How do you RP a Shaman without being too cliche? (EDIT: Shaman and Undead?)

[TheBlueWizard]

So, casual player, enjoy just exploring the new classes and additions Arelith has on base NWN these days due to lack of playing time.

Fancied trying to play a Shaman, but the RP side of it is holding me back.

How do you play one without being a walking cliche? In my head all I picture is either some Norse shamanistic guy with a dead animal on his head banging on about spirits, or some Native American style racist stereotype of the peaceful Wise One type behaviour. Sorry.

So, how do you approach this class? What’s the actual hold his powers have over him, and how strong is it?

Cheers for any replies!

[xf1313]

In my head, the type of character you establish would represent the deity you worship.

Aside from you are more deeply connected to nature in a board sense, not too much a city’s guy, I do not feel there’s a particular role you MUST fit yourself into.

For one, if you worship the elemental deities, you might love to rp burning your enermies and send tribute. Or strike with storm and destruction that you believe is serving nature.... Or a shaman that walks in the boarder of living and dead (necromancy, if you choose, or guardian of spirit). You can be a friend of the animals or keeper of fountains, likewise a professional huntsman or emissary of vermin and disease. Any aspect from the circle of nature can be played...being a all rounder is not as fun as pushing a few aspect to extreme.

[Distant Relation]

The one thing I would add is that the class name should be seen as a guideline, not as the sum total of options.

A 'shaman' can very well be a witch (think the witch of the woods, gathering mystical herbs in dark paths, communing with nature spirits, having to deal with silly city folk encroaching on the domain of the truly scary natural things out there.

A 'shaman' can also be an elemental channeler, harping on the connection with natural forces like storms, wind and fire. Very much a 'druid' that druids around not through stone temples and the structured order of a 'druidic circle', but by letting the raw power of the natural and wild flow through her.

The very definition of 'shamanism' is 'interacting with spirits or the supernatural through mystical trances and altered states of consciousness'. There's a huuuuuge breadth of RP you can build out of that pivotal core.

Spirits aren't just fey in Faerun, after all. Anything out of the Astral Plane can reasonably be said to be a 'spirit', from things that are natively there, to things that use the astral plane for travel or communication, to even dead deities whose lingering essence resides in the Astral Plane.

Hope that helps jog your imagination a bit If not, think back to when True Flames became True Frosts. Don't let the name be a prison.

[fading]

Shaman is a rather open ended class, feel free to interpret the source and practice of your of magic while keeping in mind its themes - particularly a connection to spirits/the spirit world.

But if you want some inspiration:

Presumably you're American, so you wouldn't be very aware, but there are still practitioners of folk magic in European rural areas - though many would never call their practice magic, but in essence, it's literally that (divining the sex of a fetus, rituals to ward against bad luck, love spells with flowers, etc). A folk shaman would therefor be someone with a deep connection to their traditions and culture, whether they're a tribal human from Icewind Dale or a half-orc scholar of orcish traditional practices. This implies an understanding of their values and world-view (orcs traditionally live in caves, they value physical strength and strength of blood - communion with spirits of these elements (darkness, disease, etc) would be fitting). Another aspect that you could integrate into your practice is ancestor worship and guidance (calling upon the souls of dead warriors to grant you strength through an offering or channeling your blood ancestry, etc etc).

[TurningLeaf]

I feel like voodoo and/or witch doctor tropes were ignored in the OP, but then again the OP sounds like they want to avoid tropes anyway perhaps.

Many RL shamanistic practices function within animism, which is distinguishable from D&D druidism and clerical beliefs by the idea that inanimate objects can acquire intention/"life" of their own through prayer and ritual.

[TheBlueWizard]

The one thing I would add is that the class name should be seen as a guideline, not as the sum total of options.

A 'shaman' can very well be a witch (think the witch of the woods, gathering mystical herbs in dark paths, communing with nature spirits, having to deal with silly city folk encroaching on the domain of the truly scary natural things out there.

