If they changed a character from a front-line to a support role, then their edition change has failed, at least if they were making any kind of effort to pick up players who played the previous editions. The problem isn't that some things didn't need nerfing; the problem is that the wrong things were nerfed, in the wrong ways. Direct combat spells have always been the quick, go-to, low-Drain choice for sustained combat. They don't need to take an opponent down every single time, but like a heavy pistol, they should still have a good chance of taking an average mook down with a decent dice roll.

Characters also need to be internally balanced, as well as balanced against other character types. When one category of spells is neutered, but more problematic areas (such as spirits or mental manipulation spells) are left alone, then the nerf makes the character less pleasant to play without really fixing any of its problems.

Mages are not alone in this. Street samurai suffer from the revised initiative rules, loss of the ability to shoot twice with two simple actions, loss of the halving of the lower of cyberware or bioware Essence costs, higher costs of the aforementioned 'ware, and be-nerfed-or-be-vulnerable so-called wireless bonuses. It's like SR5 raised the overall power level, then went back and scaled it back again with the most infuriating, fun-killing rules changes. Technomancers got nerfed too hard, mystic adepts are kind of in limbo waiting for eratta... only deckers came out better, except they have to buy expensive, cumbersome decks now, and like a mage with spell defense, they now get stuck with the job of babysitting the group from a threat only a hacker can defend against.

So what are indirects supposed to be for?

street samurai got boosted by having their niche given back. you can now make an effective street samurai that is not trivially replaced by another concept. initiative changed for everyone, and street samurai are still quite good at getting many initiative passes. and while they shoot less often, they are also shot at less often... meaning there is a lot less urgency to remove opponents quickly (and if they need to do that, they *can* use a burst to shoot multiple targets, as well). many essence costs were tweaked for SR5, and while some things got quite expensive, other things are still quite readily within reach and not crazy expensive. the wireless stuff is kinda BS, i agree; military-grade cyberware should not be built to function at full capacity only when it has a gigantic unnecessary hole in it's defences. apart from that, street sams came out of the edition change looking much better than they were in SR4.

technomancers got overnerfed, mystic adepts are not hurting, they need an errata to *reduce* their power, not increase it (and even that's not a very harsh nerf from what we've heard; 5 karma instead of 3 for a power point is not something to shed too many tears over), and deckers are doing just fine, the cost of a cyberdeck isn't slowing them down an awful lot.

for the most part, SR5 is just fine. direct combat spells no longer instagibbing everything in sight is not a bad change. there are still other things that could use fixing, but magicians are still extremely powerful in combat and out, and are even capable of making an excellent top-tier front-line combatant. while still retaining a lot of power elsewhere, even if they put a large amount of focus directly into damaging spells.

They are for attacking drones or (indirectly) people behind visual cover. I always found the fluff for their higher Drain to be logical (bringing a physical effect into the real world is much more power intensive than directly zapping someone with magical energy). If direct combat spells were pistols, indirect spells were grenades - less uniformly useful, but better at certain things.

Yeah, that's not really a balanced environment between the two. Game-wise, it simply works better for indirect to be the bread-and-butter and directs to be great for difficult targets.

Is it really possible to overlook the posts that sketch just how game breakingly powerful spirits are (or actually not to come to that conclusion by oneself?).

Sure, let's make them even more powerful by removing a (PARTIAL) counter to another terribly powerful ability they have.
Just in case you're mathmatically impaired: 6 auto hits translates to 18 dice on average, 24 dice if you're buying hits - the later showing how powerful RELIABLE hits are.

Wrong. That's SR4 - where btw. decent groups tend to houserule direct combat spells.

It seems pretty obvious that now indirect combat spells are supposed to be the default choice and direct combat spells the niche. Elemental effects throwing mages being a lot cooler might have played a part in that decision.

Ok, I want to put in a clarification here: Posting while high on flu medication, so may not be coherent or thought out.

We all want to play our characters how we envision them. We want our subtle manipulation mage to be able to pull a jedi mind trick without anyone noticing. We want our glib face-man to be able to con his way anywhere. We want our demolition expert to be able to make a big boom.

