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Message no. 1
From: davek@***.lonestar.org (David Kettler)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2005 18:09:19 +0000
So I've finally gotten myself a copy of SR4, and I've been reading it and actually liking
a lot of it. There is something that has been bothering me a great deal, however, and
it's the apparent unresistability of direct combat spells.

One thing I really do like about the new system is how combat has been made, for the most
part, much more consistent: First there is an opposed test between the attacker's combat
skill and some sort of defensive action by the defender, then the defender resists the
damage with another test (typically body). Only direct combat spells are mysteriously
missing the second part (at least by my interpretation). While it is true that they were
a little diferent in all previous editions, the fact that everything else has been made
more consistent has made this more glaring an issue. And it doesn't end there because of
the way damage values and drain have been changed...well, maybe I should just give an
example:

Let's say that a mage is fighting a generally superior opponent and wants to kill him
before he gets killed himself. Well, the mage can just cast manabolt at force 9 (since
you no longer have to learn a spell at a particular force) and as long as he gets at least
one net hit (which isn't remotely difficult since he'll be rolling magic+skill vs. just
willpower) that's a guaranteed 10 points of physical damage. Yikes. Now the rules are
supposed to balance this kind of thing out by making the mage pay for it in drain...but
they don't. I mean, sure the drain will be physical since the force is above the mage's
magic attribute, but since damage scales with force and drain scales with force/2 you're
looking at a *base* DV of 4. Of course the drain, unlike the damage, gets a resistence
test (Logic+Willpower) so any half decent mage can reduce that to just a block or two if
not eliminate it entirely. End result is that the target's brain is fried unless he is
extremely lucky and the mage barely takes any damage at all.

Now there was a thread a while back talking about how an incredibly highly skilled sniper
with a high powered rifle could easily one-shot kill somebody. I think the conclusion
was...so what? The difference here is that no particular skill (OK, you do have to be a
mage), equipment, or preparation is necessary. Any mage can do it, at any time. You
don't even need to be a very good mage. The only real defense is spending edge, which to
me seems like a hack solution for a more fundamental rules issue.

Oh, and what if you don't want to kill the target? Well, stunbolt is just as effective
only the drain is even less.

Really, this kind of high-force casting seems so effective to me I have to wonder why it
isn't used all the time. Well, OK, it's overkill when fighting grunts and the drain,
minimal as it is, probably isn't worth it, but when fighting any kind of prime runner (or
for NPCs fighting the PCs for that matter) you'd think everyone would be tossing
unresistable force-9 manabolts. On a somewhat related note, why on earth would anyone use
an indirect combat spell, other than for the elemental effect?

Please tell me that I'm missing something and magic isn't as horribly broken and
overpowered as this would imply.

--
Dave Kettler
davek@***.lonestar.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org
Message no. 2
From: zebulingod@*****.com (zebulingod)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2005 13:17:58 -0800
David Kettler wrote:
#
#So I've finally gotten myself a copy of SR4, and I've been
#reading it and actually liking a lot of it. There is
#something that has been bothering me a great deal, however,
#and it's the apparent unresistability of direct combat spells.
#

Congrats.

#One thing I really do like about the new system is how combat
#has been made, for the most part, much more consistent: First
#

I think it is more consistent. Direct spells seem to work a lot like ranged
combat (guns) with the exception that direct spells aren't affected by
armor.

Now, the counter to this?

A friendly mage with counterspelling dice allocated to his group.

Well, okay, it's not a complete counter, of course, but it's a help.

Zebulin
Message no. 3
From: sfeley@*****.com (Stephen Eley)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2005 16:37:12 -0500
On 12/27/05, zebulingod <zebulingod@*****.com> wrote:
>
> I think it is more consistent. Direct spells seem to work a lot like ranged
> combat (guns) with the exception that direct spells aren't affected by
> armor.

No, David's right. Ranged combat has the defender make two rolls: a
roll to dodge, and a roll to soak damage. Direct combat spells only
get a roll to "dodge," which adds counterspelling *if* there's a mage
in line of sight to help defend. There's no roll to soak damage, and
that's a pretty significant difference. It means that damage taken
from spells is a lot more certain than damage from ordinary combat.


