Is it possible to make a decent free spirit face? How would you go about it?

This is the best I've got so far:


With a Sustained Improved Ability [Charisma] he has 13 Dice for Influence Group, 11 Dice for Intimidation, 15 Dice for Influence Power, and an extra 7 dice (plus exploding) whenever I use edge.

Lucky is a waste of Karma. You pay 40 Karma for something you will get for free the second you raise your force. Your force is very important for a lot of things, so it stands to reason it will always be higher than your edge.

Increase Attribute: Here is always the question how it is working. (ask if you may change it to a mana spell, to make things simple)
I would really increase your spellcasting pool. As a free spirit you should have at least 4 dices to counterspells stuff.
Drop melee if you have to, a stunbolt is even more effective.

Choose Karmagen if you want to initiate, otherwise BP.

For a free spirit? No way, you definitely want Karmagen. 250/750 karma is much more doable than 250/400 bp.

I can actually see that Lucky being worth it, and not having it starts you out missing at least one really important ability. I would cut Unarmed Combat and just rely on dodge+spells, scrape up for more Spellcasting, and get more/better spells.

Manabolt is a bad idea. It does P damage, but does not work on the things you really need to deal P damage to, ie, drones and vehicles. I would instead pick up Stunbolt and a single-target elemental P-damage spell.

As a side note, the Fear power would be great for you, but sadly you can't really get it at chargen without giving up something better. I would actually consider losing the Guard power, saving the .5 PP, and getting Fear as soon as you initiate.

You really should just try to have more spells in general. 3 spells is rather sad. Some examples of good ones that you might find useful in a lot of situations: Mind Probe, Alter Memory, Trid Phantasm, Astral Clairvoyance, Astral Window... just to give you some ideas.

One of my friends runs a free spirit face. They make -fantastic- impersonators, due to mutable form and aura masking.

You're missing the typical face qualities - First Impression is excellent, and trustworthy is almost necessary due to a spirit's low charisma.(compared to an elf face)

Check out the social modifiers table, its a good way to get extra dice, Like through Control Emotions(the spell)

@UmaroVI
Yes, lucky helps.
But you are paying 40 Karma for it. Thats a lot.
(As a matter of fact, thats about 1 initiation and half of raising magic.)
So yes, you do not get the influance power, but you have 40+25=75 more Karma to throw around.

Actually, Irion is right. I was thinking it might be OK just because you'd be left without some abilities you really really want. But I forgot two important things.

1) You can't hardcap more than one stat during Karmagen. Your hardcap is going to be Force, obviously.

2) Initating is waaaay more efficient than raising edge.

Keep yourself at Force 6, drop Edge to 5, drop Charisma to 5 (since you cannot raise them higher), drop Lucky, grab Arcana, join a magical group, and initiate your socks off. Try to get Fear, which will allow you to ditch Stunbolt (because Fear is an even harder way to own living opponents, and most people can do jack about it). Then maybe get more Spirit Pacts that you can make with your pals, like Drain, Magic, and Power.

And if you want to really be annoying:
Increase willpower and use meditation+group to get your initiaton grade.
The first one might be a bitch, but later on you are off fine.

Ok, how is this?

The Influence spell is like the Influence power, but worse in every way - I would hold out for the power.

I'm really not a fan of Manabolt - I would rather have something useful for non-pew-pew or a better pew-pew spell.

Why do you have Athletics? You can go astral and fly around, and you have Dodge for dodging.

Largely looks good though.

Here's why lucky is bad.
It costs 20 bp.
which comes out to 40 karma, and it counts against your limit of qualities which can be filled with more useful things.
it raises the -max- on your edge by 1
you still have to pay to raise your edge, because lucky does not give you a free point
raising your edge to 7 costs 35 more karma
there's an inherent problem with this, and that is 'what happens to your edge attribute value when you raise your force to 7? what is its new value? Is it overwritten? does it get bumped up by 1?'
speaking of raising your force to 7, it costs 35 karma, same as raising your edge to 7
initiating once is 13 karma, which is 7 karma cheaper than Lucky, and doesn't count against your quality limits - and because you're a free spirit, neither does Magician.

