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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ Is it just me, or is stunball off the charts?
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 08:42 PM
So you roll sorcery + magic to deal force damage, ok.
But the drain is a mere F/2 + 1. A combat mage can pretty much end fights immediately with a force 12 stunball everytime. The drain is only that of a force 4 fireball. That's insane. Especially potent since it's no more difficult to land the force 12 stunball than a force 6 stunball, there's no reason to not go for the quick kill everytime.
Ok, sure, I can have every single fight draft a small squad of drones to defend against the stunballer, but where does that leave gangers? Instantly dead the moment they face a magic 6 caster? I basically can't have a magic using big bad cause the moment they show up, the PCs are either screwed because counterspelling failed once or they win without problems.
Maybe magic itself is broken, but I'm finding it harder and harder to keep the other characters into the game. Everytime is so fragmented, I can challenge the players individually, but as a group it seems they take turns rolling. Basically, a session goes: Matrix dude does his stuff, rolls independently of everybody else. Combat starts, mage goes off, wins. Combat starts, mage goes off, wins. Combat starts, mage sits out, Cybersammie wins. Matrix dude does his stuff, everybody else goes to grab a snack and waits for the result.
Is there no way to get all the characters fighting on the same front at the same time?
Posted by: Stahlseele Dec 18 2007, 08:45 PM
first:magic is broken, allways has been . .
second:force 12 means body damage from drain, and how do you get to four? drain would be 7 because 12/2=6+1=7 if i ain't missing anything . .
third:damage compensator or pain editor or what's it called let's anybody and their cat ignore stun damage . . have a mage hit someone with a Force 12 Stun-Ball, and then watch them go white as their character sheet when the target does not even blink . .
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 08:50 PM
A fireball uses the drain of force/2 + 5, so a force 4 fireball also has a drain of 7.
And really, a drain of 7 is like 3 damage with an edged resist roll. So my mage can get 2 or 3 of these off each session without significant risk.
Magic being all or nothing is a big part of the problem. If you go all in, you can pretty much take it first round. I would prefer a system where magic hits and then gets damage soaked like guns, since it would favor longer fights.
Posted by: Karaden Dec 18 2007, 09:01 PM
Since when do guns favour long fights? Usually with guns in real life it is whoever gets hit first loses, end of story. You may have some cercumstances where gun fights last longer, but this usually involves people in full combat armor baracaded in a fortified building with thousands of rounds of ammo or some such.
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 18 2007, 09:04 PM
Stunball is indeed quite badass. My Mage routinely takes out large numbers of enemies with high-force Stunballs. And given that the target needs to be awakened to get more than Willpower (3 to 6 dice) to resist something like 15S, it's just absurd.
My GM does several things to mitigate. For one, he usually spaces out opponents by quite a lot, so that I can only target one at a time.
He also has most opponents living by the GTMF (Geek Tha Mage First) doctrine, so if I poke my head out too far or leave myself too open I tend to take a bunch of physical, which makes the aforementioned overcast Stunball much less attractive. Depending on how big of a Drain dice pool the Mage has, some damage can really make casting risky.
Use of "Defense Mages" on the opposing side. In our game, most corporate security teams have at least one mage with counterspell 6, apparently.
Drones and the like are immune to stunball.
And finally, he expects small and/or undertrained opposing teams to be taken out quickly, and their physical strength rarely represents the main threat to completing the job. I.e., if a small sec team gets off a single communication, LoneStar will be on the scene in a few combat turns. Or if there is a single guard, he is monitored via the matrix by Agents, and if he is harmed they raise an alarm. That kind of thing.
But magic is overpowered during combat, pure and simple. If your Mage starts summoning Spirits of Man that can also cast Stunball, it gets ever more unbalanced. But that's why taking out the security team should only be one small part of the run.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 09:23 PM
A 12 meter radius circle is pretty damn hard to stay out of I would say, especially if your mage has more than one initiative pass and can cast 2.
Also, the geek the mage problem just makes it even more advantageous for the mage to alpha, since if he doesn't, then he's pretty much guaranteed to be taken out of the fight first. I think it's more a cause of the problem than a solution.
And I understand the value of counterspelling, but I dislike the fact that it's all or nothing all the time. I already use 6 rating counterspeller and wards and stuff to protect my dorks, but it hoses the mage just as much when he's using his regular force spells as it does the alpha strike.
I think I'm going to try raising the drain of the stunball and manaball to a f/2 + 3 and seeing if it fixes things.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 18 2007, 09:24 PM
...still, even if not overcasting, a stunball is pretty damned efficient. Take a mage with a 6 MA and 6 spellcasting casting a force 6 stunball OK that is 12 dice without adding any more for foci or Mentor Spirit modifiers. On an "average roll (4 hits), that means the target takes 9 boxes of stun damage. An average mundane with 3 Willpower gets 1 hit & takes 8 boxes. Should the mage get max hits allowable (6) that is 11 boxes (1 into physical overflow). A good chance the mundanes in the effect area of the spell are down for the count & out of the rest of the combat.
Meanwhile the mage only has to shake down 4 boxes with a pool at least as good as his casting pool and if the spell is on a fetish (and/or has totem modifiers) this adds to the drain dice. More than likely the mage will not even be winded.
Also, stun cannot be healed with either spells or First Aid. Furthermore, there's nothing stopping a sammy from going around and executing all the unconscious characters afterwards, I've seen it done a number of times.
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 18 2007, 09:39 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| A 12 meter radius circle is pretty damn hard to stay out of I would say, especially if your mage has more than one initiative pass and can cast 2. |
Yeah, when I say "spaced out" I mean opposite sides of the building, which just isn't an option all the time. His NPCs also seem to know that they are about to get a Stunball in the face, and typically move apart right away. But the average metahuman is only moving a few meters in those first few intiative passes.
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Also, the geek the mage problem just makes it even more advantageous for the mage to alpha, since if he doesn't, then he's pretty much guaranteed to be taken out of the fight first. I think it's more a cause of the problem than a solution. And I understand the value of counterspelling, but I dislike the fact that it's all or nothing all the time. I already use 6 rating counterspeller and wards and stuff to protect my dorks, but it hoses the mage just as much when he's using his regular force spells as it does the alpha strike. |
The biggest problem (IMHO) in the SR4 rules is the fact that one needs a Mage to be protected from a Mage in combat. The way my GM balances this is to make combat a relatively unimportant part of the run. While there are always jerks to frag, stealth or the ability to find what you're looking for is usually more important to getting paid. So basically he adds consequences to not pulling the run off perfectly, consequences that can't be solved via Stunball. Mr. J usually has demands like no tracks be left or no lingering magical auras. And the job usually has a stealth component, like the target will zip away on an underground subway if the alarm is set off, or the data is erased, or whatever.
I wouldn't try to nerf stunball itself, I would try to take away the Mage's combat advantages.
Posted by: Carver Dec 18 2007, 09:51 PM
You can't stunball anyone you can't see, but airburst grenades don't have that problem...
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 18 2007, 09:54 PM
The Infiltration skill is the best protection from mages. If they can't see you then they can't hurt you, except with indirect spells.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 18 2007, 09:54 PM
| QUOTE (Kyoto Kid) |
| Also, stun cannot be healed with either spells or First Aid. |
Stun damage can indeed be healed by First Aid.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 10:07 PM
| QUOTE (hyzmarca) |
| The Infiltration skill is the best protection from mages. If they can't see you then they can't hurt you, except with indirect spells. |
Can't they just go astral and see your aura standing out like a sore thumb? Assuming the setting was an office complex or something.
And I hate restricting characters by saying "No whatever you're good at." I tried it once with an assassination attempt, and I basically said to my demolition specialist that he can't use explosives because they would be detected and would be a "violent end" which violates the terms of the contract. Basically ruled out car accident, building structural collapse, anything he could try. The team pulled through, but that player was kinda bored (And not because he didn't contribute anything, I tried to let him as the big burly troll beat on a few people and stuff), but because he didn't get to do what he wanted to do.
And infiltration is cool and all, but from a gameplay perspective, that usually means that the urban ninja goes in to grab the data and leaves the rest of the team behind in support roles. Is there anyway I can motivate him to bring the rest of the team, especially if they can't sneak around well for anything?
Posted by: Fortune Dec 18 2007, 10:12 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Can't they just go astral and see your aura standing out like a sore thumb? Assuming the setting was an office complex or something. |
The Infiltration Skill applies to the Astral as well as the Physical. Nothing stopping you from hiding your aura among those of other living objects, or slipping behind almost anything, because pretty much everything has an Astral Shadow.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 18 2007, 10:14 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And infiltration is cool and all, but from a gameplay perspective, that usually means that the urban ninja goes in to grab the data and leaves the rest of the team behind in support roles. Is there anyway I can motivate him to bring the rest of the team, especially if they can't sneak around well for anything? |
Try to impress on the rest of the Players the importance of Stealth in your games.
Posted by: Stahlseele Dec 18 2007, 10:16 PM
the same reason ANYone is bringing along the combat monsters . .
'cause you can and probably WILL fuck up and they will have to take care of business because your stealthed ass won't survive a lucky shot . .
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 10:20 PM
| QUOTE (Fortune) | ||
Try to impress on the rest of the Players the importance of Stealth in your games. |
I don't want my players to play my way. I just want them to play together as a team.
The group as a whole is fine, it's just that it's hard to have everybody doing the same thing at the same time. And stunballing guards/turning off security, then having the ninja sneak in would be completely against what I'm working for.
I'm looking for the classic, protect hacking team mate from alerted guards style run since at least the entire team is at the same place and each member's success has a direct effect on the survival of the whole rather than the "I did my job, now you do your's" run.
Posted by: Stahlseele Dec 18 2007, 10:22 PM
| QUOTE |
| I'm looking for the classic, protect hacking team mate from alerted guards style run |
not much of a difference from the urban nincompoop sneaking in and getting the plot-device is it? O.o
Posted by: Siege Dec 18 2007, 10:23 PM
Pick any game system you like - wizworms are either useless or death on two legs. There isn't really any middle of the road.
As a compromise, bound spirits thrown against incoming spells might buy your NPCs a few extra rounds, but from a "realistic" point of view, the cost-benefit analysis just isn't there.
Wizworms are so rare, the average sec guard will never have any need for the amazingly expensive "magic armor". By comparison, kevlar is almost cheaper than cotton and protects against far more common threats.
-Siege
Edit: You could attempt to re-conceptualize the entire magical system, but runs into a homebrew set of rules and game world, which may not sit well with your players.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 10:30 PM
| QUOTE (Siege) |
| Pick any game system you like - wizworms are either useless or death on two legs. There isn't really any middle of the road. As a compromise, bound spirits thrown against incoming spells might buy your NPCs a few extra rounds, but from a "realistic" point of view, the cost-benefit analysis just isn't there. Wizworms are so rare, the average sec guard will never have any need for the amazingly expensive "magic armor". By comparison, kevlar is almost cheaper than cotton and protects against far more common threats. -Siege Edit: You could attempt to re-conceptualize the entire magical system, but runs into a homebrew set of rules and game world, which may not sit well with your players. |
Yeah, guess that's true.
Explains why my favorite part of the game are the social situations where all the characters be quirky and interact.
And my problem with sneak and steal is that my other dudes do their job and that's it for their part in the session.
It goes:
A. Matrix hijinks
B. Related security bust ups
C. Sneaking in
Instead of it being spread out evenly across the session. Which wouldn't be a problem if the entire team was doing the sneaking, but I don't have a gang of Tir Elf Ninjas, so I can't really make any logical explanation on why the burly troll is trying to tip toe his way past security.
Posted by: augurer Dec 18 2007, 10:32 PM
The problem I've noticed is that the combat monsters tend to dominate combat so fast that the other characters don't get to do squat. And if you provide enough of a challenge for the combat monster, the non-combat monsters don't have much chance of contributing, as they're either not going to hit, or die extremely fast if the challenge focuses on them.
The most balanced encounters seem to require a lot of mooks to give the average runners something to shoot at, and a couple cyberzombies for the Troll/Ork weapons specialist to consume more than 2 of his IPs. But large combats just aren't that believable to have happen very often.
Posted by: Stahlseele Dec 18 2007, 10:33 PM
i kinda allways thought it to be silly . . i'm playing the 3m tall, 300 kilo mountain of muscles carrying the LMG . . sneaking with maybe 8 successes (good roll there) and NOBODY noticing? naah . . . maybe the rules say otherwise, but untill i can get that image into my mind without wanting to paint my troll neon green and having him dance and sing through the check-point after such a roll, i'll not be seen spending too much points for that *g*
That's why the combat monsters are there in the first place O.o
because if the sneaky ones fuck it up someone HAS to be able to save their pathetic asses in a whole building full of potential enemies . .
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 10:35 PM
| QUOTE (augurer) |
| The problem I've noticed is that the combat monsters tend to dominate combat so fast that the other characters don't get to do squat. And if you provide enough of a challenge for the combat monster, the non-combat monsters don't have much chance of contributing, as they're either not going to hit, or die extremely fast if the challenge focuses on them. The most balanced encounters seem to require a lot of mooks to give the average runners something to shoot at, and a couple cyberzombies for the Troll/Ork weapons specialist to consume more than 2 of his IPs. But large combats just aren't that believable to have happen very often. |
Thank you for pointing out exactly what my problem is. The mage is overshadowing everybody else in combat atm, and it woud be nice if he didn't have a way of taking out the mooks along with the cyberzombie in a single turn yet still have a way to contribute to the fight.
It's a pity about large combats.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 18 2007, 10:39 PM
| QUOTE (Fortune) | ||
Stun damage can indeed be healed by First Aid. |
...you sure? I thought all stun had to be recovered by rest (save for the temporary effect of stim patches).
Posted by: Stahlseele Dec 18 2007, 10:39 PM
true, mages are overpowered even compared to combat monsters . . but if you want longer battles, have the mooks actually USE TACTICS . . with the SR4 kinda Matrix Style and stuff you'd probably be able to have a drop-down-view of the whole battle so it basically can end up like a game of chess . . with blood of course *g*
Posted by: Siege Dec 18 2007, 10:49 PM
The other problem with a protracted battle is the situation under which the engagement happens - that is, breaking into a secured area.
The longer a battle lasts, the more likely it is that reinforcements will be alerted and consequently, everyone has a bad night.
Specialists will always dominate the focus in their area of specialization - this is true of riggers, deckers, mages, combat monsters and so on. A matrix run that only takes seconds in game time can take an hour of game time, which leaves everyone else insanely bored. Conversely, one trick ponies will usually be useless and insanely bored in situations that don't touch on their specialization.
Which is why PCs should always, imho, take meaningful levels in a skill or two that doesn't directly pertain to their job function. It means players will have more opportunities to do things in the game and as a practical note, it really sucks if the only guy who knew first aid was the one who found the landmine.
-Siege
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 10:51 PM
Yeah, but the guy who decides to branch out usually gets gimped cause he can't compete with the specialists.
A guy with a rating 1 in anything is way more of a liability than a guy who didn't take the skill at all, because the rating 1 runner is more likely to try, then fail.
Posted by: Siege Dec 18 2007, 10:56 PM
There's gimped and then there's gimped.
Comparing 6 dice to 1 die, yes - the specialist wins as well she should.
6 dice to 3 or 4 dice? Still enough to be useful without threatening the specialist.
And if the specialist is otherwise unavailable, those 3 or 4 dice can be amazingly useful.
-Siege
Posted by: Mr. Unpronounceable Dec 18 2007, 10:59 PM
| QUOTE (Kyoto Kid) | ||||
...you sure? I thought all stun had to be recovered by rest (save for the temporary effect of stim patches). |
What temporary effect of stim patches? In SR4 they only allow you to ignore stun penalties, they don't temporarily heal stun like they did in SR3 and earlier.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 18 2007, 10:59 PM
Make sure to apply visual modifiers to targetted spells. I'm assuming the mage in question(magic 6 you said) does not in fact have cyber eyes? If not toss in some smoke and all kinds of stuff like that that is dirt cheap that smart sec forces should have for normal firefights anyway and reduce his pool. The problem you seem to be having is that the player built a straight up true blue combat mage. What you don't realize is that you would have a very similar problem if someone built a throw adept that could chunk 4 grenades an IP with 9-14 dice per throw. Someone who can reliably deal a massive amount of AOE damage rapidly finishes off a fight. So, visual modifiers to reduce his pool a bit, and some decent counterspelling or warding and you should be much closer to set.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 11:03 PM
3 to 4 dice is well trained to me, and my small group of 4 is actually pretty good about spreading out their skills to 3/4 in a lot of things. But even so, there can only be so much cross training before skills get too much BP.
And to DTFarstar, my problem with that is that it takes the mage out of combat entirely. I don't want the mage to be gimped in combat, just be more in line with what the rest of the team can do.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 18 2007, 11:03 PM
| QUOTE (Mr. Unpronounceable) | ||||||
What temporary effect of stim patches? In SR4 they only allow you to ignore stun penalties, they don't temporarily heal stun like they did in SR3 and earlier. |
...ack, I'm thinking old school again (recently finished running a 3rd ed campaign).
Posted by: Siege Dec 18 2007, 11:15 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| A guy with a rating 1 in anything is way more of a liability than a guy who didn't take the skill at all, because the rating 1 runner is more likely to try, then fail. |
As for someone willing to take a chance with 1 die - sometimes you just have to take a shot.
"Hey guys, I slept through a class on how to disarm a bomb, but Crazy Harry, the Mad Bomber who Bombs at Midnight is dead, we're trapped in a vault and unless anyone else has any bright ideas, the timer is ten seconds away from zero. You want I should toss my 1 die of demolitions and maybe get us blown up ten seconds sooner than we would have otherwise?"
Now, if the character elbowed Crazy Harry out of the way in his eagerness to reach the bomb first, his 1 die of demolitions held in a trembling hand, it is the responsibility of the Weapons Specialist to kill him without hitting the bomb so Crazy Harry can carry on.
-Siege
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 18 2007, 11:26 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And to DTFarstar, my problem with that is that it takes the mage out of combat entirely. I don't want the mage to be gimped in combat, just be more in line with what the rest of the team can do. |
It sounds like your Mage's spells don't do anything in one pass that two skillfully places grenades doesn't do, so similar tactics are good for defense. Cover, of course, doesn't apply because spells go through barriers. So having defensive positions that are spaced well apart and allow for popout shots is a good tactic.
For defending a building, it would be best to have guards with pistols at least 20m apart- and from positions that can be fired from then retreated behind. Then the mage must both spot the target (perception test) and can only hit one at a time.
High force spells leave an aura for much longer, too. You could start rolling perception tests for the authorities to home in on the Mage's fake SIN(s) or real hideout, depending on how available the aura is for a forensic mage to examine.
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 18 2007, 11:32 PM
And GTMF is a very valid and necessary tactic. What sec team wouldn't start blasting on the mage and/or dude with the grenades, rockets or missles?
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 11:39 PM
Well obviously it's necessary since mages have so much raw power at their disposal. I'm actually frightened for when my mage finally gets improved masking and slips under the radar in combat.
Posted by: Apathy Dec 18 2007, 11:45 PM
I always envisioned that standard security were just there as 'canaries in the coal mine' when one (or more) drops, that's when everybody else gets alerted and starts to act.
When a real response team shows up, they'll have usable countermeasures against magic. Always using partial (-2DP) or full cover (-4DP) (behind portable sheilds if necessary). Judicious use of thermal smoke (-4), flash bangs (-1), etc all detract from dice pools and help even the score. Not to mention that many office buildings will have a mild background count (-1).
Posted by: Ddays Dec 18 2007, 11:58 PM
Thanks apathy, you gave me some great ideas for a run.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 12:37 AM
| QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Dec 19 2007, 08:39 AM) | ||
...you sure? I thought all stun had to be recovered by rest (save for the temporary effect of stim patches). |
A few quotes ...
| QUOTE (SR4 pg. 124) |
| First Aid (Logic) The First Aid skill governs basic medicine in a hands-on sense, as a paramedic rather than a physician. This skill provides little knowledge of cybernetics and how they function, and cannot be used to repair them. Default: Yes Skill Group: Biotech Specializations: By type of treatment (Chemical Burns, Combat Wounds, Sports Injuries, Electric Shock, etc.) |
Note the presence of the Electric Shock Specialization. Electricity causes Stun damage in SR4.
| QUOTE (SR4 pg. 242) |
| Using First Aid Characters with the First Aid skill may immediately help reduce the trauma of wounds (Stun or Physical). First Aid may only be applied within 12 hours of when the damage was taken. |
Can't get much clearer than that.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 19 2007, 12:41 AM
Geek the mage is fine, but too many GMs are quick to metagame with it. If the Mage happens to be an ork in an armored jacket sustaining a few spells and is just sitting behind cover firing off potshots with his predator like the rest of the group, "Geek the mage!" shouldn't really come into it because unless there's a Sec Mage there to spot him, how in the hell do they know he's the mage to begin with?
Posted by: augurer Dec 19 2007, 12:46 AM
Unless the mage has some odd Centering or Geas requirement, or a Shamanic mask, I don't see how you're going to know who the mage is short of assensing the entire team, anyway. And lets face it, if the opposing sec Mage is going to spend his first combat round Astrally Perceiving and Assensing, he's not likely to survive to the second.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 12:50 AM
Actually, going by the rules, it isn't all that difficult to spot spellcasting, even for a mundane, despite what the fluff implies.
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 19 2007, 01:49 AM
We're talking about a Mage blasting off Stunball on every pass, here, which is supposedly fairly obvious because people are going down without bulletholes and the Mage isn't shooting but is doing something.
Even so, a properly prepared team might be able to hide their Stunball-blasting Mage, and then you might just have to accept that the team has prepared too well for the run you've prepared.
Posted by: Siege Dec 19 2007, 01:53 AM
The rule is something to the effect of "+2 to spot a spell caster casting a spell" versus the roleplaying aspects.
-Siege
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Dec 19 2007, 02:03 AM
I've always thought of it as a game about breaking LOS, it highly rewards indirect fire weapons, stealth and cover - maybe your security guards need to go for CS grenades and thermal smoke before the pistols - CS is an opaque gas and will probably also disrupt los giving negative casting modifiers.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 02:07 AM
| QUOTE (SR4 pg. 168) |
| NOTICING MAGIC Just how obvious are magical skills? Not very, since most spells and spirits have little, if any, visible effect in the physical world (unless the magician prefers to have flashy effects, or her tradition calls for it). An observer has to notice the magician’s intense look of concentration, whispered incantations, and small gestures. Magicians of some traditions display a more visible change when practicing magic known as the shamanic mask. The shamanic mask typically changes the magician’s features temporarily to display characteristics appropriate to her mentor spirit or tradition—an eagle shaman, for example, might seem to have feathers or beaklike features while spellcasting or summoning. Noticing if someone is using a magical skill requires a Perception Test (p. 117) with a threshold equal to 6 minus the magic’s Force—more powerful magic is easier to spot. The gamemaster should apply additional modifiers as appropriate, or if the perceiver is Awakened themselves (+2 dice), astrally perceiving (+2 dice), or if a shamanic mask is evident (+2 dice). |
The first paragraph makes is seem more difficult of a task than what the actual rules in the second paragraph dictate.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 02:07 AM
I've always been afraid of super heavy resistance regarding surprise attacks.
The one time I optimize a sniper to be a big baddie, he nearly wipes the entire team before they can find his position. (Before anybody asks, the team knew something was up at the meet and had drones surveying the area as well as a spirit searching, just plain bad rolls on their part)
Posted by: Mercer Dec 19 2007, 03:33 AM
Mages roll right over mundies; thats a hard thing to avoid. Its pretty much how the system was designed, if a site doesn't have a sec mage on duty its pretty much ice cream for (awakened) freaks. Your basic security guard isn't going to fare well against any runner, but its probably most noticeable against mages (and trolls with Panther Cannons).
So, the logical conclusion is sites that need to be defended will have magical security. If they can't afford it (because magic is rare, expensive and sometimes just plain hard to come by), then they'll adopt tactics that minimize their magical vulnerability. If a bunch of schmoes attempt to swarm the pc's, whether its a Stunball or grenades or full-auto bursts, things are not going to go well for them.
Given that magic, cyberware, and ten foot tall trolls are possibilities in SR, I would think that your average, everyday security guard is going to take that as his cue not to think he's Rambo. Schmoe-level security isn't there to take pc's on in head to head fights, they're there to rattle doorknobs, spot intruders, sound the alarm and then delay and inconvenience the runners until the High Threat Response Teams (whether they be from the parent corp or Lone Star) show up to deal with them. Lock it down, get the non-combatants to safety, and make sure the high karma backup is on the way. Schmoes should be taking full-cover and holding their actions to unload a tsunami of gunfire on the first pc that comes their way, not aggressively rooting out the intruders.
