I'm thinking about converting my characters to 5E when it comes out, and one of the characters in question is a night elf. Hmm, actually, I've also got a pixie to convert, and two dryads as well. Looking at the priority system, I'm really wondering how they'll be translated into 5E.

If I had to guess, I'm thinking that metavariants would be a higher priority up a step over what the baseline would be. Pixies... probably on par with ... troll? Maybe?

So, what do you think?

Looking at how this was ruled in SR4 priority gen, yeah one higher then base for meta types and treat as trolls for sapient critters seem like a likely way to go.

Sadly thats most likely gonna be the biggest hurdle for converting my main char build over, i really like her being a dryad as it fits her fluff very well, but having to take one higher for meta type is gonna make it really hard to rebuild her(from what i could eyeball from the preview i think i can conver her quite well as an elf)

I'm thinking we're gonna have to wait anywhere from 6 to 18 months for a companion book to be put out which actually stats out 5th edition metavariants.

If we're lucky, they'll do Infected at the same time, in the same book, a la Runner's Companion, but I wouldn't put it past Catalyst to split the two up for some arbitrary reason. As for half the gear I rely on in SR4? That'll probably end up scattered across 3 to 5 different minibooks. Sigh.

~Umi

I'm pretty sure that the 5th edition companion equivalent book("Run Harder" or something like that) is going to be the first supplement book this time around.

I think the 3E companion had a flexible system to use instead of the priorities. Hopefully the 5E will have an optional point build system similar to 4E. I'm sure it'll be optional but everyone who's been playing SR for a while will use it.

I do not know for sure -- I don't know that this question has even come up where I could hear it, though I don't hear a lot behind the scenes sometimes -- but, rather than rejiggering all the priorities, what I would propose is a quality, say 5 Karma, called Metavariant, that you have to buy from your starting Karma at chargen. Then you proceed as normal. As to what will ACTUALLY happen...we'll have to wait and see. But I think that would be the easiest and quickest solution.

Emphasis mine.

That's a rather bold statement (no pun intended).

Agreed. As an old hand, I found build points to be a major detractor with respect to character balance, ease of building, and speed.

Likewise. Never used the Build point system.

Well, we'll have to see. I'm just curious is all. Hmm, it could be an Advantage, but I think that would be... problematic. I'm also curious how they'll do Changelings. (+1, +2, +3 priority?)

So if trolls are +50% lifestyle costs pixies at 50% lifestyle costs?

I could see it as its own Priority chart for race (not hard to do, fits better than a Quality) expanding the current one with changelings being a Priority step from the Base Race and there being a Qualities/Disadvantage list specifically for them.

As someone who came in on the tail-end of SR3 and has built using Karmagen, BP, and Priorities, as well as using BP-like systems in other game systems...

Fuck Priorities.

BP and Karmagen, I can live with. But seriously, Priorities can go and have a date with Bubba the Love Troll minus the lube.

Honestly, though, because people like both, and like having options, at least two should be included in any core book, IMO.

if you're planning on running a let's say 200 hours long campaign, is it really necessary to save 1 hour at character generation? And I actually enjoy doing math and building a character, so I hope there will be a generation system for me and the likeminded. Otherwise I will just use karmagen, which doesn't need an actual rules set, because it is already there, called character advancement.
And I can use SR4 karmagen anyways

Maybe. Slight rehash of a different conversation in regards to priority:

For some it take more than an hour to build a character. Even if I have a solid concept going into it, BP takes me about 4 hours to get something I like. (Versus something playable.) The part that takes the longest is gear (of course), followed quality purchases. (I have a bad habit of looking for qualities I don't know the name of.) Chummer can cut this down to about 3 hours if I am pressed for time. I mean, I know the system well enough that I can do most of a character from memory, but I spend a lot of time tweaking gear and qualities.

Anecdote: A friend of mine just dropped out of our SR4 game because he didn't have time to create a character for the new campaign. He just doesn't know the system well enough and doesn't really have time to learn. The rest of us don't have compatible schedules for us to help out, except during game time. He doesn't do his character during game time, because we have about 4hrs to play once every two weeks. (Again, too many conflicting schedules.) He would be distracting/distracted to/by the game, so out of courtesy, he dropped out. I showed him the priority system from SR5 and told me that if our current game was using that system, he'd have been able to make a character in very little time. For some reason he just gets priority, but BP stymies him. It might be simple decision paralysis.

-Temperance

I also agree that people should have an option. I personally like BP/Karma, because it lets me get really nuanced with details and get exactly what I want. Other people prefer Priority, so more power to them.

Personally, I think unless you're playing at a convention or some other one-shot, character build speed isn't really a concern. If you've got a table of friends, with a campaign of missions to run that the GM has put many hours into prepping and which you plan to spend many hours playing, taking time to make very exacting characters is barely noticeable, much less a bother. That said, if there are one or two players who don't care to make very exact characters and would rather just get their characters built and running so they can do something else while everyone else finishes setting up, Prioritiy is great for them too.

More options are always better. You can always not use an option you don't like.

~Umi

I'd also like to point out that it's been my experience that when a game is starting, the players involved usually have at least a week's advance notice to go over the books and design their characters. Unless your play style is such that characters are dropping like flies and replacements may need to be brought in mid-session, character build speed is not an issue.

