I actually a letter published in the Swedish PCgamer for ranting about how they dare making a Shadowrun game and not making it a RPG.. Never mention that blasphemous game again.. its easy to slip on the trigger (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Aside from ruining the challenge/point of high-security facillities, I think the real reason teleportation and metaplane dimension-shunting isn't possible/easy is this:

Bug Spirits.

Imagine if a whole hive could just drop in without needing to shuck their bodies and posses one of ours?

That brings up an interesting concept, though: What if someone discovers how to replicate that method of inter-planar transportation? Imagine hopping over to the metaplanes, then hopping back and trying to inhabit Joe Wageslave to get past security--permanently dumping your body in the process.

Even worse, imagine an elite magical security force that can jump into anyone's body to apprehend you. Shit, I think I just created the agents from The Matrix.

let us not bring up the Malformed Mangled Monstrosity from Microslot. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

However, on subject of teleportation ,back in SR1, the Gm tossed my street mage a teleportation spell. Drain code from Hell and very short ranged( about 100meters max if I remember correctly). I only used it maybe twice. It wasn't a game breaker but ended up just not worth the drain. He explained it as dragging your physical body into the astral for a split second.
It did bring up an interesting moment though. the team was in a rapidly failing aircraft over a tributary of the Amazon. The plane was barely flying and everyone was preparing for a splashdown when Wormwood, my mage gets a brain storm. Turning to the rest of the team, he smiles and says "see you on shore, suckers!" and casts his little astral jaunt spell. luckily, he popped back in about 20 meters from shore and skipped a couple of times before crashing into the thick jungle foliage. Hence the rule "never teleport from a moving vehicle." (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

Personally, I like the idea that some things just can't be done with magic(yet).

Part of the problem with teleportation is the problem of being able to move information faster than the speed of light. If you can do that, it's essentially time travel, for some reasons that are better articulated by theoretical physicists than me. Something about essentially being in 2 places at the same time, and being able to exploit that to break the laws of physics. But I don't see why Shadowrun couldn't have some kind of teleporter-thing that moved you as data across the matrix, at standard matrix transmission speeds. It'd have to be ridiculously expensive, extraordinarily rare, and maybe limited to smaller things, but I don't see how it'd be game-breaking.

But as far as magic not allowing such a thing, it's pretty hardwired into the rules and would require some serious retconning by the devs to get rid of.

To some people, this applies to SR4 too.
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

"If you think it, it can't be right."

It wouldn't ruin shit. Wards should still block out teleportation, so there's no problem of high security facilities being tele'd in and out of with ease.


Not a problem. For one, there is NO MOVEMENT faster than light or any other. there is simply ceasing to exist at one point and simultaneously coming into existance at the other. Physics and magic don't have to agree perfectly. Look at the Movement power for a greeat example of this.

"If you wrote it, it's probably shit."

Wards don't block anything. They just make it more difficult. Likewise, everything in the universe, basically, would have to be uber-warded so as to protect just about anything of any value. Else your average street mage could teleport in and take whatever he wanted, no one the wiser.

It would also suck the other way around. Tracking down criminals or anyone else would just be a matter of sending a few watchers or spirits out and, once found, an entire cabal of mages teleport in and have their way with them. No matter where they are. No matter how entrenched they were. And non-mages would have practically no defense against such a thing at all.

It would essentially turn the entire game world upside down. Magic would be too powerful, teleportation spells would pretty much be a requirement for anyone capable of working magic, and... it just goes on and on.

Unlike other game worlds, Shadowrun at least tries to make the implications of magic in the world plausible. It's not like D&D where you have to completely suspend your disbelief in order to ignore the practical applications of several spells and abilities and how they would impact the world. Teleportation magic being a prime example, but also the power to create something out of nothing, the ability to turn lead into gold, and all that hubabaloo.

To some SR4 is more Shadowrun than other editions have ever been. It is all about change however and SR4 was the first massive change to the game-system - people tend to dislike change, just like mass does. Sometimes mass has to be moved.

On the topic... there is not much news here, teleportation is not part of SR and I am very glad about that. Coming up with ways on how to get into, through, out of some areas is fundamental part of the game concept.

True enough. Though hypothetically they could make a "slowportation" spell I guess.

Something where your transit speed is far lower than the speed of light.

But still I wouldn't like it for gameplay reasons.

The only thing I might allow is something that makes metaplanar teleportation possible for players. But they'd know that actually using the method is a good way to show up at location with less availible edge for having to deal with the terrors found on the way.


Oooh maybe there's a metaplane that wants to make that an easier process. Hmmmm I could have a Cthulhuriffic good time with that it might go into my game.

Although I'm glad that unrestricted Teleportation is a no-go in the Sith World, I don't think something along the lines of being able to teleport between two places that were prepared beforehand would really be that game breaking.

Oh and something to think about, everyone's favorite IE is supposed to have either 'ported or shunted himself into the metaplanes/astral.

