What can I say, the bitch didn't bring me my coffee.

I'm sure that some, such as myself, are happy with that one. Considering how poorly many people are reacting to the changes, why would you wish even more on the game, especially one that shifts the baselines of every being in the game?

I actually like the change to direct damage spells. But, if the reason it was done was to solve overcasting it was poorly implemented. Does this stop overcasting in any way, not really was overcasting only a issue with direct combat spells nope.

Now if the reason for change was they wanted to balance them a bit more with indirect spells and add some interesting flavor. Well then, it's a total success in my book.

Why do people keep saying this? You can heal both stun and physical damage with first aid. (first sentence, Using First Aid, p242, SR4)

I thought that drain damage (of either type) could not be healed with magical healing, but I can't find a rule, so that must be a house rule.

Not only is overcasting not affected by this, as long as you overcast, you avoid this nerf bat quite easily.

The more I think about this, I think I don't like this combat spell change, because I'm being punished for success (kinda).

We have a winner.



Then it just comes down to Physical heals as easy as stun so why not get twice the force for the same price? (price being a few minute pit stop.)

Well damn, you are right. Bad memory I guess.

Okay, so kinesics is capped at 3. Have any of the other powers, such as combat sense, mystic armor, or critical strike been capped? I ask because first they said they were going to cap power throw, now kinesics - so is anything else capped?

nope.

Well Physical remains worse than Stun because (a) nasty people with guns are trying to add more Physical boxes to you, (b) when Stun overflows you don't die but Physical overflow will kill you, ( c) as a magician you are much liklier to have fewer Physical boxes than you do Stun and (d) any damage that isn't healed by First Aid has to be healed by rest and Physical damage takes a lot longer to heal than Stun.

a) Wear an armor jacket, get a sustaining focus for the armor spell. Now all guns ever do stun.
b) Edge.
c) Trivial, really. You can't have fewer than 9 boxes of physical, and if you hardcap willpower you only have 11 boxes of stun (that's a difference of 2 for the large disparity between the stats).
d) If you're taking more physical than your field medic can heal with one test, the odds are either: 1) not-casting any one of those spells would have resulted in death (of either the mage or another PC) or the an incomplete run, 2) Everyone's beat to shit, downtime is going to be a while anyway.

D is really the only point you have that has any real weight to it.

You want to debate this? Okay.



Not all mages walk around with a sustaining focus with an armour spell on it. Don't create a build designed to counter a general point and then say that the point is invalidated. It is a general point, not one about your specific character.

Also, you are aware that it is the modified DV of a weapon that is compared to the modified armour value? A rival runner with a heavy pistol and APDS scoring just a couple of net hits will be doing Physical Damage to your example runner unless she has a Sustaining Focus with Armour of Force 4. Physical damage can easily happen even with an armoured character and characters are not always armoured. Don't make a blanket statement that Physical and Stun are equivalent and then use selective cases to suggest it is universal. I'm saying that they are not always equivalent and that in a wide variety of scenarios, Physical is much worse. Do you dispute that? Because if not you have changed your position to agree with me and we can conclude this.



Spending a resource to overcome a negative, does not mean that negative was not there. And your answer doesn't really address the concern anyway.

If you go through your Stun track first, then you have a buffer of maybe nine more boxes of Physical before you have to look at possibly dying. Damage on the Physical track doesn't have that buffer zone. Which character has the advantage? The one that if she overflows her damage track by four or five boxes doesn't have to spend Edge to survive or the character that does? Note that many GMs (and this is recommended by the BBB) apply serious consequences to the use of Edge points to survive and take them out of the rest of the scenario.



Never seen a character die by two boxes? In a game where units of damage are frequently dealt in small doses - three here, four there - then a difference of three extra boxes is worth having.



Well that certainly depends on the nature of the game you play in. Shadowrun tends to be much more than the dungeon crawl approach, at least in my game. Teams don't necessarily have the luxury of saying: "Dungeon completed, there wont be any more encounters until we're all fully recovered and have spent our loot on new magic items." I have seen runs go bad and PCs spend an extended escape adventure trying to get away from Lone Star. I've seen payoffs with the Johnson suddenly turn into a disagreement (the sort with bullets). If the PCs mess up and leave behind identifiable evidence on their run, then it's quite likely that the "adventure" will suddenly start up again.

