Jeremiah, I've certainly argued for 200 posts that it's not a disadvantage without at least Karma payoff, yes. As Draco18s says, there are many possible ways of replacing In Debt with a houserule version that is more balanced. Just a sampler: owe favors, much higher interest, much less BP bonus, much higher owed amount, static service charges, etc.

I like the sound of your example, Draco18s; the massive, low-interest debt means that it's actually *part* of the character for a while (as it should be).

Perceptive: 5BP for +1 Perception or 10BP for +2 Perception.

The problem with the positive quality, and most other skill based positive qualities, is that they end up with a narrow range of usefulness assuming they can be bought post character generation.

(BP): Since it's a static 4BP per rank of Perception, the quality isn't worthwhile until you have taken rank 6.
(Karma): At 10 Karma, the first rating of Perception matches the cost of Rank5 of perception and is cheaper than Rank 6.

Long story short, it's nice but not worth considering unless you already have at least Rank 4 in Perception.

Not "Endless" Toturi, it ends when you buy off the Negative Quality with Karma...

Then you and Toturi are doing it wrong...

If you play an astral-perceiving entity, or a matrix-savvy character or both, "Perceptive" is worth 1 rank in perception, assensing and computer (for matrix perception only)

When you deal with Organized Crime Syndicates (or Government Student Loans), you SHOULD be selling your soul...
As to the Karma Cost, it is a requirement to actually pay it off with Karma, otherwise he cannot remove it from the sheet, and it still causes issues....



So you see... Karma is required to pay off the Quality to remove it.

It all uses the same skill (perception) . Matrix and astral perception are specializations of the skill.

No. Just NO.

"Perception" as a Skill, is not a component of Matrix Perception... That is Computer + Analyze.

Which does nothing for assessing the cost benefit of Perceptive to only Assensing or Computer. Also, unlike Perception, Assensing and Computer have multiple usages aside from observation. If you are assensing an aura, you do not get the benefit of Perceptive. Likewise, there's plenty of software that uses the computer skill. Perceptive is still probably LESS cost effective than taking a rank in assensing and a rank in computer simply due to the wider utility of those skills since all it does is just increase the perceptive. You get, at best, three checks that that gain benefit. A single rank in Assensing gives at least 3 checks a bonus and probably more and a rank in computer gives well over 3 checks a single die. More likely you're going to gain benefit of it from Perception + Assensing or Perception + Computer which is still denying the utility of having the higher skill ranks for Computer or Assensing.

I do not know this Torturi you are refering to. I am only doing it RAW and if RAW is wrong, then so be it. And considering I am insane, wrong is all so right.

By RAW, it should not even be any favors in the first place.

By RAW they suffer the Negative Quality until it is removed form the Sheet. Therefore, the GM is well within his rights to make it a negative impact upon the character up until that point. It matters not which way the GM does this, in the end, as long as it still hinders the character in some way, shape, or form.

Not all blindness. Damaged eyes, without any injury to the optical nerve, would permit replacement as a viable reason to buy off the NQ. Also, sufficiently-severe cataracts ... which is the exact mechanism by which Ghouls go blind.






C: you're in bed with an organisation that issues loans more punitive than the law typically allows - quite likely, organised crime. As a client, not a "business partner". And with that comes a whole LOT of unwritten, unspoken, but very much real and significant baggage.






This is so so SO very wrong.

Astral Perception uses Assensing.

Matrix Perception, uses Computer.

Three skills. To buy all three up costs 12BP. Even though most people will only need two of those .... that's still 8BP as skills, versus 5BP as a PQ. A bargain, any way you look at it.

there's even weirder ways to abuse In Debt.

30 BP = 30K , you owe 45K which is 9 BP worth of Nuyen.... So you get 21 BP out of the transaction and start with no debt.

I didn't check the wording of the rules when I posted that... but theoretically you could have paid off the debt before your character started play. And netted 21 BP for other use. You only lost 3 BP worth of resources you could have bought out of the deal too, since you have 30k sitting around.

Honestly, the base debt should not be payable. It then turns into a 4500 nuyen per month cost forever (or until payed off with karma). Being able to pay down the principal of In Debt is the problem.

With the quality as written, yes. Hence my option to raise the principle amount massively and opt to have no karma cost to remove it. Owing "the bank" 200,000 in exchange for an extra 20,000 at chargen is certainly worth the 20 BP. It's something that lives with the character for a long, long time.

