Hi, im new to the forums but they seem nice. it looks like theres a lot of helpful stuff here, and i happen to have a question that me and my gm arent quite sure about

can you start as an initiate at char gen? how far up could i get in initiation if i had a 7 magic? how much would that cost(in bp)?

thanks.

No, you can't generally initiate in (BP) chargen. GM can allow it if he really wants, but it isn't generally advised, and I'd imagine that it would cost half the karma cost in BP.

Also, I should note that it is impossible to get a magic of 7 without initiation, so I'm thinking you're already doing something wrong with the chargen.

Max magic is 6, and that 6th point costs 25 BP to get instead of the normal 10.

Welcome to the Dumpshock forums!
First off, Are you discussing SR4?
In SR4 under the basic rules you cannot initiate at character creation.
(Nor can you have a magic greater than 6)
If you use the Karma-gen rules from the Runner's Companion it is possible,
with GM consent (Runner's Companion, p.43).

Hope this helps.

ah, ok then. yes its shadowrun 4th. and cant you take exceptional attribute with magic? i thought you could. but anyway, thank you for letting me know that, itll help a lot.

No, it specifies mental or physical attribute. Magic is a special attribute like edge.

Edit: It should be noted that your current magic and initiation grade have nothing to do with each other in that way. You could have a magic of 1 and 20 initiations if you really wanted.

ah, ok. thank you very much.

Actually, I don't believe you can have Magic 1 and 20 graces of initiation.
Yoru initiation is limited to your magic. (And your initiation adds to your maximum magic. So that you cna then raise your magic. After which you can initiate further.)
This is particularly important when designed cybered mages or cybered adepts.

Yours,
Joel

While I can accept cybered mages, cybered adepts are lowliest of lowliest munchkinisms one could possibly do.

Ah, I forgot that there was the magic x2 limit on initiation, or maybe just magic. It is run across so rarely and I play mages even more rarely that I totally forgot about that.

Actually, If I remember correctly, the wording is that you cannot have more initiations than your magic rating, though if you raise them in tandem (once they are near the maximum), they are effectively unlimited (though that will take excessive Karma to be sure)

Keep the Faith

If players try to make the best out of a character, why shouldn't realistic characters do the same with themselves?

Yeah, infinity usually takes a while to reach

Yes, you could certainly raise your magic to let you keep getting initiations, but that usually isn't a problem as most mages want to have at least a 6-7 magic and it'll take a while to reach that many initiations before you're forced to raise your magic to get another one.

To True...

Keep the Faith

Conceptually at least, the magic / initiation limit is a significant issue for warrior adepts. The bioware (and sometimes cyberwear) is so much more efficient at certain things. Taking synaptic boosters is much more a matter of common sense than of min-maxing.

Yours,
Joel

Yeah, and the muscle toner/augmentation is also far far more effective than the increased attributes are.

min/maxing gets thrown around too much and too much as a bad thing. There is nothing wrong with finding the most efficent way to make a char. There is somewhat a problem in being able to shoot a gun really well but not have any ability to communicate with others, run away from nasties, hide from said nasties, punch those who catch you in a situation where a gun is not effective defense, or anything else but shoot said gun.

I prefer to call that munchkining. Min-maxing is a good thing, but isn't what most people generally call it to me.

And at that point it is cheaper to just learn Metamagics without Initiating.

From a player standpoint [looking at strictly the numbers], yeah. But as living characters, don't adepts usually have a sort of religious view explaining why cyberware in general is bad because it damages your soul/spirit/ki/mojo/whatever? What is that adept REALLY giving up?

Some adepts are described (and/or are run) as having a religious view or a wholistic view.
Others are more pragmatic.
Given the range of magical belief systems encompassed in SR, to say "adepts believe X" or "mages beleive Y" just doesn't work. (In face, I can not see why Chaos mages wouldn't be perfectly happy to get cyber/bio wear, as long as it helped achieve whatever they are after. They seem to be defined as the ultimate magical pragmatists."

Some warrior adepts are going to be purists. Others will be pragmatists. (Others are probably simply crazy, but taht is true of all the characters

Yours,
Joel

Because the whole point of Adepts is the "my body is my temple" kind of shit and mixing adept powers with ware can be extremely abusive.

I don't know if all adepts neccessarily see magic as a means to obtaining purity in that way. I would assume that many would be searching for absolute martial or technical perfection, in which case 'ware would be perfectly acceptable if it increased their capabilities more efficiently than magic. Stereotyping adepts as 'ware haters isn't an accurate representation of the societal state of the shadowrun universe which allowed 'ware to be created in the first place.

Mages and adepts are not compelled in any way to be mystical neo-luddites. Nor do street samurai have no other option than to follow the code of bushido.

