 Adept Powers of SOTA 2064, Way to go, authors, you pooched mundanes |
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 Feb 11 2005, 12:57 AM
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#451
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Manus Celer Dei  Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,013 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802  |
I like the idea, but we still get back to the fact that the way to talk someone like this out of their duty would be to convince them that the rules are what you say they are rather than what they say they are.
~J |
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Feb 11 2005, 05:08 AM
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#452
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,129 Joined: 11-June 03 From: Tir Tairngire Member No.: 4,712 |
Exactly. One of the first things that I agree with you on.
Who said 34 karma is the practical limit of character advancement? We had a discussion about the amount of total GK that players possessed on average, not so long ago and I don't think I saw anyone with under 50. Now, having 20 people with over 300 is a bit over the top, regardless if that's normal or slightly above average for your other veteran players (PnP players, that is... 4-5 players in group). Just out of curiousity, when you have these monster groups of shadowrunners running around, do they all do their runs en masse? I'm having a hard time visualizing 20 shadowrunners trying to stealth into a building.
Hey, good for you. That's what we all do. It, along with your other "Look at the List of Things I Hate About Shadowrun" list, just seemed strange coming from such a "veteran" GM.
So, why aren't you running a SR1 (or 2nd edition, even) game? |
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Feb 11 2005, 01:22 PM
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#453
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Target Group: Members Posts: 7 Joined: 9-February 05 From: Kansas City, MO Member No.: 7,072 |
That guy. :) I must've missed the discussions on average karma level, myself. Meaningless statistics time! We have roughly 170 PCs approved and active on SR: Denver. 48 samurai, 21 Adepts, 30 Mages/Shamans, and 71 of other assorted archtypes, including the token Ganger. We average around 25 players online, with evening peaks well into the upper 30's, mid 40's. The 'low time' is between 5 and 8 AM CST, with about 11 people online then. The average karma of a player is 82.89 karma. Median is 27.271. We have 27 players with over 300 karma. The highest karma player on the game has 645 points of karma, and has been playing more or less continuously since the game opened about four years ago, roughly earning 0.44 karma per day. Mentioned partly out of love of statistical analysis, and partly because it leads into the next question:
There are very few events that involve the entire online playerbase at once, and most of those are social events. Our actual Shadowruns are usually composed of 3-5 players, one acting as a GM, either with or without his own character participating. Unlike many other MUSHs, we let our Players act as GMs for plots, and not just the Admins of the game. What this means, effectively, is that the MUSH is comprised of many different tabletop games that all sort of exist in the same world. The admins are more there to help coordinate between them and keep a rough sense of order and cohesive theme about the place. :) One of the biggest problems with trying to run a Shadowrun with someone who has over 300 karma is challenging them - without outright killing them. :) Most anybody can be taken down by an adept sniper with a rifle loaded with APDS - but that's not very fun. My solution is, I tend to make the plots less about 'can you get past the door/security/guard/black ops squad' and more about questions into morality, making choices between two evils, solving mysteries, and so forth. And, lastly...
Because I'm not running the game for myself - I'm running it for 170 other people. :) There's a lot of factors - 2nd edition books get harder and harder to find, people want the new toys to play with, but overall, the main reason is just to keep everyone on the same page. Whether I like it or not, the game is in 3rd edition. If people go out and buy a copy of the book from the local gaming store because of our game, they're going to be buying the 3rd edition printing. Same with the supplements - there's a certain assumption that they'll be able to use those on our games. With the last few books, though, YotC, SSG, and now SOTA: 2064, it's seemed more like doing triage and damage control than including source material. We have serious concerns about game balance and playability if we included these books word for word. |
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Feb 11 2005, 01:37 PM
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#454
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Mr. Quote-function Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 1,317 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Somewhere in Germany Member No.: 1,376 |
There's one things that bothers me with that "possibility" (by your choice of words I see that you don't know it exactly either): The M&M Errata also includes the previously missing suggestion not to allow cultured bioware for beginners (I'm still wondering why they didn't have the guts to outright forbid it like with beta grade cyberware). So the "beginning character" argument is somewhat weak to me.
While I consider it even more unbalancing despite those prerequisites. The ME2 and ME3 pre Errata where accessible for any character. Now it's only one character type that can get this off-game bonus. Note: I'm still only arguing the off-game part "karmic reduction". Be honest: Cognition itself would still be a great metamagic and fulfill the concept "awakened characters are special", even if it had a restriction that said. "The maximum karmic reduction in conjunction with a Mnemonic Enhancer is still 1 Karma per skill level"!?
