[Prompted by a statement in another thread.]

If a spirit with the Possession power possesses a magician with the conjuring/summoning skill, can the spirit then gain the ability to conjure spirits?

In SR3, free spirits can gain the Possession power, and I do not see any limitation [other than +2 for an unwilling possession] saying they could not use the skill. Is this how spirits procreate?

Usally the possesion power does not allow the spirit access to the hosts memories or magical powers. There are exception such as bug spirits and shedim. Especially master shedim. But in the latter case the magicain has to be astral projecting and have a vacant body to be inhabited. A slightly different power to possesion.

Also, the channeling metamagic lets the dual-entity (of the host and the spirit) access to the host's skills as well as the spirit's powers. That would be one way to provide conjuring potential to the dual-entity after possession.

Spirits can't conjure for one very good reason. If they could then you'd end up with every other magician commanding hoards of spirits numbering in the millions.

Channeling mages aren't a dual entity, they are two entities in one body. Their minds and powers remain seperate, and one can't use the powers of another. When the mage asks the spirit to use its powers, it costs services. The only thing that merges about them is their physical attributes and, for the purposes of resisting spells only, their mental attributes.

Another point to make about possession is that usually, a possessed person is trapped inside their own mind, unable to do something as the spirit controls their body. Mages usually get around that by being willingly possesed by a spirit they summon, so the spirit controls them, but they can give orders to the spirit. When you learn channeling, you gain the ability to use your own abilities only in that situation, i.e. when you were willingly possessed. So, to reiterate, channeling gives the mage access to his own abilities when willingly possessed. It does not give the spirit access to the mage's abilities, or vice versa.

And even if it did, a spirit conjuring a spirit doesn't make a new spirit. If a free spirit could conjure, it would just summon up a spirit from the metaplanes or wherever they come from, and when the new spirit died or used up its services, it would go back. New spirits are probably generated based on astral emanations into the metaplanes which periodically give rise to strange new entities, or perhaps potential for new entities which is molded into a spirit when the mage summons it.

If you wanted free spirits to reproduce, you'd have to make something up. That could actually be a cool idea of a campaign. Maybe two rich and powerful free spirits want to make a baby, but they need some kind of vessel. Like maybe if they get a magically drained 'husk' of a blood spirit, they can each pour their karma into it and make a new spirit which is essentially their offspring.

MitS, page 99
This form of spirit Possession is the one available to Free Spirits (MitS.118).

So a free spirit possessing a magician with conjuring should be able to use the magicians skill to conjure.


Bring on the hoards of spirits numbering in the millions.

I'm away from my books so can't look it up, but I'm fairly sure that it says that the spirit's special attributes take precedence over the hosts. So you use spirit's magic in place of the host's. Spirits (other than spirits of man) can't cast spells and none can summon, so they can't channel the correct type of magic through their own magic attribute. Similarly, a possessed adept would lose their adept powers while possessed and a technomancer would lose their resonance and so on.

Then again, I'm not quite as up on SR4 magic as I should be, so I could very well be wrong.

This is one of a number of reasons we changed the way Possession works in SR4 with Street Magic. We reduced the various Possession-type powers (9 different ones iirc each with its own mechanic or variation thereof) that existed in SR3 down to two different powers (Possession and Inhabitation).

Possession is temporary and gives the spirit control over the body/vessel it occupies. The spirit's Mental and Special Attributes "override" the vessel's own, while its Force is added to Physical Attributes. The body's own mind is trapped inside and the body is puppeted by the possessing spirit (the spirit has no access to the body's skills, natural abilities, nor can it control any technological implants that require activation). Magicians possessed by spirits they summoned can exert a form of "remote control" by giving the spirit mental orders while being possessed (although the magician still has no control of his own body). Initiates with the Channeling metamagic can bring bring their minds to the surface during possession, share control of the body with the spirit, and control both the body's and the spirits natural abilities and powers).

Inhabitation is permanent and results in a physical as well as spiritual merging of the spirit and the vessel. The power is similar to Inhabitation powers of Allies and insect spirits in SR3. During the merger (which is lengthy) the vessel can be destroyed, manifest physical characteristics of the spirit, and/or produce a good merge.

Incorrect. A person who uses Channeling has access to all of the Channeled spirit's powers as if they were his own and does not have to spend any services to use them.

As a side note, if I read it right Inhabit + maxed out cybertroll = take out Citymasters with punches

If that Inhabitation resulted in a Hybrid merge, you betcha. Hybrids get to add the host's physical attributes and the Force of the spirit together.

The wording in Street Magic is somewhat vague on what happens when you have a flesh-form merge (near perfect, pretty much passes for the host, has all the host's memories, abilities, etc). Could you answer this one for me Synner? (TIA)

Keep in mind that Inhabitation over-writes the old Special Attributes, including that smidgen of 0.1 Essence left because the troll was so heavily cybered...

Hmm... Ally spirit inhabiting a Cyborg... too bad the body & the brain-in-a-jar are separate though. Could be quite frightening otherwise.

For that matter, are the host's attributes allowed to be boosted by the spirit beyond racial maximums? I can see arguments both ways, I think.

You're absolutely wrong.



They wrote it badly. They used a double negative, which makes it really easy to read it the opposite way. Instead of saying that you are not able to tap the spirit's powers while not expending a service, they should have just said you MUST expend a service to tap the spirit's powers. But that's what they say, regardless of the poor writing.

PS: Thanks for eliminating the nine types of possession Synner, you're my hero <3

Wrong Book

Seeing as how Street Magic is the SR4 book and Target:Awakened Lands is an SR3 book, I guess it depends on which edition you're playing with!

Yeah... this is one of the problems that come from merging the Shadowrun forums, we have to make sure we know which edition people are talking about...

In SR4, I am win. In SR3, I have no idea, I never knew there was channeling, let alone possession in SR3

You almost edited before I could correct you. That was damn quick!