Character Critique, the troll with the contact "stand in" Options

[djinni]

what do I need to change?
edit: increased skills decrease magic

[Jaid]

1) you can't use a power focus. you're an adept, not a magician.

2) all those boost powers... by the time you get around to fighting, the first one will have worn off, and the fight will be over. i would say keep one or maybe two, (actually, you have little to no use for a single simple action, so maybe 2) and beef up combat reflexes instead (i would suggest agility could use a boost, and either reaction or strength)

3) addiction? to cram i presume (the knowledge skill is what makes me guess this). i would suggest deepweed if you want to be able to assense, but cram?

[ElFenrir]

For starters....perhaps some more Active Skills.

A contact, you say? or is this a PC? if this is a PC, hell definately need those skills tweaked up a bit. Up the ones you have(well, the dodge: ranged seems ok), but perhaps some social skills, at least Etiquette, a 2 charisma will screw you pretty badly.
Increase his combat skills a few points, that he has. If you dont want him with guns(the Gremlins) perhaps a Throwing Weapon skill can help, but you could essentially be totally melee, and pump the Ranged Dodge a bit after all.

But a few points in Etiquette with a specialization will help alot. I know not every character has to be the stealthy type, but look into it. Negotiations might also come in handy, again, the 2 cha might hurt, unless your team has a dedicated face.

But yeah, perhaps look into those.

[Glyph]

From a purely min-maxing point of view, a Strength of 7 does the same damage as a Strength of 8 (due to the divide by two/round up thing). So, I would move a point from Strength and put it into Reaction, instead.

Definitely run that spirit pact by your GM first; a lot of GMs wouldn't allow it. Look at all of the sample spirit pacts - the spirit always gets something out of the deal, too.

I agree that you have too many Attribute boosts - keep the Agility, and lose the others. And the remark about the Power Focus is right, too. You can't use it, so lose it to free up some BPs.

Unlike previous editions, you can get by without social skills, at least to start with, thanks to the concept of "rating zero" skills. But something like one point in Etiquette and one point in Infiltration would probably be very helpful. Especially the Etiquette, since your Charisma is too low to use for defaulting.

Your combat skills are terribly low, and your Edge is minimal.


For general advice, I would say lose those three Attribute boosts (keeping Agility) and the Rooting: 1, and reduce Magic to 5 (4), saving 25 build points. Lose the power focus to get back another 12 build points. Spend 26 points to raise Blades to 6, Unarmed Combat and Dodge to 4, and pick up a specialization for unarmed combat. For the remaining 11 points, put 1 back into resources for some gear, then either 1) get a point of Edge, or 2) pick up Etiquette: 1 with a specialization of Street and Infiltration: 1. Then see if the GM is okay with your spirit pact. If he isn't, then put those 20 points into Edge.

[djinni]

[Glyph]

Page 85, under Foci, states that adepts can only bond to weapon foci.

Page 187, under Attribute Boost, last sentence of second paragraph, states "Attribute Boost requires a Simple Action to activate".

You might want to see if your GM is house ruling either of these, though.

[djinni]

[lorechaser]

[Glyph]

[Jaid]

most likely he's got an unerrated copy. take a look at the newest errata djinni (available at shadowrunrpg.com)

[djinni]

[Kyoto Kid]

...two skill groups to look at:

Athletics - you can replace Dodge with Gymnastics Dodge
Stealth - as an Adept (unless you are one of those social types) you want to do your best at not being seen.

Perception skill (even at minimal rating) is always helpful.

as a Troll you can get by with less Mystic Armour. I see you opted for the Bio enhanced adept. Not a bad idea if you can afford the implant, however, this is 32BPs applied to resources that could be put fleshing out to skills. I know that 3pp is a lot for Improved Reflexes but you would get one MA back from ditching the implant and by shuffling points around could still make a very effective combatant.

A force 2 weapon focus will also save another 6 BPs in resources over the unusable power focus.

Can adepts take Spirit pact? I thought that was only available to mages. I could be wrong.

[djinni]

[Glyph]

Spirit pacts only stipulate that they are taken by awakened characters, so I don't see why an adept couldn't take one. My only concern was that you should check with the GM to be sure he will allow that specific spirit pact.

The weapon focus is actually pretty sweet if you can juggle enough points to keep it. Not only do you get two extra dice for melee, but you also can affect those pesky spirits with the Immunity to Normal Weapons power.

Gymnastics dodge is nice for a melee character who typically parries or blocks in close combat. However, unless your GM rules that the tumbling specialization is what is used for a gymnastics dodge, you won't get the benefit you do now, from taking the ranged specialization of dodge. If you can use a gymnastics specialization for dodging, then I would change it, because gymnastics is cheaper to take improved ability for, and can be improved by several pieces of bioware as well.

[Kyoto Kid]

[lorechaser]

You did notice the "Cha 2, Troll" part, right?

Generally, Adepts want to be sneaky or social. He's clearly not picking either of those. ;)