Making a Bargain with a Jinn allows it to temporarily transfer it's focus to the caster, as I understand. (RoP: M, p. 107).
That might solve the problem, but there certainly is a problem that needs to be considered.
You mention both sides of the issue. I'd be squimish about a Might 5 magic Jinn - way too useful for Gifted Sahirs.
Also, can we have them fully stated?
That would probably be a faerie, neh?
The question is how far from the caster the jinni can then go. The standard for a genius loci is that "The spirit actually inhabits it locus using the Presence power. A flora might reside in a single tree, whereas a genius loci might be simultaneously present in all trees in a forest, A genius loci cannot stray from its locus any more than a person can stray from his skin."
It's obvious that jinn have a bit more flexibility than just directly overlaying their summoner, but the question is how much more. Maybe relate the distance they can go to the radius of their natural locus?
Faerie Might 5 jinn definitely exist (there's one on page 65 of tC7tC), and it's likely that infernal jinn do as well. Given that, does Magical jinn of Might 5 existing change things that much?
I am planning to get to statting them; however, a) I haven't got round to it yet and b) I think it makes sense to iron-out potential problems before doing significant amounts of work.
It certainly could be a faerie (or an infernal jinn). But is Magic also an option?
So. Creating Jinn. I'm going to go through what the books say, to use as a reference.
There are three sources of information on jinn that I've found: Realms of Power: Magic (pg 107, although it is also worth referring to the information on Genii Loci on pg 106, and the information on Spirits and Airy Spirits in general earlier in the chapter), the chapter "The Jinn" from page 61 onwards in tC7tC, and (I've recently realised) pg 134 of HoH:S.
Points from RoP:M
Points from HoH:S:
Points from tC&tC:
There's a few places where the books contradict each other, and there don't appear to be any relevant errata. In particular, RoP:M says the bottom end of the typical Might range for jinn is 10, whereas HoH:S says they can have Might 5, and there's a Might 5 (Faerie) Jinn in tC&tC. I'm going to assume they can go down to 5. There's also some inconsistencies about the Forms Magic Jinn can be aligned to - I'm going to assume they can be the four elemental Forms and Herbam (and not Imaginem, as earlier suggested).
That looks a lot like the list I developed a while back, when I wanted to write up a few Jinn for Sub Rosa.
I should point out that just because Faerie Jinn can go as low as Might 5, it does not mean that Magic Jinn can. Not that it matters a lot.
I'd opine that a Magic Jinn can be associated with Forms other than the four elemental ones and Herbam, if you can justify it. A locus that produces a mirage or an otherwise unremarkable cavern with supernal acoustics might allow for Imaginem jinn.
As to sources for Jinn - did you check The City of Brass section of Tales of Power?
True, and if Realms of Power Magic hadn't explicitly said "Magic, Faerie or Infernal Might: 10 - 40" and instead had restricted itself to talking about Magic Jinn I'd probably reluctantly have concluded that one could keep things consistent by assuming HoH:S's references to jinn mights starting at 5 was a reference to (at least one) other realm(s), with Magic being limited to 10. As it is, though, there's a clear contradiction, and combined with the reference to Magic jinn being the kind most commonly summoned (pg 68 tC&tC) I'm inclined to let Magic jinn go down to Might 5 as well.
That was pretty much my reasoning, and I'd probably argue for it in a saga, but for a "standard" character I should probably drop the idea (apart from anything else, it's hard to come up with a way to make a "corporeal" body using Imaginem).
Good suggestion - I have now done so. There's a few interesting things there.
A lot of the focus of the chapter is on 'Afarit (noted in tC&tC as being the names of at least two different groups of jinn, both relatively powerful - we're clearly talking about the magical tribe here), and specifically those bound by Solomon to brass bottles, but there is also some more general stuff in there.
I think the most useful point is that it's reasonable to take jinn as usually being able to travel up to shouting distance from their locus (i.e. summoner), but that they can travel further if a bargain requires it. So it looks like a scout is feasible, as long as you make a deal for it to scout for you.
