Even though it's somewhat expensive and inefficient, I was wondering what I should do to be ready for bothering to take Astral Perception, or possibly how needed this power is at all.

As of this point, I'm most likely going to be running a two-man group (don't know if we'll have NPC partners for runs or not), and it sounds like the other guy is going to be a hacker. That being said, I'm considering doing an Adept (will most likely have good but not spectacular combat ability, and I'm leaning towards unarmed/pistols as my two avenues of attack).

My primary concern for taking Astral Perception (other than the options of gathering recon/intelligence from analyzing auras) is being able to be prepared for or defend against astral concerns. On that note, if I didn't take the power, what am I leaving myself exposed to? If I do take the power, what am I going to be stuck with wanting to take to make that power worthwhile?

I've read that astral perceiving entities have to utilize willpower+astral combat (I plan on having 4 willpower, but did not yet intend on having astral combat 4), and even then I don't know how I'd be fighting the damn thing anyway (just with my raw charisma for damage code?). Is a weapon focus here going to be necessary or useful.

I realize that if a spirit actually manifested physically, I'd have a chance with an investment in Killing Hands (planning on having Unarmed Combat 4, Agi 3-4, and a +2 Spec. along with some Krav Maga qualities) of actually killing the thing; however, if something's sitting in the astral just following me around all day I'd rather be able to look across the other side and nix it, especially if I don't have a mage or shaman running with me (hacker is my tech-problem solution, and if we had a third guy I would be looking for a street sham meat shield most likely anyhow).

Astral perception/Duality was a FLAW for which you got points in SR3.
Make of that what you will.
Adepts are hindered by the fact that, unless you resort to rules lawyering and creative thinkering, you have an effective reach of a maximum of your magical attribute to hurt astral entities with.
So if you look into the astral and there's a spirit or mage hovering 10m above you, good luck hitting/hurting him up there, while he can just sling mana spells down at you or use mana based spirit powers.
Weapon-Focus is a matter of style. But with killing hands, improved ability close combat and critical strike, you can basically make your whole body into a weapon focus . .

For the scenario you describe you don't really want Astral Perception.

Without Astral Perception a spirit must Manifest to affect you, when it is manifest, you can see it coming, and can react to it. It will be constrained by it's materialized attributes which are usually less then it's astral ones.

If you have Astral Perception, while Astrally Perceiving you are Dual natured and can be affected by Astral entities.

Note that Manifest and astral Spirits can both quite easily be out of reach.

With an astral perseption/ Spirit killer build it is usually more point effecient to take a weapon focus and use your power points for things you are going to NEED - astral beings have 3 IP astral, if you plan on fighting them there you are going to need to keep up, either with wares' enhancement (costing you magic) or adept powers (costing you magic). Magic resistance and mystic armor for those same spirits and mages who are going to be trying to nuke you astrally.

This being said every time I've done a spirit warrior I've gone with astral perception, killing hands, mystical armor, various magic resistance and magic detection powaz. Sticked to 2 IP and stayed on the physical unless I was tangling with something that could be dangerous while astral (possesion spirits come to mind). Why? My hands cannot be taken from me (ok they CAN, but by then I have other problems) and I always have then when I first wake - yes spirits will try to jump you at bad times for you if you go down this path, trust me, its a blast...

Perseption also lets you make wards (fairly sure) and see signatures (definitly). This is important. You just upgraded your home security and picked up a new sence. Being "Dual Natured" permanently is a bit of a flaw, but if you can switch it off its really quite good.

Dual natured (again fairly sure) - use you physical stats for damage and resistance. Willpower + Astral combat for the various opposed tests.

Actually you do not want to have astral perception unless you have an astral ranged weapon. The only such weapon in SR are spells which you cannot have unless you go mystic adept. Then however you have to divide your Magic Attribute, which is not good for Spirit zapping spells. Even if you had spells, you are still slowed down by your meat body. So the astral spirit would probably have no problems going for cover.

I'm not sure about possessing spirits but all others cannot affect you or other mundanes. So it may be a good tactic to stay on this side of the fence.

@DireRadiant: most materialized attributes of spirits are larger than their astral ones (Force).
If you want to build a spirit killer adept, go for standard combat upgrades, use a weapon focus or killing hands. If you don't want to go near the spirits use SnS or heavy weapons. Gauss cannons are good spirit zappers.

