Hi,

first of all I am not really complaining, but just checking to see if I didn't forget anything.

The Steet Shaman (as in SR4A but Elf and no rat) is in a fight. She have Magic 5, Summoning 5 . One Triad thug is running away with informations.

1st Round : the Shaman use a complexe action to Summon a Force 5 - Spirit of the Beasts. Dont use Edge. Spirit roll only 2 sucess (didn't use Edge to resist, could he have ? he got no reason to do so anyway). Shaman roll good and got 4 sucess. Got 2 services. Use Edge to resist a level 4 Drain and take no hit (why use Edge ? who knows, drain pool is 10 dice).

2nd Round : the Shaman order the spirit to Intercept the chinese, pointing to the fleeing guy.
2nd Round, second IP : the Spirit materialize in front of the fleeing man and easily pin him to the ground (Force 5 spirits aren't especially weak guys).

My pondering is about how easily and fast it was to conjure a very potent Spirit, a mere 3 seconds... I thought Spirits conjuration would have taken more time and be prepared in advance, not in the middle of a fight or on a whim. Did I forget anything ? I probably do.

Also Drain is very dependant on luck more than on spirit power and Force 5-6 spirits sound very easily controllable while quite strong... Afterall usually mages have rating 5-6 Magic.

I don't see anythink that you might have forgotten, but you have to remember that summoning a force 6 spirit carriers a potential risk of you having to resist 12 points of drain damage which can have catastrophic consequences if you in a middle of a run.

you did it right.

concerning drain, there's an optional tule in SM suggesting summoning drain is Force/2+ spirit hits. it's more predictable

Binding is what takes a long time, the initial summoning is quite fast. Yes, it makes it powerful. Any slower, though, and combat would be over before a mage could summon a spirit. And that would take a huge chunk of summoning's versatility.



(If you want to make the argument that limiting mages is warranted though, I won't argue)

Hum the odds to having to resist 12 pts of drain are 0.14% wich is definitely not something you will see everyday. And this is 12 pts of Stun damage.

Now you can expect to resist them with 12 dices (is there a way to up it more than maxing related stats ?), the odds you get the 3 success needed not to get down is only : 81.89%... And you can get many more dice and rules of 6 if Edging the drain (wich you should proably do).

So I think the risk is so minimal it isn't even worth taking into account. You have more chance of getting a major complication on your summoning roll.


*thanks for the http://www.pvv.ntnu.no/~bcd/SR/dicerollcalc.html page for the people that made it *

I do see one thing that was forgotten here:



Switching between the astral and physical form of a spirit is complex action. The spirit can easily act right after the shaman's order in first IP of 2nd round, however he will not be able to do anything till the next IP, and he only has 2 IP if in material form.

I'd have the guy roll Reaction (+ possibly gymnastics or dodge) to see if he can avoid the spirit and run in a different direction - or crash in the spirit.

This might not seem much of a difference, but if the fleeing guy has a a trigger happy friend in a good position, then the spirit might not survive till his action. Seen that happen several times...

Your assuming that the summoner hasn't allready taken damage during the run from casting spells and being shot at.
Also while yes spirit getting 6 succes is very unlikely, it does has a 10% chance to get 4 succes and having to resist 8 points of drain isn't exactly fun in a middle of the run especially as at that point you nessesary didn't even get a spirit out of that deal.

Also thinking minimal risk not worth to be taken into acount is a great way to get your self killed.

Materializing takes the spirits action on that 2nd pass for the 2nd IP, so technically it doesn't get to whomp the guy until CT#3, by which point, the sammy could have filled any number of people with holes.

But, if you take a mage with more IPs, then the Spirit can Materialize on IP #1 of CT2 and attack on IP #2.
Still not faster than a gun though..

Edit: mielikki made this point while I was in the shower...

Would love to see what a trigger happy ganger could do to a Force 5/6 spirit... especially as I would rules there is a surprise roll when the Spirit materialize.

But, you are right the spirit had to materialise then act... except he can use his last action of 2nd round to materialise... after all he is astral in 2nd round so he have at last 3 action, right ?

It takes an impressively well-armed ganger to take down a F5 spirit.. that's Immunity to Normal Weapons (10) you're looking at.

Supposing a quite scary ganger with a Ruger Super Warhawk and Ex-Ex, that still requires 3 net successes on hitting the spirit, which has 5ish Reaction.. not too easy. And if you bypass ItNW, it still functions as armor dice, so that's about 15 dice for a damage resistance test.

