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  1. - Top - End - #541
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Hey, it's been a while!

    So, somehow my fave GM of all time managed to convince me to try my hand at 5e again. At first everything went fine, even including those awkward minutes spent staring at the rulebook "So you're telling me that bursts only ever hit with one bullet, unless in a specific case in an other book where you can succeed on the exploit of hitting twice?" until we reached the magic rules. Specifically the obligatory casting multiple spells rules. So, after the obligatory "wait, I can cast up to six spells?" followed by "oh wait, following multiple attacks rules that's only 3 of those castings that can be attacks" followed by "wait, since reckless casting does not split your dice pool, doesn't that mean that your second spell can't be an attack?" we arrived at the very, very divisive "and what about multiple castings and foci?" concept. Oh boy I wasn't ready.

    My reading is that you start by splitting your magic+spellcasting dice pool in the desired number of pools, and then add visibility, foci, mentor and specialization modifiers fully.

    My GM said that due to the writing, Power Focus doesn't work like that, since it temporarily raises your magic stat by its force, its force should be added in the first stage and then divided. I agreed to that.

    But what about spellcasting (type) foci? These foci have to be added afterwards, since they depend on the type of spell. Same for mentor bonus and specialization by spell type. So if I wanted to cast three force 5 manabolts with a spellcasting 6, mana 6, spellcasting foci force 6, wolf mentor spirit for +2 and specialization combat for another +2, I'd end up with : 4,4,4 to which I add 10 to each, so 14,14,14, each casting incurring a drain value of 2S damage. That's averaging 14 damage minus the enemy willpower times three, but even considering a force 6 spirit, reducing the damage to 8P, that's still a lot of damage for close to no drain, especially considering just casting a force 7 manabolt against the same spirit using the same 22 dice pool nets 5P for 4P drain (that you then resist so you could lower it to 1P).

    To which my GM (which is not the shadowrun5 GM, but a player in that campaign just like me, he is just my usual GM) replied:
    1. You split your magic stat three ways so you would incur physical drain starting 2 hits.
    2. How do you deal with drain, do you use your full drain resist pool three times or is it split three ways?
    3. Foci are dice pool modifiers, not spell modifiers. You take your entire dice pool and you split it as equally as possible, like normal multiple attacks.

    Except that you don't lower your magic stat, no idea for drain but if nothing says not to do it like normal then do it like normal, and spell modifiers don't exist, every modifier is a dice pool modifier written more or less loosely.

    Which devolved into me going "The devs probably intended your reading but this is most definitely not what they wrote."
    And him deciding that at this point it was really the GM's call and choosing to blacklist that option for himself so our GM wouldn't have to bother herself with it.

    Which prompted a, maybe not entirely warranted "Welcome to 5e where everything is made up and the rules don't matter."

    So, I suppose that in three years we had an actual FAQ over this, because the posts in the shadowrun forums really didn't convince me. This question was probably asked and answered somewhere in the thread or in a previous iteration, so just directing me to where it was answered would be appreciated.

    Edit: Clocking in at 4 hours discussing this, I can certify I spent more time on that rule than the writers ever did. Basically after a while GM had a revelation: Divide the bonuses, multiply the penalties! It fit his viewpoint that free dice is bad, I agree, and that magic should be harder. I suspect he was suspiciously leveled with the writers on that one and I wouldn't be surprised if that was what was intended. Which didn't fly well with me at all. A rule should be fair and it should be consistant. A rule shouldn't say "it stacks, unless that means players get more penalties." Let's say a background of -1 count hinders every spell being cast. If you cast three spells with one complex action and you rule that the -1 applies to each dice pool, meaning a total of a -3, then if the player gets under the effect of a positive background count of +1 then it should follow the exact same logic and curve and give a +1 to each dice pool, giving a final +3. No rule should say that the exact same effect with the exact same properties acts differently depending exclusively on whether or not it penalizes players. So you either add everything, every modifier, good or bad once, like for multiple attacks and then divide equally, or you multiply every modifier, good or bad by the number of spells. You don't choose that the same effect is either divided or multiplied solely on whether or not it penalizes players.

    My working theory on this is either the devs split 4a multicasting into 5e multicasting and reckless casting late in development and missed the imbalance it caused, or they didn't think of foci and how quickly players could stack bonuses at chargen and expected the issue to only come up in old, already heavily houseruled games. Or forgot to include something they really should have. And they spent way less than 4 hours thinking that one out.

