Long time lurker, second time poster.

The problem

The problem is that physical adepts just suck under RAW. I'm sure that there's been many posts here with houserules on how to fix it. I wanted to post this here because I've been using it for some time and it's always worked well for me.

You can argue that the game isn't supposed to be balanced, magicians are in every way supposed to be better than physical adepts. It's ok with me if you want to run your game like that, I personally do not.

The following is a list of reasons why physical adepts suck:

1. Qualities in SR4 steal a physical adepts thunder. Many of the adept powers can simply be taken as positive qualities instead, and its cheaper, some examples: Exceptional Attribute(20BP, or 2 magic points for an adept) and Astral Sight(5bp, or 1 magic point for an adept)

2. Physical adepts severely lack variety in adept powers. There's only 68 adept powers total in the core books, and most of them are rather useless. 19 in SR4 core manual. 43 in Street Magic. 6 in Digital Grimoire.
Street Magic alone has 73 unique spells, and that's only if you don't count the different ranges possible as different spells.(Touch, LOS, Area) There's many more spells in the SR4 core manual and Digitial Grimoire that I haven't bothered counting. I'm guessing it's roughly double this number.

3. Attributes are more easily and cheaply bought via Wares than they are with adept powers.

You can argue that physical adepts fill unique niches in the shadowrun team, that no one else could fill. You'd be wrong, for the most part.
Physical adept roles:

1. cyber-adept. The physical adept power is cheap to take, and worth taking exclusively to raise your firearms skill. Other than that, this archetype is basically a street samurai with more growth potential than other street samuria, because he can raise his magic attribute in-game via initiation. This is kind of horrible RP.

2. stealth adept. Physical adepts can be quite good stealthers, however, a magician with the right spells, skills, and foci can serve in this role more than twice as effectively.

3. face. The face of a shadowrun team. Takes care of the social interactions. A physical adept can fill this role probably better than anyone else. A magician could do it rather well with the right spells, and no morals about getting inside someone elses head. But a physical adept will fall into this role quite nicely.

4. mystic adepts. This isn't even a pure physical adept. Most mystic adepts will take 4-5 points in adept powers, and purchase a force 3-4 power foci to make up for the magic loss. This, along with sustaining foci to keep the mystic adept buffed with things like increased reflexes, are used to make some pretty powerful characters. If your GM actually lets you overcast, this character is a god. The actual adept powers that this character takes only account for a small portion of this characters massive power. Mystic adepts, in my opinion, should be forced to take aspected magic so that they lose effectiveness for some spells/abilities. But that's a whole other topic.

The first role isn't really a physical adept in my mind, just a twink. The second role is superseded by magicians. The fourth role isn't even a physical adept, and what adept powers it does take are actually rather secondary to its massive magic/foci/conjuring power. Leaving only the third role for a physical adept to excel in. Basically, physical adepts are powerful as long as they're magicians or street samurai. It's a bit like saying the most beautiful parts of Kansas are in Missouri.

Possible Solutions:
There are many ways of solving this problem.

1. Introducing more adept powers. Perhaps stealing straight from the critter powers & spirit powers list. You can make some fun and interesting characters doing this. It adds a lot of variety and flavor. It's cool to have an unarmed adept with energy aura(this too can be done by a mystic adept.)

2. Unwared adepts: Making adept powers cost half their RAW value on the condition that the adept remain un-enhanced by Wares

3. A combination of 1 & 2, depending on what kind of power level your campaign is facing.

4. Inhabited adepts. The rest of this post concerns this interesting option.


Inhabited adepts. These are adepts who, for whatever reason, have invited a spirit to inhabit them. There are many reasons this could happen. The spirit could have been a free spirit who fell in love with the adept. The spirit could have been summoned by a magician and forced to inhabit the adept, and once the services of the spirit were used, the spirit was freed, but cannot uninhabit the adept. There are many possibilities, but it's important that the player choose a specific one for their character for roleplay reasons. This kind of inhabitation could happen to a mundane, but the mundane would have to be prepared as a vessel, whereas a willing adept is automatically a prepared vessel. This could also happen to a magician, but most magicians would be reluctant to do it because they would lose any ability to conjure. There are two main types of inhabited adepts, hybrids and flesh forms(see SM. 100 sidebar). All of this could be done in-game, according to the rules, by a magician with the desire to do so. The GM might force the inhabited character to become an NPC, or he might allow him to continue playing as the inhabited adept. These rules govern the creation of an inhabited adept at character generation, rather than in-game.

