Well but the Jail is being run by SAFECRIME Inc. Keeping UCAS safe from career criminals.

You're in their jail, with no records, and they're not getting paid for you.
So they do one of 4 things
1) they let you out.
(*giggle*snort*laugh*)
2) they give you to a nice psychopath as a playtoy
3) they kill you (bullet, strangulation, what ever)
4) they put you into their underground arena blood sport, until you die.

Yep, so you'd better have a sin, or you're screwed. With a sin, it could be some kind of processing error after being picked up for drunk driving, if you're sinless, you don't have the right to even make that case.

I'm all for some limitations on SnS ammo. Not staging damage for net hits as an example. That aside, it's already an expensive ammo and for most targets it's just as simple to kill them via lead poisoning. Otherwise the proposed changes merely further propogate the arms race of player v GM. If your group doesn't have a mage and you have a F10 spirit sent at you, I would worry WAY less about it and worry way more about A: your GM being a possible dick and B: you have a mage that can throw around a F10 spirit, because this means they can also sling F10 stunbolts.

I just don't allow elemental effects to bypass ItNW the way they can mundane armor. So many of the physical limitations of the metahuman body and bodyarmor do not actually apply to spirits, like for example, spirits are not actually made out of matter, they don't have vital organs, they don't have nervous systems, or physiologioes to be poisoned, etc.

That's what the rule actually says anyway, these guys just get "creative" in how they read it.

And for that reason sound wouldn't help disrupt that water or earth spirit? Water won't douse that fire spirit? Fire won't burn that beast spirit? Well hell then, why bother having a mage pick up elemental spells at all? In fact, lets extrapolate this further then.


Mystic Armor grants additional B/I armor. Do you halve it by elemental effects? After all, it's magical. It may not possess ItNW but it doesn't possess the "physical limitations of the metahuman body and bodyarmor" because it isn't "actually made out of matter".

/devil's advocate

The Allergy weakness specifically says that ITNW is ignored when being attacked by the allergen (i.e. water on a fire spirit). And the Sonic Rifle totally ignoring ITNW and making a spirit nauseous is so goddamn stupid I can't believe many of you advocate it with a straight face. They don't even have ears.

I actually have been tempted to interpret mystic armor this way. And make it unable to be reduced by called shots.

But the fact is they arent depandant of those even when playing RAW, i posted a small list back there with force and what weapons easily kill them, unless their uber spirits(force 10 and up)
a gun slinger can kill them easy peacy and S&S isn't even close to best option for doing that, infact it just doesn't work on force 7+(unless you have awesome shooting dicepool).

It just baffels me how many people are cooking up needless nerfs for ITNW and S&S.
ITNW really isn't a problem except for uber spirits, but those should be really hard to kill.
And S&S really isn't nearly as good as some people here advertise it beign.

My current gm just banned anything that makes me cackle like a psychotic maniac as I figure out ways to use it in new and unusual manners to totaly surprise folks... usually in lethal manners.

What can I say... I once had to explain how to use a paperclip as a weapon

I still don't get this... no matter how many times I hear it. Prior to VR 2.0 sure, but after? I mean 4.0 still has the matrix map, they just call them nodes now rather than hosts.

I just ban everything between the introduction and the index.

That was actually more in response to a phys ad using elemental fists to emulate sonic or a mage dropping a sonic attack spell.

But I ask you honsetly: Why wouldn't a flame thrower, electrical discharge weapon, [something that shoots acid], bypass the ItNW even without the allergy? If a mage throws a fireball at a spirit of man he gets 1/2 impact against is like anyone else. Why wouldn't a man portable flame thrower have the same effect? The magic actually created a physical fire. I fail to find a coherence in your rulings.

It's still magical fire, you resist it with Reaction + Counterspelling.

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 resists with Body + HALF IMPACT armor (+counterspelling, if available).

Elemental effects: many indirect combat spells utilize damaging elemental energies such as fire damage, electrical damage, etc (see Special Types of Damage, p. 154). These spells are resisted by only half the impact armor rating (round up), as noted.

You were saying? This means the book treats a magical fire spell exactly the same as a flame thrower.

And that is where the rules kind of go meh....

Ironically in 3rd edition Shadowrun, elemental effects halved the hardened armor of Immunity to Normal Weapons. So in 3rd edition, flamethrowers would halve a spirits Immunity to Normal Weapons hardened armor.

Rules are kinda like clothes. If you don't like the way they fit into your game, talk to your players or your gm, depending on which side of the table you're sitting on, and tailor them to fit. If people played rpg's strictly RAW, they'd rack up insanity points faster trying that than catching Cthulu stepping out of the shower reenacting a full frontal scene from Boogie Nights.

If its something the spirit is stated as to be alergic to then possibly, otherwise, no.


Nice summary, glad I didn't have to explain it.

