Spell locks?, How do these work? Options

[phydaux]

Hey guys! phy here.

I'm an old Shadowrun 2nd Ed player. Never played 3rd Ed. I'll be GM'ing a 3rd Ed game soon, though. The owner of my local FLAGS is letting me run a one-off demo game with pre-generated characters. Trying to see if we can drum up interest in Shadowrun in time for 4th ed to come out.

I'll brush up on the differances between 2nd and 3rd as time goes by. My question is regarding Spell Locks.

If someone wants a spell they don't know cast on them and have it made permanent, then need a spell lock. The problem is there is now an astral link from the user back to the caster. So, the question becomes "What fool in his right mind would ever cast and lock a spell on a stranger, regardless of how much they payed him?" The answer, of course, is no one.

So does that mean spell locks are worthless?

In past games I have played it that players can bind a spell lock with one point of good Karma, similar to how a Mage bonds a Power Focus. This allows PCs to get spells cast on them and be made permanent without astral trails back to NPCs. However, this ALSO provides a "ground" between the user and asteral space. Another mage in astral form can float by, spot the spell lock and cast a Powerball through the spell lock.

This provides a risk to go along with the utility of locked spells. The problem here is that the player isn't in any more danger with ten spell locks than he is with just one spell lock. Five or so carefully chosen spells all locked on one player can turn a starting character into a game-breaking Ubermench.

So one final solution becomes to make players only lock spells they know and cast themselves. This option recieves a LOT of pushback from players. Most of them don't want to spend any of their valuable Force Points on spells that plan to only case once. And yet it seems the only way to avoid a possible game breaking conundrum.

What do you guys say?