Sensing Metamagic, Does this actually exist? Options

[Eyeless Blond]

I was cruising through NSRCG today thinking about stuff to do with my character's Karma, and I ran into the Sensing metamagic technique. I've never heard of this technique before, but just from the name it sounds kinda interesting, and right up this character's alley. Could I get some details, hopefully including the book it's from? Is it really any good at all, or am I better off taking Shielding or Divining?

[Kanada Ten]

Target: Awakened Lands, but you'll have to wait on full details from me. It's basically the adept power of Magic Sense on crack. Super crack.

[mfb]

it's only useful for detecting large-scale happenings on the astral plane, like astral shallows and mana storms and whatnot. you couldn't use it to detect a shaman's lodge, which the adept power would.

[Kanada Ten]

Really? When I was making my physmage for Dr.Funk's game he insisted it did everything the adept power did and more.

[mfb]

funk's funk is full of the funk. check the last paragraph on page 110 of T:AL; it specifically disallows such.

[Kanada Ten]

Like I wouldn't have posted it if I had it in front of me. What you slacking for?

[mfb]

i hear and obey: no wards, no spells, no foci, no spirts, no astrally projecting mages, no and so on--only changes within the mana field and astral terrain itself.

[Crusher Bob]

IIRc it will let you detect things like background counts, astral rifts, etc

Which is great for finding out things that cause background counts... Someone with a large background count in their basement might be worth looking in to...

[Kanada Ten]

[mfb]

hisss. you do not know the havoc Divination can wreak. of course, said power can only be unlocked by gaining several hard-to-gain Divination-based homebrew metamagics. but trust me, once you get those--or meet someone who has? you won't laugh at Divination anymore.

[Kanada Ten]

I have a game with a PC who has it. I love it, one of the best plot hook generators ever. The last question they asked was "Is there a malignant 'they' out to get us?" I laughed so hard I had to go pee.

[mfb]

haha, wow. "signs point to 'there is now'."

[Eyeless Blond]

The same could be said for Centering, only they're not homebrew.

Honestly, though, what I want is a metamagic that does something like the Otaku's Info Sortilege. None of this seeing the future mumbo-jumbo crap; none of this vague, "You will meet a kind stranger," junk; just useful info, tied to a Knowledge skill so it's not stupidly expensive to make it work decently.

[Kanada Ten]

Meh, that sounds more like an adept power. Or a spell.

[Eyeless Blond]

Eh, I guess I could just not bother with initiation other than the first for Masking, and spend the karma on more spells, though I can't think of what other spells to get. Eh, maybe I'll just cash it all in and buy more stuff for my deck (playing a decker/shamanist).

[Kanada Ten]

Shielding is very good.

[tisoz]

Invoking is damn near priceless for a shaman.

[DrJest]

[tisoz]

It's possible, no TN modifiers like in SR2. Just no astrally projecting while decking.

[hahnsoo]

[tisoz]

Whatever, there is no conjuring while in the matrix, maybe that's what I was thinking.

[Eyeless Blond]

I think you also suffer dumpshock when you project out while decking.

It is rather unfortunate that there is basically no synergy between a decker and a shamanist, save for the reliance on mental abilities rather than physical ones and a relative lack of Essence loss for the decker. I kinda wanted to stay away from summoning, otherwise Invoking would be a good choice. Shielding sounds interesting though, as does Divination though it's skill-dependent. Any other suggestions?

[Kanada Ten]

If you're into information gathering Psychometry is cool. It lets you read "past impressions" on items, place, ect. Sort of like that guy from that movie where he could touch stuff and know things about what happened to the stuff before... Vibes was the moive. Man that was driving me crazy.

Why you dissin' on conjuring though? Having a spirit guard your meat while decking sounds sweet. Great Forms are like a chrome nine in pocket the for a Shaman on the Projection. And plus, then you can have more than one spirit going at a time.

This post has been edited by Kanada Ten: Feb 3 2005, 05:13 AM

[tisoz]

Metamagic wise, I don't know about summoning having synergy with decking. But it is nice to be able to conjure a few spirits to guard your body, maybe conceal it, maybe confuse anyone that tries to disturb you or just attack them. Maybe something as simple as jacking you out when they see smoke coming out of your ears.

[Kanada Ten]