I didn’t consider a Witch as a viable kind of Shaman build, cheers! Though I’d be slightly considered I’d be daft and start drifting into a Discworld style Witch if I tried.

Presumably you're American, so you wouldn't be very aware, but there are still practitioners of folk magic in European rural areas - though many would never call their practice magic, but in essence, it's literally that (divining the sex of a fetus, rituals to ward against bad luck, love spells with flowers, etc). A folk shaman would therefor be someone with a deep connection to their traditions and culture, whether they're a tribal human from Icewind Dale or a half-orc scholar of orcish traditional practices. This implies an understanding of their values and world-view (orcs traditionally live in caves, they value physical strength and strength of blood - communion with spirits of these elements (darkness, disease, etc) would be fitting). Another aspect that you could integrate into your practice is ancestor worship and guidance (calling upon the souls of dead warriors to grant you strength through an offering or channeling your blood ancestry, etc etc).

British actually. I’m aware of historical Pagan stuff with Celts and all that, and I did briefly consider that in regards to Shamanism and stuff.

To be fair, I didn’t consider the more broad European sense of it. I’m aware of that kind of stuff, but genuinely never considered it in the same way as Shamanism, but now that you’ve pointed it out it’s blatant. Ta!

I feel like voodoo and/or witch doctor tropes were ignored in the OP, but then again the OP sounds like they want to avoid tropes anyway perhaps.

Many RL shamanistic practices function within animism, which is distinguishable from D&D druidism and clerical beliefs by the idea that inanimate objects can acquire intention/"life" of their own through prayer and ritual.

I did consider Voodoo and Witch Doctor too, but forgot to mention it. It was a pretty hurried initial post written on my phone while finishing work. If there were tropes I’d look to borrow from I’d rather go for a more Paganistic European style though, to be fair.

Just as a point to clarify, when you say a Shaman interacts with inanimate objects possessed of “life” through belief (massively paraphrased, soz), in the fantasy realm of DND is it a genuine spirit life that inhabits the item? Is it an actual tangible thing that the Shaman draws power from?

[TheBlueWizard]

So, been looking into it more and drawing out a rough plan for a character, and I’m settling on the notion of “Ancestor Spirits” and things like that.

I’m only half-knowledgable about DND stuff, and I’m kind of under the impression that Undeath is 90% an evil act.

If I was to have a Shaman who summons Undead that are “Ancestral Spirits”, would that still be an evil act, or are the spirits willing to help?

Just wanting to double check so I’m not ruffling any established Lore feathers.

Also… was maybe thinking of having the character carrying a skull as a totem, and vehicle through which the Ancestral Spirits communicated with them. I’ve googled and can’t find specifics, but are the Spirits only able to communicate with the Shaman, or can everyone else hear them?

Just wondering before I go around RPing a character with a talking skull chatting at his belt

[Distant Relation]

So, interesting and tricky question.

Non-evil necromancy, especially the example you give of speaking with a talking skull, is a thing in core Faerun. Speak With The Dead is a level 3 spell available to clerics and a bunch of divine-esque classes that allows the caster to 'speak' with the remaining imprints of life in someone's mortal remains, to ask simple questions.

The key distinction is that Speak with the Dead specifically does not mess with the soul of the departed. It doesn't yank them out of Arvandor or Bytopia to make them answer your questions, it simply reads and questions the vestiges of life left over in the mortal remains of the recently departed.

There's even several in-universe examples of non-evil necromancy because its specifically sanctioned by non-evil deities - undead jergalite scribes, baelnorn lich elves, to name the two most famous examples.

The issue is that Arelith specifically has a no-nonsense view on Animation. Animating the dead (a skull that can talk, moving jaw and everything, would probably count as 'animated') would be dubiously evil in the Arelith-verse (unless it turned out to be some kind of evocation trick where you're telekinetically lifting and moving it as part of your ritual). And if you cast Mummy Dust, that is clear animation and will put you in the evil slot at least as far as the playerbase is concerned.