The system is just a set of rules to make sure our imaginings are somewhat on par with those of our friends so when we come together and tell our stories no one person has all of the spotlight. The limits in character creation are there to leave us with room to grow, with something to work towards. The breaks from reality are there because its more enjoyable when your super decker can tell the enemy's guns that they're shooting at the wrong people, rather than having to cower in a corner every time there's a dramatic action scene.

This is why game balance is important. Because everyone should feel equally valuable as part of the team.

This is why a build that is too flexible for too little investment is bad. Because they steal the spotlight time form other players without having to earn it.

I disagree that Indirect Spells are "Cooler." They are flashier, to be sure, but Flashy does not equal Cool in my book. *shrug*

I was talking cinematic effect and all that. Stuff the current developer crew seems to care about predominantly.

Although i have to admit that personally i also prefer the mage that has to be in the open to fry or electrocute people to the one who silently kills them from the comfy chair of his papamobil.

You know... I have played Shadowrun since it came out, and I have NEVER seen a PC Mage kill from the comfy confines of his papamobile. In fact, the only time (and rarely even then) I see such things is with Security Mages in High Security Installations, which is to be expected. Though to be fair, the Remote Mage (In Astral) spamming Spirits to the Physical plane and using them to ground spells was pretty common in SR2. Of course, those were Security Mages too, and not PC's, so...

First off:

Force 4 spirits are not gamebreakingly powerful, and 4 autohits for them is nothing, when the base damage on a gun is 4 on the low end. So you're looking at net-hits vs. hits at this point (and the shooter's got more dice). Annoying on the shooter's part, but not impossible to hurt.

Second:

Spirits below Force 4, namely the Force 1 and Force 2 spirits that should be the bread and butter, get zero armor against any kind of armor piercing round, and they have very few hits on the dodge test.

Third:

Drakes.

Fourth:

Force 6 spirits are really freaking hard to summon. And pretty much can't be bound, ever. Even with 6 auto-hits and 12 armor dice these things are still possible to take down with conventional weapons (anti-vehicular weapons, sure, but come on, it's a freaking tank). On the other hand why the fuck are you using bullets on these things? MAGIC. MAGIC. MAGIC.

People are used to seeing Force 6 and Force 8 spirits being summoned by PC mages because 4th edition did terrible awful things to the powerscale. These were never meant to be the staple spirit in the same way that Force 10 stunbolts were never supposed to be the mage's "gun."

The change I've made boosts the lower end of the spectrum into usefulness and makes the high end scary mofos like they're supposed to be. If F6 is still summonable at the table, then the summoning rules need to be looked at. If the PC is binding them with regularity, then you have a problem player no worse than the cybertroll tank.

cybertroll tanks are not a problem. that player is no longer given the goal of keeping his own character alive, he's given the goal of persuading the enemies to go after him, thereby keeping everyone *else* alive. furthermore, having a character that is hard to kill means the group can now choose options like having someone charge right through the front lines in desperate situations (i might add that they'll probably have to be *very* desperate situations, because even with a lot of armour you can still suffer death by a thousand cuts if you're not careful).

If its not a balanced environment for indirect to be niche vs drones and hit the unseen why is it a balanced environment for direct spells to be hit obscure built like a PC focused on getting missed guy?

They just flipped the imbalance, its just as bad, its does not work better.

It's more the difference in the size and meaningfulness of the niche.

SR4 is what I was talking about. In SR5, it's hard to tell. Indirect spells still have that high Drain. It's more like the mage doesn't have any good default choices - unless it is to forget the whole thing and summon spirits instead.

Well that is a campaign issue I guess because IMO the direct spells niche in 5e is smaller than the 4es indirect niche. Though I think both are too small to be balanced.

It's not.

SR4 indirect spells cost more and were less effective compared to direct spells.

SR5 indirect spells cost more and are more effective compared to direct spells.

