[SR4] What spells for a tomb raider mage? Options

[Knight Saber]

I came up with this as a concept for a character in a PbP game starting up. "A former archeologist-type corp mage, someone who showed all the care and attention to discoveries and native cultures that Indiana Jones and Lara Croft do while bringing things (Paranormal plants, animals or artifacts) back to the company to be exploited for profit." He or she found something extra-bad and quit, before or after having it exploited, not sure yet.

Anyway, I'm working off of my Former Wage Mage setup from a few months back. I have 8 spells slots... what would work well for this kind of concept?

Levitation (great utility spell, lifts things up, eliminates the need to climb)
Extended Detect Magic (The best way to find magical things to pick up)
Mind Probe (To get secrets from unhelpful locals)
Heal (There are no Doc Wagons out in the bush)
Stunball
Mana Bolt, Power Bolt or Lightning Bolt (Not sure here... Something to affect targets that Stunball won't touch, and to have a single-target spell. Two spells would be better, but points are tight)
Physical Barrier (A more useful defense and pursuit deterrent than Armor?)
Mob Control (I just like it).

Suggestions?

[Ancient History]

Catalog and Analyze Magic

[Matsci]

Spatial Sense, Extended. Nothing like mapping out an entire site in 3 seconds.

No on Analyze Magic. You can just assense stuff.

[Ice Hammer]

I would suggest Preserve (or a variation of it). Just for those times that you are digging up parchments or scrolls that if exposed to the elements will deteriorate on you. How much would that suck unearthing the one scroll that explains the meaning of life just for it to crumble and break a part in your hands!

Light would be a handy spell (unless you plan on doing any digs within a mana warp, which could happen). With such a small amount of drain (F/2-1), it would be very useful to keep sustained.

Mind Probe is a handy spell, but only if you understand the native language. IIRC, 3rd edition had a nifty spell called Translate that didn't seem to get carried over into this version, and would have helped with that pesky problem of understanding what the native population is thinking.

[SCARed]

though light can be useful, it's (for an archeologist) IMHO way easier to just bring some flashlights or stuff with you. or just play a troll or dwarf (well, concerning crawling through small spaces, the latter would be perfect). thermographic eyes let you see something even in perfect dark.

as for the second combat spell: i would go for lightnung bolt or flamethrower. or maybe acid. you cann affect everything plus it may be useful outside of comabt (light your campfire or decay doors/rocks ...)

[Knight Saber]

Spatial Sense, Extended. Nothing like mapping out an entire site in 3 seconds.

No on Analyze Magic. You can just assense stuff.

How does Assensing vs. Analyze Magic work out in practice though? Analyze Magic has a much larger die pool... your magic and spellcasting will both be 5 or 6. Sure, it's resisted, but who can afford an Int. that high and enough points on Assensing to get a comparable result? Plus spellcasting and power foci can help with the spell.

[Machiavelli]

I´m missing "analyze device" and "translate". You will have to travel a lot and speaking with the people in their mother tongue, will give you an advantage at con -tests. Shape earth could also be good if things start to fall down on you (e.g traps in pyramids)

[Ancient History]

How does Assensing vs. Analyze Magic work out in practice though? Analyze Magic has a much larger die pool... your magic and spellcasting will both be 5 or 6. Sure, it's resisted, but who can afford an Int. that high and enough points on Assensing to get a comparable result? Plus spellcasting and power foci can help with the spell.

Analyze Magic has its advantages. For example, you can cast it as a ritual spell...from a different continent. Nice way to gather information in advance without risking one's astral toes.

[HappyDaze]

Analyze Magic has a much larger die pool... your magic and spellcasting will both be 5 or 6.

For a great many early-game characters that I've seen, that's just not true.
In most early-game characters, Assensing is a good option and later, after some hefty karma has been flowing your way, then picking up Analyze Magic is probably more useful.

[Neraph]

For a great many early-game characters that I've seen, that's just not true.
In most early-game characters, Assensing is a good option and later, after some hefty karma has been flowing your way, then picking up Analyze Magic is probably more useful.

It is easy and feasible to start with a spellcasting dicepool of roughly 24, whereas starting with an Assensing dicepool higher than 12 is going to be interesting.

[crash2029]

I made a similar character, the adventuring archeologist, a nod to Indy and Lara.

