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> There are no street signs on Astral..., getting from point A to B on astrally
Dragnar
post Feb 5 2010, 11:39 AM
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Muspellsheimr is right, most of the discussion is moot. You don't need to actually "find your way". Astral entities travel at about 6000 km/h, so they don't actually "see" their surroundings anyways, because they're too fast. It doesn't matter if they'd recognize the streets if they would.
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Dahrken
post Feb 5 2010, 11:48 AM
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More accurately, they can travel *up to* such a speed, but nothing prevent them from taking their time and enjoy the travel.
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Semerkhet
post Feb 5 2010, 02:24 PM
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QUOTE (Dragnar @ Feb 5 2010, 05:39 AM) *
Muspellsheimr is right, most of the discussion is moot. You don't need to actually "find your way". Astral entities travel at about 6000 km/h, so they don't actually "see" their surroundings anyways, because they're too fast. It doesn't matter if they'd recognize the streets if they would.


Your choice. I chose to interpret that rule as meaning that a magician can imagine themselves in a place if they are familiar with it. I chose to rule that spending ten minutes with Google Earth (or equivalent) doesn't make a magician familiar enough with a location to just instantly travel there with no error. Magic has enough iWin buttons without me consistently ruling on ambiguous wordings in ways that make the magician's life even easier.
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nezumi
post Feb 5 2010, 02:52 PM
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So what test do you use for mages to find their way? What modifiers do you include?
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Semerkhet
post Feb 5 2010, 03:07 PM
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QUOTE (nezumi @ Feb 5 2010, 08:52 AM) *
So what test do you use for mages to find their way? What modifiers do you include?

As I mentioned before, I use a standard Intuition+Navigation Test. I give DP penalties if the character is unfamiliar with area they want to find. For context, the mage in my group has only been in Seattle for a couple months and is totally unfamiliar with 99% of the sprawl. So I usually start with a -5 DP penalty, making it difficult for him to succeed with no directions. On the other hand, I balance bonuses and penalties based on how good the directions they've been given are. Again, as I mentioned in an earlier post, studying high-resolution satellite (or streetview) imagery will reduce the penalty to perhaps -1. I increase the Threshold only if the location they're traveling to is particularly hard to find; i.e. just one crappy cinderblock house among millions in the slums of Lagos.

I would allow an "Astral" specialization for Navigation. A magician could spend a couple points for one level of Navigation and a couple more points for the Astral Specialization and end up with a DP of 7-8 for this test.

My intent is not to gimp fast Astral travel to locations they are familiar with, but to mildly put the brakes on the insta-scout abilities of magicians in totally unfamiliar terrain. Obviously YMMV.
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nezumi
post Feb 5 2010, 07:34 PM
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I don't play SR4, so I have no 'intuition+navigation test' to refer to. Is there anything else in that mechanic (aside from familiarity) that should be included?
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Semerkhet
post Feb 5 2010, 08:13 PM
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QUOTE (nezumi @ Feb 5 2010, 01:34 PM) *
I don't play SR4, so I have no 'intuition+navigation test' to refer to. Is there anything else in that mechanic (aside from familiarity) that should be included?

Hmm, from a SR3 perspective your only lever on difficulty is changing TN, correct? In that case, aside from familiarity (or lack thereof) I'd give bonuses for map study or really good instructions. If they had a very high resolution VR environment that took them to the place they were going and let them wander around an accurate virtual replica of the target, then I wouldn't even make them roll. I'd penalize if the target location was very hard to find by virtue of being lost among similar targets, lack of good landmarks, or out in the middle of wilderness. That's about it, I guess. What's the SR3 equivalent of a Navigation Test? It's like SR4 has completely erased my memory of SR3. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
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nezumi
post Feb 5 2010, 09:21 PM
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I don't think there is an SR3 equivalent of a navigation test (which is why I ask). I was wondering if there are penalties for prevalence of unusual structures and such.
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Semerkhet
post Feb 5 2010, 09:30 PM
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QUOTE (nezumi @ Feb 5 2010, 03:21 PM) *
I don't think there is an SR3 equivalent of a navigation test (which is why I ask). I was wondering if there are penalties for prevalence of unusual structures and such.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by prevalence of unusual structures. I'd guess it would be a bonus to have unusual structures in the area, in that they would make better landmarks to navigate by.

I haven't developed it any further than that because it's not really a big deal in my game. I've spent more time thinking about it in writing these posts than I ever did when making the rulings during a session. Anyway, I'm just giving you fair warning that this is all my opinion because, as has been pointed out, you could easily decide that the wording of the passage in the rules means that a magician could be given a street address, or shown a picture, and they unerringly travel to that location at 6,000 kph.
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nezumi
post Feb 5 2010, 10:17 PM
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QUOTE (Semerkhet @ Feb 5 2010, 04:30 PM) *
I'm not sure I understand what you mean by prevalence of unusual structures. I'd guess it would be a bonus to have unusual structures in the area, in that they would make better landmarks to navigate by.


Imagine these two situations. In one, you're looking for a set of coordinates on the strip in Las Vegas. Look it up on the map and figure out where it falls between the giant sphinx and the crashed spaceship. Compare this to coordinates in the middle of a pine forest. It's right between the one big pine tree, and another, fallen over pine tree. You mentioned SR4 has a test for this. I'm just wondering if there are any more rules they came up with that I can steal.
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Professor Evil O...
post Feb 6 2010, 08:32 AM
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For astral navigation under SR3 I'd have the player roll either a navigation or survival knowledge skill check (or default to INT) with a base target # of 4. I'd further allow the use of an appropriate knowledge skill as a complementary skill. So if the character had a skill like Tacoma astral space or gang turfs, they'd get extra dice (and as complementary dice, any successes count half toward the total). I'd modify the target # using the same table as vehicles to account for things like terrain (tight or restricted terrain being lots of identical buildings or a forest) or lighting (number of active auras). The GM should then set a base time he thinks the search should take and divide by the successes rolled.
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Snow_Fox
post Feb 6 2010, 04:26 PM
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yeah a great example is to try navigating via google earth with the labels turned off. those street level stuff are fun but can be tricky-or fun.
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