Shadowrun doesn't have character classes, alignments, or any required codes of conduct beyond the individual and idiosyncratic ones arising from a character's background. These are strengths of the game.

Although to prevent absolute munchkinism I would say that a character has to have some form of backstory/motivation for their character, and if their character has something like the Shinto tradition or something which has the search for absolute purity as part of its founding principles I wouldn't let them get cyberware.

Yeah, but that (Shinto) would apply to a mundane character just as it would to an adept.

I do agree that the background should support the character. Some adepts would shy away from cyberware, either out of religious/cultural beliefs, or out of exaggerated fears of what it could do to their magic. I only disagree with the notion that all of them would be like that.

"Hey Sorry, I know that you think your character wants to get x,y, and z cyberware, but I know your character better."

I just made a Mystic adept Driver / brawler with two essence worth of ware. Trama-dampener, Muscle toner, Aluminum skeleton, control rig, and Data jack. It makes sense to me that some Adepts will want some ware, be it cyber or bio.

You mention the Shinto tradition as having a search for "absolute purity" as a founding principle. Do you require they take the geas "no processed foods"?

Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and so many more faiths have rather strict and explicit opinions on killing. Do you say that mages of those traditions can't powerbolt some hapless guard's face off?

These are shadowrunners, who may or may not want every advantage they can scrape up, even if it's at the cost of essence integrity. The character wants to stay alive, they will weigh the cost of that essence, and that point of magic against getting three extra drain dice, and the best cyber-eyes on the market. The part of their back story that justifies ware is the part where they are a shadowrunner.

Maybe the Shinto mage looks at it as "well, i won't be able to bargain with Kami as well, but i'll be able to shoot a fly off of a dwarf's ass at 50 meters. If i can do that and still get a Kami to hide me as I sneak away it's worth it."

I agree whole heatedly with Glyph


Of course, then again, last night my GM was suggesting that I pick up Tailored pheromones on my Shinto face.

Your millage may vary.

I suppose your right there. I guess something as specific as not allowing Shinto traditions to take cyberware is something that requires a bit too much reading into the fluff. I don't mind min-maxing in a game so long as players aren't making their characters based on numbers rather than concepts. I do feel though that a GM should atleast point out perceived discrepancies like that to give players a chance to explain themselves. Half of the fun of playing a table-top game for me is in creating great characters over the course of gameplay and I don't really feel like one can be created without paying at least a little attention to the story of the shadowrun universe and the descriptions of the pieces that make it up.

They have always been rather vague on the subject of kneecaps though.

I agree with the notion that awakened being automatic anti-wares just because they are awakened really is silly. I mean this is an RPG, and putting limits like what a character must believe to be born with a certain ability seems absolutely ridiculous.

I mean personally, if magic were to enter the world right now, along with 'ware, and I happened to be a mage, I'd still consider getting ware. I likely wouldn't because any ware available when it is first developed wouldn't help me much, but I'd consider it. I'd take it or not based on how it would help me, not based on the idea that I will suddenly become a technophobe.

I should note that I'd likely be Hermetic, Chaotic, or Psionic as far as tradition goes.

This is an interesting debate here that really transcends the subject matter. I'm generally a huge critic of powergaming (munchkining, min-maxing, whatever you want to call it) but I wouldn't consider an augmented adept to qualify for this. Here are a couple of points to provoke your thoughts:

As civilisation has developed over the millennia, humanity has expressed more and more variation thanks to the ever-dominant bell curve distribution. If an adept's body CAN accept augmentation then I would strongly assume there must be adepts who choose to (though it could be exceedingly rare).

Not many people live optimal lives - we have millions of clinically obese people in today's world who shun healthy eating and fitness regimes, but not many of them will claim they want to be that way. Perhaps a closer example would be people with tattoos who regret them in later life.

If neither of those tickle your fancy, then there are other explanations for an augmented adept. They may have been ignorant, indignant, skeptical or otherwise dismissive of the magic loss caused by augmentation (the Magic rating is, after all, a contrived and abstract system). They could have had the work done before their awakening - I haven't scoured the rules or setting info to back this up, but can't see why it wouldn't happen if they awakened in adulthood. it's even possible they may have received the 'ware without their knowledge and/or consent.

At the end of the day, for each point of Essence lost to augmentation the character loses 10 BPs of Magic rating, which amounts to a 50,000¥ price increase. Whilst this doesn't affect the maximum resources allocation, losing Magic this way at chargen does reduce the starting attribute maximum, so altogether I think it's balanced enough to be an acceptable option.

Not quite...

Max Initiation Ranks = Current Magic
Max Magic = Essence + # of Initiations

So you would need to raise Magic from 1 to 2 if you wanted to Initiate a 2nd time.