Basically this is another instance of you taking a select case (your GM runs a discrete adventure with a limited time frame where no recovery would be possible in either case) and incorrectly stating that the fact that Stun gets healed in intervals of hours and Physical gets healed in intervals of days (a factor of 24x) therefore has no bearing in other cases.

You seem to think that characters should not be taking more damage than their "field medic can heal with one test" and that any such cases are exceptional / unfair. It's a Logic + First Aid test. So what? Maybe eight dice? Specialisation maybe ten? So nobody should be taking more than three or four boxes of damage? You play in friendly games, I think.

I'll also add a point (e) to the list as you seem to want to argue that Physical and Stun are equivalent in value. Stimulant Slap Patches can also allow a mage to ignore the effects of Stun for a while. That's really handy when you're badly beaten and you need to make a final getaway. A rating 6 patch will let you ignore six boxes for an hour. That's plenty.

Stun is a headache or exhaustion. Physical is blood loss, fractured bones and internal haemorrhaging. Much worse. And if the GM uses optional damage rules the difference between the two grows further.



Rubbish.

K.

I've only ever seen a PC die once, and that was a HIGH EXPLOSIVE MISSILE hitting him square in the face.

I have seen the same guy die three times, once by running headlong into a guy with a heavy machine gun, once buy running headlong into a guy with heavy machine gun supported buy a guy with a shotgun and once by covering a grenade with his body. Yes, he does not have as much Edge as he used to.

I have only once seen a guy going down by 2 or 3 boxes... and that was his stun track filling after being shot. As a troll he was a bullet magnet. I think I had another troll almost go down by a similar fassion recently...

I'm not saying knasser is wrong, or anything, just dying from attrition is something I have not seen often. Cover and retreat usually do the trick. If they go down, most of the time it would not have mattered if they had a few boxes damage from drain. Which they didn't have, not being awakend and stuff

I agree with Knasser that physical damage is worse than stun damage, but I do think the rule change makes overcasting a more viable option, compared to normal spellcasting. Before, you had a Force: 5 manabolt doing 2 stun Drain, or, say, an overcast Force: 7 manabolt doing 3 physical Drain. Now, though, you can cast a Force: 5 manabolt with 3 net successes, for 5 stun Drain, or overcast that Force: 7 manabolt and take 1 net success, for 4 physical Drain. The Drain might by physical, but there are less boxes of it to soak, so if you are decent at resisting Drain, the overcast spell might wind up being the better option sometimes.

I thought that use of Edge was limited to "Once Per Character."

Let me look it up. Nope, my mistake.

Not that that makes any difference to the sheer stupidity of your player. I shall note that I got hit with a grenade and soaked every point of damage. I spent edge on the resistance test, and rolled well, but I soaked it all. Obviously it didn't help my teammates (like laying on a grenade does), but only one of them was in the blast zone and took 4P.

He only died twice for reals. Survived the first HMG as a freebe. I can't even explain how that granade thingy happend. Boggles me to this day.

Well if I am wrong, I still have four more arguments to my case which were ignored. But actually I have seen a character die by two boxes. It was my own beloved Cat shaman back in 2nd edition and very tragic it was too. Especially considering the whole situation was because another player kept doing stupid things because he wasn't the centre of attention. So sad. But yes, attrition is less of a factor in Shadowrun than it is in, for example, certain carcinogenic RPGs. Shadowrun tends to be dodge the gunfire, dodge the gunfire, I have a bullet in my spleen and I don't like it.

