“He created man (Adam) from sounding clay like the clay of pottery. And the jinns did He create from a smokeless flame of fire.”
The Noble Qur'an - Ar-Rahmaan 55:15, 15
When Allah made Man he also made the Djinn. Since that time the Djinn have established a set of courts that each relates to. Now each is a member of one of seven courts and all except one of those is the combination of the two elements from which Allah made the universe.
The power of Invoker is not her own but bargained for with the members of these Courts. The Invoker may be a friend of Djinn, and favoured by the Court, but ultimately gifts must be given and favours exchanged. The more powerful Djinn will only bargain with those with an established reputation at their Court and the greater the service to be delivered the greater the payment required. Until her name is known the Invoker will only be able to deal with Imps and the least Djinn.
As a creation of Allah and intelligent in a way similar to Man, the Djinn have free-will. And since they have both mind and will they may receive the word of Allah in the same manner as Men and may listen to His Qu'ran and be saved.
But Allah commanded the Djinn to bow to Man and some refused. These rebels are not all evil, some are merely wilful and capricious, but the greatest of all Djinn - named Iblis, but now Shai'tan - founded his own Court and schemes blackly, though his bequests may be prodigious indeed.
The mage has learnt to communicate with the Spirits. At this level of power and respect, he is only able to impress and command the Imps and Lowest of Djinn - the impolite, demanding, mischevious children of The Court. Even at this level, the Djinn are able to perform such feats as finding treasure or causing a small storm, depending on the limitations of The Court.
Of course, all these wonderful feats require offerings to the spirit - the bigger the wish, the bigger the sacrifice. Perhaps a hundred fish for a water spirit, the gathering of 100 gold coins for an Earth creature, or the burning of a tree for a fire spirit. Spirits prefer these beforehand, but sometimes offer wishes without mentioning their demands if they're especially spiteful.
With this boon granted a mage has personal access to one of the powers of a Spirit of one of the Courts. A Djinn of the Simoon might grant the Invoker the ability to produce a dozen dust-devils to sting and distract and annoy, an Imp of Brass could permit a mage to bend and twist metals.
Djinn are loathe to grant such powers however; the Invoker may act without their knowledge and bring upon them trouble from those more senior in the Court, and the Spirit loses some of its own power. For this reason the instant-use of this Spirit's power may incur a regular fee to be paid, or perhaps a single large initial payment. The Invoker also risks the Djinn's wrath should it feel its powers have been abused.
Your power has reached the attention of the Nobles of your Court, proud powerful spirits who suffer from hubris and short tempers. These spirits are equal unto forest fires, kingship for a day and army crippling bouts of cholera. Of course, offerings to these spirits are greater again: live animal sacrifices, human bodies, or a finely made sword be destroyed on command.
The Djinn of a Court come and go and with them comes whisper of the doings of mortals and Invokers in particular. Beyond that the Djinn of a Court form an elaborate hierarchy with the least of the Children of the Court reporting to their betters and each in turn until news filters to the Lord of the Court. For many Invokers this gossip can be an… inconvience. With greater authority in the Court the Invoker can suppress the tales of the Children, and as his power grows even the nobles, and conduct his works more subtly.
In system terms you spend the AP and it becomes much more difficult for another Invoker, and all but impossible for a non-Invoker, to determine your hand in affairs. This “spell” affects all your dealings with those who are you peers within a single Court from then on. (You must recast the spell if you wish to silence more powerful Djinn as your influence in the Court grows.)
Your power has earned the respect of the Lord of Your Chosen Court. A Lord's power is near infinite, yet pricey: an outlandish offering is of course simple logic with a being who can make you the richest being on the Earth for a year or send a tsunami crashing into the seaside town of your choice. Offerings for these God-like beings include entire families burnt alive, an army sent wandering into the desert unguided, sacrifice of all your clothes, or a King thrown off his throne. You may deal with this Great Sultan of Djinn like you would any other.
