Summoning Spirits So Over-Powered It's Broken?, New Player Needs Help Understanding Options

[Aedosen]

SOLVED! SEE POSTS BELOW. THANKS FOR THE HELP EVERYONE.

Unless I'm missing something, it seems like a standard 400bp starting character is way overpowered if they are a mage/shaman who's good at summoning.

For example, an Elf shaman with high charisma and summoning (built for summoning basically) skill can summon force 6 spirits pretty much indefinitely unless he gets unlucky on some drain resist checks.

Summon a Force 6 Spirit
- Elf rolls Magic + Summoning = 12
- average successes = 4
- Spirit rolls Force = 6
- average successes = 2
- average services owed to Elf = 2
- average drain value = 4
- Elf rolls Charisma + Willpower = 13 to resist drain
- average successes = 4
- Elf now has Force 6 spirit; took 1 combat round to summon; Elf took no drain

Force 6 Spirit
- has armor 12 (physical/stun damage value must exceed 12 to harm it at all)
- if damage value exceeds 12, spirit still gets 12 added to soak pool
- it can blast or bash or grapple targets until they are all dead
- Elf picks 2 optional spirit powers when summoned for added utility or deadliness
- attackers can use their Willpower to fight the spirit

This Elf shaman can summon up to 8 of these and unleash them all at once to lay waste to foes. A character not maximized for summoning could summon these spirits at force 4 or 5 and have 6 of them.

Am I missing something that would prevent spirit summoners from completely ruining every game with their spirit servants?

[Blind Guardian]

You're definitely missing something.

A magician may only have one unbound spirit summoned at any given time, and no more bound spirits than her Charisma attribute. Spirits on remote service and on standby count toward this total.

So, your hypothetical caster isn't going to be able to just summon up an endless horde of Force 6 spirits to steamroll any opposition. If a character wants to have more than one of these monstrosities at a time, then they have to bind the spirit, which requires a roll against the spirit's force x2. Drain equals the spirit's hits, not net hits. It also takes time ([force] hours), money ([force] x 500 nuyen), and effort (your gamemaster can impose a -2 penalty on all tests while a magician is controlling a bound spirit, similar to sustaining a spell).

Attacks of will against a spirit are used in place of the Astral Combat skill. It would be a bad thing to be on the astral plane and run into a hostile spirit of this magnitude if all you had at your disposal were attacks of will. That's why being dual-natured can be a drawback as well as an advantage. To attack a mundane target, a spirit will need to either materialize or possess a suitable vessel, depending on the spirit's tradition.

The forums have numerous threads on how to deal with spirits, but the Stunbolt spell and Stick n' Shock ammo in particular can do wonders to send them back where they came from. Spirits are certainly a powerful part of a magician's arsenal, but they're by no means an 'I win' button in the game.

[Dragnar]

Spirits are cheaper than drones. Mid-force spirits are easier to destroy than combat drones, though, and have less combat power.
High force spirits are better than all drones not directly controlled by a rigger, but have a realistic chance of knocking you out cold and becoming free every time you try to bind them.

So, yes, spirits are really useful and really powerful, but not really crazy overpowered.

[eidolon]

Banishing has gotten considerably easier (and is very, very different) in 4th edition, as well.

Banishing
The Banishing skill is used to sever the magical ties between a spirit and its summoner, freeing the spirit to return to its native metaplane. In order to banish a spirit, the magician makes a Banishing + Magic Opposed Test against the spirit’s Force (or Force + summoner’s Magic for bound spirits). Each hit reduces the services owed by that spirit by one. If the services are reduced to 0, the spirit returns to its home unless a magician immediately moves to summon it once again.

rather than

BANISHING
Banishing destroys spirits, ending their presence on the physical and astral planes. Banishing is a Exclusive Complex Action. A magician of either tradition may banish a spirit of either type.
The banisher rolls a Conjuring Test against a target number equal to the spirit’s Force. If the banisher is also the spirit’s summoner, add Charisma dice to this test. Spirit foci and totem modifiers apply. The spirit rolls a Force Test against a target number equal to the banisher’s Magic Attribute.
If the spirit generates more successes, temporarily reduce the banisher’s Magic Attribute by 1 for each extra success. If the banisher generates more successes, reduce the spirit’s Force by 1 per net success. Ties mean neither side gains ground and the contest continues.
The winner decides whether there will be another round. If there is, neither combatant can do anything else until the winner’s next Combat Phase; they remain locked in magical combat.
Repeat the process until one participant overcomes the other (reducing Force or Magic Attribute to 0), or the winner of a round decides to break off the contest. If the spirit’s Force reaches 0, it is destroyed. If the banisher’s Magic Attribute drops to 0, the character takes Deadly stun damage and passes out; the spirit is free to go about its business. Additionally, the magician must immediately check for permanent Magic Loss (p. 160). Generally, when a spirit decides to break off a contest, it will flee. Circumstances may indicate different actions, however.
Magic Attribute or Force that is reduced by banishing is regained at a rate of 1 point per hour.

