Hi there!

Currently I'm preparing for a run with insect spirits.


Atm I'm reading the in the SR3 magic shadows part on the insect spirits. (my book is in german, so I hope I can describe it correctly):

The Ant soldier has a Body attribute at "F+1/F".

1. I don't understand what the slash means?
2. What values I should use for true form or flesh-form npcs?
- What would be the values if we have a host with Body=3 and a spirit of force=5?
- I guess the values for true form should be as listed in the book?

3. A simliar question came up for the Essence: "F/A", what does the A mean?

And one final question: Does anyone know if the rules changed between the adventure (SR2) and SR3 regarding for the attributes of the insect spirits? In the adventure-book the flesh-forms have a low , in the SR3 rules it's as well at Force level.

Thank you in advance for all help!

Cheers
//Acenoid

Iirc the body of F+1/F was the dematerialised vs Materialised stats and the essence of F/A was an old tag for the special type of Dual Natured.

Nope, the stats given do all represent the attribute values of materialized insect spirits in true form. The X/Y notation on Body is a general value that refers to Body (X) and natural armor values (Y, both impact and ballistic in just one value). Yes, that actually means that NPC trolls - by RAW (coming from Critters sourcebook) - do not have dermal armor but a fixed armor of 1/1 instead.

Side note: By RAW the armor values given in the table on Insect Spirits in Magic in the Shadows are in addition to the armor values that any materialized spirit receives in form of his "Natural Immunity (normal weapons)" that happens to be F*2.



The "A" in that notation indicates that those values belong to a spirit/elemental (or technically any other entity) that primarily exists on the Astral Plane and has the ability to materialize. Magic in the Shadows just made the mistake of writing it as F/A instead of F(A) or FA where F stands for Force as exact value and (A)/A for "astral being". A "Z" beind the first value would have referred to a dual natured entity that primarily exists in the physical world (like for example the female Mantid Spirit that actually has to inhabit a living being even in "true form" or Ghouls and other dual nature critters).

________________



See in my above explanation



The values from the Insect Spirit Table (p. 136f, MitS) are for true form spirits only. Flesh forms stats are explained on p. 128. They are a mixture of host attributes and spirit force. Flesh forms do lack most of the powers their true form brethren have.



For a true form Ant soldier a Force 3 would result in a Body value of 4 and a total armor of 9 points, 6 of which would use the rules on "Immunity (normal weapons)" for materialized spirits and the additional 3 from the notation given on p. 136. Force 5 would turn into Body 6 with a combined armor of 15.

=> True Form Insect spirits are tough in SR3 and should be handled with lots of care.

A Flesh Form soldier would turn into a Body 8 (3+Force of 5) creature with mental attributes of 5 across all of them ... but no natural armor and no Immunity to normal weapons.

A Flesh form worker would have Body of 2 (Host -1) and still mental attributes of 5.



See above ...



Both Flesh forms and True forms values are identical (at least at a quick glance) in general. There might be slight differences on powers however (haven't checked).



That would be an adventure specific thing. The SR2 Grimoire gives mental stats at Force as well.




You're welcome

Thank you for all the detailled info. I fear that those monsters are too much for the group :/ I thought one small run to prepare a bit with a few nice one shot weapons & grenades and all will be well. But armor 15? I wonder what can be effective against this.... Still digesting this info. I found also the "explanation" of the insect spirits table in the core book (section dragons & spirits).

More questions:
Can the insect spirits create astral barriers?
Or notice when the status of a barrier changes?
Or obtain the spellcasting abilities from the former host?