Hybrid form inhabited adept:
A hybrid forms physical appearance is very obviously not that of a normal metahuman. They take on traits of the spirit inhabiting them. It may be similar to a shamanic mask. It could even go as far as glowing eyes, or traits that appear metagenic in nature such as feathers.
A hybrid form merge enhances the hosts physical attributes by the spirits Force. The spirit retains the hosts natural abilities, including magical powers and SURGE qualities. A hybrid form may not have Wares because their physiology has been drastically altered by the merge. Any Wares the Adept had before the Merge should be rendered in-operable and moot. Hybrid forms will also be very difficult to perform any medical work on. Apply a -6 dice pool to any attempt at mundane medicine on a Hybrid form. A hybrid form may posses only the spirits skills, therefore they may not take technical, matrix, firearms, driving, or technical BR skills. A hybrid form automatically takes the computer illiterate negative quality, but does not receive bonus points for it. A hybrid form retains only a few memories of the adepts past life, and may not suffer from multiple personalities. He may however suffer from flashbacks. hybrid forms may not take the Realistic form power.

Flesh form inhabited adept:
A flesh form looks completely and realistically metahuman. People will mistake them for a regular person unless they are astrally perceiving.
a flesh form does not recieve bonuses to its physical attributes for the spirits force. It can however retain all knowledge and skills of the adept. It may therefore take any technical, matrix, firearms, driving, or technical BR skill. The spirit retains the hosts natural abilities, including magical powers, SURGE, and Wares. Unlike a hybrid form, a flesh form may have active Wares at character creation, and even have new Wares installed in-game. Flesh forms automatically get the Realistic Form power.

Misc. Rules governing all inhabited adepts:
An inhabited adept may not use any skills or abilities related to conjuring. They may posses conjuring knowledge skills, as the adepts previous life may have involved conjuring.
all inhabited forms posses the Immunity to Normal weapons power(SR288), for the mechanics purposes, this power uses the inhabited adepts Spirit Force to determine the amount of hardened armor gained, not their magic attribute.
they receive Immunity to Age.
they may use and bond any type of magic foci except conjuring related foci.
they are continuously dual natured, but do not recieve a penalty for perceiving the way that metahumans do.
they may not have a resonance attribute.
they are immune to diseases that are not magical in nature.
as an inhabited form, you cannot be banished.
the Magician power is prohibited to take as a spirit power. those wishing to be magicians may take it as a magical positive quality, as anyone else.
manawarps/voids will affect the inhabited adepts spirit force attribute as well as magic attribute, simultaneously. The same goes for mana-barriers that the character is forced through. Be careful where you tread....
the inhabited adept may take and use the counterspelling skill even if they do not have the magician quality, as long as they have the Guard spirit power.

creating an inhabited adept:
The inhabitation costs 100 build points, +10 per attribute point of Spirit Force that you wish to have, with the first point being free. Treat Spirit Force as an additional attribute, along side your Magic attribute. For the Karma build system, the inhabitation costs 140 karma points, + karma points for raising your Spirit Force attribute.

Inhabited adepts can be any metavariant available. They will retain some racial characteristics & bonuses/minuses regardless of whether they are a Hybrid Form or a Flesh Form.

Inhabited adepts may not have an infection of any type. Treat the inhabitation as a sort of infection for build point purposes.

Inhabited characters must take whatever magic they wish to posses as a positive quality, just as normal characters. In the case of mystic adepts, this will mean splitting your magic attribute between adept powers and spell power, as normal. the spirit force attribute is separate.

Spirit Force:
The inhabited adept has an additional attribute that other archetypes lack. The attribute is Spirit Force. Spirit Force determines several things. For hybrids, it determines the bonus to physical attributes, so that 1 spirit force = 1 bonus point for every physical attribute. Spirit force also determines the number of spirit powers that the inhabited adept may posses(See RC page 92 sidebar for a list of possible powers and costs). Spirit force may be allowed to exceed the magic rating of the inhabited person, as even mundanes can be inhabited. Spirit force is used to calculate the force of any spirit powers used. The natural maximum for Spirit Force is 6, it may be increased through initiation.

spirit force and Wares:
Spirit force is directly impacted by the installation of cyber/bio/nano ware. treat Spirit force as you would adept power points when losing essence. Spirit Force and adept power points are lost simultaneously. For example, if a character has 6 magic(6 power points) and 4 spirit force, and installed 3 essence worth of Wares, they will have 3 magic(3 power points) and 1 spirit force remaining. this mechanic begins operating at character creation and continues in-game.

when creating the inhabited adept, treat him as 1 character and not 2. You must pick a magic tradition and spirit type for the spirit to come from, but the spirit doesn't come default with skills or powers other than those already mentioned.

qualities:
An inhabited adept may take almost any quality, negative or positive. This includes most magic qualities, cyber/bio qualities, metagenic, and matrix qualities. It is suggested that they hybrid form inhabited adept not take any technical or matrix qualities. They may even have a mentor spirit, or the spirit bane quality. They may not posses qualities that make magic have problems touching them such as murkey link or astral hazing. they may not enter into a spirit pact of any kind.