What this means is that with a simple cost (drain) to benefit (damage) analysis, direct spells were the only way to go. Indirect spells in SR4 simply did less damage, were less likely to do any damage, and caused more drain. The only benefits were largely undefined "can cause extra effects" elemental components. Direct spells in SR4 did more damage and were less likely to completely fail, since they didn't involve a dodge roll. Plus they could be cast at ridiculously low drain costs, comparatively.

In SR5, indirect spells now do high damage with the best AP you can find, at the cost of drain and the greater chance of missing. Direct spells are virtually guaranteed damage, but the damage potential isn't very high unless you take extra measures (like Edge, Foci, Spirit aid) -- and the Drain is very low.

Further, direct spells can be cast through optical systems with no line of effect -- that is, you can sit relatively safely in your armored van looking out your armored window and cast all day. You can sit in your office and look through your fiber-optic magesight system and cast spells at a guy in the basement. Indirect spells now specifically require line of effect -- they travel from the caster's body through space to the target -- so there's no casting around corners, through windows, or through magesight. You have to stand your squishy self in the line of fire to use them.

SR 5 direct spells cost the same in drain except oddly the AoE spells cost more in drain. And as I pointed out in my campaigns which is why yes it is campaign dependent its niche is much smaller than the 4e indirect niche, though yes the disparity in drain is smaller. But that does not correct the issue, crap spell that has a tiny niche in where it is useful is weaker than a spell that is better in almost every way and costs the same drain. Assured really crappy damage is just a really tiny niche and the hide in a bunker mage is an even smaller niche, and while indirect spells sucked in 4e overall there niche of being good vs drones and other high OR items was a larger niche. Both are unbalanced, direct spells in 5e suck overall and indirect spells in 4e sucked overall. A tiny niche in where they are usefull does not balance them either costing the same drain or more drain.

You're wrong. Run the numbers at various targets.

Assuming a 12 dice caster against a guy with straight 3s and 10 armor, a F5 manabolt will do 3P and a F5 flamethrower will do 4-5P.

Assuming a target with straight 5s and 12 armor, the manabolt does 2-3P and the flamethrower does 3S with a significant chance of 0.

Straight 6s and 15 armor, 2P direct, 1S indirect and 50-50 odds on missing.

Now those are F5 because that's the last point you see minimum drain. In the last instance for the indirect to become superior to the direct, you need F7 for 4 drain. Then you're back up to 50-50 odds on 4P.

Also, F3 Manaball has pretty decent area (Radius 3 meters is good to catch 2-3 guys if they aren't spread out), use 6 drams to bump limit to 6 and you have good dependable damage that still has minimum drain.

This is excellent dependable damage in smaller areas for minimum drain and cheap cost.

The opposite, F12 fireball with 6 Drams brings a huge blast of doom down to stun drain but still insane damage (and drain, so make sure your friends are nearby)


In general, low force + drams is a new way to alter and control drain to your favor.

Don't forget that going on Full Defense adds Willlpower (which magicians usually max) to the defense roll and that doesn't add a limit because it's still purely an attribute test of Reaction + Intuition + Willpower. Magicians can max those three attributes and cast Improve Attribute on all three for a total of 30 dice. You can then cast Combat Sense to add those hits too, let's assume 6. Street Sams don't get this (unless you cast those spells on them). You can even add Gymnastics or a relevant combat skill to dodge, block or parry and add those dice too, but then you get your physical limit. To get around that, roll Edge for 6 more dice, the whole pool exploding. I frankly don't see the problem. A potential of 42 (43 if you're Lucky or have an Exceptional Attribute) (+1 for humans, -1 for trolls) exploding dice is quite generous.

Keep in mind that in 5E the only interrupt defense that applies to ranged attacks is Full Defense.

I disagree. Leaving aside the wireless mess, street sams come out as second rate adepts in just about every conceivable area. Only adepts can have Level 3 initiative boosts, and nearly everything cyberware can do can be matched or exceeded by adept powers... sometimes for a seriously lower opportunity cost. Add in the wireless mess, and you'd be hard-pressed to show any area where the sam has a distinct advantage.

Street Sams have one advantage: background counts.

When was the last time you saw a GM actually remember to use one of those? (well, tonight actually... but that doesn't matter!)