I'd start like I'd start with all combat adepts. Initiative enhancement and combat sense as much as is possible. then maybe killing hands or weapon foci. Even if you don't play a gunbunny, don't forget some ranged weapon skill and stealth.

Well, hot damn, I really hadn't considered the range problem... it sounds to me that even if you built your character around dealing with astral threats as an adept, you could probably be completely owned by a fairly average mage/spirit with the right spells/ranged powers.

Even if you keep up with them in terms of IP, they can just move really quickly away and ruin your day. If I'm not mistaken, astral entities move pretty damn quickly.

Well then, with astral perception am I always dual-natured or does it only work when I turn it on?

Lastly, can't Mystic Adepts astrally project or no?

Yes to the first question and no to the second.

Astral perception is a great power. It lets you read auras and signatures, see astral phenomena(including non-manifested spirits), and interact with a new world. And the best part, it's only on when you want it on.

That said, it's not effective for killing spirits. It can be useful for dual natured beings, but a neonate mage with manabolt will kill even the best adept in astral combat. Thats why being permanently dual natured is a disadvantage, while being able to turn it on and off is an advantage.

In SR3 they had a metamagic that let Adepts astrally project for a short period of time, didn't they? Has that not hopped over into SR4 yet?

Unless it is in the digital grimoire, no.

Off the top of my head, digital grimoire doesn't have metamagic. I would allow a metamagic or adept power that allowed ranged astral attacks.

If the adept has killing handas and distance strike, I'd allow that on the astral as well. But the range is still way too short.

Yeah, an astral entity can move arbitrary fast (approx 40,075.16 km/hour), and can attack at line of sight, which lets say is 100+m in normal conditions. An adept would need an LOS attack.

Example non-critical glitch: posting is successful, but posting appears twice.

Astral Perception = Good, but a bit pricey.

Astral Perception for killing spirits as a pure adept = Bad.

If you buy it, buy it for the things it is useful for - spotting magical security, invisible enemies, people's emotional states, how much cyber they have installed and how powerful a magician they are.

For killing spirits, you want a weapon focus, there is almost no doubt about that. Or a Light Machine Gun. But if you want a stealth / infiltration / social role for your adept, the latter can be a bit of an issue.

As there are just two of you and the other player is a hacker and you want an adept, I would recommend emphasising stealth and infiltration as one of your roles. Speaking as a GM for a moment, when I have a mix of types in the party, I am obliged to provide challenges that cater to each of them. If there's a troll slaughter machine, then I can't just leave the run to a couple of ninja team members sneaking in and out leaving the troll sitting on the sidelines doing nothing. But if there are two non-confrontational types, then such a thief / assassin game is not only viable but interesting. And if that's where you go with it, then Astral Perception could be useful, just make sure your GM includes some magical opposition for you.

Astral Perception isn't rubbish, but I'd be unlikely to buy it for myself as there simply too much else I want. But your call. Not as a spirit killer though. WEAPON FOCUS.

Also make sure your GM uses the errata on weapon foci. The bonding costs have been reduced.

One (VEEEERY EXPENSIVE) way around the range problem for weapon foci in SR3 was to take a harpoon or lasso. Not sure how that works in SR4 but I'll bet there are similar options.

This was actually kind of what I was looking at for the Adept:

Human (0): I'm pretty firm on this choice.

Attributes (280)
B A R--- S C I L W M Edge
4 3 3(5) 3 3 3 5 4 5 6

Active Skills (126)
Athletics Skill Group 3
Pistols 5
Perception 4
Unarmed Combat 5
Stealth Skill Group 3
Influence Skill Group 1

Qualitites (+25 BP)
Adept (5)
Krav Maga (5): Take Aim as a Free Action
SINner (+5): CalFree SIN
Ritual Geas (Meditation, +10)
Sensitive System (+15)
Allergy Gold? (+5)

Knowledge Skills (24 Free BP)
Philosophy 4
Psychology 4
Military Tactics 3
Firearms 1
Magic Theory 3
Something else 1?

Languages
English N, Spanish 3, Sperethiel 3, Japanese 2

19 BP on gear/lifestyle

Adept Powers:
Attribute Boost (Agi) 2
Combat Sense 2
Improved Reflexes 2
Killing Hands
Kinesics 1 ?

