Elf mystic Adept Gun Bunny chick., character critique Options

[Abbandon]

Ok here is the premiss(premise?).. An twin pistol gun bunny who can boost her agility, cast stealth spells on herself, and charm just about anybody. Tracking two different targets independantly is kinda like the way a chameleon's eyes work, and chameleons have this cool swaying motion to their movements to fool prey and predators into not seeing them, they have color changing skin pigmentation. This chick wont "talk to" her mentor for a long time after character creation or even be able to cast her invis spell at the beginning but she will be kind of obsessed with chameleons and just think its a normal obsession like some people have with cats or dogs or birds or any other animal.

Anyways she should be able to boost her agility up to 10 ocassionally + light pistols 7 + mentor advantage 2 = 19/2 = 10 dice on one hand and 9 on the other. Did lasers or smartlink help when you are dual firing? Hammerli's have recoil so she can fire 4 times an IP with no recoil mods. Hmmm. Im thinking I should put that 1 extra BP into gear and get a sniper rifle or something..

But anyways what do you think? Please dont suggest cyber/bioware. I cant cast magic until I raise magic one more time because you cant use magic you spent on power points to cast spells and stuff, should i get rid of the invis spell? I dont really want to get rid of the spellcasting skill. If i did get rid of invis that would give me +4 BP to put someplace (cuz i would also remove the 1 bp from knowledge)

Background wise, She is a princess with a bad attitude from a asian, korean area of seattle, who uses her influence skills to get what she wants. ALWAYS. But then her boyfriend who is with the Triad gets whacked and she decideds to get out of that life. Spirits of man hate her because she manipulates and uses people and they are to much alike. if she ever got dropped in the woods or any outdoor environment and had to fend for herself she would not last very long AT ALL. Hates camping, hates anything rural, hates getting dirt under her nails.

long term development is just to turn her into a realy cool assassin/infiltration character

CODE

Total BP:400
Die (Meta-type Elf -30bp)
Height: 1.8 meters  Wieght: 65 kilo's
Attributes: (-200 bps)
  Body:      1/6   4/6 +30bp
  Agility:   2/7   5/7 +30bp(max 10)
  Reaction:  1/6   5(7)/6 +40bp
  Strength:  1/6   2/6 +10bp
  Charisma:  3/8   6/8 +30bp
  Intuition: 1/6   4/6 +30bp
  Logic:     1/6   2/6 +10bp
  Willpower: 1/6   3/6 +20bp
  Initiative: 9(11) (improved reflexes 2)
Magic:  1/6  6/6(+65bp) (1mp/5pp)
Condition Monitor:  10P 10S
Edge: 1
Init Pass: 3 (improved reflexes 2)
Essense: 6.0

Qaulities:
Positive:(+20bp)
-Mystic Adept (+10bp): Splits magic pool between PP and spellcasting/conjuring. (5/1)
-Mentor Spirit (+5bp): Chameleon, +2 dice when splitting pistol dice pools, +1 to Illusions spells, charisma+will(2) test to run or sprint.
-Ambidextrous (+5bp): no penalty to off hand shots
Negative (+30bp)
-Sensitive Systems (-15bp): double essense costs of cyber, but not biware.
-Spirit Bane(man) (-10bp): Spirits of man hatemy guts and can refuse to help me or target me first.
-Incompetent(survival) (-5bp): can not survive or provide for herself.

Adept Powers: (5.0 points points)
-Improved Reflexes (2) (-3 pp): +2 reaction, + 2 IP's
-Kinesics (2) (-1 pp): +2 to all socials tests (+2 vs gauge speech)
-Agility Boost (3) (-.75 pp): Magic + agilit boost 3 test. Each hit boosts agility +1.  resist 3S drain.
-Nimble Fingers (-.25 pp): +1 palming, insert clip, pick up/drop object, eject clip, use simple object = free

Contacts: (+3bp)
--Fixer: 2/1

Active Skills: (+102bp)
-Con (2) +8bp
  spec: Seduction (4) +4bp
-Etiquette (1) +4bp
-Stealth (1) +10bp
  Disguise
  Infiltration
  Palming
  Shadowing
-Dodge (5) +16bp
-Pistols (5) +20bp
  spec: Light Pistols (7) +4bp
-Perception (4) +16bp
-Athletics (1) +10bp
  Climbing
  Gymnastics
  Running
  Swimming
-Pilot-Ground craft (1) +4bp
-Spellcasting (1) +4bp
  spec: Illusions (3) +2bp

