Havent been playing for long and very new to these forums so I apologize in advance if this has been discussed before:

Going over my one of my player's Adept character I noticed an issue with his power selection. He overspent his point allowance. He has Karma to spend, so I thought I could just subtract an appropriate amount and everybody happy. I cannot find any info if an Adept may purchase new powers with Karma or what the prices might be?

Are the powers you purchase at creation the only ones you ever get? Can they ever get improved over time?

Thanks
Wyldhorse

Power points are based on an adept's Magic rating. To get more power points (i.e. increase or buy new powers) you have to raise your Magic rating, using Karma and Initiation.

Initiation is the process by which awakened characters improve their powers. It raises the maximum of their Magic, letting them buy it higher. Each point of Magic gives them an extra power point, which can be used to either raise existing powers or buy new ones.

Also, SR4A (the anniversary edition of the basic rules) introduces an optional rule that an adept, when initiating, can opt to get a power point's worth of powers instead of a metamagic when initiating.

Thanks for the response.

That rule has been available in previous editions too.

I've been looking for this rule, but can't find it. Where is it ?? Tx in advance.

Initiation does not grant a magic point ! Initiation grant you the possibility to get a magic point, you pay for the grade then for the point.

And if his magic Attribute isn't maxed yet, he could simply raise that. No Initiation necessary.

The question was specific to a possible optional rule where Adepts could get 1 point of powers instead of a metamagic power (that's beside increasing your Magic to get Adept powers). I think I saw that optional rule (unless I was dreaming) but can't find it anymore.

My bad. I thought it was in the SR4A changes document, but it is actually in the Street Magic errata. Here is the optional rule:

I'm going to make a very strong point here.

1 point of adept powers for initiation isn't even an optional rule, it's a suggestion for a way to tweak the system as a potential house rule. It was also written before karma costs for increasing attributes were increased w/ SR4a.

With the changes in SR4a I believe and argue it's a wholly broken option now. In many cases you're far better raising your initiate grade than your magic rating AND it's far cheaper. It used to be more expensive to initiate than to raise magic. (3x magic vs. 10+3x new grade for initates). Now that magic is 5x new rating though, this is very quickly untrue.


Example... you're an adept w/ magic 5 out of chargen. It'll cost you 30 karma for the next point of magic.. but potentially only 8 karma for grade 1 initiate w/ a 40% reduction from ordeal & group. (IIRC: it's 20% for each, please correct if wrong). Initiations will cost you less than raising magic the whole way to initiate grade 5, when you must raise magic to go higher.

Now what does raising initiate grade do... it does a lot... it increases the number of penalty dice you can ignore w/ adept centering, it increases the difficulty of seeing through masking, it increases a lot of very usefull benefits. What does raising magic do? It mostly only raises your max ranks in single adept power (most adepts I find have their points spread out so that this isn't a huge problem once you hit magic 5 or 6...).


Given all this... I think it would be far better, barring changes in initiation costs, if as an option GM's consider limiting the initiation to .5PP per initiation grade. Or strongly consider this effect on the game.

Except that The Initiation Grade ONLY benefits as you indicate IF the Adept has those Metamagic Techniques that you are pointing out as an advantage, otherwise it means nothing...

Keep the Faith

Correct. However, there are a very limited number of ordeals any given character would like to do, and you forget to +5 karma for joining a magical group (FYI: for your first initiation it'll be 13 karma raw, 13 with the 40% discount, 15 (group only) or 10 (ordeal only)).

Tymeaus,

The entire reason for the suggestion for the house rule tweak in the book, is that adepts have less available metamagics than mages, and quickly run out.


Then lets not forget there's another actual optional rule presented, that players can buy metamagics for a straight 15 karma w/o initiating. (still subject to the limit on max known metamagics == magic). So if you combine the two, now you can automatically buy 1PP for 15karma flat cost... no matter high how high your magic is.



On to other points:
IIRC it's 10 karma to join an initiatory group. But they come w/ other benefits/drawbacks as well... so it's not a complete waste. Especially if viewed as a group contact of sorts, if initating, it will pay for itself after the 4th initiation. For mages, they also add the ability to do ritual magic with others outside your tradition IIRC, as well as a source of learning new spells.

