1. How does Banishing Resistance work? The spirit has infinite services, right? So can it be banished at all?

2. Do I have to pay for Skills that it requires to use a free Power? IE, if I give it the (free) power of Elemental Attack, do I have to pay 5 Karma for Exotic Ranged Weapon to use it?

3. If my ally has more than one form, can I have a power that only affects it in one of them? IE, I want my ally to materialize either as a small pixie/fairy (think Tinkerbell), or as a small dragon. I want the Energy Aura power, but only when in dragon form.

4. All spirits can fly when materialized, correct? The Flight skill is only for if they need to be good at it.

EDIT: 5. Can an ally be Invoked?

No to invoking; although you can give it special abilities anyway. You don't have to pay karma, but you'll do it at agility-1 to attack. IT can be banished, I forget exactly how, but it acts like disruption. As for 3, I don't think so. Just don't use it in tinkerbell power. Couldn't tell you about 4.

1. I don´t know this one, sorry. IMO banishing does not work against "Unlimited services", banishing resistance or not. You could rule that banishing the extra services would be sufficient to get rid of the ally.

2. There is a complete list of free skills in Street Magic (German pg. 103, page may deviate). You have to buy the skill or default on everything else.

3. You are free to buy a power and use it only while the spirit is "in dragon form". Simple and stylish.

4. Materialised spirits are not bound by the laws of gravity (German SR4 pg. 176). The flying skill helps with rolling tests. Possession-based spirits need a vessel that can fly - or a Levitate spell.

5. You do roll a Binding test as per standard rules for your Ally, so I don´t see what could stop you.

Ok. For some reason I was thinking of Energy Aura as an "always on" power - but I suppose that was a bit of an assumption.

I'm not sure what you mean by this...

Should have clarified - if it has elemental attack - fire, and no skill, we treat it the way we would any normal ranged attack made without the skill, at agility-1. Different topics.

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks.

Fly Skill : Flying :: Run Skill :: Running.

That is to say, make a fly check to gain extra meters/turn for movement rates.

And about Banishment: I think that you are supposed to treat an Ally spirit as having infinite services for the actual services. Otherwise, treat them as free spirits with services = unspent edge, +1 (Banishment Resistance). It was kinda hinted at in the text, but not actually said.

Excellent. That makes sense.


The logical disconnect I get from that is that a decent, 3-edge shaman, will have an ally that is easier to banish than most of his summoned-for-the-day spirits, and all of his bound spirits. Heck, even my Norse mage (who barely summons at all) could get that many services out of a bound spirit.

The other possibility I can think of is that the power is there (for allies) more as flavor text: "of course they have banishing resistance, they have infinite services." That kind of thing. In that case it would be (∞ + edge). But it would at least call out the spirit as being special, which would reaffirm that... arg.

Then again, if I was confident in that interpretation, I wouldn't have asked

Ok, next question. Can an ally indefinitely sustain multiple spells? Do they suffer the -2 modifier a magician does for sustaining his own spells? The books are unclear.

I have to say, while I'm not too saavy of the rules of ally spirits yet, I love the idea of a Norse-influenced ally spirit. So yeah, wanted to give props for that at least.

Anyone capable of casting can sustain as many spells as they manage to cast. I believe that Allies also suffer the -2 modifier, which is the effective limiter on how many spells you can have going at a time.

Limiter? As long as I cast the spells, and the spirit doesn't do anything but sustain, then even a -20 modifier shouldn't really matter, right?

Ok, so now I'm confused again. Do ally spirits lose the ability to sustain spells for the PC?

Yes.

It would appear so, after the errata modifications.

Peter

Yeah, but you can't usually cast when you're facing a -20 modifier.

I forgot about the errata, but that doesn't stop an ally from casting and sustaining one of its own spells on you.

Well crap.

Oops never responded to this. Yeah, I'm looking forward to how she turns out