[X] My Assistant

[tjn]

Where in the rules does it say this?

Of all the purposefully argumentative and myopic rules lawyering... stop attacking the guy for having a different approach to the game than you, especially when you attempt to beat him over the head with RAW... but RAW disagrees with you.

By the way, it's on page 66:

Note that for most metatypes, the maximum rating for Magic, Resonance, and Edge is 6; humans have a maximum Edge rating of 7. Certain qualities (Lucky, Exceptional Attribute allow characters to exceed attribute maximums by one, but the player must purchase these qualities with Karma and may only do so with gamemaster approval (the player may purchase either Lucky or Exceptional Attribute, but not both). Even if one of these qualities is purchased, the player must still spend the attribute points/Karma to raise the attribute to that new limit. With Exceptional Attribute, you can end up with a Maximum Magic or Resonance rating of 7 when starting the game (before Initiation or submersion).

(Emphasis added).

Furthermore, I did a read through of Spending Your Leftover Karma (page 98) and Character Advancement (page 103). The only limitation on raising attributes on page 98 is the only one attribute can be at the natural attribute limit, and in the Character Advancement section, the only mentioned limit (other than the requisite Karma) to raising attributes is that it takes New Rating x 1 week in downtime.

Then I went to the Magic section, just in case. And under Magic Basics, on page 278 I found this gem, which was right after your quote!

The maximum value of your Magic Attribute (if you have one) is 6+ your initiation level.

At this point, either you're too stupid to read to the end of the paragraph, or you are intentionally arguing in bad faith and purposefully trying to bend RAW to use it as an attack on a fellow poster.

Or I've been successfully trolled.

[tjn]

As an interesting aside to my perusal, also on page 278, there's this interesting little blurb:

If your Magic is reduced to zero, you can no longer use any skill requiring the Magic attribute, even if your maximum Rating is still greater than Zero (but you can still raise the attribute with Karma and then get back to the spellslinging). If your maximum rating falls to zero, you've burned out, losing all magical abilities.

This means you don't have to do the dance of buying cyber, then increasing your Magic back to two, then buying more cyber, then buying more Magic, etc., etc.

Due to that there are no references to "negative" attributes, and that those who are mundane are given a rating of 0, which would put a floor on the Magic attribute of zero because a character can't be more mundane than the unawakened, the better way to work the heavily cybered adept or burnout mage is grab the lowest level priority for your magic "class," load up to knock your Essence down to where you want it, and then spend your finishing touches Karma to get back to two or three (or four, if you grab the max disadvantages and devote all fifty potential Karma to the Magic attribute: 5+10+15+20=50).

I'm thinking of trying this out, probably with a D priority Adept, and see if this interpretation would be broken (in my opinion). And while I haven't seen any RAW to say otherwise, and while I personally like this interpretation, the following standard boilerplate disclaimer applies: 1. run all potentially controversial ideas past your gamemaster and group as a whole, 2. come to a satisfactory compromise for all involved, 3. don't be a dick.

[PraetorGradivus]

Of all the purposefully argumentative and myopic rules lawyering... stop attacking the guy for having a different approach to the game than you, especially when you attempt to beat him over the head with RAW... but RAW disagrees with you.

By the way, it's on page 66:
(Emphasis added).

Furthermore, I did a read through of Spending Your Leftover Karma (page 98) and Character Advancement (page 103). The only limitation on raising attributes on page 98 is the only one attribute can be at the natural attribute limit, and in the Character Advancement section, the only mentioned limit (other than the requisite Karma) to raising attributes is that it takes New Rating x 1 week in downtime.

Then I went to the Magic section, just in case. And under Magic Basics, on page 278 I found this gem, which was right after your quote!

At this point, either you're too stupid to read to the end of the paragraph, or you are intentionally arguing in bad faith and purposefully trying to bend RAW to use it as an attack on a fellow poster.

Or I've been successfully trolled.

I made no personal attack- this is a difference in the interpretation of the rules. As always, what one group does doesn't bind another.
Calling someone 'stupid' on the other hand is a personal attack.
Have a Coke and a smile- chill out.

[tjn]

I made no personal attack- this is a difference in the interpretation of the rules. As always, what one group does doesn't bind another.
Calling someone 'stupid' on the other hand is a personal attack.
Have a Coke and a smile- chill out.

My apologies if you took personal offense. Perhaps the tone of your previous post was unintended, but by:

1. Attempting to ask a rhetorical question ("What in the rules does it say this?"),
2. Giving directions to the other poster ("Notice the part that says limits..."),
3. Repeating use of the word "you" and coming across accusatory,
4. The use of "long story short" implies a glossing over of details that you couldn't be bothered to expound upon, and
5. Implying that he is wrong in stating the limit of the magic attribute through an appeal to RAW,

You come across as very patronizing. Any one of these by themselves might not effect that tone, but together, even if unintended, your post was an attack.

