Cheesy Sustained Improved Reflexes, The spell and a sustaining focus combined Options

[Maelstrome]

3) Essence.

what is essence really needed for as a mundane?

[Adarael]

The amount of time you can go spending your yen on hookers and blow before you die of organ failure.

Or wading through toxic waste and radiation, I guess. Whichever you prefer.

[Maelstrome]

i think ill take the blow and hookers but the toxic radioactive sludge is a close second.

[Glyph]

what is essence really needed for as a mundane?

It acts as a limiter to how much cyber/bio stuff you can put in your character. As The Jake pointed out, there are ways to really stretch it out. The previously mentioned two items (nuyen and availability) are more limiting, but it really depends on the game. The mundane edge assumes a high nuyen/low Karma game, and it could just as easily be the opposite of that.

The "unlimited" cap on Magic is something that will only matter in really long-running or high-powered campaigns. It still bugs me, though, because it jars with the rest of the game. I would cap it a bit higher than some of the house rules I have seen here, but I would cap it, myself. Metahumans should have a hard limit to how much Magic they can channel. Even great dragons and IEs should have limits, even if they are a bit higher than the "normal" ones.

[Maelstrome]

It acts as a limiter to how much cyber/bio stuff you can put in your character. As The Jake pointed out, there are ways to really stretch it out. The previously mentioned two items (nuyen and availability) are more limiting, but it really depends on the game. The mundane edge assumes a high nuyen/low Karma game, and it could just as easily be the opposite of that.

The "unlimited" cap on Magic is something that will only matter in really long-running or high-powered campaigns. It still bugs me, though, because it jars with the rest of the game. I would cap it a bit higher than some of the house rules I have seen here, but I would cap it, myself. Metahumans should have a hard limit to how much Magic they can channel. Even great dragons and IEs should have limits, even if they are a bit higher than the "normal" ones.

i ment keeping your essence.

my buzz is gone now. back to normal existence.

[Fuchs]

I think it says enough that any specialist build is an awakened character these days.
Also, all the cyberware and bioware mentioned is available for awakened characters too. They may not be able to stuff themselves full of it to the hilt, but if the mundanes can have all that expensive cyber, then the adepts can cherry pick the stuff they want, and top it off with magic.

[The Jake]

It acts as a limiter to how much cyber/bio stuff you can put in your character. As The Jake pointed out, there are ways to really stretch it out. The previously mentioned two items (nuyen and availability) are more limiting, but it really depends on the game. The mundane edge assumes a high nuyen/low Karma game, and it could just as easily be the opposite of that.

The "unlimited" cap on Magic is something that will only matter in really long-running or high-powered campaigns. It still bugs me, though, because it jars with the rest of the game. I would cap it a bit higher than some of the house rules I have seen here, but I would cap it, myself. Metahumans should have a hard limit to how much Magic they can channel. Even great dragons and IEs should have limits, even if they are a bit higher than the "normal" ones.

I have NFI where the fuck this "unlimited" rule or notion came from. I believe it was from earlier editions (in which it was true). But I can assure you this is not the case in SR4. It really bothers me so I actually looked this up to find the exact page/reference/quote.

Let me spell this out:

A character’s initiate grade cannot exceed her Magic attribute.
If a character’s Magic is reduced below her initiate grade, she loses
that level of initiation and the metamagic she gained with it.

Quoted from BBB, p. 189

In other words, the maximum you can initiate to is 6, making your highest magic attribute (excluding the use of focii) a 12 (6 for essence + 6 for initiation). There used to be tricks in previous editions using Essence drain to pump up Magic but those days are gone (at least from my reading of the rules although I might be missing something).

Trust me when I say this. Mages definitely do NOT have 'unlimited' Magic potential.

That doesn't account for the fact that once you initiate you have to pay the karma cost of initiation AND increasing the attribute. The fact you have to undergo a ritual or quest of some sort *every* *time* you initiate.

You have none of that as a mundane. You find a surgeon. You pay the nuyen. You undergo the surgery. You're done.

That. Is. It (unless you are using transgenics, cybermancy or optional rules).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying one is more powerful than the other but even if magic WAS more powerful than cyber/bio (which is highly debatable) then it is because they bloody well deserve it.