If you simultaneously cease to exist at point A and resume existence at point B, then you're moving faster than the speed of light, as your travel took exactly zero time. Light, however fast it might be, takes greater than zero time to get from point A to point B. No matter how you accomplish that, through magic or technology, you run into problems with the way the world works. Again, I'm just trying to paraphrase what I've gotten from Physics textbooks, Wikipedia, and other sundry sources. If you really want to debate it, there must be some resident physics grad student here on Dumpshock.

Hmm, it was my understsanding that at least at a Quatom Level teleportation coudl exist with no problems what-so-ever. But then again I have never claimed to be a physics student. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

Anya: Actually, she just wen't airborne. It's flahier, impresses the locals, but it's not as fast.
Xander: As what?
Anya: True teleportation. *vwoomp*

/buffy






Not to mention what teleportation would do to state borders. Can you imagine trying to impose trade tarrifs or check passports when a mage can easily bypass your checkpoint for a handful of credits and 5 minutes?

It may not be game breaking, but it would dramatically change the face of the setting. Things would be so different that it would take a while to figure it through. It changes all sorts of things on all sorts of scales, in ways that we've not really experienced, which makes changes more difficult to predict.

Not a physics major myself, but the whole point of using teleportation to go faster then the speed of light is because you aren't actually moving, per se. Light goes from point A to point B by visiting point C and all the other points in between. Teleportation (as it is understood in popular culture) is something else, allowing you to 'cut out the middleman' as it were, by whatever means that particular fictional universe uses. Occasionally, teleportation is also used in science-fiction to describe deconstructing someone atom by atom, beaming the schematic for them to boint B and then reassembling them (a-la Star Trek) but this is usually different to magical teleportation, and is limited by the speed of light (or by the speed of whatever that particular sci-fi universe has used to circumvent the speed of light).

As for quantum teleportation, I'll leave that for someone more qualified.

As understood by physics transit of mass/energy/information as transluminous speeds is impossible. This does not rule out use of wormholes however, or that magic need not necessarily adhere to laws of physics, as if it did, SR magic couldn't exist in the first place.
Some physics theories indicated the universe is full of microscopic wormholes all the time, so a spell would simply enlarge a local one at your origin, with an exit near your destination. The metaplains route is also a good one, just need to find a way into and off of the meta planes physically, and you can bet it would be less then subtle, but would defeat all wards just as metaplains travel does for spirits. Either way there are many potential problems with such travel. Now if you had the portal take several minutes to form, and be real flashy, ahla terminator time travel, I'm sure it wouldn't be worth drawing that much attention to your point of exit, and cut down on the use of it radically.

So what if I made a spell that turned me into light and allowed me to move at 186,000 miles per second? That would not be outside the realm of possibility since there is already a spell that will turn you into a critter right?

I don't remember if it was here or on another forum, but I remember a discussion that ended with the idea that such a spell would basically be an ELE as the Mage exploded. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

However in my campaign you would have to overcome two problems, firstly you would have to figure out a way to survive enough drain to make a Great Dragon explode into chucky salsa even with Edge. And lastly you would have to figure out a way to sustain a spell when you are no longer a sentiant being capable of using Magic in the first place.

It might be possible to arrange things so you Astrally Project just as the spell is cast, and then sustain the spell and guide your body to it's new location from the Astral. The real problem I see (besides the hellish drain this spell would have) is what happens when some of the light that makes up your body gets scattered or absorbed by the atmosphere.

I fully support the concept of some things simply not being possible - teleportation being one of them.

That said, I have designed a spell that can be used as a not-quite-teleportation - Astral Form. Similar to Astral Projection, except while sustained, you become wholly astral, including your body. I have not yet tried to get it into any game because, while I can explain how it bypasses the "spells cannot affect both the physical & astral", I am not quite satisfied with my justification.

As far as balance is concerned, I point at Free Spirits. While I still debate with myself about if they should be allowed as player characters, & they suck in their current form, they do have this ability, & are now official player options (excluding Missions).

Naw, because you can't cast spells on the physical plane while projecting, so the Mage is SoL.

I think the most plausible and survivable way would be to pull a Laughing Man and simply rip a hole in the Astral that you can physically step through and then move at Astral Speeds to your destination. You get something that appears to be teleportation while not breaking Sixth World Magical Theory.

Of course, after the shit that Big A's Astral Experiments are supposed to have caused I sure as hell would not want to be in the shoes of the Mage who figured this trick out.

http://xkcd.com/465/

I never said you did. You do not cast the spell while projecting, you cast the spell & while sustained, it forces you to "project".

Similar to that, yes.

My (in my view, unsufficient) explanation of how it does not break magical physics - spells may affect the Astral or the Physical, but not both simultaneously. This one would affect both with a single casting, but not at the same time; it would shift it's effects from the Physical to the Astral.

If anyone else happens to have another explanation of how it could work, I would greatly appreciate it. I do not want to try using this spell until I feel I can appropriately explain how it works without breaking the laws of magic.