As seen in:

Insect Spirit in True Form are - as mentioned before - tough, but they aren't invincible either. Let's stick with that force 5 ant soldier:

In order to kill such a thing you need attacks that at minimum exceed its effective "Immunity normal weapons" armor value. For normal attacks that would require a power of at least 11. Unlike with hardened armor this power does not need to be base damage but can be the modified power value with ammunition modifiers to power (but not those ammunition modifiers that affect armor, since armor piercing effects are treated as if they were standard rounds) and/or burst fire or full auto => Ex and ExEx rounds in combination with burst/full auto are a good choice there to get to that bare minimum of 11. The spirit would subsequently resist damage against TN of 2 (until the attack power exceeds 17) with his Body of 6 plus available combat pool. The number of successes of the attack will determine if he goes unharmed. He'll most likely not go down in one round but concentrated fire from burst fire / full auto capable weapons will bring down a solitary Insect Spirit.

There have been arguments whether or not Ex/ExEx ammo qualifies as 'elemental attack' which would halve the Immunity, bringing down the minimum attack power to 6 but by RAW both ammo types are not considered as elemental attack. Explosives like grenades on the other hand are treated as elemental attacks. So grenades certainly are a way to kill higher force insect spirits as well - at reduced armor values.

Third option are magical attacks that either completely bypass the armor issue (spells like Stun Bolt, Mana Bolt, Spirit Bolt) or at least would halve the Immunity and still exceed the remaining Immunity (force 6 Flamethrower or Fireball in this case).

Fourth option: Adepts with Killing Hands (can't remember if those bypass completely or just halve immunity) or other (troll) melee characters that either have a base attack power of 11 and/or are skilled enough to generate enough net successes on a standard melee attack to raise the power to 11+

Fifth option: Willpower attacks in melee as per special rules for those kind of attacks. Only high Willpower characters should ever attempt that.



By RAW the requirement for creating wards is the ability to perceive the astral realm and a positive magic rating => Yes, a free spirit could technically set up a ward on its own will. A bound one could do so when ordered to.



If it created the barrier itself then standard rules would apply: The barriers creator is instantly aware of any attack against the ward.

If someone else created it (like the insect shaman) then he/she could order a bound spirit to react with virtually no delay after becoming aware of the attack. Another option would be a patroling spirit that observes the ward (for example from the inside) and sees the fluctuation in the ward when it comes under attack.



I'd have to look that one up, but IIRC True Forms are created by total destruction of the host whereas a good merge (perfect flesh form with strictly human body) would retain memories and skills of the host (but with the possible exception of magical skills). Details should be available in MitS somewhere around page 128+

edit: After a closer look: Nope. While a good merge does retain the memory of the previous host, there's no reference to actual skills (or spells) of the host. So both True Form and good merge Flesh Form will only have access to spellcasting abilities if the GM explicitly asigns the Spirit Power of "Magical Skills (Sorcery)" and gives them a list of spells besides any spell they might have as part of the Innate Spell power (which none of the Insect Spirits possesses either).

Vulnerability (Insecticide) can make insect spirits one of the easiest in the game to deal with, if you're prepared for them.

Can make for a very Alien-esque progression, which is cool. First encounter (Alien) a single spirit gives an unprepared group a very hard time, second encounter (Aliens) the group is armed to the teeth but now have to deal with overwhelming numbers.

Actually that's a bit of an exageration. Yes, a weapon based on an insecticide will (normally) cause wounds with one wound level above normal. That's the equivalence of 2 net successes. For lower force Insect spirits that works quite okay, but higher force spirits have enough Body and Combat Pool do deal with such problems adequately ... and - by RAW - you have to actually do damage harm to them with the attack (coated melee weapon, capsule rounds, splash granades and the more specialized chemtech application weapons come to mind there) ... simply spraying it onto them doesn't quite qualify (and causes a "nuisance allergic reaction" with no mechanical effect but certainly gets them angrier or a fixed damage of 4L according to M&M). The gains aren't that substantial and tend to become edge cases, since - by RAW - vulnerabilities do not reduce / affect Immunity normal weapons. Unfortunately Insecticides also do not have a general (RAW) Damage Code as poisonous substance themselves so you're stuck with the weapon Damage Codes most of the times.

