Ah, mea culpa. Just trying to help.

I find it hard to beleive this conversation is happening.

"No, really! 35 Power Points are creation is totally balanced!"

The munched '12 Power Points at Chargen' is bad enough!

Power Points do not equate to Force Points...even back in SR2.

35 Power points to start with!?
Now I haven't actually done the math here, but that's like starting your characters off with 300+ Karma! Grade 29 Initiate!
I mean this in a purely constructively critical way, but how is that not insane??

Well, depending on how the power level of the campaign is... In most of the physical games I play in, the Adept starts out shitty. Granted, he Initiates a few times and gets über, but that's unimportant.

Most likely SR3Comp, that or MitS.

well. as a filter for groups that were playing SR3 before MitS had been published.

Or didn't use Initiation rules from either Grimoire.

I used to make samurai type characters exclusively. First purely cyber monsters, then bio-borgs, then bio and cyber mixes, then when the whole thing of cyberzombies came out...I finally started losing interest in how much further I could go with loading tech into my characters.

I spent some time playing phys ads, and much like others have posted, I learned they may lack some power in the beginning, and that it is really easy to (in my opinion) get into the trap of burning precious points on boosting skills so you have higher rankings to start with, rather than spending your points on beneficial but not directly attrib/skill related stuff. (Enhanced senses, etc etc)

Nowadays I like trying to find a nice mix of a bioware-physad. Granted he'll have even less direct adept powers out of the gate because of bioware use, but with some wrangling, and initiation down the line, he shapes up quite nicely.

well, I stand corrected, sort of. I see that 35 points can be abused.

that said, there have been at least 3 physads created with this system in STARTING games I have played for a long time <2nd edition though, just started in 3rd..> and they have never been overwhelming in power <typically a little bit weaker than street sams but with the advantage of no easy to detect cyber/bio. very deadly in close combat if they ever managed to get there... in srun someone @ 50 m away will take you forever to reach!!!.. meaning you wont get there before getting killed.>
.. perhaps we were just lucky and had players who first create a concept and then build a character around that instead of creating chars based purely on what to roll.
also most of the `odd` abilities like mega stealth etc pretty much require the adept to go alone, no point having stealth 18 if you are walking next to a troll, is there? & since it takes just one anything that is astrally perceiving or a proper sensor/trap and your stealth 25 is irrelevant... never mind bad rolls..
imho the only thing that breaks the character a bit is if he were to take an über bow skill which nobody did in our group, but even that balances out <maybe> with all the problems you then get in a real srun as opposed to a hypothetical situation.. ie arrow supply, single shot, cover problems, <try to shoot a bow while keeping cover...> & the fact spent arrows could conceivably be traced back to you.
and I know a special bows with aim action=death.. *shrug* just about any decent weapon in SRun with aim actions =death. the whole point of srun is not absorbing blows it is about avoiding that situation..
The other advantage he has is having a lot of improved senses, everyone else can buy a sec helmet & build all that stuff in for about 25K if I remember corr. but natural is better & more portable..*shrug*
athletics is a decent skill but not tadaa.. in practice it makes you run a bit faster..
if you see astrally you get a +2 tn to just about everything you do, & astral critters still wipe the floor with ya <not in melee tho>
We did not use edges as we dont own src & from what I see around about albino gnome mages etc those seem a bit ... hmm... skewed

phew.. long post. hope it makes some sense any case thanx for the replies, but you left me wondering how you create a decent adept <not an uber specialist,> just using 6 points.. and not using odd geasa in order to get freebie points..<or idem with edges>.. and not using cyber/bio since those are supposed to be against what the character believes in, like mages..

DS

By the way, Stealth may be used to fool Astral Perception. It is Invis/Imp Invis that Astral Perception can break.

By the book, someone spotting the troll may not notice you even if you are walking right along side him. Do not forget that Stealth(Awareness) can be used as complementary to Perception. Usually the adept is very difficult to Surprise.

Exactly.

However, the high Stealth does let him spot the Troll carrying a PAC hiding in the corner.

