Well, from the part about Free Spirits being "paid" in "magical energy" Street Magic, P. 107: Free Spirits and Karma, as one good example. There are a bunch of similar and related references about the two-way bond between a spirit and a mage. For the first part, I was going off there being no such language showing the spirits - summoned OR bound - get anything at all back from the deal. Is that what you were looking for? I need to shinny out the door, but if you want to go further into it, I would be more than willing later on... maybe make a good topic for a new thread. Do note: the fluff itself clearly talks about the debate AROUND THE 6th WORLD about the true nature of the Spirit Realms and how they relate to (meta)humanity, so a debate would probably mirror discussions in academia in the SR universe. *grin*

Yes, I think restricted gear for a power focus 4 is totally lame to be in the rules. 4 BP for binding instead of 40 karma is insane, but on a side point I'm spending BP in nuyen and normally as a mage I'm looking at a pile of cash after a few runs with no idea what I should do with it. And then I end up funding team projects. Anyways there is a reason why we are doing things like restricted gear for power focuses, normally we play more average characters. It is so freaking cheap to get an extra 4 dice for all magic tests that involve the magic attribute thatif it is let in your game it is almost dumb not to take it.

Still I'd assume for a starting mage a magic 4 or 5 and a summoning skill of 4 or 5, with any specializations or mentor spirit bonuses you would get to 11 dice kind of quick. My previous character had a 5 magic and a 4 in the conjuring skill group for 9 dice but I got +2 dice for spirits of man so 11 dice. I went with only a 1 summoning and am riding the power focus bonus train since one of the players wanted to play a summoner who rolled 16 dice to summon water spirits. I let that skill set slide so I would not step on his toes. Since he is a slacker and has missed multiple sessions I have been picking up the summoning slack.(Yeah Chummer I am talking to you)

And yes your character should go back to playing with dolls if you aren't willing to take some pain for the team. You will be facing a lot of dudes with guns shooting at you and your team-mates. If you are not willing to take damage get patched up or mostly pathed up in a controlled environment before hand to mitigate you and your team mates chances of getting killed you character is in the wrong job.

Anyways if the game was designed so that spirits abused edge to resist a simple summon I think they would mention it as a possibility or maybe use it in one of the examples. Now the fluff does specify that they don't like to be bound and fight it with all there might. That is probably why they get x2 force to resist being bound, but I guess you could say they might also use edge. I think its a stretch, but hey go for it. A basic summon though, it doesn't even seem like they dislike being summoned.

Oh certainly. A magician that doesn't think that spirits exist before he "creates" them isn't going to think that they need to be "paid" though he'd understand that he "spends" mana to create them.

Every tradition is going to think of it differently, sure.

But if you amalgamate all of the traditions you can come to some conclusions, the first of which is that spirits regardless of who summoned them, existed in some other plane prior to being summoned.

Zeroth is that spirits are generally smarter than people. We know this because of the rules, a spirit has Force Logic (and other stats), making a Force 8 spirit generally more intelligent than anything living on the planet that didn't have its graymatter replaced with genetically vat grown stuff. A mage who thinks he creates spirits should not be able to conjure up a construct that is smarter than he is, or at least, not smarter by much. The spirit is supposed to be an extension of his own mind, so while to him it could appear that the spirit is smarter than he is (because he has an idea of what "smart" sounds like) in a practical application of logic it wouldn't be able to do any better than its master.

The next conclusion we can draw is that no matter the force of the spirit, all spirits of the same type are identical, save for size and power. All fire spirits have Fire Aura, etc. etc. This implies that "older" spirits are "more powerful" (higher force) and that there is something that a spirit can do to get bigger and stronger over time.

From there we can assume that whatever that is that they can't easily do it on their home plane or they wouldn't leave, ever nor would there be any Force 1 spirits (likewise "fighting each other" doesn't work, as all the force 1s would either be dead or subjugated (subjugated would imply "unavailable for summoning" as they're already serving a master)). But it also means that if it requires leaving their home plane they can't do that easily either, or their home plane would be empty (everyone would have left to go get stronger).

That leaves mages. Mages can summon spirits away from their home plane, implying that this act is at least part of what is necessary for a spirit to grow.

As for the "magically compelled to obey," it's debatable. If you've got a spirit who doesn't want to interpret your instructions it will find a way to avoid them. "Get rid of this obstacle" might not in fact be to remove the obstruction, but to conceal it from view. "Haha, very funny." Spirits are very smart, especially if also very powerful and we have rules (or at least guidelines) for how spirits should regard someone who abuses spirits.

Also, spirits are beings of magic, there's no reason we can't assume that the contract entered into by the spirit is some form of geas. People don't like them either, but how many mages out there have at least one? Raise your hands please. Yes, a geas that says you have to wear gloves or you can't cast spells counts, even though there's no real detriment....

So a spirit allows itself to be summoned in order to leave its home plane so it can Grow Wiser, Gain Experience, and Become A Better Person. It does this through a binding magical contract and receives some kind of payment for having served its time.

You know, it doesn't sound a whole lot different than the piece of paper I signed a month or two back in order to have a job. Might not be magical, but it sure is legal! Nothing I can do to avoid certain clauses (say if I steal the source code to the software I'm using and publish it online, that would violate my contract and cost me quite heavily! I wouldn't even think of doing it).

“Almost dumb not to take it�. That DOES sound an awful lot like the complaint regarding FFBA in another thread. Fortunately, the GM must approve each and every individual item you wish to purchase with “Restricted Gear�. I can easily see a GM explaining that they feel it would unbalance their campaign to have a beginning character start with a force 4 power focus.




The thing that kills me is the discrepancy I find between threads. In another thread, I was criticized for assuming that shadowrunners built standing and balanced teams, trading off abilities and skills to maximize capabilities and ensure coverage and backup coverage. Now I am hearing that first, teams like I was advocating are the norm. Second, I am hearing that those teams are SO close, that a mage should be willing to unflinchingly shoot themselves in the arm with a light pistol so their team can have a bigger, badder spirit along for the run. Let us be clear: physical drain is not just a nose bleed and a headache. It is physical damage no different than being shot with a light pistol! Minimum damage with a light pistol is 5P with 1 net hit, staged down once or twice is 3P damage. What you are stating, flat out, is that to be a “team player�, before each run, a mage has to “shoot themselves in the foot� in order to pull up an over-casted spirit. Even if a medic can patch it up quickly, the duration is still extremely painful for the magician. That’s pretty ruthless, expecting the mage to routinely “take a bullet� like that. Do you expect the samurai to make a similar sacrifice? All SHE has to do is check out her weapons and load a couple clips. In what world (with genuine human motivations) is that going to be considered “normal�? The phrase “walk it off, pussy!� doesn’t even BEGIN to cover how callous an attitude you’re describing, or how self-sacrificing your magician would have to be.

