SHAMANS OF WAJOK

by Trotsky

Special Note: The following description is written for use with the Harnmaster rules. 1st edition rules are marked 'HM1', while the 2nd edition rules from Harnmaster Religion are marked 'HMR'. For those of you without these rules, a guide to terminology is provided. Translation rules for RuneQuest (3rd ed.) are also available.

Circles & Offices

Shamans are graded into five Circles, based on Ritual ML. There is, however no structured hierarchy like that of civilised religions. Use the following table:

	HM1		HMR
Circle	ML	Office	RML	Office
1st	26+	assistant	1+	adult
2nd	41+		21+	assistant
3rd	61+	shaman	51+	shaman
4th	76+		71+
5th	86+		86+

Training

Both men and women may become shamans upon reaching puberty, if divinations show that they have the ability to commune with the other world. Although the majority are expected to reach the third Circle and go on to become full shamans, this is by no means compulsory, and a substantial minority remain 'assistants' throughout their lives.

HM1

The assistant gains the following skills:

Ritual/2, Herblore/2, Foraging/2, Survival/2, Awareness/1, Oratory/1, Weatherlore/1

The assistant then gains three option points to be expended to improve his or her skills or open appropriate elective skills. For each year spent in training, the character may improve their Ritual skill by half SB.

Once an assistant has raised Ritual ML sufficiently to qualify for entering the third Circle, they may opt to become a shaman. If they chose not to do this, they cannot advance beyond the second Circle. There will rarely be more than one shaman in a tribe (although this is not unheard of), and a few of the smaller tribes lack any shamans at all.

Totems

Every Ymodi tribe is associated with a particular totem, which is said to protect them and provide useful abilities. In rules terms, Ymodi totems replace sunsign for all members of a given tribe. The bonuses provided are as follows:

HM1

• Bear - Throwing +2, Fishing +1, Maul +1, Tower Shield +1
• Eagle - Awareness +2, Shortbow +1, Tracking +1, Weatherlore +1
• Fox - Rhetoric +2, Awareness +1, Stealth +1, Survival +1
• Hare - Awareness +2, Foraging +1, Jumping +1, Tracking +1
• Mountain Goat - Climbing +2, Acrobatics +1, Animalcraft (goats) +1, Foraging +1
• Otter - Acrobatics +2, Fishing +1, Swimming +1, Unarmed +1
• Salmon - Swimming +2, Fishing +2, Jumping +1
• Swift - Awareness +1, Stealth +1, Weatherlore +1, Running +2*
• Wild Cat - Stealth +2, Animalcraft (cats) +1, Survival +1, Tracking +1
• Wolf - Spear +2, Animalcraft (dogs) +1, Knife +1, Tracking +1

* - Spd is treated as being +2 for determining running speed only

Ritual Invocations

HM1

• Blessing (IV/5)
• Courage (IV/15)
• Cure (IV/15)
• Divination (V/25)
• Exorcism (IV/25)
• Protection (IV/40)
• Spirit Voice (III/15)
• Woodscraft (III/25)

SPIRIT VOICE (New Invocation)

This invocation enables a shaman under the influence of the drug tasparth to identify a nearby ethereal in the spirit world and invite it to share his or her body for 4d6+20 minutes. The intent is to allow the shaman to mindlink with and gain information from a friendly ethereal, but there is always risk that an evil spirit will be contacted instead. On a CS, the shaman may specify the precise type of ethereal to be contacted, otherwise one is randomly selected from those in the vicinity. If the spirit turns out to be malevolent, it will likely try and attack the shaman or other people nearby, so it is customary to restrain the shaman for the duration of the invocation.