I seem to vaguely recall that in one of the "history of the 6th world" fluff there was something about the first ghost testifying on its own murder.

Are there really ghosts? What kind of magic can interact with them? A lot of RL magical traditions focus on ghosts of the dead - what have they achieved in SR?

Any magician who believes the spirits they summon are the spirits of the dead, such as many Shinto magicians, are technically necromancers. Someone with the Divination technique could specialize in it as well. A necromancer is just someone who gleams information from the dead, afterall. But unless the spirit has a power like Divining (such as Guardian Spirits), they're not going to know anything one of your ancestors or the dead in general knew that you yourself didn't already know.

But no, I seriously doubt that the legal systems in Shadowrun would allow testimony from a ghost even if they were proven to actually be a real ghost and not just a Guidance Spirit or something posing as one. I'd be surprised if even a free spirit that witnessed a crime would be allowed to testify, let alone any under the direct control of a conjurer. It's even more questionable than mind probing, which is strictly forbidden if I recall (albeit for the "can't testify against yourself" clause).

Most nations don't allow spectral evidence...I think the last reference was back in the Grimoires, but the NAN might allow ghosts to testify.

What I wanted to ask was: do ghosts of the dead stick around at all? And can wizards do anything with them? I don't explicitly see them covered by any of the normal 11 types of spirit, but they should seem to be a pretty common type...

Not in the way you mean.

Divination (either your own or that possessed by a spirit) and maybe Psychometry are your only real bets when it comes to dealing with the dead. Any references to ghosts are just other spirits posing as one, or a mage who firmly believes his spirits are one.

There are spirits known as ghosts, though most people believe they're some sort of astral echo rather than the literal spirit of the departed, and magicians can banish them, combat them, and in some cases bind them like free spirits.

Oops, I completely forgot about the actual "Ghost" spirits. I don't think they made it into SR4 though.

I think we squeezed them into Running Wild, but that wasn't my chapter.

There's a Reference to them in the shattergraves section of Chi-Town, but it's very minor; something along the lines of: watching the spectral ghosts of the victims go about their day is a major attraction on the one day a year that the astral echo of the tower manifests.. (heavy paraphrase)

They are in Running Wild, page 178, and necromancy is talked about in Street Magic, page 139, under the header Path of the Dead.

EDIT: Also, there's some fluff in Runner's Companion about "ghost" free spirits, somewhere in pages 69-70, and again it is mentioned (I believe) in Kawai-i's blog in Running Wild, page 46-47. If not there in the fluff at that section of the chapter. It's mentioned off-handedly, like "the PPC accepts ghost testimony" or "the CAS doesn't accept ghost testimony" or something.

I found this in the history section written by Captain Chaos in a sidebar - I think it was SR3.

So I think it's sort of annoying that spirits of the dead aren't dealt with more in depth. But if it's in running wild, I may need to check it out after all.

There's also Cybermancy, which deals directly with the spirit of some more or less dead person.

Well, their is an anomaly that could describe Captian Chaos's story. When a mage goes astral, if his body dies his astral body (and his mind) stay in the astral for a few hours untill fadeing into nothingness.
So if my wife finds out I'm cheating on her through the astral, she could just wait till I project, toss my body in the sound (or the bathtub) and then when I go back I find my body dead. At this point I have a little while befor its all over so I go to my shaman buddy and tell him what happend and hope that justice comes down on my murderous wife.
Also theirs Zombies, wich are realy just spirts bound it the body of a dead metahuman.

In this case, it would not be a ghost, as it is simply your astrally projected form. Also, as long as you are initiated, you can run off to the metaplanes and exist indefinately (it stops the timer on your astral clock).

I beleive I have heard such astral projections called ghosts. I think Knasser did something like this once.
It'd be intresting if in a foray to the metaplanes one found a mage from one of the past worlds (earthdawn and before) whome after loseing his body stayed in the astral forever.

I've debated it. It'd be really easy to do. The mage would even be able to come back to the Physical plane, and possibly even Materialize. He can still summon spirits. Let's assume he's Initiated (he'd have to be), and he has Invoking. He Invokes a Great Form Task spirit, then has it Endow the conjurer with the spirit's Materialization power.

He'd still have an "Astral Clock," however.

Have the spirit Endow Astral Form. That power lets you exist on the Astral.



I could see this power as suspending your time limit on the Astral for the duration of the power. The justification being the Astral Form 'power' granted from Astral Projection inherits the limits of Astral Projection while having Astral Form endowed by a spirit would not come with such restrictions.

BTW, he wouldn't need the Materialization power per se. The mage could Manifest. Granted, he couldn't directly interact with the Physical but he'd certainly be able to haunt someone.

Right, but with Materialization, he'd not only be able to affect the Physical, he'd also gain Immunity (Normal Weapons).