If I was going to take Astral Perception as an Adept Power, I'd probably slough off the Kinesics and 1 point from the Attribute Boost or something... I'd figure a way out to work it in. The big thing with Astral Perception would be knowledge gathering, also meaning I'd probably want something allocated to the Assensing skill. Astral Combat would seem a waste of a skill since whatever I was fighting could just run away or use a ranged attack. If something wanted to fight me in the astral, I would just stop perceiving and force a manifestation or at least keep myself safe. I am interested somewhat in the infiltration role and would like to not be socially incompetent, and with 19 BP on gear I will be able to have some neat toys.

The choice of Logic 5 is very much a roleplaying consideration. I would kind of like Astral Perception but damn is it expensive. I really enjoy the idea of having a high Edge (Edge 6 is pretty awesome).

Suggestions/criticisms are quite welcome. I was considering a Mage and realized that my joy of firearms and unarmed combat as well as a relatively practical character just doesn't work that well with a Mage. As an Adept, I'm just kind of a better guy with some enhancement to myself who in the end can still be somewhat of a 'regular' person.

I can't stand the idea of not having a character with at least 3 IP. 4 IP is a bit of a pain to get at char gen and I don't think it's worth it, but how a character with only 1 IP would ever compete in any actual combat situation beats me. In fact, if the opposition has only 1 IP and you also somehow lose initiative, you can just full defense for that IP and blow them up on the next couple.

I also could not stand the idea of jamming random crap in me (cyberware, or even bioware to some extent). It's just gross/wrong. So I guess that leaves me with pure normie/magician/adept.

Anyhow, the requirements of a magician (sorcery, counterspelling, summoning, binding at good levels, drain, expensive foci, and spells) are too stringent for me to create a 'well-rounded' character (like I believe the Adept is above). Also, Edge really makes my above build capable of doing awesome things, even with unimpressive social ability (better than nothing) and not too crazy stealth/infiltration.

So yeah, Adept vs. Magician paired with a hardcore hacker build is where I'm at. Suggestions particularly on negative quality choices (I am really gunning to get the full +35BP in negative qualities) would be awesome.

Take a mage with stunbolt instead if you want to kill spirits. Buy synaptic booster 2 instead of spending huge adept points on the same power. But then again, I see mages as the best hammer for the nail that is SR.

Yes, Mage + Stunbolt often means dead spirit. As far as the Synaptic Booster 2 is concerned, 160,000 nuyen is a lot to spend in chargen and dropping my Essence to 5 (and Magic to 4) is somewhat concerning to me. It does seem quite efficient, but I'll have to see how much I like it or not (I guess that would actually give me more Adept powers, 1.5 power points worth if I'm not mistaken).

For general combat, like what you have, an adept isn't really all that effective. You can use combat drugs to get the attribute boost, combat sense just isn't worth that much to me, kinestatics only makes sense if you are building a social adept. Killing hands is cool, but death touch/manabolt etc works fine and doesn't require the huge investment into unarmed combat skills.

That is probably just me, but I just don't see much reason for most adepts in 4th ed.

Concept.

^^That. And as much as I find mages highly effective, after investing into Sorc 5/Counterspelling 5/Summoning 4/Binding 4, you're not left with very much to do. You've spent your entire life so far studying nothing but magic, and your mundane ability is left a bit shriveled.

Yes, the Stealth spell helps counter not having infiltration. Yes, the imp invis or invisibilty spells help with that as well. But if you're sustaining them, you have a -2 to EVERYTHING you do for each spell you sustain. Yes, you can get sustaining foci. They have to be of the force appropriate for what you want to cast, which does mean they are a bit expensive experience and money-wise to obtain. On top of that, you could do damage to yourself for casting.

In the end, mages are pretty damn awesome. They have a lot of advantages, and if I were playing a high-end game or a game lasting a long time, a mage is going to probably shine greatly (high level foci of all kinds, meaning lots of exp and money spent, and a full-fleshing out of any desired spells/skills/metamagic), but to some people it just doesn't fit quite right.

Also, most mages I've built at chargen could still get perforated in a single IP by a good street sam if he lost initiative. Yes, I could theoretically one-shot the street sam too, but if it comes down to whoever wins initiative as to who gets melted, that leaves me feeling rather uncomfortable.

An adept is the closest thing to a regular guy who's spent his time perhaps meditating, reflecting philosophizing and acheived a certain level of enlightenment without ending up somewhat silly.

So yeah...

