So there are various targets as a mage that you can aim for in initiation. You can be stealthy, you can be harder to nail with spells, you can draw power off of background count. Now with trying to hold back on constant initiation (lets say 5+) what do you think constitutes the best types of builds.

For the stealth mage I would say the must buys are flexible sig., Masking, Extended Masking, and Cleansing.

For a ritual head exploding mage or a summoning mage I would say Centering and Filtering does nicely, or Centering and Geomancy. Great Ritual is nice if you have a group of ritual spell casters. Sympathetic link is also nice.

Defensive mage is of course shielding, reflecting, and absorption.

For the mage that is about to be totally boned you take masking, and flux. Flux is actually not a bad spell if you decide that you need to change your astral identity and have spirits of man sustaining your buffs instead of spell foci.

The stealth selection is very good for the simple reason that runners are criminals and leaving behind as little evidence as possible is of paramount importance.

Ritual spellcasting is great but not for wetwork (unless you have an initiation grade high enough to completely cover an high force spell with Flexible Signature).

Absorbtion is highly exploitable: summon force 3 spirit of the man and give it a heal spell, have it to cast on you force 6 heal sell(1 drain enough dices to buy an automatic hit), counterspell and absorb it, use aborbed energy to resist drain from serious mojo; it works realy well at high initiate grade in conjunction with Centering and foci.

Flux affectes all the astral links not only the foci ones.

Generally the most painful thing about using flux is losing foci, more then the spirits.

I've usually played combat mages with a lot of stealth and general utility, when I've played.

If I play again soon, I'd go a houngan summoning combat wombat most likely. Specialise in Summoning and conjure up big bad beasties with Regeneration and wade into combat. Or get it to possess the team street sam.

- J.

I tend to think that masking is almost always the first metamagic any shadowrunning mage should take. It's just all around useful, especially for someone whose lifestyle involves hiding from the Man (or Men, as the case may be in a world ruled by multiple megacorporations).
Flexible sig is a stable second choice for the same reason.
I personally think highly of shielding for most of my mages, as well, although you can usually postpone it until your fourth or even fifth initiation, as the bonus isn't too hot beforehand.

Sorry chummer but Voodoo tradition can summon Guardian, Guidance, Man, Task and Water spirits, and regeneration power is exclusive of greater forms of Plant spirit; the only possession tradition in Street Magic able to summon a plant spirit is the Hedge Witchcraft (than you have to explain how a man, being hougans men and mambos women, was reveled secrets usualy reserved to women), but lacks badasses like Guardian (warior spirit grantes combat skills), Guidance (its great form is the only one that has Astral Gateway power), Man (innate spell) and Task (technical and artisan skills on demand), and requires the Invoking metamagic (thing that all the dedicated summoners should have).