I've been doing a lot of shadowrun reading and i have seen bloodmagic and bloodmages come up.

1)Can anyone tell me if there is such a thing as a sane bloodmage. so far they all seem so drawn to there tradition that it corrupts them.

2)Can anyone point me to info on bloodmagic/mages.

Well, the Ghost Dance was Blood Magic, but, considering the results, I don't think Daniel Laughing-Coyote was sane, either.

'Course, with Coyote as his Totem, it's hard to tell...

As for what happens in my games. No, the corruption seeps in, and soon the person is power-mad. Perhaps there is an ancient, forgotten way of doing it properly, but the ways currently known are designed to be a dark, slippery slope to making a dark world even darker!

How long would it take for the use of bloodmagic to corrupt a mage?

Nah, blood magic is just a tool like any other. It is, however, a tool which requires you to calmly and ritualistically slice someone open. This requires a mindset which not everyone has. If you aren't comfortably with ritual mutilation and/or ritual murder then you probably won't have any use for blood magic.

Ancient History's Blood Magic stuff: http://ancientfiles.dumpshock.com/Blood.html - pretty good overview. Most of the really detailed "official" information is from Earthdawn, which may or may not still be canonically the Fourth World.

Personally, I'd say blood mages can be sane, just because IMO it's not a tradition, it's a set of techniques. Looking at the write-up of the Blood Mage Gestalt in Threats, it's basically a story told from the POV of someone who is, more or less, a blood magician, just not an uber-powerful, high-up, evil-Aztlan-Horror-Cabal member, and she's really obviously guilty about her role in the death of her students and freaked out by the whole thing. Most people who practice blood magic probably wind up getting increasingly crackers with their self-justifications and throwing morality aside (plus if you're a fan of the Earthdawn crossover angle, there's always the idea that even if you're using it responsibility and to good ends, it still attracts notice from the Horrors), but there are some canon examples of traditions that recognize the gravity of blood mojo and treat it accordingly (the good Tir/UK druids, arguably the GGD, etc). It's not like Insect shamans where they've pretty much based their entire magical paradigm on the whisperings of evil bugs who want to subvert humanity, and are basically working off an entirely alien mindset.

Pretty sure there's not really a canon answer either way, though, so you're pretty much down to GM fiat.

Depends on what you mean when you say 'bloodmage', do you mean the stereotypical Aztlaner guy that kills people to power his magic or just someone that decides to maybe use themselves as the sacrifice to take some physical damage as opposed drain or who uses someone who's willing? The latter I don't really class as blood magic but life magic.

If it's the former then I'd say yes to a certain extent. I mean this is someone that's willing to kill other people simply to not have to suffer any drain or help boost their magic casting potential. Although considering what PCs do for money they're no more 'insane' than the average Shadowrunner IMHO. Of course you're talking more about sociopaths here than complete crazies. I generally play them as sociopaths, very cold and calculating and willing to use people to get what they want (but really that sounds like most megacorporate executives) without remorse but other than that rational and sane.

The mindset required to become a blood mage will drive most people to insanity, but not all. There is nothing that requires such a mage to be insane, although nearly all are Twisted (which, once again, does not necessarily mean they are crazy, just *misunderstood*)

Insanity is culturally defined. In most modern cultures, taking "life" from living breathing people and transforming it into "mystical power" is considered taboo. Thus, people who do it are considered insane. In many ancient cultures and some modern ones, it's considered reasonable behavior and the mindset required to do it is normal.

In Earthdawn, every singe character without exception was a Blood Mage. All of the Immortal Elves and Dragons lying around from the 4th age are all Blood Magicians, and come from cultures which did not consider that behavior to be strange or even noteworthy.

-Frank

thanks for all the input guys.

My ex-circus child eclectic Wiccan slits the throat of the odd chicken or goat during some of his ritual magic and conjuring.

Does that make him a blood magician?

Of course, his Idol/Mentor Spirit is an ethereal woman whispering in his ear, compelling him to murder beautiful women for her love, so it's a foregone conclusion that he's insane, but is he a blood magician?

doesn't blood magic need blood from sentient beings?

