I've read all the posts in the recent search history on the topic of Free Spirits. I understand they're just one giant ball of liabilities, but I'm committed to making this work - possibly because my GM is new to SR and not very harsh, generally speaking.

As you can see, I've borrowed basically every element from the threads in question:


I like the end result, but it's sort of schizophrenic. He was initially intended as a backup caster, and his stats suggest that, but I really like the idea of a bruiser golem now, too (thematically appropriate, yay!) and his physical stats DON'T back that up (10/1/1/10 in his homunculus). The other benefit is the GM is playing a GM character in case someone else wants to take over (we've never had any of the problems most people associate with GM characters) - to make his life easier, I can always simply possess him.

I'm looking for suggestions and recommendations (OTHER than "don't play a free spirit" or "use karmagen") for either balancing this guy out to specializing him further. Attributes, spells, powers, etc. Any way to make him better.

P.S. I included the "group contact/karma factory" thing, but I won't be abusing it. I just like the added story elements and the safety net. I thought maybe a Loyalty roll at the end of each adventure for a little extra Karma or something.

one thing i would talk to your gm about is the money/karma exhange. i played a free spirit, i used karamgen so he was a little better off than yours. another thing you might want to ask(most likely to be shot down though) is to be able to gain a metamagic/power that allows you to either drain karma from people or to absorb the magic from focuses and turn it to karma.

all the luck in the world to you.

As a note... The Life Pact is particularly Useful (page 108, Street Magic) as it will allow you to "Heal" those with whom you have the Pact, and gain a Karma point for doing so each time it is invoked...

Thsi is the one that I use... Along with the Friendship Pact...

Wow, that Life Pact is pretty phenomenal.

I did actually end up going Karmagen as it allowed to eek out a slightly more well-rounded spirit that (mostly) can't be killed by a stiff breeze. (I still paid 500 Karma for being a spirit, but 250K got me further than 150BP.)

More questions related to the concept that are slightly less rules-related:
1) We also have an AI in the party - how is the best way for the spirit and AI to keep in touch? I mean, are we talking something as simple as earbud and microphone mounted on the homunculus or are we relying on friendship pact'd members acting as go-betweens?
2) Free spirits and AR. Is there any reason a free spirit possessing a vessel couldn't use AR gloves, goggles with image link, and a standard commlink to interact with the Matrix? Could such a spirit eventually learn Matrix-related skills?
EDIT: Found it.


I'd really prefer to keep my very astral character out of the matrix, but I'm just thinking practically here.

Finally,
3) We're playing Missions (although not officially) - any thoughts how this character might realistically be considered for the purposes of NYPD and the fascist corporate state interests there?

Depends on the people in charge. Some nations, and some corps grant citizenship, and thus SINs to Free Spirits. Some dont recognize them at all.

My understanding was that spirits could interact, if they are possessing a body or similar. I assumed that its only while manifesting there is no way for them to interpret simsense because they have no internal organs.

At the very least, I would have thought possession would fall into the murky grey waters of GM fiat.

- J.

I think you missed a big part of the description. Free spirits can materialize and form a body that seems perfectly real. This is one of the things that makes them horribly powerful. They can go astral, walk through a wall, materialize and open the door for the rest of the team. The fact that a magic 8 free spirit can't be hurt on the physical plane by anything short of an antitank rocket or a mage makes it even better. Then the fact that you can't kill them and their ability to do metaplanar shortcuts....

The 250 points is not an absurd cost.

With only 15 BP for stats and skills it essentially produces and unplayable character.

You run 265 BP games?

The character will be limited, but you can start with 12 pts of hardened armor (hence no need for body) and make a decent mage. You are not going to build a great street sam, but can do other clever tricks. Being nearly impossible to kill by mundane means is one of those clever tricks, as is the fact they they can fly.

We played an alternate game one weekend when we were missing a few players. One of our newer players needed an alt and rolled up a free spirit. Gotta agree with KZT play style makes a huge difference when playing an out of the box FS. Flight,astral travel speeds and movement used on the team are just scratching the surface. Three different times during the mission my planning had to be thrown out the window. Even more then usual with a FS on the team, the team had the advantage.

Two separate but important points here.

Well, that would be true if I had not intentionally chosen a possession tradition for flavor. Although I could theoretically possess the physical lock/handle and open it.


While I agree the advantages of a free spirit are pretty phenomenal and I agree that 250 points is not in itself unreasonable, the sad fact is that you're still trying to build an entire magician on 150 BP. That barely produces an automated spellcasting unit, must less a versatile character.

You practically have to take minimums in most of your stats to do anything other than your handful of spirit powers (not that I'm suggesting those aren't cool or incredibly powerful - just not especially interesting since a summoned spirit could do the same thing, only better). And at that point, you can be capped by a punk with a heavy pistol or SMG.