There is far more options for player's to increase the amount of nuyen on their character than they can to accumulate karma. In every game of SR I have either ran or played, it is far, far easier to accumulate nuyen over karma. I have been playing/running this game in some form or another since 1989 so I feel somewhat confident in saying that. Even if an astute GM wanted to monitor this situation and maintain a strict balance, he can't alter this predicament without seriously railroading his players and his campaign.

E.g.
Imagine you're a player and want to make serious nuyen to bankroll a new implant/facility/vehicle/whatever. You plan the job meticuluously and the GM just constantly undermines you with random "obstacles" making it feel like your every attempt to earn extra money is being under-mined. Or alternatively, you complete the job and he just keeps throwing random "unfortunate accidents" your way just to deplete your credstick. That sort of behaviour devalues your efforts as a player and makes one feel powerless. It also really ruins the fun of the game and can burn players real fast.

I'm not saying a GM can't put in obstacles between a player and his nuyen (hey its the GMs job!). But I am saying he can't take the nuyen from that player after the fact or withhold him from it indefinitely without seriously undermining the player's efforts (especially if that player has his heart set on it). This is why I'm a fan of optional rules that allow nuyen:karma conversion (for magic using characters at least).

- J.

[Tomothy]

The Jake: Your initiation grade cannot be higher than your magic, but when you initiate it gives you +1 to your max magic. So if want to initiate past level 6 all you have to do is increase your magic by 1. This can go on indefinitely.

I think initiate grade 6 is as good a place as any to cap it though.

[The Jake]

The Jake: Your initiation grade cannot be higher than your magic, but when you initiate it gives you +1 to your max magic. So if want to initiate past level 6 all you have to do is increase your magic by 1. This can go on indefinitely.

I think initiate grade 6 is as good a place as any to cap it though.

I see what you mean.

I simply interpreted it that the (starting) absolute Magic rating at character creation is what caps your Initiate grade. I interpreted this because there were now skill caps as well (when they didn't exist previously) so I thought they were looking at capping Magic along with skills.

I can see how that interpretation could be construed but I'm quietly confident that's not what was intended (unless one of the writer's wants to jump in and correct me - at which point I'll happily eat my hat).

To be honest, I'd be perfectly fine with allowing magicians to have a nigh-infinite Magic rating.

To paint a picture, I played a character on/off for around 7 years and the highest he got to was a natural Magic of 9 (excluding a power focus) and he also had something like 2-3 essence points of deltagrade cyberware/bioware with that. And this character was a generalist and skill monkey - definitely not a min-maxed magician.

Even with this most favorable interpretation of yours, you'll find the karma costs for for increasing the Magic attribute of a magician really steep. The reality is even if you throw karma at a character like confetti (like we did back then too) and even if you allow nuyen:karma conversion (like we house ruled back then) you invariably find that players want to spend their karma in other areas anyway and so the whole thing does balance itself out reasonably well.

This is why I maintain that - if anything - cyberware/bioware is far too powerful for starting characters as it is by RAW, especially if you allow the Positive Qualities in Augmentation. The reason I say that is that you can do a lot more a lot earlier than a magician. Not that I care or prevent this mind you. My experience has been that this really does come out in the wash in the end.

- J.

[Sir_Psycho]

what is essence really needed for as a mundane?

It won't come up very often, but if you're the archetypal 0.01 Essence Street Samurai, you really don't want to go near anything with the essence drain power.

[The Jake]

Let me give you a quick example:
35 build points I can buy 'Type O System' and 'Adept' which effectively gives me access to Delta grade bioware at no additional cost and Magic abilities.

For a 'Negative' Quality, I can take 'In Debt' up to 30. That gives me an extra 150,000 nuyen and I can add that ontop of the maximum 250,000 nuyen I started with (because I maxed out nuyen at chargen and believe me, you really don't need to with this example).

That's 400,000 for half essence cost items (assuming availability rules apply) and if I decide not to use all that Essence, I can put the remainder towards Adept powers.
EDITED: Sorry, forgot its 50BP max for gear.

If I don't even give a shit about Adept abilities, trade that 5BP Adept quality for Restricted Gear and choose your favorite piece of bioware/cyberware/gear/whatever with an Availability up to 20.

