I never said that 'obviously stupid' and 'within the rules' were mutually exclusive. That's kinda the whole point. If the massive abuse weren't legal, the GM wouldn't need to ban it.

It wasn't a knee-jerk reaction. It was clear from one of the pattyhulez's previous threads that he didn't have a way of getting Energy Drain (other than GM fiat, which can do -anything-). Obsoleting one method of character advancement (by having effectively unlimited karma) is an interesting theoretical exercise. However, the existence of the ability to do this doesn't mean that karma costs should be completely disregarded, any more than monetary costs for gear in D&D 3.5 should be disregarded because you can turn cows into salt for massive profit with scrolls of Flesh to Salt or invoke Pazuzu and do a Wish-chain.

Pattyhulez's dismissive "you guys have obviously never heard of the drain karma power" was a bad post and deserved to be mocked.

edit: Hm, maybe mocked is the wrong verb. It still was a bad post.

I guess if the GM lets a party of runners get extra income from starting/buying some business or running a protection racket, then this is not much different. 1karma equals about 2,500ny. But this should not be something that someone can start out with or get without game development.



This kind of prevents mass karma exchange.

Note that it does say either a pact -or- the lengthy ritual is needed to transfer karma.

Despite this, I still think that huge karma gain through being pacted to a ton of people is theoretical optimization, and therefore not really useful in a thread that's discussing the usefulness of ally spirits in a (presumably) normal game.

I guess I should not really assume anything. I figured that the temporary pacts allowing karma transfer would make things to easy. The life pact explicitly involves a karma transfer and the formula pact makes the metahuman a copy of the spirits formula which is necessary to make a transfer of karma with a ritual. But it is certainly reasonable for a gm to rule that any pact counts. That is probably closer to RAW.

True. It is interesting, though.

In discussions about SR spirits, it never ceases to amaze me at how many people think slavery or permanent indentured servitude is totally ok, as long as you are nice to your slave, they should be happy and never want freedom, right?

Right?

If given the chance, a spirit will probably jump at the chance for freedom. Even if its master has been super special nice to it, it is still going to want freedom. If you have been super special nice to it, it probably won't want to kill or permanently injure you when it escapes. But to assume that it won't desire freedom seems a bit off to me.

I treat Ally Spirits desire for freedom as more a teenager and parent thing, not a master and slave thing (though it is close). That is unless you're mean to them, then you're boned.

Which would be a valid comparison, if the teenager never grew up and was never allowed to leave home.

You don't generally release your ally spirits, or send them off into the wide world to make it on their own. You keep them chained to your being to serve as you see fit.

A gilded cage is still a cage. And the only one who seems to remember that is the bird.

Psh, they're not people. Ally spirits are created. You're god. Besides, this is Shadowrun: *actual* slavery is okay, and every other atrocity you can imagine.

You can probably get paid for committing those atrocities, unless it's part of Missions.

But the point remains, Ally spirits will try to free themselves should the opportunity present itself. How do you explain that Mr. Smartypants? A poorly designed Spirit Formula?

Well, yes. "An ally can only attempt to break away during a rebinding ritual or if its master is incapacitated by Physical damage or Drain, and even then will only make the attempt if it feels that is has been wronged."

The rules for what 'wronged' means are: "Characters who are especially cruel or callous can lose the respect and friendship of their ally, just as they can anger any other contact or acquaintance. If the magician becomes over-dependent on his own ally spirit or regularly endangers it, the ally may become resentful and attempt to seek its own freedom."

So, cruel, callous, over-dependent (which I interpret to mean 'unfair' in terms of work or risks), and 'regularly endanger' are the options.

And all of those are subjective, and up to the spirit to determine.

But point taken. Ally spirits are the most loyal of all the slaves spirits you can have bound to your will.

Didn't they used to always attempt to break free when the mage was incapacitated in previous editions? I seem to remember that being the case... I'll have to check my books later.

In other news, we've discovered a new profession: Mage/Ally Spirit counseling.

Mortals don't live forever. When the master dies, the "teenager" becomes a full-blown Free Spirit adult.

Well, maybe Elves live forever.

On the other hand, perhaps Orks have no trouble keeping their spirits happy, since the spirit knows it won't have to wait all that long.

