Ritual Spellcasting with Material Links

Ritual Spellcasting with Material Links

phasmaphobic View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 09:57 PM Post #1
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 169 Joined: 13-December 05 From: Portland, OR Member No.: 8,070	I don't have my SR4 book on hand. Have rules for using Material Links in ritual spellcasting been included yet in 4th Edition?

stevebugge View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 10:07 PM Post #2
Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,026 Joined: 23-November 05 From: Seattle (Really!) Member No.: 7,996	Not in the Main Book, you'd have to houserule it for now.

phasmaphobic View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 10:11 PM Post #3
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 169 Joined: 13-December 05 From: Portland, OR Member No.: 8,070	One of my players, his character is currently seaching for his missing son. Character and son have not communicated in years, but now character (Reg) is aware of danger to his son, and seeks to find him. Son wore a pair of dog tags, once belonged to his deceased ex-military mother, and he never ever took them off. Reg found them, and intends on having the group's detection mage try to use them to locate the missing son. Sound viable?

stevebugge View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 10:14 PM Post #4
Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,026 Joined: 23-November 05 From: Seattle (Really!) Member No.: 7,996	Sounds doable to me, unless he's behind some sort of astral barrier (held within the confines of an active lodge, in a warded cell, or something similar). You could ask the GM if a bonus dice or two sound reasonable for a strongly linked item like the dog tags, but there is no rule it would just be the GM's call.

phasmaphobic View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 10:20 PM Post #5
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 169 Joined: 13-December 05 From: Portland, OR Member No.: 8,070	Ah, see, I am the GM =) I actually DO want this to be possible, as it could seriously speed up some sluggish plot development. I'm just trying to figure out how it woulr work with 4th edition.

phasmaphobic View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 10:24 PM Post #6
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 169 Joined: 13-December 05 From: Portland, OR Member No.: 8,070	Actually, now that I'm looking for them, I cannot find any rules for using Detection spells with rituals. The ritual rules in SR4 state that they can be used on targets beyond visual range, but then the rules go on to state that a target must be visible by one member of the ritual team. How do rituals affect detection spells, where being able to see the target before casting would eliminate the need to cast the spell?

stevebugge View Member Profile	Jun 30 2006, 11:10 PM Post #7
Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,026 Joined: 23-November 05 From: Seattle (Really!) Member No.: 7,996	Easy way around this. Don't use a detection spell, use a maipulation like influence to send a message or a control spell to get the subject to call home. You could also just use an astral Tracking test (extended test Assensing + Intuition, 5 hour interval) for locating the subject eliminating the need for a ritual altogether, though you may not be able to recognize the location from astral if you aren't familiar with it, you can't read the street signs ;) Using the Astral Tracking test you probably could use Ritual Casting to put Clariaudience or Clairvoyance on the right area. Mindlink would be an ideal spell for a ritual, as it actually uses targets. More general detection spells or area spells probably are hard to use with a ritual casting. Again all of this is starting to fall in to the realm of GM's call but if you need it to work to advance the plot it's a lot easier to use the old "this time only prinicple" than in most parts of the game.

hyzmarca View Member Profile	Jul 1 2006, 01:37 AM Post #8
Midnight Toker Group: Members Posts: 7,686 Joined: 4-July 04 From: Zombie Drop Bear Santa's Workshop Member No.: 6,456	My recomendation is to provide bonus dice for astral tracking or reduce the threshold. The material link is connected to the character in question so it is only a matter of seeing the astral threads and following them to the target.

phasmaphobic

Jul 1 2006, 01:41 AM

Post #9

Moving Target

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Looking through the Magic in the Shadows book, I came up with this derivative conversion of the Linking process (copy-pasted from my Campaign's Wiki):

CODE

Material Links

(roughly converted from the Third Edition magic rules expansion book)

According to normal SR4 ritual rules, you or someone in your ritual group must see a target in order to ritually cast a spell on them. However, with Material Links, you can overcome this need, although it can be much harder. When using a link as part of a Ritual Casting, an additional step is added to the process. This step, called the Linking Test, is added in right before the casting test. When performing the Linking test, use allocated dice from the ritual casting dice pool. Those dice, once used for Linking, cannot also be used for the casting of the spell. If you have a magical focus somehow bonded to the target, you get bonus dice to this test equal to the rating of the focus.