Regarding the whole change to Direct Combat Spell drain, I've had a chance to mull it over now and, especially in the light of Glyph's comments, I think I don't like it. I wasn't particularly of the opinion that direct combat spells were broken before partly because I had a non-Powergaming group (though the group I had after that were quite power-gamey), so I wasn't itching for a change to it. But I think I don't like the extra calculating I have to work into the round and more particularly I don't like the flaw that Glyph points out where you take less drain for casting higher force. It's Physical and the difference in the number of boxes will be small so I guess it's still a disincentive to overcasting. But I like my intuitive feel for Higher Force = Heavier Drain.

I like the Attribute change though so I've come out of this errata ahead for the most part.

2ndeditiondoesnotcountyourwrong.

Oi! I said it first! That's my credit, Glyph stole my credit! Giev back my credit! I wants the attention!

So Knasser, I am curious. Under the assumption that Direct Combat spells need to be reduced in power, which method would you suggest? Introducing the drain-increasing sub-system they currently have, or removing a sub-system & allowing both a Defense & Resistance roll?

Also, do you prefer a fixed New Rating x 5, as they currently have it (which ruins metatypes), or would you prefer to see my New Rating x 5, taking into account metatype modifiers system?

Interesting movement power nerf. Or at least I think this is new. If the Body of the target exceeds the critter’s Magic, the movement bonus is halved. If the Body of the target exceeds Magic x 2 then the power does not effect them.

This trims down a bit on some of the logical problems with the power, but still its fairly abusable with overcasting your summons. This hurts trolls a bit, though there base movement being higher compensates a bit.

Glyph - that was very naughty. But Malicant - nobody likes a tattle tale. Time out for both of you!



Under the assumption that Direct Combat spells needed to be reduced in power I would have gone with a straightforward increase in drain values. Maybe +1 to all of them. Simple and the least possible amount of hassle for me. Allowing a defense and resistance roll would also have a balancing effect but it would reduce the differences between Direct Combat spells and firearms (and Indirect Combat). I find merit in having them operate distinctly because it contributes to the Rock, Paper, Scissors feel of Shadowrun that I consider one of its strengths. Everyone is dangerous in Shadowrun, but everyone seeks the correct circumstances for them to apply that power. Samurai can stand around all day firing off whole belts of ammunition. They're reliable and efficient. Mages can't do that but they have the LOS power to shred someone's body inside their armour. Rock, Paper, Scissors. It's why I think that I like the increase in Object Resistance. It gives magicians who use Direct Combat spells reason to add a different approach to their array of tactics (i.e. Indirect Combat spells are now more useful) and differentiates them further from Samurai. Technology being harder to affect has always been the intention but in the face of powerful Magic ratings, that's kind of failed.

At any rate, I certainly wouldn't have gone with the new sub-system. It adds complexity not because the process itself is complicated (though it is an additional step), but because it requires calculation on the part of an efficiency-minded player. "Do I cast at X Force and do I choose Y hits for drain Z or..." And between allowing the defense and reistance roll or just upping the drain by a point, I would choose the latter to preserve what I consider a fast and distinctive system. Shadowrun is deadly all round. But people keep focusing on the magic and trying to make it not so. I think it's because many GM's don't really know how to deal with it or compare it to someone firing an SMG in the isolation of a single initiative pass not considering how it plays out over longer battles or that the equivalent to a very high Magic rating isn't an SMG but a MMG with all the mods. If you allow the former, why don't your Samurai have the latter?

Anyway, hope that didn't come across as a rant, just rambling on the subject.

Regards the New rating system, I think you have a very good point (unless it's Malicant's) about the effect on Metahumans. We can both see the effect it has on Metahuman attribute building - that needs no arguing. What hasn't been questioned is the immediate assumption that this is a bad thing or an unfair penalty. I agree with you and I like your solution, but if we're going to argue from first principles we need to explore the value judgements that have been assumed.

Why is it bad that metahumans don't get discounted upgrades? From a mechanical viewpoint, increasing your attribute has the same value regardless of race. If we accept the notion of a non-linear purchasing system for Attributes, that it should cost more to upgrade from 4 to 5 than it did to first get to 4 from 3, then why should this approach suddenly become invalid because we have attached a particular name to a character sheet? Someone paid 30 BP to be a troll. What does that mean? Does it mean that they have a inherent right to pay less in the future than someone else would for the same gains? Or does it merely mean they get a slightly discounted package of attribute bonuses at the start? From a mechanical point of view, I don't see an argument for why we should say metahumans should have a special system. In fact you could even argue that they're already coming out ahead by their choice and adding this just adds to that.