Earning the respect of the Lords of your Court gives you command equal to them; lesser Spirits now respect your every word. Not only have you earned the right to demand the offerings of these Lesser Spirits, but you can now bind their essence into corporeal forms, like lamps, jars or rings. Activating these containers allows the wielder to gain wishes from the captured Djinn without payback, as the Djinn is powerless to escape it's prison. Releasing a Djinn by destroying it's prison may end with it rewarding it's saviour, but is most likely to end with the Djinn hunting it's jailer.
The Divine Spark within your soul creates a link between you and Your Court. You may open a great, glittering portal between you and Your Court. Entering the portal and Djinn leaving the Portal to aid you are both matters of (likely) chance.
The Darkness within you scares the Courts into silence. Their terrified respect for you makes you equal unto the Lord of a Court. Like a Djinn, you can make and demand deals with other mortals. The ramifications of these deals are decided in the context of agreement and the Court which you have terrified into submission.
An Invoker must always remember that he possesses no magical power of his own. Instead the Invoker must bargain with the Djinn for what he desires. And the power that the Djinn offers always comes with a price.
The Invoker begins by seeking the attention of a Djinn. This is not hard to achieve since being an Invoker is to be sought by the Djinn, and to be more than a neophyte just begun ones studies is to have already established relationships with the members of a Court. The Invoker will have arranged a way to contact with their allies at Court; for Dust they may allow sand from a tomb run through their hands while they whisper their request, for Simoon they may burn a missive marked with a certain sign and let the fragments rise upon the heated plume. Whatever the method it is neither difficult to perfom nor difficult to conceal.
The Djinn may then appear either in its true form, in disguise or in a hundred different ways (such as speaking through a candle flame); it may send an emissary to bargain on its behalf; it may simply cause a missive scribed on parchment to appear in the Invokers hand or to be delivered the next day. A dialogue will be begun, a price agreed and the act performed.
First and most importantly you must arrange with the GM team in advance the terms of your bargain with the Djinn. Djinn will often appear at meetings of the Peace of the Covenant, this is obviously a good time to begin bargaining. Otherwise simply send us an email with what you want to achieve and your initial offer.
If your turnsheet simply says “Use Invocation to set the chimneys of Jerusalem alight to win my bet with Sir Bedevere” you are making life very difficult for us, and possibly for yourself. We will decide the terms of the bargain with the Djinn and may, at our discretion, have you carry them out that turn. If you think that the terms are unfair or that your character would not do such a thing (“pluck the eyes from a dozen orphans”) then this is your own fault.
Apocaplyptic warnings out of the way, it's time to return to our normal friendly tone!
The simplest way to avoid such problems is to place the Djinn in sufficient debt to yourself that they will do your bidding without a fresh bargain being required. This will require you to guess what it is the Djinn holds in esteem and place it in its hands before it even asks. Skill at Diplomacy can aid this, as can a clever mind and much flattery.
You can also arrange a few sample deals with your Djinn. “If I were to ask for a hundred roses from the gardens of Sheikh al-Nazim, each thorn dripping with peerless poison, what would you request of me in return?” Obviously the GM teams time is limited so we can't deal with too many such hypotheticals but having a few in stock will allow us to set a fairer price should you be unable to bargain with the Djinn through the normal methods.
Diplomacy gives an edge to all such bargaining, as one might expect.
Ways of summoning jinn were told in The Thousand and One Nights: by writing the name of God in Hebrew characters on a knife and drawing a diagram, with strange symbols and incantations around it.
To establish a bargain always requires 1 AP and one action.
The Djinn will always require some level of commitment from you in realising the terms of your bargain. In system terms this mean that a minimum of at least 1 AP must be spent by you in carrying it out.
You may, if you are able and desire to, seek help in fulfilling the terms of your agreement. If you rely entirely on others the Djinn will accept that its terms have been met but will become colder and more distant and future bargains will come at a higher price. Similarly a Djinn will normally be willing to wait for you to complete your end of the deal. The Djinn are immortal after all and weigh time differently. However, they must believe that you are making real effort and preparations to uphold the bargain. Even if they do so they may be reluctant to strike a new agreement while the last languishes.
