Should mages have to buy spells like adepts buy powers?, It seems like it would be more fair. Options

[Whipstitch]

As long as you're avoiding the most expensive bp-to-karma ratio pitfalls (such as buying many skills at levels that are too low to be ratio efficient or even helpful,) I wouldn't worry about it too much, especially as a Magician. Unlike mundos, there's a number of things Magicians can do with Karma that they cannot really do with build points, which makes it a bit trickier to really assess the value of BPs vs. karma. Unlike with Samurai, I often find myself saving my Mage's karma up for initiation grades and new spells rather than just purchasing the low level skills and specializations I passed up on at character creation-- often times that BP->karma discount coupon goes unused, so to speak. Obviously your mileage may vary depending on how tightfisted your GM is with the karma and how long your group sticks with the same characters, etc.

[Glyph]

This post sums up nicely why karma-gen is 1000times better then BP-gen, gets nicely rid of idiotic sheanigans like that.

Except that the example was bogus - a Magic of 6 is not something everyone picks up, and for those who do, the 25 BP is not cheap compared to Karma. Karmagen's biggest problem is that the "special" Attributes such as Magic fall under the 375-Karma cap. Mages aren't usually that hosed by that, though, because with all of the other things they need to get, they will rarely have a high Edge, and they will usually have a few core Attributes that can be dump stats. If you want an adept with good physical stats, or a mage with a high Edge, though, then you get boned.

Karmagen doesn't really get rid of any "shenanigans". Soft-maxing your core abilities while remaining functional in other areas is still the optimal tactic, in either char-gen system. It only makes more "well-rounded" characters because after you've bought the essentials that you would have with 400 BP, you usually have a few extra points left to spend.

[toturi]

Karmagen doesn't really get rid of any "shenanigans". Soft-maxing your core abilities while remaining functional in other areas is still the optimal tactic, in either char-gen system. It only makes more "well-rounded" characters because after you've bought the essentials that you would have with 400 BP, you usually have a few extra points left to spend.

I agree that karmagen doesn't really get rid of any shenanigans. It simply changes them. Karmagen encourages lower numbers, it makes characters appear to be well rounded. Karmagen does not give out Knowledge skill points; a min-maxed karmagen character would have much less Knowledge skills than its BP counterpart, if at all. Karmagen simply replaces one set of problems with another.

[darthmord]

Who cares about the reaction boost when you have physical invisibility and masking? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) The NPC can go first all they want, but they have to be able to see you to hit you and if you get a surprise attack off on them then they can't even dodge. A sustaining penalty is only two dice, so when you're used to rolling 12-20 dice to attack, that sustaining penalty just doesn't really matter.

Last time I made a big invisibility-type smashing character, I didn't bother buying reaction up at all, it's still at 1. It's just not important (I bought Agility up instead to attack better and do the occasional gymnastic dodge -- mainly, if I'm "dodging", I use parry). And since I'm not the driver, I only need a small drive skill to be able to drive out of there in case the driver dies (or I go invisible and duck into the mall or something).

Then there's the "getting better". It's relatively cheap for a samurai to buy up a skill and new spells are also cheap for a mage. Adepts have to initiate and raise an attribute, unless you use some optional rule to make it cheaper. Make the magician feel the same pain that the adept does in trying to get new skills, then cut back on nuyen a bit and suddenly everyone's skills and abilities and ware all gets better at the same rate.

That 'going invisible' only works as long as the opposition doesn't try to track you via the Astral. If they do, your spell only shows them where you are all the better.

[Mäx]

I agree that karmagen doesn't really get rid of any shenanigans.

Concidering that the sheanigan i was preferring to is selectinc waht to get at chargen based on the fact it will be more expencive or cheaper after chargen, i would say that karmagen gets rid of that really well.

[Shinobi Killfist]

So are power foci really that much better to get at chargen? I realize that after attribute, skill, and mentor spirit options are limited for out of the gate power/survivability. It just seems for a R2 power foci I'd rather pay money and 16 karma later than 12 BPs at generation. There's not a big hit to efficiency there.

Just curious for thoughts from the more experienced...

I'd say it is campaign dependent. A r4 power focus is 100,000 nuyen, will your character see that kind of money in a reasonable time. The other factor is karma yes I expect you will see 40 karma after X number of runs, but are you the type of player that can do nothing with his karma until he saves up 40? And even if you are, from the 1 karma to 40 karma point your GM might be upping the opposition a bit as you get more experienced. Can you survive when you do nothing with your karma while everyone else is bumping up there skills etc.?

