For simple oxygen supply/holding your breath yes. But as I recall it also provides the same benefits as the extended volume bioware right, only more so? Which means it reduces the TN for Fatigue Test by two per level on things like running or carrying loads.

that's exactly my point, really. if you're playing a low-power game, an SMG-monkey adept can be abusive. the question that needs to be answered is, "are these face adepts being abused in most games?"

this sounds about right, to me. adepts tend to specialize in 1-2 main areas.

edit: i don't have my books on me. flakjacket may be correct. gentlemanloser, you can't have more successes on Enhance Aim than the spell's force, as i recall. if your mage has it at force 12, you deserve to be able to get -4 TN.

Thanks Cochise,personal impressions are as good as any other.

However, I've seen trolls with STR28 and 4d6 initiative that some people don't seem to find abusive. So since you've mentioned that the characters in question might be debatable, an example or a guideline as to the power/cyber combo would be useful.

A while back, Dr.Funk exemplified a combination that I found particularly nasty and which hadn't come up in playtesting (namely a couple of Edges, Kinesics 2, IA:Negotiation 4, Cultured Phermones, Gaesaed powers and rounded out with a couple of combat powers). The combination of Kinesics with IA: Social Skills is really the only point I found gamebreaking which is why I've underlined that it wasn't in the authors' drafts.

I think you're jumping to conclusions here
I'm not saying that I or any of these round that a have insight into play "low-power".

There are numerous people who'd even call me "power-gamer" and "roll-player" instead of "role-player" for my style of game.

No, not "most". I'm not sure that the Mnemonic Enhancer previous to its Errata was "abusive" towards "most games". Hell, I didn't consider it abusive, but I acknowledged the fact that others didn't share my POV on that and I didn't have a problem with the Errata either. But now I do have a problem: Obviously the karmic reduction of more than just one point per level was considered to be errata worthy. Now give me a good reason for providing such an option to Adepts and Adepts only, no matter what the pre-requisites might be (double initiation as such isn't too restrictive when it involves two rather powerful techniques)?

Actually that observation for me is true for any character ... I have yet to encounter a character that really is good in more than 2 fields.
And no, the combat oriented Adept wasn't restricted to just one weapon type or heavily emphasised ranged or melee ...

@ Synner:

Interestingly enough the combination that Doc F. made was one of the things that instantly sprang to my mind when reading SotA'64. I had seen several mundane characters that heavily utilized the TN reduction that some edges provide and thus seriously enhance good social skills. The (cultured) pheromones just being the cherry on the pie.
And that's pretty much how the two Adepts I mentioned worked: By utilzing that existing possibility (mainly good looking and knows it + apitude) + kinesics + IA: Negotiation combined with some other suitable powers for their second field of choice (the second one going for IA: Electronics B/R which is quite important when dealing with maglocks and microscopic view as power)

why should mages and mages only be able to cast spells or summon spirits?

yes, but those characters usually also have a smattering of other skills besides their main areas of focus. with adepts, that's much rarer.

the thing with social adepts is, it's already possible for a mundane to beat the pants off of kinesics. good looking and knows it + aptitude + good reputation + several other edges can give a TN much, much lower than even 3 levels of kinesics. yes, adepts can stack kinesics on top of those other edges... but that's what adepts are for. if magic doesn't make you better than a straight-out mundane, what's the point of having it?

People missed the point of your ramblings? I wonder how that happened.

Dude, don't flatter yourself. I can only speak for myself, but I don't consider anything you wrote in your post deific in the least. These aren't taken as a personal attack; think of it more as everyone loves to give the smackdown when they read drivel. Maybe that'll keep you from feeling too much like a martyr.

No they don't. One of your main issues is with exaggeration and flair for the overly dramatic.

Uh... okay. This has to do with adepts how?

Rigggghhhhht... I'm getting the adept connection here too.

