Milspec Armor & Possesionspirits, Powergaming or Min/Max Question Options

[Medicineman]

Hi Guys.
My Char D.E.M. is a Gnome technowizrd (self invented Possesion based Tradition)
and he's got Plant Spirits for Healing aspect.
If He learns to summon Big (mighty ?) Spirits and summons a Level 6 Spirit in his Milspec (which is a prepared Vessel)
with Armor Value 19/17 Jumping Jacks Lvl 5 and enhanced Mobility Lvl 3.

what Values (Armor Jumping, etc) does this Possesed Armor have ?

with a possesed Dance
Medicieneman

[Stahlseele]

You mean Great-Form Spirits i think.
And if i remember correctly, the Spirits Force gets added to all values of the Armor.
Not sure though. Might be just more points in both Impact and Ballistics.
And if you are summoning Great Form Plant Spirits, one of the most usefull parts gets completely ignored.
Their Regeneration Power only works if they possess living beings i think.

[Medicineman]

it is Great-form Spirits IIRC:)

We're discussing right now wether regeneration works in/for the Mil-Spec or not

with a Great-Form Dance
Medicineman

[Ryu]

As in "a chemical seal gets repaired after armor was penetrated" or as in "the being inside the armor gets regeneration"?

[Medicineman]

The Armor is possesed so "a chemical seal gets repaired after armor was penetrated" Regeneration/selfrepair for the Armor

Hough!
Medicineman

[Ryu]

That should work. Great Spirit at force 6? You are a brave man.

[Stahlseele]

More likely a foolish man, summoning things bigger than his considerable head . .
Also, i am not sure this works, as regeneration is something that only "living" "things" - i am looking at you here HMHVVV! - seem to be able to get.
But i don't think this particular question has come up before either . . i believe i am remembering something along the lines of spirits - inhabitation, not possession, mind you - being able to repair an ammount of boyes on the condition monitor of their prepared vessel as high as their force in a given ammount of time, but don't ask me where i am pulling this from . .
Actually, this raisins another question to/for the dancer . .
Possession Spirit?
NOT Inhabitation?
CAN a Possession Spirit possess an object at all or is that limited to Inhabitation Spirits and Possession Spirits can only possess living beings?

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

More likely a foolish man, summoning things bigger than his considerable head . .
Also, i am not sure this works, as regeneration is something that only "living" "things" - i am looking at you here HMHVVV! - seem to be able to get.
But i don't think this particular question has come up before either . . i believe i am remembering something along the lines of spirits - inhabitation, not possession, mind you - being able to repair an ammount of boyes on the condition monitor of their prepared vessel as high as their force in a given ammount of time, but don't ask me where i am pulling this from . .
Actually, this raisins another question to/for the dancer . .
Possession Spirit?
NOT Inhabitation?
CAN a Possession Spirit possess an object at all or is that limited to Inhabitation Spirits and Possession Spirits can only possess living beings?

Possession Spirits can possess non-living vessels. The Wicker Man and Plasteel Homonculous are examples from Street Magic.

[Stahlseele]

Then what's inhabitation good for, if possession can do it too? O.o

[Modular Man]

Possession spirits can indeed possess an object.

For inanimate vessels, the spirit makes a Force x 2 (vessel’s Object Resistance) Test.

Inhabitation is especially great for living vessels, as some merges of vessel and spirit give the spirit access to cyberware and such, the Flesh Form even grants the vessel's skills.

I think it could work, both Possession and Regeneration.
For additional armor points, I'd say the armor will get a lot beefier (is that even a word?).

If the vessel is inanimate or dead, the spirit’s Force is added to any appropriate Physical ratings (at the gamemaster’s discretion). For instance, a corpse’s attributes would be appropriate, as would a jar’s Barrier rating, or a vehicle’s Body, Armor, and Speed—though not it’s Handling.

That would probably mean that the spirit's force will add to the armor value, because if that's the case for vehicles, then why not a bulletproof vest?