Combat Sense is extremely valuable, if you go all the way (5 or 6 at CharGen). Upping your defensepool is generally better than increasing the soak pool. The former only has to deal with the attacker's hits whereas the latter has to reduce the weapon's base damage + net hits. Surprise is a problem for this tactic, but Combat Sense helps with that as well.

@EnlitenedDespot's Adept: I would reduce the AGI Boost to 1 and take STR or BOD Boost as well. With 6 opposed to 7 diece you only get a marginally smaller boost, but you can have two boosted attributes and the drain is even less.

You obviously have a reasonable idea what you're doing. Specific suggestions with your character I would make are to drop Edge a couple of points and use them to get other scores up. Agility by a point, perhaps, Body and Reaction also. Logic 5 is high. Don't forget that 3 is a person that is reasonably intelligent, 4 is already someone noticeably smart. 5 is close to genius so if it's for role-playing flavour, 4 might be adequate.

I would consider whether you want to get some Longarms skill just for situations where its useful. But possibly your teammate will have it covered with drones. Similarly, you might want to consider some weapons ability. If you drop that Edge from the maximum (I do hope you haven't been listening to Cain's Mr. Lucky stories), then you could get yourself Blades 4 with a specialisation if you want. Drop the Edge to 4 and you have the skills plus a bonded Force 3 Weapon Focus. I know it might not fit your original character focus, but Shadowrun is not a game where the devs felt it necessary to balance all options regardless of realism. Attacking someone with a knife or a sword is more effective than going unarmed and doubly so when its a weapon focus. Of course you'll still be killing people bare-handed because you wont be able to sneak foci everywhere, but its nice to have options. Check the recent "Useless Abilities" thread for an example of a skilled adept fighting an averageish troll. It's simply hard to damage some opponents bare-handed. Especially without Critical Strike.

Anyway, just some thoughts. Hope they help,

K.

Ahh, well every suggestion helps. I often find your guys' mastery of rules and having run more scenarios in this specific game than I help immensely.

That being said, I like the idea of two stat boosts as opposed to one. I was really not that interested in buying up large stat boost powers, as even the difference between Agi Boost 4 and 1 is increasing the attribute by 1.

I have maxed my expenditure on attributes. I could drop Logic to 4 and get Agi or Rea up to 4. I like Willpower and Body at 4 as is. Short of spending .75 power points on actually boosting an attribute (this just feels wasteful) permanently, I don't have tons of options.

Dropping Edge from 6 to 4 only gets me 20 BP. This could very well let me grab Blades 4 or MonoWhip 4 and snag a Weapon Focus (the availability limits them to a rating of 2 normally, no?), but my goal isn't to use my bare hands. I figure a souped up Ares Predator or something of the like would be my mainstay, with my hands just really a fall-back (or a materialized spirit killer).

I'll also look at how much I want to up combat sense. The synpatic boosters ain't too shabby if I have the money to spare (that's the main concern) considering that it frees up 1.5 power points (I lose one power point as my Magic drops from 5 to 4 and Essence from 6 to 5, but I have 4 Magic as opposed to 5 Magic with 2.5 power points taken up...).

Boosting Body feels really situational though, and boosting strength would only come up when/if I wanted to churn out unarmed damage.

I figure my best bet for a weapon focus would be a monofilament whip? I'm not that into the whip but its' armor piercing, reach, and huge damage really make it an attractive option. as well as its overall concealability...

Correct on the Edge. For some reason I thought you had the maximum amount (which would have cost more), but you're human so it's fine. I still recommend dropping it.

If you're going to go the route of Synaptic Boosters, you could give up the Agility Boost altogether and put every spare point you have into Improved Ability (Pistols). It doesn't look like a cost effective use of magic points - and genuinely, maybe it isn't - but +3 to that skill (and find some points for a specialisation in Semi-Automatics, while you're there), could be useful. You don't have Longarms or Automatics so you're going to suffer against well-armoured targets. And at some point, yes, you're going to meet "The Troll" at which point you'll want every hit you can get. Until you find a source of APDS, you've got a problem.

If I read your last post correctly, you're talking about having two Attribute Boost powers? In practical terms, it might not be so bad, but personally it would annoy me to have to take two Simple Actions to get myself up to speed at the start of every combat. As you're an infiltratory type, combats you do enter into will likely be the result of accident, rather than on your own terms, which means a pass getting your boosts or writing them off for the combat.

