QUOTE (Faraday @ Oct 21 2011, 06:48 AM)

Theoretically, you COULD actually have a mundane character develop magical powers. You'd need to start out shortly before puberty, though.
Awakening can happen any time, it's not so predictable as to always happen during puberty(though that's common). That said, if your character is going to awaken, they should have the latent awakened quality, people without that quality just are not eligible to awaken, short of some strong magical event(HMHVV, SURGE, a pact with a powerful free spirit, ect)
QUOTE (Kesendeja @ Oct 21 2011, 08:48 AM)

I tend to agree, especially after seeing the Karma rewards in the published adventures. Maybe 1.5 instead of 2?
But some qualities(such as martial arts), we're designed with 2x BP cost in karma in mind, which is where the problem lies. The SR4 designers shot themselves in the foot in this regard in a couple of ways. First, they used a point buy system that uses a completely different resource than what you use to level up, second, they unnecessarily decided that all qualities must cost multiples of 5, and third the quality system was not designed to be used during play. There should be a separate list of qualities only available at creation, and those you can acquire during play(they should be called something else IMO), and rules for acquiring them should be in the main book and not require GM fiat.