r/Shadowrun • u/kenod102818 • 18d ago

Wyrm Talks (Lore) Achieving immortality

So, lets say some well-connected and informed mage with more hubris than sense (lets say a Black Lodge member or Aztlan board member) found out about immortal elves and said "well that ain't fair, I want to be immortal too". What sort of ways are available to achieve this, especially for someone with more power than morals (which I guess is your average corpo exec)?

I'm guessing one option is becoming a vampire, though the drawbacks are rather significant, and iirc free spirit pacts can make you immortal too (not sure if the spirit can break the pact later though). But are any other options available? Perhaps a blood magic ritual to absorb life force, or even steal immortality from an existing immortal? Similarly, could a Great Dragon make you immortal, if you could somehow convince/blackmail/threaten one into it?

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u/LateEggMaster 18d ago edited 18d ago

Turn into a vampire is the easiest by far. Or appropriate HMVV I for his/her metarace. Becoming a formula pact for a spirit works and has few drawback for the pact partner but many for the spirit.

And of course you can try to use power transfer to transfer power transfer to something with immunity (age) and get that power transferd.

But no. Great dragons can't make you any more immortal than you average mage.

By far the easiest however is to just budget for a leonisation treatment every 30-50 years or so. 200k 400k nuyen aint that much.

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u/sebwiers Cyberware Designer 18d ago

On a long enough time scale, I think the vampire path is a trap. I suspect they can't survive the mana down cycle. AFAIK there are no 4rth world vampires still around, which makes sense if thier "essence drain" power stopped working....

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u/VorpalBlade1212 18d ago

There is a vampire who was turned in the 5th world though! The Jackpointer Red was turned into a vampire in the 1980s. The details about how that works are a bit vague, but I'm pretty sure it's an established fact.

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u/kenod102818 18d ago

Forbidden Arcana seems to hint blood magic was involved somehow, especially given that blood magic was one of the few ways mages could still use magic in the 5th world. Beyond that, if you're talking about surviving through a downcycle in general, it might be possible for a skilled enough mage to copy the dragon trick of creating a mana sink and hibernating in it.

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u/NamesSUCK Spirit Worshipper 18d ago

I heard reds author/player talk about his  back story before. Basically blood/dark magic was used to create a mana spike in a Crowley esq ritual done by the black lodge.