I had a thought on alternate magic rules. I always find it annoying that SR locks a magician so firmly in abilities right from the start, and that the powers an aspected magician get tend to be so limited.

So under this alternate system: All magic skills are turned into metamagic techniques.
New metamagic techniques include:
Bonding (Of foci)
Enchanting
Sorcery
Conjuring
Astral Projection

At chargen a full mage gets any 5 metamagic techniques, picking any she wishes from the list. Thus a magician could give up the ability to bond foci and take, for instance, centering.

Adepthood requires 2 techniques and can be gained by any magician via 2 intiations as with any other metamagic techniques. Each point of power used for an adept power no longer counts as a point of magic for things like sorcery, conjuring, astral projection, etc.

Aspected Magicians get 3 techniques, as do normal adepts who can add one thing to their adeptness. Priority A adepts get to add any 3 metamagic techniques.

What do you think?

Adepthood, as you put it, is a bit of a sore bargain, isn't it? I mean, it hasn't been until just recently that adepts can purchase limited astral projection; and most magicians would be hard-pressed to gain any Adept powers at all, since their first two power points more than likely go toward Astral Perception!

Nah, stick with cantrips. Can't go wrong with cantrips.

I don't understand what you mean. Normal adepts are about equally powerful, maybe slightly less since you can't start with both enchanting and bonding foci, but adepts now have the ability to astrally project as any other magician can, with the right metamagic, a serious improvement over their previous gimped status. And an adept could become magician's path later by initiating and learning sorcery or conjuring, making the design much more flexible in the long run.

Move along. Nothing to see here.

*Sigh* You might have noticed this whole thread is about a set of house-rules I'm considering and wanted opinions on.

You're right. That's what I get for only reading the last post without scanning the title.

It dose have a certain attraction.

There may be some points of fluff that need to be changed to accommodate it.

How do you learn the first X metamagics you know. I would suggest that they be taught in a similar way to metamagics after initiation and require it be listed in back story (no game effect),

You will find a lot more magician’s way adepts around under this system (many adepts will take sorcery as there first metamagic even if they don’t start with it a couple of force one spells is a big advantage).

Lastly many players will play an aspected maison and start with several metamagics. For magic A you can start as a sorcerer without enchanting that gets 3 additional metamagics. O you can start with a conjurer with invoking and channelling (say yip). Not nesaseraly a problem just something you should be aware of.

Edward