It's impolite to call an old person "misfit".

"Impolite" isn't the same thing as "inaccurate", now is it?

I do wonder the next bump from SincereAgape comes. I am also still waiting for a response from Dexter to Vera.

Geez, I thought the tumbleweeds thing was pretty funny.

Woo! Tumbleweeds

Hi guys.

The latest update has been posted in the thread. Sorry it took until the end of the week. Life has been pretty busy for me. In addition to a three Shadowrun projects running at the moment, I have some personal and work based projects going on as well.

Anyone character who leaves the airplane (You can make one too, DigitalOyabun ), please make a visual based perception test.

As for the drain ruling. I put some thought into this. All magic users are to make drain rolls for all spells, summoning, possession, etc. Here is the line of thought.

In the SR II and SR III - Drain played a big part in balancing magicians with the rest of the archetypes (And even still they were very powerful).

Casting spells and summoning spirits should take a toll on the magic user period. So if you are a spellcaster the fact that you are slinging and flinging spells of all types should eventually wear you down, not just casting Lightning Bolt, Stun Bolt, etc.

Think of it this way. If you're working on any project or participating in any activity, even the smallest task can take a toll and add to your fatigue.

If you throw out a combination of overcasting on Manabolt, force 4 sticky fingers, force 6 Powerball, and then Force 4 Mind Control, it's all going to add up. It doesn't make sense for the sticky fingers to not add to the fatigue factor.

That being said. Force in 4th edition is a joke when compared to 2nd and 3rd. My main character in Welcome to the Shadows and in my live campaign has a drain resist pool of 11 and most of the time, even when overcasting force 10 stunbolts he resists very easily. Still, there is a chance that he can do really bad on a drain roll for a simple force spell, and that adds to the fun.

-Forcing spell casters to roll drain for all spells makes them more human and less like superheroes.

OK. Thanks, SA.

Hey Pete. Sure thing. And I just wanted to say, thank you for being proactive about this campaign. Despite my hesitation to allow a possession mage into the game, you've been playing Hodder very well. He's humble and you haven't abused the possession mage aspect at all. And I'm sure you'll continue this trend.

-Can't wait to see Hodder kick some arse.

No problem, SA. Actually, I could use a two-by-four upside the head right now. I see by your IC post that I jumped the gun up in the air when I assumed Hodder was seeing the dawn. I figured it would flesh out the story and emphasize one of Hodder's weaknesses by having the spirit that had possessed him on the ground in Seattle leave at the artificially early dawn in the high atmosphere. The disastrous summoning was not the one for the Binding ritual, but for the spirit to make up for the one that had dissipated due to the dawn.

Serves me right for not simply asking you when the dawn was coming. I'm happy to live with the damage Hodder has now. It will serve as a reminder to ask rather than assume.

Just so we have a clear record, Hodder has Increase Reflexes sustained in the Sustaining Focus, giving him +2 Initiative and +2 IPs. He has no other spell sustained, but is using his Heightened Concentration to overcome the pain and distraction of the Drain damage. I haven't asked about that yet! If the use of Heightened Concentration interferes with the healing process, then we'll just assume he has dropped it, OK? Enough with the painful learning process, already.

Hey Pete,

No problem on the Dawn aspect. Thank you for being honest on the rolls for your summoning and possession drain.

As a GM, I am pretty generous when it comes to awarding edge back. Any acts of altruism or roleplaying a character well are my soft spots.

Once the crew lands in Accra, Asante. Make a health test, Body X2, using any benefits from medicine. Being in the presence of three attractive ladies speeds up the process.

Thanks! In my experience, being in the presence of three attractive ladies can tend to be ... well... draining. Although, our older dog was starting to look his age, until we got a second, a young bitch. He perked right up, and now is in the best shape in which I have seen him in 6 years.