[Kumo]

Sr4:

Magician may only have one unbound spirit summoned at any given the time, and no more bound spirits than her Charisma attribute.

There is also suggestion, that controlling bound spirit may result in -2 modifier to all tests just like sustaining spell (if spirit is pissed of).

[Dragnar]

Banishing has gotten considerably easier (and is very, very different) in 4th edition, as well.

That is correct, but it's still vastly more time consuming, more drain-causing and less reliable than just throwing manabolts around, and a manabolt spell is less expensive than the banishing skill and useful for lots of other situations to boot.
If banishing didn't cause drain and you rolled all rolls until either the mage gets knocked out or the spirit vanishes in a single complex action, then there would be some situations were banishing was useful. Most likely still not enough to justify buying the skill, but by RAW, the skill is literally worse than useless, because it isn't even the best cause of action for the single use it has.

[Aedosen]

You're definitely missing something.


So, your hypothetical caster isn't going to be able to just summon up an endless horde of Force 6 spirits to steamroll any opposition. If a character wants to have more than one of these monstrosities at a time, then they have to bind the spirit, which requires a roll against the spirit's force x2. Drain equals the spirit's hits, not net hits. It also takes time ([force] hours), money ([force] x 500 nuyen), and effort (your gamemaster can impose a -2 penalty on all tests while a magician is controlling a bound spirit, similar to sustaining a spell).

Attacks of will against a spirit are used in place of the Astral Combat skill. It would be a bad thing to be on the astral plane and run into a hostile spirit of this magnitude if all you had at your disposal were attacks of will. That's why being dual-natured can be a drawback as well as an advantage. To attack a mundane target, a spirit will need to either materialize or possess a suitable vessel, depending on the spirit's tradition.

The forums have numerous threads on how to deal with spirits, but the Stunbolt spell and Stick n' Shock ammo in particular can do wonders to send them back where they came from. Spirits are certainly a powerful part of a magician's arsenal, but they're by no means an 'I win' button in the game.

Everything in your first paragraph is taken into account in my first post. EDIT: No it's not! I read Guardian's post (below) and see the rule now. That solves this little riddle.

Basically, non-magical people are screwed when fighting spirits. Thanks for pointing out the Stick n' Shock ammo. I'd have to play around with it to see if a gunslinger adept with this ammo could survive a fight with 2/4/6/8 Force 6 spirits. I'm thinking the gunslinger wouldn't drop more than one of the spirits, but that's just my guess.

I found some references to the fact that if a summoner abuses her spirits a lot, the GM can have the spirits start to use Edge when she tries to summon them. That would help lower the number of spirits or maybe their force rating of the the spirits the example character could have on standby.

The biggest advantage, other than the fact that they are super strong in combat, is that the spirits don't cost any $ and, if the character is a maximized summoner as in the example above, don't cause much if any drain damage.

[Aedosen]

Omg, Blind Guardian, you rock. That's the missing piece of info! Thank goodness they put that rule in there.

You're definitely missing something.


So, your hypothetical caster isn't going to be able to just summon up an endless horde of Force 6 spirits to steamroll any opposition. If a character wants to have more than one of these monstrosities at a time, then they have to bind the spirit, which requires a roll against the spirit's force x2. Drain equals the spirit's hits, not net hits. It also takes time ([force] hours), money ([force] x 500 nuyen), and effort (your gamemaster can impose a -2 penalty on all tests while a magician is controlling a bound spirit, similar to sustaining a spell).

Attacks of will against a spirit are used in place of the Astral Combat skill. It would be a bad thing to be on the astral plane and run into a hostile spirit of this magnitude if all you had at your disposal were attacks of will. That's why being dual-natured can be a drawback as well as an advantage. To attack a mundane target, a spirit will need to either materialize or possess a suitable vessel, depending on the spirit's tradition.

The forums have numerous threads on how to deal with spirits, but the Stunbolt spell and Stick n' Shock ammo in particular can do wonders to send them back where they came from. Spirits are certainly a powerful part of a magician's arsenal, but they're by no means an 'I win' button in the game.