This also means that if you want unlimited magical progression, you CANNOT let your Essence ever fall below 1. EVen if you raise it back up above 1, you lose your ability to progress magically.

Right, that's been covered that I forgot that. And you can let your essence fall below 1, you just have to raise it again, though raising essence is very difficult of course.

You guys are already forgetting one little thing: That's from the basic Rulebook...



That seem very clear to me. If the guy is pushing wares inside his adept because it "more efficient", then he is NOT an adept, he is a street sam that strangely still uses magic. It´s a lot of power for just 5 BP, and should be seen with very serious consideration by the Gm. it´s easy to min max on her.

Of course that is just my opinion, but i guess the devs would agree, or else that detail would not be written specifically. It´s kinda obvious.

I'm playing a mage (okay, not an adept) wired down to an essence of 2 following the nordic tradition with Odin as his mentor spirit. Odin himself gave an eye for gaining power. (In the form of knowledge.) One can't generally say an adept or mage will never go for ware.


Btw, if you think a wired adept's PG, have you ever seen a vampire-adept?

Our GM would never allow a vampire in the first place, but yeah, I'm well aware of the kind of abuse one can get with a vampire adept.

Wouldn't the world be filled with horror stories of adepts once being able to do x, y, z, until they got ware and lost the abilities? I just see the perceived stigma of loss as to big a hurdle to just casually toss aside. Or are the magic/ware numbers as codified in the shadowrun fiction to the same extent as they are codified in the rulebook?
I can very easily see people inputting ware before they know they have mystical abilities, or replacing lost essence with ware (lost arm etc...).

Then again I have the same issues with characters having 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001* essence for the same reason. I mean, they [the characters] KNOW that's the limit, really? Wouldn't the doctors say something to the effect of, "You have a better chance of winning the lotto then surviving that operation.". But because the players have the numbers, it's just another heavily medicated weekend in his character's background.

*- The point of the fake number still stands.

IIRC the very first Shadowrun novel published (and if not the first, one of the early ones) concerned a mage who didn't discover he was a mage until after he'd had a datajack installed, and it was giving him constant headaches because it was interfering with his magical essence. I don't think it made him a worse mage, but that's the diffrence between novels and rules

Yes, it's also filled with stories of Adepts who lost their confidence and were able to compensate with 'ware. It's also filled with stories of Karl Kombatmage blowing shit up with his mind without breaking a sweat.

And, yes, I prefer to assume that the characters in the game have an understanding of the fundamental physics of the game. Otherwise, their scientists are vastly overpaid.

"Ah well, you did what? 2 years of training and now you have this superb sight and hearing? Um, my doc did the job in 2 weeks and I mastered astral perception on top of this."

I tend to play my awakened characters as purists. That said, it is a personal prejudice. Mage, Adept, and Technomancer are all mutations or alterations of the human form. At no point in a character's life does he arbitrarily decide to awaken. A great many of them may make some choices to sacrifice for their perception of "perfection", but there is no requirement that they do so. The character could in fact have never even realized that he was a potential adept. The street doc having no clue kept installing the ware until one day another mage offered to teach him. Some religions might quite well embrace a melding of man and machine as well, considering it some sort of sacrament to add ware, and mages or adepts would be able to fit into this sort of environment easily. The only universal in Shadowrun is ubiquity.

I call bullshit on that one. The qualification is there to prevent characters from taking it for an easy boost for 5 build points, not to prevent awakened characters from getting cyberware or bioware. An adept who uses cyberware or bioware is still an adept. I get so sick and fucking tired of people who play the "developers' intent" card as a weasely way of implying that their version of the game is the "right" one.

Though I am guilty of doing that exact thing from Time to Time, I have to agree with you on this one Glyph... There is absolutely nothing that states an awakened character cannot, in no way, acquire cyberware or bioware... as a matter of fact, it is pretty explicit in the rules that it is a common occurrence, else there would not be any crunchy bits for losing magic as your essence drops from implantation...

It becomes a tradeoff, you lose magical power when you gain technological power...


Keep the Faith

What I REALLY like about this is how you show how humble you are by saying "just my opinion". You then - in the same sentence - claim that the Dev's MUST agree with you because you say they do (presumably because you are that awesome). Ending with "it's kinda obvious" thus implying - not stating outright as that would contradict your humility - that anyone who disagrees with you is such a fool as to miss something so clear.

In no way is it "obvious" that adepts with ware are street sam's and therefore not adepts, and so can't take the adept quality.

What the Dev's where saying is that the DM should say something before the PC chromes up to having only one essence, and never bothers to raise his magic above one.