Qualities recommended for inhabited adepts for good role playing:
spirit bane
spirit affinity
multiple personalities(flesh form)
flash backs (hybrid form)
glamour
nasty vibe
gremlins

Concerning traditions:
The character should more strongly follow the spirits magic tradition than it follows the physical adepts Way. The character is essentially a free spirit, possibly with more baggage from its hosts past life than other kinds of free spirits.

inhabited adepts, initiation, and metamagic:
Inhabited adepts may initiate at the same cost as magicians or adepts. They may join a magic group and have ordeals. When initiating, an inhabited adept may choose to increase his Spirit Force attribute by 1 point, or increase his Magic attribute by 1 point. He may also choose any metamagic not related to conjuring. If the inhabited adept does not posses the magician or mystic adept quality, he may not choose any metamagic related to spellcasting or drain.

Famous inhabited adepts:
The man knelt down in the middle of the pentagram, naked to the waist. Sculpted muscles tensed and relaxed rhythmically with the chanting of low voices in the chamber. Long dark hair lay flat on his pale skin. Pointed ears cut a swath through the hair like a stone in a river. Second Sight revealed more. A blinding white light so brilliant and pure, a less educated man might think him a god or an angel. Five hooded figures stood at each point of the pentagram. A voice rang out, clear and high "Do you, Riven, willingly make this sacrifice, that your very spirit will be destroyed in service to your kin?" A low, loud, and clear bass replied "I do." The lines of the pentagram, etched into the stone floor, caught fire. A wall of flame now confined Riven to the inner circle of the pentagram. Behind the wall of flame, none could see the Balor Lord materialize in front of Riven. "We bind you together! Fire & Flesh!" The Balor reaches out and clasps hands with Riven. A terrible cry of agony escapes Rivens lips. Tears streaming down his face, muscles spasming, he smells his own burning flesh and feels his very spirit being torn asunder. He thinks one final thought of his mother. The screaming stops, he stands alone in the cirlce, the Balor gone. Smoke rises from his body, the fire of the pentagram exhausted. The hooded figures do not recognize him. His hair, once long, dark, flowing, is now brilliant orange. It reaches upward as flame does. His eyes, once emerald green, now brilliant red. His skin, once pale, now charred black. His aura burns so brightly it hurts to look upon. Waves of heat crash over the conjurors who created this being. "Mighty Flesh and Unquenchable Flame, bound together in you. You have become our weapon against the plague of Insects that would destroy all humanity!" Dead silence for a moment, then a low rumbling sound that shakes the chamber, followed by a loud hiss "yyyyeesssssssss"


The demon hunter Riven was an elven physical adept living in chicago around 2064, the time of the insect spirit war. A group of powerful conjurors, desperate for any means by which to beat the insect spirits, requested that Riven invite a fire spirit to inhabit him. Riven agreed. With the help of the conjurors, a Greater Fire Lord was forced to inhabit Riven. What resulted was a hybrid form inhabited adept. Riven was a potent physical adept to begin with, more than three times as powerful as your average physical adept. When the spirit inhabited him, it more than doubled his already dazzling power. Riven is rumored to still be alive today, despite the nuclear explosion that caused the end of that war. There's currently 10 movies and hundreds of books about his adventures, most of them pure fiction.

On the one hand, I respect that you took the time to think (and write) out an argument, and I'm glad you've obviously put some thought and effort into it. What's more, possession is a new twist on a way to fix the problem, so kudos for that.

On the other hand, I think you're terribly, fundamentally, wrong about adepts sucking, being awful, being worse than anyone else, etc, etc, etc. So...well...yeah. Good argument method, flawed core argument. Sorry you think they don't work. Have a good one.

The Physical Adept fills the combat role the same way a Technomancer fills the hacker role. Poorly at first, but once he gains experience with his abilities (spends karma) he starts to exceed anything else on the streets.

You can say this as long as you're ready to entirely ignore the problem of Adepts who take Wares. I have already acknowledged that they are better than a mundane street-samurai. The problem is that they're not really a physical adept. They're an awakened chrome-boy.

Yeah. It's kind of like how the Bioware Sammy differs from the Cyberware Sammy. The Bioware guy is harder to get off the ground -- synaptic boosters 2 costs a hell of a lot more ¥ than wired reflexes 2 -- but he has a lot more room to expand, due to low Essence costs. He's stealthier -- no cheap way to scan for bioware, so he can walk into a lot more places.