But balance has never exactly been my priority and particularly not in Shadowrun where strategy and tactics count for so much more than simple stand up and fight it out capability. If we consider issues of internal consistency and player fun, we do find good arguments for allowing metahumans a discount system. For a start, not doing so skews a race toward the low end of its Attribute range. We can't penalise PCs stat-wise in relation to the rest of the race. If there are strong discincentives to having a PC raising their score to a given level, I don't like to have lots of NPCs running around with it by virtue of GM-fiat. And whilst this can be addressed by BPs in the initial build, I also dislike encouraging such distinctions which limit character concepts to initial ideas and limit development thereafter. And its not fun for a player to be effectively stuck without progress. The ever-increasing cost of raising an attribute serves two purposes. It balances a increasing power effect from focusing abilities. When you get really good at something in Shadowrun, it can have a large effect on what you can do. I put that badly - a person with 3's in all their attributes isn't anywhere near as effective as someone with all 2's except an Agility of 9. Same total, but concentration makes a huge difference. That's why the rising cost reflects an actual rise in value. But with huge metahuman dice pools (and I'm picturing a high-body, high-strength troll here), the damage is partially done. Your troll already has Strength 8 and an extra die is maybe just an extra die by this point. At any rate, paying 45 karma points for that extra die is a rip-off.

So while I'm in favour of the rise to x5 for Attributes (I'm of the opinion that so long as the relative costs between the options are correct, you can adjust progression upwards easily by adding more karma), I think the deduction of metahuman modifications before cost calculation is a good thing. It might allow some fiddling at the low end with people working out whether they're best off buying with BP or saving with karma, but nothing serious.

This has been a very long and rambling email. It's 12:40 here, I've been busy all day and I think I've simply been too tired to stop posting. :/

Short answer: +1 to drain values and deduct metahuman mods. Sounds good to me, Glyph. Thoughts on the +1 drain?

K "About to Crash" Nasser.

That's interesting - hadn't spotted that. I wonder what else is tucked away. Stops all those slightly cheesy sounding shipping routes using Water Elementals to zip across the Pacific (I am aware that cheesey is subjective, but it was too "magitech" for me). And goodbye supersonic sportscars.

Nah, that's his. Or at least not mine. But I agree that cost for increasing attributes on Metahumans can become unsetteling. 40 Karma to increase Charisma from 7 to 8 on an elf face is huge. I don't think anyone will max out Attributes after chargen, unless they run out of options where to dump karma, like after playing for a decade, or something like that. It's one friggin die for social tests, blowing 24 karma would be already something I think twice about. But 40? No way.

But that's maxing the attribute, ranking the character with the Sixth World's elite. Now lets pay 40 karma for a troll to raise his strength to an 8. Sheesh.

All I know is my group is going to have to seriously up its karma awards. We do 3, 4, maybe 5 a night. The change makes sense - think how tough it is to raise an attribute in the real world, as compared to raising a skill, but it sure slows advancement.

The system is mine. I have questioned the assumption that it is a bad thing &/or unfair penalty. I spent over a week going over the system, before initially posting it months ago. The Karma Generation system I use (of which this is taken from) has undergone some changes sense I initially composed it, but the attribute advancement has remained the same throughout.


The points payed to play a metatype reflect the advantages of that metatype. You should not be required to pay additional costs to continue playing that race, which is what the current system does. I do not agree that the values payed for a metatype (RAW) properly reflect the benefits of that type, but that is a discussion for another time/thread. The point is, that is what the costs are intended for, and do succeed at to a reasonable degree.

From the mechanical point, increasing a rating by 1 has the same effect, regardless of what it is being raised from. I like the scaling cost of attribute advancement, but that is purely for flavor reasons. Mechanically, there is no reason not to have linear costs for advancement to reflect the linear benefits of that advancement.

