Mages and Stim Patches, are they as bad as everyone thinks? Options

[James McMurray]

I hear a lot of people saying they would never use stim patches on their awakened characters because they're "bad". However, if used with a little restraint stim patches can be a great way to offset drain.

Using a rating 2 stim patch with a magic rating of 6 gives you a 0.002% chance of failing to roll at least one 2. Should you somehow manage to do that, you still have a only a 27.778% chance of rolling below a 6 on the magic loss test.

Using a rating 3 stim patch you have only a 1.0877% chance of not rolling any 3s.

As your magic rating increases through initiation stim patches become even less scary. At magic rating 9 you have close to a 0% chance of not rolling any 2s. You have a 0.463% chance of not rolling any 3s. At magic 12 you can use a rating 3 stim patch and only have a 17.83% chance of failing.

And of course, as your magic rating grows your karma pool also grows, giving you a reroll or 2 to ensure you don't get screwed.