Greetings,
I've got a magically active character whose player is looking for some RP opportunities and wants to have an accident and go cyber in order to explore that side of things. If his magic is 7 or above, does that mean he can go down below 1 essence, or is sub 1 essence always an end of magic? I would expect as long as there's a magic attribute above 0 when essence is calculated, that they'd keep both, but I figured I'd check.
Thanks!
With a sweep of his ...
Hat
Full Version: Magic and essence loss - what's the limit?
Sub 1 essence means 0 magic... which in turn mean that he can't cast spells anymore.
Remember that a player can cast spells with force up to twice his magic rating (in 4th edition). So 0 times 2 = 0
Also remember that if the spell force is greater that his magic rating, the drain is physical!
Remember that a player can cast spells with force up to twice his magic rating (in 4th edition). So 0 times 2 = 0
Also remember that if the spell force is greater that his magic rating, the drain is physical!
Magic is reduced by 1 for every point or fraction thereof lost to addiction, essence drain or 'ware. Of course, since you can't lose more than 6 points of essence without dying, the most magic you can lose is 6 points, so a magic 7 mage could be converted to the most 'wared up monster you can imagine without burning out. Of course, after all that implantation he'll only have a magic rating of 1, which is scarcely worth the effort.
Adepts can get some cool shit with that one point and if you only go down to 1 point youll have two power points for even more fun powers in addition to 5 essence worth of ware.
JesterX, I believe you simply lose 1 point of Magic for every point or fraction of a point of essence loss. Hence if you're less than 1 essence you're down 6 points. If you've already initiated, you could still have magic. That's what I was trying to verify.
Ornot, the player in question is looking for roleplaying opportunities and thought that exploring the tension between cyber and magic would be interesting. I can do it without impacting power levels, and he's willing to take the karma hit, the Edge hit for nearly dying etc.
THanks for the response.
With a sweep of his...
Hat
Ornot, the player in question is looking for roleplaying opportunities and thought that exploring the tension between cyber and magic would be interesting. I can do it without impacting power levels, and he's willing to take the karma hit, the Edge hit for nearly dying etc.
THanks for the response.
With a sweep of his...
Hat
As far as I know, you're correct, Hat. A player can lose, at most, 6 Magic from losing up to 5.99 points of Essence. Thus, if a player had initiated prior to losing that (massive) amount of Essence, they'd still have 1 Magic left and they'd actually be able to initiate again to raise their magic. Don't forget, though, that regardless of their Magic attribute rating, they're still a Grade 1 Initiate. Losing Magic doesn't mean that their Initiation cost in Karma is reduced.
Agreed. Full price to pay for upgraded initiation. It wouldn't have been my route and it's certainly not a power build, but it gives the player the RP opportunity he wants so I'm willing to help it happen as a GM.
With a sweep of his...
Hat
With a sweep of his...
Hat
Actually, I'm not sure you can initiate again from that position. Your initiate grade cannot be higher than your magic, so in this one instance you'd be stuck at grade 1, magic 1, since you haven't got a second point of magic to allow initiation to grade 2.
Frankly if the character took sufficient damage to necessitate replacing that much of his body with 'ware, he'd probably be dead already.
Still, if that's what interests you, have fun.
Frankly if the character took sufficient damage to necessitate replacing that much of his body with 'ware, he'd probably be dead already.
Still, if that's what interests you, have fun.
else, initiate, lose essence, initiate, lose essence . . lower essence with more or less the same magic level and not the possibility of getting stuck with magic 1 and initiate level 1 . . of course, after each initiation he has to rise magic up again before doing the next step O.o
QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Jun 20 2008, 10:27 AM) 
else, initiate, lose essence, initiate, lose essence . . lower essence with more or less the same magic level and not the possibility of getting stuck with magic 1 and initiate level 1 . . of course, after each initiation he has to rise magic up again before doing the next step O.o
That's the plan for my mage...who already sunk his first point of essence at character creation
QUOTE (ornot @ Jun 20 2008, 11:22 AM)
Actually, I'm not sure you can initiate again from that position. Your initiate grade cannot be higher than your magic, so in this one instance you'd be stuck at grade 1, magic 1, since you haven't got a second point of magic to allow initiation to grade 2.
Right. Once your essence goes below 1 your magic, initiate grade, and max magic are all, at best, equal and you can no longer raise any of them ever again.
Keep your essence above 1, though, and you can continue raising magic and initiating forever.
QUOTE (Dashifen @ Jun 20 2008, 08:57 AM)
As far as I know, you're correct, Hat. A player can lose, at most, 6 Magic from losing up to 5.99 points of Essence. Thus, if a player had initiated prior to losing that (massive) amount of Essence, they'd still have 1 Magic left and they'd actually be able to initiate again to raise their magic. Don't forget, though, that regardless of their Magic attribute rating, they're still a Grade 1 Initiate. Losing Magic doesn't mean that their Initiation cost in Karma is reduced.
