From nv91-asa@nada.kth.se Sat Mar 8 01:44:02 1995 Status: RO X-Status: A Received: from arwen.otago.ac.nz (arwen.otago.ac.nz [139.80.64.6]) by mail.nada.kth.se (8.6.10/8.6.9) with ESMTP id BAA00984 for ; Wed, 8 Mar 1995 01:43:23 +0100 Received: from [139.80.68.214] (n068214.otago.ac.nz [139.80.68.214]) by arwen.otago.ac.nz (8.6.10/8.6.9) with SMTP id NAA00640 for ; Wed, 8 Mar 1995 13:39:46 +1300 Date: Wed, 8 Mar 1995 13:39:46 +1300 Message-Id: <199503080039.NAA00640@arwen.otago.ac.nz> X-Sender: st005910@brandywine.otago.ac.nz Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: Anders Sandberg From: david.hood@stonebow.otago.ac.nz (David Hood) Subject: Re: The Apostles of Ialdabaoth Here are the comments that bounced: Something else that has occured to me about the apostles- the relation between the fallen (or at least leaning over) mage and the avatar. The avatar after all is a major influence in the drive for ascension and abandoning the quest is going to (eventually) have fairly serious reprocussions. So here are the two options that occur to me for how the mage/avatar relationship could be affected. The first is that the avatar accepts the mage slothfulness. This is probably the prefered option for those who like avatars to be fairly passive (or at least internal to the mage). The rational here is that the mage's abandonment of ascension causes a similar listlessness to set into the avatar. If the mage ever become interested in seeking ascension, the the inertia of the avatar would have to be overcome- a seeking with no guidance from the avatar would probably have to be the least of the mages efforts. The second option (and one I tend towards) is for those who see the avatar as being more independant from the mage. Initially the avatar attempts to cajole/ threaten the mage back into action. Of course many mages in this position resent such treatment so the result is just as likely to be the two driven further apart as brought back together. After the avatar has tried all its other options it may well choose to disassociate itselt from the mage. This is a last ditch action to protect itself from being damaged by the mages actions (or at least from wasting additional effort on a lost cause). I would suggest that any mage in this position suffer similar penalties to when their avatar has been taken away by rune-fetter (something along the lines of + 3 to magic difficulties, unable to regain prime [or similar]). To regain the avatar would be a fairly epic story, a task which most mages in this position would be loath to undertake. This leaves long-time Apostles as a somewhat unusual encounter for mages trying to determine what exactly they are ("they seemed to be preforming true magic, but I had no sense of an awakened avatar"). Of course the two options are not necessarily incompatible. As a result of thinking about this I'm planning a posting (in a week or so, depending on lunch breaks) on a mindscape/dreamrealm/rote/mediation/place where mages can regain aspects from their past (such as regaining contact with the avatar, or recalling lost [or stolen] memories). If all goes as planned I should post to both mage-l and the WW newsgroup (which on my server has a turnover time of three days. I don't have time to check news every three days, sigh) so you should catch it even if you do unsubscribe. Regards, David H. David Hood david.hood@stonebow.otago.ac.nz