Under the assumption that scaling costs are the proper way to go about it (that I agree with), the scale should be based on the minimum & maximum values of what you are playing, not the actual value. To do otherwise is to inflate the costs to absurdity with high-base attributes.

For a brief touch on my arguments against the Runners Companion karma generation system, which does have some relevance to this, you need to charge for the metatype advantages separately from the advancement system, so simply reducing/removing the metatype cost is not a solution to the inflated advancement costs. The cost of playing the metatype is not "included" in the obsurd advancement prices because the advancement prices are not required - you can still play a Troll and receive the +4 Body; you are not required to raise it any higher at the inflated cost, & still have all the advantages of a 5 Body.


Glad to see you (mostly) agree.


While it is one solution, and better than the current, I dislike it for a similar, if different, reason from the solution they took in SR4A. As an extreme example (simply to get my point across), let us assume you can kill anything you can see, automatically, without a test. This is obviously overpowering. The solution, then, is to reduce its power - not reduce how often you can do it. Even if the frequency is restricted to once a month, or even longer, the ability itself is still to powerful.

The Drain system is there to limit how often a spell may be cast - more powerful spells have greater limitations & danger associated with them. While this is effective (to a point), it does not directly affect the power of a spell, & thus cannot always be used as a balancing factor for overpowered spellcasting. I believe the Direct spells are the latter case, & increasing the Drain will not make them any less effective - only less frequent (and even then, not by much).

You know..I keep hearing the grousing about things like the stuff they did to magic...

I am guessing those people who are grousing about the changes to magic never played back in second edition. I kind of wish that Grounding had been brought back...The changes to the drain of direct combat spells, the upping Object Resistance Thresholds? Those brought us back to the old days where Mages tended to strike hard, and fast,to get the fight over as quickly as possible because long, draw out fights meant the mage wqas likely to be passed out, and where Tech was often the mages bane.

The people who are grousing that the Karma costs for Attribute were raised, while Skill costs were reduced...I am sorry, but do you REALLY think that it is going to be easier to improve your agility(And thus 18 skills) then it is to increase one skill? to take a skill from 1 to 6 in the new rules costs (2x2+3x2+4x2+5x2+6x2) 40 Karma. Previously, however, it would have cost 100 Karma. Now, it would cost 100 Karma to raise those 18 skills to 6 Agility if you started with 1 Agility, verses raising one skill from 1 to 6. In essence, this moves things, again, back to the feel of older editions where the Skills are what matters, not the attributes. It goes back to the old days where you wanted to make sure your attributes were solid out of Chargen, since it was going to be easier to up your skills.

@Cardul - those are all less than desirable, and getting rid of them with future editions was a good move. Going back to them is stupidity.

Making attributes harder to rise is a good thing, in my opinion.

And since you're not using Karma anyway, your opinion is obviously wrong.

Wow, direct combat spells add +drain value equal to net hits?

Wouldn't it be easier to simply disallow overcasting in general?

Were spirits ameliorated? At low fore under three, they were far too weak (and only the 4th edition watcher which was totally useless under the new rules was worse), but above force four, they're suddenly ultra-hard, and far too powerful with their special powers and their skill attributes.

The cost to raise a skill has not changed SR4 to SR4A, only the cost of attributes.

..and that's the problem - the total costs have risen, without any compensation.

I'm toying with the option of having 5x for Attributes, 3x for Skill Groups, 2x for Skills and 1x for Knowledge Skills.

(I have not had the opprotunity to read the full 10 pages of debate)

Won't these changes hit the Adept the hardest? Previously there was the debate between Cyber and Magic (magic wins out in the long run, cyber kicks ass now). But won't this seriously hurt Adepts from getting more powers (which is the entire point of playing said character). Alot of Magician tricks are tied up in Metamagics (higher magic is nice, but Metamagics give you the nifty powers), but Adepts use their power points to compete with the cyber characters (while the metamagics are often side bonuses).

I'm sure this point has been brought up previously, but it's one of the first things that jumped out at me.