This argument kind of fails to see my argument again: I didn't critizise the ME-analog effect. I critizised the compatibility of both effects ;)
The direct comparison lies with the pure off-game effect. The M&M errata suggested the limitation of access to cultured bioware in general. It would even have been possible to make an Errata on ME that restricted it to ingame aquisition. Yet it was decided to completely remove the karmic reduction greater than 1 per skill level. And now it's brought back, for one single type of character. And that (and only that) is, where my beefs with Cognition lie. I previously mentioned I have similar beefs with other SotA'64 Powers. It's generally not the Power itself or better its idea. It's just certain points that I don't like. Take Iron Guts: More powerful per Level as its implant counterparts -2 on Power, while implants that do similar things only provide -1, level restriction only Adepts magic rating while the implants can only go natural Bod/2 where you'd need a natural Bod aatribute of 12 to achieve the same level *Thus mainly "Trolls only". This power would still be powerful enough if it came only with a -1 per level. Pretty much the same with Iron Lung. The TN reduction is limited only by magic rating. A fixed TN reduction however, would have served the purpose more than enough.
And I'm still the person who find's the idea of the "Lost Adept" rule rather stupid ;) |
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Feb 11 2005, 01:45 PM
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#455
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Not Cameron Diaz Group: Retired Admins Posts: 472 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Newark, Delaware Member No.: 188 |
Holy out-of-context, Batman. mfb didn't say "practical limit." He was talking about how three grades of initiation are the average upper limit, character advancement-wise, in most games... at least, most games that he's been in. (Myself as well, but that's beside the point. I'm sure there's others whose games average at higher upper limits.) He happened to include the karma cost for those initiations as a demonstration of what it would take to get a certain power. It didn't include karma costs for skills or attribute boosts one might tack on along the way, which I'm sure is part of these 300-karma totals you're talking about in your games. |
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Feb 11 2005, 02:08 PM
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#456
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 100 Joined: 14-June 04 Member No.: 6,400 |
The trick to shadowrun is that it isn't an MMORPG. Balancing is in the hands of the GM, not the writers.
If you don't like something... remove it. If you don't like the idea of removing something from canon for your game... make it really really rare. That is what I do with most things. While one player may have access to it for a character, it is still rare in the game world. How many social adept fixers are there on the planet? Maybe 200... MAYBE. And why on gods earth would they ALL be fixers when most of them could work for corps and make WAY more money? |
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Feb 11 2005, 02:57 PM
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#457
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 138 Joined: 24-September 04 Member No.: 6,700 |
too true.. and I can find more than a few non sr professions they would excel at.. salesmen, lawyers, actors, tele-evangelists, etc etc.. no good reason they would even want to be runners or fixers. they have the skills to be HIGHLY rewarded in the corp world.. without having anyone gunning after them.
DS |
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Feb 11 2005, 05:51 PM
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#458
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 226 Joined: 4-June 03 Member No.: 4,685 |
Yes, following this thread I agree that core of the problem is:
1. Adepts get cyberware/bioware AND their powers to stack in few fields. If they would have to choose powerpoint/cyber, it would be really balanced. Choosing easier TN or additional dice is fun. 2. There is not much after Man and machine about cyber/bioware (not that I know of), so technology is a little behind curve :) P.S. On Amazon State of the art 2064 is called (Battletech) serie. I already pointed thatout, so probably it will be fixed soon. If not, maybe people of power should mail about it. |
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Feb 11 2005, 05:57 PM
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#459
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Manus Celer Dei Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,013 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802 |
This one's not Craig's fault. I read mfb's quoted text the day it was posted, and only just now rereading it in Craig's quote did I realize that he meant initiation and not karma. Holy vagueness, Batman. ~J |
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Feb 11 2005, 06:04 PM
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#460
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Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670 |
yeah, i meant that 3 grades seems to be the upper limit of initiation for most games. that's based on my memories of a thread from a while back; take it with a grain of salt, as my memory isn't wholly dependable. 50-60 karma, as i recall, was the upper limit on karma advancement for most games.