That would include chickens of course.

Blood Magic gets more mojo from sapient beings, but you get some from any living thing. And considering how many pigs we go through every year anyway, I genuinely don't understand why we don't have any massive animal sacrificing industries in the 2070s Shadowrun world.

-Frank

So I can murder as many chickens as I like without increasing my insanity levels? Oh joyous day.

But what about awakened MENSA Chickens?

Does he have teh Sacrificing Geas or the Sacrificing Metamagic or the Blood Invoking Metamagic? At least one of these three is required to be a blood magician.

isn't industry and magic more or less an exclusive X/OR?
meaning industrial things make working magic harder?

i guess the closest would be the kosher stuff eaten by the jews . .

Well, it's a difference if you use your own life force to power your magic (the strain costs of some talents) or if you slit the throat of other people for that.

Umm, isn't Aztechnology the largest producer of consumer goods, ie food???

What? You thought that a coincidence?

I'm perfectly sane, why do you ask?

In all pig production there is a massive amount of waste animals, maybe sick, deform, not for breeding and too old for food, or hell, you could even Eat the animals after they were used as sacrifice.

I could very well imagine someone using industrial pig production to side-line in sacrificial offerings on a larger scale.

what about that one guy in the novel?

i think it was one my lisa smedman......lemme check my books.....blood sport? if i remember it was set in the aztlan place. any who some of the rebel guys were trapped and they were gonna die, a priest, after confessing, slit his wrists and an avenging angel was summoned and started kill everyone. But before that he was a good guy if i remember. been a long times since i read that book

I think FASA made them NPC only because of there was too much stigma with a game mechanic that would force players to essentially make human sacrifices.

It's hard to have sympathy for a person who cuts open other people to lessen their own suffering...

that being said:

Realistically, I could see sane-ish blood mages, but they'd probably focus on cutting themselves over other people - and that's a little sick in the head in itself, isn't it?


The biggest issue is: where do you go to learn blood magic?

To the 2070's version of a My Chemical Romance concert? I'm sure someone there will be able to teach you how to slit your wrist the right way

Down the block, not across the street.

-Frank

ask Rippy the Razor, he will teach you!

I would like to point out that there is yet another angle to blood magic besides using it on the self and willing subjects, and using it on kidnapped babies for power. Namely, using it in combat on enemies that you were to kill anyway. Between purposeful human sacrifice, and slightly modifying the method of demise of your enemies, so that you harvest their fleeting life force and put it to an useful end, there's a world of difference.

couldn't ritual magic be described as blood magic too?
in most cases you need a sample of the essence of the victim . . which in most cases tends to be blood O.o

I think it might be difficult to call upon the spirits to help you cast your spell while simultaneously slicing your enemy with your Silat Kali Skill. But then again, martial arts have been used for ritual meditation for eons. Once again, it's the practicality of being close enough to stab someone and then casting a spell. If you can do the one, do you really need to do the other?

Stab NPC1, use NPC1-Blood for Magics, Sling Spell at NPC2 to NPCn? *g*

One interesting use of blood magic is to reduce the drain on healing spells by slicing open the person you are trying to heal. Thogh this depends very much on how a GM interperates a "set of injuries". An easier method would be to use multiple donors to negate the drain of health spells in a round-robin fashion as each time the wounds required to redce the drain would be less.

However, I would argue that damage from Blood Magic rituals can't be healed magically, for the same reasons Drain can't.

Sanity is relative. They are people who get off on hurting/maining/killing others for power so it is kind of hard so say 'yes.' But there is no reason why they cannot be completely sociable even charming, as long as you are not in line to be a power supply.

The difference between the GGD and Bloodmagic is the sacrifice. The Ghost dancers were voluntary sacrifies who gave up their own lives for the greater good. The victims of a blood mage are just that. They are victims.

can't the "victim" be willing in blood magic too?
well, okay, maybe not willing to die, but who cares about some blood and some scars with SR4's technology to get rid of that?

Exactly my point. Or the Blood Magic equivalent for Adepts.