Questions only gameplay can bring..., 6 rule related questions Options

[TKDNinjaInBlack]

So while planning out character development and troubleshooting some rough spots while gaming, I've compiled this list of questions I need answered.

1. the metamagics of Flexible Signature and Masking... does an adept first have to possess the astral perception adept power to even learn these metamagics? It makes sense to me, but it is not a prerequisite to either
a)learn either of these,
b)use flexible signature to reduce the amount of time of an astral signature lingers or change your astral signature
c) mask to appear mundane, change apparent level of magic

Astral Perception (and in turn Assensing) is only necessary to forge someone else's astral signature. If one was just changing their own into something random to not be identified later, it seems that it's not necessary.

Astral Projection is necessary for using masking to change the appearance of your astral form, but to get the other uses of masking to change the apparent level of your magic or appear mundane, it seems one doesn't need to have the ability to even detect these things. Am I right about these two powers?

2.Power Focus... Since according to the rule book it says a Power Focus feeds a Magician's Magic directly does that mean it significantly alters limits that are related to a magician's magic level? could a magician with magic rating 2 and a power focus of rating 4 effective cast spells at a force 6 without overcasting or is he still limited to a Force 4 spell that's overcast? I always played it as it was just a dice poll modifier and it didn't affect the limits of force levels, but reading it again recently, the wording seemed a bit ambiguous to me. It would make their astronomical price seem a bit more applicable, but might be game breaking...

3.In the Full Defense section of the Combat chapter, Full Parry is listed as reaction + (melee combat skill x 2) does that include all melee combat skills? If someone is defending completely unarmed, they could still full parry? I referenced the initial parry defense (Defending against Melee p.147 SR4) and it says use the appropriate weapon skill. This is misleading as it implies that one can only parry with a melee weapon and only block with unarmed. Can one not also parry with their unarmed skill or block an attack with a melee weapon (exotic melee, club, or blade) skill? In Arsenal, the martial arts style of Aikido and Karate can grant bonuses to full parry which would imply that full parry could and would be used with those weapon-less styles.

4.Attacks of Will...The martial arts of Tai Chi and Kiai can give up to a +3 DV on attacks of the will. Does an astral combat attack count as an attack of the will considering that it uses Willpower, or are attacks of the will strictly just the willpower + banishing roll under the Attacks of the will section (p. 94 SM)? It would be poetic and wonderful if training in a soft, spiritual martial art like Tai Chi Chuan would allow one to add damage to their astral combat attacks, but the wording is pretty specific and I don't think this would work. The maneuver Focus Will helps with a +2 die modifier for its bonus to willpower based tests. It would appear that this bonus could be used for both astral combat and attacks of the will, but the Kiai/Tai Chi possible +3DV for attacks of the will doesn't translate to astral combat. It would make sense considering a majority of astral combat takes place between astral entities and not dual-natured martial arts Tai Chi Adepts (despite how cool this would be).

5.Freeze Foam- With initial results, Gamebreaker, plain and simple. I had a couple of corporate HRT extraction squads frozen in place in their own vans with freeze foam grenades. A few games later I had a bunch of Octagon Triad flunkies freeze foamed into a hallway. I wanted to try to figure out what kind of area or diameter my player's "freeze foam grenades" had, and found that they didn't exist. He was just using the gas/spalsh grenade with chemical template and dumping freeze foam down. I read up on freeze foam and found out that it's pretty much only used by medtechs, and riot cops as per the description. I don't think it can be applied to a splash grenade. If you went by the rules, that grenade explodes and everything in a 10m radius is encased in a 20m diameter ball of (if rating 6) armor/structure 6 material that they can't move from because they are pinned. The pure physics of it didn't make any sense to me, despite the example the player was using to illuminate his idea of it (in the movie Demolition Man there's a scene where the cop car crashes and Sly has to break out of hard encased foam that had filled the cab to prevent damage to the occupants during the collision). Upon closer inspection of the rule however, this wouldn't be the case because freeze foam doesn't expand, just harden. It would be more similar to squirting it from a hose like the riot cops would use (Ares Fogger Glop Cannon p.123 Arsenal), or squirting it from a dispenser over a broken limb and it hardening into a cast like the the description says the medtech professionals do. From here on out if the player chooses to use them his grenades in the more realistic described fashion, the grenade blasts are going to spray a shell of liquid out and things will be covered in a layer of freeze foam that shortly hardens and depending how covered and the rating of the foam, I'll assign an appropriate modifier. Sound Fair?

6.We still haven't developed a full grasp of astral combat (not the actual skill, but otherwise damage). We had a scenario last night where a Wujen was projecting and casting some pretty hefty kill spells on awakened party members who were dual natured (our shaman and his materialized beast spirit). Simultaneously though, our sneaky thief B&E expert had found the cars where the opposing team's magician and rigger were holed up. He dumped a flash bang in through a window he kicked out with his hydraulic jack legs and let it go boom. The magician took enough damage from the concussion of the grenade reverberating back and forth in the car to get knocked out cold, but he was already projecting and engaging our shaman astrally. How does a GM handle the? Technically the already unconscious physical body just took enough damage to knock out the NPC under normal conditions. Does that stun damage knock out and disrupt the astral form into unconsciousness and it returns to the body? Does the projecting astral form continue to wiz around on the astral with a full stun track? Can one even take stun damage on the astral? Is there a separate astral and physical damage track like with hacking and personas? This would make sense considering astral physical attributes rely on mental attributes and therefore could actually increase or decrease an astral condition monitor by referencing astral body (willpower).

Halp PLZ!