Adepts are like that, but even more so.

You're free to (a) assume I'm talking about 'ware-enhanced Adepts, which I'm not, and (b) have a perspective that this is a class-based game where someone's either an Adept or a Street Samurai, which I also disagree with.

I've made my share of pure Adepts. I've made my share of Adepts that take the shortcut and take some chrome. I've made my share of brick-mundane razorboys, I've had a long-running gunbunny Awaken into an Adept mid-game...I've got experience with both sides of this equation, and I just plain think you're wrong in your core premise (that of Adepts sucking). Sorry.

If you're as long-time a lurker as you claim, you should know by now that "mundane vs. magic" and "adept vs. sammie" and on and on and on is about as long-running an argument around here as, well, Shadowrun itself. It's not going to get settled in this thread by folks going tit-for-tat at each other, and, in fact, it likely will never get settled. One suggestion I'd make is to check out the Anniversary edition of SR4's core book, where several Adept powers did get their costs reduced (straight up initiative enhancements being chief among them); maybe that will help balance things better in your opinion.

And so, once again, I think you're incorrect and I hope you have a good day. Kudos on an imaginative new "fix" to the problem, and if it works at your gaming table, great.

A physical adept is easier to spot than a Bioware sammy, to anyone with astral perception.

I wasn't expecting to settle the argument. It's just my solution. I like it. I'm willing to defend it to a certain extent. It's not perfect.

No one has yet pointed out and glaring flaws that would make me reconsider the entire thing. That's what I'm looking for. That's why I posted here. Objectively prove to me that I'm wrong. I would love to see it. Tell me there's more adept powers than spells. Tell me you can easily boost core abilities with adept powers better than with Wares.

Assensing is how you find both Bioware and Adepts.

Of course, if your world has Awakened, Assensing dudes working low-rank security gigs as rent-a-cops, our 6th worlds differ rather significantly.

First off, the role of an Adept is Spirit Killer. Adepts IMHO since 2e have always been slow to start with insane power at the end. Remember unlike almost everything else in 4e Magic has no cap, so its possible with enough karma to buy... well everything as an Adept. Also Adepts are simply awesome against magical threats. Street Sam vs Adept against drone the Sam has the edge, Street Sam vs Adept against a Spirit the Adept has the edge (assuming the Adept bought the right powers). The gap may be a bit wider between starting Adepts and Street Sams with 4e but it was always there. Trying to put Street Sam and Adept at the same starting level would be fine if you cap Magic to. Then the difference becomes flavor much like the 4e Mage and Shaman.

Unless, Of Course, the Adept has the Masking Metamagic... at which point he looks exactly like a mundane...

Keep the Faith

Physical adepts are awful spirit killers.
See this very relevant thread: http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=31717
tldr: the spirit or projecting mage can kite forever in astral form and the adept can never touch them.

as long as he succeeds in an opposed test against the mages assensing + magic vs his intuition + magic.

Ahhhh... who said the Adept was attacking into the Astral? That would be stupid... If a Spirit wants to affect the Real World (and Mages Too, for that matter) he has to be on the physical plane, where they are very easy to attack by anyone, it is just that Adepts are are usually a lot better at it than mundanes are, if built for that aspect anyways...



You got it all wrong... this is an Active task that must be attempted (An Assensing Test), and is in no way reflexive... if they are not looking, then they will NEVER penetrate it.

Keep the Faith

the idea that he starts to exceed anything on the streets is off to me. He can get what 3 more dice, and what else? There are some areas they can rock, dodging with combat sense, unarmed combat and thrown weapons but end of the day a street sam will usually be as good if not better in most combat fields. Yeah many hundreds of karma in the adept is a powerhouse, but a cyber monster will be as well assuming he is getting paid decently. So certain fields they exceed anything on the streets, but a lot of other fields only at absurd karma levels and only by a small margin.

For the general topic. While I don't have a major problem with adepts, though I do think an wide range of powers cost too much SR4A did not go far enough. But still there are not terrible broken. And I do not have a problem with cyber/adepts existing I do think SR4 went way to far in making it the best option for adepts. They seem to have given up on the idea that magical types want to avoid ware, which I think is a pity.

Most of the qualities that can be taken as an Adept power cost roughly the same or less than the quality (Perfect Memory for instance costs 10 points, while the equivalent for adept costs 0.5 magic which is almost 5 points).

And Astral Sight is an awful quality. You only get Magic 1 that can never be raised, which means that if you take ANY point of ware, you lost the ability.

Agree completely.