I personally feel that 'ware is far cooler than adept powers, but I don't think that rule of cool qualifies as a mechanical equalizer per se.

Show me where in the core rulebook I can find the rules for Background Count, and you might have a point. Otherwise, it's just another house rule.

Our GM uses Background Counts all the time in SR4A. I do not expect that to change in SR5. Apparently, in SR5, those BGC's are not all that much a concern, though. Sad, really, since they are a control on Magic.

They will be there when the Magic Book comes out, and you know it. And I believe that the rules on BGC have been spoiled, at least a bit anyways.

I'm going to pull a toturi here, and point out that if it's not in the core rulebook, it's not a core rule. At best it's an advanced/optional rule, a house rule until it's published, and a rule which will also likely be forgotten by many. If adepts were deliberately overpowered in SR5 with background count being the restrictive factor, it was a poor-ass design decision.

It has been argued that the Awakened are ALWAYS overpowered. Background Count has always provided a controlling factor, whether you actually like that rule or not. If it is not used, then people have no leg to stand on when claiming that the Awakened are Overpowered.

Thank you, but as an Awakened I Levitate thank you so keep your silly leg.


And this is what has me scratching my head the most about the 'core' book, it comes across more as part 1 of X rather than the Baseline with future books being options.

Is it playable as is? Yes, but with bits of fiddling along the way or unanswered basic questions that should not necessarily require splats to fill in the gaps.

Oh, Well, You're welcome then... Of course, as a levitating entity, well, I would still use BGC against you. Grounds you and weakens you at the same time. Makes you more susceptible to the Grenades.

But not until the splat comes out... mwahahahaha

Indeed, though we are working on that as well.
Cleansing & Filtering Metamagics are a wonderful for helping to mitigate the effect of BGC. Will be interesting to see if these survive into the new splats.

first off, street sams can get level 3 initiative boosts. not at chargen (yet), but they can get them. most likely, they will at some point become available at chargen through the use of positive qualities, but that's just speculation at this point. regardless, the fact remains, that it isn't beyond their reach, merely beyond their reach at chargen (how easy it is to reach after chargen obviously depends on run payouts... if you use the official guide, then granted, it may as well be "never")

secondly, cyberware and bioware is *vastly* more effective in building someone that you can literally hide behind because bullets just bounce right off with no effect. armour is expensive and has only one type available for adepts... for street samurai, there are many sources of armour.

thirdly, attribute boosts in general are much more readily available through augmentation.

there's a few other niche areas (skillwires would be something i'd list if they weren't so bloody expensive, for example, and i'm fairly certain adepts don't have any powers equivalent to the cyberarm gyromount, but most of those areas are currently fairly limited).

truth be told, it's better in the extreme long run to be a combination of adept and street sam, but practically speaking the cost of reaching that eventual theoretical maximum is not particularly reachable for most.

in short, adepts are good at some things, street sams are good at some things, and they both work very well, just differently. street sams actually have a niche now... they'll typically be maybe 2-3 dice behind an adept in the adept's area of specialty at chargen, and will also have their own strengths to bring to the table.

Jaid,

Let me first say that I like samurai. I like playing them better than playing adepts because I find the flavor more enjoyable than that of an adept.

I can't really agree that samurai (in this edition) are anything other than worse adepts.

The problem is in char gen the availability of the equipment limits you (while the adept has no such limit) and out of char gen while you are saving up money for the big ticket items, the adept can be buying some of the cheaper high value to cost ratio items while saving their karma to initiate and get more PP. (Not to mention picking up Qi Foci as well as cheap boosts to their PP)

Improved Ability is a huge problem, in that it gives the Adept the ability to be 1.5 times as many dice better (i.e. if you have a skill of 6, the adept can have 9 dice (and I've seen it argued, although I don't agree that this is RAI, that they can actually have 15 dice) using Improved Ability.

This by the way, can be used for ANY skill, which means the Adept can be a better decker than the decker, a better face than the face, and a better gunslinger than the samurai.

Adepts have a variety of powers that make them more effective in melee than samurai.

