Whats on your face?, One Million and One Faces Options

[Slide]

Ok, so one of the more interesting things in SR to me is the face. An "archtype" that came about from the realization that talking is often more productive than shooting. A man who weilds words like the street Sam wields dual chrome ares predators. But there is more than one way to build one. What is your's? Magic? Techno? Part time decker/rigger? Demolitions expert? How about a ninja assassin face? Or are you the type that believes that everyone should have social skills (like me) and encourage them to. Or maybe (also like me) you belive that no amount of dice can compare to good role play (or bad).

Thoughts?

[FuelDrop]

It has long been known that the greatest weakness in security is the metahuman element. While possibly the most direct way to take advantage of this is through high velocity lead poisoning, the fact is that defeating your foes by matching wits with them and coming up trumps has always had a lot of appeal to a certain player base.

This is where the face comes in. Shadowrun isn't about solving all your problems with brute force... that's what D20 Modern is for. No, Shadowrun is about having a team of elite criminals who between them have the right skills for any job. The face should not be the only character with interpersonal skills (primarily because many good scams require at least two people with some degree of competence as con artists), but they should realistically be as far ahead of the street sams at talking to people as the street sams are ahead of them at combat.
Should a face be incapable of combat? Heck no! Combat is a regular part of the game and every character should at the very least not be a burden if it comes up.

[ElFenrir]

The face I have(and he remade well, btw; the Essence loss he has didn't burden his Social pool badly at all, it's 7, which is pretty nice) is essentially a hybrid combat-face. He's very skilled in martial arts and pistols(both easy to conceal; he doesn't need to conceal his body, and pistols are nicely concealable) . He's got other skills as well(stealth, driving, first aid, and the like.) He's essentially the guy that, while he may not be super-optimal for the guy who has to go deal with Damien Knight or something, can do Face-oriented things in a dangerous situation and not only not be a liability but be able to actually 'face' in situations that would be risky even for someone who just has basic combat skills. I had split him Attributes/Skills/Resources/Race/Magic. He's got some pretty sweet attributes, 5(7) Agility and Strength, 6 Charisma with one level of Pheremones to boost that.

I sort of run him almost as a 'Bodyguard' type, to be fair. He's a tall, pretty elf dude with a suit, long blonde hair and a longcoat; looking like a cross between 'classic runner' and 'classy MF', so a higher-end person wouldn't be embarrassed about having him stand around in a nice establishment and charm people, but whom also might be threatened by something and likes the idea of their 'face' actually being the guy to start introducing people to the floor instead of some more 'obvious' muscle. (He's got all the social skills at some level; including a nice Intimidation as well.) Plus, why hire two people when one guy can do both?

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

I have two Primary Face Characters...

"Jenks" is a Human Mystic Adept Face/Investigator specializing in Manipulation, Health and Detection Spells. He is a Grade 4 Initiate (Magic 3/2) with Masking, Extended Masking, Flexible Signature and Centering. He speaks 13 Languages, at least passably. ~312 Karma

"Dhark'oni" is an Oni Ninja Face/Throwing Adept (Last of the Line of the True Iga Clan) that utilizes Mask of 1000 Faces to become whomever he wants. He is also a Grade 4 Initiate (Magic 4) with +3 PP and Masking. He speaks probably a half dozen languages passably well. ~250 Karma

Sadly, neither character would translate well to SR5 untill more books come out. Conversions are Nice, but Rebuilds would sacrifice a lot (as I indicated in another thread topic for Jenks, at least).

Both are fairly well skilled in other areas, so as to cover as many bases as they can. Average top-end DP's for Primary Skills on both are 12-13 Dice (Midrange DP's are from 6-10 Dice). As for the Dice, they are there to resolve roleplay, and I believe that Social Skills are generally important for almost all of my characters.

[Draco18s]

I would love to play a face someday.

Unfortunately I am bad at talking IRL and would end up being like, "Um..I make something up" and roll dice.