Further, there is no "difference in the interpretation." The RAW is explicit. If you wish to make your "interpretation," your house rule, go wild. However please realize it is just that, a house rule, and not RAW and should not be used as a basis for an appeal to RAW to prove your argument.

My addendum was frankly inspired by my incredulity, because either you literally stopped reading in the middle of a paragraph, without going on to ascertain the full context of the passage that you were quoting, or you intentionally omitted it. The first option, I honestly have a hard time in believing, as I doubt a reasonable person would use a quote as "proof" in an online debate, without reading the surrounding area as an attempt to CYA, because no one likes being called out as wrong. It is because of this, that I used the word "stupid" in hyperbole as I find it hard to conceptualize someone just not caring enough to finish reading the paragraph. If someone truly does make a habit out of not finishing paragraphs in mid thought, and perhaps it is judgmental of me, but I would think that perhaps their mental acuity is not the best. My apologies.

The second option is truly what prompted my edit. Because I feel the unintentional omission of the very next sentence in the paragraph quoted is unlikely in the extreme, the only other option is that the omission was intentional. Unfortunately, it is this option that, especially on Dumpshock, I find to be highly likely. Dumpshock members like to argue, and they like to be right. So I find that an intentional omission in the service of being right on Dumpshock, sadly, is to have a far higher likelihood than the alternative. Additionally, your attempt to backpedal and state that your claim is only one "interpretation" of many after being proven wrong, and after you took the other member to task for his/her own "interpretation," further supports the implication that you would rather be right than to acknowledge facts that indicate otherwise.

Now the tone of the message berating a user for being wrong, plus the high likelihood of the foreknowledge that the accuser him/herself is actually in the wrong when they go about said beration, offends my sense of fairness. Perhaps I should have sighed and moved on without posting, but I didn't. However your response at being called out, after calling out Tycho, got under my skin (obviously).

You don't get to cast stones at someone and then yell "no fair" when you receive the same treatment in return.

I think I'll get that coke now.

[Voran]

For the concerns of the magic/initiation superscores, consider that unless you're a dwaaaaaagon and have bullshit for needing to stick with game mechanics, the price is really expensive, even with group initiation reductions. We're talking months (in real life) worth of game sessions and runs to reach the hundreds of karma you'll be needing. If we go by missions, which seemed to run around what 10-12 karma for good jobs, that's quite alot of gaming weekends.

[FuelDrop]

For the concerns of the magic/initiation superscores, consider that unless you're a dwaaaaaagon and have bullshit for needing to stick with game mechanics, the price is really expensive, even with group initiation reductions. We're talking months (in real life) worth of game sessions and runs to reach the hundreds of karma you'll be needing. If we go by missions, which seemed to run around what 10-12 karma for good jobs, that's quite alot of gaming weekends.

Really? we're lucky to get 6-7 karma for a weekend's gaming.

[Shemhazai]

This means you don't have to do the dance of buying cyber, then increasing your Magic back to two, then buying more cyber, then buying more Magic, etc., etc.

Actually, dances are now half price. You can lower to 0 and keep buying up to 1 for 5 Karma each time.

[Chrome Head]

Actually, dances are now half price. You can lower to 0 and keep buying up to 1 for 5 Karma each time.

Why not do it all at character creation? Take priority D adept. Buy 5 essence worth of 'ware. In the last step of character generation, buy 1 point of Magic (your Magic maximum is currently 1) for only 5 karma. Pretty good deal.

And this makes me think of something that seems to be currently allowed by RAW but a bit absurd: initiate for 13 karma, buy a second magic attribute point for 10 karma (your Magic maximum has gone up to 2 during initiation), and you have a starting character with 3 power points and 5 essence worth of 'ware at the total cost of 28 karma. Take for example resources A, skills/attributes B/C, adept D, race E and you have a damn incredible power build (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

[Falconer]

Chrome because the rules for essence loss don't work like that chargen or not. It was this way in SR4 and I'd be utterly shocked if it's not in the book for SR5. I don't have the SR5 book yet to check though...


SR4 you cannot buy it back with karma not even in step 5 as you just suggested. If the Magic attribute is 0 it simply cannot be bought up ever again, it's gone, lost forever. To retain magical abilities... said character would need 6 magic... so he'd still have 1 left after the augmentation.