So just start at force 7 if you want extra edge.

However, Lightning Reflexes IS a fantastic choice for a spirit who wants to fight a lot. They have hardly any ways to raise that attribute, and 30 karma for two flat points of stat are an amazing deal in karmagen.

Regarding spells: Take Stunbolt - its a Mana spell, so it works on the astral. This is important, because it gives you a pretty big edge against other astral threats.
You want to pair it out with a Physical type Physical damage spell to pose a threat on the physical plane. Powerbolt is good for this. Be wary of getting Indirect combat spells, because those get treated like ranged attacks, and can thus be dodged. Spirits have a harder time matching sammies and adepts in raw dice pool - those archetypes can easily get attributes above 9, skills above 6, and easy access to ware to give dice pool bonuses and cancel out negative penalties, such as from vision. Spirits don't have easy access to those things, so you need to pick your loadout with a little more discretion

Everything else I agree with, but I disagree with your analysis of Powerbolt vs. Indirect spells.

If you are fighting someone on the physical plane, Stunbolt is fine. If you want to kill someone, you can Stunbolt them and then shoot them in the head. When stunbolt is not fine is when you are fighting things that do not take Stun damage - 95% of which are drones and vehicles, and 5% of which are people with Pain Editors or Adrenaline Pumps.

So you really should be analyzing "would I rather have Powerbolt or Lightning Bolt against a drone/vehicle," and the answer is that if you are really, REALLY powerful, Powerbolt starts getting better because you just go up against a flat 5 OR, no matter how much armor is jacked onto it or how much body it has. But with your character's 10 dice, your powerbolts will fizzle against drones and vehicles, and you don't have any other way to hurt them.

Peoples with Pain Editors or running Adrenalin Pumps do take Stun damage. They don't feel it and ignore the Stun damage modifiers they would take without the bioware, but they will drop as soon as their Stun track is filled, like anybody else.

I thought you can't drop from a full stun track alone with an activated pain editor?

Pain Editor... No. They drop when they PHYSICALLY can't move anymore {when physical is full} up to that: They keep going. But oh well... TWO stunbolts should cure them from that *g*.

Unless it's a Mage with a pain editor. I've seen plenty of those...

Yeah, I should have been more specific about that, but my point stands.

Yes, sorry, I read a bit too fast and missed that.

They still take the damage. And it prevents you from going unconscious. At that point further damage carries over to the physical track, remember?
Its definitely not immunity.



Lets see. I can see where you're coming from, but there's more to it than that.
Also, you can't stunbolt a vehicle anyway. Mana spell no worky worky.

Indirect combat spells don't have to deal with object resistance, its true. But they have a worse drain code, especially if they're elemental, and this encourages you to cast at lower force.
For example, a force 6 powerbolt (f/2+1) is 4 drain, which is pretty managable, while a force 5(odd force is better due to rounding) is 3.
While a lightning bolt at the same force (f/2+3) is 7, which is getting to the point where it can fill up most of your stun track on a bad roll, and you're unlikely to soak it all.

Because Object Resistance is a threshold, you don't need to exceed the OR, just meet it. And remember that force caps hits. Putting this together means that a force 5 powerbolt is enough to damage any vehicle or drone - assuming you can get 5 hits.(as you said, it gets better the more powerful you are). Recall how thresholds and success tests interact - it works if you meet the threshold, net hits past that increase the damage.
Against people, its even worse - powerbolt is resisted with Body, and you roll two stats against one on the attack, with net hits on that increasing damage, and no soak.

The downside to lightning bolt is also based on having a small dice pool. With only 10 dice to toss a lightning bolt at something, (3-4 hits on average), your attack isn't likely to hit at all, because people can just go on full defense against it, and you've suddenly eaten a bunch of drain for nothing.
You might think you can get away with lowering the force a bit, to save on drain and adjust your force to the # of hits you see consistently - but that's just kind of self defeating because it makes it easier for your opponents to dodge(by lowering the ceiling on your hits) AND because it lowers your base damage on the spell - and if its low already, chances are its going to be soaked away, or mitigated enough it doesn't matter too much, even with the AP-half on the soak test from being elemental.
Electricity damage IS good, but also bear in mind that vehicles resist the zap effect of electrical damage with Body+armor(not half armor, per page 63). That means a doberman rolls 9 dice to avoid the stun, and a steel lynx rolls 13, and they only need to equal the hits on the attack to be unneffected.
If we're still using your 10 dice as an example, that's..... not very good odds.