In defense of my analogy, many mages with Ally Conjuration ultimately do release their ally spirits under the premise that a free spirit contact with high loyalty is almost as good as the original ally (this rarely happens, most campaigns don't last long enough). As a GM strongly in favor of the 'make sure it is fun' philosophy, I don't tend to play up the whole bonded servitude thing as it may creep people out. I do encourage the player to make a second personality (for the ally) and roleplay both of them at the same time, trying to balance what happens between both of their desires.

Wrong, actually. It was not an uncommon practice for real life indentured servants to request to stay on permanently - in fact, there were many laws about how to handle situations like that. Just because America had a bad experience with slavery and human trafficking remains a global problem does not mean that mana constructs created for the sole purpose of indentured servitude rebel against it.

I think of Ally spirits more as something like dogs - they can stay loyal forever if you treat them right; they don't have some inherent problem with asymmetric relationships.

Or perhaps it's a feudal like arrangement. The spirit gains power and knowledge while serving the mage.

Except, of course, they do if "mistreated". Out of curiosity, did those indentured servants who wanted to remain get paid or compensated in some way?

That said, I just double checked my previous edition books (MitS and the Grimoire). While it is heavily implied that an ally would take the opportunity to break free when the mage is dying or fails a ritual of change, it is mentioned that if the spirit is well treated (regularly fed karma, isn't forced to do things it doesn't want to do, and is generally treated as an ally rather than a servant), it doesn't have to try to escape. There was something in there about an ally spirits force related to its masters charisma. I think if the spirits force was higher, it could attempt to break free whenever the master was rendered unconscious from physical or stun damage.

In any event, I withdraw my assertion that the ally spirit will always try to break free, as some wiggle room is there for the GM to make the call either way.

Actually yes. Many of them were given land, payment, food, shelter, and wives.

Check out the first American Slave owner - Anthony Johnson. While he was still an Identured Servant he bought his own plot of land for tobacco farming, perfected his trade, had a wife and 4 children, bought his own servitude off, then became the first slave owner in America. Oh, and he was a black man himself.

So they were well compensated for their work and well looked after. This would be a big difference between slavery and indentured servitude. Your example even goes so far as to show that indentured servitude wasn't permanent (it could be "bought off" or was only for a temporary amount of time). So indentured servitude isn't really a good parallel for an ally spirit, is it? The only real way for the ally to be free is:

1. Escape when its master is down for the count.
2. Wait for its master to die.
3. Be voluntarily released by its master.

Some traditions would be more likely than others to pursue option 3, and some would be more inclined than others to treat their ally spirit well. But a spirit cannot "buy off" its servitude, and the only payment it will generally receive is karma, which might be a rare thing depending on whether its master wants to make it more powerful.

I suppose it really depends on how the mage treats the spirit, and what call the GM decides to make.

That said, are you trying to get at something else with your posts? I feel like I'm missing some point you were trying to make.

Slavery and indentured servitude both had their own laws and customs in many regions. Both could buy themselves free, both could own land, both could recieve payment. My point being basically that slavery and indentured servitude was and is completely normal in many countries around the world and is not good evidence to use against Ally Spirits.

Look, we get it. The "At Loyalty 6 they'll pay what I want them to pay when I want them to pay it because of this. " statement alone is telling of your particular viewpoint. That's fine, that's your opinion. My question is, are you trying to win at the internet or something?

There's wiggle room in the Ally spirit stuff, much like the whole game, you go with what works for your group. Given sentience, spirits will react differently to the same stimulus as other spirits, or people, or whatever. General rule of thumb, you treat them badly, and you'll pay for it, not now perhaps, but perhaps down the line. I also feel there's a reason they added the snippet of' For many magicians, the ally is more than a servant and is seen as an equal—or even a superior.' as it reflects the importance that mindset can be an influencing factor keeping that high loyalty rating.

Ally spirits are kinda like your kids. They will come to reflect the way you 'raise' them. You raise them by using them as drain batteries or mystical meat shields, and they'll 'grow up' a certain way. You treat them like partners and they'll grow up another way. Treat them like mentors and yet another way.

I was taking that standpoint to prove a point. I was both correct and my point was proven.


Excellent. I agree.

Anyway, I don't let PCs just buy Loyalty 6 anything willy-nilly. That's a GM not doing his job.

I really hate to bring this up again, but the rules don't support what you said at all.

Not picking on you Neraph, honest, but the mechanical rules of Loyalty don't work that way.

