Character Critique Time!!!, fire away.... Options

[Rasumichin]

As far as biotech is concerned, do you actually need the whole group?
Just taking first aid would be cheaper and have the same effect.
I don't think you plan on being the groups healbot, so it's highly unlikely that you have to fix the group sam's wired reflexes or conduct long term medical treatment of your teammates.
Go go with first aid (2) instead of the skill group on 1, get one more dice for the situations where you actually use biotech skills if you're not a doctor or at least a trained paramedic and save 2 precious BP.

[Abbandon]

Hmm synaptic boosters would be more effecient. They would cost 32BP of which i could get 35BP back just from selling back 2 points of magic and still have 1.0 PP to get more stuff with.. but....it would decrease my agility boost power which is vital to my character. And I really dont like the idea of mixing cyber and magic on characters. Mages and adepts should be pure. Obviously there should be a bigger penalty for awakened characters who get implanted like -2 magic for every 1 point of wares. -1.5 if its cultured bio (round down). Make delta/whatever is the best bio 1:1.

I just dont think an orc/troll chick can be sexy, thats why im so opposed to changing that. Seriously, can you see an orc chucking cards at people? More like taking a basbeball to their face.

[Fortune]

Obviously there should be a bigger penalty for awakened characters who get implanted like -2 magic for every 1 point of wares. -1.5 if its cultured bio (round down). Make delta/whatever is the best bio 1:1.

I whole-heartedly disagree with this sentiment, and contest that it is in any way an 'obviously' needed alteration.

[Rasumichin]

Hmm synaptic boosters would be more effecient. They would cost 32BP of which i could get 35BP back just from selling back 2 points of magic and still have 1.0 PP to get more stuff with..

Doesn't work this way.
You first have to raise the magic attribute, then get the ware installed, then lose the magic points you have already payed for.

Edit : wait, you're right, but it only works out for your character BP-wise because you have already maxed out your magic attribute, wich is prohibitively expensive at chargen.

[Ryu]

The synaptic boosters cost you a point of magic (If we assume you have them installed instead of lying on a shelf (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) ). So you need to find 7 BP to keep your magic at 4. Still worthwhile.

To pure magicians: I whole-heartedly disagree with this sentiment, and contest that it is in any way an 'obviously' needed alteration. (Thanks Fortune)

The same on the racial stereotyping that seems to be common. An orc does not have a lower charisma than a human. Not all orcs are muscle-packed brutes, just because they are on the samurai throne right now. Or did you want to sell a natural strength 5 as a toned body? Human women would mostly be in the roid-user category to achieve that.

[Abbandon]

Awakened characters bodies, should be more sensetive to drugs and wares. I think it is reflected in the -modifier you get from just trying to treat an awakened character with first aid. If their bodies worked just like a mundanes then why is that there. I think the balance between cybered, mundane and awakened doesnt make sense actually. cybered people should be easier to treat with first aid since there is less of them(+ modifier for first aid/healing), drugs would be more potent in them since there is less "person" to absorb them which explains to the +modifier to benficial stuff but it should also be a -modifier for negative drugs, and they should be more susceptable to magic + to healing, - for resisting spells or + for enemy mage spellcasting.

Awakened people on the other hand. - to healing, + to negative drugs. They should be harder to harm with enemy spells so + for spell resistance or - for enemy mage spellcasting on them. And wares would be way more harmful to them since there is less magic "person" to channel magic through, draw on whatever.

But that wound be to complex just to make things realistically balanced. But still i think its pretty stupid that there are tons of mages and adept running around with wares. But lets stay on topic heh.

[Ryu]

Awakened characters bodies loose magic when they get augmented. So the Awakened need to spend karma on keeping their level, or take a (in the case of adepts rather substantial) hit on their power. Besides that, healing them is flat-out harder already.

Cybered chars should heal worse than the Awakened. Being awakened is binary, while augmentations can and often do alter the whole body. Repairing a cyberlimb instead of healing the body can easily negotiated (when I GM at least), but most players prefer the "no cost, and I don´t feel the pain"-variant.

On this tangent, I rarely see anyone who would never take augmentations for his awakened char take anything less than maximum magic, soft or hard cap depending on the player. The purity decision seems to come bundled with the ultimate-power decision. YMMV.

[Abbandon]

Ok I was looking over qualities, and i saw one that jumps out at me...

Natural Immunity...-5/15BP I was thinking she could take it for a toxin gamma-scopolamine(truth serum). It causes paralysis among other things.
(are there any new toxins in arsenal or augment? specifically with paralysis and that maybe cause damage?).

Its vector is injection so would you guys count suffering a physical wound by a playing card coated in g-s as being "injected", thats probably going to draw blood. She could coat her playing cards in that stuff and handle them just fine but if she accidentally cuts herself with them she would be immune. g-s is made from a plant so does that mean I only have to pay -5BP for immunity? (-15bp is for artificial).

As negatives qaulity i was thinking of Sensitive System +15BP and Simsense Vertigo +10BP and possably Astral Beacon +5BP but that raises a question......