Then we get to the other part of the problem: if you ‘runners can come up with the idea, what’s to stop the corp you’re running against from doing the same drekking thing? They have many times the resources, and if they bind the spirit, they can get extended use out of it. Or how about just putting up force 10 mana barriers? Spirits are dual-natured when manifested, and if tagging along astrally, they still face the barrier. If they can’t make it through, there went your “mitigation�. If you always use the same trick, why shouldn’t the corps recognize it and adapt? And that doesn’t begin to look at the issue of hiding a force 8 spirit tagging along behind you. There are so many other ways to achieve many of the same ends without the physical damage. You’re a mage …quot; cast spells. They are versatile and can be dialed up or down as the situation merits. It is as much my teammates’ responsibility as mine as a spell-caster to “mitigate� our chances of getting killed. There are just too many ways to nix a powerful spirit or at least minimize its usefulness to make the REAL injury either appropriate or necessary. Adding a competent dispeller on the other side by itself will reduce the effectiveness of your spirit tremendously. It always comes down to “what do poor mundanes do against the evil spirit?!� Get their own mage, of course.




Again: we aren’t talking a “simple summons�. We are talking about a summons from an individual known for callous cruelty and disregard to spirits. The phrase “oh, hell no, not me!� comes to mind. Spirits also have some innate intelligence, and if they are resentful enough, they might choose to misinterpret your instructions as they see fit. For a normal mage calling an unbound spirit, it’s probably not much more than an annoyance, a temporary distraction. Some traditions make a point of showing gratitude to the spirit for its service. But many people here seem to regard a spirit like a drone or a slave. It is neither. We’re not talking about generally penalizing every mage who summons a lot. We’re talking about characters (players) who treat spirits as disposable, consumable and unaware. If you think that might include yourself, ask yourself why; Are you really that callous to your spirits? If you think your GM might use that against you inappropriately, that prompts a totally different question, doesn’t it?



I’m not talking about injecting “Reality� into a game. I’m talking about using a little common sense and considering the (meta)human side of your character when you do things like “take 3 to 4 physical drain for the team� so they don’t think you’re a wuss. Every team member has a responsibility to carry their own weight and help ensure the success of the mission and the survival of the members on the team. The face is supposed to get you through checkpoints without guns being drawn. The sneak is supposed to get inside and disable security to let you past. The hacker gives you “papers� or fakes the system into letting you in. The armorer makes sure you have the best and RIGHT weapons and armor on hand for the mission at hand. The rigger provides recon and transportation to keep you out of harm’s way. The mage is your Swiss Army Knife, and depending on their build, can fill any of those roles with spells, spirits or personal astral projection. The Samurai is for main line combat when every other person has failed. If you approach that in reverse order, utilizing a “facial ballistics� approach, you’ve exempted the rest of the team from their nominal obligations and responsibilities to the team; Why have them at all? And before somebody jumps on that, yes, some missions DO specifically call for wounding or killing a person or group of persons: but that’s an objective, not a means. Creativity and adaptability are much more powerful and versatile tools than just having a heap big spirit tagging along.

However, neither are mutually exclusive.

From my perspective, which does not apply to Killfist nor am I speaking for him in any way, we are testing the game and not GM fiat. Any game can leave countless decisions to the GM, good games have handy rules built in. Examples of possible GM fiat, as brought up in only the last handful of posts, include,

* Edge rolls by spirit on Summon
* Edge rolls by spirit on Bind (though this is explicitly mentioned as a possibility, so its only slightly less fiat)
* What constitutes Spirit abuse, What spirits would find annoying. (Add in traditions and this is a big ball of fiat)
* What someone can and cannot take Restricted Gear and purchase

I think SR4 is a good game, so don't read any false implication previous statement. However, I think it could be a better game. To this end we are trying to figure out where problems may exist and then test it over and over to see if its really a problem. An example would be Adrenal Pump. I waited numerous sessions and PC collapses before I posted asking why Adrenal Pump is so terribly flawed. As easy as it is to call Big Fraggin Spirits ™, I don't think its broken yet. Big Fraggin Sprites ™ , heeh TM, may be but I won't put up a thread on the subject till I have more data.

As to the various posters telling you how to play, including Killfist, I officially say "Meh". Its your game, play it how you and your group like it. Play and have fun, everything else is way out there on the importance scale.

Oh, and yes I do have fun testing systems. I am a Rod Damned Engineer, its in my blood.

BlueMax

True enough.


Oh, fiat you! *thbbbbbbbt*


"If it doesn't fit, force it; If it breaks, it needed replacing anway." -The Dwarven Axiom, also, Engineer's Creed

Oddly enough, using Karma Gen reduces the abuse of foci in character creation. I've got a magician and two adepts in my group, none of which started with a focus of qany sort.

Just so. That's actually why I assembled the character gen packets like I did for our group: we're using Karma with a couple tweaks (we arent't counting magical/virtuakinetic qualities against the 35 BP / 70 Karma cap). Nobody started with a focus. Not one. The GM decided he wasn't comfortable with Initiation/Immersion to start which threw a couple of us off stride. If they are limited to F2 at start, they are less attractive as well; They are certainly far less unbalancing that way. All our GM did was decide to get VERY hard on the "Restricted Gear" quality. Nobody wound up thinking it was worth it. The Sammie decided it wasn't worth the extra to start with the Suprathyroid since the GM was wavering on allowing it.

True. I talked about this with one of my players last night while eating dinner. We have not thoroughly playtested the Karma system but understand most of the concepts.

When we approached using karma, most of our BP builds had 1-200 karma left to spend. We must have done something wrong.

BlueMax

Were you using the increased Attribute costs from SR4A?

Yes. We did every character and we made a spreadsheet. The only guy who came close was the Troll and it seemed that was only because it penalizes his 10 and 9 stats.
I thought the system would work better if karma hit your unmodified(racially) stats. But then again, thats just early speculation as I haven't spent enough time on karma yet.