Also, the sense behind loyalty is that its fluid, or at least potentially fluid. Sure you can have a friend for life, which also entails a broader set of options that still allow friendship, but much like any individual there will be a threshold beyond which you'll even wreck the loyalty of said friend. Course, another variant is the brainwashed cultist who's been twisted into ways that allow you a free range of abuse on them, but i wouldn't really equate a loyalty 6 cultist with a loyalty 6 friend.

I think the slavery statement goes too far, but there are different ways some people define slavery. If slavery is just not being able to walk away from a contract with your employer then most in 2070 that work for a corporation, criminal organization, or armed forces are all slaves. This may be true in an abstract philosophical sense but I think most people would consider it a gross exaggeration and an insulting comparison to people who are actually made slaves. Is the person kept locked up, made to work for no pay, made to sleep with who ever you chose and their children made slaves? Slavery is in reality horrific and goes hand in hand with beatings, dehumanizing, racism, and rape. That said, there have been many institutions though out history that are almost but not quite as bad as slavery. Surfs had to work where they are told on the land of their lord and had basically no rights when it came to protection from abuse by nobles, but they could marry who they chose, for the most part go where they want and do as they chose. Shadowrun "wageslaves" are similar but they have a few more rights. Chain gangs were similar to slavery but they theoretically still had rights and their imprisonment would not last forever (maybe). I am no expert on these topics but I would hope that the relationship with an ally spirit is normally better.

A slave is anyone who is stuck to their current situation with little to no way out.

You hit on it when you mentioned a wageslave. They are corp workers who earn just enough to stay in debt to the corporation for life.

Everyone, even people nowadays are slaves to something. Be it our employers, spouses, families, hobbies, etc. Can you realistically leave your family / wife /husband / children / work / etc and not come back? Very few people can do that, not even the rich. Why not the rich? They are slaves to their fortunes.

BTW, it doesn't have to go hand in hand with abuse. It often did because the enslavers were of small minds and little imagination. But indentured servitude was a common form of slavery (in essence, slavery with a binding contract). Generally indentured servants were treated well. It was a profitable business. It was often used in apprenticeships to Masters too. In fact, anyone who signs up with the military has such a thing. For X years the military can do what they want (within legally defined boundaries) with you. In return, you get certain benefits. For my time in the US Navy, I got a basket of benefits that I found to be very useful. All I had to do was sign the contract and follow through on it.

If you wanted to have an ally spirit with such restrictions, let your player(s) know it's part of the ritual. Perhaps the player has a flavor of magic that requires such negotiation. Maybe the spirit bargains with its summoner after the ritual is over. Perhaps over time the spirit decides it wants to go free. Nothing stops the spirit from asking its summoner. If the summoner disagrees, it could cause a rift. Anytime the ally gets unhappy, the summoner will be unhappy. SM was very clear that summmoners need to treat their spirits properly (as defined by their magical tradition).

Don't stress yourself out Neraph, I don't want you to lose any sleep over it. You have your viewpoint, and I don't agree with it (assuming I'm correct in my understanding that you think slavery is an ok institution).

At any rate, bottom line for Ally spirits is you'd better treat them well, or they'll probably turn on you the first chance they get.



Well, an ally spirit must do whatever its master commands, and is only compensated/rewarded whenever the master feels like it. Also, it can never leave its master's service (unless the master frees it, or it manages to escape while he's dying).

What exactly would you call that?

Oh, come now, while Neraph can be unclear at times, there's no way to get that out of what was said.

I'll be honest then and say that I still don't see what he was getting at. Neraph, were you simply trying to say that slavery is alive and well today? If so, yes I know that. And no, I still don't think it is ok.

If your point is that an ally spirit won't try to break free if it is well treated, then you probably missed where I admitted as much back on the first or second page (edit - It was post #68 on the 3rd page, my mistake).

If I'm incorrect in my understanding of what your point is, could you please state it again, as clearly and simply as you can?

What he was trying to say is that in certain places, under certain forms of slavery, many slaves did not feel the need to rebel against their masters. At least, that's my reading of it.

But there's nothing in his posts that says or even implies that real life slavery is ok.

I'm not sure how that relates to what we were talking about, unless he was, in fact, agreeing with me (which didn't seem to be the case).

For clarity's sake, my initial position (which I recanted a few posts later), was that an ally spirit would try to break free whenever it got the chance, regardless of its treatment. I was under this impression because of working in the previous editions (where it is strongly implied, but refers to a spirit possibly choosing not to break free), but recanted when I found my recollection was slightly faulty.