[Chrome Head]

As previously quoted, p. 278:

[ Spoiler ]

For every point (or fraction thereof)
of Essence lost, both your current Magic Attribute and
your maximum Magic Rating are reduced by one. If your
Magic is reduced to zero, you can no longer use any skill
requiring the Magic attribute, even if your maximum
Rating is still greater than zero (but you can still raise the
attribute with Karma and then get back to the spellslinging).
If your maximum rating falls to zero, you’ve burned
out, losing all magical abilities, including astral perception
and projection. You are mundane forever. Burnedout
magicians retain all magical skills and knowledge,
but they lack the ability to use them. All Magical active
skills except for Arcana become Knowledge skills.

My understanding is that "you can still raise the attribute with karma". It does not say anything about buying back for all the lost essence, or having a negative magic attribute or any such thing. It talks about maximum magic however, and that would still be 1 after you are down to 1 essence. So you would still be allowed to raise your magic to 1, which is your current maximum, and "get back to the spellslinging". Please enlighten me (with 5e material) if you think I got this wrong.

[Lobo0705]

@Falconer,

Unfortunately, Chrome is correct (to be clear, it isn't anything against Chrome - he is spot on with what the book says, it is unfortunate that the rule is written that way).

Hopefully this will be addressed in the Magic book, as the ability to do this is just silly - you should not be allowed to drop your Magic Attribute below zero without any consequences, even if your Maximum Magic Attribute is higher.

However, the way it is written you can do this.

[Falconer]

Wow, just wow...

A mage can still burn out... provided that they set the maximum initiate grade to magic in the rules. Because then Magic 0 would mean a loss of all initiate grades. So no essence 0 + 1 initiate grade max magic non-zero shenanigans.

Then what he said is true... get the lowest possible magic grade and you have a burnt out char (or a 'latent awakening' char).

[Quake]

The topic seems to have turned into a very specific (and heated?) debate. If I may re-ask the earlier questions:

"What are the better 'ware options to pick up?

It seems like stuff like Reflex Recorders are pretty Essence friendly compared to equivalent Adept powers (even if Basic or Used).

Any good builds have crop up? "

I was thinking of picking the following 'ware:

• Muscle toner R4 Beta
• Platelet factories Delta
• Pain editor Alpha
• Smartlink Delta
• Titanium Bone Lacing Delta
• Reflex recorder (x2: Automatics and Sneaking) Alpha
• Sleep regulator Alpha

425100 nuyens, 2 ESS

Or rather (for much cheaper):

• Smartlink Delta
• Reflex recorder (x1: Automatics) Std
• Plastic Bone Lacing Delta
• Platelet factories Alpha
• Pain editor Std
• Sleep regulator Alpha

126800 nuyens, 0,99 ESS

Has anyone tried making "tank" bioadept builds also?

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Really? we're lucky to get 6-7 karma for a weekend's gaming.

We get ~two per session until the Run is over, and then we get what the run is worth (Primary GM)
For the secondary GM, we get from 3-5 usually, with any remaining Run awards at the end of the run.

[Chrome Head]

The topic seems to have turned into a very specific (and heated?) debate. If I may re-ask the earlier questions:

"What are the better 'ware options to pick up?

You're right, back on topic (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Well, your choices are very nice. I would also consider only a subset, say muscle toner, smartlink, platelet, to keep the essence cost to 1 at most. If you are looking for valid character generation sets of 'ware, you'll have to revise your suggestion, as the best grade available at chargen is alphaware, as I've recently found out.

[Jack VII]

Yeah, aside from the Grade, some of that stuff is totally out due to availability restrictions.

"I'm looking at you Mr. Pain Editor! Why do you have to be so unavailable?"

[Quake]

Yeah, this is clearly *not* a chargen set of ware. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I was wondering if the Pain Editor should be considered a staple (or a kind of mandatory item) of any combatant. I mean, it really does seem like quite the liability to fall for stun damage, since high armor leads to most damage being stun.

Also, there does seem to be a nice synergy between platelet factories, pain editor and high armor: since only half stun damage is converted to physical once the track is full, if you are still conscious because of the PE, then platelet factories cancels out stun damage at a pretty good ratio. 3 stun becomes 2 physical (rounding up), which is then reduced by 1. For 4 stun, it gets reduced to one physical damage. Having this whole set makes for a pretty good bioadept tank that's hard to kill except with assault canon rounds, and since dodging is very good with Combat Sense and Imp. Ref. it seems like a good defensive combo overall.

[FuelDrop]

For a character generation legal alternative, consider adrenaline pumps. Those things are seriously good in 5th, though hardly flawless.

[Chrome Head]

Yeah, this is clearly *not* a chargen set of ware. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I was wondering if the Pain Editor should be considered a staple (or a kind of mandatory item) of any combatant. I mean, it really does seem like quite the liability to fall for stun damage, since high armor leads to most damage being stun.