But, basically, lightning bolt vs powerbolt comes down to these questions:
how many dice do I roll on the spell, and can I instakill a car if I drop edge on the test?
Can I deal with the drain afterwards, without also spending edge?
What force do I need to cast at to reliably kill a drone(having a max body of 4, large drones will have at most a max of 10 physical track)
What about with 1 net hit?
If I encounter a serious threat, and need to overcast for the extra damage, what force can I somewhat reliably/manage to deal with?
How sustainable is the spell in general? Can I cast it twice in a row without giving myself stun track penalties?

When deciding on direct vs indirect, those are some things to think about.

There are some benefits to indirect combat spells, though. Because they're treated like ranged attacks, you ought to be able to use Called Shots to boost your damage, if you can deal with the dice pool penalties, or take aim for extra dice.

Drones don't actually have amazingly good range defense checks - they just roll Response. Yeah, they can full defense against it, but while they're full defensing, they aren't shooting and they need an autosoft to do it. Drones will usually only roll 3-4 dice to dodge an Indirect Spell, and if you're rolling 10 to hit you have excellent odds of connecting. On the other hand, with a Powerbolt, and 10 dice, you need 5 hits... that's terrible odds, you only have about a 21% chance of having an effect.

Unless there's a rigger inside, or someone Commanding it. (when you think about it, command 6+optimized 3 is a hell of a lot cheaper than a billion rating 4 autosofts at 4k each), then yeah, they have terrible dice pools. You're also forgetting about evasive driving.

If a gm is sending drones at you without backup, its basically like giving you free money, if your hacker is halfway competent.

Evasive Driving is the equivalent of full defense and still takes a complex action. Command only helps you Full Defense; it doesn't raise the basic defense pool.

With 10 dice, the target needs fourteen dice for your odds of hitting with an elemental spell to be as low as your odds of hitting with powerbolt. Nothing is going to get that high without Full Defense actions, and a lot of drones can't get that high with full defense. I'd much rather have an attack spell that at least makes the drone Full Defense to avoid it, instead of an attack spell where the drone will laugh at you and then shoot you in the face.

For comparison, an average rigger (Command 6, skills at 3) remote-controlling an average, response 3 drone with Handling 0 (pretty reasonable - most combat drones have handling 0) has 3 dice on regular defense checks, which gives the mage an 86% chance of hitting, and with full defense has 9 dice, giving the mage a 46% chance of hitting - over twice as good as powerbolt even when the target goes on full defense.

Powerbolt is not a useless spell - but it's a terrible choice for a mage with 10 dice and no other way to hurt drones or vehicles.

Wrong.

Command replaces attribute in tests. You defend with reaction, or, in this case, reaction. (see common rolls for riggers, 4a 247)

Your dice are hella off.

Command 6 + hot sim 2 = 8 dice on defense tests, passive defense.
+ dodge or pilot on full defense.

A jumped in rigger is just as good - response of 4 base, for a probable Security class drone, 2 for the hot sim, 2 for the control rig = 8 dice on defense tests, passive defense. Which is, coincidentally, the same amount as command, just achieved with dice pool modifiers instead of a higher 'attribute'.

Using your example of 3 skill, thats 11 dice against any decently(we are not even talking heavily optimized here) controlled drone.
Thats MORE dice on the defense than on the attack you're proposing! Even before the possibility of counterspelling!

The reason powerbolt is great is the drain is low enough you can keep on trying until it works, and it bypasses defenses, unlike lightning bolt which has multiple states in which it can fail to do what you want (hit, do damage, or stun). With the dice you're putting out, it has a good chance of being resisted or evaded, and a much higher drain code to resist on 12 dice.

