Covert Possession

[gamesmeister]

Quick question regarding covert possession - can the possessing spirit voluntarily leave at any time?

The only reason I ask is that we had the rather amusing situation last week where one PC was covertly possessed by a Fear spirit, only to discover that he had integrated a rune of harmony and was immune to the effects of Fear

So now it's stuck inside him, and I'm not quite sure what to do about it !

 

[RosenMcStern]

Uhm, my book says nothing about runes of Harmony and emotion-affecting spells, but maybe it has been made obsolete by some Deluxe edition or the like. However, if he was immune when he was possessed, then the covert possession attempt must have failed. Possibly the spirit has faded to the spirit world instead of possessing him.

 

[gamesmeister]

The affect is in the additional runic powers PDF published some time ago, however that's irrelevant as, being the GM, I could have just made it up

Anyway, the PC is immune to Fear inducing effects, not possession itself, so I'm not convinced that the possession would automatically fail. I could go with that if necessary though.

 

[soltakss]

I've always played that Passion Spirits (Fear/Madness/Pain/etc) and Disease Spirits are basically unintelligent and sticky - they stay where they are put until the host dies, then they depart for the spirit plane.

Ghosts and similar spirits might be able to leave when they want to.

The best bet is to go for a shaman or similar person who can exorcise the spirit.

 

[The General]

I'm with soltakss... the spirit is sticky. This of course provides you with some great role playing fodder...

Lets say the player character gets up to go to the loo in the middle of the night, forgetting to pick up his rune as he goes... Sudden fear of the dark and the deep dark hole in the ground grips him, he runs back to the inn and feels instantly safer.

The rune may prevent fear effects, but only when the character has the rune on him. You could have lots of fun with that :twisted:

 

[Loz]

I'm with soltakss... the spirit is sticky. This of course provides you with some great role playing fodder...

Lets say the player character gets up to go to the loo in the middle of the night, forgetting to pick up his rune as he goes... Sudden fear of the dark and the deep dark hole in the ground grips him, he runs back to the inn and feels instantly safer.

The rune may prevent fear effects, but only when the character has the rune on him. You could have lots of fun with that :twisted:

I agree 1000%. You can have so much fun with this (so can the possessed player). Its like the character knows he has this malignant alter-ego inside him, and all that keeps it at bay is that Harmony rune. Its a great roleplaying situation.

 

[gamesmeister]

I'm with soltakss... the spirit is sticky. This of course provides you with some great role playing fodder...

Lets say the player character gets up to go to the loo in the middle of the night, forgetting to pick up his rune as he goes... Sudden fear of the dark and the deep dark hole in the ground grips him, he runs back to the inn and feels instantly safer.

The rune may prevent fear effects, but only when the character has the rune on him. You could have lots of fun with that :twisted:

I agree 1000%. You can have so much fun with this (so can the possessed player). Its like the character knows he has this malignant alter-ego inside him, and all that keeps it at bay is that Harmony rune. Its a great roleplaying situation.

Yeah, I really like this too. We haven't pinned down yet what form the harmony rune takes, so I'll do that at the next session.

I wonder if the PC even knows he's been possessed - quite possibly not given that he's a Lankhor Mhy sage and won't know a great deal about spirits and spirit magic.