So I've got an Adept with less than 1 point of Essence loss due to Bioware (i.e. he's got 5.5 essence, so his Magic was reduced to 4 from 5).

Some people in my gaming group are telling me that when he initiates, he'll automatically get back a point of Magic. I can't find anything that supports this. Can someone confirm or deny this for me, and give me a book reference to support? Thanks!




<edited due to NathanRoss's comment. Thanks Nathan!>

Okay, now I am assuming this is SR4 right? Magic and Initiation are seperate, and right now you are a burnout, and have lost all your magic ability. Period.

Initiation just makes it possible for you to increase your Magic past Essence - Ware (round down). However, you waited too long, and have permanently given up the ability to use magic.

d'oh - I mean he's LOST less than 1 point of Essence.


My bad.

He started with 5 Magic and is now at 4 due to Essence loss.

And yes, SR4.

Then the maximum magic attribute is increased by one. He still has to buy the magic point separately. The automatic point is SR2 and SR3.

A quick example might help:

Bob the Dinosaur shaman has Magic 3. He initiates and is now a Grade 1 initiate. He gets a metamagic technique to go with his nifty new understanding of the cosmos. He opts for Centering so he can learn to cast while the teenagers beat the crap out of him in his purple costume. His magic is still a 3.

He can initiate two more times (bringing his initiate Grade to 3) before he hits the soft limit of current magic. He will need to raise his magic from 3 to 4 before gaining a new initiate Grade. Alternatively, he could up his magic each time he initiates. However, they are separate items in SR4.

Essence loss not only reduces your current Magic, it reduces your natural maximum magic. Thus, if you have -1 magic from essence loss, you have a maximum magic of 5. Initiation is the only way to raise natural magic max. Each initiation raises it by 1. But you still need to buy the point of magic to raise it from its current value up to, at most, the natural maxiumum. It's all on p.164, magic, and 189, initiation. See especially "she will still have to pay normally to increase her magic attribute." Doesn't get much clearer than that.

OK, that's what I was thinking based on what I'd read - but I wanted to stick that out there and see if anyone argued for the opposite. Thanks guys!

HAHAHAHA, and here I thought you just totally blew it. Anyways, yeah, the easy way to calculate you Maximum magic (not what you have, necessarily) is:

Essence - Essence cost of Cyberware/Bioware/Genetech/Nanotech + Initiation Grade (round down)

Also your current Magic is:

Magic Bought at Chargen - Essence cost of Cyberware/Bioware/Genetech/Nanotech + Magic Increase after char gen (round down)

So now that your magic is 4, you can increase it back to 5 since your max magic is now 5 (6 - 1 + 0). In fact increasing it now that you have lost a point of essence is cheaper by 3 karma, since you only have to pay 15 to raise it to 5, where you would have to pay 18 to raise it to 6. Also after you have raised it to 5, to raise it any further, you will have to Initiate.