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Toxic_Waste
post Nov 19 2004, 07:31 PM
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There just seems to be something wrong with having the astral affect the physical and not the other way around.

Since we know there are several physical items that affect the astral, from that funky plant that block out astral bodies to magic weapons, there must be a way to create astral ammo. Disrupting an astral presence can be achieve with a enchanted weapon, why not with ammo?

Assuming the astral body is indeed a "body", magically active items should damage it. Ruling out flat out enchanting bullets, can anyone come up with a way to make bullets astrally active?

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ES_Riddle
post Nov 19 2004, 07:34 PM
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If you're playing in third ed, the astral can't affect the physical (except for dual-natured beings). From what I've gathered it only could in limited situations in earlier editions, too.
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Ol' Scratch
post Nov 19 2004, 07:35 PM
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What do you mean? Anything purely astral is exactly that; mundanes are completely safe from them. Even astrally projecting magicians have no way to affect the physical world unless they possess someone, order a previously summoned spirit to materialize and do their bidding, or other tactics along those lines.
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Toxic_Waste
post Nov 19 2004, 07:38 PM
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Spirits was what I had in mind, yes. They smack around even the most tooled up sammy, leaving you at the mercy of the team's mage. Who may or may not be competent.

Astral perception would be a must to pull any of this off, of course. Which rules out sammies. Still...
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Ol' Scratch
post Nov 19 2004, 07:38 PM
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If the spirit is smacking you around, it's materialized. You can attack them just fine, assuming you get past their armor.
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Toxic_Waste
post Nov 19 2004, 07:40 PM
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QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein)
If the spirit is smacking you around, it's materialized. You can attack them just fine, assuming you get past their armor.

Which you can't, unless you're packing a Panther around. So, shoot them before they materialize. There must be a workaround...
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Ol' Scratch
post Nov 19 2004, 07:46 PM
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A Shotgun with EX Explosive ammo will take down any spirit up to Force 5. If you're up against Force 6 or higher, you're fighting some kind of serious magical opposition, so you're stupid to go in without a mage or two with you to back you up. And even in those cases, you can attack them with your Charisma and Willpower... you'll probably fail if you're a munchkiny-type of sammy, but it's still an option.

Failing that, get a weapon with an elemental effect. A shotgun with rocksalt, a laser pistol, a taser, and a water cannon all punch right through a spirit's Immunity to Normal Weapons even if they're an elemental of that type.
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Shockwave_IIc
post Nov 19 2004, 07:47 PM
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Yeah be a real determined SOAB with a curtain rail.....

Or strength 8 with dual Spurs...
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Jason Farlander
post Nov 19 2004, 07:49 PM
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QUOTE (Toxic_Waste)
There must be a workaround...


Engage them in melee. Even if your Willpower is an unimpressive 4, using a weapon that grants a reach bonus can ruin a force 6 spirit's day (with reach 2), or at least provide an even playing field (with reach 1).
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Apathy
post Nov 19 2004, 07:53 PM
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QUOTE
Which you can't, unless you're packing a Panther around

The AZ-150 Stun Baton is only availability 3, and 1500 :nuyen: ; every runner should have one. It does 8S electrical damage and gives +1 reach, enabling any street sam the ability to go toe to toe with a Force 7 spirit (which is the most any starting mage can conjure without giving himself physical damage).

Alternatively, anyone with decent willpower and charisma scores can whack them in a contest of wills.

[edit] and munchy sams often have insanely high strength. Coupled with a spear (+4L damage, +2 Reach) they can pop any spirit even a high-level initiate could come up with.
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Toxic_Waste
post Nov 19 2004, 07:54 PM
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Or both. How about some dikoted spurs, lightly sautéed with alcohol and lit? Some fire proof gloves, similar to an old wolverine uniform...

Would that be considered elemental damage? The blades are on fire... :grinbig:
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mfb
post Nov 19 2004, 07:58 PM
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the fire would be elemental damage, yes. not the blades.
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Apathy
post Nov 19 2004, 08:05 PM
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varies based on GM; I'd probably say no. The most damage that your rubbing alcohol fire is doing is maybe 2L, but you could roll that as a separate damage code.

Effective mundane attacks vs spirits:
  • attacks with high power level (spears on strong chars, etc)
  • fire extinguishers/water cannons
  • flamethrowers/incindery grenades/molotov cocktails
  • tasers/stun batons
  • blast effects (explosives or grenades; subject to GM approval)
  • Lasers
  • Contests of will
  • attack the conjurer
I like the last one the best. Take the mage guarded by a full complement of elementals; if he goes unconscious, odds are at least one of the spirits will kill him themselves.

[edit] ... can't believe I forgot FAB! If you want to make a rules change that hoses mages, just decrease the cost and availability of FAB Strain 3. Have security teams walking around with aerosol cans of the stuff.
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Shockwave_IIc
post Nov 19 2004, 08:22 PM
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I personally believe strain 3 is WAY too dangerous for that kind of use......
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JavaLamp
post Nov 19 2004, 08:23 PM
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Toxic, what you need is dual natured ammunition! just get some of this dual natured organic stuff, give it enough nutrients to last a bit inside a bullet until you shoot it!
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vagranttimelord
post Nov 19 2004, 08:35 PM
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One thing I would like to state is that elemental effects do not completely get around the Immunity to normal weapons they only half the "armor rating" the power provides.... a force 6 spirit would still have 6 ballistic and impact armor....considered hardened.
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Ancient History
post Nov 19 2004, 08:38 PM
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Well, provided you come across an astral construct of a gun and astral construct of a bullet that said gun can fire, you could conceivably kill a magician's astral form.
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Shanshu Freeman
post Nov 19 2004, 09:15 PM
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QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein)
A shotgun with rocksalt

o really?

more info plz kthnx
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tjn
post Nov 19 2004, 09:20 PM
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QUOTE (Javalamp)
Toxic, what you need is dual natured ammunition! just get some of this dual natured organic stuff, give it enough nutrients to last a bit inside a bullet until you shoot it!