Combat sense 6, improved ability - dodge 3, improved reflexes 1 for powers with reflexes 6, dodge 6 and magic 6 gives you 22 base dice to dodge, or 31 for a full dodge, and once initiated, it becomes even more extreme. This can be done using 100 BP plus 60 Karma (start with reaction and magic at 5 and raise them through karma) or 150 BP.

Edit: Added wrong.

To address some of the more specific points, in the interest of giving feedback:

Overall, your proposed solutions seem too strong. Currently, adepts can be pretty good at a number of roles. They are moderately good at combat, very good at sneaking, athletics, or social skills, and have far more options against things like spirits with invulnerability to normal weapons. While their ability to get multiple initiative passes or improve their Attributes is far more limited than an augmented character, it is counterbalanced by certain adept powers such as combat sense, mystic armor, and critical strike, as well as the improved ability power.

Adepts are like elves - generally not an optimal choice, but very well suited for certain roles. I could see giving them a bit of a power-up. However, I think your proposed solutions go a bit overboard. Some of the critter powers are extremely powerful, giving adepts effectively double their normal number of power points is complete overkill, and inhabited adepts seem to have the worst game-unbalancing effects of possession traditions.

If you think adepts are weak then you aren't building them correctly.

If I played in any games where gaining karma over time actually happened, I'd do adepts every time (when not a mage, of course): sam, hacker, rigger, face, melee, ninja, whatever. In the long run, they'll always beat cyber. Hell, mysad and you're all set, as you said.

Maybe i'm being obtuse, but I don't have the rules in front of me. Why are you adding your magic attribute to your dodge roll?

Because my head's not 100% in the posting here. Fixed it.

Kind of surprised no one's mentioned the obvious problem: inhabitation kills the host. What you end up with is not a dude walking around with a spirit in his head (that would be possession), but a body whose original soul has been annihilated and replaced with a spirit. Two completely different animals, and outside of super-ultra-mega-batshit insane cults, I really can't see you finding a whole lot of "willing adept" volunteers.

Duh, they're 'roleplayers'. They'll do *anything*.

These are not the only criteria for success in the Sixth World. Things like Mentor bonuses and Adept Centering don't have a mundane parallel and Adept Centering is an awful, awful good ability. Same deal with Item Attunement. Likewise some bits of cyber and bioware aren't actually all that expensive essence wise and can be combined with Magic abilities to great effect. For example, you're just not going to create a character that can out-Face a bio-Adept short of running with SURGE and getting Glamour. Even then, the Adept can come out on top by adding in a dash of Improved Ability. But then, I guess you already know that, judging from this comment:



Comments like this are completely and utterly subjective. There's multiple paths to power in the Shadowrun world and you took one of the paths that happens to work very well, discarded it and then said the system doesn't work. I'd much rather you not throw around rhetoric like "Objectively prove me wrong," when such comments make up the crux of your initial argument.

The existence of Improved Ability, alone, is the end-all be-all that makes adepts superior. The problem is that with an adept, you have to specialize if you really want to be competitive from start to finish, and some specializations are far better than others. No one's going to come close to challenging an adept specialized in Unarmed Combat, for instance. There's also concepts like the Social Adept, but you're clearly more interested in their physical abilities.

That said, I prefer building cyberware-oriented characters over adepts because I prefer their style and like being more of a generalist. But physically-oriented adepts are hardly subpar or worthless. They just need a niche. If you try making one who's just as good at gunslinging, swordplaying, infiltrating, and spying, well... you are going to be sorely disappointed compared to other character types. But hey, that's your fault for not taking advantage of the adept's strengths.

And as others have said, this comparison only holds weight during character creation and the earliest stages of a campaign. In any long-running campaign where the Karma is flowing freely, adepts quickly overtake just about anyone short of other magicians as far as being a generalist and all around badass goes.

Yup, which is why I said in certain areas like dodging they can rock. I did not go that far with my troll boxer character but rolling 12 dice on a dodge without it being a full dodge even was awesome. A large number of shots just missed so I didn't even have to roll my large number of soak dice. They have there rolls so like I said I don't think they are too unbalanced.

I do think some things cost too much(wall running is a prime example) and I wish they'd have a reason not to be a cyber/adept. While it wasn't iron cast especially not for the power gamers who worked the system, it used to be if you were an adept if you took cyber it was to cover the things magic could not handle.(enhanced attributes have always sucked for adepts for some reason, not as bad comparatively as now though) Limb replacement, smartgun links things like that. In 4e, you go to it just because it is cheaper and better at most enhancement and you go to magic for the things tech can't handle like combat sense, killing hands etc. But since you took the path of magic I think it should be the previous edition way or what they setting wise shot for, as an adept magic should handle all you enhancements except for things that magic just can't do.