Knowledge Skills: (4+2 x3=18 free Bp worth)
  Triad Politics (2)
  Current Events(Seattle) (3)
  Working Out (2)
  Firearm Designs (3)
  VR games (2)

Language Skills:
  English N
  Korean (3)
  Sperithiel (3)

Gear: (+7bp) = (34,650/35,000Y)
-Armor Jacket 8/6 (-900Y)
-Urban Explorer Jumpsuit 6/6 (-500Y)
-Ares Predator IV  (-350Y)
  Dam: 5P,  AP: -1, Mode: SA, Ammo: 15c
  Built in smartgun
  Concealed Holster (-75Y)
  Silencer x1  (-200Y)
  Heavy Pistol Clips x3 (-15Y)
   ammo: Gel (30Y per 10: x3) (-90Y)
   ammo: Explosive (50Y per 10: x3) (-150Y)
-Hammerli x2 (-1300)
  Dam: 4P, AP:0, RC:1, Mode: SA, Ammo: 6c
  Built in smartgun and uses heavy pistol ranges
  Hidden Arm Slide x2 (-700Y)
  Light pistol Clips x8 (-40Y)
   ammo: Explosive(50Y per 10: x4) (-200Y)
   ammo: Gel (30Y per 10: x2) (-60Y)
-Knife (str/2 +1)P  (-20Y)
-Flash-pak -4/-2 flare comp to attacks, can last 10 turns(-200Y)
-Clothing (10x200) (-2000Y)
-Commlink: (Meta Link+Vector Xim)(5,5,5,5)(4000+1000+2500+2500 (-10,300Y)
-Sub Microphone (-50Y)
-Trodes (-50Y)
  Programs:
     Encrypt (6) (600)
-Commlink: (meta link+vector xim) (-300Y)
  Sim module(cold) (-100Y)
-Glasses w/ Vision Enhance,image link (3) (-350Y)
-Glasses w/ Thermo, Smartlink, Flare, image link (-700Y)
-Earbuds w/ Audio Enhance (3) (-300Y)(free earbuds w/ comm)
-Fake SIN (1) (Ashlynn Shunoi) (-1000Y)
  Fake License: Firearms (4) (-400Y)
  Fake License: Driving (4) (-400Y)
  Fake License: ammo (4) (-400Y)
-Fake SIN (4) (Mia Sukboi) (-4000Y)
   Fake License: Drivers (4) (-400Y)
-Suzuki Mirage (-6,500)
-1 months Low Income (-2,000Y)

-Spells
   Improved Invisability +3bp

Special Abilities:
  Low Light vision
  +3 to visual perception (glasses)
  +3 to audio perception (earbuds)

[Ryu]

I think you need to allocate at least one point to magic power, but that may be a remnant of SR3 memory. Else the char looks good. I´d shift a point from reaction to agility (to favour infiltration tests over combat power), but thats minor. Fine!

[Shrike30]

You don't get laser/smartlink bonuses when going akimbo.

If your whole reason for choosing the Hammerlis was the recoil compensation, you should really check out some of the weapons and weapon mods in Arsenal. A personalized grip alone would be enough for semiautomatic fire, and you could slap that on a different pistol with a larger magazine.

[Abbandon]

I reread pg186 on mystic adepts and it just say mystic adepts have the OPTION of splitting thier magic points. Doesnt say anything about having to start with 1 of each.

Man Arsenal sounds like a must own book heh. I have to wait to get it though. It definately sucks emptying your clip every other turn.

[Ravor]

I agree with Ryu, I'm pretty sure that you have to split your Magic between Adept and Mysticism, and I know that I personally wouldn't allow you to learn spellcasting without being able to actually use it.

Although unless I misunderstood her background, shouldn't she have Korean as a native language istead of English?


