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> Possession vs. Materialization
Tyro
post Dec 18 2008, 08:31 AM
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What are the practical implications of each? I don't mean the two sets of rules side by side, I mean actual pros and cons in various situations with the rules backing them up.

I'm trying to figure out if my magician should use Hermetic Qaballah or be a Chaos Mage
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Cain
post Dec 18 2008, 08:53 AM
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If you're not certain, go with materialization. The rules for it are better supported, since it's the default.

Possession has some very specific advantages, but they're specific enough that some of the differences are esoteric and niche; they're only more useful in a handful of specific situations. Possession + Channeling + Invoking is a hugely powerful combination, but it involves a dedicated build to get the most mileage out of it. It's great if you want to have a combat mage, not so great if you want a more utility mage type of build.

I take it that you want to go hermetic Qaballa for the golems? You can do that with an Ally spirit with the Inhabitation power.
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Tyro
post Dec 18 2008, 08:56 AM
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QUOTE (Cain @ Dec 18 2008, 12:53 AM) *
I take it that you want to go hermetic Qaballa for the golems? You can do that with an Ally spirit with the Inhabitation power.

Sweet! That clinches it.

I'm still curious about the specifics of how Possession can be exploited, though. For example, I love the idea of having a spirit possess a corp guard and having him drop a grenade.

Also, how useful is Ritual Spellcasting at low levels? Do you really have to invest in it for it to be worthwhile>
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Ryu
post Dec 18 2008, 09:30 AM
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You can "maximise the potential utility of possession" by a) getting high-force spirits into your body (works for any build, but needs Channeling metamagic), or b) getting high-force spirits to possess small drones (20k¥ per ton of vehicle weight for vessel preparation IIRC). Idea in both cases: Exploit the adding of stats, be invulnerable. If you get Invoking on top, look at Plant spirits (Regeneration).

Possession of unprepared vessels is hard to do. Yes, you could pull of the grenade-dropping trick, but a spirit capabable of doing so will provide IntW to one of your targets.

Ritual spellcasting depends on your list of spells. Think about potential uses before you opt-in.



Chaos magic / golem magic? Which concept do you prefer? I´d build an augmented, technophile chaos mage, or a traditional, almost unaugmented quaballah mage. Both can be fun. Cains suggestion of an Ally spirit of (the other) type is good for both cases.
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CoyoteNZ
post Dec 18 2008, 09:40 AM
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QUOTE (Tyro @ Dec 18 2008, 09:56 PM) *
For example, I love the idea of having a spirit possess a corp guard and having him drop a grenade.



Not sure how much said spirit would like that, because spirit will be at ground zero (ie is the guard) when it goes off.

But if spirit possesses guard, the guard is yours!

Fires on friends, can walk around base not setting off alarms, 'escort' party in, so many possibilities when you have complete control over the guard('s body)


Max,
Dunedin, NZ
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BlackHat
post Dec 18 2008, 03:33 PM
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Except that a security mage might notice he's dual-natured all of a sudden (with no registered magical talent before) - also, any MAD scanner would pick up the grenade on the way into the building, and he would probably be arrested. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) But its still pretty useful.
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pbangarth
post Dec 18 2008, 04:53 PM
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QUOTE (BlackHat @ Dec 18 2008, 08:33 AM) *
Except that a security mage might notice he's dual-natured all of a sudden (with no registered magical talent before) - also, any MAD scanner would pick up the grenade on the way into the building, and he would probably be arrested. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) But its still pretty useful.


Being noticed for dual nature is a potential problem, but in my opinion the sneakiness of having an 'inside man' is an underused aspect of possession. For example, it is amazing what one guard with a set of keys can turn off in a few minutes. Or how profitable it is to deliver the target to your employers, and then have the target break out undamaged later so you can deliver him into hiding for a second fee.

Peter
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Drogos
post Dec 18 2008, 05:40 PM
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Good idea PBA. Just remember that what the guard knows and what the spirit knows are two different things and the spirit can't access the guards knowledge to know, for instance, this key goes to this door or the passcode for my commlink is 123456789. Still, a little trial and error can go a long way and the official looking presence can get you past checkpoints with ease.
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Cain
post Dec 18 2008, 05:48 PM
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If getting past a security checkpoint with a familiar face is all you're worried about, use Physical mask. That's much more versatile than Possession for this sort of thing. You won't be burning through services left and right.

Possession has its uses, but this isn't one of its better uses.
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Ryu
post Dec 18 2008, 06:10 PM
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You are putting it lightly there. Possession is obvious. You instantly and subconsciously know that something isn´t right, even as a mundane (A perception test with a threshold of (6-spirit force), that´s close to zero for spirits that can possess non-vessels).
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pbangarth
post Dec 19 2008, 12:10 AM
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I concur that sleazing past buddies is a problem for a possessed NPC. Smoking eyes, and all. I guess I am falling back on the experience of a possession mage of mine who can rip into a mind and find what he needs to know.. and THEN sending in the mook with a spirit inside and the knowledge he gives it. Alternatively, one can have the spirit seek the target out after he is traded in for the payoff.