I still stand by my original point... even WITHOUT reductions for initiatiatory group, or ordeals or the like. It's only 25 karma for the 5th initiation grade. And to put a different spin on this... if taken this way... how is say 'masking' any different from being a 1point adept power not much different than 'astral perception'. Excepting of course, that unlike a normal adept power they automagically increase in strength w/o investing more power points into them.

It's 5. Street Magic p69.

Odd... Having played an Adept to Grade 8 before changing characters, I had a great deal more to purchase in the way of Metamagics... I was in no danger of running out as you suggest...

Lets see... I see 16 potential Choices for Metamagic Techniques for an Adept (See List Below), 2 of which can be taken multiple times for different things... does not seam all that limited to me... as a matter of fact, there are only 28 Metamagic Techniques listed in Canon, of which 16 are useable by Adepts (14 if you discard the two arguable ones, which brings us to half of the available metamagic techniques, definitely not LESS than a MAge after all)... How are Physads limited in Metamagic exactly?

Adept Centering
Attunement (Animal)
Attunement (Item)
Cognition
Divining
Empower Animal (Advanced Technique)
Extended Masking (Advanced Technique)
Flexible Signature
Flux (Advanced Technique)
Great Ritual (Arguable, as there is no skill being used, and would fit in well with a Wiccan Philosophy)
Infusion (Advanced Technique)
Masking
Psychometry
Quickening (if you possess the Living Link Quality, again Arguable)
Sensing
Somatic Control

Hmmm.. I guess that an Adept is not really all that limited after all is he?

Adept centering is great for a Phys Ad

Attunment Animal is pretty bad in my opinion though.

Attunment Item woud be great if it was easier to use on things like bikes or cars, but it doesn't work for weapon Foci. Since Atunment item requires Karma to get, and Karma to bond the item, I'd rather just get an Weapon foci - especially if you're using the 4A rules that make them dirt cheep to bind. The other downside is that you must pick a specific TYPE of item. So you can't just take the metamagic and then bind your car, Katana, and your lockpics, you would have to initiate three times, and then pay more karma to bond to each one.

Great Ritual - Again

Cognition is cool for Hacker or other mental adepts, but doesn't do it for Phys Ad's.

Divination - I just don't see your average knife weilding brawler adept having a large dice pool of logic + Arcana to get the hits needed for it, nor is this really "Physical Adept" territory here. It's NEAT, but it's more of a miscellaneous ability that doesn't jive with alot of Physadept concepts.

Empower animal - I'm unimpressed by the regular version, why go back for more? Though i do admit, i want to make a troll who rides a horse, wears metal armor, and uses a lance.... why's he a shadow runner? Cuase he's fucking crazy and thinks he's king F'n Arther!

Masking / Extended masking are more for social adepts to hide their nature than anything. A neat trick but something that most physad's can wait on.

Flexable Signature is for Magicians and Mystic adepts who are concerned with leaving their astral figerprints on their spells. It doesn't hide the fact you just put your fist though someones face, or hide that you are awakened - that is what masking is for.

Flux is pretty much at the bottom of the barrel in my opnion. A pure Phys Ad will have no bound spirits or foci (other than weapon) to track him by, so this is useless there, and if he goes with Item Attunement (Katana) then he's not likely to even have a weapon foci. Also, if you're leaving foci in the middle of an Aztechnology research center, you're doing something wrong.

Great ritual - Not really a traditional phyad thing. Maybe your group does more ritual casting than mine, but ritual's are more a function of NPS's and the NPC's cast at the speed of PLOT! They do what they do, and my helping them out isn't going to keep them from passing out from drain while the runners have to fight the angry spirit they poked. I think we agree this is not terribly likely to be a first choice.

Infusion is a great power for Any adept.

Psychometry requires Assessing, which many adepts may not have, AND it requires more karma or BP's for assensing to make it actually go anywhere.

Quickening... Seriously?

Senseing, is Meh^3. Yes it is Meh cubed.

Somatic control is great though.

Of course You millage may vary.


Ok, my sleeping pills are sudenly kicking in in full gear... so i'm going to go to sleep RIGHT NOW,

SC

Well, whether it is broken depends a bit on whether paying the x5 cost to raise Magic is fair or maybe a bit much for Adepts to gain new powers.