I agreed, probably in an unclear way, that a very well treated ally would probably not try to break free from its master.

So again, if Neraph is disagreeing with me, what is the point he is trying to make? Because I appear to be completely missing it.

I suspect what happened is that Neraph missed where I changed my position, and I wasn't clear enough in my responses, and so we've been arguing a non-issue for a while.

As to the slavery being ok bit, I go the impression Neraph was ok with it from this comment:



It was the completely normal bit that stuck in my head. Re-reading it, I can see now that I may have been mistaken in my interpretation of what Neraph said, so my apologies to you Neraph, if I've gotten your viewpoint wrong.

Sorry for the delay on getting back to you all, but even I need sleep sometimes.



Yeah this. I was stating that there existed laws in many cultures for slaves that prevented them from being hurt and allowed them to own property, get paid for their work, and even allow themselves to buy themselves from their masters or to stay on for life after their time was up. Point being, as Mooncrow said, "What he was trying to say is that in certain places, under certain forms of slavery, many slaves did not feel the need to rebel against their masters."

Just because America had a bad experience with it and just because human trafficking is an extremely bad example of slavery in recent history does not mean that:
1) All experiences were bad (and this does not neccessarily mean I support it), and
2) We should place our beliefs on real world slavery onto the imaginary mana constructs of an imaginary game placed in an imaginary future where imaginary people are imaginarily referred to as "wageslaves."

Also, thank you for looking at my signature.

1. Sure, not all slaves were treated badly, but this doesn't address anything I said, does it? Or are you still arguing against the post that I've (repeatedly) mentioned was in error?

There are no imaginary laws in the imaginary Shadowrun universe that I am aware of that prevent ally spirits from being hurt or allow them to own property, require they get paid for their work, or even allow themselves to buy themselves from their masters. So again, how is this pertinent?

2. I'll direct you to what I said a bit earlier in this thread in response to Badmoodguy88:

"Well, an ally spirit must do whatever its master commands, and is only compensated/rewarded whenever the master feels like it. Also, it can never leave its master's service (unless the master frees it, or it manages to escape while he's dying).

What exactly would you call that?"

I would think that, short of needing to invent some imaginary word for our imaginary game to describe this imaginary relationship, we could just use a real world analogy. Slavery certainly seems to fit the bill, and not the happy-go-lucky slavery that apparently exists everywhere but America.

My post was not neccessarily in direct response to you. You needn't get so defensive/offensive.

In any event, as a creature of pure mana that can live forever barring being tracked down to its native metaplane or other extensively difficult measures, being "shackled" to a mortal for a mere 70 years (in the shadows, more like 4 'runs) in return for combat experience and being brought into existance seems a fair exchange. He's going to be a Free Spirit for far, far longer than he was ever an Ally Spirit.

Soooooooooooo..... It is Okay to trreat them as Slaves?
Just Curious, as, in my opinion, that justification really sucks...

How about we all just agree that the nebulous "treating spirits nicely" fluff is poorly written and unsupported by any actual mechanics?

Since the only rules are "whatever the GM says", in this case it seems to be more profitable to talk to your GM prior to running and find out what his guidelines are.

I'm fairly certain that he was saying the spirit does not see it has hostile slavery in and of itself. Sure a mage can be a jerk, but the idea of being an ally spirit is not directly tied to a slavery thought for the spirit since it is short lived and he gets stuff out of it. Indentured servant, slave, job with a contract that doesn't let you quit, call it what you want. The spirit does not see it as a bad thing in and of itself.

All of which is only an opinion...

But No worries...

That's why your Free Spirt is also a face. You wan't to join this pact for 1 karma a week for drain dice. Also It will be come a better deal in time as I rias my power you get more drain dice. I mean I think most PCs would be tempted for 6+ extra drain dice for 1karma a week.

Or if 1karma week is a bit high 2-3 karma a Luna cycle would work perfectly.

If you go on the long term plan you would expect some price cut as an incentive added to the ability to use the drain at your leisure and when surprised. Normally this kind of pact would be negotiated right before a big run.

The spirit might give a price cut for paying up front too. Getting a years worth of karma all at once is a very nice thing and deserving of a discount.

Very true. I once ran a 350 bp solo game with this being my goal. I must say its harder you can't afford the ubercontact

Well, if your GM lets you play the NPC's, sure. Go ahead and have them give you all their money and property while they're at it.