I guess my question is, make a samurai character, and then make an adept character designed to do the same thing. How many times can you make a samurai that is straight up better than the adept? This is complicated by the fact that if there is a piece of cyberware that is better than the magic equivalent, the adept can buy it instead of using magic. And if their is a magical ability that is better than the ware equivalent, then the adept can take that. The samurai has no such ability to choose.

And in the long run, the adept starts to pull away and will leave the samurai in the dust.

You illustrate my point nicely. Adepts can start off faster, and sams may never have the ability to match that. It does depend on payouts, but it simply might never happen under the recommendations given in the core book.


Um, no. Sams might be able to boost their armor more effectively, but adepts can boost Body directly. And Body is better than armor, as it's not subject to armor piercing. Adepts also are potentially harder to hit, as they have access to Combat Sense. Generally speaking, it's better in SR combat to avoid getting hit than soaking the damage.


No. The Attribute Boost power is dirt cheap, and is just about as effective at Rating 1 as it needs to ever be. Attribute boosting is clearly dominated by adepts.


Adepts can directly boost their Strength for cheap, which covers most of what a gyromount offers. Skillwires are a joke.

I'll concede that there may be a few niches that sams can eke out a small advantage in, stat-wise; but them we have to deal with the other hits they take, such as Essence loss, social penalties, and wireless trouble. On the balance of things, Adepts have the advantage just about everywhere; and even when they don't, the differences are miniscule and tempered by the other disadvantages of being cybered.

Don't forget that an Adept can increase the accuracy of any weapon group they choose for a negligible price. For something like a combat axe that's a 25% increase, and when the weapon's primary balancing factor for its power is a low accuracy that can be a big deal, a fact that is exacerbate by the high dice pools available to the adept via improved ability and weapon foci.

If you're willing to risk foci addiction then Qi foci outstrip augmentations for cost effectiveness in most instances, with the primary limiting factor being their availability. Even then, having multiple low-force foci is entirely viable as a solution to this problem if you can work within the limit on foci numbers.

Finally: Adepts get access to a bunch of unique senses that can't be replicated with technology, though granted they're all meh at best and I can't see many people taking them, while their only real penalty is that they have to get a couple of abilities externally, which of course limits you to +1 dice from smartlink rather than +2. This annoys me because most of them would be fairly easy to replicate with 'ware, but are Adept only.

Wait what?

Where does it say that an adept can't buy and wear a flak jacket?

I believe that he means that samurai have the option of bone lacing or dermal plating or orthoskin or cyber limbs while adepts only have mystic armor.

Hey Lobo0705, something completely off topic due to your handle: What are your thoughts on DC comics old Lobo vs new 52 Lobo... assuming that's what you are referencing.

@FuelDrop,

Not what I was referencing, and either way, I haven't read the new 52 Lobo, so I can't really compare the two

Unless they just buy cyber anyway, and make up the magic out of karma later.

You know, the easy way, given the base book payouts. You'll get the karma a lot faster than you'll ever get the nuyen.

That still doesn't matter. If I build a troll tank as a sam, then again as an adept, the adept is going to be better at soaking damage *and* have a few advantages in other areas.

I've been avoiding commenting for a little while til I had some playtime under my belt...

Seeing the comments about BGC not being canon from certain posters strikes me as ignorant. They are published in the hotpatch errata for Missions and are used heavily in the chicago campaign. (a negative dice pool seems to be working nicely in that setting). So by that measure they are in an official release already.


Direct combat spells are lacking in SR5. I like some of the aspects of how they fixed things. The problem is they only do one thing damage. And they don't do it well enough in most cases. Tossing a lightning bolt was vastly prefered in most cases. Because the bolt would do more damage when it hit, it would -1 penalize the target, and drop their initiative by 5. In contrast, again, the direct combat spell does damage and damage only.


With 6 Mag and 6 spellcasting this normally worked out to 10 dice casting any spells. (-2 bgc in the areas of chitown of the official campaign we were in). This typically meant that casting a manabolt got me about 4 successes rolling well. Then the target would resist half that on their willpower.