BlueMax

corporate wagemages don't do the big summons because they have to be available all day, every day. they don't work one day a week/month/whatever, they can't just sleep it off later, they have to be up at 6:00 AM the next day to do it all over again. additionally, their magician isn't routinely in situations where he's gonna be facing almost certain death should he not give it everything he's got. their magician is actually in a situation where he can say "no, i don't feel like doing that" most of the time, because they're rare and not particularly replaceable, particularly magicians who can routinely conjure force 8 spirits successfully (never mind your proposed binding of force 8 spirits, which is not cheap, and generally not worth it for most applications)

for a shadowrunning magician, *not* having that high force spirit can get you killed. being able to choose to take that in controlled conditions, when you are not distracted, and have time to recover, most shadowrunner magicians should be choosing to summon in advance, as strong of a spirit as they can handle, because that's part of their job. nobody expects the magician to go toe-to-toe with a cockatrice, that's the sam's job. nobody asks the magician to risk his brain getting fried by black IC, that's the hacker's job. nobody asks the magician to be the most well-known person in the group, and try to sleaze his way into situations where saying the wrong thing could mean being found out and killed, that's the face's job. but they do ask the magician to take some drain to summon spirits, because that *is* the magician's job. and quite frankly, having a spirit makes you MORE versatile, not less. there is nothing less versatile about being able to use the fear power to scare off a bunch of paracritters, or using the influence power (which, by the way, is not subject to counterspelling) to make a guard more helpful, or using the concealment power to be harder to notice. only one of those is a combat application, but in all three cases you will notice a difference between having a force 3 spirit on hand, and a force 8.

and no, we aren't discussing a specific mage who abuses spirits. you are. we aren't. we have nothing to indicate that summoning a force 8 spirit constitutes abuse of the spirit. what if the magician isn't abusing spirits? assuming that the summoner is abusing spirits and advocating punishing the summoner for doing so without even knowing enough to make the judgement call is absurd. if you want to bring up the specific case of a magician that is abusive, that's fine, but it certainly isn't generally applicable accross the board to all magicians, and in a discussion about all magicians it isn't really relevant.

As it should be...

Bluemax:

Yeah it works a lot better when there's an up front cost for your statline and racial abilities. (2x BP cost in karma).

Then buy stats like a human. Then add the positive and negative racial mods last... works a lot better.

But that's heavily discussed house rules. As karmagen has come up a few times as badly broken as written.

For the record, in our game, any spirit of Force 4+ generally uses edge to resiste the summoning on general purposes... now, if the mage in question works with the spirits and treats them well, that sometimes boosts upwards to Force 5 or even force 6, depending upon trhe spirits and the mage in question... as you say, Force 3 and lower spirits are a dime a dozen and are extremely useful outside of combat, and as long as the mage is not abusive to these lowly spirits they will generally not resist too much (won't spend edge)

This has worked exceptionally well to curtail the craziness of massive summonings and bindings of HIGH force spirits just because I can have a Dice pool approaching 20+ (if I wanted)... The most memorable scene in our game was when the mage tried summoning a Force 5 Spirit (because he could, and he was gonna have the spirit Spell bind a spell, after it was bound to him). when he attempted the summons, the spirit obtained 10 successes on the resistance (spent edge)... needless to say, the mage was in a rather uncomfortable position as he now had to soak 20 boxes of physical damage... he did so (he had 15 dice in drain) taking only a measly 8 boxes of damage... after the spirit metaphysically kicked his ass, he opted for a much smaller spirit to hold the spell for him... not a bad choice in the long run...

And no, the GM was not being a dick about it, but it was a good learning experience for the mage player, as he tended to abuse the spirits that he summoned, not really caring whether or not the spirits survived... guess what, he does not do that anymore...

Who says they have to be available all the time? Who says the corps can't hire them to work in shifts at important sites? They aren't going to waste live magical talent in some drekky little office. They will keep their pool of (good) talent concentrated where it can be of most use and respond in a nodal defense with mundane response teams to non-core offices at need. The old SR2 Security Handbook had examples, and the Runner's Companion mentions it under Security for Advanced Lifestyles that high security areas have bound spirits on constant patrol. Being Awakened puts you on a diferent playing field as a corporate person. Somebody has to summon those spirits, and the material costs are fully justified especially in comparison to the wages a highly trained security mage commands. Who do you think sets up the big wards? It's not all about "mana fungus" or "astral bacteria" - those are mundane ways to fortify lower end facilities and back up the primary defenses of prime targets. You hit it right on the head: they are relatively rare and not very replacable. So why would a corp treat them like a common wage slave? The two are mutually exclusive in a smart corp - and if they weren't smart, they wouldn't have the security we're discussing in the first place. Your low level "door" mages would be on simple rotating schedules and not permanently on-call, either. Rest is more critical to effective functioning of a mage than nearly any other profession save the virtuakinetics and air trafic controlers in places too primitive to have dedicated computer approach control but enough trafic to demand a full-time crew. The ones "on-call" are the ones who set up the wards, summon the bound security and patrol spirits, and respond to things like shadowrunners breaking into a secure facility.
Sorry, but your statements are contradicted in multiple canon publications. Given their resources, larger corps are MORE likely to employ "expensive" magical defenses because they CAN. And if you're routinely pulling off jobs because you're toting along that heap big F8 elemental, believe with your last breath the corps are going to counter that in kind, and in very short order. They spy on each other asiduously, especially in the areas of security. If Corp A and Corp B get bull rushed by a group of 'runners packing a high force spirit, not only are A and B going to soup up their Awakened defenses "after the horse is out of the barn", but C and D and E and all the rest are going to quietly apply those lessons to their own procedures as well. The next run, you run into a nasty surprise or three, and with your spirit's services burned up (or banished or blown to mana-bunnies), you need to improvise somehow. Whereas if you had used those alternate methods rather than the same hole care, they wouldn't have had a chance to adapt. The corps are anything but stupid. If anything, they prey on the runners more that the reverse.


Let me ask you a question: when do you summon this unbound spirit? The rules still say an unbound spirit vanishes at sunrise or sunset. That means if it's a run for that night, you can't call the thing in until after sunset. Flip that for the day. And you can only have a single unbound spirit at a time.
SR4A, P.186: Spirit Services.
A spirit will perform the services it owes until the next sunrise or sunset. At that time, regardless of any remaining services or what it was doing, the spirit will depart and return to its home deep in astral space.
How many services do you get on your average roll? What do you do on the 'run when those are used up? How does your spirit deal with heavy-duty wards? How does it deal with awakened security (say, bound security spirits)?
You mentioned Fear, Influence and Concealment. I can agree on force being important in those circumstances. But there are spells to do the same things. It doesn't REQUIRE a spirit. To get the spirit to help you on the 'run, it needs to be able to get past any wards. Spirits are invisible on the Material, but on the astral? A mage assensing you isn't going to notice the F8 pet following you around? Foci can do the same sustaining tricks without the personal blood sacrifice.
A magician's JOB is to deal with magic, period. If they can do it in a way that does not leave them weakened or cause them pain, they are going to try it that way. I won't deny the RAW benefits of what you are describing, but you need to address the drawbacks I mentioned and how you compensate for them in game terms. I am saying that Crunch & Munch aside, it makes no sense for a magician to do that to themselves (twice) daily when they can accomplish the same ENDS in different ways, if you look at it from the actual character's perspective. Most of those other methods are as reliable or MORE reliable because they can be there when you need them, unlike a spirit whose services got burned up and left, or couldn't beat the ward to get in with you and, oops, tipped off the security mage.


