Story / strategy idea - how do you deal with a child mage? Options

[Malicant]

Use a Manabarrier to protect yourself from his spells. Counterspelling might be useful, too. Then proceed to killing/incapacitating from long range, if possible from outside the background count.

[hyzmarca]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davy_Crockett...clear_device%29

[Aaron]

It's pretty obvious that force isn't going to fly with this kid. It'd be a shame if you were unable to out-think or out-negotiate a child (preferably by email).

[CanRay]

Hey, Game-Station-Transportable! It'll work, I tell you!

Or spraypaint "Free Puppies" on the side of the Ares Roadmaster, and park it by the side of the Playground where the Mage Kid is!

[O'Donnell Heir]

Hacker meets car. Car meets kid. Kid meets pavement. Researchers meet kid.

[Malicant]

You forgot "car meets kid's new anti car spell that defies SR magic rules". (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)

[Jaid]

i agree with the videogame idea, but i would add in a caveat that once he's in the (simsense) game, you should immediately proceed to blackout him until he's unconscious. since you personally are not seeing him, he can't detect your thoughts. unless your GM is just being a jerk, of course.

[masterofm]

10 Drones with conceil, scopes, and stick and shock rounds. If they all aim and fire at the same time, while preprogrammed to not to accept any incoming transmissions (and then to proceed after wailing on the kid to head to an area that could potentially be another ambush point?) Also another drone above the boy could also just drop like 5 nerostun grenades from a very high distance. Oh yeah and if your GM tries to pull that the kid has detect enemies bullcracky you can then politely tell him that YOU CAN'T USE DETECT ENEMIES TO DETECT DRONES!


If this doesn't work start looking for the freight train of doom...

[HentaiZonga]

Perhaps I should rephrase: The drone in question got too close to the kid, and was picked up mundanely. He did, in fact, use full-on ritual magic (taking about a minute) to geek our rigger, but due to a combination of the background count and how 'weird' his method of magic looks, we weren't able to tell what he was doing until the rigger turned inside-out. (Admittedly, there *were* clues).

What we finally wound up doing, was overwhelming the kid's "detect enemies" sense by sending a good ol' torch-and-pitchfork mob at him, then grabbed him while he was weakened, drugged him to hell, and hauled him back to the researchers.

Which has pissed off the rather nasty free spirit that was apparently responsible for this whole situation in the first place.

[masterofm]

Was the drone armed? Did the character want to play another character? If a flyspy flew by would you just kill the person who is using it? Seems very very very.... um... very shady.

[Tabula Rasa]

I'm not sure if this has been suggested before or not but since he can mess with you if you can see him, buy a bunch of disposable artilary pieces and fire a barrage of indirect fire at his location. You can do that withuot seeing him as long as you have a location lock on him.

Truth be told though, if a GM is putting out this sort of NPC to mess with you, they rarely let an "easy" tactic work. Typically they will expect you to go in there and enjoy a big badass fight. Don't know your GM personally though, I suggest you just use his past tendancies against him. Then again, when you make NPCs that break the rules, nothing says you can't just whip another ability out to counter the PCs and say he had it all along.

[Jaid]

not to mention the fact that ritual sorcery takes a minimum of 1 hour.

[edit] so i hope you sold this kid for an obscenely large amount of money, because seriously he can do things that are just plain impossible [/edit]

This post has been edited by Jaid: Apr 14 2008, 09:23 PM

[HentaiZonga]

Was the drone armed? Did the character want to play another character? If a flyspy flew by would you just kill the person who is using it? Seems very very very.... um... very shady.

Well, the rigger had fallen into NPC status, as the player hadn't shown up to play his character in *ages* - so this was a way to 'write him off', as it were. But yeah, we were all a bit weirded out by it.

[masterofm]

Note to what Jaid said and know that your GM hit you with a bullet train. My advice is sigh, expect more of this, and move on from there.

[Malicant]

not to mention the fact that ritual sorcery takes a minimum of 1 hour.

[edit] so i hope you sold this kid for an obscenely large amount of money, because seriously he can do things that are just plain impossible [/edit]

QFT

[O'Donnell Heir]

There wasn't nearly enough hitting people with cars in that plan.

[Cabral]

Emotitoy C12 squadron.
Plus a perimeter of drones with AV-loaded sniper rifles controlled in captain's chair mode.

And most importantly ... stand in the cornfield so when you get wished there, you can keep lining up your shot.

Then slap patch the kid with the awakened drug that makes you astrally perceive and strap him into a semi-ballistic.

[KarmaInferno]

Drown the building with immobilizing air-breathable foam, laced with a sedative?


-karma

[Fortune]

Ignore the kid and go get another job.

[HentaiZonga]

Ignore the kid and go get another job.

Would that we had chosen that route (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif) Unfortunately, having acquired the kid, it appears that the kid was only half of the story - now we have to deal with some sort of nasty toxic spirit that's REALLY pissed about having its play-toy / future emissary taken away from it.

[fool]

find a gm who doesn't use quite so much fiat, and more rules.

[Fortune]

Trade the kid to the Toxic Spirit for future considerations. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Jaid]

Would that we had chosen that route (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif) Unfortunately, having acquired the kid, it appears that the kid was only half of the story - now we have to deal with some sort of nasty toxic spirit that's REALLY pissed about having its play-toy / future emissary taken away from it.

did we mention background count yet? nothing makes a spirit's day take a quick trip down the crapper like mana static.

(are you starting to understand *why* mana static is on everyone's top 5 list now?)

[HentaiZonga]

did we mention background count yet? nothing makes a spirit's day take a quick trip down the crapper like mana static.

(are you starting to understand *why* mana static is on everyone's top 5 list now?)

I am definitely going to have to learn this spell. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Also - according to the GM, everything is on-the-level rules wise. He says "something weird is going on here, but nothing that hasn't been mentioned somewhere in an SR sourcebook".

[Jaid]

I am definitely going to have to learn this spell. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Also - according to the GM, everything is on-the-level rules wise. He says "something weird is going on here, but nothing that hasn't been mentioned somewhere in an SR sourcebook".

that's funny, i coulda swore that tarantula had to jump through all kinds of hoops to get his ritual magic down to taking only one hour to cast so it couldn't be noticed before the great dragon got nuked by a ridiculously powerful elemental combat spell.