    Goddamn 5e
    Last edited by Alberic Strein; 2018-09-18 at 05:43 AM.
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  2. - Top - End - #542
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    So... the party beat up everyone at the cybernetic chop-shop and acquired some paydata on the mystery they're slowly uncovering. The cash-to-karma method of getting experience points seem to be well-received by most players. The team completed their job with a total payout of about 10,000 Nuyen to each runner. At 2,000 per karma point, that's 5 points if they fully convert. The mage felt cheated, but I think he's just a bit impatient to get into his initiation grades.

    Best moment of the night--the team spent 40 minutes debating what to do with a dead body they found; turn it in, destroy it, dump it? They decided on dumping it so they found an alley near the local police station and disguised the body as a homeless bum with a big hat and a cardboard sign reading "please help".

    Two days later that body was still there undisturbed.
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  3. - Top - End - #543
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by DigoDragon View Post
    So... the party beat up everyone at the cybernetic chop-shop and acquired some paydata on the mystery they're slowly uncovering. The cash-to-karma method of getting experience points seem to be well-received by most players. The team completed their job with a total payout of about 10,000 Nuyen to each runner. At 2,000 per karma point, that's 5 points if they fully convert. The mage felt cheated, but I think he's just a bit impatient to get into his initiation grades.

    Best moment of the night--the team spent 40 minutes debating what to do with a dead body they found; turn it in, destroy it, dump it? They decided on dumping it so they found an alley near the local police station and disguised the body as a homeless bum with a big hat and a cardboard sign reading "please help".

    Two days later that body was still there undisturbed
    .
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  4. - Top - End - #544
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    So I ran through 5e Core/Chrome Flesh lists of 'ware, and hoo boy, was I disappointed. There were very few things that weren't overpriced either in Nuyen or Essence. Especially Essence, since I have no idea how a non-botched plastic surgery in 2075 can remove your humanity while in 2018 it doesn't. Lots of purely cosmetic things cost 0.1 essence (would you trade 1/60 of your soul to recolor your skin or have shiny hair?), lots of mechanically useful things aren't worth their cost in Karma/Nuyen equivalents, etc.

    I still don't get understand who actually gets Wired Reflexes 3 in this system. It's always been 5 Essence out of 6 total, so basically you take that, even at alphaware or betaware level, and you're screwed, because that means no spiffy cyber-limbs or anything.

    Oh, and I made two huge correction lists (one more conservative/flavorful (some cosmetic changes are still invasive and cost a small bit of Essence, etc), one completely game-balance based without consideration for fluff (cosmetic changes don't cost anything but nuyen, and you can stuff a lot of stuff into yourself if you can afford it, just not all at once)) for those things, including a Chummer 5e file. If anyone's interested, I can translate those to English and post them here.
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  5. - Top - End - #545
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by comicshorse View Post
    Not a Ghoul neighbourhood I take it ? What a waste
    Nah. The party seems to collectively avoid ghouls, due to having very low opinions of them. Probably colored by the fact most of them play Fallout games and see ghouls as fodder, so that stigma carried over and... yeah. Best to just try and not cross paths.


    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    Lots of purely cosmetic things cost 0.1 essence (would you trade 1/60 of your soul to recolor your skin or have shiny hair?), lots of mechanically useful things aren't worth their cost in Karma/Nuyen equivalents, etc.
    As a GM I usually wave the essence cost of trivial cosmetics like hair recolor, tattoos, etc. that don't really give any kind of solid mechanical benefit. Why should only the Street-Sams run around with pink mohawks? ;)


    I still don't get understand who actually gets Wired Reflexes 3 in this system. It's always been 5 Essence out of 6 total, so basically you take that, even at alphaware or betaware level, and you're screwed, because that means no spiffy cyber-limbs or anything.
    I've seen some dedicated builds with Wire3, but in actual play I've never had a player go above Wire2.
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  6. - Top - End - #546
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    3E Man and Machine: Cyberware said that they decided that essence loss comes from things that need to interface with your neural system, and other things (like pacemakers or pins in your broken leg) should not. Makes pretty good sense, right? Then they went and charged essence for things like bone lacing and dermal plating, things that don't need to interact with your brain at all. Heck, even non-retractable razors and spurs shouldn't really cost essence by that definition, since they're really just pins that penetrate your skin as well as your bone.

    (Apparently I cannot spell "essence", and I had to go back and change the last "s" to a "c" every time I used it in this post except for this sentence!)
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  7. - Top - End - #547
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    I prefer to view Essence as your body's capacity to self-heal. Some things, like bone lacing, cost essence because they impinge upon that. Others, like wired reflexes, interact with your nervous system, which is already difficult to heal.