5bp's for the adept quality means you get a magic of 1, and hence one PP. Just that ONE PP can do some pretty fantastic things compared to 5bp's spent elsewhere. 5bp's wont get you an attribute up, you need 10bp for that... unless you take the Improved physical attribute power. which BTW can even take you up to the maximum for just that 5bps, as opposed to buying that maximum with BP's cost 25.

5bp's can get you just one skill rank. If you spend that 5bp on the adept quality and the PP on Kinestetics, Cool resolve, and a level of Improved Ability (any one social) you get: +1 dice for all social tests, which is better than a rank of the influence skill group as it includes intimidation as well, PLUS an extra dice any time you are the defender in a social skill test, so that's +2 dice, and if you are defending in the skill you picked up Improved ability, you are getting a +3 dice pool bonus.

What is obvious, is that the Dev's expected that SOME, not all, awakened and technomancers would want ware, that is why they included rules for how essence loss effects those characters - if they had wanted to ban it outright, the page would just read "Awakened and technomancers universally hate 'ware and will never get it voluntarily."

Also I'm going to quote the dev's to back me up on this

Very well said, Nows7.

Oh my god, Shepherd!

--



Not exactly.

"For each point or partial point of Essence below 6, the character loses 1 full point from her Magic and the maximum for that attribute is reduced by 1."

Unless there's another obscure rule somewhere (wouldn't surprise me), if you can find a way to get your essence score above 1 you can progress magically. This is due to the fact that the max magic attribute is based on the number of points below 6 essence you have, rather than how many points of essence you have lost. Now, if you raise your essence score, you wouldn't gain back any bit of your lost magic score... but you can progress magically again.

So if you get reduced to 0.6 essence, and never initiated, you would have a magic max of 0, though if your essence goes to 1 your magic max would raise to 1 and you can consequently raise your magic score from 0 to 1.

Disclaimer: I may be forgetting or unaware for certain rules for magic.

Glad someone got that



Ah, but the problem there is that if you ever hit magic of 0 (Permanently) you lose access to magic forever (Becoming a burn out) and thus can't raise it back to 1 (At least that is how it seemed to me when they talked about burn-outs, but that could just be because the ability to get essence back hadn't come out yet). So you would have to have a single initiation when your essence dropped below 1 and a magic of 1 after the drop. Then if you brought it back up to 1+ you could raise magic to 2 and then continue the initiation/magic cycle.

One thing the book doesn't quite address is what happens if your magic drops below your number of initiations due to essence loss? Nothing seems to indicate you would lose your initiation, so I figure you'd just have to pull your magic back up before you could initiate any more.

I'm surprised I was the first.



Basically, if your magic stat is between 0 and 1 you cannot raise magic at all. Your magic cap is equal to your current initiate grade at this point, so whatever your initiate grade was prior to hitting 0 essence is the max for your magic stat. Which means that your magic stat will be lowered to your initiate grade. So all you would need to do is ensure your magic score is equal to essence score + 1 to avoid the burnout.



Yes it does.

"A character's initiate grade cannot exceed her Magic attribute. If a character's Magic is reduced below her initiate grade, she loses that level of initiation and the metamagic she gained with it."

So if you have 6 Magic, 6 Initiate, and you are reduced to 0 essence, you will lower 6 points of magic, dropping you to 0 magic, instantly dropping your initiate grade to 0. You are a 0 Magic, 0-grade initiate. When you get back above 1 essence, you would be able to progress again, assuming no rules exist that say if your magic stat is reduced to 0, you forever lose the ability to utilize magic. You would then have to spend 105 Karma to raise your magic back to 6, and 123 karma to raise your Initiate grade back to 6 (is initiate graded still 10 + Grade * 3) for a grand total of 228 karma to get back to where you were.

That's why if you ever plan on being a cyberzombie mage, get to 10 initiations and 20 magic first, then lose that last point of essence. Just don't go below 0.

(Negative essence means that your magic will be 1 below your initiations, so you lose an initiation, which means you lose a max magic, which means you lose a magic...)

Slightly off topic, but I suppose it'd be relevant to karmagen: If you take 1 essence of 'ware at chargen, do you lose the point of magic before taking the ware (so that you pay the extra BP to max magic when raising it to 5, and someone who hasn't raised their magic at all still has 1 point) or after (so that you pay to have it where you want it to start, then it goes down based on essence loss, and if you haven't paid enough to keep it above 1, you're not magical)?

I can't find a reference anywhere, but I would treat Essence Loss due to Cyberware as an Augmentation. So you calculate the cost to buy Magic as if there were no 'ware and then you add in the Essence Loss from the 'ware.

I would take it a little different. I would use essence after ware as a limiter on how high the character can take their magic at creation. That's essentially how it will work out anyway. If a player realizes their ware will drop their magic score, they'll either adjust their ware or drop their magic score willingly to get the points back.