I'm just trying to figure out the mechanics of the Healing Test. Here's what I can figure out so far:

Pretty sure:
BOD 7: 14 dice
average (indoor conditions): -1 die
Awakened patient: -2 dice
Medicine: + successes [The medtech or physician rolls Skill + LOG and adds successes as dice to the Test]

Not so sure:
Medkit 6: + 6 dice [ Does it help in a regular Healing Extended Test? Does it help IFF the right medicines are available?]
Assistants: + ? [Do they have to have the Medicine Skill specifically?]

If that last one works, then I have a request. I summoned the Task Spirit to do First Aid on Hodder. Since that is illegal, can the Spirit have Medicine instead, and then be an assistant to our medical doctor, whom I assume will be Vera? This would add one die to the Healing Test.

The medicine roll can be an assisted team roll, with the assistants adding onto the primary administrator of the medications.
1. Sure the spirits can have medicine instead of first aid.
2. I believe medications is different from an actual med-kit. A med-kit encompasses a variety of first aid materials that can help with the overall healing. Medicine is a one shot deal. You either have it or not. (Unless someone can state otherwise.)

Yeah, Kerenshara, but it didn't nearly kill you!

OK, so near as I can tell, the Healing Extended Test for Hodder will be as follows (correct me if I am wrong):

BOD 7 X 2: 14 dice
average conditions (on a plane or in a building, out of the elements): -1 die
Awakened patient: -2 dice
medkit (6): 6 dice
assist from Task Spirit (uses up a service): 1 die
medical attention from our physician (uses up some medications): #hits on Vera's Medicine Test

TOTAL: 18 + (Vera hits) dice

OK, I FINALLY got that post edited to my liking. I can be a bit of a perfectionist with my prose.

I hope that's the end of luck like THAT on the dice. Yuck. And yes, Peter, I know it didn't almost kill me, but when I looked at the luck on the BIG dice pool, rolling like that for Drain would have left me with at least one row full on Stun, which would have been embarasing; Having both Magicians demonstrating their inability to handle their mana in front of the mundanes this early in the mission would be a Bad Thing.

*grin*

Peter, on the healing test, I'm not sure what everybody else is doing, but if we asume Vera is playing doctor, and Dartha's playing "assistant" by keeping an eye on you and playing fetch & carry, then she can get a +1 on her roll from me (up to 3 assistants help a doctor on their Medicine roll).

I can't see how you can make a Healing test as a teamwork thing, beyond Medicine, but it's SincereAgape's campaign.

And as for three ladies making things... exciting, Dartha's being attentive but not agressive. She understands what you're suffering with and she's not going to do anything to delay your recovery and extend your vulnerability to the mundanes.

That makes 20 dice as I got 7 hits. Hodder doesn't get to play with the medkit Vera does.

How many dice did you roll for 7 hits? Holy smokes. I think I need to quietly swap dice when you're distracted.

That's 12 dice. And that includes the medkit (ability+medicine+medkit). So, it's actually 20 dice that Hodder gets to roll.

Kerenshara and Chrysalis are both right.

-Spirit and Dartha aid on Vera's medicine roll, not on Hodder's healing test. (Up to plus 3)
-Vera gains the benefit for med-kit.

@Belloq
Body 7 X 2: 14
Average Conditions: -1 dice
Awakened Patient: -2 dice
Medicine: + Vera's role.

@Vera
Logic + Skill + Medkit + Assistance (2. Dartha and Spirit)

With the added two dice when rerolled I got:

14d6.hits(5)=5

So 5 hits instead of 7. Vera works better without people

So Pete. You will be rolling 16 dice once the plane lands in Accra.



*GM joins Dexter in laughing.*

Some people pay Vera good money for that

And now Vera gets a high powered rifle round in the back of the head. Luckily the snipers decided to set up with the sun sin front of them.

So much for Hodder's casual approach

Yeah, well, it will take an incident or two to get the old joints oiled again.

Great. The gang is all here.

A few things about the perception tests, for next time.