If you really want to cheese In Debt, and you aren't trying to go above 250,000Y, just take a somewhat useless neg quality like Prejudice (choose metahuman race; biased) and buy the nuyen with those BP at actual Nuyen value. In Debt is a terrible nuyen:BP ratio.

Only if you focus solely on the perception parts of those skills. Computer and assensing do have other, non-perception functions. Perceptive does not give you any bonuses to understanding auras, just to spotting things about the astral plane.

--



In Debt does not provide nuyen at a ratio of 1000:1 compared to the 5000:1 offered by regular BP conversion.

You get 30,000 nuyen for -30 BP compared to 30,000 for 6 BP.

Or to look at it another way. If you put all that BP into resources, In Debt is worth 180,000 or 6000:1 compared to the standard 5000:1.

Yes I know, that was my point.

So if you want to use in dept to get BP.
You will take the following. In dept for 30BP for 30k. This leaves you with an dept of 45k.
Now we will take a high lifestyle and but +12 (1.2k) into getting more starting money.
This gives us 8000 to 18000 nuyen. With this we pay back our dept. Reducing 30k down to 12k to 22k.
(And thats the nice way to calculate that. )

Ambidextrous seems like it would at least be useful within the limited context of ignoring the subject's armor, as per elemental strike: sound/smoke.

Home ground would be useful for a hacker who lives as though (whether he as the lifestyle or not) he is fully immersed.

Analytical mind is useful for any technomancer, as +2 software = +2 threading


I find the biggest negative from any SURGE character is the distinctive style negative quality that comes along with it. +3 to all dice rolls to physically locating, including perception tests.

But you *are* (possibly) using In Debt to go beyond the chargen cash limit, and/or get a bunch of NQ BP. You can't ignore those aspects; any quality can be 'not-abused', so that doesn't matter.

Perhaps stop discussing 'In Debt‘ in a thread about "positive qualities" finally after all those pages?

Oh wait, it's kinda positive indeed...

I see what you did there, Xenefungus.

The BP-nuyen exchange rate has no bearing after chargen. If it still applied I daresay one would be permitted to buy starting cash with BP. As it is I'd say in-game nuyen is worth more.

You do realize that 45,000 minus 8k to 18k is actually 27k-37k, right? And 10000 a month in addition to the percentage is not really worth it, and would screw you out of the monetary difference within 2 months. I don't see any GM allowing you to take this for starting change and then abandon it, that is fairly abusive.

On other qualities note, how often do you make characters that do not use all 35 points of available quality points for starting characters? How often do you use SURGE qualities? I feel like I am debating metagenic Improvement on every character. Finally, I also seem to always find myself staring at Type O system every time I make a street sam.

That's a moral question every person must answer for themself: 'how munchkin am I today?' SURGE/Metagenic Improvement *is* basically a no-brainer if you only care about the numbers.

Instead of spending BP and playing with the result try thinking up a character that is more than an archetype and then spend BPs accordingly.

I know that sounds facetious but I'm serious, give it a go and see if it works better for you. Maybe it will, maybe it won't.

It does sound. Here is the problem with that. Archetypes are archetypes because people categorize. It's the same reason aliens, magical beasts, and everything else thought up are usually modifications or combinations on something that exists, that people have seen. Street Sam. Combat Mage. Beasthandler. Smuggler. Go ganger. These classifications exist for a reason, and every character put together with some form of cohesiveness will resemble one.

When people talk about a shadowrun, certain skillsets are used. As a result, archetypes come in to play, because Players have seen such categories in books, cinema, and other games, because jobs with those subsets exist, and because certain skillsets lend themselves better to certain attributes. This is why it's very rare to see, for example, a hacker/street sam, the dice pools required for each do not overlap whatsoever.

However, since we are debating the uses and relative benefits of positive qualities, discussing such without naming where they would most be useful is pointless. Things must be in context, and context discussions require names, categories, and archetypes that people are familiar with.


Ahem. As for moral choices, I agree the players must take some responsibility for an actual character, but again, discussing the qualities themselves, they do represent some overpowered choices. Anything that is considered a "no brainer" in terms of taking it for a numbers based system means that the balance of such must be suspect. I've made characters both with and without, but the fact that it is tempting is also a sign of imbalance. Any good GM will draw a line as well on realism, even if it's not a solid one.