Summoning a force 8 spirit doesn not in itself constitute abuse. I'm pretty sure I didn't say it was. If she's not abusing the spirits, then the proposed rule wouldn't affect her, now would it? If I recall, the proposition was a means to convince abusive summoners to re-consider their actions. Why is that an assumption of anything or absurd? Applied to all magicians, most would never run across that little aspect, because most are at worst indifferent. I can't decide if you're intentionally trying to twist what I am actually saying, or missing the point entirely. I am going to choose to believe it's the second and respond accordingly. The idea as presented was that abusive mages would find their lives complicated further and further in relations with the spirit world until it either a) killed them or b) they figured it out. To the mages who were indifferent but not callous and abusive, they would notice nothing whatsoever. And mages who went out of the way to be respectful of the spirits and so on might even see a small reduction in the difficulties involved with summoning. In what way does that require me to pull out a speciffic mage as an example. Please don't confuse the fact that we are discussing multiple topics simultaneously in the same thread; the discussion about routinely bringing in a F8 spirit with medic assisted summoning prior to a run is entirely separate from this discussion about relations with the spirit world. If you want to mix them, that's up to you. I am entirely content to look at them individually on their merits.

And Besides... Per rules in SR4A, You cannot heal drain with Magic, nor can you heal stun damage with medicine (though you can compensate for a short time)... so patching the mage before the run is not goingg to work... best case your mage rests for an hour or two to heal the Stun damage before the run starts...

That's new to my ears.

*cracks knuckles metaphorically*


OK, I like where you're starting here. The problem is your logic could be read as "Since we can prove oranges are orange, apples must be orange too". Yes, a F8 spirit is going to have a higher logic stat than the summoner in most likelyhood. If you're agreeing that they shouldn't be able to bring in a spirit substantially "smarter" because their own mind shapes them, that's false. They are bringing in a spirit most suited to themselves, their needs, their tradition(s) and their perceptions. The end result of that summoning need have nothing to do with the summoner's base cognitive abilities.


Untrue, on the face of it. While it is true that all spirits that can be generally compared by what we would refer to as their "type" share certain minimum identical traits (thus the reason we group them together in the first place), greater spirits can posses a wide variety of additional observed abilities. And some theorize that spirits may be able to draw on the inate mana of their native meta-plane to fortify and improve themselves in some manner.


Given that there are things which can inherently disrupt and permanently reduce a spirit's force, I see no reason their "progression" over time need to be exclusively one-way. That could easily explain the number of spirits of lower forces. And who is to say what number of spirits of any given force exist? We can only say that the incidence of lower force spirits is much higher on the Material Plane due to the ease with which lower level mages (and frugal experienced mages) summon them in the first place. Given the dangers of attempting to summon spirits of collosal power, who is to say that the metaplanes are not rife with demigods of energy?


The fact that they CAN be summoned away from their home planes in now way leads to the conclusion that a spirit will grow from any such experience, or that such an experience in any way enables them to improve themselves. For that matter, it may be that on the distant metaplanes from which these spirits hail, it may be their natural development to spontaneously form from a confluence of magical energy as virtual demigods, like ethereal magical suns, and slowly consume themselves, drifting towards oblivion?


Contract? What contract? We are not speaking of negotiations with a Free Spirit. We are discussing simple summoning or binding. Evidence [ed: the rules and fluff] shows that spirits actively resist binding. Why are we to assume they would not actively fight temporary bondage? There is no negotiations with a summoned spirit, merely a contest of wills. A wise magician limits themselves to spirits whose will they feel certain to be able to best. Willing contracte would, in all probability, carry all the weight of a geas, but also that bond would go towards the magician as well, as a contract is by definition an agreement between two parties.


I do not see proof that a spirit "allows" itself to be summoned; neigh, I would contend that evidence [ed: again, the rules and fluff] suggests it is merely a failure to resist said summons that results in the spirit being pulled from it's home at all. Now, as I said, Free Spirits and Karmic Contracts with mortals are a totally separate issue! But if you consider my arguments, I believe you will find that their logic is both sound and persuasive.

(OK, that was fun.)

Tymeus:
You're WAY too strict w/ that. Spirits under force 3 are a waste of time for most things. Only really good as a nuisance. They can't even take a hit from a spitwad in a fight. I'd say you'd be more likely to be considered 'abusing' low force spirits than high force ones... as they're far more likely to die before you can release them. (yes I do spend actions to release a wounded spirit and don't have it just go til it's forcably dematerialized).

Hardened armor is only of value when it's enough that you can bounce a fair number of the basic pistol shots (or even an AR). And low force spirits don't have enough of it to be even slighly meaningfull. Let alone enough dice to be very usefull to a lot of things. (at those levels they're really only usefull for giving a small die penalty w/ things like concealment).

Force 1-3.... generally jokes
4-6... generally usefull and well balanced
7+... things start getting iffy depending on the type of game. But can easily lead to monstrous drain. Anyone who plans to summon these regularly has better have centering and a good edge.

I have nothing against getting a bad drain check on a high force (yes I overcast for force 6... my magic was 5... but we were going into a force 3 background count... so to get at least force 3 left... I had to). And with 2 drain per hit on the resistance spirit summoning is high risk because sometimes you get next to nothing... other times it really does hurt.

Use of background counts and such, actually enforcing visibility and other situation negative dicepool mods is a much better way to keep your mages in check. That fancy spirit isn't much good when suddenly caught in a mana static and it's force collapses from 7 to 2 and the street sam fills it full of lead while laughing maniacally.

Yeah, hate to do it, but I have to agree with Draco18 here. It does say First Aid can succeed in healing EITHER stun OR physical damage as long as applied within 12 hours of injury and that the injury has not been already healed magically. Nothing says you can't follow up with magic afterwards, either.
I agree that the idea of actually fully regenerating the damage from a gunshot wound in as many turns as there are boxes of damage is beyond even the fantastical technology of the 6th world. If it was that capable, why are there extended healing times? First aid has always been (in real life) about applying treatment allowing the injured person to continue on so they can get the rest or further assistance necessary to fully heal. I would say that (as a house rule, but a common sense one, especially to cut down on some of the Crunch & Munch) the rules for First Aid apply as written for the purposes of completing a scene or adventure by negating the EFFECTS of the injury, but that truly recovering would require the rules under medicine and extended healing. That makes it so 'runners that are patched up DO have to spend some down time resting and healing. Magical healing would be exempt from that since it is bringing in so much power, has the ability to manipulate the flesh at an intrinsic level (hence the penalties for essence loss), and causes such heavy drain on the part of the healing magician for anything like a grievous wound.

Actually the book is quite specific... drain can never be magically healed. (p253, magical healing)
That was also in the errata prior to 4A IIRC.

