Uncontrolled demons…

  • Simon Foston
    Participant

    Something I’ve always found the rules on demon summoning to be a bit fuzzy on – what happens if an adept uses a spell like “Party Like Hell” to summon a demon but then doesn’t have a spell for controlling it? I’ve always assumed that the adept and the demon have to strike some kind of faustian bargain, but there doesn’t appear to be any sort of rules mechanism for either the adept to banish the demon or the demon to possess the adept if neither one gets what they want. How do other people play it?

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  • Mishima
    Participant

    I assume it’s much less formal than a simple ‘old school pact’. I suppose when you’re dealing with the insane souls of the tortured dead, anything is possible….personally I’d go for possession themed requests, for example:

    ADEPT: “I demand your acquiescence!”

    DEMON: “Oh but for a moment inside your mothers hands as she kneads your fathers doughy belly!”

    Well, maybe not…but that’s my take on it.

    🙂

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  • Simon Foston
    Participant

    That’s pretty much my idea too. The demon does what the adept wants in exchange for a certain amount of time in the adept’s body. The question then being, is the adept’s Soul strong enough to eject the demon if it wants to stick around longer than it said it would?
    The way I see it, if there’s no agreement, the adept has to roll under his Soul stat but over the demon’s in order to banish it – without a formula spell, there’s no way to control it. Similarly, the demon has to roll under its Soul stat but over the adept’s in order to possess his or her body.

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  • Mishima
    Participant

    That sounds totally fine to me….although I’d bear in mind the possibility of an unscrupulous adept offering some other persons body as a vessel for the demon, say for example, his own daughter….

    But the mechanics are pretty much the way I would go (short of writing up some sort of esoteric ruling).

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  • Simon Foston
    Participant

    I was sort of wondering about that idea as well, but from what I can gather it’s not normally possible for a demon to possess an unwitting person unless their Soul stat is very high (80 or above), so strictly speaking I don’t see how adepts could offer up other people for possession. But I’m sure there are rituals and formula spells that could enable them to do it.

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  • Mishima
    Participant

    Yep….although there is that cliche about children being more receptive to the supernatural. It jut might be, that children have the highest Soul stat of all, which swiftly deteriorates as adulthood looms and old fantasies are smashed apart by apparent reality. I like the idea because it throws up the sort of moral quandaries which make Unknown Armies what it is.
    And there’s the option of daddy ‘introducing’ said demon as an imaginary friend or ‘special pet’ for his darling….kind of a metaphysical ‘A dog is for life, not just for Christmas’…..hmmm I’m disturbing myself now. 🙂

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  • Mishima
    Participant

    But yeah, I’m revealing my relative noobness as far as demons go!

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  • Insect King
    Participant

    I think demons should be catered individually rather than just shrieking banshees from the Evil Dead.

    Rather than use Obsession/Possession as the Obsession skill monkey about with using the Passions instead for extra creepiness (Noble, anyone?) Muck about with demon-only skills to assist such things in this world.

    Also, if the demon is not a twit he might just flee the scene or, as was mentioned, bargain for a victim (perhaps targetted by the Entropo’s blast spell).

    Cheers,

    Chris.

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