You probably wont get flamed for allowing high-karma players in your game as much as you will for supporting a game in which you hate some of the core meta concepts and the frickin' rules. The rules?! How can you continue to run a game in which the rules are something that you hate?

Since you're not the God of Shadowrun, as you stated, what makes you think you should know what Shadowrun is supposed to be? You do understand that magic is in an upswing, right? It will dominate over those with no juju. You have a really skewed concept of what adepts can actually be. The biggest problem I have with your concept of what adepts are now, is that they can't take all those powers... starting characters are still limited by the number of power points that they have to spend on abilities. Just because they have a list of powers which is still a fractional amount of the items that sams can pick from in M&M, does not make them gods. Try making this 'uber adept' concept that you have in your craw and you'll find that you wont be able to cram all of these powers into one standard starting character. Sure, if starting characters had 24 power points to begin the game with, you'd see a character that can "do everything" as you say. But the simple fact is that they don't and they won't be able to.

Well, your opinions are just that... yours. I'm thankful that I don't play in your narrow tinny world.

That's fine. You're the god of your magic-stunted world. Just remember that you're playing a divergent game. You and your game are not the norm. Don't be offended when you have people who love the game, smack your game-hate when its posted here.

Most people try to order their thoughts in a cohesive manner so we can understand what your point is. Since adepts can't do everything, your grocery list of comments didn't really get to the point of the thread. It was just you giving your personal review on powers, often times without understanding some basic meta concepts of the game and difficulties posed by character creation. You looked at how long the list was and forgot to work out the math. Adepts can't be everything on that list, yo.

Now why would you go contradict yourself like that? You made all these claims at how lame the power was to begin with, and then say that its good enough for someone else to use as canon. Bro, make up your mind. Either you "hate it" or you're going to allow it. Do you make flippant decisions like this when you GM?

"It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt." ~Mark Twain

That's what happens when people read drivel, especially here.

(5+1) * 1.5 = 9
(6+1) * 1.5 = 10
(7+1) * 1.5 = 12

I get 31. But maybe my math's off.

Thank you for reinforcing my point.

My job here is done.

I don't like to jump on the wagon willy-nilly, but I couldn't have summed it up better myself.

I guess that's what you consider a valid argument?
However, I don't consider it as such ... I do see it as the answer of someone who actually doesn't have an answer ...

So, where's your argument now?
You said that it's o.k. for adepts to have 2 fields. I said that pretty much every character has just two major fields.
Your most used argument in that regard is the fact that the 25 bild points for being an adept do lack in other fields.
Guess what? I'm not going to question that, since that's not my problem I have with the powers of SotA'64.

The thing is that your mundane needs to use edges already to get where the adept can go. But that's not even the point of my criticism.

No, that's not what adepts are for or at least it's not what they initially were for ... Or why is that e.g. wired reflexes and increased reflexes don't stack. Or why can't damage compensators be combined with the corrosponding Adept power?
That's what pretty much pissed me off from the very beginning when I voiced my concerns: I'm not saying that those powers are stupid. I'm saying that they lack some balancing restrictions that other powers do have.
But that keeps constantly being ignored.

A human with a serious number of "edges" is not "straight-out". And that's where my concerns lie. An adept with just those powers is better than a straight-out mundane. A highly "gifted" mundane can get initially on par with or even slightly better than an adept, but will still lack the possibility of development the Adept has (mainly with those IA-Social skills) in the long run. => The Adept will be better in that particular field and rightfully so.
Again: I'm not questioning those powers. I just miss some elements of balancing that other powers do have.
And that's not restricted to just those social skills. It goes for things like Iron gut or Iron Lung as well.

Well, speaking as probably one of two or three people who has run and dealt with Social Adepts in the last six months, I like to think that my arguments have basis in, what's it called, gaming experience.