    This means that some of the minor, cosmetic stuff (like artificial hair follicles) are going to still cause problems, but not nearly as much as major structural changes.
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  8. - Top - End - #548
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Yeah, that definition has always been problematic and was quite divisive even back in the day. The whole basic principle feels wrong to me, Essence is directly tied to Magic, so giving it a purely "scientific" explanation doesn't really cut it for me.

    I still like the "aura blueprint" interpretation for Essence. Your aura is what makes you alive, it's a magical "blueprint" of your body and channels mystical "living energy" from the astral plane through your body, so to speak. The more you modify your body, the more different it becomes from your aura, so less of that energy makes it into your body, your aura gets weaker. Easy to understand, easy to work with, it also explains cyberzombies quite well which didn't really make a lot sense with the M&M description.

  9. - Top - End - #549
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Is there anything about how cybernetics interact with birth defects?

    I'm thinking about stuff like congenital deformity, and in specific missing limbs -- so the cybernetic limb is not a replacement for a former living limb, it's a new thing (relative to your "blueprint").

    I think per the rules you'd still pay Essence.

  10. - Top - End - #550
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Delta View Post
    Yeah, that definition has always been problematic and was quite divisive even back in the day. The whole basic principle feels wrong to me, Essence is directly tied to Magic, so giving it a purely "scientific" explanation doesn't really cut it for me.

    I still like the "aura blueprint" interpretation for Essence. Your aura is what makes you alive, it's a magical "blueprint" of your body and channels mystical "living energy" from the astral plane through your body, so to speak. The more you modify your body, the more different it becomes from your aura, so less of that energy makes it into your body, your aura gets weaker. Easy to understand, easy to work with, it also explains cyberzombies quite well which didn't really make a lot sense with the M&M description.
    That seems to be the official stance, I remember seeing something about transgender modifications not costing essence because you're bringing your body more in line with your aura. Can't remember if it was a 5e book or Shadowrun Returns though.
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  11. - Top - End - #551
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Delta View Post
    Yeah, that definition has always been problematic and was quite divisive even back in the day. The whole basic principle feels wrong to me, Essence is directly tied to Magic, so giving it a purely "scientific" explanation doesn't really cut it for me.

    I still like the "aura blueprint" interpretation for Essence. Your aura is what makes you alive, it's a magical "blueprint" of your body and channels mystical "living energy" from the astral plane through your body, so to speak. The more you modify your body, the more different it becomes from your aura, so less of that energy makes it into your body, your aura gets weaker. Easy to understand, easy to work with, it also explains cyberzombies quite well which didn't really make a lot sense with the M&M description.
    And yet a cultured bioware arm replacement - grown from your own cells, so, basically, it's your arm in all ways - costs essence. Yes, it's only 0,02, but even that knocks mages or adepts down a peg if they lose an arm. Personally, I got rid of that, because it just doesn't make any sense either mechanically or by fluff.
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  12. - Top - End - #552
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    So I ran through 5e Core/Chrome Flesh lists of 'ware, and hoo boy, was I disappointed. There were very few things that weren't overpriced either in Nuyen or Essence. Especially Essence, since I have no idea how a non-botched plastic surgery in 2075 can remove your humanity while in 2018 it doesn't. Lots of purely cosmetic things cost 0.1 essence (would you trade 1/60 of your soul to recolor your skin or have shiny hair?), lots of mechanically useful things aren't worth their cost in Karma/Nuyen equivalents, etc.
    The prices have steeply increased since 4th edition, probably because the game wasn'rt MagicRun enough.
    Now, it is mostly SubstanceAbuseRun, considering how effective a dedicated drug user is compared to a more traditional street samurai. It is a bit sad, really.
    On the other hand, I am still a bit miffed about the very idea that Bioware should cost Essence in the first place. Retconning garbage, that rule is.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    I still don't get understand who actually gets Wired Reflexes 3 in this system. It's always been 5 Essence out of 6 total, so basically you take that, even at alphaware or betaware level, and you're screwed, because that means no spiffy cyber-limbs or anything.
    To be honest, if you are using that kind of 'ware, you are never, ever buying it in standard. That's what alphaware (and better grades) is for. If I remember correctly, the best essence to effectiveness to money ratio of any inititative booster is a Move by Wire System 2 alpha, as you get the talent wires for free as well. If you play with the cybersuits from Lockdown, there are a few others that are really, really good, but hardly affordable.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    Oh, and I made two huge correction lists (one more conservative/flavorful (some cosmetic changes are still invasive and cost a small bit of Essence, etc), one completely game-balance based without consideration for fluff (cosmetic changes don't cost anything but nuyen, and you can stuff a lot of stuff into yourself if you can afford it, just not all at once)) for those things, including a Chummer 5e file. If anyone's interested, I can translate those to English and post them here.
    That does sound interesting.