[Blind Guardian]

Always glad to help. It's rare that I get a chance to get an answer in before somebody else beats me to it. Being online at off-peak hours of my days off seems to help, though. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[X-Kalibur]

That is correct, but it's still vastly more time consuming, more drain-causing and less reliable than just throwing manabolts around, and a manabolt spell is less expensive than the banishing skill and useful for lots of other situations to boot.
If banishing didn't cause drain and you rolled all rolls until either the mage gets knocked out or the spirit vanishes in a single complex action, then there would be some situations were banishing was useful. Most likely still not enough to justify buying the skill, but by RAW, the skill is literally worse than useless, because it isn't even the best cause of action for the single use it has.

I'd argue that manabolting spirits rather than banishing them would be more likely to earn you the spirit bane quality. You're actively trying to dissipate the spirit at that point rather than end its service to the current master and force it to flee back to the metaplanes.

[Apathy]

I'd argue that manabolting spirits rather than banishing them would be more likely to earn you the spirit bane quality. You're actively trying to dissipate the spirit at that point rather than end its service to the current master and force it to flee back to the metaplanes.

I think this is reading too much into things.

There's nothing in the rules that indicates that manabolting is more likely to earn spirit bane than banishing. They're not even your spirits, so there shouldn't be that much of an expectation that you should have to take care of them. And the book doesn't really say whether spirits experience pain the same way we do, or that they don't find banishing painful/uncomfortable. I tend to reserve something as extreme as spirit bane for really extraordinary actions abusing one's own spirits.

[Bleifalke]

So a spirit has 2xF armor AND takes no dmg if the dmg code is below the armor value? Did the devs smoke heroin while writing?

So what your saying is if I run into a F6 spirit an assault cannon blast would bounce off its armor? This is gonna get houseruled away asap if i ever get around to be GM of SR4.

[eidolon]

You're certainly free to do that. Part of the fluff and flavor has always been that spirits are bad news to somebody that can't deal with magical threats, because so much of Shadowrun is that sort of "prepare for eventualities; think there will be spirits, then hire/take a mage" type of assumption.

Really, it's just up to how you want to run the game. Do you want to emphasize the "like for like" aspect of Shadowrun (Hacker to combat matrix threats, Mage to combat magical threats), or do you want to level the playing field for all?

[kzt]

So what your saying is if I run into a F6 spirit an assault cannon blast would bounce off its armor? This is gonna get houseruled away asap if i ever get around to be GM of SR4.

It's not such a huge deal if you are fighting people who are reasonably equipped. 4 Alphas with APDS and a few net successes will do a number on them. If you are fighting gangers it's all over. You just wait for the screaming to stop.

Depending on the game it isn't such a huge deal. But if you get some crazy who summons up a F8-12 spirit you'd better have some people with spells or anti-tank weapons.

That's one reason why 100% mage teams are really tough.

But yeah, if you don't like it you could change it.

[Bleifalke]

1% of the population is awakened, say about half of that 1% are mages. In my interpretation of the 6th world, few runner teams even have an awakened member.

I think i'll make it so that the spirit keeps Fx2 armor but ignores AP mods instead of just ignore all dmg. Because DV modifiers for bursts and net hits won't count towards 'cracking' the spirit armor, correct? As i understand its only the base dmg of the weapon thats compared to its armor when you determine if its immune or not? What about AP mods from APDS etc? I read the immunity critter rule and I don't know if its to be included or not when determining if its immune to the attack.

[DWC]

Spirit immunity is no different from vehicular armor.

The AP of the attack does apply to the spirit's immunity to natural weapons, just like the net hits apply to the DV for the purposes of penetration. That means the assault cannon round, with a DV of 10 and an AP of -5 will do dirty things to the F6 spirit. The spirit's 12 points of hardened armor from Immunity gets reduced to 7 points by the cannon round, more than allowing the base DV of 10 (plus hits) to pierce the armor. An assault rifle loaded with APDS, firing wide bursts to reduce the spirit's defense pool will probably suffice for places you can't bring an assault cannon.

A Force 9 manabolt also works, with the notable benefit of having no availability issues, no concealability issues, and causing a statistically meaningless amount of drain.

[Ravor]

Something else to remember is that ( Force 6+ ) spirits are pretty fragging rare per the setting if not the actual rules.

[Muspellsheimr]

1% of the population is awakened, say about half of that 1% are mages. In my interpretation of the 6th world, few runner teams even have an awakened member.

By your logic, only 1 out of 100 people in an Exclusive Awakened Bar are actually awakened.

The 1% figure is a worldwide estimate of Awakened. It has no relivance whatsoever in small-scale measurements like the runner community. Yes, there are less Awakened 'runners than there are mundane, but that is about as far as you can go.

I think i'll make it so that the spirit keeps Fx2 armor but ignores AP mods instead of just ignore all dmg. Because DV modifiers for bursts and net hits won't count towards 'cracking' the spirit armor, correct? As i understand its only the base dmg of the weapon thats compared to its armor when you determine if its immune or not? What about AP mods from APDS etc? I read the immunity critter rule and I don't know if its to be included or not when determining if its immune to the attack.

