Shadow's Dawn: Diving into the past, Pre recruitment: Feedback on idea appreciated Options

[Seth]

One more thing. Under the description of Free Spirit PCs in Runners Companion, we are told that their astral initiative is INT X 2. Does this imply that a Free Spirit PC's astral Attributes are based on their Mental Attributes rather than Force, as is the case for spirits in general?

Yes. As you know the spirits in the critters section basically have one attribute and everything is derived from it. All their mental stats are equal to their force. This makes it really easy for a GM in a hurry. For a free spirit we follow the more detailed player route, and use their mental attributes. So in astral combat for example: initiative is 2*int, attack is willpower + skill, defense is int + skill, and the damage done depends on charisma.

[Ol' Scratch]

I'm currently considering a Pixie/Windling who's good at stealth and the likes. I think that the spirit pact way of immortality is most likely.

Yay! I was hoping someone would try a Windling. That was going to be my second choice for a concept. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

How are you planning on handling the Fifth World, though? Circumnavigating that was my biggest obstacle for the idea.

[Halinn]

How are you planning on handling the Fifth World, though? Circumnavigating that was my biggest obstacle for the idea.

Very, very carefully. Rely on stealth and the innate concealment. All those old fairy myths and the like were from times things like me got spotted, I s'pose.
And of course by not being too close to anywhere a lot of people gather.

[sabs]

Anyone else finding 450 BP hard to make a believable high-level operator (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Ol' Scratch]

Anyone else finding 450 BP hard to make a believable high-level operator (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Maybe a little.

(Okay, maybe a lot more than a little. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) )

[pbangarth]

Anyone else finding 450 BP hard to make a believable high-level operator (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

It's a challenging exercise for one who delights in creating PCs. My Free Spirit will have about 7 spells and 8 Skills. I rationalize those numbers as being artifacts of the 'long sleep' and forgetting stuff. And Skills and spells are relatively easy to buy with the Karma we will earn.

In the meantime, he will be Force 9 and have an Edge of 9. So 9 points of Powers along with the 4 Initiations, and 9 points to add to metmagic techniques (as a Free Spirit, he gets Edge rather than Initiate Grade). Speaking of which, he will have Shielding, Centering, Absorption and Cleansing, if anyone else is interested in meshing Initiatory metamagics.

I'm having a good time figuring out how he spent a few thousand years wandering around Asia, as an itinerant Artisan, absorbing philosophies, living the simple life, that sort of thing.

No, you may not call him Grasshopper.

[sabs]

Gonna post my current idea as far as I've gotten.

[ Spoiler ]

Dwarf
Magician

Body: 3
Agility: 2
Reaction: 2
Strength: 3
Charisma: 5
intuition: 3
Logic: 5(8)
Willpower: 7
Edge: 2
Magic: 4
Essence: 5
Intiative 5

Qualities:
College Education
Linguist
Media Junkie(Moderate)
Allergy(Uncommon, Severe, Gold)
Blood Debt (First Box of Stun and Physical in condition monitor filled)*
Initiate Grade 2 (30bp)

Skills:
Sorcery(group) 4
Artisan 3
Assensing 6
Arcana 4
Etiquette 2
Con 3
Data Search 3 specialty: Magical Formulae

Languages:
Russian N

Spells:
Analyze Device
Analyze Truth
Astral Window
Combat Sense
Increased Reflexes
Levitate
Manabolt (Crushing Will)
Translate

Metamagic: Shielding, Centering
Spellcasting Foci R3

Cyber/Bioware
Pushed
Cerebral Booster 3
Mnemonic Enhancer 3
Encephalon II

* waiting for Seth to tell me if my live long and prosper background option is okay.

