There have been a number of "pick your favorite 8/10/12 spells" threads. None of them originated before SR4A. I DO NOT WANT A FLAME WAR. Assuming the current rules as written, avoiding ALL talk of houserules and such, what are your new top picks?

Slay SR4A

I don't play spell slingers, have no plans to upgrading to SR4A, and as such don't really have an opinion.

Likely an electricity based single/multitarget spell.

Stunbolt is STILL a top choice - just now you need to overcast it as high as you can and take the one net hit for minimum drain. That should still one-shot most opposition, with the minimum possible self-injury.

Stunball however, would be stupid to use if the enemy has a counterspelling mage that knows what he's doing - all he has to do is leave the lowest willpower grunt unprotected and you're left with the choice of either hitting one guy for higher drain than a stunbolt would have been, or hitting a couple more for twice the drain value.

No difference. I just bought a illusion spell focus to compensate the higher ORs.

Regarding Stunbolt: It was always the smartest choice to cast it as high as force 9 or 10 to ensure that you - if you get the spell through the defense - won't have to do it more than once per target.

Mechanics of play aside, I always prefer the "flashy" magic over the "efficient" magic. So give me the Levinbolt, the Fireball, Shapechange & Petrify. Keep the boosted reflexes, jumped up attributes and clairaudience. But that's just me.

Hear, hear!

Mental manipulations, as far as I know, have not been nerfed at all. So the mind-control mage suddenly became even more attractive. Why risk the high, unpredictable Drain from a combat spell when you can just make that security guard shoot himself? Touch range combat spells are also good if you have decent unarmed combat ability, since you can overcast them with one net hit and usually soak the Drain.

If this is the case, why are you even posting in this thread? I'm pretty sure the OP mentioned he didn't want a flame-war or argument concerning the changes in SR4A, so other than increasing your post count, why bother posting in a thread which you yourself have admittedly no input for?

Personally, my mage prefers to levitate people. Why? I don't know, it's rarely very effective. But it's hella fun, especially when we had a gang of bikers chasing us at high speed. The image of the biker desperately lunging for his handlebars as he floated off his bike was a great moment. I suppose our game is more geared towards just enjoying ourselves. If everyone has a good laugh, it was a good game.

I also like discerning intent/motives. Always good to know who needs a quick dose of levitation!

Because I have a sense of humor and you don't?

I'm pretty sure I said no flames

Yet again, the Drain increase is based on Net Hits applied to damage, not Net Hits. And you get to choose how many Net Hits are applied to damage, so the above technique does nothing but guarantee that the grunt will be hosed.

You might just need to sig that in bold until people get it.

Correct, but I think it was stated that for area effect spells, Drain would be based on the target taking the most net hits - so in other words, if you shoot stunball into a group with 6 successes, where the guy with 6 willpower rolls 5 successes and the grunt with 1 Willpower rolls no successes, you are screwed - you can either damage both of them and take an extra 6 to your Drain, or choose less net successes, which means you will affect the low-Willpower goon but no one else. I am pretty sure that you can't choose net hits for each target (I would like to be wrong, though ) So even with the option to choose net hits, area-effect spells are still tricky to use.

Let me get this strait, I have enough net hits to effect both targets, but I chose to apply no net hits to damage at all and suddenly it doesn't effect the one dude?

Since when I play mages i somehow always play burnouts with magic 1 the physical illusions are a big no go for me now since such OR's can't be obtained with edge on a somewhat regular basis anymore.
So I'll keep my all time favorite shapechange and probably dabble a bit more in mind controls.
For combat i'll stick with my reliable browning ultra-power and razors.

Yeah, I'm not quite sure what that's about, either. The luckiest mook only got 5 hits, leaving the caster with the 1 net hit necessary for the spell to apply at base damage throughout the whole AoE. The drain value is determined from the worst opposed test result - and since you don't calculate and soak drain for every effected target, the best test results (the 5 net against the Will 1 mook) should be irrelevant.


And as far as the original question goes, direct combat and manipulation are still (mostly) where it's at. But I'm biased, 'cause I've never played illusion, health, or detection-centered casters. Or casters who ever even used those types of spell (beyond heal, anyway).

Net Hits is now separate from Net Hits used to increase DV. You get your full 5 Hits (or whatever), but apply 0 Net to damage. The DV is then Force, with no Drain modifier. Anyone that would be affected from 5 Hits is. The highest Drain modifier from increasing damage is used - in this case, 0 - regardless of what anyone rolled, as you are not boosting damage.


It is a very shitty system - & even worse if the GM decides not to distinguish between Net Hits & Net Hits applied to damage (which would be a house rule).

I quite agree with you, but people are all up and getting confused and making less sense.



That, I also, heartily, agree with.

Hrm...that I could live with...I'm not quite sure that's the intent, though. And it still massively rewards overcasting.

So many topics...so many opinions. Wouldn´t it be the best to cancel all combat and illusion spells? For me it looks like the developers didn´t wanted the mage to be the one for such tasks no more. So "nerfing around" to force people to switch team-member-tasks was pretty ineffective. Let the samurais do the damage, let the hackers fool cameras and the mages...hm...the dance around with drums for the feeling.^^

Sorry, I´m just tired of all these rule-changings. If we would work like this in our business, we still would have been closed down. Thinking before writing rule-books would be the solution for all this.