Hello folks,

Relatively new here, though been lurking a little bit. Short background is I'm a GM running a small campaign while catching up on 4th ED rules, last time I played was 2 ED so I'm a bit out of date and have been trying to clarify a bunch of things, which a lot of you have helped me tremendously with already, so thanks.

Anyway, my immediate specific issue is one I can see coming up in the near future. It has to do with spirits on remote service, specifically attached to another player. Say Mage A attaches spirit to Street Sammy B to run remotely while Mage A goes to the stuffer shack. The specific remote service doesn't really matter, I don't think, let's say 'counterspell anything thrown at him'.

Street Sam B proceeds with his plan to hit the local arcology, and passes a ward he knows nada about. Spirit hits ward and obviously can't pass. What occurs from here? Does the spirit push its way through the ward to continue completing its task, report back to the mage with tears in its eyes, or perhaps just fizzle?

(I did do a search, but didn't find anything regarding this, so if there's already a discussion in the backlog somewhere please just point the way.)

I don't believe it's covered by the rules, but as for me, the spirit's actions would mostly depend on the tradition of the mage (that is, spirit's personality) and the way the instructions were worded.

Depends on how the service is worded.

One, is the spirit supposed to be discreet... pushing through or holing the ward by attacking it are going to set off alarm bells and the street sam has no idea the trouble he has brought down on himself.


Does the spirit let the street sam know there is a ward by manifesting or materializing and telling him.

It's really up to you how you play it as the spirit is a NPC under orders and it will do it's best to follow those orders.

If the spirit attempts to move through the ward while Materialized, or in the astral plane it will have to overcome the ward.

If the spirit is away awaiting a call to come and render it's service, it may arrive on the same side of the ward as the street samurai via the metaplanar shortcut.

Ah, sorry, my bad. A good clarification. I mean the spirit is in the astral actively protecting said sammy till sunup/down. A few folks here have mentioned it would depend on how the orders are worded, which I'd agree with, but in general how detailed a set of orders would you usually allow for a spirit to get?

As an extreme: Go to stuffer shack, manifest, grab some candy bars, walk down the street and tip over two street lights, await interference or an attack. If you don't get one, repeat the following every ten minutes: Find a nearby car, flip it over, and smash it to bits. Once the Star arrives fight until you're dissipated or banished.

That seems a bit much to me for a remote service, though danged handy as a distraction while you bust the vault a few blocks down. So, assuming the order's along the lines of "Protect this person with counterspells until you're either stopped or defeated. If you're stopped report to me before you leave." I could see it. Assuming my mage neglects the crazy prepared option for giving orders, what do you figure it would default to?

Spirits should tend to do things according to the wishes. It's a magical telepathic understanding, not a lawyerly twisting of written words.

If you must have a way of figuring it out, roll the Spirits Force with a threshold of 2 for it to figure out on it's own to use the metaplanar shortcut. Or simply decide for yourself as the GM. That happens, you need to make decisions as a GM for what happens. Sometimes the spirit will sometimes it wont'. Have fun with it.

Guess I got too embedded in looking for precedence. I figured there was a common or expected result from this, I see I was inaccurate. Thank you for the clarification.

Major point...
The spirit cannot bypass the ward by metaplanar shortcut. The spirit is loaned to the street sam, but is still linked to the conjuer. DireRadiant has it wrong.

If it's not a bound spirit it's on remote service and owes the mage only the 1 remote service (accompanying the street sam in some capacity). "Even if the spirit is loaned out in this manner, it is still bound to the summoning magician, not the character she ordered it to serve" (loaned services, SR4a)

Metaplanar shortcut: (SM p94)
"This shortcut may only be taken if the spirit's conjurer is on the other side of the barrier (taking up one service) or if the spirit has been to the location on the other side before (a reason to never allow a spirit into your private sancuary)"

The street sam is NOT it's conjurer (that would be the mage of which loaned service is very clear he is still linked to).

IE: the spirit cannot choose to simply take the metaplanar shortcut on it's own. Even a free spirit can go pretty much anywhere, but is still restricted from simply bypassing a ward. (as it's conjurer is not inside, and it must have already been inside the ward).

Spirit range:
Summoners magic X 100 meters... if it goes beyond this distance it's on remote service.

Thank you for that Falconer. After Dire's post I thought I had misread something and just hadn't had a chance to go back to Street Magic and chew through it yet.

Basically spirits are rather literal but they are not completely unintelligent. So for example if the spirit was ordered to protect against magical threats it would likely attempt to bypass the barrier and continue on. If it was ordered for concealment it would likely break off and not interfere with the barrier as bypassing the barrier would honor the letter but not the spirit of the command.