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 19 2007, 05:00 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays @ Dec 18 2007, 05:30 PM) | ||
Yeah, guess that's true. Explains why my favorite part of the game are the social situations where all the characters be quirky and interact. And my problem with sneak and steal is that my other dudes do their job and that's it for their part in the session. It goes: A. Matrix hijinks B. Related security bust ups C. Sneaking in Instead of it being spread out evenly across the session. Which wouldn't be a problem if the entire team was doing the sneaking, but I don't have a gang of Tir Elf Ninjas, so I can't really make any logical explanation on why the burly troll is trying to tip toe his way past security. |
Its simple, really, remind your players that sneaking, matrix hijinx, and blowing stuff up are not isolated from each other. Everything happens at once. The opposition are doing everything at once. They no not just line up and die. Every security camera and door is connected to the matrix. They figure out where you are and they lock you down
so you can't escape. Matrix overwatch must be constant to prevent the security from prevailing simply due to their control of the terrain.
On the issue of stealth, it is the most powerful option in the game, but it isn't perfect. There are some things which don't need to make perception checks to spot you (pressure plates, motion sensors), and when you run into one of them you'll damn well need to be sure that the guards are as far away from you as is possible (which is where the heavy hitters may come in) and that your guys have control of the matrix-connected security systems.
The heavy weapons guys are important for the get away, because they have to kill quick. Remember, if a fight with the police drags out for too long, one of two things will happen. A) They'll will run out of police or B) The fight will escalate to the point where you can't possibly win. Unless you're Shadowrunning in Mayberry, the latter is significantly more likely than the former. Once the shooting starts, they have only so much time to get out before they're so overwhelmed that they can't possibly survive. This is the mistake that the North Hollywood guys made, they took too long.
This means that it has to be coordinated so that the matrix guy, the stealth guy, and the shooting guys are all doing different things at the exact same time in order to ensure that they don't get trapped.
The mage, depending on his spell list, can fulfill multiple roles, of which combat is the least important.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 19 2007, 05:18 AM
What I was trying to say and failed earlier is that mages are above everything else - VERSATILE so if this Magic 6 guy built his character right he has 11 other spells he can cast. If you let him wail and destroy some security then have the others use intelligent mage tactics and kill his Stunball dice pool he should have the ability to do other things, if he just continually tries to stunball and fail... don't feel bad. Suggest other alternatives, use enemy mages to SHOW him other alternatives. There are alot of spells out there and if all he has is self boost and combat spells... well 5 karma and a little time will remedy that.
Above any other skill that could potentially be useful to a shadowrunner innovation is the most important. The ability to flow with pressure and come up with new tactics instead of just blowing through all the opposition is what Shadowrun is all about because you know who has more guns, mages, and badass tech than you? Every corp and government in the damn game.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 05:30 AM
Well, my main problem is that anything that foils specifically high force stunball foils almost everything else he can do short of calling up a spirit in reserve.
Either that or they run away and it's back to the one thing at a time gaming which is rather boring unless you introduce some weird contrived situation.
THE GUY'S A LIVING MANA WARD, SO YOU BETTER USE IMPROVED INVISIBILITY TO GET THE TEAM AWAY. OH HEY SAMMIES, TRY TO TAKE HIM OUT WHILE I FORCE THE MAGE TO PLAY SUPPORT.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 19 2007, 05:51 AM
What spells does he have and what is his tradition? I might be able to give him and you some ideas about how this could go. The problem I'm seeing now is that you don't want to force him to do anything he doesn't want to do and it sounds like the ONLY thing he wants to do is annihilate people with magic in the most badass way possible. Which bothers you.... but you don't want to force him to change... hell I dunno, if you could copy us his sheet it would help alot too. But it is obvious- to me anyway and nothing says I'm not wrong- that his is more than just stunball being a really efficient spell.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 06:00 AM
Everybody on the team fulfils a valid role. The mage is perfectly willing to play ball, I'm just kind of annoyed that the game isn't exactly balanced in terms of what combat contribution each character can bring forth at what effort. When a mage can kick as much ass and have three times the utility of a cyber sammie, I would like to fix it without being forced to come up with a situation that specifically smacks down the mage's effectiveness.
It's ok if I occasionally smack down a character to make sure they don't get too cocky, but that's not a long term solution to the problem. And the general vibe I'm getting here is that the only fix is a encounter design one rather than a straight up mechanical change. Sigh, I guess nobody said being a GM was easy.
Posted by: kzt Dec 19 2007, 06:38 AM
You can do a mechanical change, but it's likely to be tough to get the balance you want without tweaking.
A few ideas:
Increase the drain on combat spells. Remove the divide by by two for drain. So a force 13 stunball is 14 dice of drain. Or alternately, make area effect spells have double the drain of single target spells, so the force 13 stunbolt is 5 dice and the stunball is 10 dice.
Reduce the damage. For example, damage is just double net hits, with a cap of total hits of force but no base damage.
I haven't tried these, so I have no idea how ugly they they will or won't be.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 19 2007, 07:12 AM
| QUOTE (Fortune @ Dec 18 2007, 09:07 PM) |
| The first paragraph makes is seem more difficult of a task than what the actual rules in the second paragraph dictate. |
Yep, true enough, but by the time that time the mage has already smacked you with the stunball. All I'm saying is geek the mage isn't that terribly useful because you can't really use it as a preemptive measure if the mage in question knows what they're doing.
Oddly enough, if you really want to make mages sweat, you really ought to make life harder for the hacker and riggers. Object resistance will catch up to a mage sooner or later, and drones backed up with counterspelling or minor background count can make things real hairy, plus they're essentially immune to stun to begin with. I damn near smeared my group the first time I GMed 4th by having the top security guy at the facility statted out as a Mystic Adept with just enough magical ability to take Improved Ability for technical skills as well as counterspelling and a rifle he used to back up own his personal drone army. Pretty nasty when you consider that he ran them on a second commlink which wasn't connected to the main facility's PAN; if a Steel Lynx were even remotely capable of being stealthy, it could have been very messy.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 09:58 AM
| QUOTE (Whipstitch) |
| Yep, true enough, but by the time that time the mage has already smacked you with the stunball. All I'm saying is geek the mage isn't that terribly useful because you can't really use it as a preemptive measure if the mage in question knows what they're doing. |
That assumes there is only one person (or small group) in opposition to the mage. Other bystanders or non-targeted opponents can also make use of Perception.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Dec 19 2007, 10:15 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| The mage is perfectly willing to play ball, I'm just kind of annoyed that the game isn't exactly balanced in terms of what combat contribution each character can bring forth at what effort. When a mage can kick as much ass and have three times the utility of a cyber sammie, I would like to fix it without being forced to come up with a situation that specifically smacks down the mage's effectiveness. |
Sammie's real strength is in the ability for a well equipped sammie to walk straight through a security checkpoint without anything less than blood testing demonstrating that the sammie is in any way a threat.
Posted by: Siege Dec 19 2007, 10:18 AM
That isn't exactly true - when a person is packing so much 'ware they stop having a thermal signature and qualify for a vehicle signature, they're gonna raise some eyebrows.
I love my samurai, but to be fair - they usually make the average cyberware detector roll over and die. 
-Siege
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 10:32 AM
That has actually happened to one of players, passing through a security checkpoint, the hacker heard this being broadcast across the coms:
"Be advised, on approach we have 3 geeks and a GM truck"
"You sure, tower, visual shows 4 of them on foot"
"Cyber sensors clearly show a vehicle there, captain"
"Oh."
The fourth member being the the casually strutting troll sammie of course.
Posted by: Ryu Dec 19 2007, 11:12 AM
The main problem here is overcasting as rule rather than exception. The magic 6 caster should well be able to toast gangers, but not as fast as manaball allows for.
The option of increased drain is valid. If you suffer the same drain from fireball as from stunball, you decide what kind of resistance roll on behalf of the target you can beat easier. I would advise to lower drain by one
Another option would be to limit damage from stunball etc to net hits. That would result in marginal damage in presence of counterspelling and encourage the use of foci to increase DP size.
I think one aspect that is often ignored here is the control of mage power vs. mundane power in character design (read "GM approval"). Magic 5 or even 6 seems to be the norm for most mages that where submitted to me. As are high drain stats.Casters with magic 6, spellcasting 5(combat spells), stunball, fireball and increase reflexes clear house. More so with a few cheap initiations.
On the other hand, mages can do with magic 4 or even 3, and can well spend their karma in other places. If you want to leave combat to the mundanes, tell the player to make do with magic 4 and promise to stay light on magical security. More BP to spend on non-magical things, too.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Dec 19 2007, 11:31 AM
If you're sammie is hardware toting to the max with BIG GUNS the problem is a rigger rolls lots more dice because drones are cheap and he can seriously have like 5 LMGs, and so is speccing out to do jumping in to the max, and can do all sorts of other cool stuff (thanks to the drones he's a great spy, excellent transport/get away driver and can usually hack a bit) and is just as legal (ie not very).
Competing against a rigger, while flavourful, isn't exactly where the 'strength' of the sammie is. I'm more thinking biosammie as an illustrative option of the strengths of a sammie.
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 19 2007, 01:32 PM
One bane of mages is speed. Samurai have it; they don't, usually. And with speed comes success in surprise tests.
Let us create a hypothetical character called Reasonably Fast Guy Reasonably Fast Guy has a reaction of 4(8) and and Intuition of 5, 3 IPs, and a MGL-6.
Reasonably fast guy runs into the party in a hallway by accident, both sides make surprise tests. The mage is surprised. Now, being surprised, the mage cannot Stunball Reasonably Fast Guy, or take any action against him whatsoever. Reasonably Fast Guy can, however, fire 6 airburst grenades at the mage.
The only hope is that the party has in this case is a speedster faster than Reasonably Fast Guy, who might have the drop on him or who, at least, will be going first.
Posted by: rangda Dec 19 2007, 02:54 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Everybody on the team fulfils a valid role. The mage is perfectly willing to play ball, I'm just kind of annoyed that the game isn't exactly balanced in terms of what combat contribution each character can bring forth at what effort. When a mage can kick as much ass and have three times the utility of a cyber sammie, I would like to fix it without being forced to come up with a situation that specifically smacks down the mage's effectiveness. |
It's a role playing game. Strictly speaking it doesn't have to be balanced as you're not playing it in a competitive environment. If the mage is dominating combats talk to the player and point this out and ask him to tone it down so others can be involved.
In our game I have a magic 6 grade 5 mage who has a spellcasting dice pool of 22-23 dice (I forget the exact number) for combat spells and 18 dice to resist drain. And has 1 point of cyber which includes ears and eyes; I *could* split my dice pool and cast 3 stunballs / round or cast F12 stunballs with impunity but I don't. My character ends up being the 2nd most powerful character in combat (our party only has one character designed for combat) because I throttle him back and play him appropriately stupid. (Our GM is also reasonable in that he doesn't have every mook immediately drop what they are doing in an attempt to vaporize the mage, so I can be appropriately stupid). As a result combats are entertaining for even the non-combat types.
If it bothers you that much that a mage could in theory break things, then disallow casting multiple spells per combat turn and double the drain for overcasting, but honestly I don't think it matters if nobody does it.
If the player won't be reasonable (but from what you've said it sounds like he will be) then give the team a run for something important and have the something important guarded by a grade 4-5 initiate with absorbtion and 6 dice in counterspelling. (At the risk of digression if you think magic is broken it's nothing compared to how broken shielding and absorbtion are; high grade initiates and their best friends are basically immune to magic.) That will give the baddies 10-11 dice in shielding and I don't think the team will be very fond of the F12 spellls that come back at them.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 19 2007, 03:32 PM
Yeah, magic is overpowered in basically every RPG. It just happens by it's fundamental nature. The thing is, the mage should be bringing something to the table just like all the other characters. If the mage is bringing combat doom, then what is the sammie bringing? Support? If the sam has combat covered, encourage the mage to find his own niche. Again, apply visibility modifiers halfway intelligent sec forces should use cover, smoke etc. just for the firefight anyway, don't let the mage ignore it. Keep in mind you can't stunball/manaball/powerball what you cannot see. Cover! Cover! Cover!
If the enemies use poor tactics, and like I said in another thread, seriously magic has been around for how long now? 60 years? You can't tell me that there isn't at least a class or two in sec guard school about breaking LOS, throwing up smoke and flash packs, retreating to a warded area, and hitting the big red "Oh shits we are being attacked by a mage!" Button that summons the astral sec mage and his elemental friends. Or even nastier guardian/plant spirit friends to manifest. These are not smacking down on the mage! They are reasonable security precautions on the companies part against a threat that has been known for 60 years!
Chris
Posted by: Glayvin34 Dec 19 2007, 03:35 PM
| QUOTE (rangda) |
| It's a role playing game. Strictly speaking it doesn't have to be balanced as you're not playing it in a competitive environment. If the mage is dominating combats talk to the player and point this out and ask him to tone it down so others can be involved. |
Excellent point. It could be the player, not the character. We used to have a player that would always overcast and always send force 6 spirits after every enemy. He was a very competitive person, and was dominating combat as a result and we thought it was because of how powerful Mages are. Once he left, Mages didn't dominate combat so completely because the Mages in the game weren't played by players that weren't competitive and therefore less ruthless and single-minded during combat.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 19 2007, 03:54 PM
...yeah I had that experience myself as a GM. Don't get me wrong, Mages are still tough if done well. However, now I have a team that plays in a much more balanced manner so that everyone is a part of the action instead of one person hogging it all.
Posted by: Prester John Dec 19 2007, 04:03 PM
Stunball is an area effect spell. So if you want to cut its utility a bit, have some of the guards move in for melee combat. Maybe a few of them rush in with stunbatons. Clearly, they won't run across a hundred meter long open courtyard to do this, but with the blind turns common in a lot of building, if the NPCs have access to the buildings security cameras or something, they can plan ambushes where stun-batoning a couple surprised PCs is an effective strategy.
If just a few guys are in melee range, or have taken cover within a few meters, the mage's ability to stunball the whole world into submission is greatly reduced. If the opposing security team is within 12 meters of the PCs, then the mage has to make some tough decisions about withholding spell-casting dice.
Posted by: WorkOver Dec 19 2007, 05:41 PM
this seems like a GM problem to me.
If you are fighting in a building, how is your own team not hit by a 12 meter radius spell?
That would cover several rooms.
Why are your bad guys just sitting out in the open, and not behind cover, as they are involved in a fight.
Why does your mage keep going so soon in the combat round? Even with a 6 intuition, 6 reaction, improved reaction spell, improved intuition spell, have them all active, and got maxed out rolls, they have an initiative of 18 reaction max.
If the combat mage has those two spells up, maxed reaction, maxed intuition, fighting idiots in a wide open space, no cover, 3 will power ratings, while none of your team just happens to be in a space about as wide as half a football field, then more power to the mage.
A little smarter tactics, a street same who is worth being a street sam, and a GM with the testicles to strong arm a player who is strong arming your game, and mages go away.
I have never, and I mean never, ever had a problem with a mage.
One player even work armur, and sustained an over casted armour spell, he walked around with 32 points of armour.
I mind controlled him, had him blind fold himself, hit him with decrease charisma, which is always fun, and packed hand grenades around him while he was standing in a mindless stupor, and exploded him.
this was after 3 or 4 sessions of him just trying to find ways to over power everyone and everything. Several warning where given. Finally, that was enough.
Also, I like to hit players with force 12 or 16 spells after they abuse them. Force 16 decrease charisma is a dirty trick, but once mage players get on your nerves, you need to apply the rules they like to use against thier group, the problem goes away.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 19 2007, 05:42 PM
Going first is as easy as spending a point of Edge. As a general rule smart mages keep Edge for Initiative and Binding tests that look like they're going sour. Also, an Intuition tradition combat mage with Reaction Enhancers and Improved reflexes running through a sustaining focus is faster than hell and a lot less expensive than what you're suggesting.
Posted by: Feshy Dec 19 2007, 07:01 PM
The first time one of those low-ranking mooks happens to be an initiate mage supervisor with improved masking, spell reflect, and a counterspelling focus -- well, it might not be the last time the mage tosses a force 12 stunball, but it will be the last time he does so with impunity. A rare event, to be sure -- but a memorable one.
Force 12 spells hang around on the astral for half a day. That's a long time for a forensic mage to analyze it. After a few runs, the mage will have quite the security profile, and likely have left some physical samples around. That gives the higher-up corp mages incentive to send out some high force spirits -- spirits that track the character when he's trying to rest off that high spell drain. Or worse, when he's meeting with Johnson to exchange the goods for some pay. The paranoid Johnson -- the one with snipers on the stuffer shack down the road in case the team tries to double cross him.
Of course, in my opinion, if the mage is leaving around extremely high force spell signatures regularly, he's lucky if only security guards notice it. Do you have any idea what a great find he'd be to an insect spirit hive? If he can toss around spells like that, they'll reason he's a perfect target to make a flesh-form. Maybe even a queen!
There have always been magically resistant beasties in Shadowrun lore, have some of them show up with some security guards guiding them. Then there's something for both the Sam and the Mage to do. Add in a few drones, and everyone's buys at once!
Remember mooks have edge too -- and can spend it to go first. They can take actions like tossing a grenade while running for cover. If they're caught by surprise? Well, taking out a pile of hapless and unwitting goons quietly is great work for a mage. And the street sam will have plenty to do when a dozen biomonitors go off in the security office simultaneously...
Tactics, tactics, tactics. Security goons don't want to be geeked by the mage. They're no doubt trained to avoid them (avoiding LOS, vision modifiers, spending edge to get to a safe spot first.) Security drones, on the other hand, are cheap -- far cheaper than security guard death benefits or hospital bills. Security goons are just there for the "human" element, and to make judgment calls -- calls like "now is a good time to turn the drones / hellhounds loose."
As others have said, "canary in a coal mine" is another job to fill. This comic sums it up well: http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0512.html
Posted by: WorkOver Dec 19 2007, 08:14 PM
| QUOTE (Whipstitch @ Dec 19 2007, 12:42 PM) |
| Going first is as easy as spending a point of Edge. As a general rule smart mages keep Edge for Initiative and Binding tests that look like they're going sour. Also, an Intuition tradition combat mage with Reaction Enhancers and Improved reflexes running through a sustaining focus is faster than hell and a lot less expensive than what you're suggesting. |
Really? all that cyber? Then how does he toss force 12 spells? If he does it with magic, it still costs.....
The power focus costs a lot of money, the high attributes cost a lot of build points.
A lot of edge cost a lot of build points.
A high spellcasting skill costs a lot of build points.
How are all these theory mages just hanging around?
Lets see, he is human, so he gets 2 edge, thats free, so unless he spends build points, how does he just conviently go first? Why can't an NPC also spend an edge to go first to counter it?
Reaction enhancers? The spell? Thats 3 build points to buy that spell, and plus the foci.
+3 reaction to max out your human reaction, requires a rating 3 sustaining spell foci, thats 30 grand, and its 12 availibility. 30K is 6 build points, plus the 3 to buy the spell, thats nearly 10 build points.
10 more, to do the same for the improved reflexes.
How much edge does he buy?
Where are the characters getting all these build points from? How pitiful are their other attributes? If he has a 1 strength, he is getting his strength drained, and rendered unconscious or paralyzed.
How many times can he buy a first action before he runs out of edge to go first? As a GM, each one of his NPC's can do the same, except they don't have to worry about needed edge for the next encounter.
I don't know, force 12 stun blasts are never abused in my games, as they are so easy to counter, just like any mage is, hell, you can counter a stun blast buy buying an NPC magic resistance, as in the edge, and bio/cyber that ignores stun. Hell, a damage compensator will push one box to physical and help more.
The whole mage being over powered crap is nothing more than weak GM's who don't want to go the extra 2 inches to use what is available to him to keep them in check.
Posted by: Apathy Dec 19 2007, 08:26 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Well, my main problem is that anything that foils specifically high force stunball foils almost everything else he can do short of calling up a spirit in reserve. |
- Stunball won't work well on the guy hiding behind the dumpster lobbing grenades at you...for this you need an Indirect AOE spell like fireball or a spirit.
- Stunball won't work against the drone (which doesn't even have a stun track and you'd need 4 hits to affect it anyway)...for this you need an elemental effect spell like lightning bolt or something to limit its mobility like ice sheet or a spirit with accident power.
- As someone else pointed out, area effect spells hit friendlies (including yourself) as well as enemies, so AoE spells aren't ideal if your team is in the same area as the opposition. (It's easy to see bad guys if your in a parking lot, but inside a twisty-turny office hallway with lots of doorways to hide behind, you're screwed.) SR doesn't have facing rules, so it doesn't really matter if your looking at them or not - as long as there's an uninterupted straight line of visibility to the guy behind you he's hit just as bad as the guy in front of you.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 19 2007, 10:04 PM
| QUOTE (WorkOver) |
How are all these theory mages just hanging around? The whole mage being over powered crap is nothing more than weak GM's who don't want to go the extra 2 inches to use what is available to him to keep them in check. |
Look, I know you don't know me or my playstyle, but I don't talk "theory" about Awakened characters, I play them; almost exclusively, in fact. Second, you're being an ass when you call the people on this thread asking about how to keep -combat- spells from wrecking their games weak GMs. Personally, I don't even think Mages are particularly overpowered, but my opinion doesn't do much good for those people whose combats are being steamrolled by force 8+ combat spells, but telling them that Initiative is only a small part of the equation that needs to include other considerations is a step in the right direction.
Here's a Mystic Adept Combat Mage sheet I have laying around. I've never really played it because Combat Mages aren't my style; I leave indiscriminate killing to the Samurai because they don't have to worry about dragging foci through wards and leaving astral signatures all over the place, plus there's a lot more useful things a -real- mage could be doing other than subbing in for a sammy. I'm afraid he only casts Force 8 Stunballs rather than 12, but at least he has 17 dice for combat tests. Sorry if that disappoints.
Now that I think about it, I should probably tweak this sheet and see if it'd make a passable Combat Mage for the Sample thread. Probably wouldn't work though; it rather sucks at close range comat...
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 10:23 PM
A lot of people are saying its a GMing problem, but seriously, I have infinite resources. If I want to make the game unfavorable to mages, I can do it easily. Very easily.
On why the mage has the space: This is mostly a tactics thing, the team is pretty good with spacing and scouting using various means. Sure, it's gone bad once or twice, but most of the time, they hit fast and they hit hard.
And since stunballs can't hit people the mage can't see. The rest of the team gets behind cover. Sometimes the guards catch on, sometimes they don't.
On why he wins initiative - 2 words, surprise round
The team as a whole makes it a point to keep their backs covered at all times, so I generally try to make sure ambushes only occur when they chill at a bar or relax. A bunch of bar regulars walked up and bought them drinks, then started shock glove pimp slamps all around. The mage and the hacker went down quick, but the troll was able to handle all the gangers by himself. So yeah, I can make combats where the mage doesn't instantly win, no problem.
And I don't have a problem with the mage, I really don't. And I never said the mage was a problem character, he isn't. The real problem is that the mage and the rest of the team has gotten comfortable with a style of combat that works for them, but which spreads out the rolling in phases which makes the session a bit dry for the story I want to tell, so I'm looking for ways to switch it up a little.
I just want a way to make him mix up his spell casting a little before it gets too dry for everybody. The first couple times a combat ended with the force 12 stunball everybody was happy about it. Now I just wish there was a way to recreate fights like the corridor fight from Matrix 1 reliably.
And no, retirement isn't an option, yet. (I want to finish my story arc, they already have the next batch of characters ready)
And thanks again Apathy, your ideas for combat are always interesting.
And for guys who want his stats, they aren't really broken or min/maxed, he has a bunch of weaknesses for me to exploit and I'm not sure if he bought absolutely everything he needed, but here's the most convenient stat sheet I have, when he submitted the character:
I think the build has a few emergency points left over so that I had some twiddle room to give him whatever he was missing.
I don't have the one with karma gains on hand because that's the physical paper one and I let them keep those.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 10:29 PM
| QUOTE (WorkOver) |
| Hell, a damage compensator will push one box to physical and help more. |
Damage Compensators do not work the way you seem to think they work.
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 19 2007, 10:36 PM
Well, if the only problem is stunball spamming then why not just start giving out Pain Editors, the bioware where allows you to ignore all stun damage? Or bring back old style stim patches and put them in auto-injectors.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 10:38 PM
| QUOTE (hyzmarca) |
| Well, if the only problem is stunball spamming then why not just start giving out Pain Editors, the bioware where allows you to ignore all stun damage? Or bring back old style stim patches and put them in auto-injectors. |
I'm not about to give pain editors to every joe average when my own runners want them and can't afford the cost nor the availability.
About the auto-injectors, never thought about that.
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 19 2007, 10:47 PM
It only works if you houserule stims back to negating stun damage like they did in SR3 instead of just providing pain resistance, or create a new sort of drug. It might kill the grunts in the long term, particularly if they take a second stunball, but it'll keep them awake and on their feet just a little bit longer.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 10:54 PM
Oh, I already have a house-rule regarding stimpatches - when you apply a stimpatch, you can stay awake with your stun meter full as long as your physical damage doesn't exceed the rating of the stimpatch.