As a GM myself, I try to never replace or limit RAW rules without a lot of forethought, open discussions with the other GMs of our group, and usually the players as well. So, to limit things without denying a player the possibility, I will remind them of SURGE and it's ramifications. You may not be a freak with SURGE, but that doesn't mean everyone is comfortable with it. Actually, I think this last paragraph might deserve a side topic. Be right back.

No quality is a no-brainer. Only if you're playing a heavily numbers-oriented game. A quality should fit to the character concept. You should ask yourself "why IS this character biocompatible"? After all, I'd bet you, that most people who have this quality in the game world are either not heavily or not at all augmented.
Sure. If you're playing a mage, getting restricted gear and a rating 4 power focus at creation is a 'no-brainer' because it's less expensive than in the actual game. But that is only if you think in numbers instead of in-character. Nothing wrong with that, if your play stile swings this way, but from a role playing perspective I'd first ask myself "Where does this restricted gear come from?", then cook up a connection.
I'd even go further and first decide what the character can do and what he has, before I put numbers on it, but that's - again - personal preference.

If you ask yourself "Why do I need to play the most special Snowflake with the awesome best-buy qualities while taking 'Incompetent (Riding)'", you should also ask yourself "Is this my group's (or my) preferred play style?" first.

I don't want to sound patronizing, just some food for thought.

Quick question, what's the average pay per run? I don't know why, but I thought it was around 5k; at about one run a month. Just curious.

Also, I think the Ways qualities kind of suck. It's like the Archetype issue above. My courier gets shanked, cause he can only get certain skills at discount. But he also specializes in finding people (His day job is a federal process server); but anything that might help isn't as point valued to take. It's annoying.

Depends on the group, the job at hand, and other factors.

10BP, for a 25% discount on the kind of powers you were already inclined to take ... how could that possibly "suck" as a general rule? Sure, sure, some characters it's not a good fit for. But IMO, most characters who can afford to lock up 10 of their 35 points in PQs, should take a Way. They're just that good.


So your one singular concept is one of those less able to take advantage of a Way, and therefor, the Ways all suck, for everyone?

Yeah, um ...

Sorry, this is like a burr inside my sock, so I just can't leave it be ... [n]wee tiny nitpick:[/b] it's spelled "archetype", not "arctype".

Actually Perceptive is not that bad. A +1/+2 bonus to three skills for *ALL* uses of those skills/tests is pretty good. Assensing is for all purposes the astral replacement of perception (matrix perception the only one being a distinct action in it's own right).

Assensing tests (including aura reading and spell signatures) are nothing more than the active use of the assensing skill. (no different than someone declaring they're making an active perception check to attempt to notice anything). It is still a perception test. It is still handled as a perception test using assensing. So I disagree with the other gent that it's useless, he's imposing an artificial limit on what is a perception test and only allowing it for 'passive/reactive' type tests I feel. I can see the how he's trying to make them entirely different actions, just I strongly disagree with his artificial limit.

Note, the only 'action' defined for assensing is 'shift perception' in the magic section. After you've shifted perception you simply use assensing as if it were the perception skill. While assensing it is your perception skill, and it's used actively and passively in the same way.

The biggest problem with it is the opposed die pools vs. masking... masking it's your two dice pools vs their three two of which are uncapped! (assensing + intuition vs intuition + magic + initiate grade). So every and any source of dice is a huge help. Everything from observe in detail (aura reading)... to specialization (aura reading)... to perceptive makes a huge help.

How they suffer from that Negative Quality is stated within the description of that Quality. Therefore, if the GM is running it RAW, he should not have it make a negative impact anymore than what is stated within the Quality. By RAW, it does matter which way the GM does this as it can not and should not deviate from what the Quality has stated.

Here I think you've answered your own question. If you determine that you will build 'a street samurai' then you will find qualities that have a more positive impact on stats, dice pools and general effectiveness than other qualities. The combinatorics of having many dozens of qualities dictates they cannot be play-tested exhaustively. Also, it's kind of the point that picking a quality is better value than seeking equivalent utility through other means.

So it's no wonder if you're never building a sammy without Type O - that's one of the prime choices for optimal sammying. As you said, you don't feel inclined towards the hacking skill because that's not what sammying (I feel I should not like this ludicrous word as much as I do) is about so just as your skillset is largely predefined so is the kind of qualities that appeal and to expect otherwise is, IMO, somewhat flawed.