-The maximum benefit you can receive from a teamwork test is equal to your skill (Hence plus 6 for Karoline and plus 4 for Dartha.)
-The tower is roughly 400 meters away. -3 for Sniper Rifles, -6 for Assault Rifles.
-Since it is dawn. You guys are looking into low-light.
-Since this is SR20th, any cover that you guys take is adding to your reaction or full dodge roll. Hence having good cover will give you +4 to your reaction roll.


-Everyone roll initiative.

Fuck.

Oh, I guess I roll Initiative here, not in IC?

REA 6 + INT 4 =Init 10
10D6 ==> 6 hits

Initiative=16

[Yeah] Post initiative rolls here or send them to me via PM. After this initial combat, I'll have everyone's augmented initiative rolls on record and easier to reference too.

HTML<a href="http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/2289532/">10d6.hits(5)=3</a>

Damn, what I do wrong this time?

Percpetion (Visual): Skill 6, Int 3, Limbic 3, Visual Enhancement 3 = 15 (Vision magnification bringing the view up to 50x if I need it) (15d6.hits(5)=6)

Meh, Initiative = 12

I'll keep that in mind for next time on the perception tests, though taking away a die (even if it was a hit) is still easily more than 5 on that particular one, so hopefully off the hook there.

Yeay for 400m! That's the sort of engagement range I like

Edit: P.S. Yeah, sorry for not posting much the last few days. Been very busy. Went to a car race with my mom and dad last night, went to breakfast with friends yesterday, had a big dinner thing today and Thursday.

I have Reaction 5 (7) with Lightning Reflexes quality and 3 Intuition, get to add a +1 die when chewing snuff.

So, are you up to snuff now?

LOL, not at moment...usually only when bored does he chew (or in the field)

Hey Budd.

You roll 12D6, using Invisible Castle as you've done above. Create a profile and then fill in these blanks when selecting the roll dice menu.

Character Name: Texas Jack
Campaign Name: Dota
etc
etc
Feel free to add a note: Initiative in Cairo Tarmac or something along those lines.


http://invisiblecastle.com/

It's not necessary to link your roll here. Just let me know the results via PM or In the thread.

Ohhhhh.. That's what the 'notes' section is for!

One more thing.

When you make your rolls to attack or want to perform action during your combat phase. Do that IC (With as much character detail as you would like) with a OOC note.. So here is an example of a post.




or if performing an action.



or

Do I learn anything from my six hits through the image mag low-light/thermal scope? Feel free to PM it if you don't want everyone else knowing what it is in advance.

I REALLY don't want to be an asshole; I'm just asking. Is Hawkeye really just walking around with a Barret Sniper rifle? I'm just a bit surprized she can handle a 30lbs+ weapon thats about 60 inch long.

Haven't you been reading my posts? She's had it on her ever since about 30 seconds after boarding the plane, and it has actually been mentioned several times in both the vignette and various IC posts. Yes, she is really walking around with a Barret Sniper rifle. The only time it hasn't been on hand the entire game was during the meet with Ms. J.

It was often in small pieces, but one of the first things she did after getting on the plane was get the pieces out of her bag and put it together.

I'd imagine that weapons tech has come a fair way to make the weapon lighter than 30lbs. But anyway, yeah, she had it on her back as she walked out of the plane because she didn't expect anyone to see her in the private airway, and so wanted to have it on her as she is still uncertain around most of the other party members. Call it her 'safety blanket' if you'd like

In case it is still needed:
Perception+Intuition+Vision Enh 2
http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/2289655/
Perception Roll: 3 hits

Initiative Roll
http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/2289654/
Initiative Score: 10

I know she had it with her; but I remember back in SR3 that the issue with the weapon was that it was HUGE. In Fields of Fire, there was even a bit in the shadowtalk about how one Street Sam used the shells as paper weight because they were about the size of a human hand. There's a difference between having the weapon lets say, lying on a table, and actually manoeuvring around with it. I'm not even sure someone could actually stand up and turn around inside a jet with a fully assemble barret (I'm not too good with lenght conversion... but 60 inches is what... like 4 or 5 feet?) This is in NO way some asinie comment on my part or anything. I just wanted to make sure I had understood the whole thing correctly.

