, I'm assuming this is SR4 cause of the edge references (and the form) but, DANG your stats and skills are high! (multiple Exceptional Attributes & Aptitudes?, via a nice GM I'd guess)

Um, not really on topic, but wouldn't Gostwalker also have an Ally spirit. I mean you don't actually think he's going to spend his karma upping his strength to 46 do you? He already knows most spells, and has really incredibly good skills (sorcery group 8, etc.) Or are dragons incapable of creating allies? Wouldn't that be interesting?

Um, can't you only have one ally at once? (and upgrade it for twice the karma cost?) Or did I get the wrong impression from that section?