Aspected Magicians, Summoning dudes with spells Options

[Namelessjoe]

hi there
so i was thinking about a summoner and was wondering i know if your aspected you wouldnt have a use for spells but if you have a spirit (of man for example) with innate spell who can use one of your spells.... can you learn spells eventhough you cant your self cast them to give to your summoned spirits?

i am at work thinking about it so i cant check my books (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
thank you in advance

[Kerenshara]

hi there
so i was thinking about a summoner and was wondering i know if your aspected you wouldnt have a use for spells but if you have a spirit (of man for example) with innate spell who can use one of your spells.... can you learn spells eventhough you cant your self cast them to give to your summoned spirits?

i am at work thinking about it so i cant check my books (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
thank you in advance

Go back and re-read the quality:

It's not that you CAN'T cast spells, it's that you're down so many dice (-4) that it's mostly pointless to even try. No reason you couldn't have picked up a couple you're just hopeless at throwing that you just happen to hand of to your stable of minions to use properly FOR you.

It's cheesey as drek, but nowhere near the worst I've seen around DS from time to time, and it's certanly completely legal.

Plus, when you eventually buy off the quality by contined practice... (you WERE going to buy it off eventually, right?)

[Rasumichin]

Aspected magicians of the Summoner type aren't unable to cast spells.
In contrast to someone who has taken Incompetence (Spellcasting), Incompetence (Ritual Magic) and Incompetence (Antimagic or howsitcalled), they aren't unable to ever learn these skills, they're just extremely bad at it (-4DP).

Edit : dang, ninja'd!
Anyway :

So your option is indeed possible, even though i absolutely wouldn't allow it if you wouldn't buy ranks in Spellcasting as well, as learning new spells takes an extended INT+Spellcasting (5/1day) extended test.
Good luck with that, considering how much your character sucks at spellcasting.

Also, keep in mind that you have to command the spirit first (takes a complex action) and then, when it's the spirits turn to act, he can use the spell for you. That's kinda...problematic in some situations in combat, i'd imagine.
You also need to summon a new spirit if you want to utilize another spell, either binding or dismissing the old one.
It is a workaround, but even though it sounds munchkinny at first glance, it will be rather clumsy and cumbersome in actual play.
I'd advise against hurting yourself in such a manner.

[Bugfoxmaster]

It's a pretty cheesy move, but yeah, you could learn a couple spells and hand them off to your spirits. You have nothing preventing you from using them as well, besides your abysmally low dice pool. Well, usually abysmally low.

Edit: I need to learn to read what the people before me have said. This post was unnecessary.

[Ol' Scratch]

People have weird ideas of what's cheesy and what isn't.

This is an "isn't."

Innate Spell is a power unique to spirits. Conjurers are masters of using spirits. Conjurers can also learn and cast spells, they just don't do it very well themselves. But in no way should their spirits be gimped compared to a traditional magician! If they've taken the time to learn a spell (paying the price for it in all ways, just like any other magician), then there is absolutley nothing wrong with them commanding their spirits to use it for them. Their negative quality is handled in the fact that they, themselves, cannot us the spell and that they're forced to rely on their spirit to do so. In other words, you have to 'waste" a service to act like an ordinary magician, whereas standard magicians don't.

There's a price to be paid, no added benefit gained, and maintains the Conjurer's style and flavor. There's absolutely nothing wrong or unbalanced about it anymore than a Sorcerer being able to kill spirits with Spirit Bolt.

[Namelessjoe]

alright sounds good thanks i had forgotten it was just a penelity to casting (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) it was mostly a thought to how it would work mechanicly. With a good charisma you could possably have several spirits bound with some of spells ready for you also it makes sence that it would take a while to cast my spells but i wouldnt have to worrie about drain from casting just for summoning/binding then you might be usefull elsewere during combat

[McCummhail]

What does a pure summoner do once his spirits are in motion,
summon a watcher to enjoy the show?

[Bugfoxmaster]

Cast his crappy spells? Or are we assuming he can't? In that case, pull out an assault rifle or SMG and cut loose with several doeses of lead. Acute lead poisoning's almost as good as magic for hurting people...

[pbangarth]

I agree with Dr. Funkenstein. The mechanical cost of passing powers off to spirits and having to wait an initiative phase for the spell to take effect (unless some canny instructions were given beforehand) more than makes up for the "benefit" of the Conjuror Aspect.

I put that in quotes because I don't see that the 5 BP return for giving up 4 dice in every other magical function is worth it. If someone is doing this strictly for cheese, we should pity him, not revile him.