Also in previous edition if you were magically active you were worse in the matrix and maybe rigging, I can't remember on that the driving rules sucked just as much back then as they do now so we never played riggers. I think it was +2 to all TNs in the matirx, which was a huge penalty. It did something important it separated magic types so magic types weren't just as good as you at X activity but they also had magic. I'd bring that back and sensitive system I'd give that for no points to all magically active types but have it also effect bioware and geneware. Things like synaptic accelerator are still more essence friendly, but it wont be by an absurd margin anymore.

It might sound like a lot, but most of that is to help SR feel more like SR to me than it does now. 4e really moved away from many of the SR concepts that I loved.

i'll have to disagree with the doc here, in 4th edition, improved ability is one of the less nifty powers that adepts have, imo. it's been oft-said that shadowrun is a game of glass cannons - characters who have been optimized usually don't need more dice, whoever moves first is mostly likely to make the kill. plus you only get like 2 extra dice due to the augmented skill maximums, as opposed to sr3 where it wasn't unusual for an adept to be throwing twice the number of dice in his area of expertise as the samurai. that said, adepts can do a lot of cool things that sammies can't - being able to laugh off some of the most commonly abused spirit powers is just one of their unique talents, one that no samurai can replicate (magic resistance only works on spells, and astral hazing is a rather suicidal quality to take).

Gotta agree with Critias on this, it doesn't matter how good an well though out your post/idea is when your core argument is just plain wrong.

For excampe show me character who isn't an adept that can jump out of the 10:th floor of a building and consistantly take no damage from that fall or do that movie trick of jumping from one building to the building on other side of the street.

And then there's the Infusion metamagic. It's good to boost up a power in a pinch. Even better if you want to take say a range of low level Improved Ability powers in different skills, then boost the one you need. It's not the fastest thing in the world, and it certainly isn't free. But it can be used to make an adept a bit more well rounded, if you build them for that. And it can do it better than Skillwires with a few levels of initiation.

There are definitely things an adept can do that mundanes can't. There are things mages can do that adepts can't, but adepts weren't made to trump mages. They're more of a middle ground.
Killing Hands +Elemental Attack + Critical Strike can do some interesting things.
Traceless Walk + Improved Ability (Infiltration)
Commanding Voice along with False Signature, Facial Sculpt and Impr. Ability (Disguise)
Improved Ability (Weapon type) + Weapon Focus + Attunement
Attune to an animal type, share Improved Unarmed, Critical Strike + Elemental Attack, then give the animal the power.

Yes cyber can give some better stat bonuses to skills and attributes for cheaper. But you're also not factoring in things like metamagics and foci. A cyber-Chameleon can change his voice, his eyes, even his face, but not his aura. No one else has the ability to give an animal like a bird +4 unarmed, +4 Critical Strike, and an electrical attack. Successful adepts plan. As Doc/Scratch said, cyber lets you spread out a bit more (enhanced articulation+muscle toner+Reflex Recorder).

Personally I don't get why people get upset about adding cyber to something (like a mage or adept) and it being better than before. That's the point of augmentations. But a straight out adept is far from inferior IMO.

This all goes back to that gamer study that was referenced in another thread.

The Thinkers don't like that they can't get an "optimum build" out of a physical adept vs. other types.

The Powergamers worry that they might not be as effective as other types.

The StoryTellers only want to make sure they can contribute to the story.

The CharacterActors just hope they have an interesting and consistent character concept.

Funny. I'm pretty sure I count as a Thinker, Storyteller, and Character Actor, yet I like adepts just fine across the board. Probably a Power Gamer, too, but not by that definition.

Quick example off the top of my head:

Social Adept, Human.
Notable Attributes: Charisma 5, Edge 6, Magic 5.
Active Skills: Influence Skill Group 4, Intimidation 4, Pistols 4, Stealth Skill Group 4, Dodge 4, Perception 4
Powers: Kinesics 3, Voice Control, Facial Sculpt 3, Melanin Control, Commanding Voice, Linguistics, Enthralling Performance (Oration), Multi-Tasking, Eidetic Sense Memory
Equipment: Commlink (System 5 and Response 5), Empathy Software 5, Glasses and Contacts with the works, Ear Buds with the works.