You do know that the boost is not capped at the rating of the power? Each hit on Mag+Boost increases the attribute by one. So, with MAG 5, on average you'll get +2 for rating 1, and +2,3 with rating 2. The boost however is capped at the Augmented attribute maximum, so with a 3 as base attribute, you could get a maximum of +6.

Yup, since SR4A synaptic boosters are not so much of a no-brainer anymore

You are right about that, but unfortunately REA cannot be boosted if you have Increased Reflexes.

Don't forget, you have to buy an extra skill for it: exotic melee weapon: whip. Although the monowhips damge is great, I'd rather go for a more easily replaceable weapon.

Here's a slightly unorthodox idea for a spirit slaying adept.

Weapon foci when activated are active on both planes whether or not the adept is. You'd think a free floating greatsword swinging wildly in both planes would be a fairly dangerous item.

If the spirit is materialized... great slice and dice time as normal. If it's not, but is floating in the vicinity... you need some way to locate it's approximate position to attack it blind. I don't know if motion sense, or detect magic type adept power would work though. But barring that martial arts specialized in blindfighting (or awakened fighting)...

Lacks the normal weakness of the adept (sitting duck in astral), but lacks the fine detection and reading abilities of assensinng.

You have mentioned the weakness yourself. The spirit can clearly see an attack the weapon focus. If it is feeling generous, it will just knock it out of your grasp (assuming that works) or ,which is garanteed to work, will break your focus.

Actually Dakka... try reading the rules before slamming the idea.

The most that can be done to a focus is to deactivate it... and that requires a direct mana spell out of digital grimoire. And damage done to the focus regenerates at a fairly quick rate at which point you can just reactivate it again.

Digital grimoire is the only place I've seen anything regarding attacking and deactivating foci.

Entire point is to pick out abilities which are also usefull in meat, while still allowing it to engage an astral target in close proximity. It's a stretch to use those abilities though I admit.

I have not read that part of the digital grimoire, but all the necessary rules are in the BBB and possibly street magic.

Active foci are dual natured. Thus their physical representation can be attacked from both planes. A spirit can smash the astral form of the focus and the physical object that is the focus is destroyed. The adept holding the focus however cannot defend against this because he is not aware of the attack.

Unless you can cite a passage saying that foci cannot be destroyed, the normal rules for dual natured objects apply.

Firstly, think of the ramifications of what you said.
If it were as you said... there'd be very few adepts w/ weapon foci, as any mage can and would trash them at will w/ his spirits (as most cannot astrally perceive). This is obviously not the case in the system.


Secondly.
No they are not that clearly cut & dried. You need something to assert that.

First of all, there is no such thing as a standard 'dual natured object' there are 'dual natured creatures'. In fact all dual natured items I can think of fall under either the special category (fab/vines..) or foci as best I can tell.

Things like FAB which have rules to attack and destroy from astral have those rules contained within their sections.

The only rules I've seen for attacking an active focus, simply deactivate it, it turns off... and then it takes some time for it to regenerate itself, then it's usable again. However, it requires a special spell specifically crafted for that purpose, not something your typical spirit will have.


Thirdly,
Though I just found my answer to above... wielder must be dual natured to use the weapon focus in astral combat. Of course, put in a section away from weapon focus and such... typical.



This gets into my issue w/ most breaking weapon rules in many games. If you can hit the weapon hard enough to break it (unlikely except for some light and fragile weapons). You hit it hard enough to knock it clear out of the other guys hand. (and if it's a focus leaving the hand or astral form deactivates it). (excepting special weapons designed to trap and break other weapons... and exactly what is the hardness, HP, and armor of a combat axe in meat space, let alone astral.

From everything that I have read, all objects have a "health track" of 8 + (Body/2)... This is because the various spells that target objects actually deal damage to the item (and thus to their damage track)... Now, if you do not actually destroy the object, it will function at a lesser capacity (same as the damge to the character... now, if you do not actually destroy the focus, it will heal a number of health boxes equal to its rating every turn... does not do it much good it hte item was actually destroyed, however...

If you can break the object that is magically enchanted, the enchantment is destroyed... the spell you are talking about in the Digital Grimoire is for disruting (and therefore deactivating) foci... why would you want to deactivate a focus rather than destroy it? well, if you can defeat the character that owns the focus, you can take it for yourself... not so much if you have destroyed it...

