As I set out the scenario he's in a car, looking at the target through the one-way glass.

Yup, anyone in the car who can see him will know he's casting a spell. The gangers will simply know they are dead. He could just be invisible 20 meters away and any survivors wouldn't have any ability to notice the spell or the caster due to the need to make a threshold 2 test after beating the average 4 hits on the improved invis spell.

Better yet, the rules on noticing magic don't actually allow you to do anything about the spell, as it goes off in that IP. It just IDs the mage for the survivors, assuming he's so foolish as to allow anyone hostile to be able to see him.

RAW magic is really powerful in SR, and anyone who denies it is not just playing the game using the same rules as the rest of us.

Thank you, it feels good to finally realize that I'm not crazy, but my reality is in fact true.

With so many people telling me I am crazy to say magic is extremely powerful, I thought I actually might be. It's a relief to know I'm not the only one playing with the SR4 rules as is.



Imagine a gang war. Screw bombs, assassinations, etc. Just do a drive-by AoE overcast spell with a single magician, and the entire Mafia Family is dead.

Very powerful? Yes. More powerful than Mundane options? Not really.

Hmm..

Yes, it is really powerful. I don't think anyone is denying that. The discussion gets testier when someone argues that magic is overpowered, or unrestricted.

Magic is powerful, so is a guided missile. The latter is very noticeable. So should the former if it is cast at the Force suggested earlier. Why must the 'noticeability' be only visual? And even if it is only visual, why must the visibility draw the attention of only the pathetic gangers? Or be blocked entirely by the car? What about the astral plane? A Force 12 spell should light up the astral area like fireworks. And the signature would last for a long time, pointing straight to the magician. So now she has to also wipe it clear if she doesn't want the curious, the malicious or the officious to come looking for her.

Wouldnt that be houserules though? The rules state that you must notice the PERSON casting the spells via talking, visuals, etc. This still adds a ton of perception modifiers, not to mention the fact that he still already whiped the floor with the gangers, and so even if they do perceive (which by RAW they wont, especially if the windows are rolled up in the car [less noise])

According to RAW rules, magic has the stealth of a melee fighter, with the power of a huge, obvious, hard-to-get guided missile.

Not to mention that it takes what.......an INCREDIBLY hard time and TONS of money to get a guided missile? And it takes a mage what........FREE to cast?

Im still viciously against "The only counter to Magic- is Magic." This makes it overpowered. When something cannot be countered, except by itself, it's obviously far superior to everything else. Detectives would have to be Astral Detectives. Mundanes perceiving what is going on would have to be educated in Magic (which most arent) and if they ARE educated, who the @#$#@ would go randomly confront a mage that is THAT powerful? If they are educated, they're actually LESS likely to be suicidal.

Because it's a game, and that's what the rules say.

On the subject of 'drive by manaball' to kill a mob boss and his family... Any mob boss who doesn't have at least one mage dedicated to protecting him deserves to get killed, same as if he didn't have bodyguards and got shot up by a couple of hired guns.

When you're the boss, you pay to armor your limo against snipers, and you pay to have a mage keep magic from killing you.

My initial suggestion was not aimed at balancing spells vs. guns, but indirect vs. direct spells. Taking RAW, indirect spells have less damage potential (since the can be defended against with reaction and then soaked afterwards) but have higher drain values.

Therefore I suggested to have the same resulution logic (and drain) for indirect and direct spells.

--- The Pat

Where? The only thing I see is 'Noticing Magic' on SR4's page 164, and it says nothing about being only visual.

With a threshold of NEGATIVE six to notice, I doubt those "whispered" incantations are really whispered for a force 12 spell.

Though, if you're in a soundproof limo with a one way mirror, I could see it working just as well.

EDIT: Though, now that I think about it, since the threshold is nonexistant, wouldn't the check be made automatically? The only way I could see to have it be shielded would be to either do something that raised the threshold, or stack so many modifiers that the enemies' perception pools are nonexistant.

Tricky.

A F12 spell is about as noticable as the guided missile. There is just no stealth in that situation, youre pulling out all the stops and channelling enough mana to cause yourself greivous bodily harm.

...and flatten your magician with Physical, unhealable Drain.

Yes perception modifiers come into play, to counteract some or all of the -6 threshold to perceive the spellcasting. This is only one aspect of the casting of spells, though. Anything can look overpowered if you concentrate on only some of the conditions and consequences. The magician will be sucking huge Drain to swat flies. Are you casting in a populated area, say Seattle, where casting a spell above Force 3 (I think) is illegal without a permit? Force 12 will garner huge attention. And the astral signature would last 12 hours, pointing straight to her, unless the magician sticks around for 12 combat turns to erase the signature. Half a minute is a long time for hungry astral beings to come for a taste, and an alarmed neighbourhood to take down a licence plate and description.

Sure, the gangers are toast. So what? They are not the only denizens of the streets or astral space.



"The only counter to magic is magic" is as "the only counter to bullets is armour." Neither is true, though both are advisable. Even in that extremely restricted frame of reference, Why is it OK to say "They have guns and armour, so we have to have guns and armour", but not OK to say "They have a magician , so we have to have a magician"?

Six gangers would be taken down by a specialized street sam just as surely as by a specialized mage. The street sam would be way noisier (well, without a silencer), but the magician would hurt herself, and attract all kinds of attention from two planes of existence.

"The only counter to Magic is Magic, or heavy Visibility inhibitors, or Manatech, or a Steel Lynx spitting FA bursts of EX Explosive rounds from a HMG..."

If you have a Direct Combat bunny spouting out how awesome they are, just send a drone. The controlling Rigger will probably win on Initiative and even if they don't a Drone's Object Resistance makes it pretty tough to nuke with a DC spell.

anybody have a source for Manaspells being invisible? Or any combat spell for that matter?

It's pretty hard to spot the mage in a crowd Vs spotting the sammie with the rocket launcher. Unless you have astral perception, which tends to kind of require a mage. Can you show me where you get a drone with assensing? Otherwise all you know is that somewhere within LOS there is a mage casting direct combat spells at you. Like behind the 50 stories of mirrored glass on the other side of the plaza. The open window with the rocket launcher sticking out tends to be a bit more obvious.

For that matter it's kind of hard for the average drone to even notice a mage who doesn't want to be spotted even if it has LOS. Improved invis with 4 successes is 100% effective on drones, and concealment works just fine on drones too.

An ultrasound sensor will counter the Invisibility, it's not going to be perfect but it can work.

If anyone has time to set up any sort of attack in a building, well concealed, on the other side of a plaza it is going to be difficult to counter; whether it is Magic or not.