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Message no. 1
From: The Digital Mage <mn3rge@****.ac.uk>
Subject: Mages V Sams
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 1996 16:32:00 +0000 (GMT)
Here's an interesting (sort of) fact for those of you discussing mages
taking sams head on in combat.

I played out a combat between an Ork sam with Wired 2, Muscle aug:2,
Orthoskin:1 Bone lacing plastic, and some other stuff. The combat mage
had Boosted reflexes 1 and a smartlink.

The sam wins initiative and attempts a flying kick to get in range
(TN:6), the mage counters with a punch and tries to sweep. The kick fails
to hit, but the mage does no damage and faails teh sweep.

Mages go, lets off a Stun bolt:6, has a TN of 10 (the sam had WP:6 and a
force 8 Anti spell barrier spelllocked to him), mage gets 2 successes!
Sam only 1 Serious stun damage. Mage takes Light drain.

Sam tries a yoko geri kekomi kick with his karate concentration, but with
+3 Tn fails, though agin teh mage does no damage on the counter.

Mage goes again, another stun bolt, and another serious wound, no drain.
Mage wins! WOW!

Then I realise taht teh sam had a pain editor -stun damage doesn't give
any mods, so I pick up from the kekomi kick again and the sam does deadly
stun with one kick (well the damage was base of 10M +2 power for the kick).
Sam wins! WOW!

So what this piece of drivel shows is that, a simple piece of bioware, or
teh choice of a spell (if it had been a manabolt damage would have been
physical) can change the course of a battle -so take things carefully folks!

By teh way, for those interested teh above were both starting characters,
although teh spell lock on teh sam was paid for by a fellow player and
cast by another players sorcerer.

The Digital Mage : mn3rge@****.ac.uk
"Life is a choice, Death....an obligation."-Me
Shadowrun WWW site at http://www.bath.ac.uk/~mn3rge/Shadowrun
Message no. 2
From: Robert Watkins <robertdw@*******.com.au>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 24 Jan 1996 08:29:59 +1100 (EST)
>Mages go, lets off a Stun bolt:6, has a TN of 10 (the sam had WP:6 and a
>force 8 Anti spell barrier spelllocked to him), mage gets 2 successes!
>Sam only 1 Serious stun damage. Mage takes Light drain.

Sam rolls his 6 Willpower dice, TN 6... odds say he'll get one success on
average. Throw in up to six more dice from combat pool, and THEN allow
Karma to re-roll failures if needed. That Stun bolt doesn't work.


--
_______________________________________________________________________
/ \
| "As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it |
| wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging |
| had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I |
| realizedthat a large part of my life from then on was going to be |
| spent infinding mistakes in my own programs." -- Maurice Wilkes |
| Robert Watkins robertdw@*******.com.au |
\_______________________________________________________________________/
Message no. 3
From: Marc A Renouf <jormung@*****.umich.edu>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 1996 18:16:04 -0500 (EST)
On Tue, 23 Jan 1996, Robert Watkins wrote:

> Sam rolls his 6 Willpower dice, TN 6... odds say he'll get one success on
> average. Throw in up to six more dice from combat pool, and THEN allow
> Karma to re-roll failures if needed. That Stun bolt doesn't work.

You can't dodge combat spells. You can't even "roll with the
hit" which is what combat pool dice reflect in SRII. As Stun Bolt is a
combat spell, you point is not applicable.

Marc
Message no. 4
From: TopCat <topcat@******.net>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 1996 21:40:42 -0600
At 03:59 PM 1/23/96 -0500, Digital Mage wrote:
>Here's an interesting (sort of) fact for those of you discussing mages
>taking sams head on in combat.

>[snipped the fight]

My tests along those lines ended really quickly.

[ranged] I used control actions, improved invisibility, and a pair of 20X
goggles and had the samurai execute himself (so I wouldn't get dirty).

[HTH] The samurai absolutely demolished the mage. We don't use any martial
arts subsystem in our game anymore so that wasn't a factor. If the samurai
in your example had just gone for a normal melee attack instead of the added
TN special maneuvers, he would've decimated the mage.

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Bob "TopCat" Ooton <topcat@******.net>
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"Outside they are gathering and their fangs are bared, for
the bigger your fangs, the bigger your share."
-- Sol Invictus "Here Am I"
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Message no. 5
From: TopCat <topcat@******.net>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 1996 21:43:52 -0600
>Mages go, lets off a Stun bolt:6, has a TN of 10 (the sam had WP:6 and a
>force 8 Anti spell barrier spelllocked to him), mage gets 2 successes!
>Sam only 1 Serious stun damage. Mage takes Light drain.

