Get an updated PDF mate.

Against a basic low level mook you might be taking one down per burst, if you're gunbunny with 20 dice. Against anything more powerful, with better defenses going into full-dodge, you can't expect that reliably. This comparison has honestly been done to death.

In our last big fight, three people shooting at an intermediate mook quite similar to what I posted above took him down in 1IP, but the mage knocked out the Stirruped infected zombie (18 dice to full dodge(ranged), 27 soak ballistic, 21 impact, 14 boxes P, 11 boxes S) in one IP with zero chance of failure. The second advanced bad guy was likewise totally untouched by gunfire (with stuff like 6-8P getting through his dodge, which he easily soaked) and went down to one stunbolt. Granted, they had no mage. The only elite enemy taken down by gunfire was by a very lucky narrow-burst with edge, and a bad def roll, even with edge. Even so, from 22P before Def, only 12 got through, bringing him to just 1 overdamage.

My point: A semi-competent mage can take out one enemy per IP. A semi-competent shooter with 15-18 dice can't. You need lots of dice over and above those the defender has, OR wide-burst automatic weapons by default, with the risk of not getting through armour. YES I know everyone should be shooting only S&S. But in the world where that happens everyone and their mother will be getting electrical resistance. Semi-auto weapons have totally lost this comparison, long ago.

The absolutely only advantage shooting has is stealing actions without using any special BFC methods.

Called shots do worlds of good. Heck, my pistol-wielding troll consistently does decent damage to the opposition.

The problem I'm seeing is that he's spending Edge to go first. That's not usually a big deal, but mages have their points stretched thin. Having an high Edge mage based on overcasting is really pushing the build. If he's going first constantly by spending from a high Edge, spending Edge to boost his spells (and resisting drain, if he's smart) and has the points to routinely overcast, something is probably up.

Slightly off topic, but is this really possible? You can have a nanohive in your cybereyes? My new mage is really curious

No. Cybereyes only take visual upgrades.

Try again chummer, but legally this time.

Yep, that pretty well describes the mage.

Look at that character sheet, especially if this was the same guy with a drinking problem.

yeah

Yeah, I'd double-check that character sheet. The best I've been able to manage is a human mage with Edge 6, using the old karmagen rules. And even then, that was pushing things. If he's managed a high Edge and a high Magic, he's got to have taken a hit somewhere else.

Here's a thought: it's not at all clear to me that drain damage is healable by First Aid, or by anything other than rest. IIRC, physical drain manifests as things like burst blood vessels, embolisms, heart arrhythmia, etc. Not really the kinds of injuries you can slap a bandage on. If the mage has a Savior medkit (the nanotech medkit from Augmentation) I'd allow him to First Aid drain away, subject to all the normal rules, modifiers, and limitations. But with a standard medkit? No chance.

That seems silly, if I wanted a datajack or biomonitor or some other "could be anywhere physically" component, in my cybereye it should be fine. Also does it actually say that anywhere? In any case it doesn't matter, if you don't allow the cybereyes get a cyberhand and put the nano-hive in there, still reduces the essence cost by an order of magnitude.

It seems more silly putting the nano-hive loaded with nanites for your brain in a hand or lower arm than in 'ware actually in your skull.

Well, how often does the Edge refresh in this game?
IF - say every session - and there arent that much fights, then he doesnt need that much Edge...

The problem is that the Capacity scales are not the same for eyes/ears and limbs. A large smuggling compartment takes 5 Capacity and can contain a heavy pistol. If you allow cyberlimb enhancements in cybereyes, you can stuff 4 Predator in your eyes. 2 in each.

I would also point out how long it actually takes to heal wounds with first aid. (Page 242 SR4, Complex action + number of combat turns = to the DV you are attempting to heal.) Are you really giving your mage enough time to sit around for several minutes patching himself up when he's on a run? I'm also going to have to second everyone about the visability modifiers as well. Radar/ultrasonic works wonders for mundanes, but its really not that great for a mage since they cant target with it. Get some smoke grenades, darkness, or even a spirit with concealment to reduce his ability to target enemies.