If I was the ganger, I'd shoot the mage. Unless he has a Body of 6+, he can't really be better armored than the spirit. Also, geek the mage first, otherwise he might just summon more spirits/throw stunbolts.

Except the Mage stayed at the top flat while the gangers are running in the street... as always it is all circunstancial...

Taser works quite nicely and only needs the 1 nethit required to hit.(10/2=5 armor and the damage is 6,7 or 9 with the one nethit, depending on what model of a taser he has)

Make you wonder why they bother cary fire arms as Taser is so much better than anything else... sigh.

Anyway I dont think Taser is part of the classical gangers/triad gears... wich is weird as Triads are supposed to be very into occult.

They do have a v. short range can be a big negative.

I double checked it and was surprised to see the range is shown to be up to 20 meters... I thought that taser was nearly close combat weapons...

It's still a -6 to hit at 20m also once your in 20m that spritys gonna hug you next turn so if you miss...

Given Astral speed and materialisaton I am surprised even 20 meters is enough... no reason why the Spirit cant wait for his 3rd PI in astral to materialise right in hand to hand range.

Distance only matters for people supporting the target.

In combat distance always matters for everyone, unless you're very loose with distances in combat. But, that said, using Astral to "hop" in combat is typically a good way to limit the effectiveness of spirits.

So having the spirit pop astral to close distance works kinda like this (assuming the spirit goes first in initiative as it likely has more dice):

IP1:
Spirit: Spirit uses complex action to shift to the Astral. Then uses free action for movement to where it see's target's aura.
Ganger: Runs

IP2:
Spirit: Free action to move up to ganger again. Complex action to shift back to physical realm. Cannot do much else this round, at least much that's useful.
Ganger: If he's taken a combat drug (likely) or is one of the lucky ones to have IP enhancements (less likely) he gets a free shot on the spirit.

Now we've got to go to the next turn to get a hit off.



Now me, I'd have the spirit close the distance in the meat. Most spirits can move as fast or faster then humans, meaning they can at least keep pace unless the target is built for speed (or a troll... trolls and speed is just crazy). It can be targeted doing this but will have more options.

IP1:
Spirit: Spirit uses free action to close some of the distance, then uses elemental attack on ganger.
Ganger: Ganger shoots at spirit at penalties from running and possibly damage from elemental attack. Likely will not penetrate ITNW.

IP2:
Spirit: Spirit closes more distance with another free action. If close it might use unarmed combat or a close range power. If not close then another elemental attack does nicely.
Ganger: If IP enhanced somehow will fire again, at likely same or worse penalties.

The big difference here is that it will likely take an additional turn and let the ganger get a free shot on the spirit to "pop" in front of him. And while all this is happening, the Street Sam is taking his/her actions. So, in all likely-hood the ganger drops before the spirit gets a chance to attack.

Also, an addition to IPs does not take place until the next combat Turn. So shifting to Astral means you don't pick up IP#3 until the combat turn it shifted is over and a new one has started. It works like this for all IP bonuses.

I don't know... Our mage took 20 drain from a Summoned Force 5 Spirit once (and with the 15 Dice and Edge Spent to resist it, he ONLY took 11 boxes of damage... Of course, he had a penchant for abusing spirits (Spell Binding and other shenanigans), and the spirit resisted the summoning with Edge (with 10 Hits on resistance towards the summoning), but that is the chance you take when you play with spirits.

No idea what the RAW says, but if you think that a summoner is getting away with a spirit too 'easy', you CAN have the spirit use edge to resist getting summoned....using it to reroll after the test would probably be best. If you roll five dice for a Force 5 spirit, get one success, decide to Edge and go "oh there's three more successes" it's the difference between the shaman soaking two drain and soaking EIGHT drain.

Also in your above example did you take into account that Materializing is a Complex Action?

I definitely would not say that summoning is overpowered though. Remember that a Street Sam can just shoot the fleeing character with a stick-n-shock round in the same pass without taking ANY drain or waiting for the spirit to appear.

Why would the spirit have to spend an action to go back to astral, isn't he in astral in the first place, he just need to materialize when he reach the target.

About the IP1 the spirit use his free move action after the gangers so he dont need to move again after materializing (free action could be taken out of your own initiative rating) it is far more logical and better translate simultaneous action.

The sammies weren't able to shoot the guy because they were ambushing him at an appartment top floor. But the ganger manage to smell the trick and didn't enter, deciding to run down stairs. Sammies goes in pursuit, what they didn't plan was that the ganger was a physical adept and use great leap to go downstair a lot faster they were expecting and he have headstart.