Some other users here have seen my SA or dealt with her. And to my knowledge, no one has said anything about her powers being excessive. Of course, no one's seen her interrogate someone under hot lights yet, myself included (Well, except in her backstory), so that's the ultimate test I guess. Until that day, she's just a regular character who doesn't spend every waking second trying to use her powers to jerk people around because she can. If she did, she wouldn't be where she is. Of course, she'd also have more SA powers. Just because I can do something with her, doesn't mean I should. Not when number -crunching gets in the way of playing a character who can sometimes, and usually when it is almost a necessity, talk the pants off someone. Beats torturing them, which is pretty much her policy.

You know what'd be nice, and I mentioned this to another author already, would be to flesh out shamanism a little more. As it is, it's just... Something's off. The rules are fine, but the homogenization of totems and NA magico-belief systems could be fixed.

Well, some of us already did that in explaining the thesis of our own respective arguments.

But if you're going to be defending your argument or attacking someone else's point, it is a far more effective debating tool to address each specific point individually rather than altogether. You want to talk about context? You ruin all semblance of context when you decouple the original point with a rebuttal or addendum.

Have you never debated anyone in your life? Did you just refer to their argument once at the beginning, or not at all? How'd that work for you?

I also have to do it for work, so figure I may as well stick by it here.

THis has no place in this thread.

Now, I'm done.

your math's on, but you also have to pay 3 karma to join an initiatory group.

see, this isn't how arguments work. you can't just call someone's argument invalid and then run away; you actually have to provide a reason why it's invalid. your say-so isn't enough. so, let's try this again: my position is that it's perfectly acceptable for magic to allow Awakened characters to do things mundanes can't. now you post, and tell me why you think mundanes should be able to do the same things an Awakened character can. we'll then take turns presenting arguments until one of us is either moved to change their position, or gets sick of the whole thing and wanders off.

this argument generally doesn't apply to edges, though. for instance, High Pain Tolerance stacks just fine with both the Pain Resistance adept power and Damage Compensator bioware. Aptitude: Pistols (if your GM allows you to take it) stacks with both Smartlinks and the Attunement metamagic. Vehicle Empathy stacks with VCRs. the only edge i'm aware of that doesn't stack with similar cyber/bio/magic is Adrenaline Surge.

i could almost see Kinesics not stacking with Tailored Pheremones, but keep in mind that Improved Ability stacks with Enhanced Articulation and Reflex Recorders. the basis for the bonuses are different in both cases, so i really don't think there should be a problem with them stacking.

I guess you'd better not try to explain to me how "arguments" are to presented or how arguments (as synonym of "discussions" are to be lead). I asked a question and within the context of such a discussion it is you who failed to provide one, but instead tried to save yourself by asking a more or less unrelated counter-question.

However, my question was based on an argument: First they got rid of something like that, due to "balance issues". That's a fact. So my questions still stands: Why bring it back and then for one character type only?

Save for the fact that you didn't provide any argument

Nor was your question, since that's not what had to be given at that point.

Which wasn't the point I was arguing =>

... This is not my argument to be made. I since I never claimed that mundanes should be able to the very same things as awakened persons, your "demand" will never be met.

Thus we actually won't do that, at least not on the topic you try make it now ...

Beats me, I guess that's why lightning reflexes as edge is not compatible with the combat sense power?

Interestingly enough it works with both

And again, it stacks with both, while Atunement and Smartlink still exclude each other when it comes to the game bonus (an atuned Adept could still control weapon functions via smartlink). Does the word "balancing" ring any bells?
Because that still is the sole thing that I'm talking about: The lack of balancing that I see with some of the new powers. Not all of them ... not to the same extend for all of them.

See above for the lightning reflexes ...

I'm keeping that in mind. And I'll tell you that I pretty much had the same criticism on them stacking, ever since M&M came out.

And that's the part where we'll have to agree to disagree.

Excellent point, but no need to "Devil's Advocate" anything. Just speak what thou wilt.