We find that it makes stun damage slightly weaker than physical, which is balanced especially considering the other advantages stun damage already provides (prisoners, interrogation, bounties, etc.). Not to mention the fact that stun damage is slightly easier to deal with the current equipment.
So mooks do routinely apply stim patches if they're about to be knocked out, presuming they're actually awake when the first stunball hits.
Posted by: Starmage21 Dec 19 2007, 10:59 PM
If youve got a magic rating of 6, and you feel safe enough to cast a force 12 stunbolt, why not just cast 2 F6 stunbolts instead? Split your dice pool in 2, give them 2 chances to resist some of the damage, and yourself 2 chances to absorb much less STUN drain, but 10 stun damage is crippling if theyre not unconscious alltogether.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 11:05 PM
Spellcasting is a complex action, and its safer to knock out the opponents before they can even get one pass to smack your face or call reinforcements.
Unless you're on a sensitive mission where periodic checkups by a central booth are required, security guards knocked out before they can signal warning means that reinforcements, if they do arrive, arrive too late. At least, that's how I do it as a GM.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 11:07 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays @ Dec 20 2007, 09:05 AM) |
| Spellcasting is a complex action ... |
It may be a Complex Action, but you can indeed cast multiple spells at the same time, in that single Complex Action. They don't even have to be the same two (or three, or four) spells either.
Posted by: Konsaki Dec 19 2007, 11:08 PM
There is that problem of +2 drain per spell you cast in one IP though... that hurts...
Posted by: Fortune Dec 19 2007, 11:12 PM
| QUOTE (Konsaki @ Dec 20 2007, 09:08 AM) |
| There is that problem of +2 drain per spell you cast in one IP though... that hurts... |
Not terribly, because you're casting at a lower Drain level to start with (in the case of multiple Combat spells as in the example), and you have your full Pool to resist the Drain from each spell.
Personally, I'd multi-cast the Spells at Force 5 (odd levels are almost always the best in Shadowrun). Maybe even 3 of them, depending on the situation (and have in quite a few games), since the Drain is low enough even at +4 or even +6 DL per spell.
Posted by: Gort Dec 19 2007, 11:27 PM
I think all of the stunning options are overpowered in Shadowrun. I'm quite surprised anyone uses lethal weapons, seeing as it's more effective to stun people.
Most serious opposition for runners will have more physical track than stun, and more ballistic armour than impact. Gel rounds go against impact and hit the stun track. Electric ammunition and melee weapons go against HALF impact armour and hit the stun track, and the melee weapons don't require the stupid levels of strength it takes to use the other melee weapons effectively. Stunball and stunbolt have lower drain levels than physically damaging spells.
It really isn't hard to make a character who never kills anyone, ever. One might even call it optimal. If only real life was like that...
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 11:33 PM
| QUOTE (Gort) |
| It really isn't hard to make a character who never kills anyone, ever. One might even call it optimal. If only real life was like that... |
Yeah, we all know how easy stun damage is to deal.
I have some houserules in effect that make stun damage slightly less effective, and you can never guarantee 0 collateral damage.
Posted by: Konsaki Dec 19 2007, 11:38 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) | ||
Yeah, we all know how easy stun damage is to deal. I have some houserules in effect that make stun damage slightly less effective, and you can never guarantee 0 collateral damage. |
Well, one thing to consider is that when someone gets hit with a stun gun/baton, it's electrical in nature, which makes the muscles seize up and spazm.
If the victim has a gun in hand, the trigger finger yanks automaticly while the arm jerks wildly for a second. You could random roll for everyone infront of said person for a chance to be hit by a single/burst/fullauto fire. Depends on how reallistic/evil you want to be as a GM.
For spells, I cant do nothing about that I guess. But the grossly increased signature on the astral sorta leaves a 'I'm Bob the Mage' sign in the area. Plus if just one of the guys being hit with that stunball has a biomonitor hooked up to an alarm, your team could be in serious trouble from a Quick Response Team, which might have mage(s) overwatching.
Posted by: Spike Dec 19 2007, 11:45 PM
It seems the real problem then is that the combats have become comfortable, routine.
One thing combat should never be is comfortable.
So: Shake things up, break their patterns, their habits. If they've been around for a while, using these techinques, then their "MO' will be known by their enemies and exploited.
Security companies will adapt too...
Posted by: Ddays Dec 19 2007, 11:50 PM
| QUOTE (Spike) |
| It seems the real problem then is that the combats have become comfortable, routine. |
Yeah, that's part of it.
But it just seems to me that in a lot of the situations I can come up with, stunball is still the go to combat spell. And if I introduce the horde of drones, then the hacker just tries to hack them all, while the mage sits on the sidelines.
If I introduce a mixture of drones and humanoids, it's still better for the mage to cast stunball and take out the hummies. Though at least the combat involves the entire group. Which explains why that's my default encounter for these guys.
I just want to mage to say, "Gee, I wish I took fireball, sure would be handy right about now." once in his career.
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 20 2007, 12:06 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89NxeVCSSSQ&feature=related can make the RPG combat experience http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7GOlqLEmhI&feature=related.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Dec 20 2007, 12:08 AM
Add civilians? Civilians with low body and will so overflow will kill them if you go in for huge overcast stunballs
Posted by: Spike Dec 20 2007, 01:03 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| But it just seems to me that in a lot of the situations I can come up with, stunball is still the go to combat spell. And if I introduce the horde of drones, then the hacker just tries to hack them all, while the mage sits on the sidelines. If I introduce a mixture of drones and humanoids, it's still better for the mage to cast stunball and take out the hummies. Though at least the combat involves the entire group. Which explains why that's my default encounter for these guys. I just want to mage to say, "Gee, I wish I took fireball, sure would be handy right about now." once in his career. |
Therein lies the heart of the matter. The Mage has the luxury of letting the hacker hack all the drones. That's not a challenging fight. He's COMFORTABLE letting the hacker hack..
I've discussed 'unhackable' Drones before, the ones where they are given filled command qeues and the wireless is physically disabled, or it uses a non-standard protocol like tightbeam laser signalling that can't properly be hacked.
That and 'counterhackers' are going to be more common than counter-mages, so the hacker should be sweating balls to shut down any given drone with the rest of the party sweats balls trying to stop the onslaught the hard way (bullets in other words)...
All the while the Mage is going 'why oh why didn't I take FIRE-ball', or failing that starts sweating balls because some highly paid securty mage-initiate is trying to rain death down on the party in the form of nasty spells and high force spirits.
At this point in their career (coming up on your supposed 'end game') there is no reason why their opponents should not be more comparable to their skills and MO. They've been around a while and they probably have some rep, some enemies, and some freinds that are really enemies. If not: Get some!
Posted by: Siege Dec 20 2007, 01:05 AM
And if you really, really want to mess with the players, add a dash of realism to the mix:
1. "What? Whaddayamean that fragging has a <duck> Savalette Guardian!?! Who knew he was a gun nut on the side? Holy drek, is that Triple EXXX explosive tips?' That stuff reviewed in 'Solo of Fortune' - so powerful only trolls and geardos will use it?"
2. "Um...why is that secretary frothing at the mouth and looks like she's gonna leap the table at us? What? Who the frag takes kamikaze recreationally?"
3. "What? What the hell is a corporate accountant doing with a Body and Strength of 6!?! Muscle and Fitness magazine?"
4. Random bystander is a weekend warrior who just happens to be a reasonably good shot.
5. Chiphead freaks out at gunfire and starts reliving "GunBunny IV: Bambi, locked and loaded."
6. Homeless guy is a vet of the Desert Wars and is still sporting some 'ware.
7. Random driveby or nut decides to open fire. Contagious funfire - a group of people start shooting and everyone nearby with a weapon opens up.
8. Old woman loses control of her car and collides into...<random location>.
One GM at a 'Con used a random magical effects table - <gm> it's raining. <us> Right - Seattle, got it. <gm> Frogs. <us>...
Trust me, sometimes dumb stuff just...happens. It keeps life interesting.
-Siege
Edit: The new, upgraded version of our "Mr. Macho!" personafix chip! Are you timid? Afraid? Scared of new surroundings? Be the master of board meetings! Be confident when you meet that hot chick at the bar! Show that ork bouncer who's really the boss!
In game terms, otherwise timid wageslaves who should be diving for cover start reaching for weapons instead.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 20 2007, 01:14 AM
Ah, yes, the surprisingly competent "bystander" can be a lot of fun. One time the resident min-maxed 4 body 1 strength elf sammy in my group was suffering from some wound modifiers when the dwarven cleaning staff tackled and subdued him with their racial 3-7 strength range.
Posted by: Apathy Dec 20 2007, 01:37 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Spellcasting is a complex action, and its safer to knock out the opponents before they can even get one pass to smack your face or call reinforcements. |
If they're wearing biomonitors (and as cheap as they are, it would be stupid for the corps not to issue them), knocking the guards out does call for reinforcements.
The better option on that first action would be something like control thoughts/control actions/mob mind/spirit possession. Mental manipulations don't set off biomonitors, and can make the guard compliant.
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And since stunballs can't hit people the mage can't see. The rest of the team gets behind cover. Sometimes the guards catch on, sometimes they don't. |
If you're casting a spell with a 12-meter (~40') radius inside an office or hallway, then chances are you and your whole team is inside the area of effect. (I just paced off my office, and it's only 40 feet wide. and it's a giant 'cube farm'. Most offices would be much smaller.) For your teammates to not get hit with the spell they don't need cover from the center of the blast (that would be an indirect spell), they need cover from you. And it's not enough that you not be looking that way; they have to have something physically blocking LOS to be immune. And there's no way that the caster doesn't have LOS to himself. This is rarely an issue when casting a force 4 or force 6 stunball unless the guards are right up on you, but when you overcast at force 12 that huge radius creates logistical issues.
So, if the guards burst out of the office 10 feet away, stunball won't do you much good unless you're willing to take down your teammates too. If they're 40 feet away and in plain sight you can take them down no problem, but it's almost as easy (and doesn't cost drain or leave a signature) to use a grenade launcer.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 20 2007, 05:29 AM
| QUOTE (Apathy) |
| So, if the guards burst out of the office 10 feet away, stunball won't do you much good unless you're willing to take down your teammates too. If they're 40 feet away and in plain sight you can take them down no problem, but it's almost as easy (and doesn't cost drain or leave a signature) to use a grenade launcer. |
Yes, because the burnt remains of a corporate office is so much better than an astral signature.
Yeah, the teammates actually do get cover from the mage. Especially in the cubicle systems you describe, it's fairly easy to scurry behind a wall and hide from your own mage while the surprised enemy gets stun balled. Or even more likely, they were behind the mage in the first place.
My team tries their best to not have guards run into their position without them knowing, so the whole guards burst in moment rarely happens. More often than not, they get the drop on the guards.
Hm, I guess I'll just have to push the limits on what I think they can handle and see if they surprise me. I hope they have a good way of fighting the enemy mage who drops the force 15 stunball first round of combat.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 20 2007, 05:41 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Yes, because the burnt remains of a corporate office is so much better than an astral signature. |
More often than not, yes!
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 20 2007, 09:11 AM
Sadly, yeah it IS a lot better to just leave a charred building. And if you don't believe that, well, obviously you've never been hit by a high Force Ignite spell targeted via ritual magic. 
Posted by: Ddays Dec 20 2007, 09:40 AM
Haha, it may be more dangerous to leave behind a peace of yourself as a mage. But retaliation's probably a bit smaller given that at the very least you left the dude's building intact. (And his guards alive, but then again, I thought the corp is going to care about that)
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 20 2007, 10:47 AM
As for hitting your own teamates with a force 12 Stunball. Easy. The mage just counterspells his teammates before the run. Magic versus Stat + Counterspelling should give them a good chance of not getting hit. Same with the Mage hitting himself...
That's the problem with Direct spells. They are all or nothing. You rule combat with them, or you plain suck.
There is no inbetween, there is no struggle, no suspense.
You either rule totally with them, or shouldn't either bother rolling.
As for ranged combat visibility penaties, why do they apply? For an AoE spell like Stunball, you don't aim it at someone, you just need to be able to see the centre of the spells AoE (maybe requiring a perception test). Then everyone in the AoE *should* get hit. Even if they're stealthing with a super 40 dice stealth skill, or Invisble.
But the actual rule states that only 'visible' targets in the AoE get hit. :/
So people could just stand behind the Mage. Or if the mage closes his eyes, no one gets hit by it. :/
Hmmm.. Is the mage a visible target for himself, if he's not looking at himself? It's noted that AoE spells hit the caster if they are within the AoE...
Heh. By this reasoning, and Invisible target within a Fireball AoE wouldn't get burned. As they aren't a visible target. So would someone holding something in front of them that totally obscures them from the mages sight (turning over a table maybe?) would totally protect them from a Fireball.... As would being behind the Mage protect everything, even flammable material, from a Fireball...
Bah. AoE's should hit any target in the Area of Effect.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 20 2007, 10:52 AM
I believe fireball still works out of LOS cause you create a giant ball of fire rather than actively targetting the people in a specific area, but that could just be my memory playing tricks on me.
I believe my team's best method for getting around friendly fire on a stunball was having the hacker put up convenient AR blinds where his teammates are.
Sure, he can still see the enemies perfectly fine, but his teammates are nowhere to be found come time to fire off the epic stunball.
Luckily, I convinced them that the tactic was against the spirit of the rules, so dropping dice to control spell area remained a viable tactic.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 20 2007, 02:02 PM
Direct area effect Combat spells only affect targets that the caster can actually see in the targeted area.
Indirect area effect Combat spells affect everyone in the targeted area.
Posted by: kzt Dec 20 2007, 03:51 PM
Unless you miss the target with indirect, then it just mysteriously seems to "go away" per the rules.
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 20 2007, 04:20 PM
| QUOTE (Fortune) |
| Direct area effect Combat spells only affect targets that the caster can actually see in the targeted area. Indirect area effect Combat spells affect everyone in the targeted area. |
Fortune, where's that explained?
I can't find a diference for indirect and direct spells under the AoE rules? :/
Posted by: Dashifen Dec 20 2007, 04:30 PM
@GentlemanLoser
Read the section under COMBAT SPELLS (p. 195) before the actual spell descriptions. That details the differences between direct and indirect ones.
Posted by: kigmatzomat Dec 20 2007, 04:31 PM
Y'know, in SR4 wards are cheap, essentially being a ritual spellcasting that lasts weeks. They also affect VOLUMES rather than surfaces. A mid-level wagemage with a Magic of 4 can create a Force 4 ward that lasts a month and encloses 200m^3 volume per casting (8mx8mx3m) in an afternoon (4hours).
So it's perfectly reasonable to believe that there could be several warded regions in key locations (R&D, payroll, server rooms, security stations, tactical locations, etc). That instantly gives the sec team an extra +4 dice to resist spells as well as extending the time it takes spirits to get to them. Plus any time something begins beating on the ward the mage knows and can sound the alarm.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 20 2007, 04:42 PM
| QUOTE (GentlemanLoser @ Dec 21 2007, 02:20 AM) | ||
Fortune, where's that explained? |
From the http://www.shadowrun4.com/resources/faq.shtml ...
| QUOTE (SR4 FAQ) |
| When casting an Indirect Combat spell, do you need to see the target? Or can you cast at a target completely behind cover since they use ranged combat rules? You do need the see the primary target of the spell. However, as noted in the errata, Indirect Combat spells will affect other targets that are unseen by the caster as long as they are caught within the spell's area of effect. Note that the same ruling for grenades applies to Indirect Combat spells cast "at the ground" -- if the attempt is to catch targets in the spell's effect radius, treat it as an Opposed Test, no matter where the spell is actually aimed. |
From the SR4 Errata v. 1.5 [actually added in version 4] ...
| QUOTE (SR4 Errata) |
| p. 196 Indirect Combat Spells [4] Add the following line: “Note that unlike other spells, Indirect Combat spells may affect other targets that the caster cannot see if they are caught within the spell’s area of effect.� |
The applicable entry from page 196 ...
| QUOTE (SR4 pg. 196) |
| Indirect Combat Spells: Indirect Combat spells are treated like ranged combat attacks; the caster makes a Magic + Spellcasting Success Test versus the target’s Reaction. If the spell hits, the target resist with Body + half Impact armor (+ Counterspelling, if available), with each hit reducing the Damage Value. If the modified spell DV does not exceed the modified Armor, Physical damage is converted to Stun. Note that nonliving objects resist damage from an Indirect Combat spell with their Armor rating x 2 (see Barriers, p. 157). |
Hope that helps.
Posted by: Spike Dec 20 2007, 06:08 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Yeah, the teammates actually do get cover from the mage. Especially in the cubicle systems you describe, it's fairly easy to scurry behind a wall and hide from your own mage while the surprised enemy gets stun balled. Or even more likely, they were behind the mage in the first place. My team tries their best to not have guards run into their position without them knowing, so the whole guards burst in moment rarely happens. More often than not, they get the drop on the guards. Hm, I guess I'll just have to push the limits on what I think they can handle and see if they surprise me. I hope they have a good way of fighting the enemy mage who drops the force 15 stunball first round of combat. |
I've highlighted the problem areas here:
First off: Making it less easy to drop those AoE spells without hitting teammates is well within the rules, the spirit of the rules, and massively effective in most Shadowrun evironments, as has been pointed out repeatedly in this thread. WHy you keep ignoring that I have no idea, but again: Standing behind the mage does NOT mean the team is out of LOS. That is a call YOU chose to make, and now you complain that stunballs that affect the entire officebuilding are too powerful? Dude: Start forcing that LOS thing... it WILL have an effect.
Second: I pointed this out before, if the team is comfortable in combat, you are not playing the enemy hard enough. Player's ALWAYS get the drop on the guards? Sure, maybe the first batch they hit. Then the High THreat Response Teams start HUNTING them. Maybe you should pull a reverse run, where the Runners are the targets, not the paid mercs, and the other guys get the drop on them. Whatever you do, stop giving the players the exact same situations to deal with time and again.
Thirdly: And here is, I suspect, the real problem, a failure of imagination. Force 12 Stunballs breaking your balls? Don't just pull out a BIGGER stunball. that's simple escalation, and it sucks. First: What's to stop your players from workign for that force 16! stunball eventually? Then you shoot for the force 17, and eventually people start cheating and getting stupider, the game breaks down. It is the simplest and least effective countermeasure known to man. Counter it creatively. Use the massive wall of drones, too many to hack. Use technology to counteract stun damage. Use wards. Think of the game like Judo, you don't use force to oppose force, you redirect the force where you want it to go.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 20 2007, 06:50 PM
| QUOTE (Spike) |
| Thirdly: And here is, I suspect, the real problem, a failure of imagination. Force 12 Stunballs breaking your balls? Don't just pull out a BIGGER stunball. that's simple escalation, and it sucks. First: What's to stop your players from workign for that force 16! stunball eventually? Then you shoot for the force 17, and eventually people start cheating and getting stupider, the game breaks down. It is the simplest and least effective countermeasure known to man. Counter it creatively. Use the massive wall of drones, too many to hack. Use technology to counteract stun damage. Use wards. Think of the game like Judo, you don't use force to oppose force, you redirect the force where you want it to go. |
...excellent comment and analogy.
Yeah I got wrapped up in that sort of thing in one campaign because of an abusive and disruptive player (where I finally dropped a Prime NPC on the team who had a Negotiation pool = nearly one 36 ct brick of dice, without using edge). While it defused the situation for the moment it didn't solve the underlying issue. However, with some players even doing the creative approach doesn't always work as they cry foul on you the GM for "setting them up". That is when you have to step OoC to deal with the matter.
Posted by: Magus Dec 20 2007, 08:06 PM
Hammer them down with 3-5 cyborgs. They are virtually unhackable, cannot be targeted by Mana spells, and have an OR of 4 +. Nasty nasty things.
Posted by: Apathy Dec 20 2007, 08:27 PM
In case anyone is interested, http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=12837&hl=line%20of%20sight&st=0 is where people hammered into me that AoE spells effect targets behind you even if you aren't looking that way. At the time I started out with the theory that your spell only worked on the guys you were looking at, but that opinion was universally shot down.
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 20 2007, 09:14 PM
Thanks fortune! 
Edit for clarity.
So you could hit a geezer round a corner in a corridor with an Indirect Sepll aimed at a location.
But you culdn't do the same with a Direct spell.
Makes sense if you look at thier names.
Now all SR has to do is sort out the IWIN/TEHSUX binary existance Direct spells have.
Posted by: Ravor Dec 21 2007, 04:36 AM
It's been mentioned already but largely ignored, why in the hell doesn't the lights shut off, installed flashpacks trip, thermo smoke rise from the vents, all trigger the moment security realizes that there is a something in the building that is knocking out sec-guards right and left? It is easy for a corp that controls the enviroment in a building to make it rather hostile to invaders, Mages included.
But then again, personally I refuse to cater to one-trick-ponies, the security consultant who designed the setup doesn't care if some Runner is going to be completely gimped because he or she didn't branch out so neither do I. (Also remember that even if you assume that the corps actually care about whether or not a guard is dead or alive they would be really fragging stupid not to use the big glowing Neon Fingerprint a ( Force 12 ) spell leaves behind to their own advantage.)
Always remember that a good Mage can kill you with her mind, but a GREAT Mage has the wisdom to use her trusty predator instead.
Posted by: toturi Dec 21 2007, 02:03 PM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| Always remember that a good Mage can kill you with her mind, but a GREAT Mage has the wisdom to use her trusty predator instead. |
Because a Great mage is smart enough to stun you with his mind and remove his astral signature. A Predator leaves a bullet. A stunned security guard means he's been sleeping on the job.
Posted by: knasser Dec 21 2007, 08:04 PM
First off, hello again Dumpshock. It's been a while and I've calmed down now. Came back to have a mooch through the forums and simply couldn't contain myself after reading through this thread. Yes – I've lapsed. :-/
There are a number of issues here as I see it. The basic problem as stated by the GM is that the mage player has found the same optimum strategy for himself in a wide range of situations, resulting in a repetitious game. There are a few assumptions in there as well as possible solutions.
The first is that a mage with Magic 6 is very powerful. Using the 3rd to 4th conversion guidelines, a mage with Magic 6 is equivalent to one with Magic 9 in the old system! A mage with Magic 6 should be able to take down a large number of mundane grunts on an equal playing field. That's not even mentioning the Spellcasting at rating 6 which is that of a master. I'm stating this only because some people consider Magic 6 to be normal and then decide that magic itself is over-powered. I don't think that this is the case in Ddays' game, but it's a valid observation that when you get to this level of power, it becomes much tougher to stop players stomping all over the opposition. If the power level were lower, then Stunball would not be the default option every time. In fact, it would be balanced quite well with its drain as most opposition would remain standing and Stun is less harmful than Physical. The player would certainly use a wider variety of tactics in that case. The problem is not Stunball alone, but Stunball taken to such a level of power that its weak areas become irrelevant.
Looking at the posted stats on this character, I see a well conditioned scarecrow (Bod 3, Str 1) who appears to have done little with their life other than practice throwing spells and has the reflexes of a fighter pilot. It's not all together surprising there are repetition problems with such an obviously min-maxed character. Even the selection of the tradition seems min-maxed toward combat spelling as it's one of only four (out of twenty) that has the initiative enhancing Intuition as a drain stat. I think the problems began here, not with the Stunball spell.
That said, I'm going to assume henceforth that re-calibrating the party power-level is a closed option as this is often resented by players and look at other ideas.
The second assumption that is made in the initial problem is that it is a bad thing for the mage to use Stunball all the time. It is, but note that a Samurai may always use the same gun but we don't try to force the Samurai to use a different gun every fight. Okay, I do try to bring variety here too, with confrontations at different ranges, in areas where larger or smaller guns can be smuggled, if you really want to know... but most people worry far less about the repetitiveness of the samurai. Why is this? That's another question but maybe just as the Samurai finds interest in doing things other than rolling to hit somebody, the mage can find interest in doing things other than rolling to stun things. It's not answering Ddays' question, but it is addressing it – spice the game up with more non-combat tasks. That should be even easier to do with a magician than it is with a mundane.
The third thing, and this is relevant, I think, is the issue of overcasting all the time. Casting a spell at Force 12 is not even possible for most magicians in the world. And that's a drain value of 7! Again for emphasis – 7! Physical! How is that a routine action for the PC? With ten dice to resist drain (which is good), the PC will average 3 or 4 boxes of physical damage each time he casts like this. And being an average, there are times when the mage suffers worse. Compared to the samurai who can happily throw grenades or spray bullets all day long, this is pretty significant.
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And really, a drain of 7 is like 3 damage with an edged resist roll. So my mage can get 2 or 3 of these off each session without significant risk. |
If you take 3 damage two or three times in a session, the character is on 6 to 9 boxes of damage. That in itself is a big risk.
The fact that the player regards this as not a problem suggests to me a few things. The first is that the player may be trusting you not to take the same shots at his character when he's badly wounded as he is when he's in perfect condition. It's good to show some leniency as a GM. It's bad if the player alters their character's behaviour to something unrealistic in expectation of it however.