What kind of things would an adept have to do to leave an astral trail behind? power throw would leave a signature on my arm not a playing card right? Would missle mastery leave one on the card since its making it into a better weapon, a knife would do more damage, is this just do to better accuracy (my arm, eyes) or due to infusing magic into the thing im throwing(cards/knifes/stars)?

I like the idea of having an extra bright aura lol even though its mostly bad.

[djinni]

there is a certain dose needed to be injected, your cards can't carry that dose.
you can throw a normal card hard enough to give you a paper cut so in teh magical world of shadowrun in your concept an ordinary everyday playing card would be able to cut pretty bad.
whenever you touch something you leave behind an astral signature.

[Rasumichin]

Its vector is injection so would you guys count suffering a physical wound by a playing card coated in g-s as being "injected", thats probably going to draw blood.

I'd count it as injection, extrapolating from the rules for cyberspurs combined with toxin glands.

She could coat her playing cards in that stuff and handle them just fine but if she accidentally cuts herself with them she would be immune. g-s is made from a plant so does that mean I only have to pay -5BP for immunity? (-15bp is for artificial).

IMHO, it's artificial.
Natural toxins would be stuff like a critter's venom.
Not substances merely produced on the basis of a natural substance.
But that point is debatable, better talk to your GM about it.

As negatives qaulity i was thinking of Sensitive System +15BP and Simsense Vertigo +10BP and possably Astral Beacon +5BP but that raises a question......

The first two fit well with your concept, generating badly needed BP without actually incurring real drawbacks.
If you are willing to restrict your concept in such a way that you don't use ware oder smartlinks, you should be at least patially compensated for it, i think.

As far as astral beacon is concerned, i cannot recall any rules passage explaining how it would work out with the powers mentioned by you, but your approach (no signature for power throw,but for missile mastery) makes sense to me.

[masterofm]

How about just getting a synthetic cyber arm? You could put a cyber arm slide in it and your character will basically produce cards out of nowhere, you can jack up the Str on it to seven because lets face it you are probably only going to be throwing cards with a single hand. You could tone down your characters Str a bit to be able to afford the implant and at the same time free up some Bps. If you GM will let you fluff the way that since you already have nimble fingers the cards come out of a hidden compartment and you can quickly catch and throw the card at the same time (makes sense.) This will allow you to give up quick draw (because lets face it the only thing throwing two cards per IP will do is just make you split your dice pool) and trim away just .5 more essence off of maybe off of power throw and you will be doing pretty much the same damage (depends on if you care to redline or not) and it allows you to play around with your stats some more... Worth a thought at least. If its synthetic it looks like a normal arm so at least you character does not have some funky looking robot arm, and you can buy up your karma instead of your Str to flesh out your character a bit more.

[Abbandon]

Ok I added all her new qualities... She is right at 400bp's. Any more opinions on if Gamma-scopolamine is a natural or man made toxin? 10bp's is huge and would go straight into Etiquette.

I think there is a difference between processing a plant to make a toxin and engineering a toxin in a lab by mixing things together that dont ever come together naturally.

[Abbandon]

So you guys are saying keep her an adept but hack off her arm right? Not ditch being an adept and just become cyber? Hmmm I dont have augment. Even though I hate that idea....it sounds like something cool to do later if her power level just cant keep up with the rest of the group or isnt able to hurt anything.

I can see her pissing somebody off eventually and they knowing about her card chucking so they hack off her whole arm.

Oh yeah. And normally I would totally ignore everyone's opinion about my chick's name cuz thats 100% personal and i dont give a crap if others dont like them but... I do agree its maybe to simple. It did have a reason though. Gambit is always calling Rogue "Ma'cherie" or whatever. So thats where it came from. But having her be so focused on playing cards and stuff there is probably a really cool name should could go by.. I have a few but wouldnt mind hearing more card playing names.

Diamond - kinda sounds more like a stripper name. But they are sharp and hard.
River - The 5th card in texas hold'em (the best form of poker)
Seven - Or Lucky Seven. For 7's that are on the slot machnines.

[krakjen]

The French "ma chérie" means "my darling"
(even though Gambit is speaking Cajun, I don't think the meaning is much different)
IF you'd want to go for a French-sounding name:
Cherry -> Cerise
Diamond -> Diamant*
River -> Rivière
Seven -> Sept*

* Those two are masculine nouns in French, that doesn't sound very nice for a girl's name...

[Ryu]

Gamma-Scopolamine is supposed to be a man-made variant of atropia belladonna.

[BlackHat]

I once made a throwing adept ("Knives") for a game on these boards, so I thought I would weigh in.

I like your idea about how someone figured out her shtick and had her arm lopped off. I think if you decided to get cyber, something along those lines would make a good backstory, too. I don't recommend waiting to get cyber in play. Depending on the GM, it can be a lot more trouble than the price suggests - tracking down a streetdoc that you can trust, negotiating the operation, making sure he didn't cross any other wires while he's in there, dealing with being out of commission for a while, etc.