I don't mean to sound like I'm down on free spirits - obviously, I wouldn't be trying one if I didn't think they could work.

I was just able to eek a little bit more out of karmagen for versatility so he was less of a one-trick pony.

I'd bet that 250 was just a number pulled out of the air. You could adjust it to fit your game. The trick is to avoid having it be overpowering up-front. Clearly a NPC style spirit where you bought force for 10 points and ALL your stats went up is insanely powerful, but there are other ways you could do it.

The fact that a free spirit has access to things that no other character type has makes it a lot more difficult to balance, particularly given different play styles. Metaplanar shortcuts and materialization are huge. Influence can be FAR more effective than mind control. And you could make an argument that aura masking allows the dual natured free spirit to walk through wards as if it isn't dual natured....

So we ran our first session. There was some ambiguity with SINs and passes for the spirit, but mostly we let the truck carry the body past checkpoints while I floated overhead.


In this case, I spend most of my time possessing a homunculus.


Normally, this is straight where I'd go, but our GM is very inexperienced with SR and would just turn it over to me or another player in the group. This other player recommended just going the mic/speaker route, so that might be the consensus.

As an aside, my newb GM hates my use of Influence, so I'll be limiting my use of that until he learns to better counter it (I've given recommendations), but that's probably a discussion for the "control thoughts" thread.

More questions.

• Discretion! The text mentions plasteel homunculi passing as anthroform drones - any suggestions on how one might roll this?
• Concealment! If a spirit activates this on a group of runners while in full view of a squad of corpsec guards - how do you determine whether or not they are still seen? Do you just roll Perception immediately? Does that roll apply for the whole encounter (guards who don't pass never pass)? If they start shooting, are they simply subject to the Blind Fire modifier?
• Concealment 2! The power mentions being used to make a dual natured entity NOT look dual natured. Would a possessed, inanimate homunculus look like a non-living target under the power - or simply a statue with a mundane aura (which would be a pretty big give-away anyhow)?
• Dualnaturedness! Can a spirit possessing a body (being thusly dual natured) attack astral targets? Do the aforementioned possessed fists of fury count as "normal weapons" against materialized spirits?
• Dualnaturedness 2! If I'm attacked on the astral while possessing something, do I use my possessed stats or my astral stats? (I'm sure this is in the book now that I think about it...)

I had more but I'll remember them eventually.

Hybrid form inhabitation merges are the only way spirits can utilyze AR or the 'trix.

Stick-n-Shock ammo, stun batons... All you need is 3 net successes and the F8 spirit needs to roll damage resistance.

If you try to get all the 5 core spirit powers at a rating = your force, and keep your stats basically in line with your force, you end up being a Force 2.5 spirit. You're pretty much as cool as a standard Force 3 Spirit that has a lot of "F-1" and few "F" stats, and not nearly as many spirit powers. That's why I prefer to think of Free Spirit PCs as Wild Spirit PCs. You have to be really clever for them to work for you, such as being a Materialization tradition and taking Shapechange.

I've been toying with the idea of having a 350 BP free spirit base cost, starting at F2 like normal, but gaining the 5 core spirit powers at a rating = your force and having your stats = your force, allowing you to raise stats over your force as desired (lots of spirits have "F+3" stats)(and possibly not Edge-having to raise that one from 1 to a max of your Force), and gaining one spirit power per point of force (as opposed to Spirit Points as written). That way you're pretty much playing a real freaking spirit, or at least an Ally Spirit lookalike that went free.

[EDIT] Theoretically, if you have a spirit with Realistic Form, he should be able to use at least AR [/EDIT]


The problem is homunculi don't have the "internal organs" needed to use AR either. Think of a homu as a glorified statue. They don't have eyes, ears, sensors, or anything else.


I'd agree. And you could try getting like an oldschooll LCD/LED display screen hooked up to your 'link to see it. Or your GM could be nice and allow it to appear just fine on Electronic Paper.




Discretion! You'd do a "Spotting Spirits" section on page 95, Street Magic. If they fail to notice you're actually a spirit, they'll prolly assume you're a drone.

Concealment! I'd say they have to make a new Perception check, with the "Active Looking" +3 DP modifier (which they'll likely still fail). I'd allow them to re-check as needed, and yes, they'd suffer Blind Fire if they could point their guns in the correct direction.

Concealment 2! I've never seen that anywhere. I know you can use other powers/metamagics to appear mundane/awakened/dual natured, but Concealment simply subtracts dice from Perception tests.

Dualnaturedness! ... Dual Natured creatures can attack astral forms. Dual Natured creatures count as magic weapons.