Linking takes a number of hours = Force of spell divived by success from the test. If Linking is successful, the spell can be cast as normal. If unsuccessful, skip the casting test, and all participants must resist drain as if the spell had been cast.

Linking Test Tables

TARGET'S LOCATION THRESHOLD
City or county known 4
State/Province/Country known 6
Continent Known 8
Location Unknown 10

TARGET IS LINK IS THRESHOLD MOD
Living Thing Biological None
Living Thing Non-Biological +2
Nonliving Structural None
Nonliving Non-Structural +5

I mostly pulled those thresholds out of my ass, and figured for dramatic purposes, I'd allow non-bio and non-structural samples to be used for living and nonliving targets, respectively.

Thoughts?

Da9iel View Member Profile	Jul 1 2006, 03:41 AM Post #10
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 556 Joined: 28-May 04 From: Moorhead, MN, USA Member No.: 6,367	Seems kinda tough to me. Threshold 12 to find someone with their beloved stuffed bear? Whose got 36 dice to chuck around before even casting a spell? Not that I think it should be easy, but sheesh!

phasmaphobic

Jul 1 2006, 03:44 AM

Post #11

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QUOTE (Da9iel)

Seems kinda tough to me. Threshold 12 to find someone with their beloved stuffed bear? Whose got 36 dice to chuck around before even casting a spell? Not that I think it should be easy, but sheesh!

Suggestions?

Perhaps merely lowering the threshold, or perhaps making it an extended magical test?

Cold-Dragon View Member Profile	Jul 1 2006, 04:28 AM Post #12
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 753 Joined: 31-October 03 Member No.: 5,780	Provided there's no interference, and you don't botch anything, the extended test makes more sense for 'searching' since that's the sole purpose. However, there aren't exactly rules for it, so they gotta be winged. An alternative might be to use the ritual to 'advance' the limits of a detection spell. For example, can extend the ranger further through successes or something, or use them for successes. Then you use the resistance table in SR4 that's normal for detection spells, and use it across the 'new' range of the spell. Of course, if the son isn't in range, then you won't sense him (or he's protected) but if he is in range and you got a few successes, you'll know he's in a particular direction. ...That is, if I'm rememberin the detection spell mechanics. >.< Also depends what style detect spell you use.

Kalvan View Member Profile	Jul 1 2006, 02:57 PM Post #13
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 174 Joined: 21-May 06 Member No.: 8,583	Looks like we have to wait for Street Magic for this one.

phasmaphobic

Jul 1 2006, 06:09 PM

Post #14

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QUOTE (Kalvan)

Looks like we have to wait for Street Magic for this one.

Not really. THat's what house rules are for =)

Aaron View Member Profile	Jul 1 2006, 11:08 PM Post #15
Mr. Johnson Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,148 Joined: 27-February 06 From: UCAS Member No.: 8,314	I, for one, hope they do not have rules for material links in Street Magic. There have already been a number of changes in the SR4 rules to remove all of the crap that makes it so that Shadowrunners have to burn down every room they were in to avoid DNA analysis and material linking. How easy is it for a AAA to have a few uber-magicians who can trace shell casings back to their owners and blow them up every now and again? Sure, that would be expensive, but you only have to do it once a month or so before the 'runners start to get nervous about hitting the big guys. It seems to me that the whole Haley's Comet thing strengthened the barrier between physical and astral space. That would explain the absence of grounding spells from the astral, the lack of astral signatures of non-astral objects, and the lack of material links. And I, for the sake of keeping the game stylish and fun, hope it stays that way.

phasmaphobic

Jul 1 2006, 11:18 PM

Post #16

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QUOTE (Aaron)

I, for one, hope they do not have rules for material links in Street Magic. There have already been a number of changes in the SR4 rules to remove all of the crap that makes it so that Shadowrunners have to burn down every room they were in to avoid DNA analysis and material linking. How easy is it for a AAA to have a few uber-magicians who can trace shell casings back to their owners and blow them up every now and again? Sure, that would be expensive, but you only have to do it once a month or so before the 'runners start to get nervous about hitting the big guys.