There. Only about 250ish build points spent, leaving 150 for everything else; mostly his attributes, contacts, and gear. I didn't even bother with qualities, and didn't have to bother with Restricted Gear a single time. Good luck trying to make a face through any other method that comes even remotely close to being as powerful or versatile in the role as this guy is. Even if you ditch his Magic, that's only 40 build points you can use to catch up to him. And considering the price for things like Tailored Pheromones, your only real advantage might be in starting the game with a few more contacts than he is. But with those abilities, he won't have any trouble picking up new contacts as the game progresses... especially if he's selective about the contacts he does start with. A Black Marketeer and a Fixer specializing in introducing people with each other is all it would take to give him just about anything he needs.

Adepts are fine, especially Social and Unarmed Adepts. They have their niches, and they handle those niches either competently or, as exemplified above, too well. And with particularly creative players, lots of other options open up that makes them unique and interesting compared to the mundane options simply because those mundanes don't have access (at least not easily if at all) to what certain powers can do.

Many of you seem to be very poor at reading. You have stated that social adepts are awesome. I agreed with this toward the beginning of my original post. In fact, it's the one role I said an adept could fill probably better than anyone else.

The character is essentially a free spirit. I guess I could've been more explicit about that. No, there wouldn't be many willing volunteers. It should be rare. The build point costs reflects this. The short story of Riven, I thought, also made this clear.

Not that your that much better yourself, as you seem to be ingnoring everythink thats not social adept in many post pointing out thinks adepts are really good at.

I didn't feel the need to reply to most of them, because they all ran into the problem of the cyber-adept. An adept who doesn't take Wares is just not going to be as good under RAW as one who does. Period. Some people have brought up athletics-adepts. Jumping from roof tops, etc. Neat. A cyber-adept is still better at this than an unWared adept. Others have brought up the infinite growth potential of an adept. That's stellar. I mentioned this in the same sentence as I mentioned cyber-adepts. They're just a street samurai with more growth potential due to initiating with karma in-game. Even a social adept would be a fool not to take the Pheromones Ware.

It's not that I have a problem with Wares in general. I've made a lot of chrome-boys. I've also made a lot of chrome-boy adepts. The problem is, I think that playing a pure adept without Wares should be a rewarding experience, and not one you have to sacrifice overly much for.

Improved Physical Attribute is 1 power point for adepts, and effectively 30BP through qualities+buying the allowed (not given!) additional point.

Astral Sight at 5bp is a) not allowed for anyone with any other Awakened quality, b) extremely fragile; lose a point of Essence and it's gone forever. c) Without any other Awakened abilities, it mostly puts you at risk from spirits; it gives you no real ability to handle them.



Fair enough. But that list wasn't meant to be exhaustive, just a list to start from, just like the spell list isn't meant to be exhaustive. For example, in my campaign there's an NPC adept who's developed an adept power to stay young forever. Not so relevant in combat, but for long-term RP, it's an important alternative to leonization.



This is not necessarily a bad thing. Augmentations are supposed to be the quick and dirty road to power. "Pure" adepts aren't a goal of game design; they're a viable choice, but not meant to be the only viable choice.



I don't really see what's horrible about that. It's different from all-mundane street sams, it has style, and it isn't too much better or worse at it.



Adepts have a far easier time with astral barriers, and always-on powers that don't require rolls and risk of drain are pretty neat if a run turns sour. A magician that only rolls well might be slightly better, but reactivating your foci and spells every time you have to sneak past an astral barrier will really slow you down.



Spellcasting is noticeable; 6-Force is the threshold. This means that high-powered mind manipulation is going to draw attention. It's visible on cameras; no sensitive employee should be left unmonitored.
I personally think a face needs to be far more subtle than that, and adepts can be much smoother than magicians. Their powers can be fairly well-hidden, and people often underestimate how useful looking normal can be to a face.



I've always thought mystical adepts were a bit wonky. I don't like not having astral projection as a standard power; what kind of half-trained magician does that make you? Mystic adepts have a hard time excelling in anything particular. They're good as all-purpose runners though.



So basically, I disagree with all the above points you made. Adepts aren't as extremely versatile as magicians, and don't quite have the range. They're more subtle and faster though, and they don't get tired as fast.
Some of your solutions still have their uses though;



More different powers is nice; they don't have to be more powerful, but variety is good.




I don't think Essence Virginity needs to be so hardwired into the game system. Some adept powers are a bit overcosted, and that should be fixed, but I don't think any special bonus should be given for not augmenting. I don't think we need clear "class boundaries" in SR. I rather like bio-adepts as a character type.

I first want to say that I appreciated your entire post. You made fair points pretty much everywhere. Concerning essence virginity: The problem with not hardwiring it into the game, the problem with simply cutting the cost of Adept powers, is that the cyber-adept sees the same increase. You've only worked to widen the gap between the Adept-street-sam and the mundane-street-sam, without giving any incentive at all to remain "pure", one way or the other. Remaining pure may be a goal in itself for some characters, and I think they should be in some way rewarded.