Retarded ruling, for various reasons. You clearly have no idea how Hardened Armor works - I suggest actually reading it. I will give you a hint: modified Damage Value (excluding burst/automatic fire modifiers) vs. modified Armor Rating.

[Bleifalke]

Ok, thanks, I thought at first that only the base DV of the weapon was compared to the armor, but adding net hits and AP mods, it's not so bad anymore. I think I'll keep the RAW after all.

Ofcourse, magical attacks will be best, but my runner team has maybie 5 members (very low chance of having a mage) and will meet potentially 100s of "opponents" through their career (ie they WILL encounter spirits eventually) therefore I like the idea of mundane ppl having the ability to deal with it even if its not optimal.

[Ravor]

As much as I hate it, SnS works wonders on spirits per RAW. However given that the ruling doesn't make anymore sense than allowing a Water Spirit to drown or a Fire Spirit to burn many DMs hosuerule it away.

[Bleifalke]

By your logic, only 1 out of 100 people in an Exclusive Awakened Bar are actually awakened.

The 1% figure is a worldwide estimate of Awakened. It has no relivance whatsoever in small-scale measurements like the runner community. Yes, there are less Awakened 'runners than there are mundane, but that is about as far as you can go.

My logic about 1 in 100 is not flawed, your comparison of it to a "all awakened bar" however is very flawed. There is no social or economical incentive for magicians to have a higher reprensentation in runner teams then they do in the rest of scociety. Mages services are in extreemly high demand in security, military, entertainment etc, there is no reason to believe that most mages go off and become runners.

Retarded ruling, for various reasons. You clearly have no idea how Hardened Armor works - I suggest actually reading it. I will give you a hint: modified Damage Value (excluding burst/automatic fire modifiers) vs. modified Armor Rating.

No need to be so rude about it. I don't know much of the SR4 rules, thats why I asked the question here on this forum. If you don't wanna answer, thats fine, there is no need to call my lack of knowledge retarded, just don't respond instead.

[DWC]

As much as I hate it, SnS works wonders on spirits per RAW. However given that the ruling doesn't make anymore sense than allowing a Water Spirit to drown or a Fire Spirit to burn many DMs hosuerule it away.

I deliberately skipped bringing that up, because it's a perfect case of the rules being extremely clear cut and the situation being extremely stupid.

[Muspellsheimr]

Ok, thanks, I thought at first that only the base DV of the weapon was compared to the armor, but adding net hits and AP mods, it's not so bad anymore. I think I'll keep the RAW after all.

Perhaps I should clarify: Hardened Armor Rules as Written work, but they Suck. Your idea of how to alter it was even worse.

I suggest, for a variety of reasons, that Hardened Armor is treated as "automatic Hits" on Damage Resistance Tests, with Armor Penetration applying normally (it is still Armor, after all).

Immunity to [Insert Something Here] provides Hardened Armor against [Insert Something Here] equal to the Magic attribute (opposed to RAW Magic x 2).

End result is Hardened Armor becomes both more & less powerful (much better soaking, but lower threshold to inflict damage & more affected by AP). More importantly, it is now streamlined & actually makes a bit of sense (unlike the previous all-or-nothing type effect, of which there are exceptionally few in Shadowrun, all of which I suggest altering or removing).

[Ravor]

Actually I can see Mages trending more towards a life in the Shadows, after all, why in the nine hells should I be forced to listen to the mere ape who has no idea of the wonders I've seen blather on about how I have to do my job? Does the worm not realise that with a mere stray thought I could turn his brain into mush?

Remember people, power breeds arogence, especially dangerous power, and while the corps have to put up with alot of crap a mage throws their way, there are limits.

[Bleifalke]

Perhaps I should clarify: Hardened Armor Rules as Written work, but they Suck. Your idea of how to alter it was even worse.

I suggest, for a variety of reasons, that Hardened Armor is treated as "automatic Hits" on Damage Resistance Tests, with Armor Penetration applying normally (it is still Armor, after all).

Immunity to [Insert Something Here] provides Hardened Armor against [Insert Something Here] equal to the Magic attribute (opposed to RAW Magic x 2).

End result is Hardened Armor becomes both more & less powerful (much better soaking, but lower threshold to inflict damage & more affected by AP). More importantly, it is now streamlined & actually makes a bit of sense (unlike the previous all-or-nothing type effect, of which there are exceptionally few in Shadowrun, all of which I suggest altering or removing).

Yes, I agree, your suggestion is much better then mine. Still havent decided if I'm gonna use yours or the RAW though. Think I need to run a few games first before I decide.