Pixie Toxic Mage, feedback appreciated Options

[Ol' Scratch]

Frankly, I don't think such a mage would count as toxic. Being toxic inherently means turning from natural ways toward toxic ones, from creation to destruction, etcetera. It all kinda comes in a package.

No more so than playing a Voodoo character means you have to be Petro. That's one subpath and one mentality of the tradition as a whole.

[Manunancy]

The bad side/good side of voodo is built into the tradition. The toxics don't havethat dichotomy. And th kind of magic and spirit wielded by a toxic mage are rather antithetic to just about everything else. Just like insect spirit's I don't see what sort of good could come out of them. Toxic sprits are nasty bugger not matter the specifics of their nastiness.

With the pixie, there's another angle that makes taggign along with him a rather bad idea if you're not into toxic magic too : the black magic tradition as a strong habit of makig sprit pacts - which in the case of a toxic mage doesn't stikes me as a good idea.

And the 'but.. you can be toxic and a nice guy' seems more like bending the background into a bretzel to be able to play with toxic powers without the hassles of being a public ennemy nobody in his right mind would consider working with. Basically unless the game is centered about a toxic agenda, it should be off-limits for players.

[Walpurgisborn]

WyldKnight

Toxic as is doesn't sound like what you're suggesting. Or at least not as Toxic is portrayed. That doesn't mean that a homebrewed Tradition can't be built. I'd rather like to see what you could do with that, if you were to build somethign with a mildly Darwinian, radiation kills and changes but also brings forth new and interesting, mutation is a hand that gives and takes away.
If Tomothy swaps out black magic (which is where I'd see the real difficulty) and pops in something associated with Shiva, you might have a real winner as a character concept.

[Fatum]

That's one subpath and one mentality of the tradition as a whole.

Are we reading the same books here?

Toxic magicians are [...] driven by hatred of their species and themselves. Having left behind their former paradigms (and mentor spirits), they now follow the toxic path. They revel in blight and disaster, spreading various types of
poison (not necessarily pollution) to feed their agenda. [...] They all look forward to destroying life on Earth to one degree or another.

I don't see anything suggesting toxics can follow any other "subpath" but the one towards universal destruction, like, say, the descriptions of Voodoo tradition suggest.

[Ol' Scratch]

<shrugs> I refuse to argue semantics with pigheaded adherents to the rules as written (no personal attack intended, just a general sentiment). There's nothing inherent to the Toxic Magic tradition itself that makes it a villain-only tradition except for the fact that the person who wrote those particular rules insisted on writing them that way. They've done the same thing with Blood Mages and all the other "threats" in the game, but again, there's plenty of concepts and examples of where they don't have to be evil, maniacal mass murderers. It's a type of magic just like all traditions, not a one-dimensional state of mind.

There's no reason at all that Black Magic shouldn't be treated the same way, yet inexplicably black magicians are completely free to be good, sane, healthy individuals.

It's simply close-minded and narrow-visioned to think otherwise. Especially in the advent of having several examples of rational and sane concepts described here and elsewhere. You even seem to agree as much, but base that agreement on the aforementioned pigheaded adherent to the rules as written. It's okay for Voodoo to incorporate both good and bad followers because the rules go into detail about that. But oh God no, not Toxic Magic because they don't.

But to each their own. I still think it's shameful to chastise the original poster for trying to have fun and do something neat with a concept that more often than not just goes to waste because of how shitty the fluff writing for it was.

[Fatum]

Okay, skipping your implications of personal attacks here. You know, typically when a person says "I want to make a Toxic Mage" it means "I want to make something as it is described in the books, not in the houserules of some other user I don't even know about yet". Surprisingly enough.
I'm not saying house rules are bad - your Toxic Mages can be the radioactive saviours of metahumanity, technomancers in disguise, or anything else you as a gm might want. What I'm saying is that if you redefine standard fluff you should not argue your houserules as being universally applicable.

[Ol' Scratch]

No, usually when someone says they want to play something like a Toxic Mage, they're referencing the rules and general gaming principles of a Toxic Mage, not the fluff background for cartoony supervillains that are included with those rules.