But does it do as much as raising Magic?

Magic directly influences a number of Adept powers and also limits their maximum rating. Not something to dismiss for sure.

Bye
Thanee

Is it me or is Meditation by far the preferable Ordeal? It doesn't take all that long, you can retry if you fail, and it doesn't hurt (no ritual links, chopped off fingers, messy quests etc..)

You're right, but once you picked it, you cannot pick it for other grades. Treat this as a free 20% Karma.

Likewise, Asceticism is not a big deal either. You simply have to live on the street for 1 month (1 lifestyle to make it simpler). Role-playing-wise is good, but the impact is much less than a deed or a geas.

Where does it say that you can pick any ordeal only once? Ironically the Meditation ordeal gets easier to succeed the later you take it.

I just reread the ordeal. My bad, you're right. I believe my memory was affected with an old rule from a previous edition.

You forgot Centering.

While Centering may be available to adepts it doesn't make much sense. The only Power that actually causes drain is the Attribute Boost IIRC, and only if someone takes a lot of levels in it does the drain increase to an amount where centering is needed.

Uh? Adept powers and drain? What adept powers and drain?

I think etherial was talking about regular centering. This would only help for Attribute Boost as this Power actually causes drain:


Woops, I just checked and by RAW adepts could only use regular Centering and not Adept Centering
I know this is a simple error and the RAI is that they can use at least Adept Centering and possibly even normal Centering.

Some of the Adept Metamagics also cause Drain, like the ones that let you move attribute points around.


Dakka Dakka, reread your SR4A. Mine specifically lists Adept Centering *and* Centering.

Either way, Street Magic has to supersede that or else Adepts only get 4 options period ever.

I agree Jhaiisiin...

Just like I said, the suggested house rule was suggested before the cost change for raising magic attributes.

I think it's a good idea given the shortage of adept powers. Just I believe w/ the cost changes the amount of power points it should award should be cut in half. (.5PP per initiation since initiating is roughly half as cheap as raising magic).

Indeed I did... Oooops

Keep the Faith

Actually, that is in the main book... Street Magic increases the number of Metamagic available to Adepts greatly...

As for Centering itself, it would also be useful against the Infusion Metamagic Drain as well...

Keep the Faith

Why? Regardless of what initiation costs, either a power point is about the equivalent of a metamagic, or it is not. If you like the house rule but think a power point is too much, I could see your rationale for reducing it. But if you are doing it because initiation is cheaper compared to raising Magic now, then you should also be limiting mages to one metamagic every other initiation, too.

Hell, if you really wanna jack up the costs, insist that they cannot initiate again until they raise their magic to fill the point gap created by initiating.

I disagree... while your angle is worth advocating as well. I have no opinion on the value of a metamagic vs. a power point as they're different, and advance differently. Something else to consider, raising a powerpoint metamagic still raises the initiate grade advancing the other metamagics (masking, adept centering, etc. which gain higher threshholds or more dice as initiate grade increases). So you're not merely gaining, only a power point, as you would if you were advancing magic instead (at a higher cost to boot).

Think about it this way, under the old 3x advancement costs... 10+3x init grade got you advance in all your metamagics + a power point... or you could do 3x magic and gain the same power point.... Costwise, you'd generally keep your initiate grade ~3 points under your magic rating. Now with the change to 5x cost... initiation no longer costs more than magic, and it makes initiation a much more powerful option. (this is a bigger change than some think.. it's surprised my GM that I'd rather initiate than raise raw magic lately).

Either 1PP is worth the cost in magic or it isn't. To arbitrarily allow 'half cost' by using metamagic w/ a suggestion for a house rule (again this suggestion didn't even make optional rule status) is rather contrary to the change in attribute costs that SR4a rightly. That's all I'm saying. I like the spirit of the rule, but given the changes in costs which have occured since... think some tweaking is called for.

I also note nobody noticed or commented when I pointed out another 'undercosted' option. Pay 15 karma to learn a metamagic w/o initiating which did make it as an optional rule suggestion. Do you feel it's right that an adept could learn power points for a flat 15karma fee, w/o initiating. (this had the slight change that, you could still only know as many metamagics as your magic rating... so you'd still need to initiate... eventually), but it did give you 2 or 3 'cheap' advances if you use the two together.