PS
I feel like this character should have Artisan skill
I'm contemplating dropping conjuring and self-gimping. Wizards in ED did not do much Spirit talking
This guy just doesn't feel "10,000 years old to me"

[Ol' Scratch]

My problem deals more with what I chose to focus on with my character, I think. He's basically a top-notch alchemist and enchanter (which consumes three Active Skills alone), as well as a skilled doctor, artisan (metalworking), and armorer. Throw in the skills needed for basic conjuring and assensing, as well as the few metamagics I'm considering taking (mostly Psychometry and Divination), and that really eats a massive chunk of my build points and free points. Nevermind the various shops and toolkits I have to buy, and the staggering amount of Knowledge Skills just to cover those same abilities. That leaves me with very little to get the traditional shadowrunner-type abilities like social skills, Dodge, Weapon Skills, and so on and so forth, even at really low ratings. Then there's lifestyles, fake SINs, vehicles, commlinks, flavorable Knowledge Skills, and etc.

So I hope there's going to be at least one or two combat types in the group. Cause I'mma need someone to hide behind. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

That said, after having played around with some other ideas, I think I could make a very potent character if I had a concept that was more focused. Especially combat wise. Adepts, in particular, are quite powerful with these house rules. As is anyone else who would focus on skills such characters should have anyway (say, a Face).

[BlackHat]

Anyone else finding 450 BP hard to make a believable high-level operator (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

With what little progress I made, I did, in fact.

Dunno if these observations will help anyone, but I noticed that as a spirit, attempting to get force/magic/edge as high as possible, you end up having to build all of your attributes up to 4 (by the design of the houserule), which makes you much more like a force-4 spirit than a force-9 spirit. Compared to the stock spirits in the BBB, your manifested form is actually a bit worse than a force-4, because their manifested physical attributes are usually a few points higher than their force. You could easily have most of the spirit powers you might want, of course, but if you have to throw down in astral combat, you're basically a force-4 spirit. Some of your powers will key off of your ridiculously high force/magic/edge, but for a lot of rolls you'll only be chucking 5-9 dice. I also noticed you can't actually become force-10, because raising all of your other attributes to 5 would cost more than half of your points (and you can't put more than half into attributes). Not that that is a huge deal-breaker, but it seemed strange that a non-spirit is welcome to have magic 10 and everything else a 2, but a spirit isn't allowed to do the same thing. My conclusion was that after dumping almost all of the BP into raising magic/edge/attributes, you end up as basically a force-4 spirit, who will probably be force-2 in the past.

Another thing I noticed when considering a mage, is that although you could easily have Magic 10, you wouldn't be unable to resist much more drain than usual. (Although being a grade 4 initiate with centering obviously helps). You might be able to spare the bonus points to max out your two resisting attributes, and pick focused concentration 2, but you're still talking about 16 dice (so 4-5 hits on average). So although you could cast force 10 spells, or summon force-10 great form spirits, and would have a lot of dice for the actual spellcasting roll (so you'd generate a lot of hits, and do something impressive), you'd probably knock yourself out with a couple of spells unless you reigned the force of your spells back down to something much more mediocre (like force 5). You still end up a good deal awesomer than a normal mage (getting 5 hits when a starting PC might get 3), but you are forced to act at a fraction of your true potential power.

Then again, I didn't really finish either of these designs, so my calculations might be off.

[BlackHat]

In the meantime, he will be Force 9 and have an Edge of 9. So 9 points of Powers along with the 4 Initiations, and 9 points to add to metmagic techniques (as a Free Spirit, he gets Edge rather than Initiate Grade). Speaking of which, he will have Shielding, Centering, Absorption and Cleansing, if anyone else is interested in meshing Initiatory metamagics.

Also, I dunno if you're interested, but in case you missed it, I noticed that Free Spirits have the option to take another power-point of Spirit Powers instead of a metamagic technique.

[Ol' Scratch]

I'm contemplating dropping conjuring and self-gimping. Wizards in ED did not do much Spirit talking

That actually works rather well with my character, who has Incompetence (Spellcasting), but is (or at least likes to think he is) a decent conjurer.

