tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post8238402419181047131..comments2023-10-14T03:58:59.333-06:00Comments on The Tao of D&D: ShamanismAlexis Smolenskhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10539170107563075967noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-11611163468309035742015-12-18T08:05:42.981-07:002015-12-18T08:05:42.981-07:00Encountering a tribe when it's preparing to fi...Encountering a tribe when it's preparing to finally retaliate against an enemy shaman "poisoner" from years past sounds like an excellent adventure. Thank you for sharing, Carl.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3871409676946408069.post-86514038854644611212015-12-17T02:07:15.893-07:002015-12-17T02:07:15.893-07:00This post fit in nicely with some ethnographic rea...This post fit in nicely with some ethnographic reading I have been doing lately on a few different Amazonian tribes, all of which practice shamanism. It prompted a few thoughts which may or may not be helpful to you.<br /><br />The most common way of accessing the spirit world or ethereal plain in these tribes is simply through dreams, and everyone in the tribe would have access to some very basic abilities through dreams: communicating with spirits of the dead, seeing through the eyes of distant animals, communicating with living but distant people. The prevalence of this is such that among the Jivaroan tribes, for instance, no individual would undertake a hunting trip unless they had a vision dream showing the location of game (this is pretty common across many North and South American tribes). <br /><br />Shamans of course can access this world while awake, looking across great distances with the eyes of a bird for instance. This might be too powerful for you if you don't want them to have any spell like effects I suppose. <br /><br />A common thread running through most Amazonian shamanism is that the shaman's magical power manifests in physical form as a thick phlegm which the shaman can produce (regurgitate) on command - this allows the shaman to safely coat, swallow and store magical "darts", tiny normally invisible spirits (visible in the ethereal plane/under the effect of hallucinogens) that are kept inside the shaman to be produced later. These darts are the spirits of plants, animals and inanimate objects. These darts can be sent to do harm to others, they can be set out to defend from magical harm sent by others, they can be used to cure existing magical harm, and they can even be bound into an object to create a minor magical effect (basically imbuing an object with a single use minor enchantment, the spirit will return to its home in the jungle after activation). These darts are viewed as the cause of all sickness; if someone is sick, an enemy shaman has hit him with invisible darts and only another shaman can see the darts, use their own darts and magical phlegm to suck the enemy dart out and neutralize it. <br /><br />A big part of the shaman's role is not just healing, but identifying the culprit that caused the sickness (an enemy shaman). In any sickness resulting in death the shaman is required to name the offending party and a retaliatory raid will probably follow (possibly even years later). <br /><br />Interestingly, shamanic power can be shared by ingesting the potent phlegm of a shaman. That is how apprentices get their start. Magical darts can also be shared in this manner, coated in the special phlegm and given to someone else to swallow.<br />Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07648499022366444265noreply@blogger.com