[RHat]

My favourite face? I've got this one character in 4E who's basically a Vegas card shark and general hustler who basically fall ass backwards into his first augmentations (Guy owed him a LOT of money. Guy was a street doc, Guy talked him into taking some Cerebral Boosters instead of the money he was owed. He was a little slow on the uptake back then, so he took the deal.) This started him on a run of getting a lot of augs, including some combat stuff because some people had a tendency not to like it very much when he kept on winning their money away from them. Eventually, though, he got caught up with the Vory because of something someone else did, and they more or less burned him in Vegas. Struggling to maintain his independence, he ended up with a lot of underworld ties all over Seattle - setting himself up so that if he ever had to move against the sovetnik that was holding things over him, he'd be in a good position to do it.

Was a very interesting character, but sadly the game died. Rebuilding him to SR5 doesn't work perfectly for a couple reasons - first because most of his skills were in groups (Influence and Stealth, rounded out with Pistols, Blades, Gymnastics, and a point of Hardware) and so it gets kind of hard to grab those again, and because he was SURGEd and that hasn't been printed for SR5 yet (but he remains VERY effective if I assume Glamour remains the same, though due to skill changes his dice pools might be moderately lower - his Social Limit ends up around 10).

[Dancer]

I've sometimes considered a Drake face (focusing on Con and Intimidate). After all, how many people can actually tell one dragon from another by sight?

[Draco18s]

I've sometimes considered a Drake face (focusing on Con and Intimidate). After all, how many people can actually tell one dragon from another by sight?

I can. :3

Usually pretty easy too, you just gotta look at their scales.

[quentra]

My PI main is a face, really. The crux of investigation is asking questions - he's not a crazy pornomancer, but he can pretty much talk his way into anything (and I mean anything.)

[Neko Asakami]

My face is a ex-Yamatetsu ex-pop idol, who now works for Horizon writing manga about shadowrunners. She might have joined an initiatory group that styled itself after a group of magical girls as well, which is DEFINITELY not why she follows Moon Maiden (yes, yes it is). She started as a joke to create a stereotypical magical girl in the Sixth World (with influences from Kat o' Nine Tales), but ended up being sort of a "this is what happens when the dream doesn't go right" sort of character. Life pretty much dumped on her while she was in the shadows after leaving the idol business, creating a hard runner whose magic is the utmost in flashy-girly fluff.

In game terms, she's a Dryad Mystic Adept (built using 750 Karma) who has initiated three times with dice pools for major skills in the 12-14 range, minor in the 7-9, and spell casting in the 13-15 range. Right now, she doesn't know a whole lot of languages and has to rely on the Armor spell and being aware of her surroundings to avoid getting geeked, but at only 49 Career Karma, I'd say she's pretty damn good. She does rely on a pair of creative interpretations of the rules, however. First is one of her initiations came during character creation (which is okay with the GM since she's a Karma gen rebuild of a BP gen character that had initiated) and second, all three of her power points have all come from the initiations giving her a 5/0[3] split for the Magic/Adept. Most of her adept powers don't actually rely on having a Magic attribute (thankfully), so it's rarely an issue, and the ones that do I've worked with the GM to ensure they are usable.

[FuelDrop]

My face is a ex-Yamatetsu ex-pop idol, who now works for Horizon writing manga about shadowrunners. She might have joined an initiatory group that styled itself after a group of magical girls as well, which is DEFINITELY not why she follows Moon Maiden (yes, yes it is). She started as a joke to create a stereotypical magical girl in the Sixth World (with influences from Kat o' Nine Tales), but ended up being sort of a "this is what happens when the dream doesn't go right" sort of character. Life pretty much dumped on her while she was in the shadows after leaving the idol business, creating a hard runner whose magic is the utmost in flashy-girly fluff.