Also, there does seem to be a nice synergy between platelet factories, pain editor and high armor: since only half stun damage is converted to physical once the track is full, if you are still conscious because of the PE, then platelet factories cancels out stun damage at a pretty good ratio. 3 stun becomes 2 physical (rounding up), which is then reduced by 1. For 4 stun, it gets reduced to one physical damage. Having this whole set makes for a pretty good bioadept tank that's hard to kill except with assault canon rounds, and since dodging is very good with Combat Sense and Imp. Ref. it seems like a good defensive combo overall.

I agree it is very strong. It does involve a lot of expensive 'ware and surgeries though. If you want to plan the long term though, a nice set to be sure.

Where I'm getting confused is how 3 and 4 damage become 1. The order in which the reductions take effect is not clear to me.

[Shemhazai]

Why not do it all at character creation? Take priority D adept. Buy 5 essence worth of 'ware. In the last step of character generation, buy 1 point of Magic (your Magic maximum is currently 1) for only 5 karma. Pretty good deal.

And this makes me think of something that seems to be currently allowed by RAW but a bit absurd: initiate for 13 karma, buy a second magic attribute point for 10 karma (your Magic maximum has gone up to 2 during initiation), and you have a starting character with 3 power points and 5 essence worth of 'ware at the total cost of 28 karma. Take for example resources A, skills/attributes B/C, adept D, race E and you have a damn incredible power build (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cyber.gif)

I see. Not permanently burning out lets you go "negative" and then back to Magic 1 in one cheap step. Then go for the best of both worlds as you initiate to get power points and metamagic while minimizing investment in Magic rating.

[DireRadiant]

At this point, either you're too stupid to read to the end of the paragraph, or you are intentionally arguing in bad faith and purposefully trying to bend RAW to use it as an attack on a fellow poster.

Warnable offense.

Please read the Terms of Service.

[Quake]

I agree it is very strong. It does involve a lot of expensive 'ware and surgeries though. If you want to plan the long term though, a nice set to be sure.

Where I'm getting confused is how 3 and 4 damage become 1. The order in which the reductions take effect is not clear to me.

1. If your stun monitor is filled (and you're still conscious, thanks to PE), damage goes to the physical monitor at a ratio of 2 Stun = 1 Physical (rounding up, I suppose).
2. Platelet factories (PF) reduces physical damage by 1 if damage is 2 or above.
3. Thus, damage from stun transfered to physical becomes physical, and is thus affected by PF.
4. Stun damage is always still received as stun, even if the stun track is filled, so if you have a lot of armor, a lot of stun is getting converted into physical (2 Stun = 1 Physical) and a lot of it is getting reduced further by 1.

[Chrome Head]

1. If your stun monitor is filled (and you're still conscious, thanks to PE), damage goes to the physical monitor at a ratio of 2 Stun = 1 Physical (rounding up, I suppose).
2. Platelet factories (PF) reduces physical damage by 1 if damage is 2 or above.
3. Thus, damage from stun transfered to physical becomes physical, and is thus affected by PF.
4. Stun damage is always still received as stun, even if the stun track is filled, so if you have a lot of armor, a lot of stun is getting converted into physical (2 Stun = 1 Physical) and a lot of it is getting reduced further by 1.

Thanks for the explanation. Very ingenious.

[Shemhazai]

Yeah, this is clearly *not* a chargen set of ware. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I was wondering if the Pain Editor should be considered a staple (or a kind of mandatory item) of any combatant. I mean, it really does seem like quite the liability to fall for stun damage, since high armor leads to most damage being stun.

Also, there does seem to be a nice synergy between platelet factories, pain editor and high armor: since only half stun damage is converted to physical once the track is full, if you are still conscious because of the PE, then platelet factories cancels out stun damage at a pretty good ratio. 3 stun becomes 2 physical (rounding up), which is then reduced by 1. For 4 stun, it gets reduced to one physical damage. Having this whole set makes for a pretty good bioadept tank that's hard to kill except with assault canon rounds, and since dodging is very good with Combat Sense and Imp. Ref. it seems like a good defensive combo overall.

Holy crap, I think mages can do this.

[PraetorGradivus]

My view on MA and Chargen aside... let's assume, and you all are probably right, that your Maximum Attribute 6 even if you only leave chargen with 3 Magic.

If you take 4 ESS of Cyber/Bio you are dropping that Maximum Magic Attribute from 6 to 2 while dropping your rating from 3 to 0...
Without initiation, that character can only spend karma to get to 2 Magic as that is now his maximum.

BTW, whatever a Samurai can do an Adept can do better.
As far as what to put in the Adept... synaptic boosters are a better buy than improved reflexes assuming you have the money...1.5Ess (2Magic) vs 2.5 Magic.