The next thing that it suggests to me is that players have a too much certainty in the progression of the adventure. I.e. they think to themselves something like: “First combat, second combat, climactic combat, nuyen.� The player may feel comfortable in damaging himself again and again knowing that its all just ticks on paper and full healing time will be allowed at the end of the “adventure.�
I don't really have a typical game, but one thing that tends to be the case is that opposition and length of the scenario is variable according to the PCs actions and also factors they aren't aware of. They certainly don't find it comfortable to be severely injured at the end of a run (they don't even like little injuries). What if the drop-off is a double cross? What if their getaway goes wrong and they end up in a running shoot out with Lonestar? What if the GM springs the next adventure on them when they haven't had time to heal up (oh, yes – I do this)?
There's also a parallel with Edge usage as you mention an “edged drain roll.� I notice that the character sheet that you posted later on lists an Edge of 3 but you mention it is frequently spent on drain rolls for overcast Stunballs. I remember a long conversation we had on Dumpshock a while ago where someone kept insisting that Possession was overpowered. The GM's mage player was accustomed to “whipping up a Force 7� as needed and it turned out that the GM was refreshing the Edge pool multiple times a session. Consequently his game was turning into a manga. Edge is a way for GMs to adjust the Indiana Jones level of their game and it's quite important to tone. If the player feels comfortable burning lots of edge on routine attacks, it might be something to look at. Again, my players use their edge for special occasions and I like it like that.
Now I can already hear Ddays' fingers on the keyboard, I think, so I'll get on with practical examples and ideas of how to make Stunball the non-optimal strategy.
The first thing has been said by lots of people, but I have to say it again anyway. That is the degree of preparation the PCs seem to have before each combat, spacing themselves out, etc. I don't know how this is happening, but there have already been lots of good ideas posted on how to give the opposition some smarts and the definite first thing to try is some of these.
The next thing is confined spaces. It doesn't matter if you have the time to spread out and plan if you don't have the space. Most office buildings should provide the option to bring about this restriction. At the very least, site security should have the ability to co-ordinate an attack from multiple directions. But you can also go for more unusual environments. Have you ever:
- Had a gun-fight whilst clinging to the service ladder in a disused elevator shaft?
- Had to deal with a hybrid merge ant-spirit in the narrow confines of an underground nest, where you can barely move and the thing comes out of the ground three feet in front of your face and the rest of your team are backed up behind you in the tunnel?
- Had a subtle duel take place in the Aztechnology Pyramid shopping centre when two mortal enemies suddenly chance upon each other but neither dares to attract the attention of the arcology's security force?
- Had the traitor who is leading you through the compound suddenly double-cross you and turn on you right in your midst while her allies spring their attack?
- Had the possessed director of the company's wife lead the charge of the security services at the party?
These scenarios demand other tactics than an overcast Stunball. For example, the confined spaces in the ant hive made indirect spells more useful. You could hurt people you couldn't see, In the shopping centre show down, Control Thoughts and Magic Fingers become the order of the day.
As well as varying the deployment and terrain, you can interfere with the roles people play. Fine – the hacker deals with the drones. But that's so easy to nix its almost insulting to suggest ways. What if the hacker, jacked into the corp's security network, reports that a Steel Lynx is on its way around the corner. Calmly the character hacks into the Steel Lynx's node, only to find that an enemy hacker is residing in that node. Now the character is engaged in desparate cyber-combat to stop the enemy from raising the alarm and putting the entire system on alert, but that leaves the rest of the characters (including the mage) to deal with the oncoming drone(s).
Likewise, you can split the party. Yes – everyone who has ever DM'd a game of D&D has a conditioned dread of this, but in Shadowrun where the players can legitimately communicate and swap plans and maps, it's not an issue. So make a requirement for them to perform multiple things at once – the Samurai has to cut the power in the basement at the same time that the rigger flys the captive out of the compound, etc. Don't force the issue, but let the players work out that its the best way to pull off their mission. Now the mage has to deal with the drones, corp mage, Hell Hound, whatever, all by herself.
In short, if your players are comfortably managing their opposition then you have failed to induce sufficient panic. Jumble things up and apply more severe pressure. You can only use your hammer all the time if your friend with the screwdriver is available to help you out.
Finally, returning to the issue of predictability that I raised earlier, bear in mind that the approach your magician is using is one with limited ammunition. Three or four points of damage every spell? The mage is taking a minor gunshot wound each time. Draw battles and missions out. The reason you think the mage is overshadowing the mundanes, samurai, et al, is because one of the balances on the power of magic is the inability to keep it up or be consistent. In running games that encourage the player to calmly take a few “gunshot wound� level drains as a matter of course, you are removing this balance.
These are some ideas on how to solve your problem. You are looking for some universal fix and even suggesting that the magic system itself is broken. But in fact, there is no universal fix, only a constant attention to variety. You have a PC that is pretty optimised and it's no surprise that they have arrived at what they feel is an optimal tactic. Even though you see Stunball as the inevitable Go To tactic, there are other Go To tactics the player could have come up with and which we'd be having the same conversation about. Truthfully, with the power level of the character, there are any number of ways that he can hopelessly outclass a bunch of mundane security guards. It's just going to happen. Maybe its time for your group to progress to weirder and more interesting missions. Immerse them in the world of crime, or a campaign arc against a secretive ant hive. Throw in an elf in face paint if you want.
But accept that this character is far too optimised to be challenged by a straight shoot-out with mooks. It's not as if a samurai couldn't have the same effect with grenades and less drain.If all else fails, ask the player why their Buddhist character is marauding through secure compounds in the pursuit of money, blasting honest working security guards with potentially lethal psychic blasts.
I hope this helps,
-K.
Posted by: Buster Dec 21 2007, 08:37 PM
Yay knasser is back! Many welcomes!
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Dec 21 2007, 09:27 PM
...nice ending statement...
Posted by: Apathy Dec 21 2007, 10:01 PM
Welcome back, knasser! We've missed you!
Posted by: Ravor Dec 21 2007, 10:34 PM
Aye welcome back knasser, we may seldom agree but your posts are always thought provoking.
-----
toturi, call me crazy, but I'm sure that the differences between going from being awake and fairly alert to K/O in an instant and falling asleep naturally would be easily detected by a biomoniter not to mention security footage so no, I don't see that combo as being anymore stealthy then the mundane options either.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 22 2007, 12:25 AM
*hugs knasser* Glad to see you back, man. You've been missed. Happy .... whatever the hell holiday you celebrate that is closest to now. I don't know where you live so have no general demographics to guess at.
Chris
EDIT: Also, now that I've read it wanted to say I agree with your points. Many of the same ones I was trying to make except you phrased it better. Also, that was a very... verbose and amusing reintroduction to the boards.
Posted by: toturi Dec 22 2007, 12:45 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| toturi, call me crazy, but I'm sure that the differences between going from being awake and fairly alert to K/O in an instant and falling asleep naturally would be easily detected by a biomoniter not to mention security footage so no, I don't see that combo as being anymore stealthy then the mundane options either. |
No, but it is not anymore unstealthy. And it requires you putting biomonitors on your guards and the data transmission of which is vulnerable to hackers.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 01:02 AM
Hey Knasser, a lot of good points.
As for the 2 or 3 physical damage, yeah, it's a bit of damage, but considering that a shot from a single mook can be just as deadly, so that makes it easier to justify the cost somewhat.
And I dislike the insinuation that I simply let them slide by thinking they succeeded, I do hit them below the belt, its just that the mage is more scrambling to stay alive than doing the stupidly heroic.
I feel like I have to defend myself as a competent GM at this point, since a lot of why I feel magic is overpowered is instead being converted to why I lack creativity as a GM. Yes, I can indeed challenge my players.
Ex: My team is in a garage specializing in sprucing up rigger vehicles. Problem: deranged technomancer with a host of machine sprites. This fight, my mage ended on the defensive, levitating the party to prevent them getting run over, sammie was blowing up the vehicles with the big guns, the two hacking capable characters trying to end the technomancer's control.
This is what I consider a successful combat, all the characters are there contributing.
Ok, now for my point about stunball.
Suppose I introduce an enemy mage. This said mage is created using the extra bad template, so he spends some additional bp in initiating and upping his magic.
How the hell do I work in the fact that he can cast super stunballs against the PCs without introducing imbalance in combat? The moment I give him enough spellcasting die to have a good chance of overcoming my PC's counterspelling, boom, half the team is pretty much screwed. And no, not using the overcasted stunball is a horrible tactical decision, considering his said enemies are known for being able to fire 2 grenades in a single initiative pass. The 2 or 3 points of drain are no where close to the hurt any of the PCs can be putting on him if they stay conscious. The whole situation just gets even worse if he uses spirits as distractions before combat.
Now my pcs have to split up or get ganked by superfoe, which for most of you GMs seems like a good thing. What if I want a mage combat that doesn't put my team in such dire straits? I don't give him stunball. The other combat oriented spells may kill the PCs, but the drain might be more damage than the NPC would be willing to risk and if the spell does get counterspelled, he may be too hurt to retreat and escape against any drones set on overwatch mode or backup. Not to mention the armor saves against damage the PCs get to make against elemental damage spells. Wouldn't that make it seem that there are some balance issues there?
Something similar to the save for half damage seen in DnD would make for a great way to make the high force stunball less binary in nature.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 22 2007, 01:19 AM
| QUOTE (Ddays @ Dec 22 2007, 11:02 AM) |
| Something similar to the save for half damage seen in DnD would make for a great way to make the high force stunball less binary in nature. |
Then implement one and be done with it. Just know that it is a house rule, and one that many people feel is not warranted.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 22 2007, 01:46 AM
One thing I would like to point out is that - in my world anyway and especially non-hermetic mages, mages don't get to see a catalog with ok... F/2+4 so a major gunshot wound... huh well I mean stunball has less drain and I can just cast it again or kill then when they are unconscious so... it's a better spell to pick at this point.
In my world you aren't going to get the ins and outs of a spell until you really get involved with it unless you are really smart and have a high arcana skill. Keep in mind if they are buying formula online or in a store... selection for combat spells should be limited and they are going to make them sound like the SHIT no matter what spell it is because they WANT you to buy it. Also, since the bad guys can't line the stats up like we can, they shouldn't be able to be like "Hmm, I'll take less drain if I develop this stun spell.... blah blah blah" to develop their own spells unless they have just insane amounts of magical theory, arcana, logic etc. It seems obvious to US that every mage worth his salt should have stun ball, but just because we can look at it and say that doesn't mean THEY can have the same thought process without alot of appropriate background. Also, just make the dice pool big enough that that mage is using some of his vaunted edged rolls for something besides CASTING spells. My players tend to save edge for resist rolls anyway because magic and rockets/grenades are nasty.
As has been said before Shadowrun is often a game of big hammers and glass figurines. Dodging or soaking the long burst from the ares alpha that lucked out and got 4 or 5 net hits, or resisting that influence or control thoughts to activate two or four of your grenades, etc is often much more important than casting or soaking a spell that well. I rarely have players that can reserve their edge for overcasting spells hardcore and then using edge to soak the resultant drain, they usually have to keep the spell for a little lower or just take a larger portion of the relevant drain.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 01:52 AM
| QUOTE (Fortune) |
| Then implement one and be done with it. Just know that it is a house rule, and one that many people feel is not warranted. |
Well, the point was to gather opinions on the subject.
And I can see there are ways to mitigate the fact that magic is powerful. And considering that I play only one session of SR a week, I would prefer to have it well thought out before changing the play experience.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 22 2007, 02:01 AM
The gist of what I just said was more that while stunball makes more sense for a Buddhist than say.... fireball or one of the other more lethal spells, such is often not the case for the opposition. I cannot expect that most Toxics, Blood Mages, Chaos Mages, or basically most mages that aren't Christian, Zoroastrian, Qabbalistic, Buddhist, etc. would find that stunball is the best fit for them. Especially sec mages, because if it take a lot of time and money and life force to learn a spell then if they get a Direct Damage spell at all I would imagine it would be Powerball because that can at least get drones and such as well. Of course there are other arguments against it, but anyway, I am digressing again.
My point is that with the exception of some logic tradition mages that are cold bastards and can make a decision involving changing/parting with/binding part of their life experience/soul/whatever the hell karma is on a cold blooded consideration of his knowledge of potential spell effectiveness, the difficulty of disrupting body patterns, and the burnout such effort would leave on his body.... well most mages would choose what fits their personality, and that is often not stunball.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 02:11 AM
| QUOTE (DTFarstar) |
| The gist of what I just said was more that while stunball makes more sense for a Buddhist than say.... fireball or one of the other more lethal spells, such is often not the case for the opposition. I cannot expect that most Toxics, Blood Mages, Chaos Mages, or basically most mages that aren't Christian, Zoroastrian, Qabbalistic, Buddhist, etc. would find that stunball is the best fit for them. Especially sec mages, because if it take a lot of time and money and life force to learn a spell then if they get a Direct Damage spell at all I would imagine it would be Powerball because that can at least get drones and such as well. Of course there are other arguments against it, but anyway, I am digressing again. My point is that with the exception of some logic tradition mages that are cold bastards and can make a decision involving changing/parting with/binding part of their life experience/soul/whatever the hell karma is on a cold blooded consideration of his knowledge of potential spell effectiveness, the difficulty of disrupting body patterns, and the burnout such effort would leave on his body.... well most mages would choose what fits their personality, and that is often not stunball. Chris |
I respect that notion, I'm just pointing out how an encounter changes when a mage has stunball versus an elemental spell. The same tactics apply, but the mage with the elemental spell has a much harder time since he can't lay down a near lethal smackdown first turn if he gets the drop on the characters.
And before there's side points about smoke grenades, spirits on overwatch, drones, and other tactics that the PCs can use to defend against the mage, or the fact that anything getting the drop on the PCs can cause them a world of hurt, I'll remind the community that the defense discussion is not the point of the topic.
I think the binary nature of spells unfairly weighs stunball in terms of power, and it would be almost stupid for a PC not to take the spell. A lot of you disagree by stating that there are good ways to counter any strategy, and while that is true, it doesn't really address the issue at hand.
Posted by: Ryu Dec 22 2007, 02:18 AM
There was a suggestion of increasing drain to the level of elemental spells. The different mechanic should be "worth" as much drain as the elemental effect.
A somewhat harsher solution: make the whole group of spells work on the astral only. There are elemental effects to cause stun, it´s closer to armed combat and therefore inherently more balanced. You might want to lower the drain a bit.
As to how a team can stop the bad super mage... depends. Having a mage with counterspelling and Shielding and Shielding focus stops offensive magic. And if your player knows what he is doing and continues on his path (YAY Knasser! Nice analysis of tthe mage), you will be looking at several grades of initiation and an unchanged magic attribute soon - he will be able to protect his team, making him even more vital.
Posted by: Clyde Dec 22 2007, 02:46 AM
It seems to me that the issue with effectiveness is that combat spells deal base damage equal to their Force.
Other spells, like Confusion, have an effect that is strictly proportional to the net hits scored. Stunball with 1 net hit is more effective than Confusion with 2. And it has lower drain.
A better fix might be reducing the base damage for combat spells to 1/2 Force + Net Hits or even limiting them to only net hits.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 04:37 AM
| QUOTE (Clyde) |
| It seems to me that the issue with effectiveness is that combat spells deal base damage equal to their Force. Other spells, like Confusion, have an effect that is strictly proportional to the net hits scored. Stunball with 1 net hit is more effective than Confusion with 2. And it has lower drain. A better fix might be reducing the base damage for combat spells to 1/2 Force + Net Hits or even limiting them to only net hits. |
This actually raises another point, just how obvious is it that you are under the effect of certain spells?
Stunball is called a "sleep spell" and if my guard dozes off, how do I know if its because he got stunballed or just slacking off on the job?
Posted by: Clyde Dec 22 2007, 06:02 AM
Stunball is a combat spell. I'd figure it rather thoroughly knocks around anyone hit by it. A troll hitting you with his fist does damage comparable to some stunballs - that's hardly gentle. The only way to wake someone who has been stunballed to unconsciousness is by healing the damage or other medical means. So I figure it is fairly violent. Targets who take too much damage suffer knock down and biomonitors would probably show a wicked spike.
A true sleep spell might be a mental manipulation that causes the target to fall asleep, but they can then be awakened normally. A health spell that induces suspended animation might do the trick as well.
Posted by: knasser Dec 22 2007, 09:08 AM
| QUOTE |
I feel like I have to defend myself as a competent GM at this point, since a lot of why I feel magic is overpowered is instead being converted to why I lack creativity as a GM. Yes, I can indeed challenge my players. Ex: My team is in a garage specializing in sprucing up rigger vehicles. Problem: deranged technomancer with a host of machine sprites. This fight, my mage ended on the defensive, levitating the party to prevent them getting run over, sammie was blowing up the vehicles with the big guns, the two hacking capable characters trying to end the technomancer's control. |
Sounds great. Apologies if I implied that your competency as a GM was challenged, but when you have a character that is as powerful as this mage and as specialised, maybe the only real solution actually is a lot of imagination which is why we keep coming back to it. You're going to have to continue doing things like the technomancer attack so long as that character exists. Hey, at least it gives your GM muscles a good work out.
But I don't feel that you're entirely on the same side as those of us trying to help you. A lot of our suggestions are shot down rather than - "yep, I can use that." If that's really the case, then that's really the case, but reading through this thread I saw a lot of good ideas from people (some of which I'll pinch when my game starts up again : ).
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
As for the 2 or 3 physical damage, yeah, it's a bit of damage, but considering that a shot from a single mook can be just as deadly, so that makes it easier to justify the cost somewhat. |
It might be worth playing up the actual description of this. As you just said, it's equivalent to a minor gunshot wound and it takes some guts to inflict that on yourself. Seriously - take a long needle and push it through the centre of your palm. Pleasant experience? It's less than three or four boxes of physical, I'd say.
I don't know if this will stick with this particular player as it seems he is very focused on the numbers, but I usually like to play up the actual descriptions of overcasting in my game. The players pick up on what they're actually doing to their characters and it's good for atmosphere.| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And I dislike the insinuation that I simply let them slide by thinking they succeeded, I do hit them below the belt, its just that the mage is more scrambling to stay alive than doing the stupidly heroic. |
Well this is quite different to the impression I had. In this case, it seems like the mage character is being driven to using what he sees as the super spell, just like if you e.g. push a samurai with mook swarms, you always end up with the grenade. Maybe lightening up will free the mage to use more variety. Perhaps you could encourage the mage character to learn more spells by giving him a friendly mentor who'll teach for reduced costs. Is the mage player having fun playing as he is, or is he also bored with Stunball and would like to try something else?
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| How the hell do I work in the fact that he can cast super stunballs against the PCs without introducing imbalance in combat? The moment I give him enough spellcasting die to have a good chance of overcoming my PC's counterspelling, boom, half the team is pretty much screwed. |
Bad assumption. That's the George Bush approach - when presented with a screw instead of a nail, you're resorting to a larger hammer. Yes, you can pile on the initiation until the Stunball can get past the counterspelling. But counterspelling is extremely effective and is meant to be. Magicians tend to cancel each other out very well. The way past counterspelling without resorting to ridiculous force, is to use Indirect Combat Magic (or more innovative tactics such as spirits and telekinesis). That's one of the things that it's there for. Have the Sultan of Stun resort to a few Lightening Balls instead. (I like elemental Blast effects because it knocks PCs flat on their backs and lets mooks charge them while they're getting up.) But the best thing for you is that it's less of a no-harm / PC's captured effect. A few Guardian spirits scattered through the run and the PC mage may learn to use Indirect Magic as well.
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| Something similar to the save for half damage seen in DnD would make for a great way to make the high force stunball less binary in nature. |
Too complicated, too hard to predict the effect on balance. If you're going into house rule territory then the simplest approach is to ban direct combat spells. Drop the drain value by a point (or two) for all the remaining indirect spells, for balance. You're left with a magic system that works a lot like mundane combat and damages along a smoother gradient than does the direct combat system.
I wouldn't do that myself, however. When you talk about variety in spells, that's one thing. But you're saying that magic is unbalanced now, and that's something else. I very much feel that it isn't. A samurai can throw multiple grenades every combat turn without worrying about drain at all. And they're very cheap, too. Try some of the suggestions in this thread - look at edge usage, why the mage feels able or compelled to shoot himself multiple times per session, the environments and opposition the PCs come across. I think your problem will go away.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 09:19 AM
Oh, if I came off as ignoring ideas, I am not. While some of the stuff mentioned here I've used, a lot of is fresh and I'm certainly going to incorporate into future runs, and thanks to everybody who contributed. In fact, I'm specifically not mentioning which ones in case my players are monitoring the topic.
On gunshot wounds, my mage would rather take a nonlethal bullet and save himself from a painful death everytime. And he does roleplay this aspect (bloody nose being the most commonly used and cliche, minor organ trauma, bleeding from his fingernails, etc.).
And you have to remember, I'm not piling on initiation specifically to beat the mage, I'm just making a slightly stronger than pc level mage to compensate for the fact that he's fighting them all off at once. That and extended masking is in my opinion the best bonus to initiation, and a key to keeping your powerful mage from being tracked down by astral signatures.
And in my experience with magical combat, the better mage wins. Magic + Spellcasting is generally higher than Will + Counterspelling and even a single hit means death. I would love if somehow will + counterspelling somehow scaled down damage instead, but I'm afraid of house ruling for good reason. A bad houserule can turn an entire session into a wash.
Indirect spells feel weaker, but the way the damage scales according to armor and toughness is also a lot more fair for the pcs. They can potentially end up badly burnt no matter how high the force is instead of outright dead, whereas they either die or are unscratched from direct spells. It just seems that to me that direct spells are always worth the gamble of unscratched since the drain is so ridiculously low for the power in their hands.
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 22 2007, 09:51 AM
You could always try giving Direct Spells a Damage Resistance Test.
Just without Armour.
Posted by: Ryu Dec 22 2007, 11:45 AM
Hmm. Each guardian spirit has counterspelling, its own edge attribute and immunity to normal weapons. And severe combat power. Fight by proxy, no real need to initiate.
What kind of drain fix do you prefer?
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 22 2007, 04:06 PM
Keep in mind the LOS stuff we have mentioned. I will agree that with the exception of drones I can never see using lightning bolt over stun/mana/powerbolt, but the elemental damage spells- especially ball lightning- come in really handy sometimes when you can't see them, when you need to disable a vehicle, when you want to nail everyone in a group with at least a -2 DP penalty and potentially knock them unconscious.
Direct Damage spells are great, but if you don't feel you have a more than 50/50 chance of it working - as I often don't in my GMs games- then it is hard to justify when you know that Ball Lightning will do something to everyone in it's radius. I wouldn't be adverse to toning down elemental drain by 1 or 2 to reduce the disparity, but if you lay anymore penalties on DD spells then unless your mage often gets to fight people with no counterspelling and no cover you will see stunball go from his MO to a spell that never sees the light of day. Stunball, and the DD damage spells, are all very much all or nothing, besides damage being that way in their particular situation they are ALWAYS better than the opposition, but it is a very limited situation that generally- in my games at least- doesn't come up that often.
Chris
Posted by: toturi Dec 22 2007, 04:09 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| And in my experience with magical combat, the better mage wins. Magic + Spellcasting is generally higher than Will + Counterspelling and even a single hit means death. I would love if somehow will + counterspelling somehow scaled down damage instead, but I'm afraid of house ruling for good reason. A bad houserule can turn an entire session into a wash. |
Not true. Generally at chargen, every modifier and hard/soft cap of magic + spellcasting are the same or worse than that of counterspelling + willpower. There is even a entire category of modifiers that adversely affects spellcasting that counterspelling bypasses - visibility. Sure, you can target with astral but even in the astral there will be some astral visibility mods. Magic is softcapped at 5, so is Willpower but dwarves have generally higher Willpower and you can raise the cap with Exceptional Attribute. Once you initiate, you'd expect Magic>Willpower, but the parity is maintained by the introduction of Shielding.
A baseline plant spirit can counterspell with Magical Guard and prevent glitches(from Counterspelling) from happening using Guard and Conceal your target. You might want to enforce Perception tests to determine if a target can be targeted.
Posted by: Ravor Dec 22 2007, 05:00 PM
Biomoniters are fairly cheap, especially if you charge your employees for mandatory equipment and are a great way to keep someone from sleeping on the job. And although the data transmission is vulnerable to being hacked, every node that a corp is able to force a Decker to deal with is another chance for the Decker to screw up and be detected.
Also remember that it takes time to clean up the astral fingerprint you left behind from the necessarily high Force spell you just lobbed in order to ensure a one-shot, and I imagine that on most runs time is fairly short since the longer you stay in the building the more likely you are to be detected.
----
Ddays I know that you've stated that the Runners almost always get the jump on the sec-guards and so are able to place the Stunball where it one-shots them all after the Runners take cover (Did I miss where you responded to the idea that with ( Force 12 ) spells the Mage is going to be including himself in the AoE and even with Counterspelling active it only takes one unlucky roll to one-shot himself as well?).