So they weren't in a position to take pot shot at him, magical interception was the trick.

(in fact the ganger was intercepted by one of the runner that was disguised as the concierge and that shot him flat with his colt deputy (that's where I discovered the runner specialised in infiltration, disguise and lockpicking is using a Colt Deputy oO and where he discovered you cant use silencer on thoses ... ).

About the use of Edge to resist summon I am unsure of when I should use it, always seems too harsh, especially for a quite random summoning. I think it is more usefull in case of binding or attemps to summon again specific spirit.

Well, at our table, we use it for summoning any Spirit of Force 4 or greater... they spend the edge to Re-roll any failures in most cases. They also spend Edge to resist any Binding at Force 4 or Greater...

Yeah definitely use it for Binding spirits REALLY don't want to get bound, yo.



Technically, this is legal:

R1, IP1: Summoner summons.
R2, IP1: Summoner commands spirit . Spirit gets in place and materializes.
R2, IP2: Spirit pins guy.

Functionally no difference with waht you said, BUT what you described is...



Which is technically impossible because a spirit CANNOT Materialize and pin someone in the same IP! Materializing is a complex action, just like melee combat. Hence what you are describing happening on the second IP of the 2nd Round isn't possible. Going from Astral to Physical is a Complex Action.

Anyway...if the guy was out of line of sight--like way out of line of sight--wouldn't the spirit technically had to have spent time using the Search power to find him? And if the guy ISN'T way out of line of sight, can't the Samurai just catch him and nail him? Of course I'm sure I'm not picturing the situation right. I wasn't there.

Also...unsilenced revolvers make me a sad panda. I guess he could use...subsonic ammo? Unsure why he's so in love with the Deputy anyway.

Ummmmm, Spirits get Multiple IP per Round, and your Mage may also have Multiple Initiative Passes... Your examples continue to not take this into account... But your right, it is highly unlikely that a spirit could materialize and Pin an opponent in a single IP...

Just... Ouch. Is magic really that much of a problem in your games? That's some hard-core GM predjudice.


That's okay, because technically spirits cannot Materialize.

In any event, it would take at least two Initiative Passes for that to work.

What? Spirits have the Materialization power. It lets them...Materialize? Where are you getting "technically spirits cannot materialize from". Not everyone is rocking a possession tradition.



If the mage has multiple IP why, in the first example, did he wait until turn 2 to command the spirit? That's why I assumed he had one IP.

Also, if I recall correctly materialized spirits have a maximum of 2 IP. Spirits have 3IP in Astral and 2IP when materialized.

Magic is not a problem in our games... There are a lot of things to keep magic controlled, and this rule (Spirits can use Edge for any purpose after all, just like a character can) is one of the reasons why; Believe me, it is not a predjudice on anyone's part... In Fact, it tends to maintain the verisimilitude of the game a lot better than having no constraints would. If everyone is summoning High Powered Spirits (I think that I heard once here on Dumpshock that the average Force Spirit summoned was 9; here anyways), then the game tends to bereak down a lot. When there are canon limits to what is common/typical, then you tend to see a more believable distribution of spirits in game... Otherwise, you see nothing but Force 9+ Spirits, and that just is not a lot of fun for a lot of people... Believe me, Mages are quite powerful enough already, and a common sense limit to their power is a good thing, not a bad thing.

As always, I know that not everyone agrees with this sentiment, but there you go, YMMV.

Materialize is a Physical Power, and cannot be used in the Astral Plane... But you MUST have an Astral Form to activate Materialize (Which means you are on the Astral Plane)... How do you activate a Physical POwer on a Plane that does not allow activation of Physical Powers? Catch 22... Materialization, Possession and Inhabitation all have this issue if I remember correctly.



Can't answer the first for you (Maybe he was casting spells?), but the second is indeed correct...

Spirits are initially summoned on the Astral Realm. You cannot use Physical Powers on the Astral. Materialization, Possession, and Inhabitation are all Physical Powers. By RAW, spirits cannot use Materialization, Possession, or Inhabitation.

FYI, I do in fact suspend that limitation, but only for the purposes of those Powers.

EDIT: Look at Type, under Powers, page 286, SR4, and the descriptions for those three Powers. Or page 204 from Running Wild.

