I am a big fan of rules being the same for NPCs as well as PCs, something caught my eye that I had not thought of previously.

In the preview for Runners Companion...


Now this made me realise that it does not work.

The Shapechange spell has some restrictions.

1. you can only change into a critter
2. you can only turn into a critter with a Body mare than 2 point away from your own body.

So it is actually impossible for a Dragon to use the Shapechange spell to masquerade as a metahuman.
Even if you are a Dragon with a Leviathan of the lowest Body 9, you are unable to shapechange into any critter with a Body below 7. (and you are a Western Dragon the spell is almost worthless).

This is certainly a reasonable restriction of a spell. We certainly do not want the weakling awakened guy with all his points maxing out their mental attributes using shapechange as a super increase attribute with disguise.

I have a couple of ideas for spells to work around this, but I want to write them up properly.

Anyone else thought of this?

Dragons have access to better spells. The text was copy/pasted from an older edition, hence the seeming incongruity.

Actually, there's a hint to another possible solution in the upcoming Runner's Companion.

That preview as far as I know was an "Aprils Fool" joke. However, being a dracoform, humans might go through as critters. Also you could still write your own spell, as the "Street Magic" allows you to. With those rules the spell you are looking for is perfectly possible.

Also don't let the rules eat your brains... else we will need a new type of infected.... the rrrrrrule-ghooooul

Better Spells: the response I was expecting , which is why I would just create a spell if there was no rules that I was not privy to.

The text are pasted in was from the preview for the Runners Companion... are you meaning that parts of the Runners Companion are just revised material?
The restrictions were from my copy of SR4 (first print) but I have seen nothing in the errata.



No worries.
I do not have any players suicidal enough to ask whether I will let them play a artillery-magnet like a dragon.

But certainly interested if anyone has any other ideas...

It was actually only triggered by the preview. It is just as legitimate an issue with just the core book.

I am not the sort of person to get too wrapped up with the rules though for my personal games, it is more intellectual curiosity. I just prefer clear rules that work within an established framework to minimise complexity (and thus confusion).

Well, like I had it in my first post in this thread, the rules for creating spells will solve the "problem". Clear and simple. I would rather be irritated if spells for Dracoforms would be a topic in the grimoire of the core rules.

Yeah, sorry if you got the idea that I blew you off, but I already mentioned in my original post that I could just make a spell for it. Thus you repeating my solution in my first post did not seem to contribute.

Bah, it doubleposted...