[sabs]

I updated my character, suggestions would be seriously welcome. I've never been really good at making Mages. (I usually make cybercharacters)

[Ol' Scratch]

Well, if you intend Sorcery to be his focus, my main advice would be to get Focused Concentration 2, perhaps offset with a Mild or Moderate Addiction to Psyche (or the redball combination of it and Red Mescaline), and splitting your Sorcery skill group up and grabbing Spellcasting 5 and Counterspelling 5, or Spellcasting 6 and Counterspelling 4. Those are the two big parts that jump out at me. Ritual Spellcasting is fine at 4 or even 3. I'd be surprised if it came up much, though it would have more use in a game like this than a traditional Shadowrun campaign.

If you plan on picking up a flashy Indirect Combat Spell, there's a new item in the War! sourcebook that basically functions like a laser sight for such spells. That could be a cool and interesting twist for him in the Sixth World era. Of course, Indirect spells are kind of hard to deal with Drain-wise compared to other offensive spells, but it's still something to consider.

You'll also definitely want to get Shielding and Centering as metamagic techniques. Absorption is pretty cool, too, and I bet it'd come in really handy in this game when dealing with other spellcasters; it basically turns counterspelling into a means of getting extra dice for your own spellcasting. Pretty cool stuff. Quickening is another nice one since you (and the rest of us) should have an easy time dealing with the usual obstacles that makes it sucky. Our high grades and Magic ratings, coupled with the Masking that Seth wants all of us to have, will make bypassing astral barriers a breeze.

Cybereyes are also pretty handy since you can't use technological aids to help with line of sight under normal circumstances. But I can certainly understand if you'd want to avoid that. Being a dwarf with natural Thermographic Vision certainly helps a lot in this area, but Vision Magnification is really hot, too.

[BlackHat]

I updated my character, suggestions would be seriously welcome. I've never been really good at making Mages. (I usually make cybercharacters)

If I'm not mistaken, Seth changed the initiation rule so that everyone (except mundanes) get grade 4 initiation for 0 BP. It looks like you've spend 30 BP on it.

[sabs]

I need Ritual Sorcery to explain how he's still alive. He's doing a Blood Magic Ritual once every 100 years and 1 day. (Also why he's got the first box of his condition monitors filled in.)
Also, depending on how Seth rules, he's already at the -35 Quality Threshhold, so more neg qualities doesn't get him more points.

Mm, Did he? That's not listed in the first post, he still has 10/30/60/100 for the initiation grades.

[Ol' Scratch]

He changed it in a later post. We're all starting at a base Initiation Grade of 4 and Magic 4 for free. You can build both of them up from there using the normal cost as well as the house rules mentioned in the first post.

[BlackHat]

Its at the bottom of page 1

...After quite a bit of thought, I think the best option is to make you all grade 4 initiates as free present from me (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) You still have to pay for the magic attribute, but that should make you all feel a lot more potent. Magic 9 costs 80bps and Magic 10 costs 125bp. If you want to be a mundane, I will give 50 more bps to compensate. I am also adding a free spirit power that allows free spirits to ignore one point of background (this costs one edge).

[BlackHat]

He changed it in a later post. We're all starting at a base Initiation Grade of 4 and Magic 4 for free. You can build both of them up from there using the normal cost as well as the house rules mentioned in the first post.

I didn't see the thing about magic starting at 4, but it might have been in the other 3 pages of posts.

[Ol' Scratch]

I could have just misread it my first time through, too. Wouldn't be the first time!

[Ol' Scratch]

I'm considering refocusing my concept slightly, instead making him the equivalence of a Weaponsmith through the ages, rather than having him slowly turn into a Renaissance Man which is just eating up way too many resources for me to make him a viable teammate. Does anyone have any suggestions one way or the other? Most of my thoughts are in this post for the meat and potato ideas, and this post for the more flavorable side of things.

My alternate idea is to have him still focused on Arcana and Enchanting, but instead of delving into modern medicine and the myriad other things I mentioned, he'd be a mystic adept intermixing conjuring and melee combat (probably a hammer and shield as his preferred weapons). At least this way I'd be able to contribute if things go south, and it sounds like they will often, as well as still holding on to the key idea I originally had.