You are right on the passive defense check using command; I got that one mixed up. I also wasn't adding hot-sim but now that I think about it, a command rigger has no reason not to hotsim. However, none of what you've said actually changes things, because the margins were so huge. With 8 dice passive defense and 11 dice active defense, your odds are STILL better with lightning bolt than powerbolt!

Your odds with Lightning Bolt are 53% if they don't dodge, 34% if they do. Versus 21% with powerbolt, and they don't need to dodge to get that. I'll take my entire 1 point more drain in order to nearly triple my chances of the spell working.

I'm not really familiar with the rules for rigging, and AFB right now, but wasn't there something about riggers suffering damage when their rigged drones do? Which would be physical if they're hotsimming? See how that Lightning Bolt or Wreck Drone tastes, in all BTL goodness.
Plus the illegality of hotsimming, of course, which won't stop a AAA from doing it in the comfort of the laws they create by extraterritoriality, but will definitely stop most smaller company's riggers.

You only take Biofeedback from drone damage while jumped in; a command rigger is totally safe.

A Command rigger, will however not benefit from hotsimming at all, since his Command doesn't get the +2, just the rolls he's making with it.

Right...but getting +2 to the rolls you are making with it is a benefit. I'm not sure what your point is. When do you care about the difference between having an 8 command, and having a 6 command but getting +2 to all the rolls you make with Command?

Ah, you are right, of course. I was somehow thinking it was the drone making the tests when Commanding. Mea culpa.

Fair enough, and that's entirely your call to make, but it is two drain. (f/2+3 vs f/2+1). Out of curiosity, what force do you plan on casting your lightning bolt at when you need to break it out?



I'd always liked to think that the legality of it is why the implanted sim module exists, for the more oldschool hackers who use a datajack and an external commlink to do their hacking - having an implanted sim unit means they can pick up any off the shelf commlink and have hotsim capabilities with it(handy if you like burning links after using), and nobody can check if its -actually- a hot sim unit without opening you up.

As for the rigging biofeed back, its basically a joke. It only applies while jumped in, and only in hot sim, and its always stun damage. Such a rigger takes half the damage a drone does, but gets to soak it with willpower+biofeedback filter.
Yes, this means the potential incoming damage is reduced by the defense test, then by the armor, and then soaked again. A trauma damper and a good biofeedback filter means that a good rigger basically doesn't care about it at all.
Though if your drone bites it, dumpshock can still potentially get you, but I think that's an issue for anyone in VR in a drone node, not just jumped in riggers.

@Udoshi

Well, it depends. Yes, many little stings of needles won't hurt you.
But a force 12 Powerbolt frying your drone one shot, will give a hell of a kick and additional dumshock.
Without pain editor, you are probably "out of order".

What you say is perfectly true for "drone hits drone and soaks most of the damage". But honestly, due to how drone armor works, thats not quite the common way...
(There it goes mostly: Hit->no damage or Hit->Kaplam.)

Having a comlink implanted means it's tough to access when you want to upgrade it, and we all know IT folks like to tinker with their toys.
Having a hotsimmed comlink implanted means you need to find a cyberdoc who's unscrupulous enough to implant 'ware he knows might well be lethal, on top of being terribly addicting, on top of being illegal. For a shadowrunner, this isn't all that hard. For a common wageslave spider though... After all, an actual registered surgeon could stand losing his license, on top of criminal prosecution when it gets out.

Also, when you work for a company, you can count on them doing a background check on you and your 'ware. Especially if you intend to run company business on said 'ware.

Even for a AAA, there's plenty reason to not have their spiders hotsimming. It's a question that equates "do our guards use smartlinks, or will they never go down for more than a few seconds, and never suffer any actual harm?"

Oh, No, no, not a commlink.

A cyberware/headware hot sim module. Like, the seperate item on the table of headware that nobody bothers to look at? Yeah. THAT ONE. That is very specifically a seperate entry from a commlink.

The idea being that you connect your Datajack/Sim unit to an external commlink. Because the hotness of the signal is not dependent on the commlink at all.