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Feb 11 2005, 06:15 PM
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#461
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Manus Celer Dei Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,013 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802 |
I believe it was three. As for karma, if I remember correctly there were essentially three clusters: under 15, 60 or so, and 200+.
~J |
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Feb 11 2005, 07:55 PM
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#462
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,133 Joined: 3-October 04 Member No.: 6,722 |
Mmrr... Obviously I wasn't trying hard enough to twist the rules then, because I - and both my gaming groups - were sufficiently underwhelmed by the SR2 physads that we reduced the cost of many powers to make them more attractive; until we did, only seriously hardcore roleplayer types would even consider making one, and that's not to say everyone else was a munchkin by any stretch of the imagination. Just the old Increased Reflexes power alone - same cost as the SR3 one but without any reaction increase, initiative dice only - was clearly broken in comparison to the equivalent cybernetic options. I'm curious - would you be prepared to post what you consider a non-wuss SR2 physad? In fairness, I will warn you in advance that it's likely to engender a lot of debate and picking apart of the character. |
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Feb 11 2005, 09:54 PM
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#463
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,314 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Lisbon, Cidade do Pecado Member No.: 185 |
Regarding the choices behind the ME Errata I can only offer my "suggestion" because I was not privy to the reasoning behind it. I can however attest that what I've posted was at least partially the reasoning since it came up during the development of Cognition.
I've read the discussions on the German Forums. It strikes me most people have missed the point. Ways were always meant to be integral to adept character concepts since as far back as the Grimoires and Awakenings and all adepts were meant to have a Way. As described from that point forward, particularly after Awakenings), Ways provided a guideline not only on character outlook, but the manner in which he expressed and developed powers (as opposed to the random collection of useful powers method of character creation). However, since there was never any game mechanic attached to this, the vast majority of players/GMs disregarded Ways as simply fluff, even though their importance was once again underlined in MiTS. As such it was decided to address this "problem" in several ways in SOTA64: The first was to use the "testemonies" to show how Ways actually apply to everyday characters in the shadows and the Sixth World, grounding the stuff you'd read about in the rules (ie.Grimoire2, Awakenings, MitS) before but never seen in a game world context (outside the novels). Another approach was to use the fiction in SOTA64-which IMHO has got less attention than it deserves, both in the Adept chapter and elsewhere— to underline how powers develop within the frameworks of Ways and how flexible these can actually be This was meant to show that Ways are not necessarily the straight-jackets they might appear to be at first sight (ie. Howler's Killing Hands manifest as Wolf's claws, while an artist like Handiwork developed it to sculpt wood). Finally, the "Lost Adept" optional rule was introduced for the benefit of gamemasters who want to underline the role (and limits) of Ways in Adepthood and also to combat the missmatched "whatever looks useful" method of power selection. The main problem I've seen with the rule seems to arise from the fact that some people have misunderstood that while each Way is ultimately individual, it reflects a core personal ideal which almost never changes and isn't particularly flexible. It should not adjust for convenience or even need. Like a magician's tradition, Ways are (mostly) for life. What a player describes as his character's Way at his character creation is as "permanent" as a magician's choice of tradition. Since "Magic in the Sixth World works best—and is less dangerous and random—when given a particular focus" and since powers develop naturally or through training in the pursuit of the character's Way/ideal, it should be harder for someone to acquire/develop powers if he doesn't have a Way/ideal to pursue, or if they do not fit into the Way he chose to pursue. The optional "Lost Adept" rule is simply meant to reflect this reality. |
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Feb 11 2005, 10:46 PM
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#464
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 158 Joined: 19-March 03 From: Central IL Member No.: 4,278 |
One thing that I was wondering is hwo everyone else is handling all the new adept goodies? Did face/adepts just pop up overnight in your games, were they there all along but no one knew, or how else did you handle it?
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Feb 11 2005, 10:49 PM
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#465
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 527 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 1,118 |
What you might endeavor to do, then, in the next edition of Shadowrun, is to categorize adept powers from the beginning such that they are Way-aspected, and cost 25% less for members of one way, or 25% more for members of another. Of course, you'll have to really be careful to make them balanced, such a system could easily end up making it so that players pick Ways to get the 25% reduction in the most expensive or useful powers.
