Ok. I have a coconut. I take a old school 35 mil pic of it. I mail it to Al Sharptree. while the snail mail is doing its thing I develop the pic and study its contents closely. I have already learned sympathetic linking ahead of time and know a few fellows who also are steamed at him. The 3 of us get together and start a ritual circle. I create the link to him through the picture, then we proceed to toast his hoop with a Force N fireball. One less annoying politician.


Do I more or less have the right idea here?(not with the assassination of politicians in general but how the power works)

For a more innocent use, I could nail a picture of my keys to my wall, and use a ritual spell to find them.

Problem 1: Al Sharptree has aids.
If Al Sharptree is a prominent politician, what happens when his secretary opens the package (and you thought I was going to say he had a debilitating disease...)? Does she suddenly become the one linked instead?

Problem 2: Al Sharptree doesn't like coconuts.
If Al Sharptree chooses to toss the coconut into the trash without taking it out of the box cause he doesn't like coconuts, does the coconut link to him?

Problem 3: UCASPS sucks.
Over the course of it's trip through the mail, at least 4-6 people have touched the package. Does the coconut link to them?

-----
1) Yes, at least for a little while. If he gets it after, it'll link to him, but only temporarily.
2) No. It won't link to him unless he touches it.
3) No, unless they open the box and touch it.

Unfortunately, a photo of the coconut won't help since you need the object itself, unless you're using the photo as a symbolic link (requiring metamagic and multiple parts). Regardless, the link only lasts for a few minutes.

Err, I think the idea is to use a symbolic link to the coconut, targeting the coconut with the fireball and catching the real target in the fireballs indirect area.

In other words, this is a magic mail bomb that doesn't show as dangerous until an hour after the start of the ritual. Anything could be used, so long as you can get it into proximity of the target.

It would still require the sympathetic link metamagic and I'm still not sure a photo could be used.

a drawing or painting done by the casters own hands, to grab more then just the image of the person

also, can one use indirect combat spells this way at all? would it not go of the moment it his the nearest wall to the caster?

Well, if it's really necessary, you can do a sculpture, a painting or a doll of the coconut.

Draw a circle on a piece of paper that, to you, looks roughly like the coconut.

Nothing says it has to be a masterpiece of artistry, and it works more because it represents that particular coconut to you rather than it actually representing that coconut. Voodoo dolls hardly look like the person they represent, so why would a picture need to?

Ah, this reminds of the old reverse ritual sorcery; where the man with the coconut could use it to backtrack the sender with the symbolic representation. Good times, good times.

The answer is yes. This works. It'd work with Manaball or Powerball or any other area effect spell. The issue is ensuring that the target will have the object near them when the spell goes off. I think a necktie is a better choice than a coconut, myself.

@Doc: Actually you roll an Intuition+Artisan test, so you need to be a good enough artist (or intuitive enough, or edgy enough)

Why use symbolic linking at all? Take some hairs from the coconut, and use them as a material link to the coconut to fireball it. That way you don't eat that -6 penalty for symbolic magic.

Good catch.

Fundamentally, the mage cannot use a photograph because of the aforementioned day-long interval to 'create a link'. Unless you rule that linking photos take some severe darkroom wackiness. I personally would be fine with that, but I think it goes against the intent of the symbolic link because the mage is not using a tool to create a photograph - it is the tool itself which creates the photograph.

Kinda like the difference between baking bread and throwing all the ingredients in a bread maker, you know?

Either way, the example holds out. If the mage can't take a photo, he can easily make a representation of the coconut using play-doh and cat hair.

And Simon, the hairs won't link to the tree because the hairs grew on the coconut, not on the tree. Although the coconut may provide a link to the tree, I find it unlikely, as the coconut is a separate object for targeting. Same reason I can't use your blood to target your mom - after you left your mom, you became a separate target.

Who's still using film in 2070 anyway? By then digital technology will be extremely cheap and extremely good. In addition, we're currently using up the last of the large format film because we don't have the material to keep making it for very long. Film will cease to be produced around the same time that gasoline rises to exorbitant prices.

Of course, this is the 6th world timeline and not ours, so who knows if film is still being produced. Then again, if all cameras are trids at this point, how do you use film to create trid images?

There's a reason they're called symbolic and sympathetic link. DNA has nothing to do with it, only will and desire. If you pluck a hair from a coconut with the intent of it connecting to that coconut, that's what it's going to be good for. Just like if you pluck a hair from the toupe Mr. X is wearing will let you ritually cast against Mr. X, since that's the desired effect.