Already considered in the calculation.

Well obviously pistols aren't the type of "can go anywhere" thing I meant, I'm just having trouble seeing someone vetoing a nano-hive in cybereyes, stuff like recommending to a hacker to get a 0.45 essence 12 capacity leg and to put commlink, sim module and whatever else in there always truck me as far more egregious and yet a perfectly acceptable application of a similar principle (headware in a cyberlimb rather than completely undefined location 'ware in eyes). I understand that the idea is that your cyberlimbs have a DNI and so a commlink in them works just fine, but if where's the "sorry chummer, you can't put headware in a cyberlimb" reply?



It's still only a matter of seconds, not minutes, though. Pretty feasible to get that after a firefight.

Just an aside, I just realized that there are Profession (First Aid) autosofts out there. Which technically means a drone with the proper equipment can be chucking 16+ dice... in First Aid.



It's ROBOMEDIC!





-k

You missed the point. The pistol was not the enhancement. The smuggling compartment was, and you cannot find more "can go anywhere" than a hole. It is just a convenient example because it gives an idea of the size of a Capacity point in a limb. To say the same thing differently:

Capacity of a pair of cybereyes: up to 16
Capacity of an obvious full arm: 15

The problem is not "can I put a nanohive in my eyes?". It is "can I put more nanohives in my eyes than in an obvious full arm?"

Put him up against a mage eater. I can give you the stats.

Even with that taken into consideration, he's blowing through Edge left and right from the sound of things. He goes first, Edges a spellcasting roll, and Edges the drain if need be. That's 3 edge in one IP, pretty quick if you don't have much.

A Fomori with Ogre stomach?

I am not a fan of overcasting as the norm. To my mind the RAI was for cinematic do-or-die situations like the climactic fight where the mage is going to die in a hail of lead unless he/she takes all the mooks down. The way I try to limit it is as follows:

1) I house rule that first aid won't work on overcasting P drain. My rationale is the overuse of mana causes interrnal hemmoraging that requires a full on clinic to treat. If you don't want to go this far, as has been mentioned above use neg mods to the first aid test as much as possible. Oh, and overcasting wounds are NOT combat wounds (gunshot, knife wounds etc) for skill specialization.

2) With radius of F metres, overcast AoE spells affect a huge area. Corridors and room size might mean the mage and/or other PC's are affected by the spell. Also, with direct combat spells, mooks who duck out of LOS will be unharmed.

3) Erasing the signature of high force spells takes a lot of time. Do it and the team (or at least the mage) are sitting ducks for quite a significant amount of time, don't and the bad guys have your astral signature and can hunt you down.

4) As has been mentioned before, drones!

5) Although I don't use it myself, some people on these boards make rampant overcasters make a CHR and WIL check (threshhold 3) check to avoid casting at the highest possible non-overcasting force. It ain't easy to willingly cause yourself P damage after all.

Hope this helps!

We meet once a month for a session of anywhere from 8-11 hours. We've been refreshing every session. I have been thinking about altering that. I've been told that as a GM, the best response I can give to a player is "yes", then I make it work. They wanted to refresh every session, I wanted to go at milestones in the Ghost Cartel arc.

The thing is, Mage and Face are the two that regularly show up. GA shows up most of the time, and SS and Hacker sporadicly. I don't really know much about those character because I've rarely seen them. RL keeps them/us hoppin'. So I don't know how the SS and Hacker do combat-wise. I know the SS chose to take the pre-made out of the SR4A book. We're all still trying to figure out the rules and mechanics.

Thanks again to you all. Keep the good advice coming.

No need for Ogre stomach.

Formori-Ghul with Astral Hazing

I would love the stats. Toss it into the Kowloon section of Hong Kong in GC.