[Bugfoxmaster]

I'd hope they weren't trying this on for cheese...
Aspected magicians are more a work of fluff than anything - 1% of the world is awakened, and most of those among that number are mundanes who can astrally percieve (via the quality in Street Magic, I guess, though this might include SURGE), people with a 'spell or spirit knack', and aspected magicians. Thus, of 6 billion people, among the 60 million Awakened, it's MORE normal to be aspected than it is to be a normal magician.
At least that's the fluffy way of looking at it. If any of us have seen a game where the aspected guys are all over the place (comparatively), I'll eat my socks.

[knasser]

I put the odd aspected NPC in my game. I like it for flavour and to remind people that there is such a thing as aspected. It's also a nice way to add in a magician that will fill a particular need in an adventure without undermining the "magicians are rare" quite as much as a full magician does.

But for a PC? Only if you have a strong, strong role-playing desire to do it. It's a very bad choice mechanically. I'm with Funkenstein on this though - if someone is a pure Summoner, I see no reason why their summoned spirits should be weaker than the non-pure summoner.

[Bugfoxmaster]

Hell, there's an option (OPTIONAL RULE) in Street magic for 'Expert Aspect Magicians', who have a -6 on all other magical things or whatever, but get a +2 to doing things from their aspect. So in some parallel worlds, aspected magicians are BETTER at their chosen craft than normal ones...

[Stahlseele]

Why only in some parallel worlds?
Aren't people who specialize usually better in their specialty compared to people who generalise and don't specialize in the specialty in question?

[McAllister]

I like the Expert Aspected Magicians rule; makes the -4 penalty a -6 penalty, but gives a +2 bonus to the things the magician can still do. Makes Aspected Conjuror LESS of a terrible decision.

Now, if only A. you could summon more than one spirit at a time, or B. you could instabind (same materials/drain etc, but faster) so throwing 3 or so spirits into a fight wasn't so difficult.

Hey, how would you guys feel about a conjuror splitting his Summoning dice pool to summon more than one spirit at once? You'd still be limited to having as many summoned spirits at one time as you could summon in one action, but it would allow for a couple little spirits, instead of one big one.

[McCummhail]

Hey, how would you guys feel about a conjuror splitting his Summoning dice pool to summon more than one spirit at once? You'd still be limited to having as many summoned spirits at one time as you could summon in one action, but it would allow for a couple little spirits, instead of one big one.

Summoning is hypothetically a mental duel with a spirit every time you do it,
If you think that an aspected summoner can handle multiple at a time,
then go for it!
You might limit it to half charisma or something,
I can see 8 force2 spirits or something like that still causing some mayhem.

[Totentanz]

People have weird ideas of what's cheesy and what isn't.

This is an "isn't."

Innate Spell is a power unique to spirits. Conjurers are masters of using spirits. Conjurers can also learn and cast spells, they just don't do it very well themselves. But in no way should their spirits be gimped compared to a traditional magician! If they've taken the time to learn a spell (paying the price for it in all ways, just like any other magician), then there is absolutley nothing wrong with them commanding their spirits to use it for them. Their negative quality is handled in the fact that they, themselves, cannot us the spell and that they're forced to rely on their spirit to do so. In other words, you have to 'waste" a service to act like an ordinary magician, whereas standard magicians don't.

There's a price to be paid, no added benefit gained, and maintains the Conjurer's style and flavor. There's absolutely nothing wrong or unbalanced about it anymore than a Sorcerer being able to kill spirits with Spirit Bolt.

+1. The word cheese gets thrown around a little too much these days. It seems for some people any attempt to creatively problem solve around a mechanical issue is cheese. I can easily see an aspected summoner who knows spells because he has to know the formulae to "teach" his spirits. It's kind of a "those who can't, teach" thing. I can also see characters who learned magic from someone that was aspected, and spends a great deal of effort in-game unlearning those bad habits. They want to be a good spellcaster, they just start out sucking at it due to their instruction. I could gin up at least three other compelling backstory ideas around this if I needed to. Throwing pejoratives on top of every idea just because it might, from some angle, be mechanically beneficial impairs character creation and development.

Funk pretty much nailed it mechanically.

Since when is gimping part of your character's role-given power set cheese? To flip it around, if a character is built only to cast spells, doesn't spend anything on other Magic skills, takes Aspected Magician, thus penalizing DP's he will never use, is that cheesy? If so, then when isn't he being cheesy?

"Cheese" != "Potentially good idea I didn't have myself" ;

[Rasumichin]

I'd hope they weren't trying this on for cheese...
Aspected magicians are more a work of fluff than anything - 1% of the world is awakened, and most of those among that number are mundanes who can astrally percieve (via the quality in Street Magic, I guess, though this might include SURGE), people with a 'spell or spirit knack', and aspected magicians. Thus, of 6 billion people, among the 60 million Awakened, it's MORE normal to be aspected than it is to be a normal magician.
At least that's the fluffy way of looking at it. If any of us have seen a game where the aspected guys are all over the place (comparatively), I'll eat my socks.