I guess I wonder how that can be, even if you the sec-guards aren't using biomoniters and the team Decker is able to covertly supress the security cameras as well as the various sensors that are designed to detect intruders, the guards are going to drop out of contact and that if nothing else should put the building on alert when they miss checking in.
Still, personally I think that if I were you I wouldn't create a magical threat with the goal of being more powerful then the PC, as it has been pointed out the PC Mage is already one of the best mortal spell-slingers in the Sixth World, he should be really fragging good at what he does, although it looks to me that magic is the only thing the character can do. Instead as has been suggested already remind the Player that ( Force 12 ) spells are seen as Magical Tac-Nukes and any Mage that is capable of throwing them around is a prime canidate for an unwilling extraction and some corp "re-education" in a world where your average Mage only has ( Magic 3 ).
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 10:50 PM
The reason I say that magic + spellcasting > will + counter is that generally, pc mages have 5 magic and 4 or 5 spellcasting while most mooks have 2 or 3 willpower + 3 or 4 counterspelling. Versus other runners, that quantity might change.
On visibility mods, if you survive the first round or are ambushing, popping smoke or turning off the lights could really wreck a mage, but if a hacker can force the lights off, he can just as easily force the lights on. And I think the fact that both mods kinda weaken a mage's ability to do combat doesn't force a mage to use a lightningball over a stunball. And lightningball is already awesome because of what electricity does (force unconsiousness and short out drones).
I'm currently liking both lowering the drain on elemental spells a tad to encourage their use and adding a damage resist roll to direct spells based on body. Anybody have any experience with those two house rules?
Posted by: toturi Dec 22 2007, 11:04 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| The reason I say that magic + spellcasting > will + counter is that generally, pc mages have 5 magic and 4 or 5 spellcasting while most mooks have 2 or 3 willpower + 3 or 4 counterspelling. Versus other runners, that quantity might change. |
As you say, mooks. Mooks are just that, cannon fodder - does it matter if the sammy drops them or the magician drops them? It does break the sense of disbelief sometimes, but given that there are no magicians at the higher end of the mook spectrum(as compared to the uberiority and pwnage of the Red Samurai and Tir Ghosts), you'd be fully justified to create a magician NPC, even if he is inferior(though unlikely).
Posted by: Fortune Dec 22 2007, 11:18 PM
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| The reason I say that magic + spellcasting > will + counter is that generally, pc mages have 5 magic and 4 or 5 spellcasting while most mooks have 2 or 3 willpower + 3 or 4 counterspelling. Versus other runners, that quantity might change. |
The same thing can be said about Agility/Firearms, or Agility/Appropriate melee skill, or Charisma/Appropriate social skill, or ...
They're called Mooks for a reason. For any key, main, major, prime, or whatever else you may want to call them NPCs though, it isn't necessarily the case that the PCs are so much better, Pool-wise.
Posted by: Ddays Dec 22 2007, 11:34 PM
Ok, even prime runners, if they're not a mage, are going to have very high spell defense die.
And it's a lot more likely for mages to buff magic + initiation than willpower. While willpower gets capped at 6, magic can go on FOREVER (at least in theory).
So there. I see what you're saying though.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 23 2007, 03:02 AM
I haven't lowered the drain on indirect spells, but me and my friends played with the resistance roll with no armor on Direct damage spells for awhile, but it REALLY killed DD spells for us. Then again I would either disallow a character such as the once shown earlier or he would probably die pretty quick, but I run a lethal shadowrun. Most of the time mages are beating their counterparts by 1 to 2 dice. So adding a resistance roll makes the lower force stunball etc. even LESS usefull I mean, if you are only getting one or two net hits on the test then why ever cast low or you risk it fizzling OR being resisted all the way down.
That being said, the way me and my groups have chosen to interpret indirect spells are the same way we treat grenades and rockets that if you are in the blast radius then each reaction success reduces the DV by 1 meters worth and then you have to soak that much with your normal test. So, DD spells are against people you feel pretty sure you will beat on tests and indirect spells are for those hard ass battles where you need every one and two damage you can get.
Chris
Posted by: Ddays Dec 23 2007, 05:16 PM
Bah, you're right. Adding armor resist would just make the low force stuff even worse to cast most of the time.
I guess I'll just weigh drain differently to favor elemental spells more. Thanks for the insight DTFarstar.
Posted by: DTFarstar Dec 23 2007, 07:01 PM
You can always try the tactic we use at the bottom of my last post, makes grenades, rockets, and indirect spells more deadly and worth it.
Chris
Posted by: Ravor Dec 24 2007, 07:36 AM
Sure the team's Decker could force the lights back on, provided that he is able to tackle the system on full alert.
However I still have a hard time envisioning why the sec-guards don't simply take cover, you can not Stunball someone you don't have LOS to while a Fireball will roast him just fine. (And yes, I remember you said your Runners almost always have the element of suprise, well I have a hard time envisioning how that works as well given the level of security that is possible relatively cheaply in the Sixth World.)
Posted by: Siege Dec 24 2007, 08:16 AM
Depends on the level of training and experience.
Your average 7 nuyen an hour "dude, I watched a video and like...wow...I'm a sec guard!" minion isn't going to act like a well-trained professional because he isn't.
As you move up the corporate rating ladder, the better trained and responsive the personnel are to threats.
All of this, of course, assumes the guards are aware enough to actually take cover before hell comes knocking.
-Siege
Edit: For typos.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 24 2007, 08:25 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor @ Dec 24 2007, 05:36 PM) |
| ... I have a hard time envisioning how that works as well given the level of security that is possible relatively cheaply in the Sixth World ... |
The PCs catch them all gathered together for a soycaf and donut break ... every time.
Posted by: kzt Dec 24 2007, 08:30 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| well I have a hard time envisioning how that works as well given the level of security that is possible relatively cheaply in the Sixth World. |
Yeah, it's really hard to secretly open a warded security door that is covered by cameras, radar and ultrasound, sounds a klaxon when it's not closed and has a guard inside who can see it through an armored one-way window.
I always like the way common semi-clever PC tricks were handled in ForcedRecon. 3rd edition mission SM01-03a. I mean, it's not like these guys are total idiots, everyone knows the "surprise inspection" trick and what to do when someone tries it.
Posted by: knasser Dec 24 2007, 11:00 AM
And it doesn't take a large degree of professionalism to get behind cover when you hear a gunshot or know you've got intruders. The world (and especially the US it seems) is full of people who want to think they're SAS types. I would imagine a lot of security guards being gun nuts and running Merc Warrior SIMS often enough. Given the lowish cost of the hardware and the high testosterone levels in the business, it would be more realistic for all of the guards to be toting Predators they bought themselves after Ares latest Penis Substitue ad campaign.
At the very least, I expect most of them grew up playing First Person Shooter games of various kinds.
But at the opposite end, this has reminded me of a game I ran a long time ago (D&D in this case) in which the guards took one look at the heavily armed party coming their way and ran for their lives. It drove the players nuts as they had to chase their opposition all around the dungeon . They kept bursting into rooms where surprised orcs would look at them in horror, turn tail and vanish (ah, encumberance rules!). Of course, by the end of the game, the enemy were re-grouping and ambushing the party. It makes me want to try something similar in Shadowrun just for the look on the players faces. Given their need for stealth, it could be pretty troublesome as well.
Posted by: Mercer Dec 24 2007, 11:48 AM
| QUOTE (kzt) |
| Yeah, it's really hard to secretly open a warded security door that is covered by cameras, radar and ultrasound, sounds a klaxon when it's not closed and has a guard inside who can see it through an armored one-way window. |
Or better yet, you build that same door without a klaxon. When an unauthorized person opens it, the only thing that happens is a red light goes on in some room somewhere. Minutes click by while the runners do their thing, and High Threat Response is in route. Lowly security guards don't go through the door, they don't engage, they simply barricade. Doors are sealed and guards are positioned behind cover and on held action.
Now, the hacker can spoof the door, get into the security system and start turning it against corpsec but that's what the pc's are supposed to be do. SR is one of those games that can be very easy played one way, and all but impossible played another. If the runners are using good strategy and tactics, if they're good at what they do, then most of the time they will be getting the drop on the opposition. But if they're that good, they'll be taking higher paying jobs against better opposition, so it should equal out. (If the runners can walk right over regular sec guards and are only challenged by the HTR teams, they should probably be raiding the places guared by the HTR-level guards.)
This doesn't really address the OP's concern that the Stun family of Direct Damage Spells are more economically advantageous than the Physical family of Direct Damage Spells. Its a difference of 1 DV, so it seems a little hard to argue that one is fine and the other is game-breaking, but if the group feels that the Stun group makes the Physical group worthless, I'd say get rid of the Stun spells, make the spells simply Manabolt, Manaball and Death Touch, and let the caster decide whether the spell will do Stun or Physical when he casts it with no change in DV. (Although if the problem is the mage is dropping all the opposition in one casting of Stunball, it seems like he'll be doing the same thing with Manaball at one higher DV.)
Posted by: knasser Dec 24 2007, 12:08 PM
And applying the same thought process on the direct vs. indirect axis, keep in mind that the drain difference between Ball Lightening and Powerball is only +2. Significant, but in proportion. I compare Ball Lightening to Powerball rather than Stunball because Powerball is a Physical spell and therefore closer in purpose. It's one of the aspects of Shadowrun that mages usually find it easier to affect living beings than technology. Attempting to "balance" things smears out these little advantages and disadvantages until everyone is the same. I liken Shadowrun to Rock, Paper, Scissors in that everything is stronger than everything else. So I'm against altering the magic system and the drain values.
A character will be good at some things and bad at others. When a mage fights drones, she should have a harder time. If this mage is outshining other players in combat then it is because the character posted is very min-maxed to do this. The best response is to include a wider range of situations.
Posted by: Siege Dec 24 2007, 02:09 PM
| QUOTE (knasser) |
| And it doesn't take a large degree of professionalism to get behind cover when you hear a gunshot or know you've got intruders. The world (and especially the US it seems) is full of people who want to think they're SAS types. I would imagine a lot of security guards being gun nuts and running Merc Warrior SIMS often enough. Given the lowish cost of the hardware and the high testosterone levels in the business, it would be more realistic for all of the guards to be toting Predators they bought themselves after Ares latest Penis Substitue ad campaign. At the very least, I expect most of them grew up playing First Person Shooter games of various kinds. |
Actually, most people tend to look around when they hear gunshots. Then they panic and flee, not dive for cover. That's instinctive. Freezing is also a natural reaction.
As for privately purchased firearms or cyberware, possibly. But then again, how regulated are individually contracted security guards? Right now, in the US, security guards usually have a fair degree of regulation - you must have so many hours of firearm safety, your weapon must fit within these specific parameters of caliber and a specific type of action. You must pass a background check and be licensed by the State in which you operate. There is also a distinction between my "individual right to bear arms" and "carrying a weapon for professional reasons."
This isn't to say you don't have the "I always wanted to be a cop but couldn't hack it" groupies or the "John J. Rambo" fanboys lurking in the wings, but they can't, fortunately, act on their fantasies beyond strutting around with delusions of self-importance.
An additional consideration is company liability - your privately contracted security guard goes nuts with his weapon and kills three people. The companies directly or indirectly involved are looking at lawsuits from the surviving families, lawsuits from innocent bystanders and the cost to their PR.
Before I enlisted, I worked for a private security company part-time. My job involved giving directions, filling out an incident log and walking around at night with a flashlight. If I'd been stopped by a cop while I was in possession of a personal firearm, I and the company that hired me would have been in all sorts of deep crap.
Back to the SR world - what visual or auditory cues accompany a Stun Ball? Besides guards passing out and hitting the floor, I mean.
-Siege
Posted by: knasser Dec 24 2007, 02:48 PM
Very good points, and useful ones. I like good justifications I can use to support the printed material and legal and bureaucratic issues covers people buying their own weaponry (though I'll have it happen from time to time).
As regards the sound of gunshots, I remember watching the movie Heat with a friend from Brazil. She burst out laughing at a scene where the bank raid has gone wrong and the robbers are having a running shoot out in the street.
I asked her what was funny and she replied (apologies here - I'm quoting): "Americans! In Brazil, if you hear a shot, everyone is on the ground. They're (americans) all stupid!"
So you may have a point, but I think the typical armed security guard should be a bit better. And the UCAS of 2070 seems a lot closer to modern day Brazil than the US of today, yes?
As regards the obviousness of the Stunball spell, I would say that there probably aren't any auditory or visual cues short of the dull thwump of collapsing bodies, but the rules state that the Perception test threshold for noticing magic is the spell's Force - 6. The accompanying flavour text suggests that you have to see the magician to perceive the spell being cast, but it's a little vague. Dday's PC's Tac-Stun isn't going to be hidden from anyone in visual range, though.
-K.
Posted by: toturi Dec 24 2007, 03:26 PM
| QUOTE (Mercer) |
| But if they're that good, they'll be taking higher paying jobs against better opposition, so it should equal out. (If the runners can walk right over regular sec guards and are only challenged by the HTR teams, they should probably be raiding the places guared by the HTR-level guards.) |
Why would they be taking higher paying jobs against better opposition unless they cannot get by on the lower paying jobs? Even if they do take the better opposition jobs, there can be only so many HTR teams around, I mean, there are only so many Red Samurai/Jaguar Guards/Firewatch teams. How many top flight shadowrun teams are there in the world? One of the strange things that I have not been able to fathom is the frequency at which better opposition keep popping up in some other games when the GM has informed you that you were facing the best of the best the previous time and you killed them all.
The runners do not need to take the higher paying jobs. If they are comfortable in their Medium lifestyle, when should they take the riskier jobs when they don't need to? Assuming that the players managed to keep you from burning their Medium lifestyles(or whatever lifestyle they are comfortable at) by doing the job cleanly, not biting off more than they can chew, etc, and they do not want to take the more difficult jobs and willing to that the slight hit to their rep, why should the GM scale the encounter to match the PCs?
Posted by: knasser Dec 24 2007, 04:26 PM
Toturi - if you take that approach, then the honest truth is that most Shadowrunners could easily get regular employment that paid better than their illegal Shadowrunning lifestyle. Even those that are wanted criminals, murdered a corp employee or fled their last employers could be picked up by a rival corp. You think Renraku cares if you used to work for NeoNET and got into a fight with your manager and killed him? Of course not. They only care if you're likely to do it again. Someone who is a mage, or has the skills of a Samurai or a Hacker or an Adept is rare and valuable. If it's too hot in Seattle, ship them off to one of your subsiduaries in Hong Kong or South Africa or Dubai.
The key to making a game interesting is to create characters that do have a burning drive to achieve more.
But don't forget that there's the other side to the coin. Sometimes the jobs come looking for you and they don't wont take no for an answer. If you're that good, then maybe Lofwyr thinks you're just right for that special job. Don't want any more carrots? Fine - we have some big sticks with your party's name on them.
Posted by: Apathy Dec 24 2007, 04:31 PM
Just my 2 nuyen, and your mileage may vary:
No single tactic will ever reign supreme for long before somebody out there finds counters to it. Just like entrenched defenses spawned the tank, which was countered by the mine (and eventually the ATGM), which now has reactive armor, etc. If stunball from a competant mage owns everyone, then very quickly R&D departments will come up with an optimal strategy to counter, and every govt agency and corp will eventually figure it out.
It seems like we've described 4 problems:
Problem 1: Optimized mages just generally kick ass.
Magic in general has pissed off corps around the world by allowing street punks a way to overcome their elite security, and they've been refining magical defenses for nearly 70 years in SR4.
- Background count (BC) is the corp's best defense. Most corps (and maybe even the city in general, depending on the GM) will automatically have a minor BC (1). This can be enhanced by a number of active counter-measures.
- There's an awakened plant listed in Street Magic that you can stick throughout the building that generates it's own background count of between 1 and 4 (depending on the size of the planter). This should be reasonably easy to maintain and cost effective.
- Facilities where really strong emotions happen (torture, murder, religious epiphanies, etc.) could have higher natural BC. Some particularly nasty corps (Aztechnology?) might bring prisoners by for torture periodically just for the purposes of upping the BC. To be extra nasty, any background count can then by aspected to the company's mages, thereby giving them a boost while your team gets the shaft.
- Now you don't have to have a mage for every facility in order for guards to get counterspelling. Guardian spirits have magical guard!
- Drones are really hard to effect via magic. And if run by a compentent security rigger, they can be hard to subvert by the team's hacker as well.
- Visibility mods and distraction mods mentioned earlier in the thread. And while these measures might be turned off by the hacker, the system may be set up to not respond to wireless (i.e. only hardline) when the security alerts are tripped.
- Wards are cheap and ubiquitous, and require mages to power down all their foci and sustained spells and re-cast on the other side of the ward (possibly incurring drain), lose a service from their spirits in order to do a metaplanar bypass, etc - or immediately set off alarms.
- Watchers are also cheap and ubiquitous, and can follow simple instructions like "alert me if you see any awakened people inside this ward". Zapping the watcher would also alert the summoner, so unless the mage has masking on himself and all his foci the alarm gets tripped.
- Arsenal is rumored to contain many other counter-magic defenses which may also help.
It's true, in a limited set of situations. But it has some counters:
- Against drones, cars, and other inanimate objects it's worthless.
- Pain Editors are relatively cheap, and completely negate the short term effects of Stun.
Also true, but also are limited to a specific set of circumstances.
- Can't damage what it can't see.
- Doesn't have elemental effects and secondary effects.
- Must overcome object resistance (4 hits for drones) to do any damage whatsoever. ID spells are less likely to do overwhelming damage in one hit, but more likely to do at least a little damage.
[edited] This might be your interpretation, but is not mine. Joe Blow security guard will always get blown away, but I believe that if Threat Response teams come they will use cover well, take advantage of the security rigger's intel, have superior knowledge of the building layout (i.e. know how to get in the back door through maintenance tunnels, etc.), and probably have better armor, weapons, have magical protection/spell defense/etc. YMMV.
Posted by: toturi Dec 24 2007, 04:48 PM
| QUOTE (knasser) |
| But don't forget that there's the other side to the coin. Sometimes the jobs come looking for you and they don't wont take no for an answer. If you're that good, then maybe Lofwyr thinks you're just right for that special job. Don't want any more carrots? Fine - we have some big sticks with your party's name on them. |
The key is that you'd never develop the rep for being that good in the first place. You get a rep for being good at what you do but you are not or have not demonstrated the ability to make it to the big leagues. Unless you are saying that the PCs cannot be good enough to handle the sticks that come looking and keep a profile low enough that the sticks that they can't handle won't come looking.
It is rare to have a very good skill, true. But how does someone know you are that good? Reputation. And rep can be manipulated if you know how and given the rep mechanics of SR4, you can certainly manipulate it such that your rep is low enough to avoid scrutiny. The whole point is that if the PCs manage their rep well/keep a low profile/etc, why should anything big (sticks or carrots) come their way, especially if they do not particularly want those sticks or carrots?
Lowfyr thinks you are just right - sure, the GM is forcing us to do it, we can't really do anything but go along, because anything else will be just risking a Orbital Cow Strike or something similar.
Posted by: Mercer Dec 24 2007, 07:43 PM
| QUOTE (toturi) |
| It is rare to have a very good skill, true. But how does someone know you are that good? Reputation. And rep can be manipulated if you know how and given the rep mechanics of SR4, you can certainly manipulate it such that your rep is low enough to avoid scrutiny. The whole point is that if the PCs manage their rep well/keep a low profile/etc, why should anything big (sticks or carrots) come their way, especially if they do not particularly want those sticks or carrots? |
If you're earning Karma, you're Rep should be going up. There's a weird little thing where you can buy down your Public Awareness by buying off Notoriety with Rep, but if you think about it, that means that in order to keep a low profile every few months you have to do something unprofessional and crazy. ("Whoops, my name is getting a little too well known in this city, better go throw the mayor under a bus on live tv, and rack up 2 or 3 Notoriety points and be a nobody again.")
Characters seeking out challenges appropriate to their skill level is based on two things. One, pc's tend to like to make as much money and karma as possible and two, the game is only fun if its challenging. (Those are my assumptions going into it, anyway.) So one rationale is in-game, one is meta-game, and of the two the second is really more important. If the players are bored, it doesn't really matter how the characters are doing.
To put another way, a Major League baseball player could quit the majors and become the most awesome softball player in his church league, but relatively few seem to take that option. In SR, a certain number of runners are going to not take risks and get by by doing low-paying easy jobs, but these aren't the runners the games will focus on. The games (hopefully) will focus on the people doing interesting things.
Posted by: Siege Dec 24 2007, 11:21 PM
| QUOTE (knasser) |
| As regards the sound of gunshots, I remember watching the movie Heat with a friend from Brazil. She burst out laughing at a scene where the bank raid has gone wrong and the robbers are having a running shoot out in the street. I asked her what was funny and she replied (apologies here - I'm quoting): "Americans! In Brazil, if you hear a shot, everyone is on the ground. They're (americans) all stupid!" So you may have a point, but I think the typical armed security guard should be a bit better. And the UCAS of 2070 seems a lot closer to modern day Brazil than the US of today, yes? -K. |
Two points -
1. Depending on how used you are to gunfire, maybe. Grow up in a rough neighborhood and hitting the deck is as natural as brushing your teeth in the morning. A buddy of mine could identify three or four different weapons by sound alone. Mind you, he was in high school at the time. Chris Rock makes the joke, "I grew up in a rough neighborhood. I didn't start walking until I was 15."
Conversely, it's one thing to know intellectually "ok, gunfire bad - I should be seeking cover before identifying the source of fire and returning fire" and the instinctive "whumph" of your chest impacting the ground before your brain catches up with "hey, was that a gunshot?"
Cops and Soldiers have more opportunities to learn that lesson compared to the average civilian from the 'burbs, but it tends to be a learned survival response, not a trained one. Just my two bits - I haven't had the opportunity to visit Brazil, but I imagine there are areas of the US just as bad.
Maybe an Edge - "combat survival: years of staying alive have drilled in you the importance of cover. At the sound of gunfire, make a Willpower Test to avoid diving for cover." to reflect life experience." No less silly than the "Common Sense" edges.
2. I had to think about your argument for virtual trainers and its a good one. There are already concerns that the more lifelike games are basically glorified combat simulators - throw a couple of "Clint Eastwood VR sims" into the mix and you've got a sim junkie with an itchy trigger finger and some skills behind that finger. In some ways, that's worse than the "Jack the Ripper" BtL junkie.
At which point, you have to decide the following:
a) How comprehensive was the company training? Would they have spent the time to expose their rank-and-file guards to VR training?
b) How did the guards take to the training? Enthusiastically? Went through the motions for a paycheck?
c) Do they leave their work at the door when they come home or do they spend their free time drilling muscle reflex as a hobby? (Don't laugh - you'd be surprised how many cops don't spend any extra time on a range.)
Just be prepared for PCs to make the same arguments for their own exposures to VR environments.
-Siege
Posted by: toturi Dec 25 2007, 12:28 AM
| QUOTE (Mercer) |
| If you're earning Karma, you're Rep should be going up. There's a weird little thing where you can buy down your Public Awareness by buying off Notoriety with Rep, but if you think about it, that means that in order to keep a low profile every few months you have to do something unprofessional and crazy. ("Whoops, my name is getting a little too well known in this city, better go throw the mayor under a bus on live tv, and rack up 2 or 3 Notoriety points and be a nobody again.") Characters seeking out challenges appropriate to their skill level is based on two things. One, pc's tend to like to make as much money and karma as possible and two, the game is only fun if its challenging. (Those are my assumptions going into it, anyway.) So one rationale is in-game, one is meta-game, and of the two the second is really more important. If the players are bored, it doesn't really matter how the characters are doing. To put another way, a Major League baseball player could quit the majors and become the most awesome softball player in his church league, but relatively few seem to take that option. In SR, a certain number of runners are going to not take risks and get by by doing low-paying easy jobs, but these aren't the runners the games will focus on. The games (hopefully) will focus on the people doing interesting things. |
So what about buying off Notoriety with Rep? Simply failing a run gains you a point of Notoriety. You do not need to go out of your way to be unprofessional to do that. Killing an innocent person needn't be unprofessional, sometimes shit will happen. Hell, getting arrested almost certainly will net you 2 Notoriety, since the GM would give you a Criminal SIN. And incredibly bad luck simply happens, whether you are pro or not. And when a dragon tells you to work for him, you give him what he wants.
"My name is going to be a little to well known in this city. This run isn't as advertised, I'm not finishing this run. I'd rather be a nobody again than dead."
If the players want to play a game with lower pay(karma or cred) jobs that their PCs can easily overcome, why not give it to them?