To put it bluntly, the sam out of the SR4.5 book is pretty mediocre. And while the early sections of Ghost Cartels is filled with mooks, more challenging fights come later on. A mage is definitely going to be a plus, but he won't be able to take on some fights with s single spell. You can read my review Here; I'm also running players through it again, so if you have any questions, feel free.

Right under Headware, in fact.

"These small complex devices are inserted into the head (typically constructed via less-invasive
nanosurgery). Items that have a Capacity rating may be installed in cyberlimbs instead, cost-
ing capacity rather than Essence."


Bodyware has the same disclaimer.

This sounds much more like the source of the problem. The SS sample character, while not Weapons Specialist levels of bad, is not exactly good either; a Mage built by someone who halfway understands the system is going to be better at fighting then her. This isn't really an issue with mages; a Street Samurai who's built by someone who 3/4 of the way understands the system could stomp all over the Combat Mage sample character too.

If he's heavily combat focused it's probably not a huge issue that the Face and Hacker are getting outshone in combat. It might be an issue if the Street Samurai and Gun Adept are. You didn't mention anything about the Gun Adept, but if it's the sample character, then they'll have the same issues as the street samurai, but more so because pure adepts aren't very good at fighting.

You might consider talking to the SS and the GA players and ask if they're having fun. If they are, no problem. If they aren't, honestly, you might get better results and less QQ from letting them Radiation Accident their characters to fix them up some.

It's early, so I'm not sure which angle you're taking here Umaro, but to clarify, cybereyes, arent cyberlimbs, so their capacity rating doesnt compare with an actual limb therefore, no hives in the eyes.

I think that's what he means in response to Lanlaorn's question. It does explicitly say that you can't put headware or bodyware in the eyes, only into cyberlimbs.

Yes, that's what I meant (ie, this is where it says "no nanohives in your cybereyes."

Thank you, Cain. I really appreciate it.

ps the link in your post that I quoted doesn't seem to work.

(edited for the PS)

Actually, that is the RIGHT way to design a mage. Why leave those pesky astral signatures lying around for later?

This is my personal favorite as well...

Just to get this straight:
The mage we are talking about did not have a nanohive in his cybereyes?

If this is the case, there is only one possible option:
1. Get a newspaper.
2. Roll the newspaper.
3. Hit player with newspaper.
4. Repeat step 3.

I mean the nonohive in the lower arm is minmaxing.
The cyberfoot is above minmaxing.
But the eyes? Thats beyond munchkin.

PS:
One question regarding the napalm spell:
Is it armor/2 or armor/4?
I would guess it is the later but...

Heh I would think the right way to play a mage would be to actually cast spells =P With respect to astral signatures though, they're not that dangerous. There's no way to put the astral signature into a database, no way to write it down or share it with other people. The Search power explicitly says that you need to see the target or provide a mental image to the spirit, and an astral signature isn't even close to an image.

If you leave behind astral signatures from your spells (you can remove them with a few complex actions after the firefight without any metamagic, and either do it faster with Cleansing or be devious with Flexible Signature) and the Mage investigator arrives on the scene before they fade (even for high force spells, if you stealthily take everyone down going in and out, nothing may be discovered until the morning) and he succeeds in his assensing (but since this is his profession let's assume that) then...

There is now one person, who if he personally sees you may, if he assenses you and if he succeeds on his memory check, recognize your aura.

It's really not that useful for tracking the Mage down unless you somehow manage to have that one investigator personally find and interrogate every Mage. IMO it's more like something that's damning evidence at your trial. Once you're caught they'll bring out the entire Magic Crime Department and have every detective assense you and compare that to their memory of crime scenes.

I don't know it just never seemed like a real threat to me, especially considering Lonestar, Knight Errant and all the individual corps you run against would each have their own magical investigation resources, so even the odds of one man building a profile because he knows you were involved in crimes X, Y and Z are slim since it'll be three guys each knowing one thing.

