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Message no. 1
From: "Jason Carter, Nightstalker" <CARTER@***.EDU>
Subject: Good Karma and the Karma Pool
Date: Fri, 5 Nov 1993 11:09:15 -0800
Here's the answer to all of you wondering about karma pools.

Karma (SRII page 190) last paragraph first section

Of the Karma a character gets, 90 percent of it becomes Good Karma, which is
used over the long term for improving the character. Ten percent goes into the
character's Karma Pool, which is used in the short term for general butt-saving.
A character's Good Karma and Karma Pool are tracked seperately. Always round
off in favor of Good Karma.

Put more simply, keep track of the total karma the character has earned. Each
tenth point the character earns goes into the Karma Pool. The rest is Good
Karma.

Example: Raven has earned 158 total karma points to date. Of those 15 have
gone into her Karma pool while the other 143 points were Good Karma. At present
she has no Good Karma left. At the end of the adventure, the GM awards Raven
4 Karma points. This raises her total to 162 points earned. The 160th point of
Karma is added to her Karma Pool. The remain three (points 159, 161, and 162)
become Good Karma. Raven looks at her 3 Good Karma points and decides to wait
til after the next adventure to spend them.

See Ya in Shadows, "I can count the number of days I've worked
Jason J Carter since graduation on one hand." - ME!
The Nightstalker Carter@***.EDU
Message no. 2
From: Dave Sherohman <esper@*****.IMA.UMN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Karma and the Karma Pool
Date: Sat, 6 Nov 1993 10:50:51 -0600
>Here's the answer to all of you wondering about karma pools.

>Karma (SRII page 190) last paragraph first section

>Of the Karma a character gets, 90 percent of it becomes Good Karma, which is
>used over the long term for improving the character. Ten percent goes into the
>character's Karma Pool, which is used in the short term for general butt-saving
.
>A character's Good Karma and Karma Pool are tracked seperately. Always round
>off in favor of Good Karma.

>Put more simply, keep track of the total karma the character has earned. Each
>tenth point the character earns goes into the Karma Pool. The rest is Good
>Karma.

>See Ya in Shadows, "I can count the number of days I've worked
>Jason J Carter since graduation on one hand." - ME!
>The Nightstalker Carter@***.EDU

Sorry, Carter, but this is FASA we're dealing with, and it just can't be
that simple.

KARMA/Karma Pool (SR2 p. 191), first sentence:

One-tenth (round up) of all Karma earned goes into the character's Karma
Pool.

Imagine that - FASA contradicting themselves... Personally, I ignore 'em
both, go pretty directly (as in point-by-point) from the guidelines on
SR2 p. 199, and average 6-8 karma at a shot (and I award it every session to
boot). Now, before you break out into cries of "Munchkin!" at the thought
of ungodly Karma Pools, let me say that I only let them have a point for the
Karma Pool if they get 10 Karma _from_a_single_award_. To me, that seems a
much more obvious interpretation of the Karma Split rules than keeping track
of how much Karma has ever been earned. (Lot less work, too.) As it stands,
I've yet to see a Karma Pool get bigger than 5, and that was for a phenomenal
player running a character who was the focus of most campaign events over the
course of 2-3 months of playing weekly... and at the end of that, saving his
butt managed to get an international biotech/medical/life insurance corp (Net
Rating 44, for those of you with Corp Shadowfiles) out for the PCs' blood.
Seems they decided to go public with proof that the corp in question had been
trafficking with insect spirits, going so far as to develop treatments which
included byproducts of some of the queen's secretions...

esper@***.umn.edu
Message no. 3
From: The Deb Decker <RJR96326@****.UTULSA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Karma and the Karma Pool
Date: Sat, 6 Nov 1993 11:25:53 GMT
The Rules (cleverly posted by Jason Carter:
>Of the Karma a character gets, 90 percent of it becomes Good Karma, which is
>used over the long term for improving the character. Ten percent goes into the
>character's Karma Pool, which is used in the short term for general butt-saving

>Each tenth point the character earns goes into the Karma Pool. The rest is
>Good Karma.

Commentary:
>>Sorry, Carter, but this is FASA we're dealing with, and it just can't be
>>that simple.

>>One-tenth (round up) of all Karma earned goes into the character's Karma
>>Pool.

>>Imagine that - FASA contradicting themselves...


I fail to see the contradiction here.
I get 10 Karma. I sna save or spend 9 and 1 goes to my pool. I go on two
runs; the first nets me 4, the next 5; I have KP of 1 and may have saved
or spent 18 Good Karma. I get another 4 and then put one more in KP and
save/spend 21.


J Roberson
Message no. 4
From: Dave Sherohman <esper@*****.IMA.UMN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Good Karma and the Karma Pool
Date: Sat, 6 Nov 1993 16:31:00 CST
The contradictionlies in the impossibility of simultaneously rounding in
favor of Good Karma and rounding up the amount going into the Pool.

You go on your first run, you get 5 Karma. By your quote, you round in favor
of Good Karma, leaving you with GK 5, KP 0 (ignoring the point you get at
charater creation). By mine, you round the KP up, giving you GK 4, KP 1.

esper@***.umn.edu

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