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Message no. 1
From: Malcolm Shaw malhms@*********.com.au
Subject: Elemantal Spells and Secondary Effects
Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 20:50:31 +1000
How do the members handle the secondary effects from elemental spells?
For example in the object resistance table page 182 SR3 it shows:-
Natural Objects Tn 3, Manufactured Low-Tech Objects and Materials TN 5,
Manufactured High-Tech Objects and Materials TN 8, Highly Processed
Objects (Computers, Complex Toxic Wastes) Tn 10. Now if one was to set
a Fireball in the opening of a Tech Control Room, or a field Caravan
control room (Please excuse the lack of military knowledge to define
these areas in military terms)- what is the damage to the equipment with
in these areas. Surely a TN of 10 for the electronic/Computer equipment
is unreal? the men etc within the area (if the Fireball had a level of
serious to deadly would be extremely lucky to survive - why would it be
easier for the electronic equipment? The same would apply if a Ball
Lightning spell was use in place of the Fireball. Also if one were to
use a Lightning Bolt spell and hit the aerial of a drone, rigger vessel
etc I seriously doubt whether the sensitive high gain electronics
connected to the aerial would survive. And how about the cyber equipment
in a Street Sam - even if one was to allow that the electronics in his
cyber gear had some degree of protection, the minimum I would expect is
some time lag for the response of his electronics due to the lightning
bolt if not some destructive effects??

On the other hand how does one calculate the secondary effects of
fireball, lightning bolt etc on ammunition and clips, grenades etc
carried by a person struck by these spells, not to say his weapon(s)?

Regards Malcolm
Message no. 2
From: Iridios iridios@*********.com
Subject: Elemantal Spells and Secondary Effects
Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 09:24:26 -0400
Malcolm Shaw wrote:
>
> How do the members handle the secondary effects from elemental spells?
> For example in the object resistance table page 182 SR3 it shows:-
> Natural Objects Tn 3, Manufactured Low-Tech Objects and Materials TN 5,
> Manufactured High-Tech Objects and Materials TN 8, Highly Processed
> Objects (Computers, Complex Toxic Wastes) Tn 10. Now if one was to set
> a Fireball in the opening of a Tech Control Room, or a field Caravan
> control room (Please excuse the lack of military knowledge to define
> these areas in military terms)- what is the damage to the equipment with
> in these areas. Surely a TN of 10 for the electronic/Computer equipment
> is unreal? the men etc within the area (if the Fireball had a level of
> serious to deadly would be extremely lucky to survive - why would it be
> easier for the electronic equipment?

As to the question about electronics surviving fires, I can answer
this from personal experience. I work for an amusement company and
have restored a number of games that have been salvaged from fires.
In every one that I have worked on to date, they all only needed
cleaning and minor parts to be replaced. The circuit cards still
worked even after being _completely_ black from soot. (Well they work
as long as you don't let your bosses try to clean them and turn them
on while still wet!)

Fire on the other hand, would melt plastic, glass and other similar
materials and would burn wood. The electronics in any kind of tech
room may survive, but the interfaces (keyboards, monitors, etc.)
probably won't.


> ... The same would apply if a Ball
> Lightning spell was use in place of the Fireball. Also if one were to
> use a Lightning Bolt spell and hit the aerial of a drone, rigger vessel
> etc I seriously doubt whether the sensitive high gain electronics
> connected to the aerial would survive.

Lightning may be more effective, but military electronics are usually
considered hardened and are probably designed to resist it more than
civilian electronics. In this case I would maybe reduce the ORT just
a little bit.

--
Iridios
"God does not roll dice"
-Albert Einstein
Message no. 3
From: Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject: Elemantal Spells and Secondary Effects
Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1999 19:59:08 +0200
According to Malcolm Shaw, at 20:50 on 2 Jun 99, the word on
the street was...

> How do the members handle the secondary effects from elemental spells?
> For example in the object resistance table page 182 SR3 it shows:-
> Natural Objects Tn 3, Manufactured Low-Tech Objects and Materials TN 5,
> Manufactured High-Tech Objects and Materials TN 8, Highly Processed
> Objects (Computers, Complex Toxic Wastes) Tn 10. Now if one was to set
> a Fireball in the opening of a Tech Control Room, or a field Caravan
> control room (Please excuse the lack of military knowledge to define
> these areas in military terms)- what is the damage to the equipment with
> in these areas. Surely a TN of 10 for the electronic/Computer equipment
> is unreal?

Mostly, it's a matter of visual descriptions -- "The Fireball spell melts
the plastic facings off the consoles" etc. For stuff that's important to
the adventure and/or the players, you might want to roll dice as explained
on page 196 of SR3: roll 2D6 (I take this to mean _not_ "roll a test with
two dice") against the Object Resistance Rating, with modifiers as
explained on that page.

This does provide rather little opportunity for damage to high-tech
equipment, so you may want to use a house rule instead. Perhaps rolling a
test using the Force of the spell against the Object Resistance Rating,
staging the spell's damage against the item up according to the number of
successes rolled. (Deadly damage = item destroyed, etc.)

> And how about the cyber equipment in a Street Sam - even if one was to
> allow that the electronics in his cyber gear had some degree of
> protection, the minimum I would expect is some time lag for the response
> of his electronics due to the lightning bolt if not some destructive
> effects??

You can account for cyberware damage in the normal way: see the Street
Samurai Catalog, Shadowtech, and Cybertechnology for rules. (I use those
in Shadowtech, BTW.)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Here I am, still intact, and I should give myself credit for that
-- Tilt, "Unravel"
-> NERPS Project Leader * ShadowRN GridSec * Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
->The Plastic Warriors Page: http://shadowrun.html.com/plasticwarriors/<-
-> The New Character Mortuary: http://www.electricferret.com/mortuary/ <-

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Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 4
From: Felix Horbach horbach@*****.uni-mannheim.de
Subject: Elemantal Spells and Secondary Effects
Date: Thu, 03 Jun 1999 02:46:59 +0200
Correct me if I'm mistaken, but the Object resistance table represents
the difficulty of aligning a spell with an target. It is difficult to
cast spells against "dead" targets because they are not really present
in astral space. For a spell caster it is kind of like grappling fog,
and therefore rather difficult. Elemental effects/manipulations on the
other hand are normally not cast directly against the object itself. The
area fireball will not target the computers - instead it will invoke
fire in an certain area. After the invocation the fire itself is not at
all magical and will therefore affect the computers like any other fire.
I would just use the barrier rating table with an rating of about 3 (no
more hacking into that mainframe).

Watcher spirit

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