And stun can be first-aided. (or medicined away w/ supervised rest for extra recovery dice).

ok, so we're agreed that abusive conjurrors have nothing to do with how probable it is for force 8 spirits to be routinely summoned by shadowrunners. i'd ask why you brought it up, but frankly i don't care enough to discuss it.

moving on, then: nothing does what concealment does. absolutely nothing. it reduces the opponent's perception dicepool. you don't have spells that do that. you can make yourself invisible, but you can't just give your opponent no dicepool. concealment can do that. and it isn't subject to counterspelling or being dispelled, because it isn't a spell, it's a critter power.

likewise, there are no spells that do what fear does. nothing even really comes close. it is ludicrously powerful, and once again ignores counterspelling.

influence also ignores counterspelling, and doesn't require you to know the spell, just that you have the right kind of spirit.

and the proper use of concealment and influence in the right places can make the difference between the corporation not knowing you were ever there. i didn't say that you need a force 8 spirit so you can kill everything in sight as your first option, i said that having a force 8 spirit in reserve is a huge deal, and it can make the difference between success and failure. how many services do you get? doesn't matter. it's better than the 0 services you'll have from *not* summoning a force 8 spirit.

and for the record, not very many people routinely bind force 8 spirits. so those immensely powerful mages, you think they're gonna be assigned to conjuring spirits for guard duty? binding isn't free, and your best mages are more likely to be in more lucrative areas than binding force 8 security spirits. areas like research, for example. conjuring force 8 spirits is great for a shadowrunner, who is going to be close to where he wants the spirit. not very useful for the mage in a central location... they can't just do a summon and send the spirit away, they have to go with the spirit. thusly, if you have mages summoning (but not binding) these spirits, then you're saying you have these high-end magicians (enough dice to routinely beat a force 8 spirit on a summoning test is not trivial) patrolling on security details in or near the facility. that just doesn't make sense. you have a highly trained magical asset, and you're assigning them to a job where they usually don't even need to be there? (i don't know how often places get hit by shadowrunners in your world, but i'm guessing that a given location will have a shadowrun against it less than once every two days. more likely weeks or months, on average).

and for the bound spirits, same thing. sure, there might be force 8 spirits on call somewhere. but you're not going to see everyone putting force 8 spirits everywhere. that's too expensive, to deal with something that probably won't ever come your way. responding with force 8 spirits on security detail in every facility is not a viable response... not when it's a heck of a lot cheaper to put reasonably sturdy wards in (which you can do with a bunch of low-force spirits, by the way) and rely on those. the very highest security areas might have force 8 spirits on standby, but everywhere? not a chance. not even normal high security areas will be willing to blow a service every day on that. not when there's cheaper alternatives (just throw in a few of those plants that create a background count, for example).

and once again, this assumes the corps even know they've been hit by a force 8 spirit. it could be just hanging out in the astral, back at some random place on the street (you might have asked it to sustain concealment on the group, for example, and if it only had one service anyways you may as well make it remote). with everything taking a -8 to perceive you, including sensors of all types, you've got rather good odds of making it through without getting detected, and even if you do, the corps aren't going to respond with force 8 spirits to attack you, because that doesn't help. the spirit may not even leave the astral, or even be seen, or even be in the corp facility. how do they know it was a force 8? it's not like they have the spirit forceometer issued to every guard, you know. it's like the rigger having a flying drone force with ares alphas loaded with APDS and frag grenades; just because you have it, doesn't mean you have to use it, and just because they have alphas doesn't mean they suddenly can't be used for surveillance in the right situation. but having the option to bring in the drone cavalry is always better than not having the option to bring in the drone cavalry. just like having a force 8 spirit on hand just in case is always better than not having a force 8 spirit on hand just in case. especially given it can still do all the stuff that a force 3 or 4 spirit could do if you summoned it on the fly during the run.

Isn't it about time for a new thread, considering what the topic of thise one is?

I was wondering how stick and shock became a 5 page thread myself. The term I think is threadcreep.

No thread stays on topic forever. From Where I Come From, the average was about 2 posts.

Back to SnS:

I don't see how it's remotely defensible to say that tasers or SnS rounds can't be more damaging with more hits on the test. Yes, they have a maximum electricity discharge, but that doesn't mean much. Extra hits, among other things, represent a more accurate shot, and accuracy DOES matter with these types of things. As a quick example, a jolt of electricity applied directly over the heart is a lot more likely to be seriously damaging (causing the heart to spasm and possibly even stop briefly) than one applied to the foot (causing at worst bad muscle cramps), even if both areas are equally armored and equally conductive. As with anything else, application of power is at least as important as amount of power.

Per a single SET of wounds, you may only use first aid once for Physical or Stun (p242, BBB) so why would you attempt to heal stun (which heals in an hour or two) when you can apply it to the Physical damage... I just see no real reason for wasting time healing stun damage with first aid...

But you are right... You may heal stun if within 12 hours of taking it with a first aid roll...

My Mistake... I have just never had a reason to do so...

Well that's because you're obviously heavily biased against magic users and guys who try and use spirits appropriately.

God forbid, that they get 30seconds of medical treatment to reduce their stun track in between fights.

I've never had a reason to as well, because I always overcast.

Not only that but you guys jump to First Aid as SOP any moment its clear. Even if someone could shake off 2 boxes of Stun, it wouldn't matter because the damn medic is already all over him!!

/me shakes a fist in rage

I started charging them 50 nuyen medkit refills per use and they still laugh at me.


BlueMax

Well I don't got time to bleed. So a medic patches me up before I waste any time.

Such Vitroil... Not even warranted I would say... I enjoy playing Mages and Adepts, and have had no problems with the contstraints placed upon me by my GM... I DO believe that spirits are the "be all and end all" of a lot of posters here on Dumpshock... That is just an opinion, but by the number of posts that support that I do not think that I am too far off here...

As for healing in combat... that just is not very realistic now is it?

I have been pretty busy the last couple days, and I wanted to make sure I had time to reply to your post as it deserved.





I could go back and reread exactly what I said, but I am pretty sure what the gist was: there are always other ways. I wasn’t trying to put down the abilities of the spirit that are unique. One of the things I have said in several threads now is that spirits are powerful and capable. I am not trying to diminish that in the least. But does the whole team need to get in to begin with? Control thoughts and alter memory can be just as effective when trying to get in. I just don’t see “loading up� with a Force 8 spirit as a pre-requisite for a run like making sure you have a full clip in your Colt Manhunter; I especially don’t see it as a “required service� of a team mage, especially if it requires overcasting.





True. The problem is that it’s kind of like a LAW rocket at that point, but with a very short timer. It’s very powerful against the first target or obstacle, but after that it’s an empty tube.