Some spell suggestions:
combat sense + sustaining focus
clairvoyance
glue
magic fingers

[HappyDaze]

It is easy and feasible to start with a spellcasting dicepool of roughly 24

Why don't you show us this twinked out masterpiece? Then we'll see just how "easy and feasible" it really is.

[Ancient History]

Well, lessee. Start out with Aptitude (Spellcasting), Spellcasting 7 (Category Specialization +2), Mentor Spirit (+2 dice for a given category), Magic 6, and Restricted Gear (3) to buy a Force 5 Spellcasting (Category) focus gives us 7 + 2 + 2 + 6 + 5 = 22.

Not sure how you make up the extra 2 dice...I'm gonna say the rules tweak "Expert Aspected Magician." That'll give us:

24 dice for casting one category of spells (provided all categories are chosen correctly)
13 dice for casting all other spells
0 dice for all other magical skills (since the Magic rating and the -6 modifier from Expert Aspected Magician cancel out, this essentially reduces them to skill level), including counterspelling and ritual spellcasting

[HappyDaze]

0 dice for all other magical skills (since the Magic rating and the -6 modifier from Expert Aspected Magician cancel out, this essentially reduces them to skill level), including counterspelling and ritual spellcasting

This is the part that makes it far less than "easy and feasible" in my eyes. Still, dropping the Expert Aspected Magician will still leave a pretty high pool without so much crippling. However, it's min-maxed to the point that many GMs I've known would simply not allow it. And, playing with karma gen, it's pretty damn expensive.

BTW, why Restricted Gear (3)?

[Ancient History]

You're casting manabolts at Cthulhu and asking the street sam to help ladle the nourishing gruel into your mouth while the rigger orders its cleaning drone to change your diapies. Calling it twinked is not an understatement.

[easl]

Well, lessee. Start out with Aptitude (Spellcasting), Spellcasting 7 (Category Specialization +2), Mentor Spirit (+2 dice for a given category), Magic 6, and Restricted Gear (3) to buy a Force 5 Spellcasting (Category) focus gives us 7 + 2 + 2 + 6 + 5 = 22.

Not sure how you make up the extra 2 dice...I'm gonna say the rules tweak "Expert Aspected Magician." That'll give us:

24 dice for casting one category of spells (provided all categories are chosen correctly)
13 dice for casting all other spells
0 dice for all other magical skills (since the Magic rating and the -6 modifier from Expert Aspected Magician cancel out, this essentially reduces them to skill level), including counterspelling and ritual spellcasting

Yes, and let's look at that cost: 10(aptitude) +28(skill) +2(specialization) +5(mentor spirit) +75(magic) +15(restricted gear) +5(force of focus) +15(resource cost of focus) = 155 cost. Before you've bought any spells. And you can't summon spirits. His initiative is low too. This guy's got "glass cannon" written all over him.

Now here's something else to think about. A mage with a dice pool of 20 will average about 1 less Hit/roll. And that can be achieved with practically no tweaking at all and high Edge (which your mage above can't really afford to have).

[HappyDaze]

I still want to know why Restricted Gear (3) when only one high-availability item is being taken.

BTW, Magic 6 = 65 BP.

[Ancient History]

Y'know, that was my bad. I don't know what I was thinking adding the (3).

[easl]

BTW, Magic 6 = 65 BP.

That's right, the first point is free. But I forgot to add in the cost of aspected magician. I think even lowering the build cost by 10 points, its still a glass cannon with very little mechanical benefit over what can be achieved without tweaking. Though it was interesting to find out *how* that dice pool could be made, I don't see much worth in it.

[Wasabi]

Spatial Sense, Extended Range mixes well with Astral Window, Extended Range. Astral Window is an assensing form of Clairvoyance that can go through a ward. That way as your mapping and you have blanks where the wards are you can see what magical things are inside the ward, the force of the ward, the astra signature compared to others you see, etc., all from your lounge chair on the surface. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Some other good ones are "Detect Traps", "Detect Diseases" and "Detect Toxins" since these are major threats in confined spaces. For validity of Detect Traps I point to Detect Firearms. Both are complicated machines. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

"Yo guys, got some HMMVV in the side shaft of..." [points to AR map] "...this passage and..." [points to AR] "...this is the Force 8 ward hiding it. The HMMVV is on a mystic adapt of tradition <blah>". There is a trap with Fugu-5 in the walls at this intersection and..."

Etc., etc.

[Octopiii]

It is easy and feasible to start with a spellcasting dicepool of roughly 24, whereas starting with an Assensing dicepool higher than 12 is going to be interesting.