However, what I think you can do is skirt the animation part. Don't have a moving, talking skull, but still carry the skull to 'speak' to its imprint. It could be your focus or conduit for divination and for expanding your awareness into the astral plane.

And getting into even more subjective grounds, I always feel the 'medium' is the only one who can communicate with spirits. It's a trope, more so than being based on any in-universe stuff, but the very word 'medium' brings the implication that you're the bridge, the intermediary between the living person petitioning the knowledge, and the soul long past's knowledge and wisdom.

[TheBlueWizard]

So, interesting and tricky question.

Non-evil necromancy, especially the example you give of speaking with a talking skull, is a thing in core Faerun. Speak With The Dead is a level 3 spell available to clerics and a bunch of divine-esque classes that allows the caster to 'speak' with the remaining imprints of life in someone's mortal remains, to ask simple questions.

The key distinction is that Speak with the Dead specifically does not mess with the soul of the departed. It doesn't yank them out of Arvandor or Bytopia to make them answer your questions, it simply reads and questions the vestiges of life left over in the mortal remains of the recently departed.

There's even several in-universe examples of non-evil necromancy because its specifically sanctioned by non-evil deities - undead jergalite scribes, baelnorn lich elves, to name the two most famous examples.

The issue is that Arelith specifically has a no-nonsense view on Animation. Animating the dead (a skull that can talk, moving jaw and everything, would probably count as 'animated') would be dubiously evil in the Arelith-verse (unless it turned out to be some kind of evocation trick where you're telekinetically lifting and moving it as part of your ritual). And if you cast Mummy Dust, that is clear animation and will put you in the evil slot at least as far as the playerbase is concerned.

However, what I think you can do is skirt the animation part. Don't have a moving, talking skull, but still carry the skull to 'speak' to its imprint. It could be your focus or conduit for divination and for expanding your awareness into the astral plane.

And getting into even more subjective grounds, I always feel the 'medium' is the only one who can communicate with spirits. It's a trope, more so than being based on any in-universe stuff, but the very word 'medium' brings the implication that you're the bridge, the intermediary between the living person petitioning the knowledge, and the soul long past's knowledge and wisdom.

All good points, thank you.

From what I was looking into and things, Shaman's seemed to derive power/abilities from nature, elemental planes and Ancestral Spirits, etc... to name some. Communing with the spirits of long dead relatives doesn't seem to me to be an inherently evil act, and, while I'm not 100% knowledgable about how undead summoning works, if a relatively good-aligned Shaman was calling upon an Ancestral Spirit to help him in combat (by using Animate Dead as a spell IG), then would that still be evil? Is that a valid way to use/represent it within server rules?

I could be wrong, but Shaman's don't 100% have to deal with divine sources (via gods) in order to commune with spirits? There's just religious overtones through the ritualistic nature of the communion and stuff. Or am I horribly wrong?

I can see how IG server attitudes could be saying that any use of undead is evil, and I'm more than happy to have the character argue his case and RP that he's not doing anything evil, he's just asking for help from Ancestors, etc... I'm just more wanting to double check to avoid getting called out OOCly for ignoring Lore and making shite up.

And in terms of a talking skull and all that...

I tend to not have a lot of time to play, so tend to make comic relief style characters (not 100% daft, but on the light side of RP) were I can emphasis one off interactions and leave a decent impression and fun time for all.

With that in mind, the concept for the Shaman I have is that of a young apprentice Svirfneblin Shaman. To add RP flavour and fun factor, I thought that his master could very much be present in his journey in the form of a skull that talks to/berates/guides my character on his journey, as the curmudgeonly master doesn't think his apprentice is ready. Origins being something like... His Master was slain by a Drow war band prior to my guy setting off to Arelith, and the master didn't entirely trust that the apprentice was ready to become the tribe/clan's Shaman, so decided to stick around in spirit (in more ways than one) and send him off to train and commune with topsider spirits for reasons undecided so far. And the way that my character communicates with his master is by carrying his master's skull around, facilitating the link to the spirit, etc.