Just an example, I'd probably make Killing Hands aspected to the Invisible and Warrior Ways, Kinesics aspected to the Way of the Speaker, and certain powers, such as Improved Reflexes and Astral Perception, unaspected(because we don't want one or more Ways to get Improved Reflexes more easily than others, or penalize all ways but Spirit Way if they want Astral Perception). Another idea might be providing specific lists, based on Way, of what powers cost more and less. Possibly provide a magical edge that allows one to follow a single additional Way, or add another power to the list of powers that are less expensive for your unique flavor of a Way. |
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Feb 11 2005, 10:58 PM
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#466
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Manus Celer Dei Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,013 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802 |
I think codifying the Ways is an extremely bad idea. Unless you can put them into categories the way spells are (and even some of those are iffy; why does a combat-centered totem usually not grant bonuses to Fireball?), you'll just end up conflicting with character visions. For instance, what of the Spirit Way Adept who focuses his chi into deadly blows with Killing Hands? Or the Artist's Way Adept whose mastery of the "intense focus [her] art gives [her]", allowing her to resculpt the organs of opponents into unpleasant but aesthetically pleasing arrangements through careful blows? Or what about the godawful mess that trying to ascribe what powers the Totem Way should gain? You'd have to go through totem by totem or have Dragonslayer totem-followers take a bath on Killing Hands or something.
Incidentally, this is why I'm against more rules for Ways in general, unless the list is going to be expanded to resemble the full list of Totems (which is still too short). ~J |
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Feb 11 2005, 11:27 PM
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#467
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Neophyte Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,078 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 67 |
The totem list is too short? I actually think it's way too long, and mostly poorly thought-out and weakly supported. Full of totems that are incorrectly portrayed, not appropriately associated to a real mythology, or just plain unnecessary (yeah, the Prairie Dog was always an important mythological archetype...wtf). It should cut the garbage totems out and increase the breadth and depth of totem descriptions, with bonuses and penalties that more solidly back a style of play, rather than severely codified "quirks." And, for chrissakes, they shouldn't be neglected in terms of regional specificity. Right now, thanks to SOTA64, Hermetic schools have more regional specificity and appropriate depth than shamanic totems do. Which is kinda sad (not that the material in SOTA64 isn't good, it's awesome). As for the problems with codifying the Ways, what Wireknight suggested as the first possibility doesn't exclude any member of any particular Way from getting any power at all. It just might cost a bit extra. So the Spirit Way adept could still get Killing Blows, if it were central to the character concept. |
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Feb 11 2005, 11:34 PM
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#468
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,314 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Lisbon, Cidade do Pecado Member No.: 185 |
I fully agree with Kage on this one.
Even amongst adepts grouped in the same Way there are different and unique approaches (one of the reasons I included the Athlete's Way twins in the fiction). Ways are meant to be individual and defined by the character (after which they're stuck with what they chose though). Just as personal approaches to Ways are myriad, there aren't really right or wrong powers for any particular Way—and IMHO they shouldn't be codified as such. As long as a player can reasonably explain/justify the expression of any given power within the Way/ideal he described when he created the character he should be free to take it (heck, even if it doesn't make sense he should still be able to take it with a slightly higher cost)... which is as it should be since ultimately its up to the GM to evaluate and decide if the argument makes sense for that particular game. |
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Feb 11 2005, 11:36 PM
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#469
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Canon Companion Group: Members Posts: 8,021 Joined: 2-March 03 From: The Morgue, Singapore LTG Member No.: 4,187 |
The problem is this: How is a power central to a concept? I understand if you are trying to "limit" the proliferation of certain powers, but consider for example the Way of the Warrior. The player could well argue and I would agree that to be a true Warrior, he must be capable in all aspects of war, including psychological (Kinesics) and military (Combat Sense). Hell, he could very well argue that he should get IA: B/R simply because he wanted money (Economic warfare).
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Feb 11 2005, 11:41 PM
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#470
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 527 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 1,118 |
I think regionality should play a large part in the totem types, enough so that totems should be listed by region. Just looking over Target: Awakened Lands, the "minor adjustments" you have to make to almost every single totem for its Australia-specific manifestations, make me think that it would be cleaner and more concise to just localize/culturalize totems and allow people to choose which particular cultural/geographic flavor of the totem most suits their character.
The thing is, focusing chi into deadly blows is a matter of spirituality, certainly, but the whole "deadly blows" thing makes me think that this would be more of a spiritual (Eastern martial arts ascetic, specifically) manifestation of the warrior way. Not every warrior way adept is a former UCAS Seal who's got Improved Ability(Submachine Guns).
