WitchyKitty
2022-02-07, 08:00 PM
Hiiiii! Another question from me; one that's always kinda been rattling around in my head.
In Pathfinder, Witches are said to be recipients of the power of a 'patron'. There's no real.. description of what a patron is, that I can recall, and if I recall, even the d20pfsrd website goes out of its way to state that some witches 'don't even know where it comes from'.
How exactly does this work from a narrative perspective? Does a familiar just up and show up to them one sunny morning, they waggle their hands and poof, magic? Do they just raise their hands up one day and huzzah, fireball (or ray of sickness, etc)?
Even the patrons list is incredibly vague, unless you specifically choose one of the alternative options where you get your power directly from a celestial, infernal pact, or from a Fey critter of ....... <indeterminate level of power or questionable gender/state of being here>. Otherwise, it was like .. 'Elements' ... 'Occult'... etc, you get the idea.
Is a witch approached in their dreams, or...? If I recall, familiars also serve the patron in a way to guide the witch to fulfilling their will, I think? How does this work as well? Are witches basically railroaded (or otherwise haphazardly but assuredly led along) into their own PF campaign-within-a-campaign by a DM (patron) with such inscrutable whims that they go to gods-knows-where?
I am boggling over here while I make a character in Wrath of the Righteous (the computer game by Owlcat, not tabletop right now).
In Pathfinder, Witches are said to be recipients of the power of a 'patron'. There's no real.. description of what a patron is, that I can recall, and if I recall, even the d20pfsrd website goes out of its way to state that some witches 'don't even know where it comes from'.
How exactly does this work from a narrative perspective? Does a familiar just up and show up to them one sunny morning, they waggle their hands and poof, magic? Do they just raise their hands up one day and huzzah, fireball (or ray of sickness, etc)?
Even the patrons list is incredibly vague, unless you specifically choose one of the alternative options where you get your power directly from a celestial, infernal pact, or from a Fey critter of ....... <indeterminate level of power or questionable gender/state of being here>. Otherwise, it was like .. 'Elements' ... 'Occult'... etc, you get the idea.
Is a witch approached in their dreams, or...? If I recall, familiars also serve the patron in a way to guide the witch to fulfilling their will, I think? How does this work as well? Are witches basically railroaded (or otherwise haphazardly but assuredly led along) into their own PF campaign-within-a-campaign by a DM (patron) with such inscrutable whims that they go to gods-knows-where?
I am boggling over here while I make a character in Wrath of the Righteous (the computer game by Owlcat, not tabletop right now).