Wait, what makes you say force 8 spirits aren’t “routinely� bound? If you want to be accurate, not many spirits get bound at all, given the relatively small percentage of the Awakened who are capable (mages or mystic adepts as opposed to adepts), have developed their gift, are not aspected so as to be restricted, have the training and the resources required, and have the desire to actually bind such a being. But as you were so observant to point out, higher level spirits have a distinct advantage over lower level ones, so if you CAN summon them, why WOULDN’T you summon one? And if drain is so easy to heal, why WOULDN’T the corp have a medic on standby? I need to double check if you can have assistance on the summoning or not, but if you can, the corp would be more likely to have the resources to provide the assistants. And as I said, if you’re going to the trouble of binding a spirit that strong, the cost isn’t that prohibitive to a multi-national, much less a AAA. And if a mage capable of summoning a force 8 spirit is “immensely powerful�, then isn’t your shadowrunning mage too? Why would the opposition Awakened support necessarily be less able than the ‘runner? And who said anything about F8 spirits being the ones on guard duty? A summoning mage is instantly aware when their spirit has been disrupted, so even a F5 of F6 spirit for guard duty is sufficient as a trip wire, notifying the remote higher level mage there’s trouble. I said nothing about the “immensely powerful� mages being on-site all the time. Once they summon the low level bound spirit (with a lot of services because of the lower force) they can be ordered to be remote and patrol. So the mage can stay remote. What I was referring to was the lower level on-site mage who might be assensing at the door for example; They just might notice when the spirit tries to come in. And you are absolutely right about the likelihood of any specific target being hit by ‘runners, but there are runs going on all the time; Remember just how interlinked the corps and their subsidiaries are, and that corporate security is a high priority for all these companies because of the THREAT of a ‘run against the facility. These aren’t rent-a-cops at the mall I’m talking about; these guys have skills and experience and the right gear for the job.





No, they won’t have the high level spirits everywhere, but they don’t need them everywhere as I mentioned above. And wards are one of the issues I mentioned before: how do you get the spirit in with you past them without tipping security? That’s a question I asked, and you didn’t manage to answer. The other thing you failed to address was the daybreak to sunset clock on unbound spirits; when do you actually do that summoning and then the attendant first-aid? I think you said you might still have a box or two on the damage track afterwards, but that was “no big deal�. Mages tend to be more fragile than sammies (or nearly anybody else for that matter). That box could easily (especially if physical from overcastting) be the difference between life and death. And as to the “services per day� issue, it’s part of the upkeep of the security for the location, just like it’s the upkeep in the “security� aspect of a lifestyle over a given level.





They don’t have to know the exact force of the spirit, just that it was “powerful�. And at -8 on visual detection, I know I am probably going to have a good chance of spotting your party, and I’m a starting runner. A primary skill for a security guard is perception, and by training it would ordinarily be visual. Throw in cybereyes for the guy with +3 to the visual check and they could easily still have a decent supply of dice left. And only one of your people has to do badly then on their infiltration, since the lowest dice pool is your weak link; how stealthy is your decker? But your point is well stated about not HAVING to use it. On the other hand, if you’re looking at me as the team mage, and telling me (in character or out) that you “expect� me to overcast before every run with the chance of substantial un-healable damage right before the run (remember the daybreak to sunset clock) on the off chance we MIGHT need the thing… your character isn’t going to like the response. And any “human� NPC mage is going to respond the same way. The mage leaves the decking to the decker, the rigging to the rigger, and the heavy combat to the samurai; leave the magic to your mage. It’s up to all of you to come up with the best possible plan based on what your legwork and the Johnson gave you to meld your abilities and talents while minimizing your weaknesses. Remember: summoning is just a complex action. If push comes to shove, I can (and have, since it’s no longer hypothetical) summon up that spirit and deal with the consequences until the medic can get to me. (By the way, what ELSE does your medic do on the team, since I can’t see you taking up a chair at the table with a pure support character like that.) I have also overcast to beat the OR threshold and bring down a drone that was murdering our group with a minigun; I was seriously hurt but it let us get away. I won’t argue THAT was part of my job, because it was, and it was the right thing to do at the time. Finally, if you summon spirits inside the wards, the wards are no longer an issue.

"Apropriately" is subjective as drekk, don't you think? And since I PREFER to play awakened characters, and ROUTINELY give my GMs fits with creativity and tactics, I will reitterate that "apropriate" use of ANY awakened power is highly subjective.

I don't have a problem with the "stun" track being healed between fights. In fact, it makes a hell of a lot of sense. Or the physical track since the rules permit it. But the word "stun" means the mage wasn't overcasting, and almost everything for the last page was talking about force levels that would almost have to be overcasting unless it's a particularly advanced character. But that's damage taken on the 'run itself. That's wear-and-tear, consequences of actual events, not just subjecting yourself to severe pain and physical damage in case you might need that spirit, a spirit that only lasts until the next sunset or sunrise since the discussion keeps mentioning they aren't being bound.

it is still better to have access to a LAW, whether you use it or not, than it is to not have access to a LAW.

binding a force 8 spirit can and eventually will result in eating 32 points of drain. summoning a force 8 spirit can and eventually will result in eating 16 points of drain. in both cases reduced by drain pool (and, given this isn't exactly a grunt, probably edge since they have individual edge). therefore, people don't bind force 8 spirits often, because sooner or later you're going to get hit with 32P damage, and that is going to have a rather negative impact on your survival when you are 12 boxes into your overflow (ie dead) as compared to 2 or 3 boxes into overflow, or possibly not quite enough to put you into overflow (ie not dead). the corporations think in terms of mass production, and if one in every 100 bindings is going to result in losing a powerful magician, that adds up really quickly to them. if they have only 5 of these magicians and the world and it happens 1 in 100 times, that's 1 per month. guess they better head off to the magemart and buy a new mage to bind force 8 spirits for them... oh wait, seems none of the magicians in town want to go sit on death row for your bottom line. wonder why. it isn't worth risking your top mages to suddenly dissolve into a puddle of gore, particularly given it's not a risk of *will* it happen, but merely a risk of *when* it will happen. and again, this supposes you even have your top mages working security instead of research. the corps can probably get as many *summoned* force 8 spirits as they want. but bound? not a chance. you're looking at someone throwing 16 dice just to average 1 service from the spirit. that's 6 magic + 6 skill + 2 specialisation + 2 focus. even if you bump it up a little, not the greatest odds of getting a lot from the spirit, and there's still the problem of the exploding magician (who takes all those services with him when he goes)

even if you can use a force 5 or 6 spirit (which is also not trivial to bind, though probably not too horribly rare to summon), these security mages are going to have a hard time covering every single site. the megas have lots of resources to protect with, but they also have lots of resources to protect, and they have to stay competitive. that means lower expenses. or hey, you try and convince management that it's worth 4000 a day (that's a new drone every 2-3 days) per facility, assuming you can even cover it with 1 spirit (good luck). far more likely, he'll settle for a few paracritters, and the ability to call on a pair of force 4 spirits if they ever really need it. you don't need to destroy the spirit; the spirit isn't there to steal your prototype, copy your data, or extract your employees. it's there because a magician told it to be there. wasting time and resources dealing with something that isn't the source of the problem isn't gonna make him rise through the ranks, and neither is spending resources on something you don't need. the megas didn't get rich by throwing a ton of money at every little problem. regular security guards will not be impressive. it's not their job to stop the runners, it's their job to call in backup and do their best to slow the runners down by indirect methods. they really are pretty much just mooks; it's the HTR team you have to worry about.