Not that it would be hard to spot, but, eh.

hmm.. we sort of assumed people glow when viewed astrally, from all the descriptions and the books.. more so the less cyber/etc they have, <more essence> and while walls and such obstruct astral sight, darkness doesnt, so that adept hiding in a dark corner becomes a glowing being standing in a corner in full view in a room... I really cant see how you would be able to hide..unless you could take a lot of cover.. but canon doesnt really go into it in great detail. *shrug*. it might have been an agreed houserule that nobody ever defined.

the hiding next to the troll.. well for all purposes, if someone sees a huge troll with a pac they will readily ignore the human walking next to it.. stealth or no stealth
in any case, the point is if someone sees the troll they shoot, whether you shoot back or not you as a runner group have been discovered, huge stealth will then only mean they will shoot at the other team members *shrug* stealth is only really as good as the lowest score in the present team. oh and since military armor stealth is by canon allowed but not by gm`s at large you need relatively light armor, so if you go alone there is a risk factor way out there..

about the 50 m.. actually a lot of our encounters were outdoors. and distances are easily that or more outdoors..<parks, forests, parking lots, abandoned however even if they arent, enemies ALWAYS spread out during combat <risk of grenades, spells, etc..> so the adept runs to target a, kills him, then has to run to target b.. etc etc.. now the typical runner who likes to live to fight again always takes cover.. running while taking cover is kinda hard.. the fact that if you are the only one from the group without cover & running towards the baddies, EVERYONE will tend to shoot at you doesnt help either..
so after you have finished spending some time jumping from cover to cover, all the while hoping nobody delays an action & nails you when you finally get there you do need more than a 6 skill to kill your target, because you have one action to do that else you will be on the wrong end of `point blank`

somebody asked to post one of the chars.. I will see if I can still find them..
why do all my posts end up so long?
DS

You don't have to bring the milspec Troll all the way in with you.

~J

even then, you have quick 9 and Int at least 5 with 4 dice of initiave and + 6 or so reaction that's on average a 27 initiative I am assuming most opposition are not squads of street sams so squads of guards get initiative of 13 at best, if 2nd ed you sprint over (run check, anyone who says walk/run do not involve balance are morons) 12 athletics dice at tn2 gives total quickness 19 equivalent you make it over in the first action (57 meters) your second action is to have a close combat attack and kill guard (katana w/ 18 dice at tn 3 gives 12 successes, opponent gets 2 successes on 6 dice unarmed, and thus the three stage ups damage to D+4 (love that dikote) 12D+4 say vs 8 impact armor and 6 body and 10 combat pool are a deadly wound, so at that point the opponent is down and I can run 27m to some cover where the bad guys can't touch me... that is ignoring my 12 dice of stealth and bow abilities

third ed, I draw and shoot an arrow with 12 dice tn 4 6 successes giving 14D+1 at 8 impact armor ans 6 body and 6 combat pool to soak that is still a deadly wound... opponent still dies ten I move up to 9 meters to hide behind cover.

the adept is still unbelievably powerful, can I join your game as an adept?

Not to mention the "cover" you would get while running using 12 Athletics dice to dodge...

And yes, I am also anxious to see one of these 35 PP characters. I'm thinking about it, and I just don't see how they couldn't blow any Street Sam out of the water.

I'd really like to see where it says, canonically, magically active people shun cyberware from their bodies. In fact, I know this isn't true, as there are archetypes based around this.

First one that comes to mind: Burned Out Mage.

Then there are those who believe in the Force and say, see Anakin had a cyber arm!

I'm not saying magicians will not get any cyberware, just that they will be less likely to do so than say a mundane, any mundane.

There is almost no cyberware that offer substantial gain to compensate for the requirement of geasa and that impacts essence in a minimal way. If it weren't for the crap modification to bioware magic reduction, that wouldn't be worth it in almost all cases either.

Plus if they aren't that big of a deal then the GM isn't doing their job properly.

Yeah, we both suck. Guess we should tell our players we quit and apologize for ruining their games all these years.

Sorry I overreacted to your comment.