In game terms, she's a Dryad Mystic Adept (built using 750 Karma) who has initiated three times with dice pools for major skills in the 12-14 range, minor in the 7-9, and spell casting in the 13-15 range. Right now, she doesn't know a whole lot of languages and has to rely on the Armor spell and being aware of her surroundings to avoid getting geeked, but at only 49 Career Karma, I'd say she's pretty damn good. She does rely on a pair of creative interpretations of the rules, however. First is one of her initiations came during character creation (which is okay with the GM since she's a Karma gen rebuild of a BP gen character that had initiated) and second, all three of her power points have all come from the initiations giving her a 5/0[3] split for the Magic/Adept. Most of her adept powers don't actually rely on having a Magic attribute (thankfully), so it's rarely an issue, and the ones that do I've worked with the GM to ensure they are usable.

I can never remember, is the limit to the number of ranks a mystic adept can have in their adept powers limited by their total magic or their adept magic?

Also, love the magic girl concept. Totally a distinctive style.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

I can never remember, is the limit to the number of ranks a mystic adept can have in their adept powers limited by their total magic or their adept magic?

Also, love the magic girl concept. Totally a distinctive style.

Your Magic Rating. Which is your Total Magic Rating.
For example, My Mystic Adept has a Magic of 5, but it is Split 3/2. For Maximum Power/Maximum Levels, the Magic of 5 is the Limit. Of course, My Spellcasting only gains the Dedicated Magic of 3 added to the Dice Pool, not the full Magic 5 (Since 2 points of that Magic is dedicated to Adept Powers).

[FuelDrop]

Your Magic Rating. Which is your Total Magic Rating.
For example, My Mystic Adept has a Magic of 5, but it is Split 3/2. For Maximum Power/Maximum Levels, the Magic of 5 is the Limit. Of course, My Spellcasting only gains the Dedicated Magic of 3 added to the Dice Pool, not the full Magic 5 (Since 2 points of that Magic is dedicated to Adept Powers).

Awesome. Thanks.

[Neko Asakami]

Also, love the magic girl concept. Totally a distinctive style.

Thanks FuelDrop, I'm rather quite proud of her. She is a custom tradition, too.

[ Spoiler ]

Drain is Charisma + Willpower
Combat: Water, “The power of water will cleanse even the most powerful evil!”
Detection: Beasts, "My animal companions act as my eyes, ears, and scouts; helping me hunt trouble!"
Health: Guardian, "The Moon Maiden will appear and heal those who appeal to her for aid."
Illusion: Air, “Images and appearences can be as fleeting as a summer breeze.”
Manipulation: Fire, "Fanning the flames of love!"

Your Magic Rating. Which is your Total Magic Rating.

Wait...seriously? That's our "house rule" for getting those few powers (like Facial Sculpt and Attribute Boost) to work. Hero Lab says that's not how it works, though, so we just assumed. I'll let my GM know, we'll both be pleased about that.

[FuelDrop]

Thanks FuelDrop, I'm rather quite proud of her. She is a custom tradition, too.

Tell me that she had the fashion and makeover spells with a fetish taking the form of a large pen...

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Thanks FuelDrop, I'm rather quite proud of her. She is a custom tradition, too.

[ Spoiler ]

Drain is Charisma + Willpower
Combat: Water, “The power of water will cleanse even the most powerful evil!”
Detection: Beasts, "My animal companions act as my eyes, ears, and scouts; helping me hunt trouble!"
Health: Guardian, "The Moon Maiden will appear and heal those who appeal to her for aid."
Illusion: Air, “Images and appearences can be as fleeting as a summer breeze.”
Manipulation: Fire, "Fanning the flames of love!"

Wait...seriously? That's our "house rule" for getting those few powers (like Facial Sculpt and Attribute Boost) to work. Hero Lab says that's not how it works, though, so we just assumed. I'll let my GM know, we'll both be pleased about that.

Hero Lab is wrong... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) I love when I can say that. It has been a FAQ entry for years now. *shrug*

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Tell me that she had the fashion and makeover spells with a fetish taking the form of a large pen...

A Pen? I must be missing something here. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

[Neko Asakami]

The Sailor Scouts use transformation pens in at least one of the Sailor Moon series. And no, I have a Rating 2 Power focus in the form of a necklace that is used for a power specific geas she has on a few of her powers instead.

