Mental communication with animal companion

[Oracle]

While creating the player characters for my upcoming campaign one of my players selected the professional keyword hunter for his character and gave a description of this characters, which triggered the idea to give him a bird of prey like an eagle as a companion. He also should be able to communicate mentally with this bird of prey in a form, that enables him to even use the senses of this companion as if his own. I see him falling into a kind of trance, which enables him to see, what his companion bird sees, smell what his companion bird smells, etc.

But I’m a bit at a loss, how to describe that in HeroQuest Glorantha game term. Is this kind of trance just an ability of the player character? Or is it based on a rune? Or is some kind of spirit charm or other spirit magic involved?

The character is a Heortling from Sartar.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Harald Smith]

Generally I’d consider an animal companion (e.g. a hawk) to be able to follow simple directions and to make relevant calls/gestures/etc. to alert the hero about something at a basic level.
An awakened animal spirit/daimon should be able to communicate more, but will still be restricted by the form of the animal – they would not have direct thought communication.
To see what the companion sees, etc. I’d require the character to have an ability like: Be One With Bird Trance. The player can then achieve that level of perception but is vulnerable as they are in the trance-like state noted. Probably requires a contest of Low difficulty to achieve with their companion (or could be automatic), but would be Hard difficulty or higher with some other bird.
You could certainly adjust to whatever you feel works in your campaign though.

[Simon Phipp]

An ability works for me. Of course, when the character is using the bird’s senses, that means all the bird’s senses and none of the character’s senses. This means that the character cannot see, hear or feel anything nearby, until the link is broken.

[Harald Smith]

“Of course, when the character is using the bird’s senses, that means all the bird’s senses and none of the character’s senses. This means that the character cannot see, hear or feel anything nearby, until the link is broken.”

Yes, I agree with that.

[Author]

Posts