Can't find a quote where they count as magic weapons, but they are magically active. That should be a huge clue.

Awesome, it's great to have that kind of feedback.


Looking again, this is the quote under Concealment:


On second read, I think it's just fluff for "the penalty applies astrally too" but I guess that leads to another not-strictly-free-spirit-related question. Other than Assensing a specific target, how does Perception work in the astral? If you're astrally perceiving a plain room and a spirit enters through one wall, shouldn't it be glaringly obvious? Do you even roll perception/assensing just to "notice" something in the astral? Is there any way, other than masking, to "hide" in the astral?

I don't see your sentence anywhere. Can you quote a source?

[EDIT] That sentence is probably from the FAQ, and it's adressing whether or not the power works against Astral Perception Tests as well, which it does. [/EDIT]

Ah, the differences with Anniversary Edition come forth! SR4A, pg.293. It comes directly after the description of Concealment you posted - nothing else was changed.

I've tried to wrap my head around making a good free spirit character, and it just can't be done. Like Neraph says, you're basically a very weak version of what mages can summon all the time. You have the potential to become brokenly powerful, but at least to start, you're terrible.

IMO, the way to make a free spirit work staring out is to have help in-character. Have a mage prepare an uber vessel for you. Not a plasteel haemonculus though -- that's just too open and obvious, as well as being pretty limited in what it does for you. Possess something beefy, like a troll! If your GM allows it, the PCs can capture a big burly metahuman, bring him to an enchanter, and have the enchanter prepare the vessel for the spirit, and in exchange the spirit gives spirit pacts to members of the team. Ideally, it would be a vessel with high stats, and passive cyber such as bone lacing and orthoskin. Then you go from being a dumb little ghost to being a tank troll with immunity to normal weapons The problem is, of course, that the GM has to OK that. You'd basically be getting two characters, both yourself and your vessel, which would be like having a lot more than 400 BP... But honestly, even if they have a powerful vessel, free spirits aren't that great -- they can be disrupted by magical and elemental attacks pretty easily. A GM should allow a free spirit to possess a good vessel just for the purpose of them being useful to the team, instead of a spectral friend who plays cheerleader and uses a few supporting powers.

Very well put, but I have a couple of constructive criticisms for that.

1) You're ignoring the potential for a Manifest-based Free Spirit with the Shapechange spell. Imagine you're crappy little F5, Bod 3 (or 4) spirit all the sudden becoming a Wolf with +5 to all the stats. Or a (Troll) Form spell (more hotly debated than Pro-Life/Pro-Death).

2) Check out the thread linked in my Sig for how to uber-break spirits, and "force" your GM to allow you to play a super-powerful Free Spirit. Also described is a way to get "enchanted" weapons for mundanes.

I'm not ignoring it. Shapechange is limited to +/- 2 body of your regular body. A spirit could certainly shift from a materialized spirit with body 3 into a critter with body 5, but that's still pretty meh. Especially because they wouldn't be wearing armor -- their one main advantage is ITNW, but you can't really put armor on a wolf, everyone would know something was up! As for (Troll) form, the RAW pretty clearly says critters. Critters means non-metahumans. It's not a philosophical matter of whether metahumans are animals, but a definitional quesiton. The term "critter" is defined in Shadowrun as anything that isn't human, and isn't spectral. That's all there is to it. Now, Shapechange can't make you shift into a metahuman, but there's no rule that you couldn't design a new spell to do that. If it allowed you to exceed the Body +2 limitation, however, the Drain would be prohibitive, easily more than a free spirit could handle with their crappy casting ability coming out of chargen. No, I'm convinced that your best bet is to kidnap a good vessel and possess them, that gives you the attributes that you simply can't afford, but which you need to be useful.



For one thing, it might be kinda hard to justify why a mage wants to die and be merged with a spirit. It's true that part of them remains after an ally spirit merging, but the host is effectively no longer himself. The real problem is that you might easily roll a True Form or Flesh Form, and not a Hybrid Form. You can't control it, so there's a very good chance that either the mage simply dies, or the spirit inhabits his body but doesn't take any of his knowledge or skills. Not to mention the fact that you need a ton of karma to make a good ally spirit, which makes this impractical as a character concept, it would have to be done after significant play time.

Also, ally spirits cost craploads of karma, assuming you can find someone to Inhabit a weapon with an ally spirit, it would be incredibly expensive. Furthermore, the ally is bound to serve the caster, not some mundane. If the caster ignores it, and keeps it trapped in a sword for all time, it may become quite disgruntled and try to break away.

Whats wrong with having two PCs colluding together?

- J.

/sigh.
You have a Body 3 spirit. You cast Shapechange to become a Bod 5 creature. You get 5 successes. Your animal form has Bod 10. With the Shapechange spell you add the successes from the Spellcasting Test to the attributes of the creature.



