Hello everyone, I rarely play Shadowrun, 'cause I'm usually the GM.

One of my players voluntered to start a shadowrun3 campaign and we're making our characters.

We're using standard priority system, and the GM expect us to min/max our characters.


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The concept of the character is: it's a Mystical Adept that is about 80% Adept and 20% Mage. The magic part of it will be really only utility spells, and I won't consider upgrading the mage part of it.
My idea is to make an Adept that can shield the party from incoming magics from enemies, and I thought the easiest way to do it was to make a Mystical Adept and eventually Initiate it and learn the Shielding metamagic.

So gamewise I will always allocate all my sorcery and magic pool points for spell defense, and I will rarely cast magics myself.


The priority are as this:

A: Magic (Mystical Adept)
B: Attribues
C: Race (Troll)
D: Resources (20.000Y) [Because even tho' the master wants us to min/max, I don't want to get ANY cyberware, 'cause I don't like the idea of a cybered mystic-adept burning his essence, even tho' I can GEAS it]
E: Skills


Troll attributes:

Body 11 (12)
Quickness 5
Strenght 5
Charisma 1
Intelligence 3
Willpower 6

(I had to allocate only 1 point in strenght, but my goal is to raise strenght ASAP when I'll have the available karma)

Skills:

Sorcery 6
Conjuring 6 (Will I ever summon something? IDK, but I kinda want to have the option available)
Shotguns 6
Edged Weapons 6
Etiquette 1 (Will raise this ASAP too)


Adept Powers:

Magical Power 1
Blind Fighting
Improved Reflexes 2 with the talisman Geas
Improved Comat Skill (Shotgun) 6 with the talisman Geas

Spells:

Improved Invisibility 1
Levitate 1
Heal 3

Foci:

Sustaining Focus (Improved Invisibility): 1 (bound) [here goes 15K of my 20k starting money]


Weapons:

Enfield + Gas Vent III
Katana
Knife

Low lifestyle




That's all, any advice is greatly appreciated, thank you for your time.

Don't think I'd bother with the force 1 improved invisibility. Kind of a waste IMO as they are too easily resisted even by lowly plebs. Better off buying a better version after start.

That's if my memory serves me correctly in that the maximum amount of successes = force. Also the TN for the resistance is force... so even when sustained and bound - lowly pleb only needs one 2 or better (even a willpower 1 idiot has a 83% chance of seeing you).

Use your resources elsewhere. Buy contacts/increase other spells/ get some armour!

Your memory serves incorrectly as far as SR3 is concerned. In SR3 spells do have to explicitly state that their number of successes is limited by force in their spell description. Otherwise no such limitation exists ... and Invisibility is not among the spells with such a description.

Now as far as a force 1 Invis spell is concerned: It's a matter of circumstances. With either version of the Invisibility spell having a casting TN of 4 the average success rate of this character is 4 (50% [rounded down] of his maximum of 9 dice coming from sorcery [6] and his whole sorcery pool [3]). Unless provided with extra dice from enemy spell defense, etc. opponents with an intelligence of up to 3 will usually not be able to pierce his Invis spell despite only facing a TN of 2 for resistance (lowest possible TN). Higher intelligence values and/or spell defense on opponent side however will lead to the illusion being seen through more than just "at times". With a higher sorcery pool, higher relevant skill rating or other improvements (like foci) he could win against more intelligent opponents by simply creating too many successes to counter the spell's effect when doing the spell resistance ... but not with the stats given for this particular character.

=> Force 1 indeed is not the best choice in terms of min-maxing there . Force 3 or 5 would be better. However - just as with his Heal spell - such force ratings do exceed his relevant magic rating for sorcery (merely 1 coming the "magic talent" power at rating 1) and thus will cause physical drain.

@ Noll:

I strongly suggest that - prior to taking an Adept of the Magician's Way (they weren't called Mystic Adepts back then) - you sit down with your GM and discuss how you'll handle the following aspects for Adepts of the Magician's Way:

1. "Magic Talent" always being targeted first should magic loss occur. This limitation can have some seriously unwanted side effects in ongoing campaigns.
2. How you want to deal with initiations. Let's just say that the rules as written have caused serious controversies over the years due to wording that is up to interpretation and the last FAQ for SR3 certainly wasn't the best either. One potentially helpful thread: here ... more can be found with an appropriate search. Don't be surprised to see my name in such threads regularly

Now for the character itself ...

