[X] My Assistant

[Fatum]

One could make a similar argument about tanks, planes, and cars. They have existed for about 100 years as of 2010 or over 150 years as of 2070. Every one is cosmetically different. They even have vitals in different locations.

They still all have the same vitals, same as drones - you know, sensor suites, engines, propulsion systems, etc.
With a spirit there's no telling if he sees you with what looks as eyes or something else entirely, he doesn't really need those wings of his to fly, and he can as well be a floating burning wheel or a stone sphere. What are the weak spots on those, how do you tell?

[Ascalaphus]

I approach spirits like this:
Form follows function. The form that spirits take is highly symbolic and tied to Tradition. The vulnerable spots are mostly in the same places as they would be in whatever natural object the spirit's appearance relates to most.

The appearance of spirits isn't totally random; it's just highly varied. But there is some sort of internal logic to it.

Also, spirits aren't just homogeneous blobs of energy; they're matrices of mana, and have more and less important spots in those matrices.

[Umidori]

Indeed, I second the point about spirits being tradition tied.

If a shaman summons a bear spirit, it not only takes the form of a bear but also the traits of such. If you shoot a bear in the face, it hurts it a lot more than a meatshot to the leg. Same for the spirit.

After all, water spirits have allergies to fire. Why? If they're magical blobs, fire shouldn't affect them anymore than anything else. Except it does because of the spirit following traditional forms and behaviors, even if those don't make logical sense.

If you are willing to accept that you can hurt spirits by force of will alone, it makes sense that your expecting a shot to a perceived weak point would do more damage as well (even though, by RAW, ranged attacks cannot be attacks of will, but whatever).

~Umidori

[tagz]

Breaking from the Called shot debate for a moment; I house-ruled that all spirits have an inherent vulnerability specific to their tradition. All vulnerabilities are to materials that are not exactly common, but not typically extremely rare or highly expensive either. Though getting weapons crafted out of, or ammunition tipped with it may be more costly though.

Anyhow, I'm using Vulnerability from Running Wild, so +2DV when using it and it bypasses immunity.

As far as knowing what material to use, legwork can usually get that info. Also, the team's mage can make an assensing test to learn what tradition the spirit is (I use 2 hits to know a tradition that is the mage is familiar with such as his own, 3 otherwise), and with 5 or more hits the mage can know the vulnerability itself.

In my game some LoneStar cops could potentially carry silver (Hermetic) and/or bone (Shamanism) tipped bullets as they are the most common traditions, but it's not standard issue and only 1 in 6 shell out the money themselves usually.

I think it gives mundanes who do their homework a sporting chance.

[CradleWorm]

My group is currently considering a house rule for this problem. As we see it, attacking a spirit or anything with hardened armor comes down to using an automatic weapon and blasting away until you get enough hits to damage it. At this point you obliterate whatever your shooting at because the automatic fire damage modifiers come into play.

Consider changing hardened armor to be used in this way:

Each point of hardened armor provides one automatic success on a damage resistance test.

Keeps combat moving and it's simple and still effective. Automatic fire isn't quite as devistating but still effective.

[Falconer]

Muspellsheimr likes to house rule it that way... he also reduces the amount of hardened armor things get by half to keep it in check and proper balance IIRC.


Your point about automatic weapons ONLY works if they're using wide bursts to eliminate their reaction pools so that the target can't reduce the net hits increasing base DV... (and generally most GM's I've played with do not allow called shot for damage (trying to hit something important) AND wide bursts (spray and pray) on the same attack). If you're doing fully automatic NARROW bursts... then the +2/+5/+9 DV doesn't help bypass hardened armor. (if the first spitwad doesn't work, then his 9 buddies right after him won't do much either).


Overall, I don't like the house rule as much as the current rule. Think of it this way... when you hit a modern armored vehicle what happens... generally the shot bounces off harmlessly, or it's critically effective doing a lot of damage if not outright killing the target. Hardened armor currently works exactly like that... Something has 12 points hardened... well most attacks bounce harmlessly off, however when something actually does hit hard enough it's pretty nasty and normally leaves the target crippled or dead... as 12 points armor at one 'soak' per 3 dice still means that about 8 points of damage will go through when it does happen.

Overall, I like the 'feel' of the grittier it either works or it doesn't. Other games like Heavy Gear use it very effectively as well in their more hard-core sci-fi settings as well. While just automatically reducing damage by X feels like a lot more of a DnD'ism to me. Especially when dealing w/ things like possession spirits... where you auto-soak X... but still have a lot of normal armor and increased body to soak off the remainder.

[AngelisStorm]

Breaking from the Called shot debate for a moment; I house-ruled that all spirits have an inherent vulnerability specific to their tradition. All vulnerabilities are to materials that are not exactly common, but not typically extremely rare or highly expensive either. Though getting weapons crafted out of, or ammunition tipped with it may be more costly though.

I do the same thing, though I don't normallly assign a single alergen for the entire group of spirits (neccessarily). As example of where I likely would would be a Fairie Wicca caster. Her (or his) spirits likely have Alergy: Cold Iron (or something similar).

[Ol' Scratch]

A Ruger Super Warhawk with EX-Explosive ammo does a fine job of dealing with spirits up to Force 6 if memory serves. APDS and AV ammo does an even better job, especially if you consider the Immunity to be a Barrier.

That aside, one house rule I've been tinkering with is completely redoing Immunity to Normal Weapons. I hate how mundanes are totally screwed most of the time, especially since fiction involving mundane paranormal hunters is so popular. I was going to start off with the premise that the Immunity was instead to Mundane Weapons. Standard bullets, swords, maces, and even bare fists wouldn't do much to them unless they were ridiculously powerful. But if you made a weapon out of some kind of pure, natural material and practiced the proper rituals in preparing it, you'd have something that would work, though it wouldn't be as high quality as the more technologically advanced weaponry would.

With that principle in mind, I looked to Silver Bullets and ran from there. I was planning on allowing characters to create or buy weapons that were prepared in such a manner using refined or radical materials, but doing so implied a +2 AP modifier under most circumstances and would have their damage code lowered on a glitch (or something similar). So a sword made of refined iron would bypass the Immunity to Mundane Weapons whereas, say, a Vibro Sword would not, but the Vibro Sword would be far and away more effective on normal targets. They'd also be extremely expensive, though not nearly as much as a Weapon Focus would be. I'd also experiment with the idea of allowing some radicals to be particularly effective, such as orichalcum.

Obviously I never got around to solidifying the idea or anything, but it's something to think about if you, too, are frustrated with the default rules. Spirits are powerful enough without having to have free reign in destroying normal people without worry of consequence.

[Ascalaphus]

In D&D I've occasionally used monsters with immunity to crafted weapons. Sticks and stones work fine, but significant processing invoked the immunity. The players had a tough time with those monsters. I suppose there's something to be said for letting weapons with a very low Object Resistance, or perhaps made from Reagents, be effective against spirits (the mana in them flows strongly enough, perhaps.)