And of course, I always recomend at least a datajack and getting your extra IPs from bioware, after all you already have a "princess" who is has trained to be among the best shooters and dodgers in the world so what is a little bio and cyber? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

Oh and unless I missed seeing it in Fourth Edition Core and Street Magic just now I'd veto your custom Mentor Spirit, the bonus to spilt dicepools is too much when compared to the others and seems too "tailored" for this character for my tastes.

[Ravor]

Sure, but it also says that DMs shouldn't allow people wer aren't interested in being a Mystic Adept to take the quality, I read that as saying you have to split your Magic as soon as you raise it.

[Abbandon]

See in her old background before i retouched her a little, she lives in seattle but she ran with a ganger who was part of the triad, her parents and friends were from a heavily asian area. So she isnt from korea.

The mentor...come on.. other mentors give 2 dice to a spell groups, and 2 more dice to a summoning group, she is getting 2 dice to something and 1 to another. why is that a stretch ?

Hmmm only 16-17 of the new mentors in street magic gave +2 dice to one thing and +2 to another. Clearly they are against such huge advantages.

[Ravor]

Because the other Mentors give +2 in something that is defined, where-as your custom job doesn't.

You get your bonus whenever you shoot two pistols. (Which is the reason you took it.)

You get your bonus whenever you cast multiple spells at once. (Which is the reason I'd take it.)

ect, ect...


Basically it's too broad in scope, plus I've always disliked custom Edges that were clearly tailored for the character in question.

[Ryu]

You could consider to buy Increase Reflexes, a sustaining focus, and two points of magic power instead of the adept power. Some other skill shuffle could give you some magic skills, too.

I would accept the mentor, as I give players leeway in customising their mentors. Consider me a follower of UMT; beliefs and made up traditions harness the magic power of the metahuman world, to each his/her own.

On the other hand, you have a strong adept going here. Much more playable than the other IMO. Because of that I think your slow development of the magical side might work. Can´t really find a qoute confirming my memory for SR4. Just take note that your development will be very slow (3 magic for spellcasting will cost you 72 karma alone), and then you´d several skills at rating 4+. Still, your base is sufficiently stable to enjoy/endure that time. I think you may like it.

[Abbandon]

ok I put +2 whenever you split dicepool just because it was the first thing that popped into my brain. What if it said +2 dice to pistols while dual firing?

@Ravor do you have any mage characters and if so what are their mentors if they have them?

@Ryu if i dropped adept, where could i possably pick her adept powers like nimble fingers, kinesics, most importantly agility boost, and all the other powers she will be able to pick up later eventually? I didnt just take it for more IP's

[Ryu]

Honest misunderstanding! I meant drop the adept power "Inmproved Reflexes", get the spell "Increase Reflexes" instead. And a sustaining focus for that. You could start out with magic 5(3 on PP).

You would need to find some points, but it would work much faster. I suggested this way because I would not want to get rid of the cool powers!

[Abbandon]

I really like that idea. The only part that doesnt sit right with me about this character is her good reflexes and being fast, when chameleons are sloooow. Which as an adept power makes it seem like its something her mentor is granting to her. If she had to learn a spell to speed her ass up or get bioware that would flow much better with the character.

However. It would be extremely difficult to shift BP's around right now to afford and bond(i "think" you have to pay for your bond in bp?) a focus. I was thinking of getting one for invis. The bigger problem I see with the spell increased reflexes is that it takes 2 hits for +1 IP, 3 net hits to get +2 Ip's. And even with 3 magic going spellcasting and such that would leave me with a dice pool of 4 to cast improved reflexes.

I would be lucky to get 1 hit and not crit with that many dice.

I was very tempted to hack out athletics but then i got to thinking. The MAX i can dedicate to is magic 3, cuz i need 2 for PP. This would limit the force of my spell to 3 and 3 hits......... oh I can overcast to 6?(do i use just magic side of my attribute to determine overcast or the full thing). Overcasting a F6 improve reflex would be 5P drain....vs...9 dice or 2 hits if im lucky on average. Thats 3P damage on average just for my IP's.

Then you talking about a sustain focus....sustain foci are forcex4 availability meaning your capped at 3. Which means the force of your spell is capped at 3. Which means no freaking way.

Casting improved reflex with a adept focused mystic adept = hell no.

