Neraph's post in this thread here got me thinking.

Free Spirit as PCs would make for fantastic allies I think, but the current rules, even with karmagen make them a woefully inadequate choice compared to a summoned one.

I was wondering if anyone here has considered or looked at house ruling to make Free Spirit PCs more playable?

- J.

Granted I've GM'd only two play sessions with an out of box Free Spirit PC but he's pretty powerful as is. Several times solving problems faster and easier then a normal PC could. Astral travel alone a huge benefit. Mix the near teleport abilities of astral travel with his fear and movement powers and he's all over the battle turning the tide in the PC's favor.

Drawback at the start seems to be defense, but he's doing a good job of staying out of the line of fire so far (unassuming manifest form helps too). That and he's got to have a teammate carry around his new toy (commlink).

Can't really compare a Free Spirit with a normal metahuman stat wise and say hey he's a wussy. The other factors make all the difference.

I'm comparing oranges to oranges - free spirits vs other spirits (including other free spirits).

- J.

well i made and played a free spirit for a short time. the gm told me to use karmagen and this is what i ended with. gm gave it a look over and his approval and we started play. im not much of a sr4 player but i was told he was pretty good. and i had no troubles holding my own while playing.

Schwartzvald
free spirit
radiation toxic

body 4
agility 4
reaction4
strength4
intuition4
logic5
charisma4
willpower5
edge 6

force 6

qualities
negative
signature 10
distinctive style 25
positive
quick healing +2 to heal
focused concentration +2 agaisnt drain.

willpower+logic=drain

skills
agility
exotic weapon polearms4(specialised scythe)
blades4
unarmed combat4
infiltration 4
exoctic ranged weapon elemental attack 4
reaction
dodge 4

intuition
perception 4
assensing 4
shadowing 4
tatooing 4

logic
armorer 4

magic
spellcasting 5
counter spelling 5
astral combat 4
ritual spellcasting 4
arcana 4
enchanting 4

charisma
con4
etiquette4
negotition 4


knowledge
magic theory 4
magitech engineering4
philosophy 4
poetry 3

language
latin 4
sperethiel 4
cityspeak n
japanese 4

spells
stunbolt f/2-1
manabolt f/2
manipulate metal f/2 +2
acid stream f/2 +3
toxic wave f/2 +5
shatter shield f/2 -3
power bolt f/2 +3
powerball f/2 +1
lightning bolt f/2 +3
heal dv-2

spirit powers
influence 2 charisma+force against willpower
guard .5 prevent accidents
elemental attack radiation 3 bypasses armor dv 6
pschokenisis .5 equal to magic+willpower test


contact
street mage 6/6
magic researcher 3/3
talismonger 3/3
Laughlin Free Spirit 6/6

First of all, your link goes to the Shadowrun forum, not a specific thread (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

We've never had a Free Spirit as a PC, but, I assume you're talking about SR4... I'm not sure if it's different in 4, but in 2 and 3, Free Spirits are completely non-playable as well, they are immune to normal weapons... And if that was taken out of SR4, shame on them. Immunity to normal weapons was the only thing that made them scary. Well, that and that they can't be killed...

Really, it's just not realistic to play a free spirit as a shadowrunner. They don't need to make money, as they have no particular need for it, (don't eat etc.) And unless they are a friend of (or forced by) someone, they probably have no real motivation to further the goals of random Johnsons that would hire them. And, since free spirits cannot get karma on their own, from experiance, they have to get it from other people via a ritual, which is also not conducive to PC play.

So, as I said, unless Free Spirits have been completely re-written (to not be free spirits anymore), they probably just SHOULDN'T be played.

I haven't done the sums but that cannot be legal, even with karmagen.
I'm presuming this is your character as it stands today - not at the time it was created...

- J.

With KarmaGen you don't have to pay the 250 point cost. ..

its what i started with plus 2 sessions worth of karma. so not too far off. and the gm did the numbers with me while i made it so im pretty sure its legal. also like the other guy said you dont pay for race in karmagen. of course if anybody actually wants to reverse engineer it im fine. i dont play sr4 (im an sr3 guy myself) so its possible there are some miscalculations.

Wow that helps.

- J.

But fortunatly it is realitic to play an awakende Metahuman warping reality with his mind. It completly does not depend on the kind of campaign you play, too.

FYI: we now have official rules for playing free spirits as PCs.

It does. You don't pay the racial cost in Karmagen. But you do pay for the raised stats. That elf who gets +2 CHA, well, the cost of his first +1 to CHA from buying attributes is based on 3 rather than 1. For that elf, CHA 4 - 8 will cost more than a human's CHA 2 - 6.

Yeah, I gathered that =D I don't know where the rules for them are, or I don't have the book. Do spirits not have Immunity to Normal Weapons anymore? Or just not Free Spirits, or Just not PC Free Spirits? Or... Do they still all have it?

That was really the only real reason that I thought they shouldn't be PCs.

(my last post came out a bit more condescending than I meant it, I was just shocked about PC Free Spirits, sorry about that all)

Yeah they get immunity to normal weapons. Its just only listed under Materialization power.

<deleted>

Oh wow. Well, that in itself is worth 250 bp then, IMO. I'm not really sure if I like the Karmagen system. But well, that's unrelated.

Thanks for the info.

True, but Spirits and AIs don't have those initial boosts. They start at 1 across the board.

LAWL

I dont know what game you been playin, but it aint SR4.

You're correct. I have never played SR4. That's why I was asking about it. What I know about SR4 is from reading through a couple of the books and from here on dumpshock.

My group plays second edition.

Why was my post funny though? I don't get it.

Because Immunity to Normal weapons doesnt even qualify as much more than "maybe a little resistant to normal weapons, except Stick & Shocks"

Oh... so, it's not (Force) points of natural hardened armor anymore then? Not that I recall if armor works the same in SR4or not... ah well. Hey, if they're balanced (or weaker) than everything else, I have no qualms with them as PCs.

Actually, it's Magic (Force) x 2 Hardened Armor - which is moderately better than Magic x 2 Normal Armor.

It's Force*2 Hardened armor, which for anything under Force 6 doesn't mean much (and anything under Force 3 means "armor, what armor?").

And at force 8+ it means "I laugh at your pitiful HMGs".

Yeah. There's a fine line on how "good" hardened armor is before it's "too good" and likewise the line on where it becomes "useless."

Ex. Drakes have hardened armor 4. Good luck ever dealing 4 or less damage.

Not quite correct. Free Spirits start off at Force 2 and their attributes start at Force. Then again, the section regarding Free Spirit PCs is a bit vague on the attributes part, especially with the verbiage stating Force is their minimum and maximum attribute rating.