1) You're assuming they die. Think Prince Arthas from the Warcraft setting.

2) Not really. For instance, for 8 karma you can get a Force 1 Ally Spirit, and for like 10 nuyen you can get a dagger. Ta-da! - enchanted dagger. Now to get one decently effective, then yeah, you need to get some karma going.

That last sentence doesn't even make sense. Where's the ally spirit stuck in a weapon going to go? And what if he's from a hermetic tradition, and was created as a living enchantment of a Wizard's Staff? Or a kannushi awakening the spirit of the katana?

Especially with that last one the spirit would just get to deal with it; that's its entire purpose of existing. And don't forget: you can go on a short metaplanar quest to get the spirit formula of the "spirit of the sword" for that katana, grabbing a F2 or F3 Inhabitation Free Spirit formula in a few short hours to complete the ritual ceremonies surrounding the forging of a new blade.

1) The spirit would still have ItNW.

2) Actually, (Critter) Form states "any non-paranormal animal", and that makes all the difference in the world. And it talks in the Dracoform section about lesser dragons having spells to change into metahuman forms.

I do agree that there isn't a philosophical question of humans being animals, but Shapechange calls for a critter, and (Critter) Form, despite the name, only asks for an animal. We've been over this.

Oh, really? I totally forgot about that. Don't sigh at me >:X



It says pretty clearly that their soul is consumed. I guess that might not fit within at least someone's definition of death. I wasn't trying to say that no mage would ever do it, I just personally can't imagine what it takes to want to let a spirit consume you in order for your body to live on with a merged spirit-person entity controlling it. The RAW even says that someone who gets inhabited is considered to be "lost," i.e. the character is gone, and is now an NPC. You'd have to have a nice GM who wants to let you continue controlling the merged hybrid entity instead of ruling that you become an NPC.



What do you mean it doesn't make sense? Allies don't want to be tools, they want to be companions. Being used as mere tools by a mere mundane could make them angry, and they could try to break free. See "losing an ally" in Street Magic, p.105. Being "cruel" or "callous" can make your ally try to escape. Putting it inside a weapon, and giving it away to a mundane, could easily qualify as callous. Maybe if the mage put the ally in an item that he used himself, it would be fine. I can indeed imagine a Qaballic ally spirit being perfectly happy if you stick it into your mystical 10 sided wand, which you use all the time. Or a hedge witch's ally could be just fine with being stuck into a gnarled old staff of mandrake root. But giving the object away seems, IMO, like abuse of an ally spirit that would qualify for it to start trying to escape.

Now, as for finding a free spirit that actually desires to live inside of weapons, and then binding it? That would work. That would actually be pretty cool. Bound spirits don't have the same loyalty, nor do they have the ability to break away when they feel unloved. Plus, if it's the right kind of spirit, then it probably wouldn't even be that angry at being bound.

First off, I apologize about sighing at you, I've had to explain how that spell works many many times. It gets old after a while.

It also says that unless the story is good, the character is completely consumed. If it makes for a good story that the mage and the spirit fuse into a new entity in which the mage is no longer fully the old mage and the spirit is no longer fully the old spirit, but a permanent combination of the two (again, think Prince Arthas from Warcraft or any of the fusion dances from DBZ, only permanent), then those lines of text are fulfilled.

Now I will cede your point on True Form merges, because they specifically state the vessel is destroyed. Hypothetically, Hybrid Forms, and especially Flesh Forms, have the potential of retaining enough of the original player (especially Flesh Form) to continue playing it, no problem, especially if the spirit was an ally spirit, and the characteristics of the ally spirit were similar to your own character.

And nowhere within the rules does it state that you become an NPC. It does not even suggest that.


That was my point exactly.

I dunno, it directly states that the character is "lost" for all intents and purposes. To me, that means you died, and the thing in your place is now an NPC. Again, the GM can rule otherwise, it says so. But that's not how it works by default.

Thought I'd toss up a Free Spirit in action. In our last game (an alt group). The free spirit provided secure communication via mindlink, fire support by manifesting near solo targets and fearing them, a movement power that got the team to safety before a SWAT team ruined there day. All in all a valuable member of this team. Being a beast spirit and manifesting as an unassuming dog let's him wander around drawing much less attention them an armored troll boxer, a coma patient in a wheel chair and the cybered up gunman.

Cheers. Thanks. I know this is in SM but I don't have my book handy.

- J.

This would make free spirits playable IMHO - and on par with summoned spirits. Personally, I'd like to see a way to cherry pick powers and/or get additional powers like a free spirit... but that's probably a bit out of the question.

Shame it is a house rule and not RAW however.

- J.