[SR4] Astral Sight Quality, Who is it for? Options

[SleepIncarnate]

So, while working on that character concept, I kinda glossed over the astral sight quality, but something about it just sort of bugged me. And then I realized what it was. It's basically a quality for no one! Take a read of the description for yourself.

Astral Sight
Cost: 5 BP
Astral Sight grants mundane characters the ability to perceive into the astral plane. This quality is not available to characters who possess the Adept, Latent Awakening, Magician, Mystic Adept, or Technomancer qualities. This quality may only be taken during character creation and cannot be obtained using Karma.

Characters taking this quality acquire a Magic attribute of 1 that may not be increased during character creation or raised with Karma. This Magic point is, however, subject to normal rules for the impact of Essence loss on Magic. Characters with Astral Sight may perceive into the astral plane just like magicians (see p. 182, SR4) and may also learn the Assensing and Astral Combat skills. They are unable to use any other aspect of magical talent besides astral perception, so they cannot learn or use Sorcery, Conjuring, or Enchanting. Characters with this quality may undergo initiation for the purposes of learning metamagics related to astral assensing or combat, such as Flexible Signature, Masking, Psychometry, and Sensing (see Metamagic, p. 52). Characters may bond with weapon foci, but bonus dice from these foci only apply during astral combat.

Only mundane characters can take it, but something like 95% of mundane PC's (at least) are going to have some form of augmentation. Even something that causes a loss of 0.000001 Essence would automatically cause the loss of the one and only allowed point of Magic provided by this quality. So... What the heck kind of build would work within the constraints of this quality, or is it essentially there for world flavor in your opinion?

[bannockburn]

Edge monkeys and world flavor.
Although it is debatable if the essence loss will reduce the magic attribute of 1 or simply the maximum during character creation, because there is no clearly defined order of operations on how that works.

Edit: Brainfart, 1 is the maximum.

[SleepIncarnate]

It also clearly states in the rules that you lose a point of magic and a point of maximum magic for every essence lost. Even if you somehow had a max of 6 but couldn't raise it, it would still lose that one right away. It's basically a 5 point quality no PC will ever take.

[bannockburn]

Yes, it's also a remnant from SR3, where it was a way for an adept to get astral sight for cheaper than as a power.

[KCKitsune]

If they wanted PCs to take it then they should have said that until Essence goes below 1, then the PC has it. Still overpriced, but would have made it a fractional better deal.

[JanessaVR]

Damned if I know. Just play magicians and you'll never have to worry about this issue. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[SleepIncarnate]

Damned if I know. Just play magicians and you'll never have to worry about this issue. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Pffft. Technomancers are where it's at in SR4. The only edition where they exist.

[Stahlseele]

We call people with that "unfortunate victims".
It is only really good for perception monsters.
With it, there is literally nothing you can not perceive

[SpellBinder]

Based on when Essence is lost and this quality is gained, it's still possible for someone to have it and still be low Essence.

On the player side of things, this quality is absolutely worthless. If you want to take minimal magic at the start and be able to see the astral, take the Adept quality (for the same cost) instead and then you can actually grow your magic as the story progresses. Heck, with the other adept powers in the list you can become an even bigger perception monster.