"Oh yes, officer, my implanted sim module is -absolutely- legally cold sim, what are you going to do, open me up and take a peek at its innards?"
and also the best of both worlds for NOT having to get surgery when you want to modify your external commlink.

See what I'm saying?

Since the discussion has moved away from Free Spirits and into rigger specifics, I might as well use this thread to ask a different question about free spirits:

Could it by any chance be, that they actually completely suck? At least when you use PC-gen rules? I'm trying to build an NPC karmagen legal free spirit as opposition for my runners, and basically... I need to give it about 1000 karma (on OLD karmagen costs) for it to be even close to the numbers of a normal PC-level character, let alone extra competent to face the PCs on its own, without backup. Even a regular F6 spirit has WAY better numbers. The only thing to do seems to be to initiate it and buy it to about F9, which won't actually make it that much stronger, but will just make sure it's largely invulnerable, except to mages and other spirits.

And the rules are also a mess, or so it seems. Do I actually get a point of edge each time I initiate? The rules seem to say that the spirit gets one INDIVIDUAL critter power each time it initiates, and RC doesn't actually revoke that, or am I reading it wrong?

I know I should just take any normal spirit and make it free, but... I don't like an inconsistent game world. Either PC spirits have to use the NPC rules, or the other way around.

Spirits don't excel in throwing huge numbers around. They excel at mobility and utility. Being able to use critter powers, a free Magician quality, and to just whisk off to the astral, to take metaplanar shortcuts. All that is what you're paying out of the nose for. If you try to outclass a street sam with them, however, you'll end up looking bad.

Hmm, so I would have to design him more like a master-mind, rather than a boss fight. Hmm... I was hoping to manage to get by without too many "minions", so that the fight doesn't get drawn out too long.

Well... so what defensive angles do I have to look out for?
Vs gunfire is taken care of with ITNW
vs. spells I have to trust WP+Counterspelling
vs spirits is a problem, because he can't match even a normal spirit's melee numbers. I would have to make sure that they don't get close, or stunbolt them right after materializing/entering astral space.

In any case powerful concealment + Influence can make this fight hard to even start, and as I understand it he would need two complex actions to completely teleport away to any place he's been before.

Two complex actions he could spend hiding under a box in the astral.

You just need to reconsider the way you approach a bossfight. The surprise of being able to jump out and attack someone is quite a hefty advantage, even without Engulf cheese. Concealment goes a long way toward going unnoticed, as does terrain control. Turn down the lights, then fill the building up with thermal smoke, pop Concealment and fly behind something to hide. Use Clairvoyance to watch the mage look around in the astral and give up, then come back in to harass someone again.

And their Concealing spirit can be stunbolted (did they ask it to Conceal itself as well? I doubt it.) while Influence is not mind control.

No, I meant hard to start for the PCs (who will likely take the initiative of ambushing/attacking him), because he could be concealed, and even if not, might get to use Influence on the PCs.

This spirit is supposed to be a trickster/impersonator, who has taken control of a drug ring and is impersonating a KE exec at the same time, effectively stopping all successful law-enforcement against the syndicate. He needs (possibly dominated) aides who use matrix devices for him, but other than that, mostly works via normal face-stuff + influence, while materialized with aura masking and realistic form. The PCs might not even know he's a spirit before they attack him.

NPC and PC free spirits are NOT THE SAME, citizen. So says friend computer.

If you're making an opposition NPC that happens to also free spirit, don't even bother with the runner's companion spirit PC rules.

NPC free spirits are just better and less hastle in every way. Not dealing with Power Points is one, as is not having people argue over whether they really do use Force for all attributes, like every other spirit in the game. They also get bonuses to physical stats while Manifested, depending on their spirit type, which is a bonus that player free spirits lose out on. Guaranteed Spirit Skills are another big one(unarmed, dodge, perception, assensing, you know), because they automatically get some skills at Force, while PC-rule free spirits just get screwed.

So! Fuck your 1000 karma prime runner PC-ruled free spirit, and just use the NPC free spirit rules in Street Magic. You will thank me later.


