Do mages have it too easy?, They get new spells awfully quickly... Options

[Kurukami]

In one of the shadowrunning games I've been in, mages were effectively the be-all and end-all of ass-kickers. Fast because of certain house rules effectively granting them magically wired reflexes, heavily armored unless you threw absolutely disgusting amounts of firepower at them, and with enough mana to roast legions of samurai and assassins with barely the blink of an eye. Hell, one guy had the equivalent of a Citymaster-style combat vehicle where he put a ritual circle in the back. Apparently, he once researched a new spell there on a drive back from a run in the Salish-Sidhe. Research time? Oh, four or five hours.

I, on the other hand, focus mainly on decker characters. The rules in Matrix are pretty straightforward -- it takes you a damned long time to code out new programs, just as it should be. Otherwise, advancement comes far too quickly -- though the MPCP limits the extent to which that might be possible.

I just find myself wishing that the scales didn't seem so definitively tipped in the direction of mages being uber. Has anyone implemented house rules of some kind that made things a bit more, well, equal?

(By the way? The aforementioned mage was at some disgusting level of initiation. 11 or 12 or something like that. Of course, this was mainly because the GM allowed the spending of cash to gain Karma...)

[Sphynx]

We came across a similar topic some time back in our group and House Ruled that you pay, in karma, what you would pay to learn a skill to that level/Force. So, a Force 6 spell cost the Mage (assuming your Essence was 6, the linked attribute) 1+3+4+6+7+9=30 Karma.

The trouble was that suddenly nobody cared about or wanted to learn new spells. :P Not that that's a big deal or anything, I personally always start out with a good 20 spells in my repertoire, but it changed the advancement of Mages alot. We un-did the rule some months ago going back to the old ways, and I've just now learned my 3rd new spell having spent 9 Karma where I would have spent 30 in the House Rule system. Personally I thought it was a good House Rule, but I was out-numbered immensely.

Sphynx

[Herald of Verjig...]

By the books, mages are no more "uber" than other character types can be until around 500 or more karma. In their element, and wielded well, mages can be very effective, but deckers can rock in their element as well.

I think your game house ruled mages into omnipotence, either that or no appropriate countermeasures were used.

For spell research time, research and learning are two different events. Research may happen quickly, but the times to learn high force spells get a bit absurd, especially with the TN of double the spells force to learn it. Example: a force 6 spell requires the mage to achieve a 12 using sorcery (and magic theory as a complement, and a few other potential sources of extra dice) to learn the spell in 6 days. If the mage can get 6 or more successes, that same spell can be learned in 1 day. No successes means 6 wasted days and you can try again later.

[edit]Learning a spell can never take less than one full day's effort[/edit]

[The White Dwarf]

Yea, and thats just learning. If you want to design your own spell its a whole other skilltest you have to make too. Im not sure how even going fast would make mages better ... the way sorcery and spell pool work multiple actions isnt exactly what it seems. While a well placed spell is worth its force in sams, mages are far from the be all and end all of anything except magic. An out of the box troll sam with ambidexterity and dual franchis is, um, shall we say rather destructive. Not that I am for or against such things, just pointing it out... Maybe if you had a specific problem you wanted help on, because to a general "are they too good" the answer is a sound "no", theyre pretty well balanced within the system.

[hobgoblin]

iwould lvoe to hear more about that houserule that gave them amgical wired reflexes, allso i would love to see the level of spells and how many initiations the mage in question have gone tru...

one must never forget that a spell with higher effective force then the casters magic rating will do physical damage to caster, and casting magic on the astral will do physical damage to caster no matter what!

i am very mutch mroe afraid of a move by wire, hardend military armor sammie then i am with a mage unless he have something like 500-1000 karma under his belt...

as for that magic circle, the diameter is equal to the rating of the spell so a rating 6 spell is 6 meters across. i have yet to hear about a car that broader then say 3 meters (and even that may be pushing it). allso, every sircle is used for one task, andone task only. you have to make a new one unless your going to redo the same task (like summoning more elementals of the same type). if its a shamans lodge then it needs to be in the eviroment of the shamans totem, and i belive that no totem allows for a mobile lodge (could be misstaken tho)...

allso, for hermetics, never forget the library demands, any magical action besides spellcasting and commanding (not summoning) spirits demands one library or other of atleast the same force as the action done...

[Matrix Monkey]

House rule? since when is quickening increase reflexes a house rule? :P

[Lilt]

Mages are extremely powerful, perhaps too powerful, but only if the player knows how to use them.