Oh man, I'm going to have to post up a demo for the 6th World's favorite Reality Show, Mike Irwin: Ghost Puncher, aren't I?

[Mike Irwin is a trained and dedicated karate-man. His LUDICROUS PUNCHES are not to be attempted at home.]

In today's episode of Mike Irwin: Ghost Puncher, Mike is traveling to the highest levels of the ACHE where the batshit-crazy Matrix entity, Deus, tortured and slaughtered thousands in wacky experiments! Not a good place folks! Let's join the action, already in progress, with everyone's favorite Orkish punch-up artist MIKE IRWIN!

"Hiya gents! Mike Irwin here! I'm on the 210th floor of what used to be the Renraku Arcology here in beautiful Downtown Seattle. Now this site was the home of many powerful mages who were all liquidated immediately upon Deus' takeover of the Arcology, so there's an awful lot of energy here. Not as much negative energy as elsewhere in the ACHE, but the energy here is extremely powerful [background count of 2 aspected to the Spirit.] Let's see if we can stir something up, eh?"

"OY! Ghosts! Come out and take ya medicine!"

"Cor blimey, that's a big one. Looks like a Force 10 at least! I'm gonna go punch the life out of it.
[musical cue]

Prelim: mike uses Elemental Strike [sound] for -full AP DV P->S. Background Count negates: Attribute Boost [strength], Commanding Voice, Combat Sense (1), and Penetrating Strike (4)

Pass 1 - Initiative: (Spirit - 29) vs (Mike - ADRENALINE SURGE)
Mike - Uses a free action to call the spirit a sissy. Holds his other actions.
Spirit - Materializes in front of Mike with a complex action. Uses a free action to make a rude gesture.
Mike - Uses a complex action to beat the tar out of the spirit. 5 net hits! Lucky lad! DV = 16S -full AP Spirit soaks 4 Damage, taking 12S. Yikes! It tacks on Edge. 3 more hits, damage is down to 9S, he's still in there. Mike takes Interrupt action to use Finishing Move, immediately making another attack on the Spirit. 3 net hits! The wary Spirit has no intention of taking any more of these LUDICROUS PUNCHES. It uses Edge to re-roll misses, reducing the net hits below 1. He's made it to the 2nd pass, folks!

Pass 2 - Initiative: Ok the spirit wins. Not a contest.
Spirit - Enraged by the fact that this piss-ant Australian just nearly disrupted him in a single deft move, the Spirit attempts to turn the tables by puffing up and using its Fear power. 7 net hits! Mike would be in real trouble now if Spirits weren't so predictable. Naturally he took a handful of Guts before he came up here. He is a professional Ghost Puncher, after all.
Mike - Still reeling from that biffed Finishing Move takes a free action to sarcastically pretend to be scared of the Spirit. It's really quite funny.

Pass 3 - Initiative: Spirit -"Wait, we're having a 3rd pass?" Mike - "Yip."
Mike - Swings again at the Spirit. Deciding that maybe it's time he spent some Edge to connect he spends a point for a re-roll. The spirit returns in kind. 2 net hits! This Ghost can't catch a break! 13S damage gets soaked to 9S. Spirit spends 4th point of Edge to try and survive. Soaks 6 more to bring total down to 3S. How about those exploding 6s, folks? Mr. Ghost still has 3 points left in his damage track.

Pass 4 - Initiative: Spirit - "Oh come on!" Mike - "I spent Edge. Get with the tempo, mate."
Mike - Not frelling around, pulls the same trick as last time. Blimey! 12 hits! The Spirit can not afford to be hit again, so it throws its Edge up front, bypassing the 20DP cap and going on a full dodge with 40 dice (after wound modifiers and previous attack penalties.) 11 hits!? Mike pulls 1 net hit! Soaking 12S, and using a 6th point of Edge, Mr. Ghost scores only 6 hits. 6S is enough to do it. Mike has just whalloped an effective Force 12 Spirit of Man in 3 seconds flat with only half his regular Magic rating!

Well folks, that just goes to show that with a bit of luck (well lots of luck,) proper planning, and aggressive action a 400bp Bio-Physad can KO a massive Ghost before it has the chance to figure out what's happening. See you next time on The Ghost Puncher!

Under standard RAW that's not true. Once you are processed you have a criminal SIN. you are in their records, and they are getting paid for you.

Except that with the 10 Point version of Erased, that Criminal Sin disappears after 24 hours... so now, you are in a prison with absolutely no records of why you are there...

Anyways...

Eh, sound affecting spirits like that is pretty meh too. I would not allow full AP deduction. Half just like any other elemental effect.

hey Max, not to go over a super dead topic again, but could you find your list from before or just throw a few ideas out re:ItNW and say, disrupting a force 6 spirit? Thanks.

Also, this super-powerful spirit from the example must be missing his super high LOG and INT:-)

My current GM is banning the infected in his future games.

Why?

I play an effective mage.


Yeah, I dont get it either.