Wait, that's your big problem? That mixing and matching from more than one "area" of abilities creates a stronger overall character? Well, uhm, duh?

Just reverse your examples and you'll see exactly what I mean by that 'duh.' A street samurai will be made stronger by adding adept powers and/or spells. A hacker will be made stronger by adding adept powers and/or spells. A face will be made stronger by adding adept powers and/or spells.

Are mages suddenly weak since they can benefit significantly from cyberware, too? Things like Cybereyes, Cerebral Boosters, and Pain Editors can do a lot for them.

That's a really... yeah, it actually is a really weak argument.

More adept powers are always welcome!

Yeah, that's why I kinda got my undies in a bunch over the "Prove me wrong," thing. His problem is largely a thematic one, since adepts are more than fine as long as you don't consider essence a sacred cow. Whether there is a "Ware problem" is ultimately a matter of opinion and perspective. Which, you know, is fine, but it says more about what a person thinks of what the Shadowrun setting should be than it says anything about what Adepts actually are capable of. Personally, I tend to discount the idea that cyberware makes your character automatically less of an adept thematically. For example, I've ran an infiltrator Adept with some fairly heavy 'ware, but he had a Mentor Spirit (Rat), a Geas and eventually attuned himself to a rat swarm in Redmond. With only 3 Magic I guess you could call him a chrome boy, but he sure as hell played like an adept. Whereas I've seen pure Adepts that treated the whole experience as a quick way to 4 initiative passes and left it at that. Still, given SR history and precedent, I do see why some people miss the magic vs. tech vibe from earlier editions, even if I personally never really cared for it. Ultimately it's an agree to disagree thing, at least after the SR4A tweaks made going pure a bit more reasonable, anyway.

I miss the burned out mage archetype.

Annnnnd, cut.

Yeah. This shows you're just not worth talking to, at least on this subject.

I wouldn't have said it if it weren't true. I addressed social adepts in the original post. Said they were awesome. If people had bothered to read it, they wouldn't have been trying to give me sweet social adept templates.

All fair, reasonable points. Thanks.

And that's fine. I wouldn't have said you weren't worth talking to, if that also wasn't true. You came in here with your mind made up, you're offering fixes to problems not everyone agrees with, and -- most recently -- you're being a dick about it.

So why bother? You see a problem, you made up a fix to it, and you're going to condescend towards anyone that doesn't agree with you. What's the point in talking to someone like that?

I'm not condescending to people who don't agree with me. Many of their arguments are legit, and I've said so. I am however very condescending toward people who aren't capable of reading.

I believe the point Crit is attempting to make is that you seem to be picking your arguements, while making blanket statements. Your statement was because of people using social adepts as an example, where you've already addressed that. On the other hand, you've said nothing of the other examples cited having nothing to do with social adepts.

I'd have to go with Whipstitch, in that it's more of a personal preference/flavor thing, which is fine. If that's how you prefer your game, more power to you. But it's a personal thing, not a game flaw. Of course an adept that takes augments is going to get a bit more of an edge. That's why you get augmentations. Bioware was made specifically to be more essence friendly, which naturally lends its self to the awakened. As adepts benefit more from attribute and skill boosts than a mage, they're going to see it used more often.

As was pointed out, a mage can also get great benefits from augmentation. A hermetic with Cerebral Boosters for example is going to be able to sling high force spells all day. They can also duplicate it with a very simple sustained spell. It's not just adepts who get boosts from augmentations. That's the point.

No one's trying to go after you, they just disagree with your arguement that it's fundamentally flawed in the system. You take a datajack as an adept, you can lose your Traceless Walk, or more likely, your potential ability to get it without dumping a crap ton of karma into it. There are a number of adept abilites that cyber simply cannot reproduce, and much fewer that cyber can do that magic can't. It's that old arguement again.

That doesn't mean that you can't have a problem with it as a matter of taste or style. If you do, just dictate that all the awakened have the Sensitive System quality, as has been said before. The fluff certainly supports that, and more recent incarnations of SR have gone away from that somewhat. But without that, or an IC reason, there are few reasons not to get augmentations. Again, that's the point.

Another change that helps adepts along I forgot to mention is Initiating for adept powers. You can take a power point now instead of a metamagic, which is great with the much more limited number of adept powers you can take, and especially good since SR4A increased the cost for raising attributes (which is a 'fix' I don't much care for personally). It's actually cheaper to increase your initiate grade than to raise your magic, especially when using Ordeals and Groups. Gives a lot more crunch reasons for the "warrior orders" and the like for adepts.