Please even TRY and build a magician with standard rules that will even come CLOSE to that. You can build something to kick ass, but I can assure you that it will be heavily min-maxed and bordering a one trick pony. The mundane example I've given allows plenty of wriggle room as I haven't even touched attributes and skills.

- J.

[Tomothy]

I've found mage's specialising in summoning can be reasonably versatile while still kicking some serious ass.

Need info? Search. Need stealth? Conceal. Need social? Influence. Need assist? Confuse. Need buffs? Innate spells. Need combat? Got spirits! And that's just the Spirit of Man (though I'd use a different Spirit for Combat).

[Pendaric]

Very impressive. Now show me a mundane that can kill you in seconds with no more than act of will and a few words from the other side of the planet.

A full magicain and a spirit can do this.

Yes a mudane cyber monster can be sick and power gamed. So can a full magicain by being a full magicain.

You seem to have had a bad experience in your gaming life that has tainted your opionion and perhapes you prefer awakened characters. The latter is fine. The former needs to be addressed, this is a game and if everyone playing is mature and interested in playing a balanced game there is no reason to become vitriolic.

A little perspective.

[Tiger Eyes]

I simply interpreted it that the (starting) absolute Magic rating at character creation is what caps your Initiate grade. I interpreted this because there were now skill caps as well (when they didn't exist previously) so I thought they were looking at capping Magic along with skills.

I can see how that interpretation could be construed but I'm quietly confident that's not what was intended (unless one of the writer's wants to jump in and correct me - at which point I'll happily eat my hat).

Not that I believe you should eat your hat - unless of course it is a hat made of chocolate chip cookies - but there is no "hard" cap for magic rating. Individual GMs can, of course, institute any cap they'd like. But per the rules, a magician/adept can continue to increase their magic and Initiate grade as long as they have the karma to spend and their GM's permission.

I don't know about other games, but my GM makes it increasingly difficult to initiate, starting around grade 4. Spirit Mentors start requiring a magician to perform some task - which can involve a run (or runs) that involve the entire group, or stretch out across multiple campaigns. Magic groups will require something challenging and almost impossible - and often the magician/adept must pay karma to learn some new skills first (ie, our current Shaman has to make a hand-carved wooden mask before her Magic Group will let her initiate to level 4. She has to learn an artisian-wood carving skill to level 3 to do that. For level 5, she has to make and bind a foci, which requires several other skills she doesn't have... plus she'll have to do a metaplanar trip and get her Mentor Spirit to agree to the initiation. And the foci has to stay at the magical group's lodge, so she can't even use it). Free spirits who promise to help in return for... something (generally something that has a high likelyhood of getting the magician and friends killed). And even after all that, he's been known to set up challenges in the metaplanes that the magician can't pass (or actually, could pass if the player could figure out the key, but that's a different story).

Now, he makes it (relatively) simple for the street sam to find a delta clinic and get some deltaware synaptic boosters... *grumble grumble*

Even with this most favorable interpretation of yours, you'll find the karma costs for for increasing the Magic attribute of a magician really steep. The reality is even if you throw karma at a character like confetti (like we did back then too) and even if you allow nuyen:karma conversion (like we house ruled back then) you invariably find that players want to spend their karma in other areas anyway and so the whole thing does balance itself out reasonably well.

Yeah, that's the whole point. Do you continue to sink that karma into initiation and increasing your magic grade, or start buying skills, learning spells, getting foci, improving attributes, etc, etc... At some point, in my game, the Awakened characters have always reached that point of diminishing returns. "Oh, I could get my Magic to 12... or I could get three new skills at rating 4... hm..." In the last ten years, I can only think of 1 PC Adept who took his magic above 9. Adepts, with powerpoints tied to magic rating, are a bit more likely to raise it high. Most of the Magicians in my group rarely go above Magic 7.

[note that my GM delights in sending NPCs against us who have much higher magic than that. Sometimes they're even on our side... and sometimes we run away screaming like little girls] (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Jaid]

It won't come up very often, but if you're the archetypal 0.01 Essence Street Samurai, you really don't want to go near anything with the essence drain power.

whereas the magicians in your game are eagerly jumping into melee combat with said essence draining critters so they can lose all their magic?

essence drain requires that you already have been subdued, for one minute. if you've been subdued for one minute, i don't care *what* archetype you are, you could have been dead 57 seconds ago.