Good that you mention it, i'll bring this up in some future games.
Right now, most of the Awakened in my game world are adepts with Magic somewhere around 3, but there's also a lot of people who can astrally perceive (they set up all the wards PC mages run into).
I'll bring in some more aspected magicians for good measure.

+1. The word cheese gets thrown around a little too much these days. It seems for some people any attempt to creatively problem solve around a mechanical issue is cheese. I can easily see an aspected summoner who knows spells because he has to know the formulae to "teach" his spirits. It's kind of a "those who can't, teach" thing.

Ruleswise, there's of course the problem that the number of spells you may learn at the start of the game is limited by twice your Spellcasting or Ritual Magic skill, plus you have to know Spellcasting to learn any spell in the first case (even though i'll now most likely houserule it so that you may opt to make the learning test using Intuition+Ritual Magic as well).

So, an aspected conjurer who wants to fully utilize Spirits of Man is faced with the problem that he has to suffer through learning some Sorcery before he can imbue his spirits with such abilities.

"Cheese" != "Potentially good idea I didn't have myself" ;

+1000!

[Kerenshara]

People have weird ideas of what's cheesy and what isn't.

This is an "isn't."

Innate Spell is a power unique to spirits. Conjurers are masters of using spirits. Conjurers can also learn and cast spells, they just don't do it very well themselves. But in no way should their spirits be gimped compared to a traditional magician! If they've taken the time to learn a spell (paying the price for it in all ways, just like any other magician), then there is absolutley nothing wrong with them commanding their spirits to use it for them. Their negative quality is handled in the fact that they, themselves, cannot us the spell and that they're forced to rely on their spirit to do so. In other words, you have to 'waste" a service to act like an ordinary magician, whereas standard magicians don't.

There's a price to be paid, no added benefit gained, and maintains the Conjurer's style and flavor. There's absolutely nothing wrong or unbalanced about it anymore than a Sorcerer being able to kill spirits with Spirit Bolt.

Cheesey isn't the same as Munchkin, unbalanced or broken. Not in my book, anyhow.

[Ol' Scratch]

Nor is it in mine.

If anything's cheesy in this topic, however, it's forcing a Conjurer to have crappy spirits compared to a standard magician. I'd hate to see how people would respond if all spirit powers were based of their master's skill set, not just this one!' And like I said in my previous post, do you feel a Sorcerer should be penalized for using spells like Spirit Bolt? Afterall, they're supposed to suck when dealing with spirits, no? Same goes for any spells that affect the astral plane directly, or any other spells that touch upon areas they're penalized in via their skills.

That said, the only thing I don't like about the new (SR4) rules for aspected magicians is that it gimps them in all other areas. I'm not sure why they'd have so much trouble using Astral Perception, for instance, or why a Sorcerer would have trouble making spell fetishes. It's like saying anyone who specializes in a mundane field should take a -4 to -6 penalty whenever they make Perception tests. But c'est la vie.

[BlueMax]

Did someone call for Cheesy?

Am I still Chester, K?

BlueMax
/or is it Chester?

[Kerenshara]

Nor is it in mine.

If anything's cheesy in this topic, however, it's forcing a Conjurer to have crappy spirits compared to a standard magician. I'd hate to see how people would respond if all spirit powers were based of their master's skill set, not just this one!' And like I said in my previous post, do you feel a Sorcerer should be penalized for using spells like Spirit Bolt? Afterall, they're supposed to suck when dealing with spirits, no? Same goes for any spells that affect the astral plane directly, or any other spells that touch upon areas they're penalized in via their skills.

That said, the only thing I don't like about the new (SR4) rules for aspected magicians is that it gimps them in all other areas. I'm not sure why they'd have so much trouble using Astral Perception, for instance, or why a Sorcerer would have trouble making spell fetishes. It's like saying anyone who specializes in a mundane field should take a -4 to -6 penalty whenever they make Perception tests. But c'est la vie.

I didn't think Assensing was affected... I need to go check but that book isn't with me (since I haven't bought "Astral Perception" yet, I haven't checked).

Help me out on that second paragraph there, Doc. I must have missed something. How is being an aspected conjuror making their spirits crappy relative to a standard magician? I know I missed something.

The only thing I thought was cheesey was taking a spell exclusively so you could hand it off to a spirit, because your own dice pool is going to make it pretty tough to use effectively yourself, especially if you take the +2/-6 option. If it's a spell that's useful at low force and spell pool levels anyhow, that's much less a concern to me. But to take stun bolt, say as a tradition that has -1 to Combat spells, and handing it to your spirit and saying "sic-em!" IS cheesey. Would it happen? Sure. Is it legal? Absolutely. Am I even going to give the player a hard time beyond the very first time I see it? Nope. (I reserve the right to utter an awe tinged "narf... that's cheesey, Brain!" the first time.)