As far as the double pay thing, the last time I did it, the target was 'unconscious' because we 'had to make him controllable'. The spirit inside waited till the mage signalled from far away, and then dealt with the guards who were waiting for the boss to show up for questioning.

So, yeah there are caveats. Then let those caveats counter the argument that possession is too powerful.

Peter
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The Jake
post Dec 19 2008, 01:46 AM
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I didn't think Plant spirits existed for Voodoo? I'm going from memory though...

QUOTE
Possession has some very specific advantages, but they're specific enough that some of the differences are esoteric and niche; they're only more useful in a handful of specific situations. Possession + Channeling + Invoking is a hugely powerful combination, but it involves a dedicated build to get the most mileage out of it. It's great if you want to have a combat mage, not so great if you want a more utility mage type of build.


Cain - do you have an example? I presume you mean Immunity to Normal Weapons for Possession + Regeneration or similar for a combat mage? How would you exploit this as a combat mage?

- J.
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TheOOB
post Dec 19 2008, 01:58 AM
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The general rule is, without the realistic form power you can always tell if something is a spirit. That said, I allow plant, beast, and man spirits to take realistic form as an optional power.
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Cain
post Dec 19 2008, 02:22 AM
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QUOTE (The Jake @ Dec 18 2008, 05:46 PM) *
Cain - do you have an example? I presume you mean Immunity to Normal Weapons for Possession + Regeneration or similar for a combat mage? How would you exploit this as a combat mage?

You said it yourself. That combination is insanely powerful, but it stops just shy of being broken, by virtue of the steps you need to reach it. Still, if we're talking a dedicated summoner, they can bind force 12 spirits and expect to survive, either by throwing a lot of dice and/or using the Edge cheat. But anyway, once you use the combination you mentioned above, you'll destroy any mundane opposition, and will give magical enemies a huge fight.
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TheOOB
post Dec 19 2008, 02:56 AM
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QUOTE (Cain @ Dec 18 2008, 09:22 PM) *
You said it yourself. That combination is insanely powerful, but it stops just shy of being broken, by virtue of the steps you need to reach it. Still, if we're talking a dedicated summoner, they can bind force 12 spirits and expect to survive, either by throwing a lot of dice and/or using the Edge cheat. But anyway, once you use the combination you mentioned above, you'll destroy any mundane opposition, and will give magical enemies a huge fight.


Of course, anyone with that kind of power is just painting a giant bullseye on themselves.
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Cain
post Dec 19 2008, 03:13 AM
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QUOTE (TheOOB @ Dec 18 2008, 06:56 PM) *
Of course, anyone with that kind of power is just painting a giant bullseye on themselves.

It's actually not that difficult. Assuming a dedicated summoner, you could throw 20+ dice for the Binding test, more if you spend Edge. The spirit will be throwing 24 dice, so they'll be about equal, except that the mage will have exploding dice, giving him the advantage.

The tricky part is surviving the Drain. With 24 dice, we can expect 6 successes, doubled to 12 (and increased 50% to 18 if you Invoke it). So, you need to soak 3 boxes of Physical damage to survive, 9 if you Invoke it. Which is difficult, but not impossible with a high drain stat, high Magic, a reasonable focus, and lots of Edge. Even so, if that doesn't work, you can always resort to the Edge cheat to critically succeed on the drain test.

So, binding a Force 12 spirit is within the reach of a starting character; if karmagen is used, then the Invoking part becomes a possibility as well. It's not that uncommon to be able to summon and bind humongous spirits, it's just dangerous and requires a dedicated built to pull off properly.
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The Jake
post Dec 19 2008, 03:41 AM
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QUOTE (Cain @ Dec 19 2008, 03:13 AM) *
It's actually not that difficult. Assuming a dedicated summoner, you could throw 20+ dice for the Binding test, more if you spend Edge. The spirit will be throwing 24 dice, so they'll be about equal, except that the mage will have exploding dice, giving him the advantage.

The tricky part is surviving the Drain. With 24 dice, we can expect 6 successes, doubled to 12 (and increased 50% to 18 if you Invoke it). So, you need to soak 3 boxes of Physical damage to survive, 9 if you Invoke it. Which is difficult, but not impossible with a high drain stat, high Magic, a reasonable focus, and lots of Edge. Even so, if that doesn't work, you can always resort to the Edge cheat to critically succeed on the drain test.

