GOZYDA SHAMANS

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

Shamans select their apprentices from among the young men of the tribe, and train them to use magic so that they can protect the clan. A shaman will never have more than one apprentice at a time, and a given clan will never have more than two shamans, so that if it already has two, neither will take an apprentice. An apprentice is expected to become a full shaman in due course; the only way out is death.

HM1

The assistant gains the following skills:

Ritual/2, Survival/3, Oratory/2, Awareness/2, Stealth/1, Spear/1, Dagger/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 must attempt to acquire a spirit familiar (using the spirit-walking power). If they fail, the spirit will kill them. Shamans have no religious function among the Gozyda, they simply have the power to use magic in their own defence, and to help the clan.

Ritual Invocations

Although Gozyda shamans do not practice any form of worship, they do gain powers indistinguishable from ritual invocations to outsiders. Keep track of piety points as if they were worshipping, even though their dedication of time is spent in different ways than prayer.

HM1

• Command Asiri (V/20)
• Consume Enemy (IV/20)
• Curse (III/10)
• Fatigue (IV/25)
• Spirit Walking (III/15)
• Stealth (IV/20)
• Summoning (V/25)
• Withering (V/30)

SPIRIT WALKING (New Invocation)

This invocation allows the shaman to leave his body, becoming non-corporeal and invisible. In this state, he cannot interact with the physical world, but can interact directly with ethereals. This effect is brief, lasting ten minutes with a marginal success, and twenty minutes with a critical success. For the duration of the effect, the shaman's body is unconscious and vulnerable to attack, although the shaman may return to it at any time.

CONSUME ENEMY (New Invocation)

This lengthy ritual allows the shaman to properly prepare a human body for a cannibal feast. Up to ten people may partake of the feast. Anybody who does so gains one development roll in a skill possessed by the deceased victim to an ML of 71+. If the victim had more than one skill at an ML of 71+, the person eating them may chose which skill to gain the development roll in. Despite the name, the spell does not actually have to be performed on an enemy, anybody will do (although obviously a young person is unlikely to have any useful skills).