Posted by: Mercer Dec 25 2007, 01:06 AM
| QUOTE (toturi) |
| If the players want to play a game with lower pay(karma or cred) jobs that their PCs can easily overcome, why not give it to them? |
I have to say, this is not a point of view I run into a lot. Most players that I know tend to either want to optimize their advancement options (earn the most money and karma that their character can) or want to optimize their entertainment options (have fun at the table), and both of these tend to go hand-in-hand with a higher degree of challenge. Now, its possible to make the game too challenging and have the pc's have no realistic chance of success, and that is a mistake I've made as well. But either extreme tends to make for a game that isn't particularly enjoyable, either because the players feel they can't succeed, or they can't fail.
If I designed a series of runs in which the players got paid a small amount of money (marginally more than they needed to maintain their lifestyle) and had no chance of failing, I think by the third session the group would be bored out of their minds. I'd be bored out of my mind.
| QUOTE |
| So what about buying off Notoriety with Rep? Simply failing a run gains you a point of Notoriety. You do not need to go out of your way to be unprofessional to do that. Killing an innocent person needn't be unprofessional, sometimes shit will happen. Hell, getting arrested almost certainly will net you 2 Notoriety, since the GM would give you a Criminal SIN. And incredibly bad luck simply happens, whether you are pro or not. And when a dragon tells you to work for him, you give him what he wants. |
Except that your Rep and Notoriety together determine your Public Awareness. Let's say you've run enough that your Rep gives you a PA of 1; the cops are just starting to hear about you. Then you get arrested, pay down the Notoriety with Rep, and that lowers your PA. The cops have no idea who you are anymore because they arrested you. That doesn't make any sense. (It makes sense the other way, if you have a PA from a high Notoriety and you quietly and professionally go about your business for awhile and use that Rep to pay down the Notoriety to lower the PA, but if you do that long enough you're right back where you started with a high Rep raising your PA, and you have to throw the mayor under a bus on live tv to lower your public profile. Its wonky, is what I'm saying.)
Posted by: kzt Dec 25 2007, 05:43 AM
It's this whole "logic in SR" part that I can't get my mind around. What lead you to expect that this was part of the game? Of course you can throw the mayor under the bus on live TV and nobody will recognize who you are, while if you just carry out secret jobs that are never reported to the cops for clients who never see your face or know your name it makes perfect sense that every cop in the region will have a whole file on you with pictures.
Posted by: Siege Dec 25 2007, 06:07 AM
Has anyone given any thought to how a runner's rep might get around in certain circles, regardless of whether that rep was good, bad or ugly?
-Siege
Posted by: hyzmarca Dec 25 2007, 06:07 AM
Having high PA from rep means that you're basically like The Jackal, the Master of Sinanju, or Fastjack. Everyone talks about you in hushed fearful whispers. They all know that you're a badass. It's like being the protagnist of an 80s Modern Ninja novel. Your like Nicolai Hel from Shibumi. Your name travels because you are perfect.
When you get Notoriety and buy it down, your name doesn't travel as much. People stop talking about you. You're no longer a perfect super-assassin so you're not constantly on everyone's lips. Your old news, yesterday's killer, and someone is already rising to take your place.
Its like being M.C. Hammer or Vanilla Ice. There was a month in the early 90s when they were two of the most recognizable and talked-about people in the world. Now look at them. When was the last time you pulled out U Can't Touch This and put it in your tape deck? When was the last time you did backflips to the Ninja Rap?
Posted by: Mercer Dec 25 2007, 07:26 AM
@kzt: Fair point.
Posted by: kzt Dec 25 2007, 08:14 AM
I wish it wasn't
Posted by: Mercer Dec 25 2007, 08:31 AM
That, too, is a fair point.
Personally, where the mechanics are wonked I'm fine with ignoring them. Public Awareness doesn't particularly seem like a place you'd need a mechanic, especially one that blows. But if I were going to whip something up on the spot, I'd keep Rep and Notoriety pretty much as they are. One acts as a Charisma bonus, one as a penalty, except to Intimidation where they combine for a bonus. Public Awareness would probably be based on the Total (not "bought down") Notoriety Score-- either the highest one-time total or the lifetime score.
Since I don't buy the "runners as rock stars" idea, I probably wouldn't have Rep add into Public Awareness. A runner who goes about his business quietly and subtly can probably run for years without amassing a PA rating, whereas the one that's throwing the mayor under a bus on live tv is probably going to rack up some impressive numbers pretty fast.
Just like I still know who Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer are, Public Awareness wouldn't be so easy to get rid of. I'd say a month in which the pc gains no new Notoriety points might lower the lifetime total by one, which could lower their PA (although it would take some time). Likewise, if the PA gets to high, they're going too have to do something drastic; fake their own death, hack Lone Star and trash their file, get a complete DNA swap, plastic surgery and a new life in the suburbs or turn themselves in and plead insanity.
Or we can just do what we did the past three editions and not worry about it.
Posted by: kzt Dec 25 2007, 08:50 AM
Yep. For me "runners as rock stars" = 'Runners as John Dillinger' or 'Runners as Bonnie and Clyde'. And that didn't work out so well for anyone other then Frank Hamer and Melvin Purvis.
Posted by: laughingowl Dec 25 2007, 11:10 AM
Hmm first:
Combat spells and overcasting:
In my games I house rule:
Direct Combat spells: Overcasting raise the 'potential' force but it is not automatic. The for is calculate as 'magic' + net sucesses (capped at the cast force).
So a Magic 6 mage, casting a force 12 stunball will Only get an effective force 12 stunball with 6+ net sucesses.
Basically overcasting allows the chance of an increase of effect (like every other spell catagory) rather then an autmatic increase.
Indirect Combat I leave alone, to improve them somewhat (and you get a double chance to resist). Overcast fireball can be VERY effective (even if the mage is likely to get burned bad too from drain).
Secondly: Just like foci, the rush (pain) of overcasting is addictive:
Look at using the addiction rules to limit overcasting to real emergencies.
I have them make an addiction check, with threshold being based off of: a) Amount overcast (force 7 at magic 6 is less addicting then force 12 at magic 6) and b) the number of times they have overcast with out rest. (generally session, but if they get extended downtime during a session then that will refresh it).
Once addicted EVERY time they cast a spell they have to make a check not to overcast it (even if overcasting would have no effect) as the crave the rush of the power flowing through them.
-------------------------------------------------------------
As to mundance dealing with mages.
Visibility: Vision enhancing eyewear is cheap... guard will have it... but does mages (using magic) no good.
Before guard go into a room, they are going to pop smoke.. sure it will hurt them some... (more then it likely hurts the sammies) but it can seriously drop the effect of the mage. (depending on if GM says NO line of sight.... or just visilibty penalties).
Two: Defending is an advantage. The 'first' strike intruders will likely get the drop and should (hopefully) easily netutralize. However, as soon as any kind of alarm goes off, the guards (not HRT) are going to go bunker mentality.
They will have defensible positions to man. They will be waiting for somebody to come through THEIR position.
If it is an 'important' facility, they will take appropriate measures.
Guard bnukers with one-way mirrored glass and gun ports. (nice armor for guards, no LOS for mages).
Beads / flaps / etc making curtains, to notice invisible people. If strands of beads move, shoot / trigger defense / etc.
Strobe lights...
Goggles (with flare comp) nicely help protect againt flares etc, yet if a mages is wearing them, he can't cast (does't have LOS) if he takes them off then he is hit with the strobes etc... (sure now a cybered mage, can ignore and still cast (since essence paid) but that means less than max magic...
Mages are rare but far from unheard of (and fairly high on the 'threat' risk of actually being involved with a breach).
While magic may or may not be involed, rest assured: Any half competent security force has atleast basic doctrine on how to minimize a mages advantages.
Posted by: Cardul Dec 25 2007, 12:50 PM
Are these runs in Cubicles? If so, the guards should be spaced out, Cubicles are nice, square grids with passages between them. If the guards move one guard per passage, then there will be points where the mage cannot see them all.
Apply a background count of 1, so the mage can now only cast a Force 10 Stunball. Seed some of those BC generating plants mentioned above.
Have the area of the prize be guarded by an elite team, since an alarm has alrady gone off by this point if you have been stunning security teams. This team will consist of a Counterspelling specialist(literally: specialized in counterspelling Combat Spells), a combat-rigged Drone(with the Rigger controlling, and a Hacker sitting in the Drone to do counter hacking). There will be a third hacker doing over-watch in the room. There will then be two Samurai. Remember: Alarms have gone off somewhere by now, even if the team's hacker silences them, a well trained(and experienced) response team is going to give time for verification(in person) that the threat has been neautralized before going back to 'stand by.'
How ARE they knowing where the guards are, anyway? Seriously? They are in a corp building, so I am assuming the hacker is fighting through IC to get control of the security cameras? Is the hacker really THAT good that he/she can keep doing that? Seed some key areas with ECM(you know..the Stairwells and the elevators), have the security systems not be wireless, as well, and have their main processor be isolated, maybe with automated taser turrets(or HMG turrets with belts of Stick-n-Shock) guarding the door for anyone who does not give the correct secondary passcode to the wired(not wireless) code lock?
I do not think there is an imagination problem..I think there is the problem you are just too nice to them. You made a comment way back that sounded like you did not want to kill the PCs...why not? They know this, obviously, so of course they are feeling safe...seriously, maybe you should start planning to throw a total-party kill at them, or at least, total party capture..have them try to escape without all their toys!
Posted by: toturi Dec 26 2007, 01:27 AM
Any GM can create a deathtrap dungeon to achieve a TPK. But remember there are often more players than GMs and you want to stay injury-free.
Posted by: Ravor Dec 26 2007, 03:10 AM
True creating a death-trap dungeon with the aim of achieving a TPK is just being an ass, however in the Sixth World you don't have to do that in order to test the players, especially if they are used to being able Stunball the building's sec-guards by magically ambushing them almost every time and have such faith in the team Decker that the very idea of Matrix Security is even a joke to the DM running the campaign.
All you have to do is pretend that whoever designed the security for the building gets rewarded for every Runner team that it stops, if you want to play in 2070=2007 mindset then the designer gets a bonus, if you play in a darker world then the punishment for failure may be much, much higher. However in order to prevent the Dungeon of Doom he has to deal with a budget that is much too small to get everything that he wants and the wageslaves in the building has to be able to do their job.
Still, hardwiring most of the security systems, silent alarms, bunker-like checkpoints, strobelike effects with the lighting system, and some anti-Mage systems that only kick in if magic is suspected aren't unreasonable measures to have in any building that warrents hiring one of the most powerful and skillful mortal Mages in the 'plex to hit in the first place.
Besides, I still say that the Mage in question has better be one of the most paranoid Runners in the sprawl, because his raw power alone makes him a very attractive target, and throwing around magical Tac-Nukes like candy is almost certain to draw that type of attention his way.
Posted by: Whipstitch Dec 26 2007, 03:35 AM
Agreed. Young deckers with chips on their shoulders were dumb enough to challenge FastJack all the time back in his prime and you could make a strong argument that he's just as dominant on the Matrix as any known Awakened runners are on the Astral.
Posted by: toturi Dec 26 2007, 04:34 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| Still, hardwiring most of the security systems, silent alarms, bunker-like checkpoints, strobelike effects with the lighting system, and some anti-Mage systems that only kick in if magic is suspected aren't unreasonable measures to have in any building that warrents hiring one of the most powerful and skillful mortal Mages in the 'plex to hit in the first place. |
Only if the mage is reputated to be one of the most skilled mages in the plex and the person hiring him is hiring him specifically for that skill. You can be very skilled at counterspelling, you can be very good at summoning, but even to an insider, do you think that a Johnson or a fixer is going to care if you're better at spellcasting than summoning as long as you have a rep as a good shadowrunner?
Posted by: Cardul Dec 26 2007, 10:32 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| True creating a death-trap dungeon with the aim of achieving a TPK is just being an ass, however in the Sixth World you don't have to do that in order to test the players, especially if they are used to being able Stunball the building's sec-guards by magically ambushing them almost every time and have such faith in the team Decker that the very idea of Matrix Security is even a joke to the DM running the campaign. |
My general take: Corp security is broken into three tiers, all security having bio-monitors:
Front Door: A guy sitting at a desk, watching x-rays and metal detectors. More important, though, for me, is that I assume that every division has its own entrances, and, in the interest of security, you will not have a guy from R&D be allowed to go in through the Human Resources entrance, or the maintanence entrance or the food services entrance. You keep schedules mostly the same, and always have two security guards at the desk(so that if one is sick, the other is still knowledgable about things), and you get them to the point where they know the people coming in by face as well as ID. AND you make sure all the employees know the guards by name. And, part of the security is to greet one of the guards by name as you come in. I also do the stairwells so they are entrance like, not just fire escapes, and put a welcome desk in front of each stairwell and infront of the elevator(as well as metal detectors, X-ray scanners, and a hardwired camera), with the same know people by face and name for the security guard there. These guys have the simple job of spotting if someone doesn't belong there, and are tasked to set off an alarm if someone does not match what things say they are supposed to be(I also put Jammers at these points.) These guards are kind of receptionist and security, but are non-combat guards.
Patrols: Patrols, again, keep the set areas, and know the people in their patrol area by name and face. They also know the maintanence people who might be showing up in their area by name and face. They may have set areas, but they vary their patrol routes. These guys have heavy pistols, and stun grenades, and decent armour. They also have helmets with smart link, thermo-vision, and image links, as well as flare comp.
Objective: Objective security are the security assigned to key areas. These are built with Prime Runner rules, and are going to be at those points where sensitive materials are kept, generally, what the runners are after. These people work well together as a team, and are basicly what the runners do not want to run into. I assume there are two objective teams in a facility: one for the actual objective area, and one as a response and pursuit team. These teams always include one mage with high banishing and counterspelling skill.
My objective is to make things where one mistake can be lethal to the players. They need to always feel that they are in danger. If they are not sweating, if they are not worrying that their characters might die, then I am not doing my job right. Because, if that is not the case, then I am not challenging them. Who ever talks and brags about the milk run? Who talks about their run ending with a mage duel on a roof top, in the rain, while the hacker is fighting for his live on the net, and the samurai is holding off a platoon of corp mooks lead by near sammies? Going easy on players is not something anyone should do, though realism is always a good temper.
Posted by: Ravor Dec 26 2007, 03:46 PM
| QUOTE (toturi) |
| Only if the mage is reputated to be one of the most skilled mages in the plex and the person hiring him is hiring him specifically for that skill. You can be very skilled at counterspelling, you can be very good at summoning, but even to an insider, do you think that a Johnson or a fixer is going to care if you're better at spellcasting than summoning as long as you have a rep as a good shadowrunner? |
And my point is that given the fact that unless I'm misremembing the Character Sheet that was posted on the board the Mage is considered World Class in general spellcasting and even better at manipulation spells, has the most raw power that any non-Graded mortal Mage can possibly have, and according to the DM routinely throws magical Tac-Nukes around like candy. So yes I think it's safe to say that that kind of behavior coupled with the skills to back it up would quickly build the necessary rep to make the Mage's life living hell.
Besides, whether or not a Johnson knows or cares about the details of the Mage's skillset is moot because any Fixer worth a damn is going to care, and you can bet that the high-end Fixers always have their ears to the ground in the search of new high-end talent.
Posted by: toturi Dec 27 2007, 01:22 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| And my point is that given the fact that unless I'm misremembing the Character Sheet that was posted on the board the Mage is considered World Class in general spellcasting and even better at manipulation spells, has the most raw power that any non-Graded mortal Mage can possibly have, and according to the DM routinely throws magical Tac-Nukes around like candy. So yes I think it's safe to say that that kind of behavior coupled with the skills to back it up would quickly build the necessary rep to make the Mage's life living hell. Besides, whether or not a Johnson knows or cares about the details of the Mage's skillset is moot because any Fixer worth a damn is going to care, and you can bet that the high-end Fixers always have their ears to the ground in the search of new high-end talent. |
Unless the fixer himself is a mage himself or has got the low down from a mage, how is he going to verify whether this new guy is good?
You might be high end and very good but if you do not have the rep to match, then how are the fixer/s going to know if you really are that damn good? You can be the world's fastest runner but if you have never ran in a recognised competitive race, do you think that you'd be crowned as the world's fastest man?
If the mage throws magical tac-nukes around and the magical investigators that come around can assense the signature and work out that whoever threw the spell/s is very powerful, word may get around that whichever mage made that run is very strong indeed. And you'd think that the mage's fixer would be the first to put 2 and 2 together and whether the fixer to keep a lid on the thing or whether he puts the word out that he knows a top notch spellslinger is completely up to the GM since the fixer is an NPC. So no, I think that it is foolish to assume that the kind of behavior backed up with the skills would quickly build up the necessary rep unless the GM chooses to deem it so.
Posted by: Glyph Dec 27 2007, 07:11 AM
There have been a lot of good suggestions about how to keep a spellslinger in check, but looking at the original problem, I don't see how much of a "problem" it really is. Essentially, a group of professional shadowrunners get the drop on a group of mooks who are all clustered together. Okay... at that point, it should essentially be an easy kill for the team. But what does the mage do? He overcasts a spell, and essentially both wounds himself a box or two and burns a point of Edge, all to do what could have been done in any number of other ways.
Overcasting and stunballs aren't broken. Most mages will break out that kind of firepower only when they have to - why risk injury, and expend that precious Edge, unless it's a desperate situation? The real problem is twofold. The group seems to be surprising these mooks on a regular basis, and the mage seems to feel secure enough to take on wounds and spend Edge when he doesn't really need to.
From the description of other encounters by the GM, he does seem to be able to challenge them, so it's hard to see what could be causing these two problems. All I can suggest, not knowing all of the circumstances of the campaign, is to maybe mix up the security measures a bit more, and hit them unexpectedly a few more times after they think the run is "over". Make that mage who's down a few boxes of physical and some Edge sweat a bit.
Posted by: Spike Dec 27 2007, 05:02 PM
Toturi: I think you are trying way to hard. This mage is not theoretical, he exists in this particular game, he has this many dice to toss for mojo, and he regularly drops a force 12 spell two or three times a run.
He's not some guy out in the savannahs of Africa outrunning horses for the amusement of tribesmen without electricity or indoor plumbing.
He's in a major city, in a subpopulation that is pretty small, and he's hitting up corporate sites with this force 12 mojo.
Ergo: He has a rep as a mothefucking badass mojo slinger. His Fixer isn't going to keep that under his hat. Think of the fixer as an 'agent' for talent if you like, he needs to get the word out and get his boy employed for the best bucks he can for his OWN wallet. If anything the fixer is more likely to exaggerate his power, not undersell it.
You want to be a super-swoopty ninja mega-mage? Don't toss force 12 spells off like it was easy. If you use the Mojo, people will know you have it.
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 27 2007, 08:00 PM
But isn't it actually relatively easy for *every* Mage (or rather every Mage that's good enough to still be alive and/or a PC/NPC...) to toss off high force spells?
Maybe the penalty for overcasting just isn't enough...
Bsides the inherant problem of it being too easy to become/start as a world class *anything*. With zero being classed as everyday knowledge, and three being Professional (and the average to expect from a starting character).
Hell, I'm barely at a professional level in anything (bar the RL stuff I've been doing for years and years, like driving...), but the game expects begining charcaters to be professionals in multiple areas, unlike someone who has usually dedicated thier life/focus to becoming a professional *something*.
Take the sample Ganger for example. He's an Expert in Street Ettiqute, to the levels of a Corporate Vice President, an F1 quality Biker, and a Veteren (over 4 years of professional expertise) in both Urban Survival and Shadowing.
Let alone all his Combat and Intimidation training.
From there, it's a simple step to become world class. In multiple applications.
If a beginning, sample charcater is expected to be that good (and NPCs by comparison) then the general standard for the world is to be that good.
It's gonna take a hell of a lot more than being just *World Class* to stand out from the crowd.
Posted by: knasser Dec 27 2007, 10:01 PM
| QUOTE (GentlemanLoser) |
| Take the sample Ganger for example. He's an Expert in Street Ettiqute, to the levels of a Corporate Vice President, an F1 quality Biker, and a Veteren (over 4 years of professional expertise) in both Urban Survival and Shadowing. Let alone all his Combat and Intimidation training. From there, it's a simple step to become world class. In multiple applications. If a beginning, sample charcater is expected to be that good (and NPCs by comparison) then the general standard for the world is to be that good. |
It is true that the sample PC has that level of skill, but if you look at the sample gangers in the NPC section, you find that they are much more in line with what we're told are typical ability scores. The sample Halloweener doesn't even have a motorbike skill and they're a motorbike gang.
PC are supposed to be exceptional. The sample PC is not just a ganger, but someone who has moved into Shadowrunning and I expect him to be better than most. Given the character's poverty of cyberware there's plenty of room for growth.
Shadowrun is a little different from a lot of other RPGs, in that personal power is not the thing that really determines how dangerous a character is, but rather cunning and preparation and contacts.
I'm not entirely certain of your point, but if it is that the Stun Master posted earlier shouldn't be considered unusually powerful, I disagree. This is a character that is highly optimised to doing what he does. Most people never come close to fulfilling their potential. I know I've never stuck to martial arts as rigorously as I could have and it isn't because I couldn't have. Most people reach a level of "good enough" and stop. Just because in theory, everyone can get their a skill up to 6, doesn't mean that most do, unlike PCs who tend to be driven or dramatic characters. We also have to ask whether we can realistically apply the simple karma rules and progressions to the whole world of NPCs. It's clear that we can't do that. Not everyone has the capacity to get to a particular level regardless of desire. I've done a fair bit of weight training and I can move a reasonable amount of weight, but I know that I could never reach the levels of the world's strongest individuals because I simply don't have the rhinocerous DNA they appear to have spliced into their DNA (I'm more the sprinter type
). By the descriptions of ability levels in that book, the Stunball character earlier is a heavily optimised, world expert in combat spellcasting. And if that wasn't the sort of game that was wanted, the GM should have discouraged it in favour of broadening out into other areas.
Posted by: toturi Dec 28 2007, 01:11 AM
| QUOTE (Spike) |
| Toturi: I think you are trying way to hard. This mage is not theoretical, he exists in this particular game, he has this many dice to toss for mojo, and he regularly drops a force 12 spell two or three times a run. He's not some guy out in the savannahs of Africa outrunning horses for the amusement of tribesmen without electricity or indoor plumbing. He's in a major city, in a subpopulation that is pretty small, and he's hitting up corporate sites with this force 12 mojo. Ergo: He has a rep as a mothefucking badass mojo slinger. His Fixer isn't going to keep that under his hat. Think of the fixer as an 'agent' for talent if you like, he needs to get the word out and get his boy employed for the best bucks he can for his OWN wallet. If anything the fixer is more likely to exaggerate his power, not undersell it. You want to be a super-swoopty ninja mega-mage? Don't toss force 12 spells off like it was easy. If you use the Mojo, people will know you have it. |
You can drop Force 12 Stunballs all day long, but as long as the signature isn't assensed and it is not linked to the spellcaster, there is no one to associate the signature to.
Ergo: He does not have a rep as a badass spellslinger. His fixer may or may not know that he is that good. I look at the fixer as a handler more than an agent. This is the shadows and the way I run my fixers (at least the good ones) according to this trusim: "There are old spies and there are bold spies, but there are very few old and bold spies." If anything, the fixer will tell the spellslinger to cut down on the overkill because he is drawing unnecessary attention.
You want to be a ninja megamage? Make sure there is no evidence to link you to the deed, just like any other shadowrunner. Use the mojo, as long as you clean it up or if you know by the time the forensic mage gets here, the signature will be long gone, people won't know about your uberness.
Posted by: Siege Dec 28 2007, 01:45 AM
Since we're going to keep whipping a dead wageslave:
What kind of relationship does the runner have with this fixer? What kind of jobs does the fixer usually pass along - high nuyen or pizza runs?
Established fixers can be downright violent regarding their reputation as their ability to get work rises and falls based on their rep. In that respect, one would expect fixers to case the talent or at the very least have a pretty good idea of what his prospective employees are capable of.
It's all kinds of embarrassing if you contract a magical protection job to a crew who doesn't have any magical talent on tap. This is not to say it can't be done, but it would be a leap of faith for the fixer to say "sure, I trust this crew to make it happen, even though they have no magical assets in-house." Especially since it's the fixer's head on the chopping block if things go badly.
-Siege
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 28 2007, 01:48 AM
| QUOTE |
| I'm not entirely certain of your point, but if it is that the Stun Master posted earlier shouldn't be considered unusually powerful, I disagree. This is a character that is highly optimised to doing what he does. Most people never come close to fulfilling their potential. |
It was.
At least I think. I'm probably still ranting over Direct Spells somewhere there as well!
But power levels are really subjective. More on that below.
| QUOTE |
| I know I've never stuck to martial arts as rigorously as I could have and it isn't because I couldn't have. Most people reach a level of "good enough" and stop. |
Oh I agree, whole heartidly.
But that's RL.
NPCs aside for a minute, look at the sample characters. The mages have Spellcasting/Summoning of 5. And a Magic of 5.
From there, it's one step, and a handful of games worth of Karma to be the *worlds best* and lobbing force 12 spells around with impunity. So really, that Mage shouldn't be considered too above the norm (can't remember the exact build, but it's the force 12 stunballs everyone's talking about!)