I cannot find anything regarding whether or not immunity to normal weapons is cumulative to that, I've searched SR4A, the glossary at the end of "Running Wild" and "Digital Grimoire", all I can find is

[...] players may reconsider their possessed Talmudic body armor with Immunity to Normal Weapons, when they realize the effects of possession-enhanced Ballistics and Impact ratings on their character’s mobility.

[Stahlseele]

hmm . . i am still not good with the magic crap it seems x.x
but that last one: magically enhanced armor adds encumbrance? O.o

[Modular Man]

It seems so, yes.
With a high enough body attribute and enhanced mobility things might still work out, though.
And, well, since the armor is already somewhat able to move on it's own accord (enhanced mobility), could that possession spirit move it's vessel by itself? It's not too different from a golem, is it? So I'd think it could.

[Stahlseele]

It probably can, yes.
Which throws up another question in my mind:
How does the spirit know not to, for example, move the armors leg to fuld up to the back of the wearer while he is still inside? o.O

[Freya]

Re: the carryover of ItNW to a possessed object, besides the comment from Digital Grimoire that Modular Man brought up, Ghost Cartels speaks to this a little bit (spoilering just in case, and emphasis mine):

[ Spoiler ]

Since it's not made explicit in the quote, using tempo leaves the user vulnerable to possession by a shadow spirit via dream pact. This is an excerpt of the description of what happens during the possession (p. 133).

For example, a spirit curious about the feeling of being shot might possess an addict, then challenge a police officer. When the officer opens fire, the spirit’s innate powers heal the living vessel, allowing the body to remain standing and moving long after a normal metahuman would have died. Once the spirit’s curiosity is satisfied, it abandons the vessel, leaving an addict facing freaked out police officers, who then empty an entire clip into his or her body. Reports of tempo addicts who believe themselves invulnerable and have massive strength and resistance to pain while high have circulated through every police agency and corporation, resulting in a general policy shift for dealing with those “flippers.”

That combined with Modular Man's quote strongly suggests (to me) that a) spirits may apply their powers to their vessels during possession, and b) ItNW and Regeneration are two powers that can be applied in that fashion. At the very least, Ghost Cartels supports the general claim and doesn't contradict ItNW as a specific case, but I'd consider that enough to rule that a possessed suit of armour would gain the spirit's Force to its armour value, be able to regenerate damage to itself and get the benefit of ItNW. (I'd also be hauling out mages with high-Force Wreck Armour or Powerbolt to deal with that, but I digress.) Anyone else have evidence either way?

Re: magically enhanced armour adding encumbrance, I could technically see that being applied through using the increased protection rating rather than the base rating to calculate armour encumbrance. By the RAW (p. 164, SR4A), adding an extra +6/+6 protection to armour (say, by it being possessed by a Force 6 spirit) should give an extra -3 modifier to Agility and Reaction rolls, assuming the new protection rating exceeds the wearer's Body x2. On the other hand, that requires you to buy into the idea that possessed armour is heavier than non-possessed armour for some reason, which just seems silly. (How much does a spirit weigh, anyway?)

Edit: I was going to justify ignoring the increased encumbrance by saying "the Armor spell doesn't increase encumbrance either", but after checking the rules, it doesn't actually say whether it does or not. I guess this is one of those cases of having to choose between game mechanics and physics...

[Stahlseele]

The Immunity to Normal Weapons would only appy to the Armor . .
Now we get to the part where i ask:
if i shoot somebody weraing that armor and i am not trying to damage the armor but him and the immunity to normal weapons only applys to the armor itself and not the wearer . .
what happens then?
because technically it's not him being protected by that bit. but his armor. but you are not shooting through a barrier to get to him . .

as for how much spirits weight:as much as love and hate.
or if you want: earth spirits/elementals = Force Kilo, water Force Liters, so basically also Force Kilo in most cases, air = force liters so about as much as 1l of air weights . . practically nothing . . same for fire, because fire is just burning air after all . .