It seems to me that the whole Haley's Comet thing strengthened the barrier between physical and astral space. That would explain the absence of grounding spells from the astral, the lack of astral signatures of non-astral objects, and the lack of material links. And I, for the sake of keeping the game stylish and fun, hope it stays that way.

Wait a sec... you're hoping they take out an awesome component of the magic system just because you have an unruly, paranoid, dungeon-crawling group of players (or are one yourself)?

I've never once played with a group that paranoid. I've played with Gms (and Gmed myself) who use lots of ways to track runners, by spell signatures, casings, and more. But it has never once been annoying.

Samaels Ghost View Member Profile	Jul 2 2006, 04:36 AM Post #17
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 984 Joined: 15-June 06 Member No.: 8,717	I don't know... What exactly qualifies as a Material Link? If shell casings or slugs in dead guards can be ritually tracked back to unfortunate 'runners then the game is pretty much up. Security companies/Corps would start investing a lot of money in Ritual Detection specialists to track down runners. And they have the resources to do so. If this sort of thing was possible then how did those assassins get away with offing Big D? doesn't make much sense... What about ways to ensure that you don't leave impressions behind on the stuff you leave behind? There has to be some way runners can protect themselvess from that sort of detective work.

phasmaphobic

Jul 2 2006, 04:39 AM

Post #18

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QUOTE (Samaels Ghost)

I don't know... What exactly qualifies as a Material Link? If shell casings or slugs in dead guards can be ritually tracked back to unfortunate 'runners then the game is pretty mich up. Security companies/Corps would start investing a lot of money in Ritual Detection specialists to track down runners. And they have the resources to do so. If this sort of thing was possible then how did those assassins get away with offing Big D? doesn't make much sense...

What about ways to ensure that you don't leave impressions behind on the stuff you leave behind? There has to be some way runners can protect themselvess from that sort of detective work.

Technically, in 3rd edition, they can't be used that way. To cast a ritual spell on a person using a material link, the link has to be biological. To cast a ritual spell on an object, the link has to be part of its integral structure.

Bullets cannot be used to magically cast a spell on a non-visual-range person, unless the bullet were somehow made from that person's DNA.

Samaels Ghost

Jul 2 2006, 04:48 AM

Post #19

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QUOTE (phasmaphobic)

Bullets cannot be used to magically cast a spell on a non-visual-range person, unless the bullet were somehow made from that person's DNA.

COOOOL! That would be such a sweet 'calling card'!!! Dangerous and SWEET! :D :grinbig: :D :grinbig:

hyzmarca View Member Profile	Jul 2 2006, 05:09 AM Post #20
Midnight Toker Group: Members Posts: 7,686 Joined: 4-July 04 From: Zombie Drop Bear Santa's Workshop Member No.: 6,456	In SR3 there is a metamagic called Symbolic Linking that allows a magician to create a ritual link from an object connected to the person. AH wrote a nice piece of fiction about a character who assassinates people by kidnapping random strangers, using plastic surgery to make the random person look like the target, and then using Symbolic Linking to kill them both at the same time. Unfortunately, when some posters pointed out the fact that the story read like a piece of snuff porn AH decided to remove it.

Samaels Ghost View Member Profile	Jul 2 2006, 05:16 AM Post #21
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 984 Joined: 15-June 06 Member No.: 8,717	What's wrong with snuff? :\|

Aaron

Jul 2 2006, 05:36 PM

Post #22

Mr. Johnson

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QUOTE (phasmaphobic)

Wait a sec... you're hoping they take out an awesome component of the magic system just because you have an unruly, paranoid, dungeon-crawling group of players (or are one yourself)?

I'll bite; what's awesome about it? The fact that one can replace real legwork with a couple of dice rolls simply because you have little kidnapped Jimmy's teddy bear? Or perhaps the fact that a corp can frag a runner because she bled a bit at the site?