I'm afraid my logic was simply as follows:
"The RoP: Magic contains rules for beings of magic. What it writes about being of other realms can be solid advice, but is not binding."
Your thinking is obviously different. Normally I'd say that a matter to be resolved with your troupe, but in this case, that's everyone on this forum :-/
So, are we the only ones who care, or does someone else care to have an opinion?
I'm going to be pragmatic about it:
One rule says Might 10 is the lower end of the range. It may not be an iron-clad rule, it could be more of a mention of typical range. I mean it doesn't say "Might can never be lower than 10"?
Another source has an example of a Might 5 Jinn, right? But no rules saying this is ok, just na example - which in theory could be a mistake or oversight?
But the important thing is: What does it matter if Might 5 is ok?
Does allowing Might 5 cause an unbalance, are some things going to be too easy or is there something abusive?
I'm afraid I don't know enough of what Eleutherious is doing to judge that.
There's a Rule saying it's okay in another source, HoH:S, which directly contradicts RoP:M.
The main reason it matters is that due to the way Summoning Strength works the Might of the Jinn you're working with is effectively subtracted from your Lab and Casting totals. (For Ungifted Sahir having Might 5 Jinn available is less useful than for Gifted Sahir, as Ungifted Sahir reqauire a Jinn of Might at least equal to the spell they're casting / learning, whereas Gifted sahir can use any jinn.)
It sounds like a balance issue, and I'd always err on the side of caution - and tend to not make things too easy.
But does enforcing a minimum of Might 10 for Jinn cripple the Ungifted Sahir, making their magic too difficult?
Or will allowing Might 5 Jinn make things too easy?
I believe level 5 might Jinn must be acceptable, as tC&tC gives level 5 Naranj examples (which only require a level 5 jinn for an ungifted Sahir to cast through), and also gives the example of Bali' Al-Ard, a faerie might 5 jinni that takes the form of a stallion on page 65. In fact, the description says "He is an example of a potential khadim (servant spirit) of a beginning ungifted sahir with only limited scores in the Solomonic Arts." If the example given by the authors for a beginning sahir is only might 5, then might 5 really should be available.
Obviously this leads to a situation where different sahirs summon wildly different Jinn depending on their strengths and weaknesses - Gifted sahir want weak ones for the lab so they can add a lot of summoning strength to the lab total, but ungifted need strong ones to cast their best spells; everyone who wants spells to penetrate needs the strongest they can summon; people wanting to study from jinn want the highest magnitude they can persuade to stay around for at least a season (and preferably a year); and everyone wants jinni with useful powers - a courier wants Bali' al-Ard's instant travel, but a landowning sahir might want one with powers over soil, an alchemist one with powers over liquids and flames, and an adventurer wants ones with the flexibility of Focus powers to handle things.
Regarding forms - As the 'Afrit in the bottle is an Imaginem Faerie Jinn, Bali' Al-Ard is Animal, Jumayl is Vim, Kharrat is Ignem, Baghl is Terram, and the Ighaq al-Siq (p130) is aquam, it would appear the elemental forms, Vim and Imaginem are all fine. As Herbam genii loci are given in RoP:M, perhaps you could get Herbam jinn with woody forms too.
Funnily enough, the Gifted Sahir gets the greatest advantage from low-might Jinn.
The Ungifted need to cast their effects through a Jinn with a Might score no lower than the level of the effect - the Gifted can make up the difference from their own power.
Learning naranj appears to be almost* strictly harder than learning an Hermetic spell of the same level, because of the requirement to subtract the Might of the jinn. It's not as bad for Gift sahir, but Ungifted sahir appear to need to triple the level of the naranj with their Lab total to invent something from scratch in a single season, or double it if they have a lab text. As Tellus commented, it's Gifted rather than Ungifted sahir who are most affected, as it means they have to subtract 10 from all lab totals rather than 5 (whereas Ungifted sahir are only affected if they're trying to create level 5 effects).