1. Coated melee weapons certainly do work. But most characters will have to be melee experts of orkish or even trollish nature to reach high enough power values to overcome Immunity. Getting that close to Spirits is not necessarily a good idea however.
2. Capsule rounds cause Stun damage at -2 power when compared to standard ammo. So while the base damage goes by 1 you still have to cope with Immunity against normal weapons with an increased requirement of reraising your attack power via burst / full auto.
3. Splash grenades, splash mortar rounds and spray Tanks that create a super overdosing without penetration have an explcit (and low powered) 4L physical base damage code against Insect Spirits (as per Man & Machine) that doesn't get modified further by Vulnerarbility (supersedes the general rules on Vulnerabilities). Most explosive grenades / mortar rounds usually do better than that
4. Ares Eldar: 4L Base Damage Code that would turn into 4M ... 7S in burst mode, still against Immunity ... There are more than enough standard weapons that cause more Damage to an Insect Spirit. Only EL-DARs modified for full auto would stand a chance of delivering up to 14D in that manner.
5. Other Chemtech application weapons: No own damage code => 4L like splash grenades at best which could turn into 4M plus low increments to power (clunky chemtech rules) if the GM is willing to give some leeway there as well ... still against Immunity. A good assault rifle usually does better as well.

So by "RAW" being prepared with insecticides isn't that strong ... and the spirits reactions towards that is up to GM discretion (again as per M&M) but should lead to higher force Inscet Spirits going berserk on your team. And as far as full-auto modified Ares EL-DARs are concerned: As GM I would seriously consider a number of times before allowing a (fully legal) weapon that has no recoil and doesn't actually fit into the weapon construction / modification rules to be altered with those rules in order to trivialize an encounter like that.

And I as GM would certainly deny the use of the effects for called shots with chemtech attacks as far as complete armor negation is concerned: The Immunity armor simply cannot be bypassed in that manner.

My personal conclusion: flamethrowers, magic spells, frag grenades and some standard lead from burst fire / full auto in the air are usually more beneficial against Insect Spirits than insecticides.

Great advice again. I ll hope the chars learn. Maybe I'll pass them some more background infos after their first encounter with some INT checks.

The first insect-flesh forms that are being encountered in the adventure above, have no weapons. The damage code should be therefore STUN?
- Would be nice, then I predict that the group will be able to manage the flesh-form encounters after getting some punches. (They will get also surprise on their side, just to be sure)

Regarding the math, it sounds easy to calculate now. However one more question about that:



Can insect spirits be victims of mind manipulation spells like "influence" as per normal rules? I guess not ?

My mistake. Now I wonder if we just assumed that vulnerability cancelled immunity, or we decided it did.

Yes, unless flesh forms do have powers like natural weapon. Workers don't but soldiers might have it (would have to read that again). But ofc any flesh form could wield melee or ranged weaponry and / or wear armor, unless their deformation prohibits them from doing so (GM's call).



Yes, that kind oft force is tough to beat. But still not unbeatable. Remember: Grenades are considered as elemental attacks that cut immunity in half. When used in buildings grenades can and will raise their attack power to absurd levels due to the chunky salsa rules on blast reflections. A single grenade can easily reach power levels of 24+ in enclosed areas. As previously mentioned your players will only have to beat the immunity part the rest can be done with enough sucesses in their attack tests.

And you still have the option of lowering the spirit's force by 2 to 4 points and still have a rather strong adversery there.



There's no clear cut answer to that. In general spirits can be victims of spells and most spells lack descriptions that would exempt them from the spell's effect. In the other hand the conjuring rules explicitly state that sorcery cannot take control of spirits ... which would rule out pretty much all control manipulation spells against spirits. Players and GMs alike often come up with explanations as to why spells should vor should not work in spirits but technically those are not RAW things.

If you want the flesh forms or true forms to be vunerable by certain control manipulations just go for it unless the magician in question would gain full control over the spirit's actions ... which would defy the intention of having the conjuring skill.