1) Yes. A player in my game (one I play in, not one I run) who got the SOTA 2064 book immediately set out making the Uberfixer. Elf, Etiquette 6, Negotiations 6, Kinesics 3 (geased to something that makes it impractical in combat, where it wouldn't be used anyways, and the GM allowed it), Multi-tasking, Improved Negotiations 6 (also geased), and the usual Edges & Flaws to lower the social TN's as well. Went up against a Fixer with Negotiations 8 (12 with cultured tailored pheromones 2) and Intelligence 6 (8 with cerebral booster 2)... and cleaned up on the guy. If it had been a fist fight, the adept would have wiped the floor with the fixer. After finding out that the guy was a Way of the Speaker adept, the fixer stated he wasn't dealing with the dude, and our group's payments were going to be reduced so long as we ran with him.

I haven't seen whether or not this attitude is universal to all fixers and Johnsons we'll be dealing with, but as this person's presence is threatening my character's profit margin, I'm already working on plans to do away with him. (Sorry, Bill, but you knew Junkie does that sort of thing to people he don't like -- it's how you lost Petra...)

2) He's playing the uber-face now, but not for long. However, upon seeing the powers that this guy has (negotiating not only a 50% increase in price against one of the toughest fixers in town, but also waltzing into a corporate facility with his silver tongue, talking guards into helping us with our 'run, and then getting more money out of the fence after the run), two other players have been looking at his copy of the book.

You might ask 'If this guy is out-negotiating fixers and fences and making the jobs a cakewalk, why are you getting rid of him?' Because the fixers and fences realize that this guy is affecting their profit margins, and refusing to deal with him on that basis. Because he's running with us, we'll end up having to find new fixers and fences who don't know about this guy. My decker feels it's in his best interests to have the adept disappear entirely from the world, and thereby send all those Way of the Speaker adepts a warning: the Shadows are not for you.

for the love of... are you seriously not able to understand that asking "why should mages and mages only be able to cast spells or summon spirits" is another way of saying "it's perfectly acceptable for magic to allow Awakened characters to do things mundanes can't"?

and the point you were arguing was--and i quote!

i gave you a reason: because magic allows the Awakened to do things other characters can't.

you also missed the point of my argument. i'm saying that edges are almost always able to stack with other means of achieving similar bonuses. there are all of two instances in which an edge cannot stack with a similar bonus from another source. ergo, the balancing factors you claim exist in other powers don't exist.

Then he's being played badly. They should all love him, at least while he's in the room.

~J

No [Devil's Advocate]Tag needed. How about actually dealing with what I say instead of making "witty" comments?

Do I? No, I'm just voicing my opinion on how certain balance issues with that particular product. Nowhere I'm claiming that as SR was or is perfect in all possible ways.
I could present several points in previous product that in my opinion could be better balanced, if we were to make such a global discussion.
To give you some examples:
Stacking Improved abilities with Enhanced Articulation is something that doesn't look o.k. for me, escpecially not after the errataed way of how bioware works on awakened.
But at the same time I'm all for balancing Improved Reflexes and Enhanced Articulation and Suprthyroid Gland on that reaction bonus that the latter two provide. Because the wording of the Increased Reflexes power those reaction bonusses don't work together, which looks rather odd to me, since bioware modifications are supposed to be "natural" ...

And again you're more or less trying to put something into my mouth. Did I actually demand Adepts to be kept "weak" as you call it?

And again you fail to recognize that I'm not against Adepts having access to those fields.
I'm close to breaking the nettiquette over this. But I'll stick to one simple suggestion: Read and understand what I've written, instead of putting me word in my mouth and constantly leading this discussions into areas that at least I never touched, becaucse I'm actually in agreement with you guys.

And I'm only saying that some of these things don't look good to me. I see it as going from one extreme to the other: From "gimping the adept" to "gimping the mundanes"

Same again: I never questioned that ...
But I guess I'll have to take yet another comment which is more or less uncalled for. Be it from you or mfb ...