[Ol' Scratch]

Standard Magician: Their Spirits of Man (or any other spirits who have the Innate Spell power) are able to cast spells just fine, independent of the magician.
Aspected Conjurer: Not so. Their Spirits of Man (or any other spirits who have the Innate Spell power) are gimpy in comparison simply because their master isn't a spellcaster.

I'm not saying that you can't dislike it personally, but both in concept and in practice there isn't anything "cheesy" about it. Again, no more than a Sorcerer being able to use Spirit Bolt and similar spells to full effect. If they can, why can't Conjurers use their spirits to full effect?

[Kerenshara]

Standard Magician: Their Spirits of Man (or any other spirits who have the Innate Spell power) are able to cast spells just fine, independent of the magician.
Aspected Conjurer: Not so. Their Spirits of Man (or any other spirits who have the Innate Spell power) are gimpy in comparison simply because their master isn't a spellcaster.

Wait, I thought it had to be a spell the master could cast; It has nothing to do with how well the MASTER can cast it... or do I need to go back and re-read that spirit power (again) in SR4A? Because if it just has to be on th master's list of known spells, I don't understand how they're "gimped" in any way; The spirit has a "casting" MAGic rating equal to its Force... right?

I'm not saying that you can't dislike it personally, but both in concept and in practice there isn't anything "cheesy" about it. Again, no more than a Sorcerer being able to use Spirit Bolt and similar spells to full effect. If they can, why can't Conjurers use their spirits to full effect?

I didn't say they couldn't use their spirits to full effect. I've been confused because I THINK we're not talkng about the same thing and therefore I'm chasing my tail and you might be chasing... well somehing else. They (aspected conjurors) are only penalized on their own spellcasting... and counterspelling and ritul spellcasting and enchnting. I don't THINK they're penalized on Assensing, but I need to look to be sure on that part. And we ARE talking SR4(A) here, right?

[Ol' Scratch]

Wait, I thought it had to be a spell the master could cast; It has nothing to do with how well the MASTER can cast it... or do I need to go back and re-read that spirit power (again) in SR4A? Because if it just has to be on th master's list of known spells, I don't understand how they're "gimped" in any way; The spirit has a "casting" MAGic rating equal to its Force... right?

Err, are we reading two separate threads here?

The alleged "cheese" is that a Conjurer is using their spirit to cast spells they know since they, themselves, can't cast them very well. Thus those who are saying it's "cheesy" are implying that it's somehow wrong for a Conjurer's spirits to use Innate Spell properly because a Conjurer shouldn't know any spells at all. Or, in some cases, that the spirit's Innate Spell ability should take the -4 to -6 penalty that the Conjurer does. I'm not sure which one of those they're supporting honestly; it's rather confusing logic to me.

By the rules they're not gimped. People in this thread want them to be gimped to avoid being "cheesy."

I didn't say they couldn't use their spirits to full effect. I've been confused because I THINK we're not talkng about the same thing and therefore I'm chasing my tail and you might be chasing... well somehing else. They (aspected conjurors) are only penalized on their own spellcasting... and counterspelling and ritul spellcasting and enchnting. I don't THINK they're penalized on Assensing, but I need to look to be sure on that part. And we ARE talking SR4(A) here, right?

Yes, SR4. And aspected magicians are penalized in Conjuring, Sorcery, Assensing, Astral Combat and Enchanting (sans whichever one they're specialized in).

I'm not sure I understand what you think is cheesy now. Conjurers suffer a penalty when they cast spells themselves. No one is denying that. Conjurers have the ability to let their spirits use spells they know through Innate Spell. This is where people are claiming how horribly wrong it is in all ways imaginable. Which it isn't. Not even remotely.

I'm also not sure why you're saying it's not your argument, too. Whether the Conjurer is learning a spell 'exclusively for use by his spirit" or not, it doesn't matter. So what if he's doing it that way? Why shouldn't he, since spirits are his bread and butter? If a player just doesn't say he's doing it but actually is, does that make it less cheesy somehow? Is it wrong for a Drone Rigger to buy a heavy machine gun for his drone even though he can't use it himself? Same exact difference.

[pbangarth]

Conjurers have the ability to let their spirits use spells they know through Innate Spell. This is where people are claiming how horribly wrong it is in all ways imaginable. Which it isn't. Not even remotely.

I'm also not sure why you're saying it's not your argument, too. Whether the Conjurer is learning a spell 'exclusively for use by his spirit" or not, it doesn't matter. So what if he's doing it that way? Why shouldn't he, since spirits are his bread and butter? If a player just doesn't say he's doing it but actually is, does that make it less cheesy somehow? Is it wrong for a Drone Rigger to buy a heavy machine gun for his drone even though he can't use it himself? Same exact difference.

Exactly. Good example.

I might try to play an Aspected Magician just to see if the 5 BP bonus comes even remotely close to making up for all the detriments that accrue to being Aspected.