And since DuckEgg mentioned it: Nobody will stop you from house ruling that weapons based on a vulnerabilty do affect immunity.

Personally I habe done that in my groups by making such attacks the equivalent of an elemental attack that cuts immunity in half and still increases the damage level when immunity can be overcome. Through that both coated melee weapons and capsule rounds become viable weaponry without trivializing the encounter too much.

the actual rule on sorcery iirc is that it cannot *summon* spirits. i don't recall anything one way or the other regarding controlling them as with mind control magic.

It's an explicit limitation that sorcery cannot summon or banish (in the conjuring sense)spirits . By implication you should also not be able to take control over a spirit in the conjuring sense (for uncontrolled and already controlled spirits) to get services etc.

There's obviously a certain overlap in what control manipulations - if allowed to be used on spirits - would give access to and that's where it get's fuzzy and people start arguing as I mentioned before.

What I actually got wrong was where those limitations come from: Not the Conjuring rules themselves but the spell design rules.

i don't see why you wouldn't be able to use mental manipulations. you can use a stunbolt to "banish" a spirit through damage, because it isn't the same thing as banishing a spirit. why wouldn't you be able to affect a spirit's mind with mind control magic (though of course with high force spirits it's quite unlikely to succeed).

Later on the FAQ for 4th edition had this to say about mind controlling a spirit:



This bit I admit surprised me as I figured a spirit's 'mind' was well outside our range of control, that's why you had to have conjuring to rein them in.

I can not find anything similar in the 3rd ed FAQ as that focused more on MCing animals.

Great! Control spells work, so I'll bump up the low willpower values.

Now I sumbled again on a little question. I assumed at the beginning that flesh-forms since they are dual-creatures get the +10 / +20 bonus from materialization but after the information form the thread I wanted to double check pg 128 does not list explicitly the powers the flesh forms have.

One passage states that the fleshform is an anchor for materialization.

How do/did you play it?

I didn't say you wouldn't be able. I just noted that the lack of explicit ruling usually leads to discussion ... for various reasons.



A stun bolt won't "banish" a spirit (and must not do so due to the already mentioned restrictions on sorcery). It will merely disrupt it and it might not return if no services are owed. Banishing (as tedious as that is - and subsequently is not used that often) will always "kill" the spirit (with certain caveats concerning free spirits). Only seemingly similar results there.

The problem with control manipulations is that they overall could produce not just seemingly but identical results or (worse) even superior ones. It can become a real nightmare should a shaman ever consider to use a Control Thoughts spell on a Hermetics elemental and sustain that spell until that elemental runs out of services owed to the Hermetic. And I'm not necessarily talking about players (ab-)using such ideas. My worries usually refer to my own motto that "what goes around comes around" ... and I can virtually hear upset players yelling at me for doing something like that.



A question that cannot be answered by/with RAW. So you just went into the kind of discussion I referenced ... but I'm not too inclined of having another one of those because they tend to become frustrating. Suffice to say that the "existance" of any form of meaningfull "mind" (that could be affected with control manipulation spells) is another problem field within the discussion and will lead to a myriad of things that could be said for and against it both in terms of implicit and explicit rules as well as fluff informations. You obviously have made your own decision already and Acenoid has made a similar one for himself thus I suggest that you just let it be.

That is a simple one: A flesh form is not a materialized spirit. It's a special form of a spirit that uses a (specialized) form of the inhabitance power. And no, flesh forms do not gain the +10 initiative bonus (nor the +20 one, because they usually cannot astrally project and only pure astral beings do get that bonus).

Thanks!

Sorry to revive this thread once more, but since we have already a nice collection of questions and answers here, I wanted to ask how a flesh form insect spirit defends in mellee e.g. it uses reaction value to attack. When it's opponent retaliates, does it only have combat pool at it's disposal?

Similar about the true form spirits, do they defend as well with combat pool only?

In the adventure Some flesh form spirits have "abilites" and some do not, I assume this is due to the different "hives" explanation again

Thanks & cheers!