[Ravor]

I would say that it doesn't seem broken in a game-balance sense, but I would still veto it because it doesn't make sense to me that Chameleon would be granting bonus for dual shooting.

To answer your question I tend to run cybered up Mages whenever I get the chance to play rather then DM, and although many of them don't use Mentor Spirits I like the following:

Dark King

Fire-Bringer

Seductress

Adversary

Sky Father

The next time I reroll Bot he is going to have a connection with Adversary, although given the nature of Adversary and Bot's personalities I don't think the relationship is going to be "smooth" by any means. Especially since Bot is a pseudo-Catholic.

[Ryu]

I think athletics 1 could be the answer. Get Spellcasting 4 (+illusion spells), Summoning 1(+favoured spirit type) for the savings.

[ElFenrir]

Saw a little error; your 2 strength only costs 10 BP. So if you added it in as 20...then you still have 10 free BPs.

Ill have to look into this more tomorrow; had a long night, but saw the small math mistake.

[Nostalgic Jester]

You do know that if you don´t allocate at least one point to mojo-slinging/spirit-tossing your magic attribute for those things will be 0, don´t you?

I mean, you won´t be able to cast anything at all!

[Abbandon]

Oooo good catch!!! I dont believe in using less than 200bp's for attributes though so its going back into one of them... eh that was a pretty easy decision. It put it into reaction so that she would have a better chance at evading bullets.

I also found out you can have an open reply and atleast quick edit other messages in the thread lol.

@Nostalgic yes....until later. Its part of the character concept/no other way to do it lol. In the beginning she just has certain abilities and has some wierd obsession with chameleons. Later as her magic power grows she will become more connected to her mentor spirit Chameleon and as a result she will start being able to cast spells. Spells she learns from chameleon like invis, healing(lizards regrow tails), sense boosting spells.

She will not ever be casting war spells or summing spirits(well maybe beast at extremely low levels)

[Fortune]

You can't actually learn the active Magical Skills unless you have assigned at least one point of Magic to the Mystic side of things.

[Abbandon]

Hmmmmm I really really dont like that interpretation, but it is irrelevant. I know that without mystic points I cant cast magic so i dont really need magic skills or spells? I was just trying to save karma down the road and make it easier somewhat easier to develope down the road.

To me the intent of that statement is to keep mundanes from taking magic skills. This character has a Magic Attribute(whether its focused inward or outward is irrelevant) she has the power, the ability, the potential to use magic. She is not mundane.

Ok stripped the spell and spellcasting and removed the 1bp from knowledge, also reduced her contact by 2 bp for a total refund of 10bp. Dumped it into Influence.

[ixombie]

I'm going to tear apart the character on a numbers basis. I don't have any problem with the idea behind it, but I think you've made a number of faulty assumptions about what's effective in SR4. Please don't take it the wrong way though (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

First of all, I think it's a very bad idea to make a mystic adept with the plan being to develop spellcasting "down the road." Magic costs a LOT of karma. And as an adept, you have way way more you can do with your magic than you'll ever be able to achieve in the life of your character. A gun bunny is going to benefit way more from pouring karma into things like attunement and centering, and just pouring on more and more adept powers. If your plan is to be an adept who casts spells, it will a) be a very long time before you realize that, and b) you will be bad at both; a crappy adept who casts crappy spells. A pure mage or a pure adept will equal karma will probably be able to kick your well toned elf butt.

That said, there is no rules problem with a mystic adept who doesn't start with any magic in spells. Your GM might not like it, but if he doesn't mind, that's his choice. I personally would allow it, though I'd counsel you not to be silly and just make a full adept or full mage.

Onto dual fisting: splitting your dice pool is BAD. You will MISS. Even with your special custom mentor that gives you a bonus to it. You have just 12 dice to shoot, even if you add two more you're looking at 7 dice. A samurai can usually dodge that without full defensing. And even a dork security guard will probably dodge it on full defense. If your opponent has cover, you will miss. If there is poor visibility, you will miss. You will miss a lot when splitting dice. And the worst part is that when you do hit, you're hitting with light pistols. Even poorly armored foes will only take stun damage. You'll probably never meet a spirit you can damage. And anyone reasonably tough who actually gets hit will not feel it.