But money and property isn't in the same rating as small amounts of karma. For a drain pact on a force 2 sprit it is worth 12 karma plus nuyen as a focus. Offering cheaper in the short term and most-likely long term as your spirits force will grow worth 6 karma every time it happens. A force 36 drain pact is worth 36 karma per-person that takes it. I can't be bothered to the all the math right now on the payment/actual worth counting the nuyen cost and the fact the sprit will grow in power how ever it looks like it's close to brake even to take the pact for a year and if the 200 people agree and we decide the very conservative .5 karma a week or 2 a Luna cycle. You're looking at 5200 karma a year from 200 people.

Edit:
The math.
The nuyen cost of a centring focus is 15000*force that equals rather neatly 6 karma at 1 karma=2500 nuyen. It also costs 6*force karma.
So each extra drain dice is worth 12 karma.

So for a force 6 drain pact a charge of 72 karma is breaking even though a focus wouldn't cost more over time how ever each increase of the spirits force ups the cost by 12 karma per person in the pact.

So for 200 people in the pact. 14400 karma is for the selling of the pact evenly to 200 people.

You can selling the pact at it equivalent cost get to 595 force with profit of 120 karma . Assuming 0.5 karma a week from 200 people it would take you about 278 years to pull off so you better sell only to elves or some thing. How ever for every person you sell you pact to the quicker the advancement and the high you can reach with out over charging. This assumes contently 200 customers paying the full price of the pact. I'm sure some one could build a better moddle that takes in to account the customer numbers and such. Every customer is worth force*12 karma if your playing fair.

Quite simply this 200 customer moddle for 2 karma every 4 weeks is viabel for over 200 years if you care about it being worth more or less than just buying the focus. Once your spirit reaches almost 600 force it can't increase in power fast enough to give the customers a good deal. By then every (unless you sell to GDs or IEs) customer can overcast to there limit and soak it no matter what.

What are you talking about? Free Spirit PCs cannot just buy NPCs with spirit pacts.

You can talk about making deals and whatever but unless your GM let's you play the NPCs there is no mechanic for doing what you're talking about.

There's no mechanic other than the same mechanic as selling your gear ect. This pact if you dump the karma in to force almost exculively is a deal better than buying the focus for every one you offer it to. The closest you can get to buying NPCs in a sense in group contacts and it has solid mechanics in how much they cost and what loyalty will get you. You don't even need rating 6 if your offering a good deal 4 would do.

What you are offering is a pay monthly plan on a centring focus that will increase in power and likely end up with you paying about 50% of the value. Hell by RAW you can buy every on in the 6th world as a group contact at loaylty 6 with 1% awakened and say 25% of those mystic adepts/mages and a population like today you could sell the pact to 15,000,000 people though logistics could be an issue. It would also put you in an odd situation upping the power of every mage fro a price.

Ignoring that insanity. How many mages wouldn't buy a focus that they can't lose that will grow in power for a small cost? I'm sure that even in a small geographical area ignoring the fact you can visit all over the world in 3 seconds. I'm sure finding 200 wouldn't be too hard a few negotiation rolls ect and your set.

I think it is just having fun with hypothetical situations.

As someone else pointed out: what makes shadowrun what it is normally, is the fluff.

You could even just take the whole environment, monsters- I mean critters, weapons, spells, and game mechanics and do a D&D style dungeon crawl into materialized alchera in search of cool loot.

There is nothing really stopping you from doing a war game either. Having masses of troupes in the form of your groups that you wage war with against corps, gangs, and magical threats.

The whole investigation and infiltration thing is cool and very shadowrun but it does not neeed to be that way.

If someone came up with better vehicular/fast moving people combat rules a game of Battle Angel Alita Rollerball would be cool. Basically highly cybered street sams on motorized cyberskates, going around a long and dangerous track at hundreds of kilometers per hour, wile trying to be the one holding the ball when you cross the finish, and beating at each other with melee weapons.

It would all probably suck but I can dream.

Heh, I get the mental image of the Free Spirit turning into Collections for this group as well.

"So, I see you were late on your last payment, and it was only a partial payment."
"I'm sorry sir - it's just, times have been hard for me lately."
"While I appreciate that, do know that we only have a 3-day grace period here at Coyote, Goat, and Deer*. We expect you to make your next payment within the next four hours, otherwise we'll have to penalize you and drop you from the program..."

* Bonus points to whoever can find the reference.

angel