[edit] in fact, the 0.01 essence street sam likely is more safe from essence drain than the magician, because just about anything that can essence drain can also assense, and will know that draining the sam will only get them 0.01 essence... not even really worth the time, i would say [/edit]

This post has been edited by Jaid: Jan 31 2009, 05:28 PM

[Mäx]

For a 'Negative' Quality, I can take 'In Debt' up to 30. That gives me an extra 150,000 nuyen

No, that only gives you 30k nuyen

For every 5 BP taken, the character
receives an extra 5,000Â¥ at character creation

[Glyph]

[note that my GM delights in sending NPCs against us who have much higher magic than that. Sometimes they're even on our side... and sometimes we run away screaming like little girls] (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

That's the area where you will see the most abuse of "unlimited" Magic progression, the cheesy NPCs. I said it in my first post on the topic, but I'll repeat it - in most campaigns, the theoretical unlimited potential of Magic won't really come up, but I still hate it, because capping everything else, but leaving Magic and Resonance wide open like that, creates a jarring discontinuity in both the game mechanics and the game world.

Personally, I would leave the mechanics for Magic or Resonance improvement the same, but cap Initiation/Submersion at either Rating: 6 or Rating: 9 (haven't made up my mind yet). Great dragons and immortal elves would be capped, too, although higher (12), making them more powerful, but not DBZ-level. I would probably cap spirit Force (for summoning one) at 12, too, saying that the only spirits over Force: 12 are free spirits.

[The Jake]

No, that only gives you 30k nuyen

Blast it. Thanks for pointing this out. Don't I feel like a retard.

Very impressive. Now show me a mundane that can kill you in seconds with no more than act of will and a few words from the other side of the planet.

A full magicain and a spirit can do this.

Heck if you want to split hairs, you don't even need a spirit to do this.

Yes a mudane cyber monster can be sick and power gamed. So can a full magicain by being a full magicain.

You seem to have had a bad experience in your gaming life that has tainted your opionion and perhapes you prefer awakened characters. The latter is fine. The former needs to be addressed, this is a game and if everyone playing is mature and interested in playing a balanced game there is no reason to become vitriolic.

A little perspective.

Not at all. On the contrary, I'd say I've been blessed with the good fortune to play under good GMs and run games for good players that have always understood the distinction between magic and tech and that one is neither more powerful than the other.

That's the area where you will see the most abuse of "unlimited" Magic progression, the cheesy NPCs. I said it in my first post on the topic, but I'll repeat it - in most campaigns, the theoretical unlimited potential of Magic won't really come up, but I still hate it, because capping everything else, but leaving Magic and Resonance wide open like that, creates a jarring discontinuity in both the game mechanics and the game world.

I think the issue there is more to do with GMs throwing uber powerful NPCs your way than anything to do with a theoretical infinite attribute.

Even if one does find this annoying, bear in mind that the game is very heavily skewed in favor of mundanes at character creation and I think the evidence presented clearly supports that (or at least cyber-adepts). You get such a leapfrog ahead in ware that comparitively it takes a very long time for a magician to catch up and most campaigns don't even go to that length anyway.

Even anecdotally, Tiger Eye's post proves my point. Speaking of which, I need to find a hat to chew. Excuse me...

- J.

[toturi]

That's the area where you will see the most abuse of "unlimited" Magic progression, the cheesy NPCs. I said it in my first post on the topic, but I'll repeat it - in most campaigns, the theoretical unlimited potential of Magic won't really come up, but I still hate it, because capping everything else, but leaving Magic and Resonance wide open like that, creates a jarring discontinuity in both the game mechanics and the game world.

Actually this is often true of most "boss" NPCs. I find that I have to restrain myself from applying all the cheese into an NPC. But this is not limited to only the Magic NPCs, although the unlimited aspect does lend itself to (ab)use by the GM.