Yeah you're limited (usually) to one skill at 6 or two at 5 at creation. And a normal Maximum stat costs a lot. But you're not discouraged from designing your Runner like that (GM's limiting builds for thier settigns aside... It's all subjective!
). I'd go so far as to suggest you're actually encouraged to build the best 'Runner you can, to specilaise in the field you want to take. Otherwise the competition will swallow you. And the good jobs/fixers/Johnsons will go elsewhere. Perils of a corporate society...(That's not to say you shouldn't ever build a non optimised or even purposly 'flawed' character. It's all about the role playing, and I'm an staunch supporter that the stats should always reflect the character. But the guys that are gonna get the Rep and the good jobs are the guys at the top of thier game. Usually.
)Most npcs don't come up to this standard, but the vast majority are mooks. And expected to be mooks. And this is what the Professional Rating system is for.
PCs, and thier power levels, are the standard, or expected level for professional Runners. And the same standard should be expected of NPC runners (or Prime Runners / High Profession Grunts). Which makes it a hell of a lot harder to stand out from the crowd. (Unless it's your setting to have your Runners better than thier peers, in which case it doesn't really matter if the Stun Master is world class at casting, he'll get the Rep just by being him.
)Just being able to chuck a force 12 spell wouldn't cut it.
You would start to get Rep and recognition for actually doing things (or having things attributed to yourself, whether you were invovled or not...) that people would take note of.
But in a sea of Magic 5/6 Mages all with the ability to overclock themselves, casting overclocked high force spells won't get you noticed.
Oh god I'm just rambling on now.
Time to stop! Just want to touch on;
| QUOTE |
| Overcasting and stunballs aren't broken. Most mages will break out that kind of firepower only when they have to - why risk injury, and expend that precious Edge, unless it's a desperate situation? |
The Mages I know, unless they know there's a couple hours of down time coming up to rest, would much rather overcast by one or two force. Just to take Physical damage and not stun.
Larger tracks, and the ease (through Heal spells or First aid) to get rid of a couple of points of damage over a couple of points of stun makes it more attractive in a drawn out situation.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 28 2007, 02:07 AM
You can heal Stun damage with First Aid, but you can't heal any kind of Drain (Physical or Stun) via Magical means.
Form the http://www.shadowrun4.com/resources/faq.shtml ...
| QUOTE (SR4 FAQ) |
| Can Physical Drain be healed by magic? No. Damage from Drain must be healed by regular mundane medical care and/or rest. |
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 28 2007, 02:20 AM
Gah!
Larger track it is then.
Hmmm... This is gonna start to get into marking different types of damage differently ( / X * Style...), as if the only heal once per injury wasn't enough (I know why it's there, it just leads to PCs cutting themselves)...
Edit: Note to self. Read the FAQ.
Posted by: Fortune Dec 28 2007, 02:37 AM
| QUOTE (GentlemanLoser) |
| This is gonna start to get into marking different types of damage differently ( / X * Style...), as if the only heal once per injury wasn't enough (I know why it's there, it just leads to PCs cutting themselves)... |
The limitation is one injury or set of injuries.
An example ...
QuikRik is cruising downtown (at full health) when he runs into a couple of Halloweeners out for some fun. Thinking quickly, he turns his bike and runs over the first ganger, getting thrown into a dumpster in the process (2P damage).
Now it's on, and the non-broken 'weener starts taking pot shots at our hero, even winging him twice (1P and 2P respectively) before Rik can blow his head off with his trusty Predator.
Rik picks up his bike, and luckily it roars to life under his shaky ministrations in time to hightail it away before the 'Star responds. A couple of blocks away, he slips into a friend Faye Talitie's pad and flops down on the couch to tend to his injuries (totaling 5P). The whole group would be treated as one set for healing purposes.
Borrowing Faye's medkit, Rik manages to heal up 3 boxes of damage (bringing his current Wound Level down to 2P). If he then falls asleep and Faye manages to inflict another wound on him with her butcher knife (she's out of practice and slips at the last minute, only doing 5P), then after he has finished her off, he could only attempt to heal the new wound (and any other subsequent wounds if applicable, regardless of source or type of injury) received since his last First Aid/Medicine (or even magical) attempt (only the 5P in this case, as the previously received 2P is considered a separate wound set).
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 28 2007, 02:44 AM
The cutting themselves was a little tongue in cheek.
I know it works that way, but it's far to much book keeping with SRs single damage style track for my liking.
What does everyone use to record the difference between normal and Drain damage?
And how does everyone record individual sets of first aided wounds?
Posted by: Fortune Dec 28 2007, 02:51 AM
Colored pens or pencils ... or even just little notes to yourself. I've never really found it too taxing, even after 4 editions. 
Posted by: Riley37 Dec 28 2007, 03:46 AM
There was a separate thread about 4E rules on damage, and the wierdness that results from two unrelated damage tracks. I'd design mages with high Willpower and thus a large Stun track, and only rarely have an equal or larger BOD-based Physical damage track. Especially if I were designing a mage to soak Drain. Largest pool I've seen to resist Drain: elvish shaman with CHA 7, WIL 5, plus fetish on the high-drain spells, total 14. He doesn't yet have Concentration; what else do people use to survive overcast levels of Drain?
That shaman doesn't go for damaging spells, though. He specializes in Illusion, Detection and Health, which happen to be the three schools for which shamanic bound elementals can sustain spells. Increased Reflexes plus Combat Sense plus Invisibility equals enough buff to fight an adept or sammie; add a Weapon Focus and that's lotsa magic which never gets Counterspelled.
Posted by: Glyph Dec 28 2007, 04:14 AM
One example of a Drain-soaking PC would be a dwarven hermetic mage with soft-maxed Logic (5) and Willpower (6), Cerebral Booster: 2, Focused Concentration: 2, and a Fetish limitation of his spell to add 2 more dice. That's 17 dice there, and 3 more if you get a Force: 3 spellcasting focus and use the dice for Drain (although some people think the erratta disallows that option).
By the way, I don't think that spirit-sustained spells are any less susceptible to being dispelled - they just don't distract the mage using spirits to do it, at the cost of expending the binding materials.
Posted by: Spike Dec 28 2007, 06:25 PM
Toturi:
Is he doing runs in a vacuum? No. Someone hires him, probably several people hire him. He's been doing this for some time, apparently. We could even argue that his force 12 stunball is a signature move. It doesn't matter if his signature is getting assensened or not, thats entirely unrelated.
Sure, you COULD have some ninja megamage with no rep at all go around doing shadowruns with force 12 overcasted stunballs... Of course, he doesn't work with a fixer, doesn't get his jobs from a Johnson, and he has no team mates... and STILL he is going to get a rep.
It'll be 'There's this dude. No one knows his face, no one knows his name. All they know is that once a week he hits a corp site like a shadowrunner and lays down the almighty fucking mojo... I'm talking MASSIVE spells. Heard he cleared out the entire perimeter of Aztech's R&D facility, you know the one, with ONE Spell. ONE SPELL!!! Man! Do you KNOW what kinda mojo that takes?!!. And get this: Nobody ever dies. Just wake up with massive headaches. They call him the Ghostmage'.
Yup. Still gets rep.
Even with no fixer who knows his name. No Johnson who has ever hired him, no body to buy the swag from him. Of course, now we have to question exactly WHY he is shadowrunning and what the hell he's doing with that loot....
Posted by: deek Dec 28 2007, 07:27 PM
| QUOTE (GentlemanLoser) |
| The cutting themselves was a little tongue in cheek. I know it works that way, but it's far to much book keeping with SRs single damage style track for my liking. What does everyone use to record the difference between normal and Drain damage? And how does everyone record individual sets of first aided wounds? |
Honestly, I don't bother with that...just because I am the GM doesn't mean I have to micromanage all the details. We have one player that has First Aid and one that is a mage. When it comes time to heal, they talk amongst themselves to figure it out...
My players are mostly honest, so I don't worry about it.
Posted by: toturi Dec 28 2007, 11:53 PM
| QUOTE (Spike) |
| Toturi: Is he doing runs in a vacuum? No. Someone hires him, probably several people hire him. He's been doing this for some time, apparently. We could even argue that his force 12 stunball is a signature move. It doesn't matter if his signature is getting assensened or not, thats entirely unrelated. Sure, you COULD have some ninja megamage with no rep at all go around doing shadowruns with force 12 overcasted stunballs... Of course, he doesn't work with a fixer, doesn't get his jobs from a Johnson, and he has no team mates... and STILL he is going to get a rep. It'll be 'There's this dude. No one knows his face, no one knows his name. All they know is that once a week he hits a corp site like a shadowrunner and lays down the almighty fucking mojo... I'm talking MASSIVE spells. Heard he cleared out the entire perimeter of Aztech's R&D facility, you know the one, with ONE Spell. ONE SPELL!!! Man! Do you KNOW what kinda mojo that takes?!!. And get this: Nobody ever dies. Just wake up with massive headaches. They call him the Ghostmage'. Yup. Still gets rep. Even with no fixer who knows his name. No Johnson who has ever hired him, no body to buy the swag from him. Of course, now we have to question exactly WHY he is shadowrunning and what the hell he's doing with that loot.... |
Incorrect. Someone hires him. But does he wave his high Force Stunball around as a marketing tool? You are assuming that just because someone uses something often, that something becomes associated to that someone and that someone is known for it. I could argue that his force 12 stunball is not a signature move, but just something well within his capabilities. Just because he gets his jobs from a Johnson and has a fixer does not mean that they know that he dropped the guards with just 1 spell. How do people know that there is only this 1 guy? How do you know that there is only 1 spell? Yes, you as a GM or player know that, but ask yourself if the same result can be accomplished with multiple lower Force Stunballs and if that is worth such a earthshaking reputation then. Take the result of those massive Stunballs and ask yourself how can this be accomplished? All you have is a group of security guards who wake up with massive headaches. You know the truth is that they got hit by 1 big spell.
You are mixing IC knowledge with OOC knowledge in your description. I do not know what happens at your table, but I do not let my PCs get away with using OOC knowledge IC. And I certainly will not set an example of mixing IC knowledge and OOC knowledge as a GM. I know, that does not mean that my NPCs will know. If my NPCs do not know, then where does the rep come from?
Posted by: FrankTrollman Dec 29 2007, 12:10 AM
| QUOTE |
| The sample Halloweener doesn't even have a motorbike skill and they're a motorbike gang. |
The Halloweeners are not a Go Gang, though they do on occassion clash with Go Gangs. They run around in halloween costumes and vandalize corporate property in the Downtown Seattle region.
They've also been killed almost to a man in the canon story line like 4 times since their introduction in 2050. Which means that they all die as often as Presidents are elected.
-Frank
Posted by: knasser Dec 29 2007, 12:25 AM
I can see that there's a nice little dispute brewing over whether the Sultan of Stunball gets a super-rep or not.
Honestly, you could play it either way, adjusting based on the fixer in question. As the fixer's personality and way of business is under the control of the GM to determine, neither attitude can be said to be correct outside of an individual game.
The most likely cause of a growing rep, imo, is not the fixer who probably wont get the amount of detail back after a run to make such judgements, but rather the corps / law enforcement and the PC's own team mates. A corp may not have their own wage mage, but after a magical assault, an expert will probably be called in to check for astral signatures, review security footage, interview survivors, etc. She will know that someone beyond normal abilities was there from this evidence and will share the knowledge with others, even if it's just the accompanying detective hearing her go "frag me" when she assenses.
However, these circles aren't likely to be the circles that the PCs move in (though it can leak back). More probable, is that one of the mage's team mates will be pumped full of novacoke and regaling the rest of the patrons of a bar with a graphic description of how is friend knocked out fifteen people with a single arcane word.
Okay, perhaps not that extreme (we hope), but that's where the information will first come from.
At least in my game. If the low-lying mage has a team with a similar attitude to avoiding success, then they might pull it off for a long time until Lone Star finally puts all the pieces together and identifies the super-mage. But no absolute verdict on this will be reached in this thread, as the factors that effect it are all down to GM preferences on NPC personalities.
I will say I've never actually come across a player that wanted to play below their character's ability though.
Posted by: knasser Dec 29 2007, 12:28 AM
| QUOTE (FrankTrollman) | ||
The Halloweeners are not a Go Gang, though they do on occassion clash with Go Gangs. They run around in halloween costumes and vandalize corporate property in the Downtown Seattle region. They've also been killed almost to a man in the canon story line like 4 times since their introduction in 2050. Which means that they all die as often as Presidents are elected. -Frank |
Really? I knew all of that except that I had them fixed in my mind as being a go-gang. Probably some story about another mounted battle with the Ancients I once read. Oh well, too late for my game now. I'll keep it in mind for talking to other GMs, though. Thanks.
I've always liked the Halloweeners. They keep getting killed and they keep coming back. I think the recruiting power of being able to dress up in the outfits must just be too irresistable to a certain sort of person.
Posted by: Jhaiisiin Dec 29 2007, 08:26 AM
| QUOTE ("toturi") |
| Incorrect. Someone hires him. But does he wave his high Force Stunball around as a marketing tool? You are assuming that just because someone uses something often, that something becomes associated to that someone and that someone is known for it. I could argue that his force 12 stunball is not a signature move, but just something well within his capabilities. Just because he gets his jobs from a Johnson and has a fixer does not mean that they know that he dropped the guards with just 1 spell. How do people know that there is only this 1 guy? How do you know that there is only 1 spell? Yes, you as a GM or player know that, but ask yourself if the same result can be accomplished with multiple lower Force Stunballs and if that is worth such a earthshaking reputation then. Take the result of those massive Stunballs and ask yourself how can this be accomplished? All you have is a group of security guards who wake up with massive headaches. You know the truth is that they got hit by 1 big spell. You are mixing IC knowledge with OOC knowledge in your description. I do not know what happens at your table, but I do not let my PCs get away with using OOC knowledge IC. And I certainly will not set an example of mixing IC knowledge and OOC knowledge as a GM. I know, that does not mean that my NPCs will know. If my NPCs do not know, then where does the rep come from? |
I'd say that's not exactly IC/OOC mixing. That's the power of a rumormill. "My chummer over at the azzie place down town had a drekked up day the other day. Here's what he told me..."
One person will say one thing to the wrong person, and by the time it hits general public, it could be blown way out of proportion. It'll either be one supermage, or a full legion of shock troops that only overwhelmed security by attrition. If you honestly believe this is a case of IC/OOC mixing, then you've never seen a true rumormill in action. It's scary what can come out of one with just the right words said to the right person at the right time.
Posted by: toturi Dec 29 2007, 04:58 PM
| QUOTE (Jhaiisiin @ Dec 29 2007, 04:26 PM) |
| I'd say that's not exactly IC/OOC mixing. That's the power of a rumormill. "My chummer over at the azzie place down town had a drekked up day the other day. Here's what he told me..." One person will say one thing to the wrong person, and by the time it hits general public, it could be blown way out of proportion. It'll either be one supermage, or a full legion of shock troops that only overwhelmed security by attrition. If you honestly believe this is a case of IC/OOC mixing, then you've never seen a true rumormill in action. It's scary what can come out of one with just the right words said to the right person at the right time. |
True. It can be a rumor, but the rumor can just as easily be disinformation that deflects attention away from the runner or has but the vaguest of associations to him. Or the rumor could die stillborn. This rumor can happen even if he did not go around slinging Force 12 Stunballs. How is this rumor associated with the runner? It needn't be, it could be just as easily point to anyone of the Awakened population. That the rumor points to the runner is a GM choice and is a case of IC/OOC mixing.
Posted by: GentlemanLoser Dec 29 2007, 11:38 PM
| QUOTE |
| She will know that someone beyond normal abilities was there |
And this is what I take issue with.
Beyond normal? Surely not for any Shadow Runner worth their salt assaulting that complex.
Posted by: Ravor Dec 30 2007, 11:16 PM
In a world where we are told that 1% of the population are Awakened, and even less then that are able to cast spells, and even among the few lucky ones that are Mages the majority of them have to overcast to hit ( Force 6 ) then yes, someone who can hit ( Force 12 ) multiple times a night will stand out if they are assaulting a complex where the guards are almost always caught in groups with their pants down. Think about how fragging rare a ( Magic 5-6 ) Mage really is.
As for whether or not the rumour mill gets things right well, the Mage's behavior is going to weigh the odds against his favor in that aspect, and considering that it appears that ( Force 12 ) Stunballs is the Mage's go-to tactic I think that it is mere DM Fiat if the Runner doesn't build a rep, not the other way around.
Posted by: toturi Dec 31 2007, 01:21 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| In a world where we are told that 1% of the population are Awakened, and even less then that are able to cast spells, and even among the few lucky ones that are Mages the majority of them have to overcast to hit ( Force 6 ) then yes, someone who can hit ( Force 12 ) multiple times a night will stand out if they are assaulting a complex where the guards are almost always caught in groups with their pants down. Think about how fragging rare a ( Magic 5-6 ) Mage really is. As for whether or not the rumour mill gets things right well, the Mage's behavior is going to weigh the odds against his favor in that aspect, and considering that it appears that ( Force 12 ) Stunballs is the Mage's go-to tactic I think that it is mere DM Fiat if the Runner doesn't build a rep, not the other way around. |
Only if you know that it is a Force 12 Stunball. How does your NPCs know that it was a Force 12 Stunball? How do your NPCs know that the Force 12 Stunball was cast multiple times a night?
A better question would be: How rare a Magic 5-6 mage runner really is?
While the odds are that eventually the mage will get a reputation for casting high force spells, it is not a given. If the magical investigators are able to find out that a very high force spell was cast, if the investigators are able to link it to the other high force spells cast on other runs, if the investigators are able to link them to that one mage, each of these are probable but as long as a single link in the chain is broken, then there is no link. The mage's behavior weighs the odds against him but with the odds are for him in the first place, it is easily even dice.
Posted by: Glyph Dec 31 2007, 02:00 AM
Keep in mind, also, that initiation has become fairly common, so a Magic of 6 is really more like a skill of 4 - impressive, but not by any means the best out there.
Posted by: Ravor Jan 6 2008, 11:20 PM
Well the easiest way for a magical investagator to tell whether or not a ( Force 12 ) spell was cast is to see how long the the aura remains in the Astral, you can figure that by the time the magical investagator arrives on the scene most low to mid Force spells are already unreadable, so if a spell is even visible at all it is going to warrent determining it's Force.
And although I agree that Initation is fairly common, in Fourth Edition it doesn't follow that an Initite is going to spend the additional Karma needed to increase their ( Magic ), hells, Jane Awakened doesn't even need to earn her first Grade until after she's capped out at ( Magic 6 ).
And as for how common ( Magic 5+ ) Mages are in the Shadow Community, I'd say almost as rare as Hen's Teeth, Mages are rare enough that a "mere" ( Magic 3 ) Mage can basically write her own ticket with the corps, so I'd imagine that the guys and gals able to drop Magical Tac-nukes at will would be even better off selling out to da' man.
Posted by: Mercer Jan 6 2008, 11:39 PM
| QUOTE (toturi) |
| A better question would be: How rare a Magic 5-6 mage runner really is? |
By http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=20063&st=0, there are approximately 20 shadowrunning magic users (adept or full mage casters) with Magic Ratings in the 5-6 Range (Competent, Superior or Ultimate). In Seattle. Those are the numbers I keep in my head for my game, so a guy throwing a lot of Force 12 Stunballs would stick out. YMMV.
Posted by: Glyph Jan 7 2008, 12:30 AM
I've always had a bit of a logical problem with the rules for astral signatures, namely that they are identified by assensing, by another magician. Okay, so the investigating magician can identify you by that signature, if he has the opportunity to read your aura. But how does that help any other magician in identifying you? The aura information can't be recorded, so really, only the mage doing the actual assensing should be able to use the aura to identify the perp.
Plus, how could that hold up in court? It would be the assensing mage's word against the perp's. Not a problem for a corporation dealing with a SINless runner in its custody, but definitely a problem for any kind of legal proceeding. It's like trying to use a fingerprint to identify someone, when you can't produce an actual fingerprint, just someone who saw the fingerprint, and says that it matches the perp's.
There has to be some way that the information gained can be recorded, or at least shared, for auras to be useful as evidence, but I don't see anything in the rules about that, unless there's something I missed.
Posted by: kzt Jan 7 2008, 01:09 AM
There really isn't any reason someone can't write a description system like they use with fingerprints. If that's useful to you, why not assume that this kind of obvious thing happened?
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 7 2008, 02:43 AM
Not sure that solves the problem.
If the only person who saw the initial Astral Sig was the mage, so he could have just assessed someone he didn't like, and then used that description. Or indeed whatever description he felt like in the first place.
That and the description system for fingerprints is pretty generic isn't it, so lots of prints will have similar descriptions but be different?
Posted by: Whipstitch Jan 7 2008, 02:52 AM
All of the previous reasons are a big part of why it says in Street Magic that a lot of magical evidence and magically induced testimony doesn't hold up in (many) of the Sixth World's courtrooms. Astral detective work is sometimes useful for law enforcement to find who it is they intend to nail to the wall in the first place, but once they think they know who they're after they're probably stuck using that information merely to try and set up a sting or otherwise catch the culprit in the act at a later date. Just think of those goofy cop films where it's no mystery who the evil drug lord/arms dealer is and all the policeman are screaming at eachother because they have to get evidence first before they can take somebody down and you'll be on the right trail. And of course, if you're SINless, Lonestar will probably be quite happy to just go ahead and fabricate as much evidence as they need on you anyway. In the words of Dave Chapelle: "Just sprinkle some crack on 'im!"
Posted by: Glyph Jan 7 2008, 03:34 AM
That's actually kind of how I see it, as something similar to testimony from ghosts - it might lead you to the right suspect, but won't help you much in court. But I think it is overused as something mages need to be paranoid about.
Yes, leaving your astral signature behind isn't an optimal situation, but it doesn't mean that Lone Star and everyone else has it on file all of a sudden. It only means that a few wage mages working for that corporation will be able to identify that same astral signature later.
Truthfully, mundane forensic evidence, and leaving things that could be used as ritual links (shell casings, etc.), are both things that shadowrunners should be far more concerned about.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 7 2008, 04:29 AM
Isn't every gun in SR caseless? I'd assume most of the bullets would be so distorted by hitting something that you'd have a hard time matching bullets to exact guns.
Posted by: Fortune Jan 7 2008, 05:28 AM
| QUOTE (Cthulhudreams) |
| Isn't every gun in SR caseless? |
The default is assumed to be caseless, but that does not mean every gun on the streets is equiped to fire caseless ammunition.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 7 2008, 05:55 AM
Yeah, though I'd be surprised if the runners went for the 'bad' option by deliberate choice.
Blood seems to be the most likely one to leave behind. And your video image.
Posted by: toturi Jan 7 2008, 06:50 AM
| QUOTE (Glyph) |
| I've always had a bit of a logical problem with the rules for astral signatures, namely that they are identified by assensing, by another magician. Okay, so the investigating magician can identify you by that signature, if he has the opportunity to read your aura. But how does that help any other magician in identifying you? The aura information can't be recorded, so really, only the mage doing the actual assensing should be able to use the aura to identify the perp. Plus, how could that hold up in court? It would be the assensing mage's word against the perp's. Not a problem for a corporation dealing with a SINless runner in its custody, but definitely a problem for any kind of legal proceeding. It's like trying to use a fingerprint to identify someone, when you can't produce an actual fingerprint, just someone who saw the fingerprint, and says that it matches the perp's. There has to be some way that the information gained can be recorded, or at least shared, for auras to be useful as evidence, but I don't see anything in the rules about that, unless there's something I missed. |
Until SR4 decides to retcon or canonise it, I'd go with the SR3 explanation of Mana-sensitive Film (SOTA 2064).
Posted by: Ravor Jan 7 2008, 06:55 AM
Wasn't that basically just kirrilian (spelling?) photos?
Posted by: toturi Jan 7 2008, 06:58 AM
Yes, I think so. But it doesn't detract from the fact that it is evidence as opposed to the magician's testimony.
Posted by: Ravor Jan 7 2008, 07:20 AM
Hmm, could mundanes use it with a little training or was it so specialized and touchy that you might as well pay the Mage to work her mojo?
Because if any mundane sec-guard could take a few classes and be able to capture a Mage's Astral Sig on film then not cleaning up every last trace of your Astral Fingerprint is just as bad as setting your cyber to accept all wireless connections by default.
Forget Masking, the first metamagic any smart Runner learns is the one that lets you erase your Astral Sigs quickly. (I forget its name at the moment, and don't have access to my books yet.)
Posted by: Glyph Jan 7 2008, 07:34 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| Forget Masking, the first metamagic any smart Runner learns is the one that lets you erase your Astral Sigs quickly. (I forget its name at the moment, and don't have access to my books yet.) |
Cleansing lets you erase your signature in one complex action. Flexible Signature lets you disguise your astral signature and/or make it last less long.
| QUOTE (toturi) |
Until SR4 decides to retcon or canonise it, I'd go with the SR3 explanation of Mana-sensitive Film (SOTA 2064). |
Thanks, toturi. That's one of the books I don't have. And it would at least explain different mages or law enforcement agencies having a way to share data on astral signatures.