QUOTE (phasmaphobic)

I've never once played with a group that paranoid. I've played with Gms (and Gmed myself) who use lots of ways to track runners, by spell signatures, casings, and more. But it has never once been annoying.

Having a nice GM is great. But while hand-waving things like being tracked down by corps is fine on a GM-by-GM basis, it's a crappy way to write a game system.

What would you do, though, if somebody came into your home and trashed your room, and you could spend five bucks and the culprit, no matter whom or where, would suffer for it? Would you not do it because you want to be fair? I doubt that a megacorp would.

But, ultimately, it doesn't matter what you or I think. Street Magic will have its rules, and GMs that want the threat of spontaneous combustion (or calcification, or massive internal damage) hanging over the heads of shadowrunners that fail to clean up their target sites with acid or fire will have house rules if Street Magic doesn't provide them.

Brahm

Jul 2 2006, 08:40 PM

Post #23

Shooting Target

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QUOTE (Da9iel @ Jun 30 2006, 10:41 PM)

Seems kinda tough to me. Threshold 12 to find someone with their beloved stuffed bear? Whose got 36 dice to chuck around before even casting a spell? Not that I think it should be easy, but sheesh!

Remember that this could be a group of casters. Then toss in Edge.

To find them anywhere.

My brain is not in number crunch mode today, what dice are we looking at folks here?

phasmaphobic

Jul 2 2006, 09:18 PM

Post #24

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QUOTE (Aaron @ Jul 2 2006, 09:36 AM)

I'll bite; what's awesome about it? The fact that one can replace real legwork with a couple of dice rolls simply because you have little kidnapped Jimmy's teddy bear? Or perhaps the fact that a corp can frag a runner because she bled a bit at the site?

Having a nice GM is great. But while hand-waving things like being tracked down by corps is fine on a GM-by-GM basis, it's a crappy way to write a game system.

What would you do, though, if somebody came into your home and trashed your room, and you could spend five bucks and the culprit, no matter whom or where, would suffer for it? Would you not do it because you want to be fair? I doubt that a megacorp would.

But, ultimately, it doesn't matter what you or I think. Street Magic will have its rules, and GMs that want the threat of spontaneous combustion (or calcification, or massive internal damage) hanging over the heads of shadowrunners that fail to clean up their target sites with acid or fire will have house rules if Street Magic doesn't provide them.

What's awesome? The fact that it just makes sense. If magic existed today, you bet your ass the cops and corps would use it forensically - as they damn well should. I see nothing at all wrong with it.

And everyone does their legwork in their own way. A material link may help you find/hurt/affect some guy, but it won't tell you who that guy is, his background, why the Johnson wants him so bad, what his dirty secrets are, and what his social connection is to the kids he's been raping and murdering.

Magical analysis, astral tracking, material links and more - these are real legwork. If all you're doing is wetwork, then sure, it makes the run a lot easier to execute, and consider it an easy job, and well done. But if all you are doing is wetwork, then I suggest switching to a more death-tastic system, like Rifts.

And if the runner bled at the corp's site, she was doing something wrong in the first place, and deserves what she gets in return. When runners fuck up, they get fucked up in return. Tell your runners to plan better, and do better legwork. The best runs are the ones without a single bullet fired. I'd personally be more concerned about fingerprints, bullets, astral signatures, and more.

Five bucks? For a magical forensic analysis? Even a simple fingerprint analysis costs more than that today.

EDIT: And one last thing. Who said anything about fairness? When I run Shadowrun - you know, a game whose very fiction constantly espouses that the streets aren't fair, and runners usually don't last that long unless they're paranoid and well-prepared - I don't play fair, and I don't expect anyone else to.

Samaels Ghost View Member Profile	Jul 2 2006, 10:16 PM Post #25
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 984 Joined: 15-June 06 Member No.: 8,717	If the best runs are ones without shots fired that makes for some boring play. Why have guns if you're never gonna use them? Why the Sammy if most runs (good runs included) didn't involve some shoot-em-up?

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