I'm just surprised, thats all. Nothing more, nothing less.

Cause what I'm picturing in my head right now is something close to this, but with a smaller girl, about to do this.

Yes, the weapon is fairly large. I figure that she has the short barrel version, which is a total of 48 inches (4 feet, 122 cm) long, and weighs about 29.7 lbs (13.5 kg) in modern times. I figure that in 2072 weapon design and materials in particular have dropped the weight by at least a quarter, so likely something like 22 lbs (10 kg), thus making it much more manageable weight wise (I know from long experience that I can operate quite normally with 10+kg on my back).

It is admittedly still fairly long, only about a foot or so shorter than she is, but her backstory provides that this weapon was specifically designed for her, and she has basically been training to operate with the weapon for her entire life, so I figure she is very used to operating with the weapon on her back.

As for the shells themselves, yes, they too are quite large (almost half a foot long), and can weigh anywhere from about 40-50 grams (which is about .1 lbs or 1-2 oz) I don't know that I'd use a single bullet as a paper weight, but I guess you could if you really wanted to. I should point out that she doesn't carry many clips for the gun 'on' her. She has the clip that is in the gun (Normal ammo at the moment by the way) and generally carries a second clip on her as backup (Ex-Ex clip in her backpack), but any other clips are usually kept in her assorted gear (Aka in her luggage at the moment).

Yes, I do admit that the weapon is somewhat unwieldy, but do keep in mind it is a game, and the game really doesn't do much to differentiate a massive sniper rifle from an AK-97(Nor in fact offer any indication in the book that the Barrett sniper rifle is particularly large at all). If you'd like we could also assume that it isn't actually a Barrett, but a different smaller gun that has the same properties (Since a real Barrett sniper rifle has a notably longer range than the game one does (roughly 1.5 miles with high accuracy, and longer with decreasing accuracy, up to a max of about 3 miles. This is not counting new long range ammo that is being developed which can fire accurately at about 2.5-3 miles), and that is in modern times, I'd imagine SR tech to push that up a good deal).

Actually not so far off from how it would look. I admit I strongly considered having her drop to a prone position because that would be the firing position she is used to, but I had originally intended the action to be more of a 'look' than an actual fire, and I might still have her drop to prone to take the actual shot (Speaking of which, what kind of action is it to drop to prone?).

The thing with the first picture though, is that the girl in it looks like she is under 5 feet tall, and that the Barret she is holding is the long barrel version (which is 5 feet long). So the girl is a bit small, and the gun is much larger.

I do admit when I first envisioned Hawkeye, I was picturing a smaller rifle (Something much more along the lines of a hunting rifle size), and it is one of those cases where I was just going through the book and going off what it had as opposed to doing any kind of research on the weapon the book was talking about. Like I said, I think the easiest solution to the problem would be to have it be a 'Gun X' which has the same stats presented in the book for a Barrett, but have it be much more reasonably sized.

You can do and have whatever gun you want! I was just pointing out what picture your post brought up in my mind.

Just for clarity, I know SA said that Hodder has done enough resting that he can make his roll to recover upon landing, but did you mean on landing in Egypt, upon landing in Lagos, or on landing in the transfer airport to get in the puddle jumper?

Yeah, I think I'll just have it be 'Gun X' and have it be much smaller if the GM doesn't have a problem with that. Otherwise it does make the game somewhat silly (Which isn't what I intended with the character). I admit I wanted to have the 'little girl with high powered weapon' contrast, but not the FF VII grade 'my weapon is larger than I am, yet I twirl it around in one hand without effort' feel.