I don't know what it is(other than spirit armor), or where a reference for it is, but the mage in my group REFUSES to believe SnS affects his spirits(spirits are not affected by normal weapons). So I would love if someone could give me some actual references to this.

Are you the GM?

If so, tell him "Rule 0. It works because I say it works. Like it or lump it."

No, fellow player. I'd particularly like it because I referenced a few forum posts about it, and his response was "Just because one idiot says something on a forum, and lot of other idiots rally behind him, doesn't make them right."

So in this particular case I'd LOVE to prove him wrong.

Pg. 295 SR4A



Spirits gain this quality whenever they are materialized. Despite being "immunity" it only counts as hardened armor, which means that if the damage value is not higher than the harden armor value, it doesn't do anything. SNS is a unique case. Strictly RAW it should apply like any other attack, but a lot of people point out that the spirit doesn't have a central nerve system for the SNS to effect. That's a GM's call.

Edit: SnS are very effective against spirits, because they halve the armor value so only need to deal damage equal to the spirits force not twice the spirits force. So SnS with one net hit will damage anything at a Force 6 or below.

What about that? If I fire an SNS from an Ares predator, why would it affect him if the weapon is normal?

Because it's not the dictionary 'immunity' but the game-defined Immunity the wording of which is pretty clear.

Read the part above that describes immunity, it's not actually immunity. It gives hardened armor equal to twice the spirit's force (the spirit's magic which is equal to its force).

Note that even a regular Ares Predator IV has a chance to hurt a spirit, if the damage plus the AP beats the hardened armor value.

For Example: A force 6 spirit has the equivalent of 12 hardened armor. If you shoot it with an Ares Predator IV and call a shot for +4 damage and get three net hits.

So you are doing 12 Damage (5P Ares + 4P called shot + 3P net hits) and this exceeds the 11 armor (12 hardened armor - 1 AP).

So while it's hard to get three net hits on a spirit, it's possible just to hurt a spirit with a standard pistol round.


If you have a really large dice pool, you can also call a shot to ignore armor, then if you hit you bypass the spirits armor. You take a penalty equal to the spirits armor when you do this. For a force 6 spirit you'd be taking a -12 to your attack, but if your pool is 15+ this might not be a bad tactic.

And just remember also, that there is precident for this in the fiction as well. In any of the novels, standard firearms are largely ineffective...but not completely so. In just about every shadowrun novel i've read the characters were at least able to hurt spirits with normal bullets if not defeat them.

The reason SnS works so well against Immunity to Normal Weapons is, as others have pointed out, it's not actually a damage immunity - just hardened armor. And since SnS halves the enemy's armor, it also halves the hardened armor, which means you don't need to do nearly as much damage to actually beat that hardening.

~Umi

OOO..OOOO...and spirits dont like getting hit Full auto either....that makes it ALOT easier to get through when you start adding +9DV to the attack.

Personally I'd like to see more use of laser weaponry for things like this, but as it stands SnS is pretty much superior in every way.

~Umi

Depends on your rules interpretation. The description of short narrow bursts includes the following sentence:

"Note that this DV modifier does not apply when comparing the DV to the armor rating."

Now, it's not repeated for long and full bursts (at least not in my printing), but then their text references the one on short bursts, so it's not really far-fetched to apply that limitation to them as well...
Of course, if you beat ItnW with your base DV the +9 usually ensures they pop. Welcome to all-or-nothing-land...

I don't think that actually works. Because you don't add that +9 DV when determining if the attack gets through armor, so your attack has to beat the hardened armor before the +9DV. Wide burst is usually a better option, because Spirits tend to have high reactions.
Edit" Ears beat me too it.

Hmm...very interesting....this I will have to research more, THANK YOU!!!!!

He's still not convinced that anything non magical cannot hurt his spirit. Because in the ItNW in SR4 doesn't explicitly state that it is referring to the immunity ability that is stated above it. So here's how he thinks it works.

1. Is the damage from a magical source (no?)
2. Does the damage exceed the magical armor (If no, immunity applies)
(yes step 3)
3. Roll armor (elemental weapons cause the defender to roll half impact, which would then have an effect on spirit's dice pool)



I think him and I are fundamentally disagreeing on number 1. But the rules are not clear about this!

There's another angle for SnS: it's not just a bullet, it's an Elemental Effect ... "electricity". Spirits aren't immune to being electrocuted.

Well, Immunity is about as clear as any Shadowrun rules get.
Oh and from the SR4 section on Conjuring:
"Physical spirits have the power of Immunity to
Normal Weapons (see p. 288), giving them Armor equal to twice
their Force against all attacks. This makes powerful spirits virtually
immune to most physical attacks."

"... most physical attacks."

Not all as he insists. But hey, if he can't be dissuaded, summon more spirits of your own - this ruling makes them so much more powerful.

The problem we seem to be having here is that your friend is not seeing the forest through the trees. If there is one thing I have learned about the SR4 book, it is that you have to hop back and forth through the pages like a jumping bean on a hot plate to get anything clear.

The ITnW is gives a reference page, and the reference page is where it explains how it works.