It's little different than selecting a Katana but describing it as a Western longsword of superior craftsmanship, or selecting a Eurocar Westwind but calling it a Porsche Winter, or being lazy and copying the stats of the Street Samurai archetype (which includes a certain set of principles and beliefs) and renaming it a Razorboy who lacks any of those principles or beliefs. And when the fluff is as incredibly dull and one-dimensional as that of a Toxic Mage, one should be applauded for trying to make it work and have fun with it, not ridiculed and treated like shit. Period.

[Saint Sithney]

Magic is just ideas and archetypes given form. That you're awakened is the only real concern. After that, it's mostly window dressing.

If he says that he follows a Mentor Spirit of Evolution and just assigns it the same basic stats as Mutation without the Toxic bent, then he's kosher.
It's really not a big deal. If a guy wants to focus his thoughts on Radiation, he just calls it Energy and then decides not to act like a huge dick - problem solved.

[Ol' Scratch]

Exactly. Rules like the magic traditions are there to guide you in creating a character. When you start letting them dictate your characters, especially in such a narrow-mindedly written tradition like Toxic Magic, you've failed the intent of the rules. Not the other way around.

[KCKitsune]

As long as the spirits the mage can summon are not of the Toxic variety, then he's good. Yeah people might give him some funny looks, but then again he/she is a mage... they are use to funny looks.

[toturi]

IIRC, there is a difference between Twisted and Toxic. Twisted is the dark side of the normal traditions, Blood Magic is one of these, the GM is only recommended not to allow it for PCs, but he can allow them without actually waving the GM-says-so-house-rule wand. Toxic traditions, as I recall, are written for NPCs, if the GM wants to allow the PC to get it, he needs to waive the rule.

Since the GM is ok with it, then he can rule it so. It is little different from allowing a PC to play a Dragon or a Great Dragon; if the GM is fine with it, he can allow whatever he wants.

[Fatum]

No, usually when someone says they want to play something like a Toxic Mage, they're referencing the rules and general gaming principles of a Toxic Mage, not the fluff background for cartoony supervillains that are included with those rules.

Look, Toxic Magic is clearly defined in the books. The very reason the toxics get their own abilities and spirits is because they are not just one more garden variety tradition, they are doing mojo completely backwards.
Again - you can change it any way you like, everything's fine about it - just don't claim that's how it should universally be when it's no more than your table's houserule.

When a player says "I want to play a hermetic who is secretly a high-ranked AZT employee", he shouldn't be surprised if Blood Magic issue is risen. If his character is a runaway clone from SK, the people reading about it will think about him being chased by the wyrm. If AZT does not do Blood Magic in your campaign, if SK is not headed by a wyrm - it's perfectly fine, just state it when the issue is brought forward - but you shouldn't be parading around claiming people are "pigheaded adherents to the rules", and those established setting points are just rumors or "a narrow view" or whatever. It's right there in the book, and it's what's happening unless specified to be houseruled otherwise.
It works the same for every setting and every system - when you take Red Mage of Thai as a PrC, you're not just "referencing the rules and general gaming principles". You are playing a member of a very strictly defined magical order with some very strictly defined moral principles and agendas, etcetera.

While I agree that noone should be ridiculed and treated like shit, I don't see anyone having the issue in this particular topic. Overreacting much?

Oh, and the last, but not the least. If you can't make an interesting, not one-dimensional insane mage, who has all the good reasons to go toxic, and whose reasoning and story is good enough for the PCs to sympathize, if only a bit - the problem is not in the setting.

[Tanegar]

What Fatum said. +1 internet to you, sir. I would also add that just because someone doesn't like the way toxic mages are written, doesn't necessarily mean they are written badly. They are BAD GUYS, capitalization intentional, right up there with insect shamans. Toxic goals inevitably lead the toxic mage into conflict with, well, pretty much everybody. Could you make a non-crazy toxic who could potentially be reasoned back onto a sane magical path? Sure. But as long as he remains a toxic, he's a BAD GUY.

[Ol' Scratch]

Man, I hope they don't hadd Nehru Jackets to the equipment list ever. Because if you put one of those on, you become a BAD GUY automatically!!! I wonder if you become a BAD GUY if you use the custom Lifestyle rules to create an underground lair, too. I think you do because, you know, that's what BAD GUYS do!!!

[Saint Sithney]

As long as the spirits the mage can summon are not of the Toxic variety, then he's good.