Coconuts won't have the same genetic material to their tree any moreso than a baby has the same genetic material to its parents. The DNA isn't the same, and they aren't part of the same living organism. Doc Funk, I disagree on your toupee example. Sadly, if you pluck hair from Mr. X's toupee, and ritually cast a manabolt on it, then one day, Mr. X is in his business meeting, when his toupee suddenly shreds itself and a puff of hair explodes off his head, leaving him disheveled, confused, and bald, but not dead, as his toupee is.

"That's not enough?"
No, it isn't. Unless you can kidnap a kid, and use him to materially target his mother.

Yes, oft handled/favored, but you choose whether you are casting via material link, or sympathetic link. If you cast via the hair as material link (believing it to be his real hair) then you nuke the toupee. If before the ritual, you find out he has a toupee, and you have toupee hair, then you can do it sympathetically.

So could some one else take the picture of the coconut and give it to me to use as the symbolic link?

The Preserve spell might be useful in prolonging that duration.

Its only actually DNA if you're using it as a material link. Doc Funk was talking about symbolic and sympathetic links. Which don't give a hoot about DNA, especially when you consider you can use someones lucky pen to blow their head up.

Also, i wouldn't say that the text for genewipe indicates that material links are all about genetics. The sample is no longer valid for ritual samples because it has broken down; it is destroyed. The fact that genetic breakdown is enough to make it an invalid link does not necessarily mean that genetics is the only characteristic that matters.

Indeed, I agree its more of the wholistic approach to mana working than it is DNA. Same reason you can take a brick from a building and ritually powerbolt the building with it. Also, if you were to first smash that brick into powder, you wouldn't be able to ritually target the building with it, as its no longer a viable link.

Perhaps it even depends on the tradition: a hermetic mage may believe wholeheartedly it's the DNA. At the same time, a voodoo mage may believe it has to do with whether the Lwa want to bless the specimen.

Magic all works the same, traditions are just how they choose to describe it. However, since we aren't a part of the 6th world, we can view outside the life of someone and see the actual mechanics of how it works, which is all the same.

For game rules, it functions the same, but I see nowhere that it says it always works the same for the characters. As far as I'm concerned, character perception is reality, and therefore there will be factions of mages arguing that their view of magic is the one true view, especially considering how personal magic tradition is.

Sure, characters in the game can argue how it works all they want. It works because the game designers said it works this way. Not because of how fictional people think it does or not.

The fiction is the reason for all the rules. If you discard the fiction and its logic and points of view, what's the point?

It's even simpler than all this really. It works this way because we choose to play it this way. But all of that is irrelevant in a discussion of the fiction and its workings. Where the rules are unclear, we fall back on the fiction to understand it.

(edited to add that last sentence for clarity)

The rules are what govern the working of the fiction. How you explain their working in the fiction is up to you, but the fact remains the rules exist outside of the fiction, and thats whats for discussion here. How the rules work regarding ritual spellcasting, not how characters think ritual spellcastings works based on their beliefs.

I have to admit, I've never read the fiction, nor do I care to. If I wanted to read stories, I'd be reading and not playing.

The rules alone should be enough to give us a way to play and what the fiction says should be irrelevant.

For clarity, I should mention that when I say "fiction", in this context I mean anything that isn't hard game rules. All of the stuff that isn't dice and numbers. The descriptions of things and ideas. I find it hard to imagine that playing shadowrun is possible only knowing the hard rules and none of the background. (Which would include descriptions of what trolls are and how tall they are, the idea that magic is the manipulation of mana, and so forth.)

Summary: I don't read shadowrun novels either, but that's not what I'm talking about.

Ah, gotcha. So you mean the "fluff" rather than the fiction. I absolutely agree on that call.

Why would you want to assiasinate someone important with magic.. magic is tracable.. A bullet loaded by someone else into the clip/gun of your choice is much much harder to trace back to the shooter.. and you can shoot from far far far away.. Heck you dont even need to shoot it yourself, have a smart gun platform or a drone do it for ya.. And any sane politican would have wards around their office etc.. I know I would.. =)

Magic isn't that traceable, it takes force in combat turns (half force with astral chameleon) in order to erase the signature completely.

The novels are not RAW. They are canon. The novels can't be RAW for RAW stands for (emphasis mine) Rules As Written. Last I checked, novels had no rules in them.

I haven't read his novels in awhile, but why does the Talon character nauseate you so?

Chris