[Jaid]

Very impressive. Now show me a mundane that can kill you in seconds with no more than act of will and a few words from the other side of the planet.

bob the completely untrained moron with no skills, but owns a drone with a hunting rifle mounted on it (and a targeting autosoft).

what? you asked for it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[raggedhalo]

For a 'Negative' Quality, I can take 'In Debt' up to 30. That gives me an extra 150,000 nuyen

No, it gives you an extra 30,000 nuyen unless you're houseruling...

[Pendaric]

bob the completely untrained moron with no skills, but owns a drone with a hunting rifle mounted on it (and a targeting autosoft).

what? you asked for it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Tsk SR4 perhapes, in SR3 you would not have the flux range. Plus show me the drone with the actual range to get to the other side of the planet. An oft forgot dynamic tis fuel. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

The game is balanced ultimately by the players of said game. The different types of characters have different strengths but play style define the parameters of 'power'.

What defines an acceptable in game effect is the type of game you all want play. The default RAW defines acceptable is laughable. Its a guideline no more. An attitude of "the RAW says so there ref," is juvenial.
A "is that ok if not lets discuss what will make for the best game." everyone gets to have fun.

We all have been playing long enough to know whatever the rules allow can be balanced by style of play and a cooperative mature attitude in everyone in the group.

[Glyph]

What defines an acceptable in game effect is the type of game you all want play. The default RAW defines acceptable is laughable. Its a guideline no more. An attitude of "the RAW says so there ref," is juvenial.
A "is that ok if not lets discuss what will make for the best game." everyone gets to have fun.

We all have been playing long enough to know whatever the rules allow can be balanced by style of play and a cooperative mature attitude in everyone in the group.

Now that I agree on. You can make barely effective, or brutally overpowering, characters for both awakened and mundane builds. The balance between a mage and a sammie is no more important than the balance between a sammie and a rigger, or hacker, or face. Above and beyond the rules, the GM needs to set some general expectations.

400 BP is best for creating veteran runners who may not be best of the best, but who are definitely within sight of that goal. But you can create beginning runners, or world-class runners, with 400 BP, too. The strength of an open build system is also its weakness - being able to create nearly any type of character means that the group needs to get together to hash out the general expectations and overall power level. Otherwise, you could have characters who differ too much, in power level and niche (Barrens rat vs. corporate jet-setter) to be able to function as a cohesive team.

[Jaid]

Tsk SR4 perhapes, in SR3 you would not have the flux range. Plus show me the drone with the actual range to get to the other side of the planet. An oft forgot dynamic tis fuel. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

SR3 had satellite transmissions too, iirc.

and you only have to get the drone there if it wasn't already there. if you ship it there, or leave it there while you go elsewhere, the drone can be well within it's fuel range. yes, it does require a bit more preparation. it still works, though. alternately, you can simply pay someone who is on the other side of the world to kill someone. it's kinda what the setting is all about, really (not so much the killing, as the fact that you can pay someone on the other side of the world to do your dirty work for you)

The game is balanced ultimately by the players of said game. The different types of characters have different strengths but play style define the parameters of 'power'.

What defines an acceptable in game effect is the type of game you all want play. The default RAW defines acceptable is laughable. Its a guideline no more. An attitude of "the RAW says so there ref," is juvenial.
A "is that ok if not lets discuss what will make for the best game." everyone gets to have fun.

We all have been playing long enough to know whatever the rules allow can be balanced by style of play and a cooperative mature attitude in everyone in the group.

this i can agree with, however.

[RedeemerofOgar]

The magician in my group decided to always have a Force 3 Health Spell Sustaining Focus active, containing a Force 3 Improve Reflexes spell with three hits, adding 2IPs. So now he has a Mild Focus Addiction (Street Magic). If he keeps it up for three more sessions, it'll go to Moderate, and so on.

I do hope you're doing the same thing to your Street Samurai who always have their Wired Reflexes active. Think back - when was the last time you heard one of your players say "I deactivate my Wires?" Not that even if you did, it would be much of a palliative to the mage, since for some reason Focus Addiction was designed to be about 10 times worse in game effect than every other addiction in the system - you'd be better off having a Serious addiction to a drug than a Mild Focus Addiction by the rules as written. Nothing says to the Mage "you suck at this game" like giving him a negative Drain Test modifier.