But when he comes back, they should love him again. Consider the modifiers involved. Let's exaggerate and say that this is disastrous for them, for a +6 TN. I'm not sure what all edges are involved, let's assume Aptitude and Good Rep 2. Between those and Kinesics. Suddenly we have a neutral party being talked into something disastrous for them as easily as we have a normal person convincing them to choose Ares Pepsi over Aztecola. With 12 dice he can expect about one and 5/6ths successes against Uberfixer; make the Fixer downright Hostile towards him (+4) and he's still expecting a success.

~J

The problem with this scenario is that your Social Adept isn't even trying to get the fixers and fences back using the same silver tongue that made the deal sweet to begin with. Does this player even understand the art of social encounters? This is more an example of someone not knowing what they're doing with a character, rather than an abuse of the power. Its also kinda lame on the GM's part to have zero love from any fencing/fixing source in the entire shadow market. That's extreme bullshit. Its not the power, dude.

I'll assume you're using "game" as shorthand for "role playing game" in this context, unless you want to be telling the World Chess Federation that the game they love ceased being relevant sometime after the castling and en-passant rules were introduced in the 18th century.

That's actually kind of funny, but I think we all knew which type of game he was referring to. Roleplaying games die when stagnant.

Actually I don't care for the love of anyone in this (*hint* Nettiquette isn't just a word)
And no I'm not "able" to understand what you're saying there.
Reasons might be:

• I'm no native speaker (take your chances on that one)
  
  
  
• I truely can't see that as an argument, because we're not talking an ingame situation, but an off-game mechanic (i.e. karma).
  
  

So then by using your own "logic" and "argument": Why only adepts and not awakened characters as a whole?

That's pretty much what I constantly think about you and my arguments.

~sigh~ And I guess the incompatibilty of certain implants and adept powers are "non-existant" es well?
See, again it's you who missed my point! I'm not saying that all powers have similar balancing factors (or require them). I'm merely saying that I do miss such factors on certain the powers at hand. Not all ...

But that's gonna be ignored as well ... again ...

That sounds like something out of Knights of the Dinner Table.

"Well, actually, that's not a knight. *My* Army has Abhramses, see. So, not only can it pass over pieces in an L pattern, but as this represents violating the Geneva Convention by running over them with a tank, this also makes them dead. Furthermore, after moving, since it's an armor unit, it can fire using cannons at any target on the board that it likes. If *your* knight represents the medieval kind, I think he just got blasted to chutney."

1st Edition D&D is still hands-down *better* than 3rd Edition, though.

But its still D&D.

Toturi, I'm writing that one down. That's beautiful.

That's misunderstanding the power, isn't it? You're not controlling the other guy's mind or anything; you're controlling *yourself* to be a better negotiator. Saying that a Johnson leaves the negoatiating table feeling like he just worked with a good negotiator is fine; saying that he felt like he just got hypnotized is GM railroading and metagaming.

This is where the social adept scares me. And using the interrogation rules. The negotiating payment part doesn't matter as much, economics and budgets only go so far. But how do you keep the super face from getting all the information, and convincing everyone to help him?

If you follow the rules for etiquette, negotiation and intimidation, and why should you change them if you are not changing them for other skills, they are going to succeed in whatever they want. It's like a smartlink equipped gun having a TN of 2, only there are more modifiers to raise the TN. With the face adept, there are all kinds of modifiers that can apply, but most of them are going to lower the TN to a minimum of 2. What other skills have a -10 modifier? Or even close?

*headscratch* okay. it's not really important, since you answered the point once i rephrased it.

because adepts have different abilities than mages. same reason a conjuror can't cast spells.

in many cases, yes, adept powers and implants are incompatible. in many other cases, they are compatible.

that's true of any face character, honestly. on edges alone, a completely mundane face can get -5 to -6 modifier to their Negotiations test--nearly double the modifier from kinesics.

edit: sheesh. the one time i plan on people posting before i finish typing, no one does.

Then you use a different tactic and convince him he is wrong, or that a special exception is to be made in your case, or that you are not actually doing what he thinks you are doing. Think outside the box.