That line right there. "have the power of Immunity to
Normal Weapons (see p. 288), giving them Armor equal to twice" this is not explicit in the original ItNW, but I think they heavily suggest it, which is what I was trying to explain to him. However, this ruling is very clear here. thank you much for this post.

- RAW SnS works on spirits the way it works on everyone else.
- Back when Rob Boyle was Line Developer, he said that SnS should not affect spirits and that it shouldn't halve the armor.
- Many people on Dumpshock consider that SnS does apply to spirits, stating that otherwise mundanes are unable to do anything against a high force spirit.

So if you want SnS to affect spirits but your mage player say it doesn't, all you need to do is ask him to show you where it states that SnS doesn't affect spirits. He won't find anything that's clearly defined, he can make a case for why he thinks it shouldn't, but it'll be up to the GM to decide.

Actually it is Force 6 and below. The modified damage value must exceed the modified armor value. At Force 7 they are equal. The SnS projectile does 7S(e) and the Hardened Armor of 14 is halved to 7.

You're right of course Dakka Dakka. Brain fart or typo I guess. I fixed it. Thanks.

I might add that if SNS can blow through a spirit's ItNW, then a taser can as well. To that end, I make a point of carrying around a Defiance Ex or two wherever I go if I'm not packing any bigger guns. 8S -1/2 AP will ruin just about anyone's day.

An Aztechnology F3a Flamethrower on a drone is also a good idea. 8P AP -half against up to two Spirits or as suppressive fire is nice and on a drone you do not need the exotic weapon skill. Against Water Spirits it is even 12P no armor and by RAW fire spirits have no special immunity against fire.

people would be less surprised about the efficacy of SnS if they learned the secret: that each round contains a tiny, unlicensed nuclear accelerator (just don't cross the streams)

p186: Spirit Combat
Note especially the words 'virtually immune" not full immunity.

Point him at Materialization power... which invokes Immunity to Normal Weapons... which then invokes the Hardened Armor power.

Appeal to consequences... if even his force 1 spirits are immune to the strongest attacks... why isn't it mages haven't wrecked the place and more importantly how is that fun for any player who isn't a mage?

Finally... the 2x4 method... take back behind woodshed and beat sense into... repeat until therapy no longer necessary.

That's still one of my favorite things in the game.

Especially when the fire spirit's fire aura starts to burn everything around him, and the spirit is stuck in the middle "Help me, I'm on fire!!!"

Well, once more time we enjoy of SR4A rules are that much more superior to... err...

Hum I couldn't even say that they are superior to having no rules at all as they are so messy we HAVE to build rules on our own to make them work. And they do a poor job in simulating SR universe as described in supplement and novels. Make you wonder if the rulebook is canon at all.

Honestly, the core book is based on a whole lot of assumptions of rules from the previous versions. I have found several instances where SR4/SR4A rules make sense when you apply them in the face of SR1-SR3 rules. But by themselves, they don't make near as much sense.

Sadly (or happily, depending on your point-of-view) that implies the previous BBBs from the earlier editions are required reading.

Care to give examples?

Please?

I have no idea where you get this from. I've only seen SR4 books and I don't see anything like what you're claiming.

I have seen SR3 books and the only thing I can remember is that without previous editions and only the core book (no street magic) there is no indication that glass is opaque on the astral plane. I cannot say though that either interpretation "makes more sense".

Yeah, I find that sometimes common sense is a better rule to go by. Rules lawyers are to be shot on sight.

Eh. Find out what KIND of rules lawyer they are, before shooting.

Some (like myself) have successfully channeled their lawyer-y impulses away from "gain an advantage" and towards "maintain a consistent environment". That is to say, we're sticklers for "if action Y worked X way under Z circumstances once, then all else being the same, it should do so twice (and beyond)".

See, I have in fact been called "the kind of rules-lawyer a GM should _want_ to have around, because he'll remember positives for the NPCs and negatives for his own character, as fast as he remembers the stuff that's good for him." And that was a shadowrun GM who said that, actually. (One that I have sorely missed over the past 17 years.)

not a ton to add to this, but since it sounds like you have a stubborn mage, have him read the Hardened Armor critter power, 20th ed pg 295, that specifically states that only damage not exceeding the armor value MODIFIED BY ARMOR PENETRATION is ignored. That, plus the verbatim on the Immunity Power above, is flat out proof that spirits that have materialized can be damaged by normal weapons.

In short, it sounds like he's trying to stand on his interpretation of fluff for his own benefit contrary to rules.

Also, not to tread on toes, but the immunity to normal weapons (quoted above) specifically states it is immune to any weapon that is not magical in nature, specifically mentioning weapon foci, spells, adept powers, and critter powers. This would mean immunity to lasers, electrical strikes (otherwise a taser would work wonderfully), and flamethrowers, since they are non-magical weapons by book rules.

So, based on rulebook wording, SnS can hurt a spirit, and hardened armor rules would grant twice its magic (then halved due to laser) before it has to roll.

As for his refusal to believe in forums, I in particular agree with him. It's easy for one person to say something incorrect and others to agree. So, pictures or it didn't happen, in a sense. So have him read the above mentioned rules, and more importantly, have the GM read them too.