What do you guys think?

[pbangarth]

With what little progress I made, I did, in fact.

Dunno if these observations will help anyone, but I noticed that as a spirit, attempting to get force/magic/edge as high as possible, you end up having to build all of your attributes up to 4 (by the design of the houserule), which makes you much more like a force-4 spirit than a force-9 spirit. Compared to the stock spirits in the BBB, your manifested form is actually a bit worse than a force-4, because their manifested physical attributes are usually a few points higher than their force. You could easily have most of the spirit powers you might want, of course, but if you have to throw down in astral combat, you're basically a force-4 spirit. Some of your powers will key off of your ridiculously high force/magic/edge, but for a lot of rolls you'll only be chucking 5-9 dice. I also noticed you can't actually become force-10, because raising all of your other attributes to 5 would cost more than half of your points (and you can't put more than half into attributes).

I believe Seth's houserule limits only Edge out of the Special Attributes to the 1==>7, 2==>8, etc. limits. He doesn't mention Magic in that discussion.

He changed it in a later post. We're all starting at a base Initiation Grade of 4 and Magic 4 for free. You can build both of them up from there using the normal cost as well as the house rules mentioned in the first post.

I don't think Magic is free, only the Initiate Grade 4. I'm also not sure he gives those costs for going above Grade 4, as he specifically says "Initiation grade = 10 points for level 1, 30 for level 2, 60 for level 3, 100 for level 4". I think he just gave the four to us for free. We may not be able to go above Initiate Grade 4.

[Aria]

I'm considering a mystic adept/hacker drake but that may be spreading those luxurious 450BPs + freebies too thin...doesn't sound like it'll clash with anyone elses character specialisms though?!?

Thought Celedyr might be a good 'sire' for a techno wannabee (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Ol' Scratch]

I'm fairly positive he intends for us to be able to initiate up to four more times above four. He mentioned a Magic of 13 as a possibility, and you can't do that without being able to.

[Seth]

Anyone else finding 450 BP hard to make a believable high-level operator

I'm sorry if I am being a little too miserable in bp. I would rather start too miserable and give stuff out later. I will remind you that I am running the normal shadowrun characters pretty much as written: most people have 1 IP, dice pools are typically 8 to 12 for mundane opposition. The 4 grades of initiation, meaning that you can buy magic 9 or 10 with bps is worth a ton of karma: the initiation costs are around 40, upgrading magic from 5 to 9 is about another 150 karma for 40 bps. The free contacts, wealth, cyber/bio as deltaware and knowledge models, I thought represented well rounded characters, and are worth a load more bp.

The shadowrun games I tend to play in (pnp) tend to be low powered (the last game started at 550 karma-gen, which was seriously challenging), so I guess I have a distorted view of what makes a powerful character.

Given the number of voices agreeing, I am going to wimp out and give every one 20 karma as well. This allows people to get quite a few specialisations and stuff that are much cheaper with karma than bp, and lets them buy a few low level skills at 1 or a few spells. This should add a couple of die to peoples die pools.

I'll modify the post at the start of this thread

I don't think Magic is free, only the Initiate Grade 4. I'm also not sure he gives those costs for going above Grade 4, as he specifically says "Initiation grade = 10 points for level 1, 30 for level 2, 60 for level 3, 100 for level 4". I think he just gave the four to us for free. We may not be able to go above Initiate Grade 4.

Correct the initiation grade is free, but the magic costs bps: Magic starts at 1, then its 10bps per point except the natural maximum (10) which costs 25bp.
Level 4 initiation is a good top point: as I said you are the tier 2 immortals at the moment.

[Seth]

I'm fairly positive he intends for us to be able to initiate up to four more times above four. He mentioned a Magic of 13 as a possibility, and you can't do that without being able to.

13 power points for an adept or mystic adept.
10 from your magic
3 from 4 grades on initiation (1 metamagic was spent on masking)

13 power points is seriously tough