The fact that the mage got two successes against a TN of 10 could constitue
as an "Act of God (or applicable totem)" and pretty much invalidates the
test. Run through it about ten more times, stick to normal melee attack for
the samurai, and then check the results.
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Bob "TopCat" Ooton <topcat@******.net>
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"Outside they are gathering and their fangs are bared, for
the bigger your fangs, the bigger your share."
-- Sol Invictus "Here Am I"
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Message no. 6
From: Robert Watkins <robertdw@*******.com.au>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 24 Jan 1996 19:06:08 +1100 (EST)
>On Tue, 23 Jan 1996, Robert Watkins wrote:
>
>> Sam rolls his 6 Willpower dice, TN 6... odds say he'll get one success on
>> average. Throw in up to six more dice from combat pool, and THEN allow
>> Karma to re-roll failures if needed. That Stun bolt doesn't work.
>
> You can't dodge combat spells. You can't even "roll with the
>hit" which is what combat pool dice reflect in SRII. As Stun Bolt is a
>combat spell, you point is not applicable.

I'm going to go away and check that, but I think I'll find that Combat
pool dice can be used for _any_ damage resistance test, wether or not it
is in a combat related situation.


--
_______________________________________________________________________
/ \
| "As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it |
| wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging |
| had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I |
| realizedthat a large part of my life from then on was going to be |
| spent infinding mistakes in my own programs." -- Maurice Wilkes |
| Robert Watkins robertdw@*******.com.au |
\_______________________________________________________________________/
Message no. 7
From: "A Halliwell" <u5a77@**.keele.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 24 Jan 1996 22:44:33 +0000 (GMT)
|> You can't dodge combat spells. You can't even "roll with the
|>hit" which is what combat pool dice reflect in SRII. As Stun Bolt is a
|>combat spell, you point is not applicable.
|
|I'm going to go away and check that, but I think I'll find that Combat
|pool dice can be used for _any_ damage resistance test, wether or not it
|is in a combat related situation.

Nope. I think you'll find that it's the magic pool for combat spells. You
can't dodge a combat spell because it grounds through your aura (and is only
visible on the astral plane up to that point anyway.....)
--
______________________________________________________________________________
| |What to do if you find yourself stuck in a crackin |
|u5a77@**.keele.ac.uk |the ground beneath a giant bolder, which you can't |
| |move, with no hope of rescue. |
|Andrew Halliwell |Consider how lucky you are that life has been good |
|Principal in:- |to you so far... |
|Comp Sci & Visual Arts | -The BOOK, Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Message no. 8
From: Mike and Jill Johnson <shadow@****.ahbqs.com>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 31 Jan 1996 17:39:40 -0700
>Yeah, but how many sams go round with anti spell barriers spell locked to
>them :) This wasn't meant to show an expected, or probable outcome, but
>it does show clearly that no matter what the odds some spells, attacks
>etc can be pulled off to devastating effect, so never take anything for
>granted!
>

My question is, why was the mage tossing spells at the sam, when he could
have been grounding them out through his spell lock. That way he wouldn't
have to worry about "making it thought the anti-spell barrier."


Jill
Message no. 9
From: TopCat <topcat@******.net>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 31 Jan 1996 18:48:40 -0600
>Yes he can run ten metres, but if he had done so he would've incurred a
>penalty to a basic HtH attack (+4Tn by the book though I half that to
>only +2 for HtH attacks) making the TNs the same, but the flying kick
>has a greater power.

Power is no substitute for damage in physical combat. For spells it works
well, but successes will win every time in normal combat (unless you're
facing a hardened target).

My favorite case-in-point there is the shotgun loaded with shot rounds and
set at a 2 choke. Sure, they'll only need 2's to resist, but they'll also
need 8-16 successes.

Also, why did the fight start at 10 meters? At that range, he'd be best
advised to draw a weapon and shoot, heading for cover to screw the mage's
LOS. The whole example is severely skewed in the mage's favor with the
samurai simply going along with it.

He could probably have walked the 10m to get within striking range instead
of running, as well, though maybe not. I don't know what his quickness is.
That would only be a +1 penalty. If he had multiple rounds to go before the
mage does anything, he could run the first, punch the second. No modifiers
at all.

Ah well, just bugs me when people run "tests" like this. Just wish they'd
chain, blind, and cripple the target of the test first so it'd be a little
more blatant.


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Bob Ooton -- <topcat@******.net>
Golden Tiger Association -- Submission Fighting Team
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Message no. 10
From: TopCat <topcat@******.net>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Wed, 31 Jan 1996 18:50:45 -0600
>My question is, why was the mage tossing spells at the sam, when he could
>have been grounding them out through his spell lock. That way he wouldn't
> have to worry about "making it thought the anti-spell barrier."

Because the spell lock would've grounded out to the poor mage who put the
lock on the samurai in the first place. Quite the surprise attack on the
mage, but little effect on the samurai :)


-- TopCat
Message no. 11
From: Robert Watkins <robertdw@*******.com.au>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 22:27:34 +1100 (EST)
>Because the spell lock would've grounded out to the poor mage who put the
>lock on the samurai in the first place. Quite the surprise attack on the
>mage, but little effect on the samurai :)

Nope... when you ground a spell through a spell lock, or any other dual
entity, the spell grounds in the physical location of the lock/entity.
That's why when you ground spells through astral mages, their bodies blow
up. The spell lock is on and with the sam, so it'll ground there.