So, binding a Force 12 spirit is within the reach of a starting character; if karmagen is used, then the Invoking part becomes a possibility as well. It's not that uncommon to be able to summon and bind humongous spirits, it's just dangerous and requires a dedicated built to pull off properly.


I'd love to see a build that does that and combines it with some meaty combat skillz...

- J.
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JoelHalpern
post Dec 19 2008, 03:57 AM
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QUOTE (Cain @ Dec 18 2008, 10:13 PM) *
It's actually not that difficult. Assuming a dedicated summoner, you could throw 20+ dice for the Binding test, more if you spend Edge. The spirit will be throwing 24 dice, so they'll be about equal, except that the mage will have exploding dice, giving him the advantage.

The tricky part is surviving the Drain. With 24 dice, we can expect 6 successes, doubled to 12 (and increased 50% to 18 if you Invoke it). So, you need to soak 3 boxes of Physical damage to survive, 9 if you Invoke it. Which is difficult, but not impossible with a high drain stat, high Magic, a reasonable focus, and lots of Edge. Even so, if that doesn't work, you can always resort to the Edge cheat to critically succeed on the drain test.

So, binding a Force 12 spirit is within the reach of a starting character; if karmagen is used, then the Invoking part becomes a possibility as well. It's not that uncommon to be able to summon and bind humongous spirits, it's just dangerous and requires a dedicated built to pull off properly.


First, with the spirit throwing 24 dice, we can expect it to get 8 successes (not 6), and therefore the invoked version is 12 successes, not 9.

And your exploding dice give you a very small edge, which means you might have a 60% chance of actually binding it.

The big thing you have to keep in mind is the difference between averages and common events. With the way shadowrun dice work, the variation is huge. Presumably, when binding, you better have less than a 5% chance of falling over dead.
But a spirit rolling 36 dice has a good shot of getting 15 successes (the odds are less than 1 in 3, but still quite high, of the spirit doing that well.) Yes, I can imagine mages who can soak enough off of 30P damage to survive. But not very many of them. Even with edge.

Yours,
Joel M. Halpern

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Cain
post Dec 19 2008, 04:08 AM
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QUOTE (The Jake @ Dec 18 2008, 07:41 PM) *
I'd love to see a build that does that and combines it with some meaty combat skillz...

I don't know what you mean by "meaty", but tossing in 10 dice for firearms isn't difficult. If you really want to get ugly, summon a Guardian spirit with the Heavy Weapon skill as a power; have it possess you, and go to town. You'll be throwing 24 dice per attack, more if you've built your character right and have Channeling.
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pbangarth
post Dec 19 2008, 06:06 AM
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QUOTE (JoelHalpern @ Dec 18 2008, 08:57 PM) *
First, with the spirit throwing 24 dice, we can expect it to get 8 successes (not 6), and therefore the invoked version is 12 successes, not 9.

And your exploding dice give you a very small edge, which means you might have a 60% chance of actually binding it.


If you are shooting to Invoke a higher Force spirit, high enough to make your chances of success sketchy, a very important step is to bind the spirit first, and try the Invoke on a re-bind. On a rebind, if the conjuration goes wrong, the spirit won't have you for lunch. Also, with the right spirit you could have it performing Guard on you while you do the Binding/Re-binding Test, to protect you from glitches.

As far as comparing dice pools, I agree that binding a Force 12 spirit for a newly minted magician, while possible, is really too dangerous. The Drain Test is likely to compare the spirit's 2 X 4 (average) = 8 hits against the summoner's, what... WIL 6 + CHA 8 + Binding Focus 3 = approx. 6 hits. Basically you need EDG to have a chance of success. That's a bad habit to get into.

As far as exploding dice for EDG, remember the cutoff value: if the dice pool is 2.5 times the Edge pool or more, save the dice to re-roll failures. If it is less, use the Edge right away to get the exploding dice.

QUOTE
The big thing you have to keep in mind is the difference between averages and common events. With the way shadowrun dice work, the variation is huge. Presumably, when binding, you better have less than a 5% chance of falling over dead.


Also remember that the larger the dice pool, the more likely (not guaranteed of course) that you will roll something close to the average.

QUOTE
But a spirit rolling 36 dice has a good shot of getting 15 successes (the odds are less than 1 in 3, but still quite high, of the spirit doing that well.) Yes, I can imagine mages who can soak enough off of 30P damage to survive. But not very many of them. Even with edge.
Yours,
Joel M. Halpern


36 dice? That would be a Force 18 spirit. How could a starting character summon such a Force 18 spirit? And it would average 12 successes, not 15. And that would be after the doubling already, so I don't see where the 30P comes from.