I was actually more thinking along the lines of an artist adept who used Smashing Blow and Improved Unarmed to chisel sculptures when I considered this, and it's the sort of reason why you'd be able to improve your list with edges. You'd pay more points, but you're also so far from the baseline that it should take a bit more push to follow your way. The additional effort, of course, is what makes it worthwhile. But, in this case, I'd think an "artist adept" whose art is deeply rooted in causing people grievous physical harm while still alive is archetypically a follower of the twisted way. |
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Feb 11 2005, 11:46 PM
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#471
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,314 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Lisbon, Cidade do Pecado Member No.: 185 |
If you're the kind of GM who thinks "Way of the Warrior" is descriptor enough, then what you're saying makes sense. However, a player telling me he's designing a Way of the Warrior adept with a berserker in mind or even with a background as a pitfighter, is never going to get me to approve IA: B/R Anything . On the other hand a Way of the Warrior Sioux WildCat in my game could believably have acquired that power. It all boils down to trusting your players to make a three-dimensional character with a minimal background, and calling them on it when they're don't. Since the writers can't set your standards for you, we prefered to leave the judgement call to each individual group. Personally, I've found that requiring a 10 word summary of the character conception of his Way is often more than enough even for the most reluctant munchy. Mileage will, of course, vary.
That would be my evaluation also. The Artist's Way is defined by following one's creative impulse, rather than the destructive one. If you start getting them muddled then you're probably on the Twisted Way (which is one of the few exceptions to the Ways being permanent thing I said above) |
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Feb 11 2005, 11:49 PM
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#472
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Canon Companion Group: Members Posts: 8,021 Joined: 2-March 03 From: The Morgue, Singapore LTG Member No.: 4,187 |
I had a player with a Way of the Warrior PC who gave me Richard Marcinko's Ten Commandments of Spec War with the last Commandment underlined.
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Feb 11 2005, 11:56 PM
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#473
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Manus Celer Dei Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 17,013 Joined: 30-December 02 From: Boston Member No.: 3,802 |
I love it that he gave a license to disregard the first nine.
~J |
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Feb 12 2005, 12:09 AM
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#474
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Decker on the Threshold Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 2,922 Joined: 14-March 04 Member No.: 6,156 |
Maybe a better way (no pun intended) would be to have adept players provide a short paragraph describing their character's Way. Then, using this, take a look at the adept's chosen powers, which have a "base" cost as per the book, but impose a 25-50% increase on powers that are clearly not part of a particular adept's Way. For example, say a particular adept in of the Invisible Way, and his writeup includes references to being like a jungle cat, agile, silent, and deadly. In that case, Killing Hands, Increased Reflexes, or Improved Athletics/Stealth would be totally appropriate, and cost no more than the base price. Improved Social skills may have a +25% cost modifier because it's not really part of being like a cat, but it's not really opposed to it either. Smashing Blow, however, would be right out, imposing a +50% cost modifier. ...or is this how Ways work in the (new) book? I haven't actually read it myself. :) |
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Feb 12 2005, 12:11 AM
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#475
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Uncle Fisty Group: Admin Posts: 13,891 Joined: 3-January 05 From: Next To Her Member No.: 6,928 |
Can't believe I'm posting on pg 19!
I actually like the different path ways for adepts. like the artist in "terminus experiment", just because someone is magically active, does not in any way mean that they're able to handle themselves in combat, or be of any use what so ever on a shadowrun. With adepts, their magic just goes into what they're putting their energy into. All magic in shadowrun seems to go off of the "practitioners' belief system. The power of it is usually reflected by their will. or in other words, what they put the most time or effort into. If that means being a smooth talker, good for him. I don't particularly like Kinesics, because (as was pointed out earlier), it gives them minuses to the target number, which no one else has any way to compare with. I just don't use that one in my game. but I think that limiting the adepts abilities should be done by their belief system, or path or whatever. They should pretty much be able to take any power as long as it makes sense with the character concept/belief/path/whatever in a believable way. If it has to be justified, it probably doesn't fit. but if it can be explained, then it works. I usually have anyone playing a magical character write up a character thesis after one or two grades of initiation (OOG if they haven't done the ordeal yet) just to make sure they follow what they're saying their precepts/beliefs are. The character can still grow and branch off a bit, but there has to be a believable reason. |
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