I like getting it on a powergaming level due to our runs frequently paying crap. So much so that after a year I doubt I had saved up 50,000 much less 100,000 nuyen. But hey invest in the enchanting skill and the gathering knowledge skills mentioned in street magic and you can get it for much cheaper if you have tons of down time where you can go into a wilderness and gather crap.

[crizh]

Funny, when I read the thread title I thought 'Hmm, I was thinking the exact same thing' but after reading the OP I was actually thinking the exact opposite thing.

The whole SR magic system has been annoying me more and more lately. It started with SR2 and has been gradually building over time but I've only recently been able to truly articulate what pisses me off about the whole thing.

I think magic is to cheap or easy. Thing is that the base system is modelled on 'real world' magical traditions which is what makes it so flavourful and uniquely appealing. Trouble is that such a system has game balance issues that have from the very outset introduced rules designed to make it manageable.

And that is the problem. The system gives with one hand and takes away with the other. Someone with an eye for the flavour of the underlying fluff has designed all sorts of wonderful things a mage could do and someone else with an eye for game mechanics has come along behind and nerfed the crap out of everything.

The result is a system that has lots of wonderful toys that a mage is going to want to play with and a bunch of kill-joy rules that make it impossible to do so. The instant a player finds some way to overcome these restrictions the whole game system starts to unravel.

What the system needs is some way of permitting a player to actually use his toys while keeping his power in check. I've been speculating about buying spells in a similar way to Adept Powers which is a system that seems to work very well. I would perhaps just make all spells adept powers and give people power points equal to 1, 2 or 3 times Magic depending on the degree of Magician quality they purchase and making spells and projection limited to mage or magical adept in the same manner.

Or we could go back to buying spells the same way as complex forms perhaps at a higher cost per point of Force.

It just seems to me ridiculous to have all these cool abilities that players never actually get to use.

[Tanegar]

What potential abilities do you think mages are being denied under the current system?

[crizh]

Any spell with a duration of S?

Look at Analyse Device for example. Sounds great but it is nearly impossible to use between OR and sustaining penalties.

[Tanegar]

Or you could use a sustaining focus, or hand the spell off to a spirit to sustain it for you. The sustaining penalty is absolutely necessary to prevent mages from casting every conceivable buff on themselves and basically being gods.

[crizh]

Or you could use a sustaining focus, or hand the spell off to a spirit to sustain it for you. The sustaining penalty is absolutely necessary to prevent mages from casting every conceivable buff on themselves and basically being gods.

That's what I just said.

A mechanic has to exist to stop mages from using their spells and breaking the game.

Which is stupid.

[Tanegar]

So... to replace the mechanic which stops mages from using their spells and breaking the game... you propose an entirely different mechanic which stops mages from using their spells and breaking the game?

[crizh]

Restricting the number a spells by greatly increasing their cost. If that's stopping them casting spells then yes, I am.

I also considered introducing a Concentration skill that limited the number of spells you could sustain.

[Whipstitch]

I just don't agree with that method at all. Limiting the repertoire but not actually addressing the power levels of any given problem spell has in my experience merely led to power game type players putting all the powerful/problematic spells on their sheet and leaving the merely fun and handy stuff on the cutting room floor. I've had a mage hit play only knowing 4 spells before, but those 4 spells were the pre-errata Mana Static, Control Thoughts, Detect Life and Mana Bolt. He got along fine and while it would have been nice to have Heal I doubt he really missed Fashion any-- at any rate it didn't stop him from steamrolling a couple of situations I had hoped to make a tiny bit more difficult than they turned out to be (what can I say; I was a young GM). Hell, if anything I suspect he used a grossly powerful solution to many of his problems because that was literally all he knew how to do. You know what they say about a man with a hammer.

[crizh]

Many of those spells are a different sort of broken though.

Mana Static for example is a moronic spell that just shouldn't exist. You can't Teleport, you can't stop time and you can't create BC with a spell.

BC used to be something interesting.

[Whipstitch]

I guess I just don't know what sort of broken you guys are talking about then; I've never had a situation where I really begrudged my players knowing a wide variety of unbroken spells. Frankly, most spells are already pretty narrow and expensive for what they do, particularly when compared to technological substitutes or what a low end Spirit could do for you; if anything my players don't branch out enough for my tastes. Not that I can really blame them, Mind Link* loses a lot of its shine when you realize that practically everyone has a commlink that can do everything but take out the garbage as a matter of course. Actually, scratch that. Your commlink can totally arrange for a Renraku manservant to go take out the garbage.


*Plus, if they're a full magician they an just jolly well project halfway across the planet and manifest a message if they have to.