That is obviously the equivalent of a typo! Why would ANYONE interpret it that way? That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

It is not an interpretation though... NO PHYSICAL powers (This includes all Physical Spells by the way) may be used on the Astral Plane, except for these 3 apparently... Though I do think that someone was not paying attention when they wrote those particular abilities up though...

Obviously those were intended to work, although by strict RAW they cannot. There should be something about them being able to work despite their Physical nature in their descriptions, but there is not.

I personally think it's fun to find things like that.

YA THINK!?

I mean, the entire PURPOSE of Materialization is to manifest in the physical world. The TEXT of the power is "Certain astral critters are capable of projecting themselves into the material world, thus allowing them to interact with physical beings". To any sane person, that should override whatever stupid technicality makes Materialization impossible.

I just think that this is very very silly. It is obviously a mistake. When an NPC in a published adventure has an Initiative of 3 and has 10 IP, because someone accidentally switched the numbers around, would you have them go ten times a turn?

HERE'S ANOTHER THING:

How did they not CATCH this between SR4 and SR4A!?

Indeed....

And who Knows...

When have I ever said that I rabidly adhere to RAW in my games? And please, stop yelling. Caps lock is not Cruise Control.

Mid range spirits 4-7 will smash regular guys. Just add spirit of man with optional power to cast one of your spells or got forbid fire elemental, with energy aura for +4 melee damage. Most mooks and lone star patrol officers folks can't hurt a f5 spirit thats why magic fights magic and they call in back up. As for always spending edge to resist summoning I reserve that for mages that abuse their spirits or rebind after they have already bound them once. But as the guy says YMMV on that and every one has house rules and styles of play that make their home game fun. Bound spirits are even faster call as a simple action and shoot the bad guy with your other simple.

Without the rule in place at our table I never summon a spirit less than force 6 unless it is for trivial tasks or amusement. I initially thought it was a weird table rule, but the more I have played the more I think it is a great way to handle things. Spirits are awesomely powerful, and it is fantastically easy to summon up a force 8 or 9 one out of the gates when they do not use edge. And for those talking about well on the fly in a run you don't ant to risk damage I say they last til sunrise/sunset and go read the first aid rules again. It is not hard to summon one up at breakfast and patch up on a bad resistance roll.

The rules basically say spirits can and will use edge if they want to resist the summons. The potential reasons they gave were abusive summoner and the spirit feels the discrepancy in power is such that you are not worthy to summon him. How a spirit thinks he is too bad assed to be summoned by you is a GM call TJs table went with force 4+, I have heard others say above the magic rating of the summoner. I prefer TJs since a few runs in and that isn't a functional limit on a summoner focused mage.

I never thought about the concept of RAW v. RAI before coming to Dumpshock. Since then I have thought about little else. Sorry for 'yelling'. It is moderately easier to hit the caps lock key then highlight something and tag it as bold. Anyway, I'm glad you don't interpret the rule that way and I hope that no one does. The fact that anyone could think that such a retarded mistake is what the developers intended and run a game where spirits are unable to manifest makes me die a little inside.



Here is one thing I think about spirits that is very silly. The most important determining factor of whether or not a mundane character can hurt a manifested spirit isn't weapon skill, Willpower, or Charisma (Attack of Will as written is highly ineffective)...the most important factor in determining if you can harm a spirit through it's "Immunity to Normal Weapons"? The AP of your weapon. Which to me clashes hard with the fluff of "Immunity to Normal Weapons" which is that spirits are immune to guns because they are magical and ethereal. APDS ammo should not be the perfect choice for "Banishing".

Well... to be a smartass for a second... APDS is not the perfect ammunition choice for killing Spirits, Stick and Shock is, though APDS/AV is a close second...

Okay, Sorry about that...
But that is really the only choice for a Mundane other than Attacks of Will, which is pretty suicidal if you really think about it, though it CAN be accomplished, if you are a bit lucky that is...

With attack of Will you roll just willpower. Just Willpower against the spirit's Reaction + Unarmed Combat (like 10-11 Dice for a Force 4 Fire Elemental). Good luck. If you hit, you deal a base of Charisma. Any character who would have the attributes to be good at attack of will is probably already a mage.