My Take on it, but not contested by any of the rules that I can find... can you show me where it states that Foci cannot be destroyed? The typical gun can be destroyed if it takes 10 boxes or so of damage... I would say the same for a Sword or other melee weapons, unless made of some extremely durable substance... this is what the various "Wreck" spells are so useful for...

As such, in every game that I have played in over the last many years, this is how it has been handled...

Anyway, My two Nuyen

SR4A, p. 193 :

So, the waving an active weapon focus around in the physical plane will not harm an astral form. Also, since only mana spells can affect astral forms, the astral aspect of a weapon focus, which is an object and therefore unharmed by mana spells, is immune to damage from spells on the astral plane. It can be disrupted by the eponymous spell from the Digital Grimoire because that is a mana spell, but that doesn't break the weapon, only turn it off.

The question remains whether the astral aspect of an active focus could be attacked by more direct means, destroying the focus. Physical objects provide no barrier in astral space, so the rules for attacking a physical barrier don't work. The only angle that might work is the assumption that the astral form of an active focus is similar to an astral barrier, for which there are rules for attacking (SR4A, p. 194). Those rules, too state that the astral barrier regenerates in the next turn. Again, it isn't destroyed, only turned off.

It would appear to me that the best that can be done to a weapon focus in the astral plane is disruption.

I would agree with this if the attack is on the astral against the astral form of the focus... but in the physical, Wreck (Sword) will still damage the material component of the Sword focus (or whichever form the focus takes with the equivalent Wreck Spell)...

At least, this makes sense to me, anyway...

I pointed out above... I saw that and realized that the idea wouldn't work in point3.

I agree w/ you two. physically the form anchoring the focus can be destroyed. I never argued against that.

Just from purely astral the best you can do is disrupt it, deactivating it. Not that this isn't usefull in it's own right.


And I can see a reason for the spell. If the best you can do from astral is disrupt the form. Then in astral mana spells are your only ranged combat option. A projecting mage who has foci... if they deactivate, cannot reactivate them while astral.


My other observation was just generally when you're talking about hand held weapons... it's easy to break things if they're held in a vise. If they're in someones hand you're far more likely to knock it clean out of their hand than break it. So I find most sundering rules fairly poorly done.

To use the barrier rating is a good approach. However a focus is not an astral barrier but a dual-natured one. As such both "components" are affected by attacks against it. While it probably regenerates, it does that only at the end of the Combat Turn. Spirits on the other hand have 3 IPs. How many hitpoints it has unfortunately is not mentioned.

I agree that the sundering rules in most systems are pretty flawed, but knocking the focus out of the adepts hand, would also end the threat of a weapon on the astral plane whose user cannot be attacked.

As for why there are adepts with weapon foci, there probably are two reasons. a) why destroy the focus when you can keep it. b)It is probably better to deal with the user directly than rendering the focus inaccessible and then hoping that the opponent is a lot less dangerous without it. You would still have to deal with him afterwards.

Sorry for the Misunderstanding then...

And yes, I would tend to deal with the person rather than the object, at least in practice, because it is indeed somewhat difficult to break something IN someone's hand, as enough force to damage the object tends to damage the meat as well, resulting in the meat no longer in possession of the object...

Dakka:
What you fail to understand is just because something has an astral form, does not mean you can interact w/ it astrally.

Illusion spells for example... they're pointless to cast against someone who can astrally perceive because they can see the spell's astral form. All active spells have an active astral form. But an astral mage cannot counterspell to eliminate the spell on a physical target. Similarly, a spirit cannot just drift over to the spells form and attack it and wipe it out.

All rules for interacting w/ astral objects come up under the sections for those objects. There are NO RULES TO INTERACT W/ ACTIVE FOCI, except the above spell. You say the generalized case applies... there is no generalized case. There are special rules for attacking other ASTRAL BEINGS, there are other special rules for attacking wards (which heal after you blow a hole in them). There are special rules for dealing w/ FAB and awakened vines. There are special rules for deactivating focus via mana spell. There is no generalized rule.

Wards again are a special case... if an active foci or spell or being runs into a ward (and is forced through).. either the ward gives way or the item/spell deactivates/awakened being is rendered unconcious (fill up the stun track... not a number stun damage... just fill the stun track and lay him out). But even in that case, the focus isn't broken... it merely deactivates.


The only portion where you run into special case for interacting is wards, and other special magical constructs which restrict astral movement. In each case above, special rules for interacting/eliminating them are presented under the item section. A spirit has no way to interact w/ an active focus, despite it having an astral form.

