Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

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Lamoron
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Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Lamoron » Fri Dec 27, 2019 6:26 pm

Having recently hit Circle 5 Nethermancer, my Bone Spirits can now actually do something in battle. Having used them a few times now, it seems incredibly "fiddly" to actually do so.

The Bone Spirit cannot move more than 10 yards from the magician, and they have their own initiative, so moving and initiative becomes a weird delaying leap frog game, trying to do something while moving so the Bone Spirit can reach a target, and then that target is moved/dead before the next turn comes around, because the spirit has better initiative than my character, unless it delays.

Are there some easy tricks, or useful information, that makes it easier to use them in combat?

Sharkforce
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Sharkforce » Fri Dec 27, 2019 9:55 pm

10 yards doesn't seem that short range to me, unless you're trying to stand *way* back from the fight and only send in the spirit. i mean, if you start from back at spirit dart range and move forward 10 yards, then summon, the spirit should then be able to get in range of whatever you used spirit dart on the previous round. in fact, *most* of your spells should be 20 yard or shorter range, which means that if you were planning to help out, you should be in range to simply move up and summon and get the spirit into the fight. after that, you could simply move forward a bit further as needed.

i mean, it isn't going to be much use in actual chases, i guess, but otherwise you should be fine.

alternately, and this is a little bit of a weird trick to get around initiative, i suppose you could get yourself a chariot or something like that. so long as the spirit and you are both in the chariot, i suppose you could move together.

but the simpler solution might be to talk about this with your GM and see if you can get a ruling that fits within the spirit of the rules while accounting for the fact that combat is handled in turns to keep things sane. say, as long as you end the round within 10 yards of each other (and don't *obviously* go further apart, like for example if you move 5 yards away and then 5 yards back), the spirit remains and the spell doesn't end.

Bonhumm
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Bonhumm » Fri Dec 27, 2019 10:05 pm

It is true that if you use the exact wording of the rules on Bone Spirit, it could be easy to screw up things:

- Nethermancer orders the Spirit to attack 'X' target, but said target moves beyond the 10 yards range before the initiative of the spirit or Nethermancer: poof, spirit is gone.
- Nethermancer needs to move away from an attacker as the spirits moved toward a target the Nethermancer ordered it to attack, resulting in the distance between them to be more than 10 yards; poof, spirit is gone.

Pretty much all Adepts would learn to just run away from the Nethermancer to have a bone spirit go away.

Pretty much the only thing I could think of to help would be to order the spirit to 'engage anything with obvious hostile intentions toward me within 10 yards and follow me at a maximum range of 10 yards if I move'.

Personally; I'd just buy a hound.

Lamoron
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Lamoron » Fri Dec 27, 2019 10:40 pm

I've more or less reached the same conclusion. It's simply not worth it. I was just hoping someone knew something I had missed, that would make it workable :D

Sharkforce
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Sharkforce » Fri Dec 27, 2019 11:45 pm

well, apart from a relatively small amount of legend points, you get a pretty reliably useful buff out of the other spell that fits into the same matrix. so it doesn't really need to be constantly useful. but i do think lots of times 10 yards will be sufficient. an aura of "don't come within 10 yards of me" isn't exactly bad on a nethermancer in combat either =P

Lamoron
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Lamoron » Sat Dec 28, 2019 1:42 am

Sharkforce wrote:
Fri Dec 27, 2019 11:45 pm
well, apart from a relatively small amount of legend points, you get a pretty reliably useful buff out of the other spell that fits into the same matrix. so it doesn't really need to be constantly useful. but i do think lots of times 10 yards will be sufficient. an aura of "don't come within 10 yards of me" isn't exactly bad on a nethermancer in combat either =P
I don't mind them coming close, I'm built for short but deadly melee fights if spells don't work. Problem is, that unless initiative is in the right order, having the Bone Spirit limits my movement a lot, or I've wasted an action summoning it. If it's on one side, 5 yards away, and an enemy shows up on the other side 10 yards away, and I win initiative, then I suddenly have to delay instead of just getting stuck into melee, or the BS goes Poof.

Sure I can sling spells instead, but melee is so much more deadly, and I have to declare stances (aggressive/defensive) before rolling initiative, which makes it even more fiddly. It's not useless by any means, but all things considered I'm beginning to think I could use that Matrix for something better.

Bonhumm
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Bonhumm » Sat Dec 28, 2019 2:14 am

You could have the GM rule that the spirit is on some kind of 10 yards leash. In other words, it cannot move out of range, no matter what your order is or how much you move.

However, if the order you gave it means he cannot reach the target because its further than 10 yards away, it would just 'do nothing'.

ChrisDDickey
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by ChrisDDickey » Sat Dec 28, 2019 2:27 am

I would just simplify it and ask the GM to agree that ether
(a) they just have to be within 10 yards of each other at some point during the round.
or
(b) they have to be within 10 yards of each other at the end of the round.

You could still lose the bone spirit if (for example) one or the other charged forward under the assumption that the other would follow, but the other gets knocked down or entangled and can't follow, but I would think it might not matter if they spent a few seconds farther apart.

Lamoron
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Lamoron » Sat Dec 28, 2019 2:31 am

Bonhumm wrote:
Sat Dec 28, 2019 2:14 am
You could have the GM rule that the spirit is on some kind of 10 yards leash. In other words, it cannot move out of range, no matter what your order is or how much you move.

However, if the order you gave it means he cannot reach the target because its further than 10 yards away, it would just 'do nothing'.
This would be a fine house rule.

Telarus
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Re: Questions for movement: Summon Bone Spirit

Post by Telarus » Sat Dec 28, 2019 3:21 am

"Unless otherwise occupied or commanded the spirit will follow you at a 10 yd distance on your init." should work out good, yeah. Also, don't underestimate the usefulness of Reserved Actions. These add +2 to your target number but allow interrupt-effects. The setup would be different depending on situation and if the Adept or the Spirit had the high Init, but there's some tactics to work out. Same for having the spirit Delay until the following round - giving it the highest rolled Init + 1!

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