Interesting... 17 is about the best I have gotten out of a starting character without making major sacrifices. I am quite curious how you made that work!

[treehugger]

Analyse device is quite interesting : first it enables the mage to be able to drive for exemple any vehicule, witch is quite interesting for travels, and second, you can analyse traps and all kind of all devices to get their uses and disarm them.

[Wasabi]

In practice Analyze Device only grants a couple of dice for complicated machines.

Lets say you want to pilot a submarine. You cast Analyze Device on a friend at Force 6 and get 6 hits with your presumably massive dicepool. You beat the OR table by 1 and get 1 net hit. Combined with your ability to default without losing a dice you've gained TWO dice. If you cast it on yourself the sustaining penalty means you've gained no net dice to pilot the sub.

Its better with low tech items like a table leg. You have Analyze Device tell you how to swing it. The club has OR of 1, You get 6 hits, 5 net, and no longer count as defaulting for a net gain of 6 hits. If cast on someone else then the sustaining penalty is bypassed and it is a detection spell after all and thus ranged [from the target you touch when you cast it] so its good for seeing how to operate a trap without touching it!

[Knight Saber]

The die is cast! Everyone else had their characters up, so I had hit a deadline. Went with the Guardian as the pistol for its burst fire and recoil compensation. Money got tight, so there's no stacked armor (though no one else seems to be doing it and I didn't want to look like a munchkin powergamer tweaker, plus layering is your enemy in hot climates). There's also no backup gun. Dropped Dodge to use the Gymnastics part of Athletics, also for the reasons above, taking some Infiltrate. There are lots of good spell choices, but I went with Improved Mask. Being able to turn it on and have some other scent is extremely useful in dodging trackers, among other things.


Street name: Jade Lotus
Real name: Li Mei-Ling

Race: Human
Sex: Female
Height 5' 4" Weight 130 lbs Age 27
Hermetic mage, archaeologist tomb raider.
Cash 2100 nuyen

Attributes
Body 3
Agility 4
Reaction 3
Strength 2
Charisma 3
Intuition 4
Logic 5
Will 4

Edge 2
Essence 6
Magic 5
240 BP

Qualities (0 BP)
Magician 15
Cursed 1 -5
Spirit Bane (beasts) -10

Active Skills 116 BP
24 Spellcasting 6
16 Summoning 4
8 Assensing 2
8 Binding 2
12 Counterspelling 3
6 Perception (Visual) 1 (3)
6 Infiltrate (Rural) 1 (3)
20 Athletic Group 2
4 Survival 1
6 Negotiate (Bargaining) 1 (3)
6 Pistols (Automatics) 1 (3)

27 Knowledge points
Chinese (N)
English 3
Sperethiel 2
Arabic 2
Latin 2
Spanish 1

Archaeology 4
Magical Theory 4
Fourth World History 2
Parazoology 3
HK Action Trids 2
Mystic Sites 2
International relations 2

Spells: 24 BP
Heal
Physical Mask
Stunball
Power Bolt
Translate
Extended Spatial Sense
Levitate
Mind Probe

Contacts 8 BP
Customs official 3/1
Talismonger 2/2

Focus Bonding 2 BP

Resources 10 BP 50000
Spellcasting focus 2 30K (Amulet)
Savalette Guardian 800
10 clips normal heavy pistol ammo 290
Quick-draw holster 100
Armored Vest 600
Renraku Sensei w/Mangadyne Deva OS 1800
PocketMage Library (1) 600 (Ars. 67)
Goggles (3) with low-light, Smartgun, Flare Comp, 800
Glasses (2) w/ flare comp, image link 125
Trideo Camera (1) with low-light 200
Periscope 50
Optical Binoculars 50
Micro-Flare launcher 50
3x Micro Flare 75
8 x light stick 40
Low-light flashlight 25
Medkit 3 300
Stim Patch (6) x4 600
Grappel gun with 100m of microline, + rappelling gloves 620
Gecko Tape Gloves 250
Survival kit 100
Survival knife 50
Water purification tablets (2 bottles) 10 (Ars. 53)
Desert goggles 15 (Ars. 53)
Snake mesh socks 50 (Ars. 54)
Scent-masking cigarettes x10 100 (Ars. 64)
Fake SIN (4) 4000
Fake Magic License (4) 400
Fake Spellcasting Focus License (4) 400
Hermetic Lounge (5) 2500
Middle Lifestyle 1 month 5000