Posted by: toturi Jan 7 2008, 07:43 AM
| QUOTE (Ravor) |
| Hmm, could mundanes use it with a little training or was it so specialized and touchy that you might as well pay the Mage to work her mojo? |
Well the old rules were to use a Photograhy related Knowledge test and the successes counted as halved for the old Astral Perception test.
So no, not any mundane could do it, but since skilled CSIs are considerably more than skilled forensic mages...
Posted by: Fortune Jan 7 2008, 08:10 AM
| QUOTE (toturi @ Jan 7 2008, 04:50 PM) |
| I'd go with the SR3 explanation of Mana-sensitive Film (SOTA 2064). |
Doesn't that just capture images of Auras that are actually still present, as opposed to Signatures, which are the remaining residue of past magical activity?
Posted by: toturi Jan 7 2008, 10:12 AM
| QUOTE (Fortune) | ||
Doesn't that just capture images of Auras that are actually still present, as opposed to Signatures, which are the remaining residue of past magical activity? |
No, it not only just captures manifesting magicians and spirits(no test required) but if you want background count, dual nature critters, auras and spell signature, that's when you want to score high on your Knowledge test roll.
Posted by: Apathy Jan 7 2008, 04:50 PM
| QUOTE (Cthulhudreams) |
| Yeah, though I'd be surprised if the runners went for the 'bad' option by deliberate choice. Blood seems to be the most likely one to leave behind. And your video image. |
There are other people who could respond better to this than me, but I believe that in the real world there are some disadvantages to caseless ammo as well. Things like ammo durability spring to mind. (Do you really want to use ammo that's basically encased in paper if you're dragging your SMG through the sewers, in the rain, etc?) Please let me know if this understanding is incorrect.
Of course, there are no RAW mechanics for this sort of thing. But if you need a fluff explanation why there would still be guns using cased ammo, that might fit.
Posted by: Jhaiisiin Jan 7 2008, 08:17 PM
I've not paid much attention to the SR4 artwork, but I know that all artwork for SR3 showed cased ammo and shells being expended. Maybe RAW mentioned something I missed.
Posted by: kzt Jan 7 2008, 09:55 PM
| QUOTE (Apathy) |
| I believe that in the real world there are some disadvantages to caseless ammo as well. Things like ammo durability spring to mind. (Do you really want to use ammo that's basically encased in paper if you're dragging your SMG through the sewers, in the rain, etc?) Please let me know if this understanding is incorrect. |
The only small arm that had caseless sort of working was the G11. This gun bankrupted HK. I corresponded with someone who used one of the 2000 or so that the FRG bought. It wasn't a total POS, but it needed work. Exact reason I can't remember. When BAE bought HK out of bankrupcy I think they trashed all the G11 tooling.
The tech is still out there, and Dynamit Nobel knows how to design caseless ammo that won't blow your gun up, but nobody has yet ventured there since HK. It's a huge capital investment to make that leap.
The gun that had the water problem was the 152mm gun on the Sheridan in Vietnam.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 7 2008, 10:50 PM
| QUOTE (Apathy) | ||
There are other people who could respond better to this than me, but I believe that in the real world there are some disadvantages to caseless ammo as well. Things like ammo durability spring to mind. (Do you really want to use ammo that's basically encased in paper if you're dragging your SMG through the sewers, in the rain, etc?) Please let me know if this understanding is incorrect. Of course, there are no RAW mechanics for this sort of thing. But if you need a fluff explanation why there would still be guns using cased ammo, that might fit. |
The flip side is of course that the bad guys can pick up your casings and then shoot unstoppable electric death at you with an unlimited range that doesn't require line of sight. I'd just pack my ammo in waterproof webbing and be a bit more careful unless I thought I'd be able to go back and pick up all my brass. Which I wouldn't.
But yeah caseless ammo being stock on every guns including military ones supposes that they've solved the problems of caseless weapons to some degree, or at least got to the point where the advantages (things like lighter weight allowing larger infantry loadouts) outweigh the disadvantages (tougher cooling systems, unreliability under stress etc). Otherwise the military wouldn't use it. Without blatant corruption. Though why ares would equip its own ares firewatch teams with inferior ares products when they can just produce the 2030 cased version would be baffling.
Posted by: Riley37 Jan 7 2008, 11:19 PM
On caseless ammo, which is not quite about Stunball 12:
Wikipedia article names several issues. One major issue is heat buildup. When an empty cartridge case leaves the gun, it carries a fair bit of heat with it. Caseless ammo guns need cooling for autofire (maybe even for sustained semi-auto fire). Rube Goldberg approach: use blowback or recoil to drive a mini cooling fan...
I dunno about waterproofing issues; off the cuff, something like wax paper should suffice and still burn up during firing. I'm gonna figure that by 2070, someone has solved that issue.
Artists draw cased ammo because a) that's what they've seen and b) the cases flying out of the gun is such a stock convention when drawing a gunfight.
Posted by: GryMor Jan 7 2008, 11:30 PM
| QUOTE (kzt) |
The only small arm that had caseless sort of working was the G11. This gun bankrupted HK. I corresponded with someone who used one of the 2000 or so that the FRG bought. It wasn't a total POS, but it needed work. Exact reason I can't remember. When BAE bought HK out of bankrupcy I think they trashed all the G11 tooling. |
Metalstorm weapons are 'caseless' in as much as the barrel serves the purpose of the case and magazine. Assuming you aren't just dropping empty magazines/barrels on the ground, you get all the benefits of caseless ammo without the downsides (it doesn't have water issues, heat and residue buildup is irrelevant since you swap out barrels). Also, no ammo feed to get jammed.
Nothing on the market yet, so there may be problems that are being hushed up.
Posted by: Apathy Jan 7 2008, 11:35 PM
I would imagine that cased ammo might be the poor gang-banger's selection. In the Barrens he's unlikely to run into any mages, and police don't bother investigating as long as he's only killing other gangers. With soldiers it would depend on how much lighter the ammo was and how well they solved the other problems. With cops I'd guess they wouldn't see ritual magic as that likely, so they might not care about casings. Shadowrunners are the only ones who really need caseless ammo.
Also, in the same way that the guy with caseless ammo can put his gun in a plastic bag to keep the ammo from getting soggy/mildew, the guy with the cased ammo can put his gun inside a bag to keep casings from flying everywhere. As long as the guy plans ahead cased versus caseless is just a 'fluff' issue.
Posted by: Whipstitch Jan 7 2008, 11:47 PM
I'd think that small arms are likely the last thing they're worried about right now with metalstorm anyway. I think the technology, if and when it gets used, will be applied to weapon systems that are already prohibitively expensive enough where a further cost increase isn't that big of a deal as long as the weapon works better or in situations where metalstorm could actually be less expensive than the current alternatives. When it comes to small arms "If it's not broke don't fix it" tends to win out over the flavor of the month in the end. After all, there still really isn't much if anything wrong with the ol' Colt .45
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 8 2008, 12:24 AM
Assuming someone comes up with a good manufacturing method, caseless ammo is actually likely to be cheaper due to the lack of, well, a case.
The manufacturing method I've handwaved there is a bit if
Posted by: Whipstitch Jan 8 2008, 12:32 AM
It's not enough to consider the costs of manufacturing though. Not even remotely; you need to have a customer base to make the round worth selling, and in the case of milspec grade weapons you need to accomodate a government or two to get the contracts to make the venture worthwhile. And from the military's perspective adopting a new weapon that uses new ammo can mean replacing entire stockpiles, which is tantamount to throwing out or socking away literally tons of perfectly good weaponry. Hell, the move from the ol' M1911 .45 ACP service pistol to the Beretta was as much over politics and conforming to the NATO standard ammo as it was over peformance.
Posted by: Siege Jan 8 2008, 01:42 AM
| QUOTE (Whipstitch) |
| It's not enough to consider the costs of manufacturing though. Not even remotely; you need to have a customer base to make the round worth selling, and in the case of milspec grade weapons you need to accomodate a government or two to get the contracts to make the venture worthwhile. And from the military's perspective adopting a new weapon that uses new ammo can mean replacing entire stockpiles, which is tantamount to throwing out or socking away literally tons of perfectly good weaponry. Hell, the move from the ol' M1911 .45 ACP service pistol to the Beretta was as much over politics and conforming to the NATO standard ammo as it was over peformance. |
And what a great decision that was.
-Siege
Posted by: Tarantula Jan 8 2008, 01:44 AM
Just some notes on his character sheet....
Strength 1, he can lift and carry 10kg worth of stuff with no test.
I'm pretty sure that a flashlight, armor vest, and magesight goggles w/30m of myomeric rope weigh more than that.
Also, how is he sustaining the increased reflexes spell? (I'll note you didn't specify a spell type for the foci)
Without this sustained, he's looking at initiative of 10, which isn't exactly fantastic. If he wants to keep it sustained with his sustaining focus, that limits it to force 3, meaning at best (3 successes) he'll be at 12 initiative, and 3 passes. Not to mention having a sustained spell, which is problematic in and of itself (particularly with wards, or spirits/astral magical guards).
Another point, his vision enhancement contacts. If they're constantly clarifying and modifying the vision he's seeing, then he can't cast out of them. Just the same as he couldn't cast through nightvision goggles.
As far as mechanicals of the sheet go: he does have 4bp to spare.
He also started with 1 too many spells, though, he could easily lose one like orgasm or physical barrier.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 8 2008, 02:02 AM
| QUOTE (Whipstitch) |
| It's not enough to consider the costs of manufacturing though. Not even remotely; you need to have a customer base to make the round worth selling, and in the case of milspec grade weapons you need to accomodate a government or two to get the contracts to make the venture worthwhile. And from the military's perspective adopting a new weapon that uses new ammo can mean replacing entire stockpiles, which is tantamount to throwing out or socking away literally tons of perfectly good weaponry. Hell, the move from the ol' M1911 .45 ACP service pistol to the Beretta was as much over politics and conforming to the NATO standard ammo as it was over peformance. |
But all the weapons use caseless ammo including the milspec assault rifles
It's a cool circular argument really, but all other things being equal caseless ammo is better due to the lighter weight. I agree with you about the standardized ammo thing though, which is really important due to logistics and all that. Again 'all other things being equal' is concealment for MOUNDS of handwavium, but with the standard being caseless it would seem that the exception rather than the rule would be cased. I'd assume even the massive NATO stockpiles of 7.62MM and 5.56 MM wouldn't be worth much by 2070.
Posted by: Whipstitch Jan 8 2008, 02:13 AM
Oh, yeah, I didn't mean for any of what I said to impact how the SR4 rules should be interpreted. If anything, I think that it means cased ammunition should be virtually extinct. Standardization has a lot of benefits, and if the standard is caseless than caseless it is. It's not really inconceivable at all to think that at some point things came to a head and cheap caseless manufacturing became viable at the same time that many weapons were being phased out so the corps invested in a different way of handling things by 2070. I was just running my mouth about IRL issues with weapons, really, and since small arms are a rather mature technology, it's not uncommon for most advances to be incremental and more related to manufacturing and optics than widescale changes in the way the weapons actually operate at this point. Economics really is the deciding factor in many cases.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 8 2008, 02:55 AM
Ah right - I agree with that, though there have been some significant changes along the way, but you are correct in drilling down to the fact that most of them arise from economics, not a technological breakthroughs - like the rise of automatic magazine based weapons in general issue is due to the declining price of firearms due to improving manufacturing techniques.
I imagine the next 'wave' of firearms 'innovation' is going to focus heavily on mobile technology, but thats my misty eyed IT optimist at work there, but that would invalidate the SR look at it, which seems to be smartgun systems as the technological innovation, then bigger guns rah rah.
Posted by: Ravor Jan 8 2008, 04:32 PM
Although I haven't my books with me at the moment, if I remember correctly the ritual bond between your ammo casings and you should expire long before a Ritual Circle would be able to be gathered together, the CSI geeks might be a bigger threat though.
Posted by: cndblank Jan 10 2008, 10:00 PM
| QUOTE (Cthulhudreams) | ||
But all the weapons use caseless ammo including the milspec assault rifles It's a cool circular argument really, but all other things being equal caseless ammo is better due to the lighter weight. I agree with you about the standardized ammo thing though, which is really important due to logistics and all that. Again 'all other things being equal' is concealment for MOUNDS of handwavium, but with the standard being caseless it would seem that the exception rather than the rule would be cased. I'd assume even the massive NATO stockpiles of 7.62MM and 5.56 MM wouldn't be worth much by 2070. |
Yeah, considering how much equipment a modern solder has to carry and how fast modern weapons can go through ammo even on semiautomatic, the military would push for caseless.
Especially when is only an ammo change as opposed to a new weapon system.
All that extra cased ammo left around would just be an excuse to have more firing exercises.
Posted by: Fortune Jan 10 2008, 10:11 PM
Keep in mind that weapons chambered for caseless rounds cannot fire cased ammunition, and vice versa.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jan 10 2008, 10:13 PM
| QUOTE (Fortune) |
| Keep in mind that weapons chambered for caseless rounds cannot fire cased ammunition, and vice versa. |
Is it possible to make a weapon capable of firing both, if you set out with that specific goal? Is this something expensive/difficult, or something inherently impossible?
Posted by: Whipstitch Jan 10 2008, 10:16 PM
Yep, which is why I believe that the caseless revolution would likely have to coincide with a military initiative to adopt entirely new weapons in order to become the new standard. I'd be willing to bet that with all the balkanization and turmoil that takes place in the Shadowrun timeline probably sped things along at some point too. One would think an awful lot of ammunition stockpiles were lost or consumed over the years, so it's not unthinkable that there'd be lots of parties interested in adopting a new standard between now and 2070, especially since NATO standards aren't a consideration anymore.
Whatever happened to NATO, exactly? My memory's usually pretty good but I'm drawing a blank right now. I can't imagine it survived the shift to the UCAS and the Euro Wars.
Posted by: Fortune Jan 10 2008, 10:19 PM
| QUOTE (SR4 pg. 312) |
| In these basic rules, the difference between cased and caseless ammunition is that caseless ammo has its own propellant and does not have a cartridge case. A gun can fire cased or caseless ammo, but not both. |
The first four words of this quote are quite telling however, as they hint that more advanced rules concerning this topic will be included in Arsenal, due out Soonâ„¢.
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 10 2008, 10:22 PM
| QUOTE (Moon-Hawk @ Jan 10 2008, 05:13 PM) | ||
Is it possible to make a weapon capable of firing both, if you set out with that specific goal? Is this something expensive/difficult, or something inherently impossible? |
It's probably not impossible but it removes all the advantages of cased and caseless systems and lumps you with all the disadvantages of both, you'd also need some significant trickery. Caseless guns for example don't need a port to eject spent cases, which has the added advantage the gun can be equally used by right and left handers, and to fire caseless rounds successfully you need to invest significant additional work in a cooling system, because you don't have a big chunk of your produced heat invested in a convenient ready to eject chunk. This is a downer.
The trickery you'd need is a way for the breech and slide to handle differently sized/shaped bullets, though you could make it so the cased rounds had less explosives and stuff, this is potentially very difficult and may be the step to be labeled as 'impossible' With all the exra weight you've created you've probably defeated the reasons you'd go to caseless to begin with: You need right and left handed rifles still, you're rifle is heaver from all the extra bling bling required to handle cased rounds defeating the advantage of light weight ammo, etc.
That said caseless weapons are pretty immature in the grand scheme of things, and no-one has done it yet, and while it may not be impossible it would require a huge amount of extra engineering and needless production costs. So it would entail those two enemies of actually happening for a mass production weapon: difficult and expensive.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jan 10 2008, 10:26 PM
Cool, thanks.
Posted by: cndblank Jan 10 2008, 10:42 PM
| QUOTE (Cthulhudreams) |
| That said caseless weapons are pretty immature in the grand scheme of things, and no-one has done it yet, and while it may not be impossible it would require a huge amount of extra engineering and needless production costs. So it would entail those two enemies of actually happening for a mass production weapon: difficult and expensive. |
Difficult and expensive....
What is the middle name of the Pentagon?
Posted by: Mr. Unpronounceable Jan 10 2008, 10:44 PM
You know, I always figured that caseless ammo was probably pointless, since they may have developed a different method of activating the primer than the current firing pin...for example, an electrical impulse shouldn't leave any identifing marks on the bullet casing (other than the microdot batch# assuming black-market bullets would have those.)
Posted by: Stahlseele Jan 10 2008, 10:45 PM
| QUOTE (cndblank) | ||
Difficult and expensive.... What is the middle name of the Pentagon? |
target?
Posted by: Stahlseele Jan 10 2008, 10:46 PM
| QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Jan 10 2008, 05:45 PM) | ||||
target? |
enter sakura gun stage left *g*
edit:hrm, too stupid to propperly quote appearantly <.<
Posted by: Cthulhudreams Jan 10 2008, 11:51 PM
| QUOTE (cndblank) | ||
Difficult and expensive.... What is the middle name of the Pentagon? |
You've got it all wrong. The Department of Defense takes something easy and makes it hard. If they start out with something hard it never works.
Posted by: TheOneRonin Jan 11 2008, 05:27 PM
| QUOTE (Stahlseele) | ||||
target? |
Dude, I know you aren't American, but those of us who are would REALLY rather you not go there...
Posted by: Stahlseele Jan 11 2008, 05:32 PM
not planning on going there.
i do not like to fly.
also: look at the form of that thing, it's even got a bulls-eye in the center . .
Posted by: Fortune Jan 11 2008, 06:02 PM
Even some of us non-Americans think that shit is in bad taste. I don't see why you would need to be asked more than once to stop, after it is obvious you are being offensive.
Posted by: Moon-Hawk Jan 11 2008, 06:10 PM
*sigh* This is the sort of reason why the Department of Homeland Security has Dumpshock on their favorites list. Everybody wave.
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jan 11 2008, 07:06 PM
... 
Posted by: Ryu Jan 11 2008, 07:49 PM
And a nice greeting to the Verfassungsschutz as well!
Posted by: Adarael Jan 11 2008, 07:57 PM
I think y'all are overreacting to Stahl's joke. I mean, I didn't giggle or anything, but freaking come on, people. The Pentagon IS a target. It's been one since Russia was the USSR and got nukes.
Or are we forgetting that standard military doctrine held that the Pentagon and the White House were 'first strike' targets for almost 40 years, until the USSR realized that killing the people who could authorize a ceasefire was a bad plan?
Posted by: Kyoto Kid Jan 11 2008, 08:02 PM
...so is a certain location just south of Downtown Seattle with three letter code BFI.
Back in the Reagan days if it looked as if the missiles were going to start flying, That was where i was going to head. Better to go out quick than deal wit the aftermath. :mushroomcloud:
[edit]
...oh, forgot. [/derail]
...ok, like a civil defence fallout shelter, rather pointless at this stage of the game but it's the thought that counts, right?
Posted by: Fortune Jan 11 2008, 08:10 PM
| QUOTE (Adarael @ Jan 12 2008, 05:57 AM) |
| I think y'all are overreacting to Stahl's joke. |
No. I am reacting to his response when asked not to comment about a touchy subject in such a manner.
Posted by: Ryu Jan 11 2008, 08:15 PM
As non-american, I still understand that the Pentagon was not only a real target, but one hit rather recently, too. And I understand that some are righteously offended at such humor, even if they could have laughed before 9/11.
Posted by: Ravor Jan 12 2008, 05:50 AM
And as an American I get more offended by people who get offended by distasteful humor then the distasteful humor itself.
Posted by: Ryu Jan 12 2008, 12:38 PM
Yeah. Still, if you are asked to discontinue distasteful humor, you should do so. My own humor is rather black, I have no problems there
Posted by: knasser Jan 12 2008, 02:54 PM
| QUOTE (Moon-Hawk) |
| *sigh*Â This is the sort of reason why the Department of Homeland Security has Dumpshock on their favorites list. |
I thought it was because our entertaining and insightful banter helps pass the day. Or perhaps there are groovy gamer types at DoH who play SR after hours. Because I doubt anyone could consider a site where we have debates about whether the law would protect trolls from being charged higher apartment rents than dwarves is going to be the starting point for the dissolution of the Union.
And the fact that every third thread becomes a debate on ammunition types isn't going to worry anyone. No-one's going to overthrow the US government with home firearms (a web-server maybe).
But then again, if Dumpshock can be re-classified as anti-american, then I suppose it's one more bit of ammunition to justify the spending of all your (US Dumpshocker's) tax dollars.
| QUOTE (Moon-Hawk) |
| Everybody wave. |
Raises brown middle finger at xenophobes everywhere.
-Khadim.
Posted by: HalloranElder Jan 15 2008, 07:42 AM
Ok, back on topic here...
| QUOTE (Ddays) |
| So you roll sorcery + magic to deal force damage, ok. But the drain is a mere F/2 + 1. A combat mage can pretty much end fights immediately with a force 12 stunball everytime. The drain is only that of a force 4 fireball. That's insane. Especially potent since it's no more difficult to land the force 12 stunball than a force 6 stunball, there's no reason to not go for the quick kill everytime. |
The drain is not only that of a Force 4 Fireball.
That fireball is only Stun damage. It's a headache. Admittedly it's a bad headache, but once the run is over our Mage can go home, go to bed and get a good nights sleep and he'll be fine the next day.
The stunball however is Physical damage. It's internal bleeding and heart attacks and brain aneurysms and twisted intestines and strangled testicles and body parts dieing because of the sheer quantity of magical energy that's coursing through the magician's body. That's days of rest to recover at the very minimum, and by rest we mean doing absolutely nothing from waking up in the morning till going to bed at night.
This is a case of the players looking at mechanics and not bothering to take into account the actual "real world" (it's real to the character at any rate) repercussions.
So, Mr Stunball picks up X points of Physical damage from those Force 12 Stunballs he flung off. Well, his fingers might be bleeding for no apparent reason, which is going to make it rather difficult for him to hold only thing, blood is a rather slippery substance. He might have burst his eardrums and his ears are then bleeding, which makes hearing anything until he's healed rather difficult. How about bleeding eyeballs? That should make it difficult to see anything until it's fixed, won't it?
If making them bleed isn't your thing, how about other body injuries. We're dealing with Magic here, so there only needs to be a tenuous connection between the injury and the effect.
The arm he was casting with decides to break. No idea why. He develops paralysis from the waist down (which incidentally would cause his bowels and bladder to void about now). His stomach might rupture, spilling stomach acid into parts of his body that really shouldn't have contact with them, meaning that he's going to be in a hell of a lot of pain and probably very distracted. The list goes on (and I'm sure you are evil enough to come up with a good possible list).
Of course, this is all caused by magic, so after the requisite time in bed (as per the healing rules on page 242) he'll be fine, but there's the scars to consider. That broken arm? Screwed up the muscles a bit on that side, so there's physio for the next month or so. The ruptured stomach means he won't be able to eat spicy food again for a little while until it's finished growing back the lining properly. His pretty face has a ugly red line running across it that will require plastic surgery to remove. The broken leg is a bit shorter than the other one now, so his pants no longer fit correctly, and he needs special boots to be able to walk straight. Things like that.
With all this the character (and I mean character, not player) is going to be a little bit cautious in throwing those overpowered spells around so willy-nilly. That hurt, and the memory of what went down would probably require a Willpower check to be able to do it, with the Threshold increasing every time from the remembered pain.
Perhaps a couple of Force 6 spells would work better?
The players are beating you with mechanics. Don't try and fight back with mechanics, otherwise it becomes a one-upsmanship game, and no one wins that. Beat them with consequences. The over-cast should only be a last resort, it should never be first choice, so make sure the players understand why my showing their characters the results.
Enjoy
Random
Posted by: Fortune Jan 15 2008, 07:56 AM
First Aid works just fine to fix or minimize Drain damage.
Posted by: Ravor Jan 15 2008, 08:07 AM
HalloranElder, the things that you mentioned sounds like the types of things I'd expect from a glitch unless you also apply such things to mundane physical damage.
Personally I think that the IC trouble that is going to be caused by throwing around magical tac-nukes coupled with making magic in general a bit more hindered by smart security is more then enough to curb abuse.
Posted by: knasser Jan 15 2008, 09:10 PM
@HalloranElder: I like where you're coming from and I try to do the same, bringing in more description for Physical drain. Due to the nature of the SR4 rules, though, I keep it abstract enough to leave me descriptive wiggle-room.
However, this does remind me of the Severe Wounds rules in Augmentation. I haven't seen one result from spell drain (or anything) yet, but the potential is there and it could be a lot of fun. The glitches are unlikely, but 7 boxes of damage could happen. Perfect opportunity for the more disgusting and disturbing consequences of magic.
-K.
Posted by: Nightwalker450 Jan 17 2008, 07:50 PM
Anyone do a test to see if the mage gets knocked off his feet from drain? That would be fun to do, knock himself prone maybe one or 2 more stun damage as he hits the floor.
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