Oh, true. My players tend to have one to two weeks (or even a month) to build characters. And, typically, only one player ever goes and builds his character without assistance. Everyone else waits until the last minute, and gets me to help with character creation. My wife especially, since she hates mechanics, and considers them a necessary evil - but doesn't bother to learn them. When she plays, if it comes time to roll dice, I have to tell her what to roll, because she wouldn't know without my help.

I wouldn't play with someone who couldn't be assed to learn the game mechanics, honestly. I'd tell them to either take an interest in the game beyond the setting, which is only half the battle, or please find some other hobby.

But I guess that if you did that, you'd live the sex life of a monk, so, yeah. My sympathies, mate.

Mostly, it's because she's horrible at math. She's got a mental block from her father trying hard to drill math into her head in perhaps the worst possible manner. So she doesn't remember numbers, or "problems". She's a good roleplayer though, and makes interesting characters.

It becomes a problem when you have two or three players like that - won't learn the mechanics, expects me to help update the characters, and so forth. That becomes a pain in the rump.

Just give her a cheat sheet - all the commonly used dice rolls she'll have to make, calculated out in advance.

"Okay, I wanna shoot that guy that's... 11 dice!" *rolls*

~Umi

I get the advantage of the Karma system, but a BP system has absolutly NOTHING over the current priority system.
The major issue with BP and Karma is how much it should cost to be a mage or some special kind of "creature".
Thats by all means more than hard to determin. 15 BP were a freaking joke and 250BP for a free spirit was a bid much on the other hand.

The major issue with BP/Karma may be pricing, but in my book that's not anywhere near as a big a problem as the major problem with Priority, which is inflexibility. If your character concept falls outside the boundaries of the Priority slots, you really can't get precisely what you want.

Yeah, sure, this feature of Priority may make more "balanced" characters in some respects, but it also makes more homogenous characters as well. I enjoy exotic concepts, and building a lot of those would be difficult, if not impossible, using Priority.

~Umi

Honestly you have the same problem of flexibility if you just adjust the prices in the BP-GEN.
If beeing a mage would have cost along 30 to 40 BP (which would about what it actually is worth) you would run in the same problems. BP made beeing a mage just dirt cheap.

How are non-standard races aside from Metavariants handled? I mean stuff like Drakes, Pixies and Infected.

Don't know yet. I'm hoping they'll be given their own priority listing, though.

BP only differs from Karma in a few places. The major difference between BP and Karma is that Karma is more punishing of specialization and promotes more rounded characters. But you can still specialize. It costs more and becomes less efficient, but it's entirely doable. I admit, BP prices are off in places, but I don't see why they couldn't (and so far haven't) been tweaked to be more reasonable.

Priority, on the other hand, doesn't let you build quite as vertically. You can still specialize, but you also are forced to take points in areas you may not want any. Some people view these as "extra" points, and see it as a bonus, but sometimes that gets in the way of an unusual character concept. Sometimes you actually want your character to be weaker in those areas, to represent some quirk of their history, nature, personality, or what have you. Being made to put a portion of your "points" into those areas inherently limits how lopsided or unique your build can be.

~Umi

At launch, I assume they won't be handled at all. They'll just be NPC-only.

Also, remember that although Runner's Companion added the Priority System back into SRF, it ended up that Infected, AIs, and Free Spirits never were fit into that system and were deemed "incompatible", so those actually required BP or Karma builds.

~Umi

I think Patrick's solution would be the best one. Metavariants are not really different enough from their base metatype to justify moving their cost up an entire priority level, or losing 3 or so points from Special Attributes. This is the kind of situation that the extra pool of char-gen karma is suited for. Plus, this would let you customize individual metatype costs - let's face it, going from elf to dryad should be costlier than going from ork to oni.

How was this handled in earlier editions that used the priority system? SR3 for example.

In third edition while the main chargen was priority, the metavariants were introduced done under a point system with dwarf/ork costing 5 pt and elf/troll costing 10 and a metavariant added 5 pts to the base race cost, so basically if you translated it back it increased the cost by one step in priority.

But back then Elf AND Troll were both Priority C and dwarf/ork was priority D. Once again the elven consipiracy is pushing their elves upon us now with a meager Priority D while socking it to the orks( C) and trolls(B) (yes to the dwarves too, but probably serves them right).

Right this minute, they're not. I've got .... way bunches of words before I get to the Infected stuff for Run Faster.

Looking forward to seeing your work, man.

Me, too, sorta. I'm working on a VERY tough scene right now, and I can really only go at it in little chunks. Proofing it's going to be a bitch.

Me too. Despite all the flak you guys are currently getting, some of us really appreciate the work you people are putting in SR5. I'm looking forward to it!

PACKS speeded up BP/Karmagen a lot. And Priorities is a very restrictive system. YMMV, but I'm not big on Priorities. Of all SR chargen systems, I always find it to be the worst.

Yeah, well, they had to pick something and, making certain assumptions as to design goals, Priority makes more sense than BP or Karmagen. For example, if we assume that the aim was to make the game easy to get into (for the sake of new blood), Priority makes a lot of sense because it helps avoid the sort of "option overload" that can happen when you put too many choices in front of a person.