Matthew Hunter wrote: > > On Sun, Aug 18, 2002 at 05:06:27PM -0400, Rick Castello <rick at 404.978.org> wrote: > > Further consider: Noish-Pa told Vlad in _Jhereg_ that he could > > teach him nothing else of witchcraft, and to increase his > > abilities as a witch, Vlad would need to get a familiar. > > > > If we consider Noish-Pa to be an accomplished witch of great > > skill who has taught Vlad everything he can (and we take it as > > fact that Vlad has actually *learned* all that Noish-Pa has > > taught him of witchcraft), then I think it's fair to say that > > Vlad is an accomplished witch. > > While I agree that Vlad is an accomplished witch, we can't assume > that he is on an equal level with Noish-pa just because Noish-pa > says he can't teach him anything else. I think there is more evidence of Vlad's mastery of witchcraft in addition to things Noish-pa says. The spell I mentioned previously, which entailed the teleport of the vial of blood from his apartment to the Paths of the Dead, as well as summoning Rocza and his ability to use Morrolan's necromantic gates to get himself to Verra, all come to mind. But I think this places Vlad on a higher level as an improvisational witch, where he uses techniques closer to sorcery to channel his power (using witchcraft without ritual, in essence the energy of his self, to throw a knife past Loraan's sorcerous defenses is another example). Noish-pa is better at the research-theoretical witchcraft, evidenced by his ability to step into Morrolan's lab and come up with a charm to prevent the teleportation sickness humans feel. Jose -- Jose Marquez jhereg69 at earthlink.net