Another example, the earth... it's an astral entity, but you can push through it and move through it w/ difficulty. Things on the astral DO NOT BEHAVE AS THEY DO IN THE PHYSICAL. (emphasis required) Even such basics as 2 pieces of matter cannot occupy the same space do not apply normally.

I assume there is a misunderstanding on your part.
Why wouldn't you be able to interact with something tangible?

Spells are not dual-natured. A spell is only present on either plane. While you can see the Aura of a spell cast on the physical plane from the astral. There is no Astral Form to interact with.

So by this logic a mundane runner cannot pickup a gun, because there are no special rules for it? Can he eat? Can he breathe? Does he need to? Are we talking about flying sartyrs here?

More seriously, those rules only explain how the interaction takes place. They are not allowing the interaction in the first place. This is already said in the beginning of the chapter on the astral plane.

There has to be a special rule if you want the earth to behave differenly than the rest of the astral forms.This rule applies normally to two Astral Forms as it applies to two physical ones. Astral Forms can only pass through Auras.

Let's look at the connection between astral form and physical form in a different way.

The astral forms of a magician and her weapon focus are not necessarily spatially linked to their physical counterparts. For example, a magician may astrally project and take her weapon focus with her into the astral plane. She may then move astrally several thousand kilometers away in the astral plane, with the astral form of her weapon still with her. Her physical form and the physical form of the weapon stay where they were when she projected.

Now, at that location thousands of kilometers away, another astral form may interact with the astral form of the weapon focus but that interaction cannot harm the physical weapon which is sitting on the magicians lap thousands of kilometers away. The best that can be done is that the astral form can be disrupted, after which the mage is without her weapon in the astral plane until she reactivates the weapon.

Given that the astral form of the weapon has been disrupted, there is no longer any spatial connection between the astral form of the projecting magician and her weapon, and she needs to return to her physical form, reunite with it, and then reactivate the weapon. Hence some of the value of deactivating a weapon focus.

An adept (or magician) who is astrally perceiving but not projecting will stay in contact with the weapon and be able to reactivate it immediately after it has been dirupted. Hence some of the value of astrally perceiving.

So anyway. I like this type of character. You can fight spirits in a hallway while using astral perception. If they move out of your reach, they can't attack you either. It's not nearly as much of a problem as everyone's talking about. monofil weapon foci are still lame. Use a sword or axe or something cool. You'll still be able to kill spirits. Melee is cool. Physical adepts are cool.

Get yourself some mirrorshades, get a flashy chrome datajack, and have your axe custom made to go with your usual outfit. since you're using a weapon focus axe, you probably can't get one for each outift, so you'll have to get in in colors that go well with everything. Neon Pink or green should do well. make sure to have a mohawk or something equally cool, preferably matching or clashing in color to the axe. Throw in some chains. Take distance strike if you need the range. And make sure to take a special skill of "Flashy Axe Tricks" or possibly bad dancing (use your best judgment here).

Now, to be able to keep up, make sure you also have the other skills to use your Perception to it's full advantage. Magic Theory, Assensing (I still don't like that skill, but what ev')?, Some knowledge of Spirits and the like. If you want to be "that guy", you could also go for some skills like parazoology or parabotany. These can definitely come in handy at times.

Now, go out and kick some spirit ass. Don't worry about people attacking your axe. If they try, cut them in half! No more issue.

Also, being dual natured was never a flaw in any edition. If it is, it's free points. I'd take that any day of the week. If there is such a thing, you might as well take it so you don't have to spend points on astral perception. But i'm sure everyone else here will say "omg if you're dual natured you'll obviously get attacked while you're eating dinner and die from it! twice!" But well, that's where the axe comes in! Smash some face, finish dinner, take a nap. Welcome to the shadows chummer.

Point of interest: This post is entirely serious.

Killing hands + A Flavour oriented take on the power (My hair can kill people) + Condition Geas (long hair in a mohawk) + Mohawk = Too 80's/ animae to be allowed to live

Make him dual natured and his hair can (scare/ cut) ghosts to death. Take a flashy weapon focus or a big gun as well and no one will see the neon pink hair coming till it's too late.

I'm sure I've seen this movie, but my mind is shielding me from full remembering.

Is it effective in a point efficent way: no.
Do I now want to be playing this guy: yes.