    Quote Originally Posted by The Random NPC View Post
    That seems to be the official stance, I remember seeing something about transgender modifications not costing essence because you're bringing your body more in line with your aura. Can't remember if it was a 5e book or Shadowrun Returns though.
    Basic sex change has no essence costs in SR5, but a full change of the reproductive system does; this is either an oversight leading to a contradiction (and that in a Shadowrun book... how surprising), or it implies that 'normal' transgender people are infertile by default.
    Last edited by Black Jester; 2018-09-30 at 03:54 AM.
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  13. - Top - End - #553
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Black Jester View Post
    The prices have steeply increased since 4th edition, probably because the game wasn'rt MagicRun enough.
    Now, it is mostly SubstanceAbuseRun, considering how effective a dedicated drug user is compared to a more traditional street samurai. It is a bit sad, really.
    On the other hand, I am still a bit miffed about the very idea that Bioware should cost Essence in the first place. Retconning garbage, that rule is.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    And yet a cultured bioware arm replacement - grown from your own cells, so, basically, it's your arm in all ways - costs essence. Yes, it's only 0,02, but even that knocks mages or adepts down a peg if they lose an arm. Personally, I got rid of that, because it just doesn't make any sense either mechanically or by fluff.
    Gotta admit I'm not familiar with simple limb replacement costs, I guess you could argue that the trauma of losing a limb may "strike through" and damage the aura as well or smth like that. But yeah, if it's just regrowing the limb without any special features or anything, I wouldn't give that an Essence cost either.

    I've had some people trying to extend the argument for regular cultured bioware, that it shouldn't cost essence "because it's cloned from your own cells!", but that doesn't really hold. Doesn't matter whose DNA it is, your "natural" body did not have muscles that supernaturally strong and resilient, so there, the essence cost makes sense.

  15. - Top - End - #555
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    There was also the argument that essence cost was also a matter of distance. Or Dissonance. No matter how good that ware is, it isn't you. You sacrificed the ability to get there on your own, you chose to give up your own ability to take the artificial ability that's made by some corporation. You are quite literally becoming less you.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    To be honest, I'm just thinking that was secondary to mechanics and "how do we stop Mages from becoming CyberMages and then CyberSamuraiDeckerMages?". Which is a noble goal, but I don't think it panned out that well.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Delta View Post
    Gotta admit I'm not familiar with simple limb replacement costs, I guess you could argue that the trauma of losing a limb may "strike through" and damage the aura as well or smth like that. But yeah, if it's just regrowing the limb without any special features or anything, I wouldn't give that an Essence cost either.
    That's my usual line of thinking; it comes down to the mechanics behind what's installed and how different is that from what you were born with.


    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    To be honest, I'm just thinking that was secondary to mechanics and "how do we stop Mages from becoming CyberMages and then CyberSamuraiDeckerMages?". Which is a noble goal, but I don't think it panned out that well.
    The mage in my group is the most difficult player. He likes to mass summon a field of spirits and outnumber the fight, so he don't need any more bonuses like cyberware.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by DigoDragon View Post
    The mage in my group is the most difficult player. He likes to mass summon a field of spirits and outnumber the fight, so he don't need any more bonuses like cyberware.
    That's the point, mages are too powerful even without 'ware, and I'm not sure how to nerf them without reducing mages to ash. We've introduced a houserule that bound or summoned spirits can only Materialize for Force/2 combat turns before being forced back to Astral. Would that fix the actual problem of "mages get to summon better fighters than street sams are by themselves"?
    Last edited by Ignimortis; 2018-10-03 at 03:48 PM.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    That's the point, mages are too powerful even without 'ware, and I'm not sure how to nerf them without reducing mages to ash. We've introduced a houserule that bound or summoned spirits can only Materialize for Force/2 combat turns before being forced back to Astral. Would that fix the actual problem of "mages get to summon better fighters than street sams are by themselves"?
    Never tried such a houserule, I'd have to get back to you on that. How well has it worked on your end?
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Did they change the "you can only have 1 summoned spirit per domain"?
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ignimortis View Post
    We've introduced a houserule that bound or summoned spirits can only Materialize for Force/2 combat turns before being forced back to Astral.
    So the more powerful spirits get to influence a fight for a longer duration?

    That seems like you're mostly nerfing less powerful mages, since a powerful Spirit will tend to solve a combat in fewer turns.