--
Have Fun,
Steve Eley (sfeley@*****.com)
ESCAPE POD - The Science Fiction Podcast Magazine
http://www.escapepod.info
Message no. 4
From: u.alberton@*****.com (Bira)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2005 08:35:50 -0200
On 12/27/05, Stephen Eley <sfeley@*****.com> wrote:
> No, David's right. Ranged combat has the defender make two rolls: a
> roll to dodge, and a roll to soak damage. Direct combat spells only
> get a roll to "dodge," which adds counterspelling *if* there's a mage
> in line of sight to help defend. There's no roll to soak damage, and
> that's a pretty significant difference. It means that damage taken
> from spells is a lot more certain than damage from ordinary combat.

All the more reason to geek the mage first...

--
Bira
http://compexplicita.blogspot.com
http://sinfoniaferida.blogspot.com
Message no. 5
From: derek@***************.com (Derek Hyde)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2005 10:43:05 -0600
> Let's say that a mage is fighting a generally superior opponent and wants to
> kill him before he gets killed himself. Well, the mage can just cast manabolt
> at force 9 (since you no longer have to learn a spell at a particular force)
> and as long as he gets at least one net hit (which isn't remotely difficult
> since he'll be rolling magic+skill vs. just willpower) that's a guaranteed 10
> points of physical damage. Yikes.

Actually, unless I'm vastly misinterpreting it, you've got the whole
force/damage relationship wrong, the way I got it was that Force was just a
cap for the max number of successes, damage is strictly based upon number of
successes...
Message no. 6
From: ramoseley@*****.com (Robert Moseley)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2005 07:56:27 -0600
On 12/28/05, Derek Hyde <derek@***************.com> wrote:
>
>
> > Let's say that a mage is fighting a generally superior opponent and
> wants to
> > kill him before he gets killed himself. Well, the mage can just cast
> manabolt
> > at force 9 (since you no longer have to learn a spell at a particular
> force)
> > and as long as he gets at least one net hit (which isn't remotely
> difficult
> > since he'll be rolling magic+skill vs. just willpower) that's a
> guaranteed 10
> > points of physical damage. Yikes.
>
> Actually, unless I'm vastly misinterpreting it, you've got the whole
> force/damage relationship wrong, the way I got it was that Force was just
> a
> cap for the max number of successes, damage is strictly based upon number
> of
> successes...
>
>
>
I believe you are vastly misinterpreting it. On page 196, under Damage
Value, it states that the base Damage Value for combat spells is based on
Force, which is chosen by the magician at the time of casting. Any net hits
scored on the Spellcasting Test increases the DV by 1 per net hit.

Robert
Message no. 7
From: davek@***.lonestar.org (David Kettler)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2005 20:35:43 +0000
On Thu, Dec 29, 2005 at 07:56:27AM -0600, Robert Moseley wrote:
> >
> I believe you are vastly misinterpreting it. On page 196, under Damage
> Value, it states that the base Damage Value for combat spells is based on
> Force, which is chosen by the magician at the time of casting. Any net hits
> scored on the Spellcasting Test increases the DV by 1 per net hit.
>
> Robert
>

Yes, that was my interpretation as well.

I suppose with counterspelling this kind of approach is a bit less effective, but if you
don't have a mage around it seems like you're just screwed. A high-force manabolt isn't
the only really effective attack a mage has available. Control thoughts, anyone? Just
take over the street sam and have him kill the rest of his team. They've eliminated the
threshold that used to be necessary to do that, so without counterspelling it's trivially
easy. And you don't need the really high force in that case so no worries about physical
drain...in fact, I can't really figure out where force is used at all for control
thoughts, so you might as well cast it at force 1...

Overall it just seems to me that mages are way to overpowered in 4th edition...

--
Dave Kettler
davek@***.lonestar.org
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org
Message no. 8
From: jeremie.bouillon@****.fr (Jeremie Bouillon)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2005 23:05:50 +0100
Le 21:35 29/12/2005, David Kettler écrivait :
>Overall it just seems to me that mages are way
to overpowered in 4th edition...