1 damage per net hit just isn't enough... and well 2 is too much is my feel. 3dam/2net hits would probably have been just about perfect. Remember that net hits are limited by force... and resistance dice comes out of those capped successes. I think the spells should be about on par with a heavy pistol given their heavy drain codes. That also fits well within the envelope of one skill to rule them all that 'spellcasting' has with multi-use magic.

Direct Combat spells are for people who can dodge indirect spells or simply shrug off the hits of normal weapons.

Indirect Combat spells are for the majority of people who cannot do either.

If you are rolling 10 dice to cast Lightning Bolt, it isn't that inconceivable that between Intuition + Reaction that the opponent rolls more hits than you and your spell has no effect whatsoever (not to mention Combat Sense or adding in a Full Defense or Dodge interrupt action).

On the other hand, them rolling 4 or 5 dice for their Willpower, your spell is actually doing damage - although not much, I'll grant you.

Increasing damage per hit sounds good, but remember reagents can easily cause you to raise the amount of net hits you get, without increasing drain. Not only that, the drain on Manabolt is F-3, so casting it at Force 6 is only 3DV drain, which should be easily resisted. If you are saying you only average 3 or 4 hits, then that won't hinder you at all (not to mention you could cast it at Force 5 and only take 2DV drain).

The way the spells are set up now, if you are fighting John Smith the security guard, then Lightning Bolt him. If you are fighting Conan the tank or Speedy the dodging wonder, then Manabolt him.

What I like about it is that there isn't a magical "no matter who I'm attacking, use this spell" - although clearly Lightning Bolt will be used more commonly.

Not everyone has access (or knows enough to care about) to the latest errata and rules. They just want to run a game based on the book they own. I've seen a couple of home campaigns of SR5 that haven't seen the background count rules; in fact, the only campaign I've seen that uses them is a Missions game that has yet to start.

The question isn't rather or not the rules exist. The question is rather or not the rule will ever get used. If it was meant to be the big balancing factor between adepts and sammies, the fact that the rule isn't widely known knocks the base right out from under the game balance.

- samurai have easy access to increased body. take a look at the new bone density.

- samurai can have almost as many dice as an adept in the adepts area of specialty, and because they didn't have to put magic as a high priority will tend to be a bit more impressive in some other area... skills, base attributes (which determines augmented maximum now), edge/race, or whatever.

- samurai can build for crazy amounts of armour, which works even when surprised and even against AOE attacks which cannot be dodged. considering just how deadly frag grenades are, the ability to reliably soak large amounts of damage is not a trivial ability. it also works better against full auto attacks that tend to drastically reduce dodge dice pools, and against suppressing fire, which isn't actually dodging (so far as i am aware, reaction + edge is all you get to roll). they can also still have quite good dodge pools, albeit not quite as good as a dedicated adept. of course, at this point we're talking about an adept who's blown all their points on initiative and dodging, so uhhh... how do you figure you're *also* fitting in 3 different attribute boosts - which, i might add, are a simple action EACH to activate - plus increasing your dice pool limit on all your weapons plus raising body plus getting all these extra senses that adepts are supposed to get plus being better deckers and better riggers. adepts can be good at their one thing, and i'll agree, they have a higher cap than street samurai... by a little. but they have a limited amount of points. you can have *some* of these things, but fitting them *all* in? good luck. the street samurai can be more than good enough, which is all that really matters. who cares if you put that security guard into 5 overflow boxes or 3 (not that 6 more dice is terribly likely at chargen)? they're out of the fight either way.

- augmented adepts do indeed get the best of both worlds, potentially. they'll tend to start off a bit slow, but they do indeed have great potential, and their starting point can be quite adequate. however, they are very clearly a demonstration of the very fact i've been saying; adepts have advantages, but so do street samurai. after all, if there was no advantage to be gained by being a street samurai, there would be nothing to get excited about when discussing the potential of combining the two. the very fact that anyone has ever thought "hey, i could make an even better character by taking an adept and getting augmentations, too" clearly indicates that there are some valuable augmentations that add a lot.