Irion: you should actually read the thread, since the nanohive was a completely tangential discussion about the first aid skill. For the record, I still think that putting non-eye components in cybereyes should be fine with obvious sanity checks.

On a side note, here's a few thoughts I had while reading through this rather lengthy discussion...

1. Isn't it actually impossible to heal drain except by NATURAL healing? I'm pretty sure I read in one of the books that was the case.

2. The optional rule about extra drain for each net het on direct combat spells is listed as optional. I find direct combat spells crazy overpowered (make the low chance roll or take enough damage to effectively cripple you in exchange for maybe 3 drain? Not cool.

3. Area effects- I would think that direct spells only affect what you see, while indirect can spray around corners and such.- Even after re-reading it, I'm still not sure about it RAW.

No. You can heal drain with firstaid/aided by medicine, but it can't be healed with magic. Stun damage in general also seems to be immune to magic at my last read through (though I could be wrong. Please inform me if I am)


I agree. And given the abundance of ways people seem to be able to avoid the effects, I use the Food Fight version of Direct spells. On the physical plane, they deal net hits in damage, and force+ net hits in astral.


This is correct.

No. You can heal drain with firstaid/aided by medicine, but it can't be healed with magic. Stun damage in general also seems to be immune to magic at my last read through (though I could be wrong. Please inform me if I am, preferably with at least a page number so I can look it up.)


I agree. And given the abundance of ways people seem to be able to avoid the effects, I use the Food Fight version of Direct spells. On the physical plane, they deal net hits in damage, and force+ net hits in astral.


This is correct.

WOOT! I got one of them right based on common sense. Anyways, I'm going to start hitting my books when I return home to see if I can find that rule about drain or at least the rule that gave me that impression. Its going to bug me, but oh well.

@Lanlaorn

Thats about the level of:
"Ok, so I get 6 drain. Now I resist drain with 10 dices.... 2 points of drain left. Since it is physical damage I got to resist with body...."

Yes, the rules do not say it is forbidden but it is actually clear it does not work that way...
Well, actually they do.

Is a nanohive an eyeware sub system? No, I do not think so...

That says that eyeware can only go into a cybereye, not that a cybereye can only hold eyeware. Also, a nano-hive has no location classification whatsoever. Headware, bodyware, eyeware, who knows? IMO it, like a few other things such as datajack and biomonitor, just make sense that they could go anywhere. I'm not going to argue "it doesn't say I can't do it" like you're trying to strawman me with the drain example, really this is something to be decided at the table, but the quoted section does not help your argument whatsoever.

While the quote above won't help this one might:
Though the rule does not specify vision enhancements explicitly, it's pretty clear that you cannot use every implant with a capacity rating.

Check nanocybernetics; Augmentation 112. This is the category into which Nanohives fall.

"Some nanocybernetics can be installed within cyberlimbs; these have the ECU and other costs listed in their descriptions."

Note, cyberLIMBS. Not any old piece of cyberware.

@Lanlaorn
Sorry, but sometimes it is obvious. I mean come on, the format alone is a give away.

(The drain example, as a matter of fact, is not that clear I have to admit...)

Look, I see where you guys are coming from, but I'm not even saying to put commlinks, sim modules, hold out pistols, or anything else that could concievably fit in them, just the truly "versatile" stuff which IMHO a nano-hive is the prime example of.

Plus it's clearly not some kind of unfair advantage mechanically since Lower Leg has a similar essence:capacity ratio and offers side benefits like another physical box, armor enhancements and so on.

I would like to submit this page as evidence for why I believe the OP should:
a) have houserules and update them as necessary
b) have a copy of the player's character sheets

It's much easier to simply houserule what you think the rules say in the first place than argue about if the rules really say that.

It is in that case: the mage already needs cybereyes for the vision enhancements. Fitting the hive in them greatly improves his Essence efficiency.

Oops. Try this one.