There are good reasons to dual fist. Wanting to fire four weenie light pistol rounds in the same action phase with split pools is not one of them. Dual fisting is very nice for powerful singleshot weapons, i.e. Ruger Super Warhawks. Each gun can only fire once a round, but if you have two, they act like a very powerful semi-auto pistol. And you have to reload their tiny cylinders half as often. Another reason to dual fist is for full auto weapons. They can only fire one long burst per turn, but if you have two guns, you can fire two long bursts, one from each weapon. Finally, dual fisting is great for holding a gun plus a melee weapon, especially something portable and concealable like a cyberspur. It's mostly useful for gymnastic dodges, since you can only dodge ranged OR melee with gymnastic dodge. If you have an offhand melee weapon and you gymnastic dodge against bullets, you'll be able to parry anyone who attacks you in melee during the same phase. Though it's also nice to seamlessly switch from shooting to melee when you're attacked up close so that you don't suffer the -3 'attacker in melee' shooting penalty. If you go with any of these strategies, you attack with your full pool every time and gain very nice advantages. The only time when it's smart to be splitting your pool is when you're shooting up chumps who can't defend against it. At the very least, I'd upgrade from light pistols to something with some actual kick. There are some especially nice choices in Arsenal, like Ruger Thunderbolts.

Last but not least, take combat sense! Combat sense is the best adept power for gun bunnies. Those extra defense dice mean a lot, especially for a relatively squishy adept who can't eat bullets. And it's such a bargain! Attribute boost, by comparison, is not your best friend. It's a minor, temporary boost, compared to Combat sense's major, permanent boost. I would drop kinesics and attribute boost and sink it all into combat sense. You can keep your charisma and influence group, and you'll still be pretty good at social. Kinesics is eating up a whole power point just to give you +2 dice on social, which is not going to make or break your character's social skills. But it will be important to have those +2 dice on defense, because of a squishy elf gun bunny it's all about dodge or die. Not observe proper etiquette or die (most of the time) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rollin.gif)

[Fortune]

Just a note about Dice Pools and splitting ...

The Dice Pool is made up of Attribute + Skill (including anything that directly adds to either of those). Everything else is a Dice Pool modifier.

Dice Pools are split before modifiers are added, so the appropriate modifiers fully affect each new sub-Pool. This makes splitting not the Bad Thing™ that some people make it out to be.

[ixombie]

Good call. But the fact is, other than the unofficial "Chameleon" mentor spirit, there are virtually no mods that apply to dual fisting, since it negates smartlinks and laser sights... I guess tracer rounds? But those don't work in most pistols.

[Fortune]

Specialization in the pistol(s) you are using comes to mind.

Of course, Firearms isn't the only (or best) place to use split Dice Pools. Spellcasting is where it really shines, because you can stack on modifiers like Specialization, Mentor Spirit, Foci, etc.

[Glyph]

The thing to keep in mind when you split dice pools is that you get the negative modifiers added to each pool, too, and when your pools are half-sized to start, that can really knock them down.

Take an elven sammie with 18 dice in pistols - 8 of it from Agility (6 plus muscle toner: 2), 6 from base skill, 2 from specialization, and two of it from a smartlink, who is shooting at a target who has partial cover, with partial light but also glare from a street lamp, and heavy rain. That's -2 for the cover, the sammie's cybereyes compensate for the light, -1 for the glare, and -2 for the heavy rain. No problem - rolling 13 dice, he is still likely to get a good hit.

But suppose the sammie decides, since he's so awesome, that he will use two Predator IVs, and split his dice pool? Okay, so he splits his base pool of 14 dice into 2 dice pools of 7, loses the smartlink bonus, and applies the specialization to each, for 9 dice. Not too bad, actually. But against that same target, now he will be rolling a measly 4 dice for each shot. Maybe enough to nail a grunt, but not likely enough to nail another sammie, even one not as awesome as he is. And glitching is much more of a possibility now.

I'm not saying splitting your dice pools will always be a bad idea. If you are attacked out in the open by multiple enemies, using two guns might be a good idea. I wouldn't make it your default tactic, though.

[mfb]

my two-gun shooter mostly used her ambidexterity to fire one weapon at a time. she generally packed something with a lot of penetration in one hand, and something loaded with flechettes in the other.