Well, the toxic spirits aren't particularly overpowered stat wise. They're just the only spirits which have a specific description in addition to stats because they are, as written, restricted to only the single, toxic tradition. But, still, you know how an Islamic hermetic might summon a fire spirit which looks like an efreet, a Wiccan might summon the same spirit and it looks like a wave of flame, and a when the Chaos Mage summons it it looks like a flaming skull icon? Same thing could potentially apply here with toxic spirit types. Just make the new Mentor's advantage be access to toxic type spirits instead of the typical "bonus to [blank] and [blank]" and then just kick all the twisted business in their description curbside.

Of course this kind of stuff doesn't pass even a moderate RAW test, but I think it sticks within the basic concept of SR magic and even SR ideology. I mean, what's more Shadowrun than potential forces and ideas which can be used for good or ill depending on a person's nature? I don't see this rule-stretch spraining anybody's brain so long as the player does the heavy lifting in defining the tradition's aesthetic. Hopefully a thread like this can help give such a player some ideas so that the GM doesn't have to spend an hour per player trying to pin down whatever half-informed thing they've got swimming in their brain.

[Kazuhiro]

Man, I hope they don't hadd Nehru Jackets to the equipment list ever. Because if you put one of those on, you become a BAD GUY automatically!!! I wonder if you become a BAD GUY if you use the custom Lifestyle rules to create an underground lair, too. I think you do because, you know, that's what BAD GUYS do!!!

An evil-looking coat and an underground lair may be lifestyle choices that reflect being a bad guy, but spending years of your life learning to be a Toxic Mage necessitates the desire to despoil the earth, kill enemies in ways that inflict unnecessary suffering, and loose your disfiguring, debilitating powers on whoever you can get away with simply because you want the data/you want the practice/your dark god demands it/it's fun.

Seriously, there's "evil" and then there's "crazed sadistic terrorist."

[Harbin]

Batman has an underground lair!

(So does the cannibal elf player in the shadowrun campaign I'm in, but he isn't Batman.)

So no, you are safe from becoming a BAD GUY. (Thank goodness for that, right?)

Toxic magic is intrinsically bad and your character is bad for using it. They want to further their evil masterminded goals/destroy creation to further their goals/create abominations/destroy creation and create abominations.

There's not a lot of room for alternate character interpretation. When I hear toxic mage, I don't think 'Better Living Through Radiation: Get Your Pamphlet Today!'

[Ol' Scratch]

Or maybe it means that you've spent years of your life understanding a form of magic that makes a lot of sense in the modern world where radiation and other forms of toxicity has become a natural part of the world. Maybe it means you've dedicated yourself to this type of magic in order to help rein it in or transform such toxicity into a more functional and healthy part of that world. Just like there's nothing wrong with a Christian blood magician who believes in self-sacrifice to make the world a better place.

If petro hougans, black magicians, and other thoroughly wicked individuals can practice magic all fine and happy like, there's no reason these other traditions can't, too. Even if it makes them a rare outlier amongst the majority. There's nothing different between those traditions and Toxic Magic other than some fluff text written by someone(s) who were focused solely on creating villains for the game rather than treating them as indifferently as everything else in the game. Even the damned Vatican and its various off-shoots have good and bad things associated with it. It's patently ridiculous for this to be an exception, especially -- one again -- when people have little to no trouble coming up with concepts that work just fine.

Why the hell should things like this be one of the only things in the game that are so one-dimensional? Shadowrun is a game about shades of gray at its core. You'll just have to deal with the fact that I refuse to accept anything in this game as being purely white or purely black. Hell, even Dunkelzahn saw the possible merits behind some of these traditions and wanted to learn more about them, rather than just eradicating them from existence because they're "evil."

[Kazuhiro]

I was under the impression that Dunkelzahn wanted all blood mages imprisoned?

[Ol' Scratch]

Then why was he giving out goodies to some of the biggest, baddest blood magicians around, like all of the immortal elves and great dragons? As previously mentioned, blood magic was a regular part of the daily lives of pretty much everyone in the Fourth World. Because it's not blood magic that's evil, it's certain individuals who practice it that are. Just like everything else in the game.

[Fatum]

Or maybe it means that you've spent years of your life understanding a form of magic that makes a lot of sense in the modern world where radiation and other forms of toxicity has become a natural part of the world. Maybe it means you've dedicated yourself to this type of magic in order to help rein it in or transform such toxicity into a more functional and healthy part of that world. Just like there's nothing wrong with a Christian blood magician who believes in self-sacrifice to make the world a better place.