Acutally, in order to initiate again, he'd have to stop at losing a total of 5.00 Essence. With that 1 point of Essence left, he still has a Natural Magic of 1 and his maximum increased by +1 due to Initiation.
There is a rule that states Initiation Grade cannot be greater than Magic. Part of that rule is that if your Initiate Grade *IS* greater than your Magic, you lose those grades until your Grade = Magic.
So in order to continue to Initiate (and therefore raise Magic), there must be at least 1 original point of possible 6 Magic that every awakened (meta)human starts with.
So if someone were making a cyber monster that only used 5.00 Essence between cyber & bio (packages, certain genemods, delta grade, etc), they could still be a full blown Mage that can fully initiate.
Using the OP's question...
Mage
Magic: 7
Initiate Grade: 1
Essence: 6
Drops to...
Mage
Magic: 2
Initiate Grade: 1
Essence: 1
This mage could still Initiate, cast spells, and gain far more magical power... and still have all sorts of wiz cyber toys.
asked in genetic heritage allready, but what about genetic treatment to recover essence? oif course implants would have to go for that, but otherwise?
While we're on the topic of cybering up mages...
Say I have character with Magic 5.
I invest 2 points of Essence into cyberware and bioware.
My Magic is now 3 and I have a maximum Magic of 4.
I haven't started initiating yet.
At this point, how much Karma does it cost to raise my Magic to 4?
-paws
Say I have character with Magic 5.
I invest 2 points of Essence into cyberware and bioware.
My Magic is now 3 and I have a maximum Magic of 4.
I haven't started initiating yet.
At this point, how much Karma does it cost to raise my Magic to 4?
-paws
Same as it costs to raise to 6, since that is technically what you are raising to anyways. It's not necessarily that your Magic Attribute is lower, just muted because your chi/mana/biopower is out of wack (lower Essence).
QUOTE (Drogos @ Jun 20 2008, 02:42 PM)
Same as it costs to raise to 6, since that is technically what you are raising to anyways. It's not necessarily that your Magic Attribute is lower, just muted because your chi/mana/biopower is out of wack (lower Essence).
No, that would make sense, and that's how it worked in previous editions. But officially, it's 12 karma, the normal cost to raise from 3 to 4.
So it would make sense, if an attribute is lowered to 3 and raising it back to 4 costs the same as raising to 6? 
Erm... Okay... Confused now.
EDIT:
Right, so having re-read the relevant sections again, it does appear to be (3 x new rating). Huh.
EDIT:
Right, so having re-read the relevant sections again, it does appear to be (3 x new rating). Huh.
maybe that was errataed?
No, thats working as intended.
And I think it makes sense. The karmic "worth" of magic 4 should not depend on if you had magic 4 before.
And I think it makes sense. The karmic "worth" of magic 4 should not depend on if you had magic 4 before.
hrm . . so in game has not been changed but in character creation you would have to pay 65 points for magic of 2, if you had yourself cybered down to 2 essence?
You're comparing apples to screwdrivers here.
The odd result of this is that if you are Magic based, and are going to have cyber, you want to get the cyber as early as possible (while, presumably) keeping enough Magic to keep Initiate.)
So, if I have a character start with Magic 4, and burn 1 magic for cyber, I should acquire and burn the next 4 magic levels on cyber (with 2 rounds of initiation) and then worry about getting more initiation / magic.
(Doing it in the right order can save 30 Karma.)
In general, if something reduces your magic below your initiation, does that reduce your initiation?
Joel
So, if I have a character start with Magic 4, and burn 1 magic for cyber, I should acquire and burn the next 4 magic levels on cyber (with 2 rounds of initiation) and then worry about getting more initiation / magic.
(Doing it in the right order can save 30 Karma.)
In general, if something reduces your magic below your initiation, does that reduce your initiation?
Joel
yes it does.
no more initiation level than magic level allowed . . that's why you can become stuck in Magic 1 even with an Essence of 6 if you screw up your order *g*
no more initiation level than magic level allowed . . that's why you can become stuck in Magic 1 even with an Essence of 6 if you screw up your order *g*
On a penalty of loosing grade and metamagic, your magic attribute may not drop below your initiate degree.
Of course, this asks the question of how to do this in the most cost efficient manner.
So I figure there are two ways to do it, both ends up with a Magic 2, 1,01 Essence, Initiate 1 cyber sammie ready to go.
There are more ways to do it, but these are the cheapest ones I could see.
So I figure there are two ways to do it, both ends up with a Magic 2, 1,01 Essence, Initiate 1 cyber sammie ready to go.
There are more ways to do it, but these are the cheapest ones I could see.
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