I can totally understand the skull not being able to be heard by others, as the Shaman himself is the one who communes with spirits, so it seems a little presumption and out of place to have a skull that's essentially being RP'd as a separate character and outwardly talking. So I might keep the concept, but basically have a ... Wilson style character accompanying my guy.

[Distant Relation]

I love your svirfo concept. I also love svirfos in general. Awesome

I could be wrong, but Shaman's don't 100% have to deal with divine sources (via gods) in order to commune with spirits?

Kinda sorta yea.

"Divine" in this sense refers generally to 'divine magic', in all its forms. All magic is the shaping of the weave (or the shadow weave), and the two primary avenues to do it are 'arcane' and 'divine'.

"Arcane" magic is the direct shaping of the weave. Whether you're following recipes (wizard), or acting upon the weave through sheer force of will (sorcerer), or even using what I can only describe as hacking scripts that you bought off the darknet (warlock invocations), arcane casters have the power, themselves, to take of the weave and use it.

"Divine" is power granted to you from an external agent, under some kind of condition that you must abide - paladin oaths, clerical dogma, druidic traditions and yes, shamanistic rituals. That external agent is, for lack of a better comparison, the "uber eats" of the magical world. No need to worry about all those raw ingredients, getting your hands messy with all that weave, just order up your Bull's Strength when you pray in the morning.

So "Divine" magic does involve beseeching some kind of external power, through which magic flows through to you, but it doesn't need to be a 'god' in the traditional sense, it only needs to be (in the words of Jeremy Crawford), 'some kind of cosmic force that has a consciousness, that is bestowing power to you or that you are tapping into'.

This is perfectly represented in Arelith by you being able to pick 'Nature Spirits' as your deity. Your divine source of magic is the very spirits themselves, whose power you tap into by communing with them, appeasing them, and generally serving their interests. No actual gods required.

[fading]

I really enjoy your concept, especially the idea of communing with an ancestor spirit through a skull (while everyone else just sees a "crazy person" talking to a skull), a cool way to reinforce your character's insight, and the way that might separate and alienate them from the common folk who are too grounded into the material world to understand.

There is basically no nuance when it comes to the treatment of undead and animation in the server, this is both good and bad. Bad in the sense that if you want to play a necromancer and not be constantly anxious, you can't in the surface, since it can often be pvp on sight - instead of the myriad of cool hostile RP that could come from it. Good because we don't see silly things like undead roaming about cities and main roads like it's nothing.

If you think it's cool though, go for it! I'm sure it could lead to some interesting interactions, just attempt to summon undead in secluded locations. Between you and me though, there's an update coming that will radically change the way undead summons work, adding a category of spirit undead summons, among other things. Not only would spirit undead be far more fitting with your concept, but it would also give some credence to your character's claims, possibly.

[garrbear758]

When Aniel and I made the class we very intentionally left it open ended, so there is definitely no right or wrong answer, but there are a lot of really cool ideas in this thread.

Just wondering before I go around RPing a character with a talking skull chatting at his belt

PS: That sounds really fun and interesting.

[Waldo52]

The cool thing about shamans is the lack of specific RP baggage. Druids sort of HAVE TO be treehuggers of some sort, you have to struggle to come up with a wizard concept that isn't a frail scholar. Shamans commune with spirits or something, right? It's vague, just roll with it.

A manic tribesman from a primitive area, a muscular city dweller who bonds spiritually with his ancestors and smashes orcs, a guy with non-traditional ideas about theology who breaks away from his temple and starts doing his own thing, a necromancer who hangs out in a swamp and gets his instructions from some terrible entity he sees in the mist. These are all quite different and all totally acceptable as shamans.

Do what you feel like. A shaman is whatever you want it to be, as long as your character can be seen as somewhat spiritual or divinely inspired. Embrace the natural world on some level, even if it's subtle or evil.