Another thing that helps make spirits a lot better is allowing Martial Arts for spirits - in a game I'm in, we had a Shinto tradition beast/guardian free spirit player, who used the Natural Weapon power(looks like a sword, but actaully uses unarmed combat) and Kick Attack(unarmed combat gets +1 reach) to represent actually having a sword that is, literally, part of the spirit. It requires working with a gm, but spirit martial arts goes a long way to making them more viable without just focusing on getting your ItnW as high as possible.

If you're interested in using your trickster spirit as, well, a trickster there's another good trick to be aware of: Free Spirit are also Magicians, and Magicians can Manifest from the astral.
Yes, i know its a word beginning with M that sounds very similiar to Materialization, but they're actually rather different.
More importantly, a Manifesting magician can peek their head into the physical plane without being very vulnerable to getting it bitten off - just like manifested mages can't Project, Manifest, and Stunball everyone willy nilly with impunity, the protection is a two way street. While manifesting you can't be shot, and you enjoy the other benefits, like not showing up on technological recordings.
Basically, a spirit Magician has what amounts to a Ghost Mode option(quasi, insubstantial appearance, can't really be harmed by non-dual natured things) at their fingertypes.
So use it! its great for freaking people out. Also worth noting: Possession and inhabitation spirits have access to this trick.

Source: Anniversary edition 186:
Astral spirits can also manifest in the same manner as projecting magicians (p. 192), and many of them prefer this to materialization if they need to interact with a physical person."

Another good house rule you should consider for said free spirit is to treat the Influence spell and critter power like Control Emotions/Control Thoughts for purposes of the Social Modifiers Table(4a 130) - this lets a free spirit face actually have supernatural charisma, and pull off the 'devil in a suit' vibe, instead of just using Influence to order/suggest people around.

What I plan to use the free spirit for is the "pact maker". Get a bunch of spirit pacts and high social and start making deals.

*Double Post*

No, I won't, because now my game world breaks down. Everyone using basically the same rules is a staple of gaming that I won't just give up on because the book says so. Why are there real free spirits (NPCs) and lesser ones (PCs) in the same world?


I'll look into that.

In the end though, does anyone really care more about how much karma an NPC is worth, than about how much that null zone facility took to construct? In the end, what matters is balance. And really karma costs are balanced for PCs. For NPCs, the relative value of things may differ wildly, and things that are extremely valuable for PCs are fairly worthless for NPCs, and the other way around.
Being able to stunbolt someone quite comfortably Concealed and Invisible from 20,000 foot up in the air, for example, is a massive advantage for a PC, but will far and wide be considered nothing but a dick move if the GM uses said capability. Replace with Stunball for a 'rocks fall, everyone dies.'

In any case, it's not like you can treat karma as a pseudo-Challenge Rating anyway. Loading up on 1000 karma worth of knowledge skills won't make you any tougher.

Balance reasons, plain and simple.

Spirits came first. And then an attempt was made to dumb it down and give it a reasonable cost for players.

If you read the rules for PC free spirits, its also pretty obvious that there was a developer war going on, with people infighting over whether or not spirits should be able to use commlinks - you'll notice that they're specifically prohibited for using AR and 'electronic projections', for some reason, when even some basic spirits have eyes(low light vision, some therms, others with realistic form) - and a strict interpretation of the poor wording means spirits can't whip out their phone to check the time, which I'm fairly sure contradicts things that have happened(Buttercup has a comm, right?). Which means someone writing the book was like 'OH NO! we can't have spirits on the matrix ever, at all! Quick, write in poorly worded restrictions!'
Even more people seem to think that you should pay 250 BP for your race, and then buy attributes independently of that, despite all spirits using Force for all stats(seriously, this issue comes up every time someone mentions playing a free spirit on dumpshock). Or taking away the improved physical stats while manifested(wait, we are giving free fire spirits 4 free agility? NERF! NERF!')
I believe in one of the previous unofficial errata threats, one of the devs commented that free spirits were supposed to be a lot less expensive, too.

The point is, PC free spirit rules are bad, and you shouldn't use them if you can avoid it.