[Freya]

The Immunity to Normal Weapons would only appy to the Armor . .
Now we get to the part where i ask:
if i shoot somebody weraing that armor and i am not trying to damage the armor but him and the immunity to normal weapons only applys to the armor itself and not the wearer . .
what happens then?
because technically it's not him being protected by that bit. but his armor. but you are not shooting through a barrier to get to him . .

I'm having a hard time thinking of ways that ItNW would apply to the armour-as-an-object but not to the wearer. It seems like the easiest answer would be to say that ItNW would apply if someone tries to destroy the armour when it's not actively being worn. If I were house-ruling it I'd say that the armour would effectively be a "barrier" (even though it's an object) and ItNW would apply that damage resistance test. The other thing that came to mind was reducing or ignoring degradation if you're using the armour degradation rules from Arsenal (p. 44).

Outside those situations, I'm not really sure what to say; those are the only two applications I can think of that actually make sense - if you houseruled it as "you get the benefits of ItNW while wearing the armour" you'd have to explain why it worked if someone made a called shot to avoid armour. Personally, I'd say it doesn't apply except in the cases I mentioned above, but YMMV.

[Stahlseele]

This is just one of the cases where the rules break down, because they were never intended to work with magitech at all.
Magic breaks Tech. But Tech also breaks Magic.

[Freya]

I don't think it's quite as bad as you make it out to be. I absolutely agree that it's a judgement call, and that it probably wasn't made this way intentionally, but every system has its little quirks that people will try to exploit to their advantage (if they're the kind of person that does that).

I was going to say "there's no reason that possession is inherently broken as a system", but I've seen a few people suggest exactly that. Since I'm not that experienced with possession mechanics (as in I haven't seen them at the game table, just read them), why is that?

[Medicineman]

This is just one of the cases where the rules break down, because they were never intended to work with magitech at all.
Magic breaks Tech. But Tech also breaks Magic.

tech doesn't break Magic.
thats an old SR2 concept.
There's a lot of Interaction between Magic & Machine (Object resistance f.E. shows very well that Magic can interact wit Technology.)
The Matrix is something differently ; Matrix and Magic doesn't mix but Tech can mingle very well with Magic
(and thats exactly what my Tradition Technowizardry is for. To enhance & improve Machinery/Technology with Magic. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif) )

More likely a foolish man, summoning things bigger than his considerable head . .

Its a Gnomes Head ,so its rather small.
And when my Char gets his second Initiation he'll have 10 Dice to summon a Plant Spirit vs 6 Dice for the Spirit to resist
(and 13 Dice for Soaking) so thats not the Problem (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

with an enhancing Dance
Medicineman

[Ryu]

SR4 pg. 296, Materialization. This yields IntW. Possession (Street Magic, German pg. 110, sorry) doesn´t.

[SpellBinder]

Street Magic (English copy), page 102, the black box on Possession and Vessels does state that Immunity To Normal Weapons is gained by the vessel, among other things.

[Ryu]

Good find, and quite explicit.

[Freya]

Street Magic (English copy), page 102, the black box on Possession and Vessels does state that Immunity To Normal Weapons is gained by the vessel, among other things.

Thanks, SpellBinder. That's what I get for skipping the introduction of that sidebar and going straight to the "Dead or Inanimate Vessels" section.

[Medicineman]

Street Magic (English copy), page 102, the black box on Possession and Vessels does state that Immunity To Normal Weapons is gained by the vessel, among other things.

Good call, but how High is the ItnW ?
19(Armor Value) + 6(Spirit Level ) 25 ?
or 19 + 12(Twice Spirit Level) = 31
or 12 (Twice Spirit Level) & 19 Normal Armar Value ?
What about the JumpJets or the Mobility Upgrade ?
can You add the Spirits Level to these values ?
(Remember the MilSpec is a prepared Vessel)

with a combined Dance
Medicineman

[RHat]

The Hardened aspect of the protection, at least, would be at Force*2 as normal. The only vague spot is whether it stacks with armour more generally; I'd assume it would in the absence of any direct indication that it does not.