    Maybe do something like... spirits can materialize for up to (7-Force) time units, then must remain dematerialized for (Force*3) time units. Units might be minutes or combat rounds or something, not sure what's best here.

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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    So, I know its just a tumblr meme, but I want this as a Shadowrun plot and/or backstory.

    https://ladyshinga.tumblr.com/post/1...t-s-robogal328
    Last edited by LibraryOgre; 2018-10-04 at 05:56 PM.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mark Hall View Post
    So, I know its just a tumblr meme, but I want this as a Shadowrun plot and/or backstory.

    https://ladyshinga.tumblr.com/post/1...t-s-robogal328
    Interstellar kinda did it already.

    BTW it seemed like everything on that tumblr page was pretty good.

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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Nifft View Post
    So the more powerful spirits get to influence a fight for a longer duration?

    That seems like you're mostly nerfing less powerful mages, since a powerful Spirit will tend to solve a combat in fewer turns.

    Maybe do something like... spirits can materialize for up to (7-Force) time units, then must remain dematerialized for (Force*3) time units. Units might be minutes or combat rounds or something, not sure what's best here.
    This makes a ton more sense than our idea, thanks. Changed the formula (it so happens that I'm basically "the number guy" for our group, even though I don't DM), with slight alterations, so it's 8-Force combat turns per materialization, and since each materialization is actually a critter power use, each use takes away one service. This way a combat summoner still works with Force 3-4-5 spirits, which are certainly annoying, but aren't Force 8 monstrosities.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by DigoDragon View Post
    The mage in my group is the most difficult player. He likes to mass summon a field of spirits and outnumber the fight, so he don't need any more bonuses like cyberware.
    This is the actual reason why Free Spirits are terrifying in 4e. Full Mage mojo, but they can inhabit cybered to heck and back corpses. Thereby gaining the full benefits of all those augments.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Quote Originally Posted by Black Jester View Post
    That does sound interesting.
    I haven't forgotten about that, if you're wondering, real life just got in the way, and halfway through I realized that the second, reinventive version, needs to do things for Adepts too, because they're a magical mirror of Street Samurai. So I'm gonna finish the shorter and less radical re-pricing in a few days, but the second list is gonna take a while. It's probably gonna reinvent how Essence works, too, since my GM expressed interest in allowing people to become Deus Ex or Metal Gear levels of augmented without turning into cyberzombies, and, in general, tone down the "cybernetics eat your soul" angle, balancing it around "proper cybernetic enhancement is actually not really all that harmful to a person, but it does screw with your magic and is expensive as hell".
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    While browsing various forums, I've come upon an often-expressed optimization point that taking some bioware is more beneficial for PhysAdepts than not taking any and staying "pure". Does anyone have a good quick fix for that?

    My approach right now is twofold:
    1) make magically-inclined characters take any grade of 'ware as "used", i.e. having 125% of standard cost instead of the usual 80% for alphaware or 70% for betaware
    2) work out some price changes to make Rating 2 Muscle Toner/Augs less sustainable than Level 2 Improved Phys Attribute (i.e. something like 0.5 base Ess cost, which gets upped to 0.65 for magic-users and is less efficient than, say, slightly cheapened Improved Phys Attribute (maybe 0.75 PP per level?). Do note that most 'ware things are somewhat cheaper in Essence/Nuyen in our houserules (Wired Reflexes 3 are 3 Essence and 120k, for instance, and might go down to 2 Essence later).

    Oh, and Burnout's Way fixes that back to 0.8 for 'ware, of course. It's a cool concept, I just don't think that every optimal Adept needs to be sacrificing their Essence.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    Huh, never really thought about fixing it -- it didn't occur to me that it was 'wrong'. That may be because the game books are almost my whole connection to the SR universe. If the mechanics work out so mages are better off taking some warez, that must be how things are intended, right? But now that I think about it, I bet the mechanics don't match the fiction in the novels.
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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    In the novels Magicians tend to regard losing Essence as effectively removing pieces of their soul/life force/spirit and so tend to find it distasteful, especially Shamans. We always ran that Spirits tended to dislike heavily cybered characters as they recognise that they have sacrificed their spirit for power
    All Comicshorse's posts come with the advisor : This is just my opinion any difficulties arising from implementing my ideas are your own problem

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    Default Re: General Shadowrun Questions III: Ya like that, Chummer?

    I kinda like that Physical Adepts are allowed to dip a toe into the Cyberware game.

    I'd like the game even better if non-mage characters had some magical benefits from staying slightly higher Essence.

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