Hello! This is my first post on these forums, though I have lurked for a few days. Please bear with me should I commit any social faux pas, or ask for things that are already well known (I do try to both check the faq and search previous posts first, but ...)
I have a handful of questions about daimons from TMRE. I had about twice as many, but Neil Taylor already kindly provided several answers on this forum.
Can a daimon create aspects "at will" (subject to the one-per-place constraint), or does it need to have every aspect summoned through Invoke The Pact Of ? In particular, does a magus with a daimon familiar need to re-summon the aspect every time it runs out of temporary might?
Is there a way a magus can "restore" the temporary might of an aspect of a daimon familiar (other than letting that aspect "expire")? Would Creo Vim be able to do so? What about the Hekate cord? Suppose the aspect has might 30, and is temporary down to 25. The magus uses the Hekate cord to lend it 3 might points by spending 1 fatigue level. Now the aspect's temporary might is 28. When the magus regains that fatigue level, does the aspect fall back to 25, or stay at 28?
A daimon forfeits all earthly ties, including the use of a lab. That's the reason why it cannot "upgrade" its talisman - no lab in the Hall of Heroes. But what about its aspects? Can an aspect work in a(n earthly) lab? Can it serve as a lab assistant?
While I believe I understand how a daimon can "fix" new knowledge, I am not sure I understand from what sources a daimon can learn. Can it learn through its aspects e.g. by practice? Can it learn from a book? From an (earthly) teacher? When it learns from spirits, can the player simply assume the daimon always automatically finds an available teacher that knows the spell (similar to a magus researching Invoke The Spirit of ), or should one roleplay the quest to find and convince the teacher?
Not sure, but I think it needs to be summoned, otherwise what would the point of developing your cult to summon you so you can "grow" be
Not sure what book it's in, but there is a guideline for temporarily restoring lost might points. (either infernal or mysteres revised) It reads something like: grant might points equal to spell (base)level, these points are lost at sunrise/fall. unless you join a cult who knows this I'd insist on research before allowing this guidline.
3.sure it can, but it can't take what it makes back home to the hall.
it learns primarily through it's aspects (I think)
Unclear. I imagine that a Daimon can send an Aspect without the ritual, if only because having a familiar that can never reset Might or Wounds without an extremely difficult ritual seems unlikely. However, the Daimon isn't likely to want to appear without the ritual, since it needs the ritual to grow.
I'd say that Might stays at 28. RoPI has a guideline that allows a magus to restore a demon's Might, but it's not clear that this can be used on Faerie or Magical beings. If it can, a magus intent on becoming a Daimon would do well to learn this spell and restore himself! Or learn a spell to summon something to cast it on him.
The aspect can serve as a lab assistant; why not? But an Aspect cannot learn a spell for the Daimon for the same reason killing an Aspect does nothing to the Daimon. (When summoning an Aspect, it's good to remember that it can kamikazi itself on any summoner who annoys it, without any negative consequences.)
This is a really great question, and opens up the social world of the Hall of Heroes. What do Daimons do on their home turf? For ordinary skills, learning spells (if the Daimon was a magus), and so on, I'd just handwave and rule that the Daimon spends its points and learns what it wants; the cost to do this is so incredibly high! But learning powers ought to be different, and is even more expensive.
considers If I were GMing a game with a PC Daimon, I'd institute the following:
The guideline from the Infernal only restores demons. (And even this guideline maybe ought to be reconsidered.)
An Aspect recovers wounds and Might exactly as any other spirit. Bringing an Aspect into the world from the HoH always requires a pact; the Daimon can spawn a new Aspect to send into the world without one, but that costs it one Daimon Point per 10 Might, rounded up. The ritual to summon a new Aspect of a Daimon to replace a lost familiar will always Penetrate, due to the familiar bond.
The Daimon always knows what's going on with all of its Aspects.
A Daimon gains 1 Daimon Point (is that what they're called?) each season for each Aspect that is active in the world as a bound Familiar, provided the magus has sufficient power (TeFo*2 >= Might).
When learning and improving skills, Arts (if allowed), spells (if allowed), characteristics and Might--everything described in the rules other than learning new powerz--a Daimon does not have to do anything in the HoH to justify the expenditure. Its connection to and experience in the world as represented by ritual pacts, services and ongoing familiar bonds justify such improvements. However, new powers cannot be gained in this way, but only through actions and interactions in the HoH.
Note that a Daimon who improves its Might becomes more difficult to summon, perhaps obsoleting existing pact spells!
probably, yes - though psychologically they generally have "better things to do" than wander around the mundane world. Things like dealing with rival heroes and trying to gather resources to boost themselves.
Things that aspects cannot do.
no... I thought we wrote an example of a Daimon familiar using the appear/re-appear trick to move around?
Certainly though, a magus with a Pact with the Daimon does not need to use the vis-costly summoning ritual.
That said, there's nothing to say they cannot - and note that the parent Daimon benefits from the points provided by the Ritual, so the familiar may try to persuade its magus to keep casting the ritual!
A Familiar can serve as a lab assistant - though as a Daimon they don't improve like a normal familiar-as-assistant. (Only improve by the slow Daimon-points method)
mostly yes.
The big limit is the difficulty of fixing knowledge, that the fixing is only for one whole season's worth of XP (you can't do it multiple times in a season, any more than you can otherwise get extra XP in a season!0
Invoke The Spirit of is special and peculiar - to find a teacher should be no easier than it is for any other powerful magus - you have to find one of a scarce resource, but (ought to!) have spells and powers to help in the search
no the Daimon Familiar can appear for the magus it has a pact with; but yes the summoning does grant points and the Daimon almost certainly wants its pet magus to repeat the ritual when they can afford it.