Peter
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JoelHalpern
post Dec 19 2008, 06:27 AM
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QUOTE (pbangarth @ Dec 19 2008, 01:06 AM) *
36 dice? That would be a Force 18 spirit. How could a starting character summon such a Force 18 spirit? And it would average 12 successes, not 15. And that would be after the doubling already, so I don't see where the 30P comes from.

Peter


He specified a force 12 invoked (i.e. effectively force 18) spirit.
So the spirit rolls 36 dice.
And therefore has quite a good chance of getting 15 hits. (1 standard deviation, or about 32% chance, is about 44.4 dice, or a hair less than 15, so it will get 15 dice better than 25% of the time.) Even a very advanced mage, with good edge to reroll failures, still has a pretty low chance of getting enough successes to soak 30 damage without dying. And remember this is physical damage, unless the mage has magic 12.

Your suggestion that a rebinding test is not subject to the attack penalty for unconsciouness does mean that at least if the mage has mundane assistance he only dies if it drops him too far past 0.
But remember, that 15 was a 1/3 shot. about 1/20, the spirit will get 18 hits, giving 36 drain!

Joel
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toturi
post Dec 19 2008, 06:38 AM
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QUOTE (JoelHalpern @ Dec 19 2008, 02:27 PM) *
He specified a force 12 invoked (i.e. effectively force 18) spirit.
So the spirit rolls 36 dice.
And therefore has quite a good chance of getting 15 hits. (1 standard deviation, or about 32% chance, is about 44.4 dice, or a hair less than 15, so it will get 15 dice better than 25% of the time.) Even a very advanced mage, with good edge to reroll failures, still has a pretty low chance of getting enough successes to soak 30 damage without dying. And remember this is physical damage, unless the mage has magic 12.

Your suggestion that a rebinding test is not subject to the attack penalty for unconsciouness does mean that at least if the mage has mundane assistance he only dies if it drops him too far past 0.
But remember, that 15 was a 1/3 shot. about 1/20, the spirit will get 18 hits, giving 36 drain!

Joel

That is if the GM chooses to actually roll the 36 dice for the spirit.
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MaxMahem
post Dec 19 2008, 06:40 AM
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Don't forget that such a powerful spirit also has tons of edge as well. A spirits edge is (always? I can't recall any exceptions) equal to its force, so a force 12 spirit also has 12 dice of edge. And might very well spend that edge to resist summoning or binding. Which makes an already very bad statistical situation much worse.

Using edge before hand to invoke the roll of 6 (almost always a good idea with these size dice pools I think), results in like 20% more hits on average correct?
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Dragnar
post Dec 19 2008, 06:55 AM
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A small sidenote regarding the power level of binding ridiculously high spirits into oneself: Yes, a possession mage binding a force 12 spirit is almost impossible to hurt normally, but a materialization mage summoning a force 12 spirit and telling him to kick ass and chew bubblegum while hiding behind a corner is usually impossible to hurt, as long as he stays out of the line of fire, a trick a possession mage can't do, so the supposed high survivability isn't a problem.
A small perk to the generally weaker possession mage, at most.
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Cain
post Dec 19 2008, 07:13 AM
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QUOTE
He specified a force 12 invoked (i.e. effectively force 18) spirit.
So the spirit rolls 36 dice.

That is incorrect. The Drain Value is increased by 50%, not the spirit's resistance dice. Invoking a spirit does not increase the number of dice it rolls.

And even if the spirit gets a good resistance roll, the drain can be completely and perfectly resisted, cheaply, if you have a low Edge score. You just burn a point for a critical success on the drain roll, reducing it to nothing. You then spend 6 karma to buy back your lost point of Edge. It's cheese, but it's also by-the-book and totally legal.

Edit:
QUOTE
A small sidenote regarding the power level of binding ridiculously high spirits into oneself: Yes, a possession mage binding a force 12 spirit is almost impossible to hurt normally, but a materialization mage summoning a force 12 spirit and telling him to kick ass and chew bubblegum while hiding behind a corner is usually impossible to hurt, as long as he stays out of the line of fire, a trick a possession mage can't do, so the supposed high survivability isn't a problem.
A small perk to the generally weaker possession mage, at most.

This is where Channeling comes into play, because otherwise you cannot control the spirit very precisely. With the fine control that Channeling gets you, you won't go through services as quickly. Additionally, you have higher stats when the spirit is posessing you: you get your physical stats, plus it's physical stats. So, if you had a Quickness of 4, and was possessed by a Force 12 Guardian spirit, you would have an effective Quickness of 18. Add to this 12 dice for a combat skill, and you're throwing 30+ dice.

If you really want to get ugly, you can have the spirit possess the Troll Samurai/Tank instead of yourself. Then you can sit on the sidelines and watch, just like a Materalization mage, with the upshot that your spirit has higher physical stats.
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