Critters and other NPCs use their reaction attribute (without any penalties for defaulting) instead of dedicated (melee) combat skills for their standard (melee) attacks as well as for defense against melee attacks. They also have access to dice pools per standard rules and otherwise follow standard combat resolution mechanics for ranged and melee. This is a generic rule that's mainly targeted at GM convenience and works best for non-sapient Critters/NPCs. As GM you can and should assign dedicated skill levels appropriate to what you want to achieve with a particular NPC.

Reviving this thread for another question

I just read a passage in the core book that described that you may attack a ghost with "willpower" making a Charisma M stun damage.
The ghost can only use his power to reduce the damage. No pool-dice nor armor are allowed to be used. (pg.188)

1. Did I understand this correct? It's actually quite easy then to bypass armor of true forms. I suppose this will not work for flesh forms.

2. If the true form spirit received 10 points of stun damage, would it then "disappear"?

3. Anyone has any experience with this rule option?

Thanks!

Late reply, but I'd say you wouldn't because being able to summon a powerful spirit with few services and making up more via mind control spells is cheese and outside of the intent of the rules.

Yes, used it as described except vs spirits, not ghosts. Iirc, it is an opposed melee test which led to some atypical situations like the magic character engaging in melee and the troll tank trying an attack with his 3 willpower. My suggestion, have the book open when running this until it becomes familiar or the tactic gets forgotten. Is there something about adding [or not adding] Combat Pool? I think I remember old discussions about this and mfb advocating grabbing a ladder to attack just for the reach bonus.

So you found the alternative attack form against materialized spirits (of any kind). This attack form has its own caveats however ...



Let's start with the second part there: Yes, this particular rule won't work with flesh form insect spirits.
Now for the first part: This particular attack form does indeed bypass armor values from the immunity power as well as the additional armor true form insect spirits have. However, there are several things to remember there:

1. This particular attack form still uses the normal melee resolution => It merely replaces any form of melee skill with the Willpower and Force stats instead and removes access to combat pool on either side, so chances of staging damage through net successes in the opposed test are rather limited.
2. For the spirit it usually doesn't mean much of a loss when comparing its Reaction attribute vs. its Force while on player character side you'll only ever want to take the Willpower route with high characters that have a rather high Willpower and moderate to high Charisma value plus wielding a weapon that provides reach (since the latter is included as part of the melee resolution).
3. Even if the character in question wins the opposed melee test WIL vs. FORCE the spirit still gets to resist CHA M damage (see staging problem as per point 1) with its force. Now while lower force spirits will have their troubles with that, higher force spirits have rather good chances of staying unharmed unless the attacking character has both high WIL and high CHA (and additionally increases his chances with a range 1+ melee weapon). Characters that actually have such high values on Willpower and Charisma usually also tend to be magical in nature and thus already have other (and more drastic) means of dealing with spirits (even higher powered ones).

=> The Willpower approach has to be evaluated very carefully for each character who attempts doing so.



Any materialized spirit who suffers either deadly stun or physical damage on the physical plane is "disrupted" (but not destroyed). It will return according the the Disruption rules the latest at 30 (or was it 28? can't remember without re-reading and I'm too drunk too do so now) minus Force days.



Personal experience says that the rule works best on low powered spirits (who would be disrupted by conventional attacks rather easily as well). For higher Force spirits it's usually a toss up for magically active characters and a bit of a niche situation for well build "face" characters. In pratical terms I have seen players relying more upon raw power (with superior fir power from full auto attacks with suitable firearms) from a distance with mundane characters and just going with magical attacks whenever magically active characters were involved.

Sidenote: Personal experience also tells that players kind of "forget" about this option once the determined that it has rather limited use for their respective character. I even remember that I had to actively remind players of that option in some cases where the chances of success would have been in their favor when opting for the "forgotten" option of Willpower attack.




You're welcome ... as before