as far as the leftover damage, i don't recall saying it's no big deal. but if you're getting shot at, it's entirely possible that could have been prevented with the help of a high-force spirit. perhaps you could've snuck in better, perhaps you could've gotten away a little faster, perhaps you could've avoided a problem entirely.

also, getting spotted when your opponent's have -8 to their dice pool is a joke. if the security guards even have +3 vision enhancement (remember, expenses, expenses... the security chief doesn't get to decide his budget, and his boss doesn't get to look good by spending a lot of money. note that the standard security guard grunt doesn't even have vision enhancement 1, or even low-light or thermo) and 3 skill (improbable; opening up my copy of SR4A and going to the grunts section, i see that the standard for security guards, grunt or lieutenant, is 0) and intuition 3 (well, this is likely enough), that would be a dice pool of 9. take away 8, and all you need is something that gives them a penalty (like, for example, not specifically trying to spot the runners, which is handy if nobody's spotted you yet and they have no reason to suspect that this is the one night this year there actually is a runner team) and even a well-trained, well-equipped guard has no chance of spotting you. and you don't even have to bring it in with you. put it on a remote service of sitting in a public park while sustaining it's concealment power on you.

if you want a nice, safe job, where you never expect to feel pain, then go work for a corporation creating wards. if you're a shadowrunner, well, guess what; it's never safe. your whole life is based on you taking risks of getting hurt. if you're not comfortable with the idea that you might get hurt, you picked the wrong job. maybe you should go try McHughs, i hear they're always hiring. be careful though, you might get some grease spattered on your hands, and that stuff is hot... it might be too risky for you.

(seriously, if you're not comfortable with routinely facing pain, then you shouldn't be a shadowrunner of any kind. as a magician, there are many lucrative job opportunities where you aren't going to get shot at. in fact, more-or-less any shadowrunner could find a job that is safer, pays well, and doesn't involve routinely risking your life. this is only moreso if you are a magician. if you are a runner and a magician, you chose to give up a comfortable life where you get regular hours and low-to-no risk, and you are choosing to do that every day, because you could still walk up to some company and offer your services. the discomfort and pain that comes from being a runner is the price of your freedom from the corps. maybe you don't need to summon a force 8 spirit every time, but you had best be summoning the best *you* can handle, because if you need it and you don't have (and a lot can happen in a complex action) that can mean your entire team just died or was captured. it's not "oops, we're going to be one day late constructing this building", it's "oops, looks like i just got the street sam shot with an LMG and the hacker is bleeding out of his ears and the face is unarmed in a room full of people with bodyguards who now know he's here to distract them for us".)

Perhaps you could wear a Chameleon Suit... -4 to the perception test... just as good as a Force 4 Spirit...

One teensey weensey little problem with a Chameleon Suit: if the DO manage to see you, what then? "Excuse me, sir, but where the hell do you think you're going?" And that assumes they don't take it as good coin that your OBVIOUS bid to avoid detection equates to hostile action and decide to go weapons free at that point. Not that it isn't a good idea, because it it, but it does have the drawback of completely lacking in subtlety.

But by the same token, you have no where to go with an explanation when discovered by the guards while you are using an uber spirit's concealment either... the chameleon suit was just another way to gain some pretty good concealment...

As for subtlety, High Force spirits are not subtle in the least..

and lets not forget, there is technology out there that renders the chameleon suit, invisibility and Concealment moot anyway... and those high tech facilities are sure to use some of that technology in their security scheme...

First, try capitalizing the first letter of a sentence. Use less comma's. Use more paragraphs.

Then, it might be readable.


Second, only because you are using 32 Drain as an example, I thought I would point out that binding a Force 8 spirit will cause 32 Drain once out of 4,304.66 attempts. Not even remotely close to 1 out of 100.

Well, I guess that depends on how "subtle" a high force spirit is/can be. I am going to sit down and carefully read the section in SR4A about spirit interactions on the Material Plane, but here's the current description of Concealment, SR4A, P.293:

Concealment
Type: P • Action: Simple • Range: LOS • Duration: Sustained
This power refers to a critter’s ability to mystically hide itself or others, or alternatively to hide something that people are looking for. Concealment subtracts a number of dice equal to the critter’s Magic from any Perception Tests to locate the concealed subject. Concealment can be used on a number of targets simultaneously equal to the critter’s Magic; concealed subjects can see each other if the critter allows it. Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and others from astral detection.

As to the rest, I presume you mean ISAR (Inverse Syntheitc Apeture Radar)? (Wideband Radar in the BBB.) Yeah, that does play merry heck with you, but Chaff does a good job on that, if you want an awakened solution. And since it IS both Physical and a perception test (What else would you call the thing scanning for you) the spirit would still HELP, but doesn't it have to contend with an OR threshold somehow? I need to read up more on that part. The fluff says that's still a relatively uncommon technology at anything below upper-middle hard facilities. But again, there are ways: radioactive dyes in aerosol curtain then sensors later on, pressure plates...

I was indeed talking about the radar option... and yes, Chaff is a good counter, however, I have yet to see a spirit with the capabilities of Chaff... also, employing chaff kinda defeats the purpose of sneaky... just a bit.

And Yes, there are lots of options to defeat sneaky abilities...

And besides, even the character I play currently has significant dice left over after subtracting the -8 that a Force 8 Spirit would apply to perception tests for Concealment... not withstanding that the radar system that I employ would defeat it without the penalty having any effect...

As for subtlety... spirits of that power level are rarely subtle as they are generally easily detected...

Do keep in mind that Concealment is the only method of hiding yourself on the astral plane. Invisibility makes you GLOW.

Exactly...

OK. Now these are better arguments, mostly. Let’s have a look at them.





Access. You DO have access – on the run – if you need it. If the spirit is not immediately with you when you need it, you still need to burn an action getting it to come in. They’re very fast, not instantaneous, and that excludes the possibility of them needing to pass a ward, which even if it succeeds, isn’t a free action I don’t believe.





Somebody else deals with your math below. I won’t repeat it. But I WILL point out a flaw in your argument: if it’s that dangerous, and it is, your mage may be virtually useless for the ‘run after summoning the obligatory spirit. I would rather my mage (if it’s not me in the first place) be 100% when we kick off, because I want their spells on hand, not just their pet. Second, I don’t think you fully Grok the way the corps see things. Yes, when it comes to making consumable GOODS, they are all about efficiencies of scale and mass production. But the absolute number of facilities is relatively small, and spirits don’t need to eat, sleep, take breaks, or any of the other things that require a large (and redundant) human staff. A single F5 spirit would be more than able to patrol a single facility. And don’t forget it’s easier to re-bind a spirit to add services than to bring it in the first time. That means they can afford to do the “one off� type of resource allocation almost everything Awakened requires in the first place. The corps understand that, and it’s why they are willing to put up with as much as they are from an Awakened employee in the first place. Lastly on this point, you still have not addressed the clock – when do you do that summoning? It sounds a little more like you do it immediately prior now, but we both seem to agree that leaves the mage injured, possibly beyond the ability of the medic to make completely good. Remember, the FINAL limit is their skill, but they still need to get those successes.