I can't see anything that is outright "wrong". However, ...

• You must be aware that in any situation where you'll use that Heal spell at its full force you can end up with more physical damage boxes (due to it being physical drain) than you managed to heal on your target. Particularly when trying to heal someone who suffered a serious or even deadly wound.
• That Charisma of 1 with an equally low Etiquette skill will leave you highly vulnerable should your GM throw social situations at you where brute force won't work and the "Face" isn't around to save your day.
• Even when always going with all dice on spell defense your current setup will only ever allow you to defend with 10 dice - Charisma 1 + 6 from sorcery + 3 from sorcery pool [( INT 3+ WIL 6+ MAGIC TALENT 1) / 3 rounded down] - against a more dedicated enemy magician who targets you with a Decrease Attribute (Charisma) spell.

Anything beyond that is a matter of my personal preferences that would clash with the game environment and play style you and your group are seemingly aiming at. So I'll spare you these.

We had a mage in SR3 that routinely utilized Force 1 Spells to blow past the Stats of the resisting characters, resulting in non-resistance. It is a viable tactic if you can actually pull it off.

You kinda convinced me against this character.

The rare times I played Shadowrun I always played either an ermetic or more often a shaman, not really min-maxing but flavouring it, and 90% of the times I half-"faced" it.

Now, I wanted a more thug-style character, good at combat and with this magical barrier idea. At first I made him elf and I completely ditched the melee, then the other players convinced me into making it a troll instead in order to take advantage of his melee bonuses.


Going back to the thing about initiation that you linked me: What is your official saying? Initiating will not grand me any metamagical technique?



Alternatively, how would you see, in the same character concept (a person very proficent with weapons/melee while giving magic defense) a burned sorcerer? (A resource B magic)

That certainly wasn't intended, because ...



... the presented concept certainly fits that bill.




The main questions there are:

Going by your own experience, how often will you actually engage in melee by your own decision?
And how often will your GM actually (successfully) force you into melee?

If both questions can be answered with "not that often" you can certainly cut back on the melee skill and the necessity of maximizing melee advantages. And as far as "taking advantage" of melee bonuses is concerned in general: Your concept couldn't make use of the strength bonus that much due to how you had to spread stats. You could have cut back on body a bit but since you already reached 9M base damage (6 strength + 3 from the katana) that strength increase would already be on diminished returns against most forms of impact armor below security armor. Thus the only significant bonus left is the troll's reach bonus. But even this bonus can be bypassed once the advanced Martial Arts rules are used. Both an Orc or a Dwarf serve well enough to gain some additional melee prowess (from a min-max perspective) and are both cheaper to get in terms of race priority. The dwarf even being better for the spell casting part ... and only becoming a real "liability" when situations where the guy has to run / sprint arise on a regular basis.



My personal preference - as far as SR3 is concerned - still lies with one of these two solutions:

1. The one where an Adept of the Magician's way get's +1 magic and subsequently + 1 power point due to initiation itself (at least for options 1 and 2, and option 3 technically doing the same through shedding an involuntary geas) and then having to chose between getting an extra power point or a metamagic when choosing initiation option 1 since he explicitly cannot make use of the 20 karma rule a normal Adept can use (and no that particular rules isn't obsolete either just because initiation rules are available).
2. A situation where you simply ditch all the special rules about Adepts of the Magician's Way initiation and just have them initiate like regular Adepts => They receive +1 magic and +1 power point due to initiation and simply cannot buy extra power points. Metamagics come with initiation option 1 as per standard rules

Either variant has served me well in various groups, whereas the other interpretation (that even inspired the FAQ back in the day) got me into troubles with my players at least twice.