@AngelisStorm: I wholeheartedly agree with you. The only way to possibly keep up with the rest of the party would be by allowing the optional rule where an adept can get another power point instead of a metamagic upon initiation. The best fix by the devs if they go with this godawful karma change would be to make that an official rule, as anything else would be nothing short of a shot in the junk for adept players. And poor technomancers have that way overloaded Resonance stat, which limits them greatly, on top of all the other karma costs they have.

The cost of some power was lowered, but overall, mostly.

Lowering the cost of two or three powers by 0.25 to 0.5 (or in the case of Improved Reflexes 3, a full PP) is hardly going to make a big difference.

For the record there will be additional tweaks to adept power costs in the next round of Street Magic errata.

If my calculations are correct, it's now easier to soak the drain on overcast spells than ones boosted with net successes.

Let's take Joe Mage, with a Magic of 5. He really wants the other guy dead, so he preps a Manabolt. He could cast it at Force 5 and somehow gain five successes, giving him a total Drain of 7S. Or, he could overcast a Force 10 Manabolt, use no net successes for damage, and be resisting a 5P.

So, the overcast spell is actually *easier* to withstand than the lower-force option.

Voila, "overcasting is too common" problem not solved, but magnified.

Was overcasting the problem they were trying to solve? I thought it was that the spell was automatic death for the target, and little drain for the mage.

That problem has ALSO not been solved. It used to be 5 drain to kill the target with an overcast spell and it's STILL 5 drain to kill a target with an overcast spell.

Well, if overcasting is the problem, just use a multiplier of 1.5 or even 2 for the force to calculate the drain value. So it will hurt more, when you overcasts. Background count will be added before the multiplier appleys.

Example: magic 6
casting a stun bolt force 6: (6/2) -1 = 3 -1 = 2S
casting a stun bolt force 7: ((7 * 1.5) / 2) - 1 = (10.5 / 2) -1 = 5 - 1 = 4P (or even 6P) instead of 2P
casting a stun bolt force 12: ((12*1.5) / 2) - 1 = (18 / 2) - 1 = 9 - 1 = 8P (or even 11P) instead of 5P

This will hurt the mage and he will think twice if he really wants to overcast.

Ok, perhaps you want this a little bit easier, so just get the multiplier at the final drain value. So we would have 2 stun, 3P and 7P with the same examples as above.

Just a suggestion

THAT is the way to make overcasting less of an option: increase the drain for overcasting.

Again for the record, I did not and do not consider overcasting a problem with Direct Combat Spells nor that it is too common. So, yes, as Cain pointed out the system does now favor overcasting of Direct Combat Spells - and taking physical damage from Drain as a result.

But overcasting is the reason a single direct damage combat spill killed people for next to no drain.

A mage wasn't likely to get the maximum possible damage out of a Force 5 Stun Bolt (5 magic, say, 6 spellcasting, 4 willpower on the target: average 3 net hits: 8 damage, target is still conscious). It was the force 8, force 10, force 12 spells that were ridiculous: the target was out of the action (unconscious) while the mage took some physical drain (4 to 6 minus resistance).

If the problem is the Force + Net Hits damage for non-overcast spells (the 8 stun for 2 stun (before resitance)) is a problem, remove the net hits from damage! It should, however, be noted that a gunweilding bunny does 8 stun (before resistance) with his firearms for no stun (no resistance), so, what's the issue?

That magic damage isn't resisted in any way. It either effects you full force or not at all.

You're hardly the first to have done this.

Well, the problem IS the point, when you don't need any hits, because you just kill the people with the basic damage.

Get a force 11 manaball and just let them die. The drain is 7P, but you can kill many enemies with just one spell. Ok, say you need one hit to add to damage because one has scored 2 hits at his resistence test. So just soak the drain with 10 dices -> 4P left. Get some medic doing first aid and it could be less than 3 boxes of damage.

Direct combat spells favered overcasting before, because they get the force as basic damage. You get 1 more damage, but your target will get twice.

Right, whatever problem may have existed hasn't been fixed.