Could always have a streetdoc contact, just in case things go south.

As for the hidden arm slide idea, unless it popped the whole deck of cards out, it would only hold a single card - and with nimble fingers, you end up being able to pull out a card pretty fast (I think it becomes a free action to draw a small item).

I would shy away from cyber, as an adept, if only because you end up paying for it twice - losing 1 point of essence for a new arm (with maybe 3 more strength on it) would cost you a lot in powers that you already paid for. I'm not sure what you would consider dropping, but I wouldn't even think about touching power-throw (best damage boost you're going to get to playing cards), missle mastery (necessary to even do damage with cards in the first place), quickdraw (what you need to draw cards quickly, increased reflexes (absolute must-have for any magically active character, and comparing it to wired reflexes, you will have already bought it with magic).

Nimble fingers fits the concept, but probably won't end up helping you in a fight unless you've thrown your 52 cards and need to pick up something else to throw. Missle mastery fits the concept too, but what are the odds you'll fight someone else who also throws their weapons. Attribute boost is nice, since you're capping power throw in anticipation of the errata, but I never much liked that power. Even if you got rid of those three non-essentials, its not enough to pay for the arm.

I would also heavily recommend picking up the skill-boost power for throwing weapons. +6 to hit will help when you're taking range penalties cause cards don't go far, or when you need some extra damage to get past a troll's heavy armor.

Last thought: Consider picking up arsenal. If nothing else, you can save yourself a buying quick-draw by taking it as a masrtial-arts advantage or maneuver (5 points). It also has a table for improvised throwing weapons - which a throwing adept should keep on hand. Once you've run out of cards, or realized they're not doing a whole lot of damage, you could throw a bowling ball, your unconscious friend, and maybe do a little more.

Other than that, I'm not sure how much mileage she will get out of that book, but its a good book anyways.

[BlackHat]

Also, two-weapon-fighting (ambidexterity or off-hand training [arsenal]). Splitting up your dicepool against a well-armored opponent would be suicide, but against a number of unarmored opponents you could throw twice as many cards. Its situational, probably, but you don't really need the off-hand for anything in your current build. Plus, it would mean that lopping off her main arm wouldn't stop her. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Getting extra dice from adept-powers would probably help with this a lot too. You're currently doing, like, 6P damage with each card. Theoretically, against someone who doesn't soak up a lot of damage, being hit with two cards for 1 or 2 net hits each is worse than beign zinged with one card for 3 or 4 net hits.

[Abbandon]

Tossing around a billion cards raises an ok name...

Pickup - Why are you called pick up? Do you drive one or something?
*pulls out her deck of cards and starts cutting and shuffling them with one hand*

[masterofm]

If you are gimping your strength it allows for a different stat shuffle and if you want to have a little more stat distribution I don't see how you are suffering that much by pulling out a cyber arm if it also adds to flesh out your character. Also on a side note I meant to say Cyber arm slide and holster. If you can have enough room for a hold out pistol I don't see why a deck of cards is totally out of the question... I mean you should basically be able to have a devise that can easily handle subtly moving a card into your hand in the SR universe (If you pay 6k for that and the GM can't hand wave that you might be in trouble, but 6k to hold a single small card vs. a hold out pistol?) A cyber arm would boost the Str from five to seven and if you knock down the Str of your character to 3 that gives 20 build points to shift around, which you could put the extra BP into con (or charisma) and maybe a few points in being able to speak French. I mean it seems you are looking for a character with flavor because if you seriously wanted to be an awesome card chucking ninja you would have rolled up a troll.

[BlackHat]

... to hold a single small card vs. a hold out pistol?

What good is a holster that holds a single card? You whip it out, throw it, and then what?
Having it hand you a box of cards would be nice, and still elss than a pistol, but why not just always hold a deck of cards in your off-hand?
Having an arm that holds a whole deck of cards, but hands them to you one at a time (like those auto-shufflers) would be the best, but would require working it out with your GM.

[Stahlseele]

so get a smuggelling compartment into the arm and just PLACE one of those auto shufflers from some casino in there so the cards come out one at a time into your hand by DNI-Command O.o

[masterofm]

I just think something that can hold and whip out a pistol why can you only whip out a single card. I mean you are paying 6k (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) to whip out one single card? A GM who would be that much of a sticker would make it that tough on a character you might not want to make a fluff character. But back story on a character with a cyber arm could be like this.

As Cherry was growing up she was a small time card dealer earning small amounts of money on the side while at the same time trying to fool people with complex card tricks to hide her creative shuffling. One night during a card game a Yak gang member spotted her dealing from the bottom of the deck and as a small word of warning had her arm chopped off. Luckily Cherry had squirreled away some money and was able to buy a cyber arm to aid in her day to day wheeling and dealings. With her nest egg gone though, and forced out her job as a high stakes dealer in a casino, Cherry has turned to the shadows to seek her fortune. Very very basic and I know it can be filled in, but hey it's a decent back story.