They already were in the previous editions. That
was ok in the 1st, now it's getting boring.

None of the playtesters saw that ??!


--
http://shadowrun.fr
Message no. 9
From: swiftone@********.org (Brett Sanger)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 16:10:30 -0500
On Tue, Dec 27, 2005 at 04:37:12PM -0500, Stephen Eley wrote:
> No, David's right. Ranged combat has the defender make two rolls: a
> roll to dodge, and a roll to soak damage. Direct combat spells only
> get a roll to "dodge," which adds counterspelling *if* there's a mage
> in line of sight to help defend. There's no roll to soak damage, and
> that's a pretty significant difference. It means that damage taken
> from spells is a lot more certain than damage from ordinary combat.

Yup. The cost is that mage has to worry about drain, whereas the
shooter only has to worry about ammo.

This combines with several other factors:

1) Drain isn't as incapacitating as it was before. The "Spiral of
death" isn't as significant. A decent mage (Magic 4, skill 4) is
rolling 8 dice...a -1 or -2 to his pool is a lot less crippling than the
+1/+2 target number modifiers of last edition.

2) Drain can be easier to get than before. Previous editions showed
casters shooting off lots of spells with Drain targets of 1 or 2,
practically guaranteeing no drain. While most spells I've seen go off
without drain, it's not that hard to make a bad roll and get a box or
two of drain. Plus they continued the trend of making low-force spells
less-effective, so mages have an interest in casting most spells at
higher force, with the resulting odds of higher drain.

3) Spellcasters aren't as specialized. Because spells have a flat cost
and no force limit, mages can take a wider selection of spells.
Previously (particularly in 3rd), you saw starting mages with a habndful
of Force 6 spells, then one or two Force 1 non-opposed spells. (Levitate
was popular). Lots of good spells were never "worth" it to
Karma-starved mages. Now, as a result of this change, mages CAST more
often.

These combine to mean that mages have more to do, and will generally
take drain more often. This acts as a disincentive to drop those
massive spells with overcasting, because the drain WILL accumulate, and
while lower levels aren't crippling, higher levels can be (and can take
you out of the running.)

Single shot? Yup, mages can kick ass. But if they do so, they are
sacrificing the long-term. (Single-shot area-effects aren't usually a
problem since the mage has to worry about roasting themselves: area is
based on Force, and the book explicitly says the mage has to worry about
themselves)

This isn't really that much of a change. A decent mage tossing Stunbolt
was practically guaranteed to take down most non-magical targets in all
previous editions as I recall. A magically-backed force will walk all
over a non-magically backed force.

No, if you want to see where mages are potentially broken, don't look at
the combat spells. Look at the mental control manipulations.

--
SwiftOne / Brett Sanger
swiftone@********.org
Message no. 10
From: rencheple@*******.net (Tim Martin)
Subject: The Ultimate One-Shot Kill: Mages?
Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 16:18:00 -0500
Derek Hyde wrote:
>> Let's say that a mage is fighting a generally superior opponent and wants to
>> kill him before he gets killed himself. Well, the mage can just cast manabolt
>> at force 9 (since you no longer have to learn a spell at a particular force)
>> and as long as he gets at least one net hit (which isn't remotely difficult
>> since he'll be rolling magic+skill vs. just willpower) that's a guaranteed 10
>> points of physical damage. Yikes.
>>
>
> Actually, unless I'm vastly misinterpreting it, you've got the whole
> force/damage relationship wrong, the way I got it was that Force was just a
> cap for the max number of successes, damage is strictly based upon number of
> successes...
Yes and no.

According to pg. 196, "The base Damage Value for Combat spells is based
on Force, which is chosen by the magician at the time of casting. Any
net hits scored on the Spellcasting Test increase the DV by 1 per net hit."

So, yes, it is limiting. The most hits that the above magician can have
is 9, but that means that the highest DV the magician can generate is
not 9, but 18.

I agree with David, I think - this is rather powerful, and the
characters' strategies in my world should probably take this into
account as a rule of thumb.

Tim

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