Interestingly enough SR4 - despite changing some of the mechanics of initiation - technically made use of variant 1 and even SR5 does so (albeit having new mechanic failures associated with Mystic Adepts). I'm kind of amused that people - who heavily flamed me back in the days of SR3 for advocating an "unbalancing" interpretation of badly worded rules - had no such "balance" issues with SR4 nor do seem to have them with SR5 either. ~shrug~



Tough call. As a GM I would certainly prefer the resulting limitations (no conjuring, no astral projection) without having to focus on those weaknesses created by low Charisma, social skills and the complete lack of stealth. Additionally an Aspected Magician (Sorcerer) - pending some changes in resource and skill allocation - could be used to "simulate" some of the Adept aspects you tried to create with Adept powers Improved Ability and Improved Reflexes:

1. Improved Reflexes can partly be recreated by the spell Increased Reflexes. Get GM's approval for having the spell as "caster-only" variant and you'll even drop
   drain codes to +1M (+1 initiative die), +1S (+2 dice), +1D (+3 dice). Anyone wondering why it's not +1L, +1M, +1S or even lower: because "caster-only" is a combined version of the drain modifiers "touch range", "voluntary target" and "very limited target" and health spells like the Improved Reflexes have the former two modifiers already included by default, thus leaving only "very limited target" as functional modifier to the drain code.
2. Analyze Device is a largely overlooked spell that can actually replicate the Adept power Improved Ability: Provided that you get enough successes against the object resistance of a shotgun or a katana the spell will grant you either 1 skill point per 2 successes of the corresponding skill or a logical background skill or a Build/Repair skill ... even if you already have the skill in question. So nothing will stop you from casting an Analyze Device spell onto a shotgun and gaining X skill levels of the Shotguns skill in addition to what you already have ... The main problem is just getting enough successes against TN of 8 to 10 (OR of a shotgun) to make a difference and worth the investment of having a sustaining focus that can carry the spell at the higher force levels that are required due this spell being one of those which actually has an upper limit on skill points gained based on spell force

But beware: Both things aren't necessarily "min-maxed" and thus might not suit the intended game situation of your GM

The big problem with Physmages is SR3 was that they get spread way too thin. You've got the same magical skills as a full mage, which you need to be effective; but you've only got a fraction of the effective magical power.

My suggestion is to go full mage. Maybe go wolf or bear shaman if you want the combat potential (or pick another good totem), but then focus on a lot of self-buffing spells and some sustaining foci. This would give you more ability with Spell Defense, which you wanted, while also maintaining your abilities in physical combat. Don't buy a lot of combat spells-- if you want someone dead, shoot them. As a troll, this build isn't hard to achieve, and you won't need nearly as many foci to sustain attribute buffs.

Trolls are often overlooked as casters. But they can be fearsome: for one, since "geek the mage first" is the first rule of Shadowrun combat, that huge Body of yours will come in handy. Second, correct me if I'm wrong, but if you cast a spell over your Magic, you resist the drain with Body. That means if you have high-force spells, you can "overcast" with impunity, since your Body is higher than your Willpower. That's a very dirty min/max trick, but since your GM asked for it, it might be valid.

I hereby correct you for being wrong. In SR3 drain resistance against spell drain is done with Willpower. Exceeding your relevant magic rating with the force of a spell merely turns the damage into physical instead of stun damage.



So no impunity there and no min-max potential either.

Might be thinking SR2, then. I remember there was some ways to turn Troll body ratings into your favor for Drain resistance, but I can't recall if it was 1, 2, or 3.

Well, a troll's high body always factored into physical drain: By reducing healing times once you suffered actual drain damage.

Troll Regeneration and all that.

In the end I made an ORK M-Adept focused only on ranged combat, with resource C and 50.000Y spent in contacts.

We played two adventures so far, and I'm currently playing this char in a completely different way than I was expecting.

Due to the high number of contacts (12 level 1 contacts) I'm feeling like I'm playing the face, but withouth the skills nor the stats for it. My uber combat skills served me nothing yet (we were able to avoid combat so far).

My GM decided to add his own interpretation of M-Adept initiation. He's using the non-faqqed interpretaion of "you get 1 magic/1 power point + you get to choose 1 extra power point OR 1 metamagic" but with the limit that I can't get anymore extra power points than my "Magician's Way" level, and I can't raise the Magician's Way with the extra power point.

Sounds like a rather good solution to me.