And, about the ammo...God I hope this doesn't lead into another RAW/RAI situation. I really thought those two were always the same and now I seem to be learning that they are always different:

SticknShock still counts as a normal weapon and requires 4 (5?) net hits to bypass the Hardened Armor of a Force 5 materialized spirit. Spirits do not resist electricity damage with only half impact because that doesn't seem to be in the spirit of the rules? Well I guess it depends what kind of a spirit. Does a fire spirit care about being electrocuted? Probably not. And an earth spirit maybe should be flat out immune to electricity damage. But maybe a water spirit would not like SnS. Although of course now that I think about it, it's kind of arbitrary to count the AP of APDS and not Stick'nShock

Attacks of Will is the only way a mundane can affect a spirit with ItNW in my campaigns. Well, you either use elemental effects like real fire, water, lightning (electricity) or the such. Stick N' Shock does not work for me because I cannot imagine that some little barbed hook can latch into hardened armor that is part of a magical being to deliver the electric in the first place!

Yes, Attacks of Will for a Mundane is a gamble, but sometimes you just have to use what you have...

As for the Ammo... No worries, It was just a comment on the availability of resources for a mundane to take on a Spirit... As for the debate (and it is a continuous debate, make no mistake) on the effectiveness of the various ammunitions for Spirits; I see no issues with using the AP of the rounds as described... after all, it is the ONLY effective means for a mundane to deal with a spirit most of the time... Any good Mage/Adept has other means of removing spirits, but mundanes only have the specialized ammunition... gives them a fighting chance... and just becasue the spirit has Hardened Armor, it does not mean that it bounces ammunition like a TANK does (WEll mostly anyways). It just makes the spirit a little harder to disrupt is all... Spirits do take stun after all, where a vehicle completely ignores such trivialities......

Immunity isn't really Immunity. Check the Immunity Fire thread for a few page discussion about that.

And Stick-n-Shock rounds are way better than APDS for smashing spirits, IMO. They're more easily accessable, you can start with them in chargen, and they're nonlethal for other opponents.

Also, I'm starting to favor the flavor of Calling mages more and more. If you use the Calling rules instead of the Conjuring ones, you end up with more balance and less Edgy spirits. At least, in theory.

Personally, I just make Anchoring way less (stupidly) expensive, change the rules on it a bit, and have Caster Shells be at least semi-prevalent for taking out the big boy spirits.

But I do play with much higher magic incidence than most.

Considering I'm not even sure what you're talking about, I'm sure you do! : )



At high enough Force it effectively is really for real immunity. A Force 10 Spirit more or less cannot be harmed by normal weapons. They have Hardened Armor 20 against all forms of mundane damage. Hardened armor of 20 is more or less actual immunity. (Welp I guess Anti-Vehicular rockets and Assault Cannons being used by experts are getting through, but very little short of that.)

The Big railguns do -1/2 AP and then another -10. The Thunderstruck does -1/2 then -5. Stick-n-Shock is -1/2 and you only need 5 successes for dmg to go through. Flamethrowers are -1/2.

Or a Manabolt.

EDIT: Or laser guns.

EDIT EDIT: Or Mana Static.

Manabolts are not mundane nor is mana static.

Five successes are hard to get against a moving target, and even a Force 9 Fire Elemental has Reaction 12 or so. So at higher levels even Stick'n'Shock is pretty ineffective (thank goodness). I guess you're right about the Railguns but then again Railguns are magic. <3

Flamethrowers seem like a great thematic choice for dealing with, say, Water Elementals.

I never said Manabolt and Mana Static were mundane methods.

Laser guns are also fairly effective, as I mentioned.


Also, a Reaction of 12 means you get about 3 successes. With a dicepool of 20 (easy-peasy to get) you can expect 6 successes, which is 3 net, which would meet the spirit's armor. If you shell out for a TacNet you can bump your dicepool to 22+ easily, making your last success or two required to hurt the thing with SnS rounds.

Also, can someone quote where it says BF/FA modified damage is calculated after checking for Hardened Armor? I remember that rule existing, but don't know the source.

I refuse to talk about Flamethrowers based on the Immunity Fire thread. Don't want to start that up on this thread again.

EDIT: No, flamethrowers are ok. This is talking about ItNW, not ItF. Bring on the Blessed Promethium, Brother-Captain.

In my old group a mundane could take banishing if only used for attacks of will. We had a dwarf street sam who decided to take up banishing to be more effective in a magical fight. Eventually he got some good at it we had him handling the spirits while we took the conjuror, MBW 3 was a big help but the main help was having two more IPs.

It should be noted (I don't remember seeing it mentioned yet) that you can only spot-summon one spirit in this manner anyways. I'd call that a balancing factor. Plus the unpredictability of the Drain. Summoning that one F5 spirit, even without it using Edge can put you flat on your back.