- your opinion on specific 'ware does not make it suck. skillwires are amazing in the right situation, because it means that you can instantly adapt to unexpected situations. being stuck relying on a set of skillwires to get you out of a bad situation may not be ideal, but it sure beats relying on defaulting on that skill, especially in certain situations (parachuting is a skill that you seldom need, but which you will most likely regret not having when you do need it). if they weren't so expensive, i would expect to see them in a lot of character concepts.

adepts have a place. street samurai have a place. those places are different, and that is perfectly fine. they don't need to be identical. in fact, i would be inclined to say that i consider it *preferable* that they are not just a direct carbon copy of each other, because that gives more room for each to be effective without stepping on the other's toes (plus, it means that the augmented adept is always going to be a bit tempting, which it otherwise would not be; it adds an entire new build that would likely not be considered if both had identical abilities with identical costs).

And adepts can Attribute Boost their body just as high for a lower opportunity cost.


Um, that lower priority for Magic will be sucked into a higher priority for Resources, so you can afford the cyber. If cyber and magic were balanced, this would be a wash. However, they aren't.

Also, no, adepts can always get significantly more dice and a higher Limit to boot.


You do realize that a good number of them are incompatible? For example, bone density (your suggestion) and bone lacing don't work together?


If skillsofts were cheap and easy to get a hold of, you might be right. However, the disgusting expense of SR5 skillwires means that you'll almost never have the right soft for the right situation. You can't instantly adapt unless you have a way to instantly get the right skillsoft when you need it.

Back in SR3, I designed a sam and rigger pair who were designed to work together. The sam had skillwires, and the rigger had a skillsoft jukebox. Whatever skill the sam needed, the rigger could download to him... and given a little time on the matrix, he could download or pirate a soft if he didn't have it. The sam never saw the light of day, but the rigger saw action as Tank. Yes, as in "Tank, I need the pilot program for a B-212 Huey." That, my friend, is how skillwires ca n be super cool. The SR5 method? Not so much.


The problem is that the adept has stepped on the toes of the sammie, a little too far this time IMO. There's few things a sam can do that an adept isn't better at, and even then, there's a lot of disadvantages to the cyber route that magic never has to worry about. It's not just sams, either: I can't recall ever seeing a mundane Face in SR5. The social adept route is just too good.

Not to mention that an Adept Decker with the potential of adding Improved Ability to all of his skills, with no penalty whatsoever. Take Magic D, get a datajack and off you go. Use karma to raise your relevant skills until it just becomes cheaper to raise your Magic and get a PP, in which case you can buy another 2 points of Improved Ability, and when that gets more expensive, start initiating and grabbing free PP for more levels of Improved Ability.

Coming from 3e to 5e, the Improved Ability is one of the things I find more objectionable. In 3e, it cost .25 Magic to add dice to Athletics, Diving, and Stealth, and .5 Magic to add a die to any Combat skill, but you couldn't get extra dice to any other skill.

The way they have designed 5e, it seems like the place that the samurai holds is "The vast majority of people in the world are not magically active. This is the best we can do to cope with that fact. We can't make our security guards/strike teams magical, but we can give them ware."

So for NPCs they make perfect sense. For PCs, where ALL of them can be magically active, they blurred the line too much.

Again, no real experience with 4e, but in 3e, if you were a samurai, you started out AWESOME, and the Adept was so-so, but as time went on, the samurai hit a plateau, while the Adept kept getting better and better. If you played that out over a long enough period of time, the Adept equaled the samurai and then surpassed them, but it took them a long time to do it. Here, the adept starts out better than the samurai, and the disparity just keeps on going.

And again, I'm not advocating that this is a good thing. I LIKE to play samurai, and wish they had gotten a little more love.

In play the Street Sam is better at char gen in our games and the sam and adept are built with similar levels of optimization. Maybe some super optimized adept build trumps the street sam but I kind of doubt it pans out as super awesome as people expect in play. I'm sure some optimized bio adept builds will be fearsome as well, but I think outside some bent obscure builds the street sam will still look better at char gen. I've easily built mystake adetps with the 5 karma rule that curb stomp normal adepts though the normal adept was more fleshed out with a wider range of skills.