Well... yeah. Do they get them, and what to do with them? Or did I miss this in Mits or BBB somewhere...

I think they get them (could be wrong though).

I guess use them to bond foci and spirits?

1 spell point per force point of Spirit or Elemental. If I remember correctly, Elementalists also have to pay for conjuring materials out of resources.

Hermetic conjurers can start with 5 force 6 and 1 force 5 Elementals on call, which somewhat makes up for their lack of spells.

I'm guessing they do. You can use Spellpoints to have spirits bound to you at the start of the game. I'm not sure of the system; but, I'm pretty sure it's in the main book somewhere.

Some GMs will let you initiate with starting Spell Points.

It costs 1 spell point per force point of bound elemental, and 2 spell points per service that elemental owes you. A force 6 elemental that owes you 3 favors will cost you a dozen spell points. You don't have to pay for their summoning materials, which is nice, but you are probably better off investing at least some spell points to bond foci. 4 spirit foci (one per element) will probably result in more favors from higher force elementals in the long run than starting out with one who does a few things and then vanishes.

As for a shamanic conjurer...why would you do that to yourself?

The best way for a conjurer to use his spell points is on an ally spirit. Initiation is a good choice too, but GMs tend to be a lot more resistant to the idea of initiation at char gen than the idea of owning an ally spirit at char gen.

Do not under any circumstances spend so much as a SINGLE SPELL POINT on a pre-bound elemental. You're much better off just sucking it up on the first run and summoning a bunch of elementals after that with pre-bought elemental summoning materials than putting karma in a pile and setting fire to it like that. A good idea is to ask your GM if you can spend unspent karma rerolls at the end of a run on summoning elementals.

Also remember that if your using BP's you can sell them back making the Conjurer cost only 18BP's

Or you can take a million nuyen, buy a rating 6 power focus and bond the sucker right off. Ally spirits are hampered because they don't have sorcery and many iniation metamagic abilities are sorcery based. The power focus is always useful IMHO.

Is there any reason a conjurer needs a high magic rating? They're not casting spells, so they don't have to worry about spell level vs magic rating, so can they then load up on 5 points of cyber?

Spirit force is limited to Magic Rating x 2, IIRC, which is also where focus addition kicks in. Ward size is also limited by Magic Rating.

Not that taking a couple points of magic loss is that bad, even less so if the character initiates twice at creation.

I think he means, if you're a shamanic conjuror, why on earth would you waste your spellpoints on a presummoned spirit? It'll last at most until sunup or sundown, which means you just blew all the invested points.

So the jury stands at (because, yes, shamanic conjurer) sell the spell points for build?

Initiate and bond foci if you can. Shamanic conjurers practically require Invoking.

Yes, unless your GM lets you initiate with spellpoints at char-gen (using the optional rule from Shadowrun Companion). One of my favorite allocations for a conjuror is 18 points to initiate once (usually picking up invoking), 12 points to bond a Force: 6 spirit focus, and turn the last 5 points in for a build point.

All of the above are, as far as I know, House Rules (which I and almost everyone I know also use), as Conjurers do not gain Spell Points by canon.

See thats what Im trying to find where it says that. It would be pretty shoddy (provided you where playing a hermetic) to denie them even the ability to have elementals at cargen. So I say to someone ??

The thing is, where does it state that they do get Spell Points?

Like I said, pretty much everyone rules that they get them, but that doesn't make it canon.

I was actually saying that it seems funny (odd, not haha) to have a shaman conjurer. Nature spirit abilities rock, but being limited to one spirit at a time seems crippling to me if you don't have sorcery to support the character.

Also, conjurers do get spell points

SR3, pg 55: "All aspected magicians start off with 35 Spell Points."

Not "all aspected magicians with the sorcery skill", and not "all aspected magicians except conjurors." Pretty straightforward, really. If you disagree, by all means, point out to me where the conjuror subset of aspected magicians are specifically denied access to spell points at chargen.

(edit: sweet...)

Cool ... one less House Rule.

where was this conversation when I was making my conjurer...