The Astral Plane does not follow Newtonian physics. There is no momentum, no inertia, no equal and opposite reaction. If two astral objects collide in the astral, they do no damage to each other no matter how fast the speed of thought is.

About the best yer gonna do, is somehow force a dual natured object into Astral Combat an unmanifested spirit. But enless the bullet's force is anywhere near the spirit's, the spirit is just going to slap it away like it was a gnat. And then get angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry.
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Apathy
post Nov 19 2004, 09:23 PM
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QUOTE
One thing I would like to state is that elemental effects do not completely get around the Immunity to normal weapons they only half the "armor rating" the power provides.... a force 6 spirit would still have 6 ballistic and impact armor....considered hardened.

But is then still vulnerable to an 8S electrical shock, and if your GM allows you to use staging on these effects (varies by GM) then you can raise the power of the damage code once it stages to deadly. Even without staging up the power, the spirit would have to get 6 successes on a Body(2) soak test to eliminate the base damage, and on average a spirit with 6 dice will only get 5 successes. It's not real efficient, but can work in a pinch.

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Toxic_Waste
post Nov 19 2004, 10:03 PM
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QUOTE (tjn)
The Astral Plane does not follow Newtonian physics. There is no momentum, no inertia, no equal and opposite reaction. If two astral objects collide in the astral, they do no damage to each other no matter how fast the speed of thought is.

About the best yer gonna do, is somehow force a dual natured object into Astral Combat an unmanifested spirit. But enless the bullet's force is anywhere near the spirit's, the spirit is just going to slap it away like it was a gnat. And then get angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry.

Well...which is it then? Two astral objects can collide in the astral without damage to each other, but a dual natured objected CAN damage an unmanifested spirit? 2 astrals can, or 2 astrals can't?

Well, assuming burst or full auto, unless it's a force 14 spirit I'm sure I could drill some holes in him... Now all that is needed is the ammo.

Couldn't a FAB derivative be used? Just a light coating of microbes or whatnot over the bullets, to make them "alive"? The whole "astral disruption" bit is what's got me stumped... not enough information.

PS: I don't like him when he's happy either :P
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Herald of Verjig...
post Nov 19 2004, 10:09 PM
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Astral combat can be forced, but usually requires the one forcing it to be living. The example in the books is a dual natured person in an elevator, the ward remains stationary, while the person is forced into a conflict with it by the movement of the elevator pushing him through the ward.

Against spirits, you need the entity to be cornered between multiple ward equivalent items so that they cannot simply side-step the slow moving projectile.
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DrJest
post Nov 19 2004, 10:44 PM
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Having been the GM for one player who went toe-to-toe with a spirit armed with nothing else but a cougar fineblade and a whole mess of attitude (it slices, it dices, it mooshes, it squooshes - truly a dream machine!) and played alongside another who killed a truly impressive fire elemental with his compound bow, I tend to think that getting a mage to banish a spirit is actually the painful way of doing it.
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BitBasher
post Nov 19 2004, 10:45 PM
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QUOTE
Well, assuming burst or full auto, unless it's a force 14 spirit I'm sure I could drill some holes in him... Now all that is needed is the ammo.
Does burst or full auto even work for penetrating Immunity to Normal Weapons?
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tjn
post Nov 19 2004, 10:45 PM
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QUOTE (Toxic_Waste)
Well...which is it then? Two astral objects can collide in the astral without damage to each other, but a dual natured objected CAN damage an unmanifested spirit? 2 astrals can, or 2 astrals can't?

Your assumption that Astral Combat and two astral objects colliding are the same thing is incorrect. Things can bump into each other without initating Astral Combat, but Astral Combat is only used when a) an entity chooses to engage or b) when it is forced to (see Herald's post).

QUOTE
Well, assuming burst or full auto, unless it's a force 14 spirit I'm sure I could drill some holes in him... Now all that is needed is the ammo.

Second mistake is assuming the power of the ammo has any relevance to the Astral Combat. Only the force of the material matters. Burst or Autofire doesn't matter one whit.

QUOTE
Couldn't a FAB derivative be used? Just a light coating of microbes or whatnot over the bullets, to make them "alive"? The whole "astral disruption" bit is what's got me stumped... not enough information.

Strain 1 FAB isn't dual natured. Strain 2 FAB has no effect on astral forms in it's airborne form other then preventing Fast Movement and giving a +2 perception modifier. Strain 3... well, it kills Astral entities fine on it's own.

So what's left? Gaurdian vines can't be uprooted. Biofiber is grown in large, flat sheets which is non-condusive to making into a bullet (remember they have to stay alive to stay dual natured, and the fact that MitS repeatedly hits the reader over the head with how fragile they are).

So... Strain 2, in a nutrient suspension housed in a capsule round is quite likely the best bet.

But the availability on the suckers is 12/2 weeks for a force 6 (which is strong enough to have a good shot) or 20/2 weeks to have the best shot possible.

And given the fact you'd only get one "encased nutrient colony" per roll, it would take anyone but the uber-face some time to acquire a clip.

So, we have our capsule round full of FAB-2 that took some doing to get, and not only do we have to hit the target (and without Astral Perception, yer firing blind with a +8 to hit), but the unmanifested spirit has to be unable to dodge the incoming projectile (through wards, aerosol FAB-2, or something).

And then, after all that work, the spirit could still beat the FAB in Astral Combat.
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