My overall feel is that letting sahir have Might 5 jinn isn't going to make sahir too strong, just reduce their handicap.
*There are a few minor tweaks to this, such as the fact that sahir get to add two characteristics to the lab total rather than just one, are better at working together and can boost their lab total by spending vis at a rate of +2 / pawn, but at the base case they're going to be significantly worse off.
I don't think the existence of level 5 naranj inherently means Might 5 jinn must exist - you can learn and cast them through Might 10 jinn, it's just harder. I agree the existence of Bali' Al-Ard is one of the arguments for Might 5 jinn existing (although I think part of Tellus' argument was that he was a Faerie jinn, and therefore didn't necessarily imply Magic jinn of similar Mights existed).
One of the things I do like about the way the rules play out is that there are good reasons to want jinn with a variety of power levels. Note that you can only study an individual jinn once per subject, though, which reduces the utility of summoning them for a full year.
I think different Realms may tend to have different Forms (albeit with overlap).
Sidestepping the minimum Might question for now (does anyone have any more thoughts / questions?), here is a draft of the stats for the most powerful jinn Eleutherius has learned the a summoning naranj for. Note that there's a good chance that he hasn't actually summoned him at the moment, as he's at the limits of his ability and expensive in vis.
Edit: Added Ruler of Earth to listed powers.
Another Jinn. This was originally going to be a falcon, but the concept mutated a bit during creation.
Will you be collecting the jinn (or at least links to them) in a single post at some point?
I hadn't been specifically planning to, but I agree would make it easier to find things. I suppose really the sensible thing to have done would have been to have an initial "summary" first post, but a bit late for that now. I can edit it in at the bottom.
That would be awesome.
I have been reading a bit about Solomonic Astrology. It is a momentary effect that gives information to the sahir. I don’t see a hermetic guideline that can be used to give false information, and counterspelling it with a Perdo Vim effect exposes the counterspeller. So I thought... what about a spell that gives a penalty to all Solomonic Astrology castings inside an specific structure (a building). Eleutherius could cast it before entering the building and all astrology attempts would get a casting penalty. Bonus points: you could imaging a wise comment from Yoda at that point talking about how dark are the paths of the dark side and how difficult is to see their purpose. I don’t think that sahirs have magic resistance, so even if the spell is taxing, you won’t need a lot of penetration.
What I'd had in mind was the CrVi General guideline on pg 157 of the main book - Create a magical shell which gives false information about the target to Intellego spells with levels less than half its (level plus one magnitude). I'd then had in mind a spell (possibly a ritual like Shell of False Determinations) that could be cast on a target (for example, Eleutherius), that would make any astrological divinations cast towards them give false answers automatically.
Shell of False Determinations seems very open ended, but it feels like you'd have to feed the spell some sort of information about what the false result would actually be. In combination, that suggests that the spell design is open-ended, but at the time of casting you specify what the false information should actually be.
So using the example Naranj that Eleutherius developed, "What is the Nature of [Target]'s Loyalties?" (SoAs 15), a level >= 30 ritual (or a higher level temporary spell) SoFD equivalent could be cast to always return the answer that the target was loyal to the Order of Solomon (and would also work for other SoAs spells in the same vein) - but the same spell could also be cast to provide a different answer to other questions.
There's also some possibilities for the easier guideline to just block spells, although that's probably less useful in most circumstances because magi at least can achieve the same effect via magic resistance.
However, you're right that Perdo Vim spells to give people penalties to casting totals could also be very useful. I think it's more useful for Solomonic Summoning than it is for Astrology (although it's not useless there either), as that way you suddenly find yourself wasting large amounts of vis in failed summonings / finding yourself bargaining with a much smaller bargain modifier than you were expecting.
It's the sort of thing I want to cast on the annual Majlis, but I'd settle for a bayut al-hikma.