So it’s OK then to condemn your own mage to “death row�, because they’re a ‘runner and just need to “suck it up�? Did I get that right?





Mages are like samurai: each has a personal focus and specialization. Many (most) wouldn’t have the temperament for research in the first place. And given the ticking clock on a unbound spirit (and the fact that you can never have more than one at a time) means it’s more economical in terms of personnel allocation to actually bind the things. And just as there are researchers and combat mages and wage mages performing low-level not-quite-mundane tasks, there are dedicated summoners whose strengths are all in that ability who would have no problems bringing in those puppies. Add fetishes (compared to the binding materials, they’re cheap) and then the guy can spend edge since it’s his “project� for the week or whatever. And if you think the corps don’t sponsor in-house magical working groups to assist in initiation to make their people better, you’d be dead wrong. Again: why must the opposition be inferior to the ‘runners to the last person? If most of the guards are mooks, it makes sense to strengthen their ranks with a very good mage.





Competitive also means not letting their secrets get into their competition’s hands by skimping on security. Anything bigger than a local office is a mini-fortress. I am sure you are going to disagree with me, but look at the corp’s history all the way back to the Shaiwase Decision: Extrateritoriality is about SECURITY. They were allowed to have virtual standing armies to protect themselves FROM THE MOB. Forget paid mercenaries and thieves (read: shadowrunners). If they DON’T take those expensive magical precautions, then any mage worth half a nuyen is going to have the ability to come and go as they please, not unlike the complete lack of defenses against the members of Echo Mirage when they went in after the virus. No matter the cost, if there is something worth stealing they HAVE to take some sort of precautions, just to keep the opposition honest if nothing else. And why does it have to be either/or? Good security has always been a blend of multiple defenses, and in the 6^th world it’s just a matter of more layers being needed. I highly recommend going back and seeing if you can get your hands on the 2^nd ed Security Handbook. The "guards" in there, the actual second and third tier folks, HAD the kind of enhancements and skills I am talking about. It goes into detail about just how extensive (and expensive) securtity is and how it has to be a blend of methods to be successful.





Regular security isn’t the issue here. If they have magical defenses at all, they will be better than the baseline mooks. If they aren’t, there won’t be a mage at all, and the passive Awakened defenses (if any) will be so pathetic that the mage would never NEED the F8 spirit in their hip pocket. And if that HTR team shows up with heavy armor, an F8 spirit in tow (because he summoned it on the way in the air, and their DEDICATED team medic patched him up after – what’s good for the goose is good for the gander), and weapons that will sneer at your defenses, your single spirit with a couple services (at best) is not going to make the least bit of difference in the end. The idea is always to be ON THE WAY OUT before the HTR team shows up. THEIR job, is to make sure you can’t just linger and take your time as much as it is to stop/kill you.

Then there’s the issue of scalability: if your jobs are paying better, you should be going after harder targets, and the individual bad guys should be much tougher. And as to cost: Rating 3 Cybereyes w/ Lowlight, Thermographic, Flare Comp, Enhancement +3, AND a smartlink are a whopping 9250¥. And you can re-claim them at the end of employment. It’s a capital investment. A rigger’s control rig starts at 10,000¥, and we know the corps routinely set up their riggers. Have you priced out the costs of a whole-building drone-patrol system? Or the cost of purchase and upkeep on a paracritter? It’s ALL expensive, which is why anything important is going to be in a single secured location. Why waste money on duplicated effort? Cheap shadowruns are against things like remote warehouses, local offices where something the corp doesn’t THINK is vital is kept but a competitor sees as a possible advantage, and other things where the defenses are relatively light. Once the Gold Credstick comes out, you’re in the big leagues. Remember what level 3 skill represents: professional training. Somebody trained to be on watch would have that training. The mooks are like the locks on your car: to keep the honest people honest and make the dishonest people have to work a little. And if an Ebony Credstick appears, chummer, you’d best bring your A-Game.

I want to check on if the spirit can maintain a power while greater than Forcex1000m from you. That sounds… odd. And would require two services to boot, so on average, your LAW rocket’s gone now.





Again, you seem to have missed the point. I take the pain that is necessary, but I am not self-inflicting when it may not be needful, and I am willing to do what it takes on the ‘run itself. A GOOD shadowrunner’s life is based on MINIMIZING risks; If you’re ok with needlessly taking big risks, it’s going to be a short career. This isn’t about regular hours and minimal risk: it’s about keeping risks as low as you can get them. A sammie faces the same discomforts and risks on the ‘run itself. The discussion was if it was prudent to forcibly subject your mage (because it won’t be fully voluntary; your outlook on mages is akin to the way SOME mages see spirits: useful but consumable tools which to you are completely replacable and have no more merit than the pain they are willing to take in your stead.) As I mentioned above, and you said as well: lots can happen in a complex action. But if that spirit is remote when you call it in, it’s not an instant appearance to sway the course of the action anyhow.

If you wish to do that with YOUR mage, that is your choice. If you expect if of every mage you game with, I believe you misperceive magic in the 6^th world, and the nature of shadowrunners. They are fundamentally looking out for themselves, unless it’s a VERY close knit team; why should they bleed for YOU if they think they can handle it without doing so? There are people that cut themselves for pleasure or penance, that doesn’t mean I will find pleasure or redemption in the practice.

So if I am, say, a lower end security mage, and I see somebody GLOWING while I astrally perceive and I shift back, my first response is going to be to press the Panic Button when I don't SEE the person, right? Assuming my counterspelling (they DID take levels, right?) didn't help me burn through? (I'm in no way disagreeing with you here.)

I keep trying to talk about NON-spirit ways to do things, and chaff is a pretty smart spell for a mage to know. One of many.
And I do agree that a F8 spirit isn't exactly "subtle". Commanding it to use it's concealment on ITSELF would be a service, wouldn't it?

In Theory, a "jerk" gm would probably say so... I guess that I am a Jerk...

Of course you are! *grin and wink*

I would be more interested in whether or not that's true under the RAW.

Per the book (BBB, pp 177-178) anytime you change the parameter of a service it costs another service to do so...

If you have a team of 8 shadowrunners with a Force 8 Spirit, to cover all of the characters and the Spirit itself would cost 2 services (it could be done with a single service "Conceal us") if the team was less than 8 runners.

Of course, this is all interpretation... once could argue that a spirit can use its powers on itself without a service being requested, but spirits being what they are, the command "Conceal Us" would allow the spirit to use up 2 services on a team of 8... that is a win for the spirit because his services are exausted that much quicker...

My Two Cents