Hey everyone! I’m going to be running a game soon and we just went through character creation and the Whisper (who is a bit of a power gamer) instantly fixated on the ability to attune to summon a ghost and command it.
He asked if he would be able to keep doing that for basically any action (attack this guy, steal this thing), which felt wrong to me but I didn’t have a solid answer for him.
My ideas were that you couldn’t get a ghost to do anything and that the more you knew about a ghost (or had objects close to them) the more you could get it to do. And that obviously you need a new roll each time and that failing would be dangerous plus sometimes you can’t find a ghost. Maybe he needs to find a specific Ghost to do his bidding?
Any thoughts or ideas? I don’t want to be a mean GM and just say no all the time but letting him do whatever seems like it would be game breaking.
Your idea to basically make ghosts very volatile is a good one. I have a player who has the same power and during one of the first adventures (infiltration of a cult hideout in the lost part of the city), she got in contact with a ghost of a man who died of plague…And wanted nothing but share his ‘blessing’ with the people…And she let him. They’re still dealing with the fallout today.
I’d say, let that player use it…But make ghosts either rather ‘disconnected’ from the real world and a little stupid and weak…Or powerful and very dangerous. It gets a LOT of drama flowing.
Also, sometimes, there’s just no ghosts around.
Say yes, and roll the dice, find out what happens. Also offer devil’s bargains of “it’s somebody you cared about”, or “the ghost has connections”, “you actually get a demon”, “you summon one already in service to somebody else” etc.
Enslaving ghosts … Not sure if the Spirit Warden would be ok with that 😉 I’d make a clock for that
Darkvlagor I feel like the clock would have to be dependent on the command actions doing something that could alert the Spirit Wardens to the enslavement. ie “an eyewitness claims she saw a man telling a ghost to attack someone” or a Bluecoat tried to apprehend a suspect and a ghost chased him away, etc. I don’t think the Spirit Wardens are capable of just being instantly aware a ghost was commanded to do something when there are whispers, rogue ghosts, vampires, demons, and other devils mucking about and causing havoc within and without the ghost field.
But I think if the player wanted a specific ghost to just basically be his proxy, then he would need a ritual to bind it to him and that there should be a clock where he has to invest time to learn about the ghost’s life and collect any remaining personal items to act as foci for the ritual. Because it sounds like he wants the Whisper character, but then conveniently wants a ghost to do all the dangerous stuff.
Commanding a ghost is supposed to be a pain, that’s why it’s a skill, whereas any whisper can cut a deal like Oskarr did in episode one of John Harper’s series. Just be sure to throw in consequences of just commanding a random ghost. Maybe it tries to haunt him and as a result of the hauntings, it’s only a matter of time until the Spirit Wardens find him trying to enslave ghosts, because they’re on the trail of this pissed of ghost that’s just creating chaos. Maybe the ghost starts feeding on his contacts and vice purveyors, forcing him to seek new ones. So on.
In my game, ghosts talk to each other, and word gets around when someone abuses them. The weaker ones actively avoid them, and the stronger ones look for opportunities to take them out.
All good notes above. The things we added in the sessions I ran:
* ghosts are usually insane. They’ve spent months, years, or decades “living” without bodies, obsessing over their past. You want to tap the nearest one on the shoulder and ask it to guard your back, go for it, but the results will likely be unexpected.
* related to the above: ghosts can’t handle anything terribly complicated. “Follow that woman, tell me who she speaks to, and report back to me” is a bit much for a simple Attune. “Go float past that guard and rattle your chains” is more like it.
In my world, there’s basically three types of ghosts: 1) Remnants: Ghosts who just do the same thing over and over, memories. 2) Ravenous: Those ghosts who hunger and who’s hunger will eventually turn them into nothing more than ravenous monsters. 3) ‘Human’: Those ghosts who can still remember who they are in more or less detail, without being consumed by one aspect or their hungers.
All of these ghosts exist on different levels of being unhinged, though none are ‘sane’ by any level. In my view, you can get a remnant to do a thing, but never for long and usually not too much out of their remembrance. A ravenous one can be easily swayed to do anything that fulfills their hunger, but usually will turn against anyone his eye falls on next…And ‘human’ ghosts remember and are often the strongest, having the mental fortitude to survive death more or less intact…So compelling them is difficult and vengeance for harming their “self” is pretty high on their to-do list.
So compelling works, but there’s risks, rewards and a load of danger to it.
If a player can use a ghost to do horrible things so can the NPCs, If a player can use a ghost as a source of information so can the Spirit Wardens.
Blades is game that approaches player choice and narrative very much like “Roll the dice and let them inform the scene”.
I feel that your player doesn’t see a down side to using ghosts as tools. I would suggest using fore shadowing to allow the player and his character know that ghosts are dangerous and there are ramifications to interacting with them.
If the player ‘always’ rolls 6s then the dice are telling narrative he is the most powerful Whisperer Duskvol has ever seen. But chances are the player is going to roll 4-5 and 1-3 more than a few times if ghosts are a thing at which point you get to introduce complications or simply sick the ghost on him when it is going to be super inconvenient.
As mentioned before this doesn’t even cover fallout from devil’s bargains or other entanglements that will occur from play.
Personally I would try to embrace the character and see where it takes me because like you my gut tells me its OP, but Blades lets a player ‘own’ part of the narrative and if a player wants to play a powerful Whisperer why should I stand in their way.
Good luck and hope it goes well for you.
Good answers, everyone.
Bavo Th. I also use three ‘levels’ of ghosts, similar to what you propose. I call them Echoes, Spectres, and Reconciled. 🙂
Another thing to remember is the stress of encountering ghosts. The Whisper may want to summon up and command a spirit, but when she does, her teammates either freeze up or flee — or roll to resist those urges. (See page 7.)
John Harper Huh, might be suffering from source amnesia then, because I thought I nicked it from a game called “Unhallowed Metropolis”, but wherever I stole it from, it works for me. 😛
I’m not familiar with that game, but maybe we had the same idea. 🙂
Great setting(Zombies rise around 1910 all over the world, we’re 2100 and people have retaken the cities), intriguing aesthetic (Retro-Victorian Dieselpunk), sub-optimal system (Starting fighting character has trouble with simple zombie). I’m basically putting a lot of the stuff I liked in it into my campaign.
Thanks team, I appreciate all the help! ^_^