Edit: She does have the Fashion spell, yes; but not Makeover. I can post her if you'd like to see her in all her glory.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

The Sailor Scouts use transformation pens in at least one of the Sailor Moon series. And no, I have a Rating 2 Power focus in the form of a necklace that is used for a power specific geas she has on a few of her powers instead.

Ahhh... Thank You for that. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[GloriousRuse]

I do believe the OP hit on the one great issue with faces: how far do the dice carry you, and how much is the player talking and thinking? How much requires the player to inherently have some mental and social skills? And how much of a face's success is open to GM interpretation?

Combat and magic are the opposite is the opposite, and I suspect that is one of the reasons they are so popular and dice maxxed- the other being you get to talk all the time in the real world, how often do you get to mow down corpsec with an SMG/Fireball? You roll the dice and its hit or miss, live or die. It is simple to allow the player to elevate themselves to combat/magic ubermensch regardless of their talents or lack their of in the real world, and we require neither a demonstration of aiming a gun, or ripping open reality with your mind.

And if you fail, you can always blame the dice (or the GM), or an exceptionally bad plan that at least all four or five of you thought was a good idea. There is no room for real, personal, failure short of stupidity on a monstrous scale.

To be a face though, you need to not only be adept at building a decent dice pool but also actually talking and thinking about what the hell it is your saying. It is perfectly possible that your failures are a result of YOU failing, not the dice. And because we are all much more familiar with social interaction than machinegunning trolls, we have higher expectations of performance from those who are faces than any other archetype. We are more willing to alter events with no dice rolled, or apply modifiers subjectively, to Faces than anyone else. As a flip, we are more likely to let someone without the dice pool but possessing actual social ability to get away with being a success socially than we are to let someone with real world firearms skills add a few net hits just for knowing how to do it.

This reinforces the potential for direct personal, PLAYER failure more than any other archetype. Which is probably why so many people stay away from them or if they do go, try to max their dice pool to the point where they can just say "Look, a Victoria's Secret model-of-the-decade with the charisma of Winston Churchill and the stage presence of Russel Crowe is saying it, and there's pheromones and magic to boot, and so it doesn't matter how ridiculous it sounds or stupid it is, it wins by raw force of being. Let me roll my dice, please, because otherwise my personal inadequacies may not let me be the character I envisioned being - which is totally unfair because Dave over there is slightly overweight, has asthma, and has never punched someone in his life, but is capable of being a F**kin Ninja"

BUT..and its is a BUT..you kind of have to do it that way, don't you? Because otherwise, why not just roll NEGOTIATE, CON, or INTIMIDATE skills four or five times in a run and then eat Doritos?

[Draco18s]

It is perfectly possible that your failures are a result of YOU failing, not the dice.

<That Other Game>
*To angels*
Don't worry, we're here to slay good!

...

I mean evil!
</That Other Game>

[FuelDrop]

<That Other Game>
*To angels*
Don't worry, we're here to slay good!

...

I mean evil!
</That Other Game>

Considering that angels tend towards lawful stupid/stupid good, it can be hard to tell the difference between them and demons at times.

[toturi]

BUT..and its is a BUT..you kind of have to do it that way, don't you? Because otherwise, why not just roll NEGOTIATE, CON, or INTIMIDATE skills four or five times in a run and then eat Doritos?

Yes, why not? I'm perfectly fine with rolling Negotiate, Con or Intimidate as long as the skill fits with what the player wants the character to do. "I try to charm him into doing me a favor." "I try to trick him into doing as I ask." "I try to put the fear of 'Me' into him."

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Considering that angels tend towards lawful stupid/stupid good, it can be hard to tell the difference between them and demons at times.

Only if you play them that way. You won't find any such in my games. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Shortstraw]

Yes, why not? I'm perfectly fine with rolling Negotiate, Con or Intimidate as long as the skill fits with what the player wants the character to do. "I try to charm him into doing me a favor." "I try to trick him into doing as I ask." "I try to put the fear of 'Me' into him."

+1
I'm sorry but unless you are going to drag the sniper down to the range to get him to show you how he shoots someone you are just being an ass if you try to force the face to do the equivalent.