If it feels as though you don't have enough of a meaningful choice when it comes to PQs I'd say that it's because you already made the choice before opening the book. Again, this is no criticism of your chosen approach to the game, just a theory in response to your quandary.

I always get full 70 Karma from negative qualities, as already mentioned there are so many of them that are "worth" taking.
I most of the time but not always spend the full 70 Karma for positive qualities. So they kinda balance each other out.

I use Surge very often. Just something unobtrusive like Metagenetic Improvement (Agility) is totally worth it. Basically you get +1 to your most used Attribute for a flat out 20 Karma for Surge II plus some irrelevant negative qualities like Impaired (Logic) or the like. And nobody even notices you are a "freak" to start with.

I also use a Mentor Spirit / Paragon whenever I build a Magician / Technomancer, no exceptions.


What's your interpretation of Type O, Krishach? Do you apply the discount only for basic bioware (so no Synaptic Boosters) or to all bioware? There have been countless threads about this, so I don't want to start the discussion again here, just want to know where you are coming from. Because i don't view Type O as a no-brainer (while those do exist of course!) for a street sam, especially for the (high) cost. The only time I used it was for a pure Bio-Ninja type of char, that didn't use any cyberware at all. And even that was only to ensure long-term growth.

I guess this is kind of not the point? Of course it's 'worth it' from a numbers perspective, and mwa-ha-ha, the drawbacks are 'irrevelant'! … Is that good? :/

The point I wad trying to make with my example (which I failed to do well), is that the Ways don't really work well unless you play an archetypal adept. If you play some sort ot hyhrid or unique adept, you are impedsd at the very least. I didn't mean to imply that the Ways qualities were useless, no PQ is truly useless; just that the Ways are a poor patch on the adept/cyber divide.

Someone mentioned doing away with the picking powers to discount, which I like.

Nope, but it's Shadowrun. Sadly, the SR rules have a LOT of flaws.

I mean, they could have changed it by classifying the very obvious qualities as "flashy" and requiring you to take at least some of those if you are a surgeling. But they didn't. So it's basically just cheap stat boosts and flaws that are beneficial instead (Astral Hazing).

Astral Hazing isn't actually as beneficial as you think.

Unless your GM also stays on this "RAW is LAW" you use to get it. If he does, you get destinctive style.

I just would not let the character pay more than the Vig until he spent Karma to reduce the amount owed. Each 2 karma (Allowable once per Month of game time) would reduce the Principle by 1000 Nuyen, at which point, for that Month the character could add the 1000 Nuyen to bring that principle down, along with the Monthly Vig. Eventually, the Negative Quality will go away. It will take a number of Months equal to the Original BP gain as a Minimum toremove teh Quality, at that point (Assuming the Player chooses to pay it down with Karma). Simple and easy. And makes the Quality a nuissance for a potentially very long time, as it should be.

Doing it this way enforces both payment systems. You MUST pay the Money and the Karma to eliminate the Debt. *Shrug*

This.... This cannot be said enough...

You don't have to play an archetypal adept to profit from a Way. I have two characters that show this.

One is Maus, a Dwarf go-ganger Mystic Adept. He has the Magician's Way, with the discounted powers of the Speaker's Way. So when he initiates, he'll get a small boost to Centering, and right up front his Kinesics (2) has been discounted from 1.00 PP to 0.75 PP. His spells are nearly all "flashy combat magic", whereas his Adept abilities are mostly "Face". Hardly an archetypal adept.

The other is a Hacker-adept, with the Artisan's way. Improved Ability: Hacking (3), cost him only 0.56 PP. So, his Hacking (Exploit +2) is rated 6(9). He gets 17 dice to hack on the fly. And "Hacker Adept" was never an archetype for Adepts I ever heard of before.

Brilliant ..... *YOINK!!*

Thank you, and Enjoy...

Actually, Hacker Adepts became common quite early in SR4 history. Just made so much sense with only the BBB available back then.

This post is in reference to...?

(Read: I have no idea what you're replying to, as it isn't the post above yours, try quoting next time).

That was in response to me, Draco.

I mentioned that Hacker-Adepts aren't archetypal ... and he apparently has conflated "popular" with "archetypal". Mistakenly so, IMO, but it's really not something I need to argue about, so ... *shrug*