I believe you are missing the point. I'll repeat myself here - noone's arguing your right to think of Toxic Mages as radioactive saviours of humanity, grey-skinned aliens or whatever else you want.
Just don't try to prove it's universally true, since it is your own personal interpretation that has nothing (as in: absolutely nothing) to do with the fluff as established and as accepted by the majority of players and GMs. Just since it directly contradicts it, and the only source of canon info on the setting are the books. Or maybe do you know some other source, which is more true, and overrules things directly stated in them?

Also, I believe you're missing the difference between Life Magic (which was oh so widely used in the Fourth) and Death Magic, of which the latter (called Blood Magic in the Sixth World) inherently draws on suffering and pain, causes corruption, rips your aura, contaminates astral, and attracts Horrors. Much like you can't manipulate mana the way toxics do and stay sane and well-intended, you can't use Blood Magic and make the world a better place.

Oh yeah, and indeed Big D pretty much put a bounty on the heads of toxics and blood mages. Moreover, I don't remember seeing any notices of IE using Blood Magic during this cycle; neither of dragons using Blood Magic at all, with all the advanced stuff they have besides that. Okay, maybe except for those Feathered Serpents in AZT - but not that Dunkelzahn supported those, did he?

[Ol' Scratch]

Where did I ever say that these views were how the books portray them? To the contrary, I've repeatedly said the opposite. I know the books paint them all as psycho villains. But going around chasting someone for thinking outside the God damned box and having fun with it, all with the support of their GM, results in YOU being a ginormous dick. Especially when they come up with a fun (in theirs and others) opinion that doesn't break the game. In fact, most of the people ranting and raving in this thread are also the ones crying about how underpowered the character is.

Believe it or not, Shadowrun is a game. Yeah, a real, actual game. And -- I realize this is going to blow your mind -- some people actually like playing a game for fun. And when you can do that, complete with support from the GM, and create an unusual character that not only doesn't break the game but is kinda underpowered compared to what you could do through more traditional rules and concepts... well, I don't know. All I know is some people need to remove the huge stick they have shoved up their asses. Especially when the centerpiece of their argument is in support of one-dimensional, rarely-used, and pathetically lame villains.

[Fatum]

Where did I ever say that these views were how the books portray them? To the contrary, I've repeatedly said the opposite. I know the books paint them all as psycho villains.

Any info on the setting is canon as long as it is stated in the books. Thus, your ramblings on the Toxic Path being "just one more tradition", stated in such an indisputable tone, are all void, and should have been polite suggestions for Tanegar's GM to consider at best, not holy truths you present them to be.

But going around chasting someone for thinking outside the God damned box and having fun with it, all with the support of their GM, results in YOU being a ginormous dick. Especially when they come up with a fun (in theirs and others) opinion that doesn't break the game. In fact, most of the people ranting and raving in this thread are also the ones crying about how underpowered the character is.

Oh right, I can clearly see the topic being full of people "chasting" Tanegar. Saint Sithney is particularly successful at that. Myself, too - how dare I suggest that a character not fitting into a concept of a Toxic Mage should not be called as such! Shame on my bald head! Woe is me!

Believe it or not, Shadowrun is a game. Yeah, a real, actual game. And -- I realize this is going to blow your mind -- some people actually like playing a game for fun. And when you can do that, complete with support from the GM, and create an unusual character that not only doesn't break the game but is kinda underpowered compared to what you could do through more traditional rules and concepts... well, I don't know. All I know is some people need to remove the huge stick they have shoved up their asses. Especially when the centerpiece of their argument is in support of one-dimensional, rarely-used, and pathetically lame villains.

Wow, you are such a nice, well-adjusted person. It's a real pleasure talking with you.

This post has been edited by Fatum: Mar 30 2010, 10:26 PM

[Saint Sithney]

Yeah, the basic idea I have is that there's no particular reason you can't play a "Toxic mage" as long as he's not actually a Toxic mage.

But if homes really wants to define himself as Toxic who isn't a madman obsessed with [insert mad science biz here], it's kinda like saying, I want to play a rapist, but without all that forced, nonconsensual sex.

[Ol' Scratch]

Wow, you are such a nice, well-adjusted person. It's a real pleasure talking with you.

Sorry. I didn't realize you were the only one allowed to be a preachy, self-righteous asshat in their posts. I'll try to remember that in the future.