If you renege on the deal the Djinn will react with fury, perhaps even calling in his own alliances and the attention of his superiors. Djinn care not one jot why you have broken your word, whether it for reasons moral or practical. More than one Invoker has chosen death rather than wait for a Court to unleash its fury.
Not necessarily intended for player eyes. Stolen wholesale from Albion.
The least djinn sour milk, colic babies, frighten cats, steal trinkets, heal the walking wounded, purify small quanties of bad water, travel many miles at the speed of thought, and irritate enemies.
These spirits are equal unto forest fires, kingship for a day and army crippling bouts of cholera.
Nobles of the Court can sink ships, destroy houses, alter the weather, reveal the most hidden of secrets, heal the lame and the blind, change the course of battles, bless cities and smite hard.
The Lord of a Courrt may start plagues, destroy cities, drown fleets, tempt and damn bishops or imams, heal anything short of death, stop plagues, calm hurricanes and turn cities into (physical) utopias.
There are two questions that anyone who even knows about Invocation should ask themselves. Why do the Djinn deal with mortals? And why do only certain people possess the gift of Invocation? The Invoker knows the secret answers to both.
The first question is apparently the simplest to answer.
The Djinn deal with mortals because there are some things they can not easily obtain without their cooperation. The Djinn are both human and inhuman, sometimes their whims and desires make no sense because they can make no sense. But others are easily understood. A Djinn may fall in love as easily as a mortal, and if she does then she will desire to know of her paramour. Does he like red roses or white lilies? A mortal can supply this information, and more importantly the interpretation to make use of it, more swiftly and surely than a hundred spirit spies. This is the easiest answer.
Sometimes as part of their bargains the Djinn demand items that are difficult for an Invoker to acquire, but trivial for the Djinn. A wooden splinter from Noah's Ark requires an arduous journey to Mount Ararat and many days or even weeks of careful search beneath the baking sun. Or it requires wafting on a breeze and a moment's attention. Why then do the Djinn demand such things? Many say that it is to prove the devotion of their servant that they set such missions.
The fact that both these answers are true disguises a deeper truth. The Djinn hunger for something they can only find in mortal humans, they have a need they cannot articulate. Where this need arises is unclear, even the Djinn themselves seldom acknowledge it. In fact to allude to it will enrage many. But it is real and it takes many forms. For some it takes the form of love; they crave alliance and friendship, on the rarest of occasions even the companionship of the bedchamber. For some it is black hate, they scheme and plot to commit the vilest of crimes and most elaborate of revenges for the slightest of slights. And in neither case do they extend their full powers for both would rob them of what they truly desire. A mortal in thrall or death cannot sate them. Reciprocal love or hate or just attention is the true goal.
This then makes the answer to the second question, what marks the Invoker as special, more obvious. Common knowledge says that the Djinn are capricious. This is true. Common knowledge says that the Djinn choose some mortals for their regard for no more reason than that one day a white cat passed to their left and a black to their right. And this is true too. Such people then become the playmates, willing or unwilling of the Djinn, and some few become Invokers. But thus is only partially true.
For there is some curious property of the Invoker's soul - it does not have a name even amongst the Invokers - that is like a feast or thrill for the Djinn. The Invoker becomes a part of the schemes and courtly games of the Djinn because the Invokers regard makes a spice for the eternal life of the Djinn. Djinn want to bargain with an Invoker.
These answers are called secret, but it is not because they are not known and cannot be told. They are written in the tomes of the great universities, they may be shouted from the rooftops. They are secrets because only Invokers truly understand them as more than words.
Love
Hate (Djinn never want the death of the one they hate…)
Charity
Avarice
Patience
Lust
Gluttony
Hope
Terror
Relics
Animal / Human sacrifice
Random