[TheScamp]

[Ancient History]

Considering the karma costs (mages have up to seven primary active skills, and initiation, and foci, and ally spirits), amgicians blast through karma like speed junkies. Cheap spell costs and astral quests to lower them are fairly reasonable.

[Hunter]

Did you forget about that fact that you have to roll forcex2 on a sorcery test (I think) in order to learn the spell? Try rolling a 12 with six or eight dice. Heck, try rolling a ten.... :S

[Hot Wheels]

A good role player and a good GM can keep mages in line. They are powerful given the chance to prep pretty good, but in a quick throw down, my wired reflexes will have a gun out and speaking before they can cast a spell.

Now, Snow fox has started refering to me as a muggle when we're not gaming, hmm.

[Hunter]

As least you're not a moogle. ;)

[Zippo]

[Person 404]

[Hero]

>Zippo

There where a lot of sustained duration spell that you discribed, a bit to much in my opinion. If he using all sustaining foci to sustain the spells, that is a large amount of foci, and with that a large amount of karma too (you do know you have to bond them). The mage can also suffer from foci addiction if he has to many foci activated at one time, if the total force of the his foci (active) are more then twice the mages magic rating he must test for magic lose (foci addiction pg 45-46). Besides I would never be have that many sustaining foci at one time, there are better things to spend that karma on, like increase skills and/or adding skills, learning spells, improving already known spells.

:rotate:
A Anti-Materials Rifle (.50 BMG or larger caliber) can take care of that uber mage easily, I am using the firearms rules off of Shadowrun and Firearms brought to us by Raygun the resident gun expert. They are meant to destroy vehicles and the like, that have a considerably better armor then any human or mage (yes even the uber mage will be downed by the Anti-Materials Rifle) can ever have. So what is the fix for that uber mage in the group, have a sniper that has a fixation for rifles with a caliber larger then .50 BMG (I suggest the one that uses either a 20x83mm, 14.5x114mm, and/or 15.2x170mm cartridge, oh the fun).
:rotate:

[ShadowGhost]

Inivisble mages are easy to take out.... Ultrasound vision ALWAYS sees them - so it's a +4 modifier to hit them, for a base target number of 8 (short range is assumed).

-2 for smartlink, and use shot rounds in a Burst-Fire shotgun with an autochoke set to a 3 meter spread at the target, for another -3 to hit, so now base target number to hit is 3.

For the mage to dodge it's base TN 4, + 1 for BF, + 3 for spread, for a final dodge of 8.

Damage - Base 8S. BF - 11D. - 3 power for spread - 8D. Two bursts, not counting net successes. Even with high ballistic and impact, they're still looking at rolling off 2D, twice, with probable multiple successes to roll off first, before staging down damage, with a generally low body.

Even if the mage isn't killed outright, he's now got injury modifiers to all target numbers to cast.

Mages who can go three times in a combat turn are spreading their Magic pools out over three passes, and are vulnerable to other mages if they don't allocate Spell Defense. A mage with an armor spell? He glows like a neon sign, even if he is invisible.

[Sphynx]

Just an FYI on the UltraSound, you still have to beat them in a Perception vs Stealth test. That's kinda the idea of having a Stealth skill. :P

As for Glowing like a Neon Sign even if he is invisible, that's an interpretation and not a Canon ruling. Purely up to the GM and most accept that Invisibilty does indeed hide that glow.

Sphynx

[Fortune]

[Kurukami]

[Clipwing]

[Sphynx]

I've had great success with it, but that could be because our GM usually gives modifiers based on situations. Hell, just being invis gives a modifier usually, even with UltraSound because that's not a natural vision (unless you're an Adept). So what you see is little more than density, and movement, not a full color spectrum like vision. If I'm standing still when someone with UltraSound is passing by, I can't imagine not getting a modifier. :P

I have a Stealth of 5, and almost always roll over a 6 (I can't remember not rolling at least a 6 on it actually) and to roll a Perception roll requires the person to spend a Simple Action (not something that you roll without a reason). As long as I don't give someone a reason to look for me, I'm good, so "passing through a room with two average people" is rarely a problem. :P Those that have reason have a TN equal to my roll plus my GM's modifier. I get found more often than I like, but I also get past more often than the GM likes.

Sphynx

[Zippo]

[ShadowGhost]

[Bölverk]

[TheScamp]