For an example, read the short story in the main book, "Plus Ca Change".


--
_______________________________________________________________________
/ \
| "As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it |
| wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging |
| had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I |
| realizedthat a large part of my life from then on was going to be |
| spent infinding mistakes in my own programs." -- Maurice Wilkes |
| Robert Watkins robertdw@*******.com.au |
\_______________________________________________________________________/
Message no. 12
From: Robert Watkins <robertdw@*******.com.au>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 22:27:58 +1100 (EST)
>My question is, why was the mage tossing spells at the sam, when he could
>have been grounding them out through his spell lock. That way he wouldn't
> have to worry about "making it thought the anti-spell barrier."

The anti-spell barrier exisits in the Astral plane too. In order to get
through the barrier to ground as you suggest, the mage would have to
project. This would make him chicken-feed for the sam at the ranges
involved.


--
Robert Watkins robertdw@*******.com.au
Real Programmers never work 9 to 5. If any real programmers
are around at 9 am, it's because they were up all night.
Message no. 13
From: The Digital Mage <mn3rge@****.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 13:11:14 +0000 (GMT)
On Wed, 31 Jan 1996, Mike and Jill Johnson wrote:

> My question is, why was the mage tossing spells at the sam, when he could
> have been grounding them out through his spell lock. That way he wouldn't
> have to worry about "making it thought the anti-spell barrier."

That wasn't the intention of the exercise, and besides by the time he'd
gone astral the sam would have been left with a nice slumped over body to
just kill :)


The Digital Mage : mn3rge@****.ac.uk
"Life is a choice, Death....an obligation."-Me
Shadowrun WWW site at http://www.bath.ac.uk/~mn3rge/Shadowrun
Message no. 14
From: The Digital Mage <mn3rge@****.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 13:20:07 +0000 (GMT)
On Wed, 31 Jan 1996, TopCat wrote:

> >Yes he can run ten metres, but if he had done so he would've incurred a
> >penalty to a basic HtH attack (+4Tn by the book though I half that to
> >only +2 for HtH attacks) making the TNs the same, but the flying kick
> >has a greater power.
>
> Power is no substitute for damage in physical combat. For spells it works
> well, but successes will win every time in normal combat (unless you're
> facing a hardened target).
Well, the TN for either attacke was the same, so liekly successes were
the same, teh only difference was the power, and the fact that a flying
kick looks more impressive.

> Also, why did the fight start at 10 meters?
It was an arbitrary choice, I didn't really think about it that much.

> At that range, he'd be best
> advised to draw a weapon and shoot, heading for cover to screw the mage's
> LOS. The whole example is severely skewed in the mage's favor with the
> samurai simply going along with it.
Well, I also said the sam had no gun and wasn't wearing any armour. By
the way, he WON -but only due to the Pain Editor.

> He could probably have walked the 10m to get within striking range instead
> of running, as well, though maybe not. I don't know what his quickness is.
Wel;l his quickness is 9 so he probably could have but....

> That would only be a +1 penalty. If he had multiple rounds to go before the
> mage does anything, he could run the first, punch the second. No modifiers
> at all.
He didn't he had Initiative of 10+3D6, the mage of 5+2D6, the sam never
did manage to get that 21+ :)

> Ah well, just bugs me when people run "tests" like this. Just wish they'd
> chain, blind, and cripple the target of the test first so it'd be a little
> more blatant.
Please read the original post, I think (excuse me if I'm wrong) that it
wasn't a test as such -if it was I wouldn't roll dice at all but use
Expected Probabilities to get an average result. It was a bit of fun that
I thought I'd post because it illustrated how a single piece of Bioware
(the Pain Editor) determined who won, and thus perhaps as a word of
warning both to sams _and_ mages.


The Digital Mage : mn3rge@****.ac.uk
"Life is a choice, Death....an obligation."-Me
Shadowrun WWW site at http://www.bath.ac.uk/~mn3rge/Shadowrun
Message no. 15
From: "A Halliwell" <u5a77@**.keele.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: Mages V Sams
Date: Thu, 1 Feb 1996 13:33:46 +0000 (GMT)
|
|>My question is, why was the mage tossing spells at the sam, when he could
|>have been grounding them out through his spell lock. That way he wouldn't
|> have to worry about "making it thought the anti-spell barrier."
|
|Because the spell lock would've grounded out to the poor mage who put the
|lock on the samurai in the first place. Quite the surprise attack on the
|mage, but little effect on the samurai :)

WRONG! Hehehehe.
The spell locks physical component is on the Sam. It's got to be to maintain
the spell.
This means that grounding the spell through the spell lock *will* affect the
Sam, and not the mage.
Check it out. Grounding through the spell lock grounds through it's PHYSICAL
component, which is on the person the locked spell is on......
--
______________________________________________________________________________
| |What to do if you find yourself stuck in a crackin |
|u5a77@**.keele.ac.uk |the ground beneath a giant bolder, which you can't |
| |move, with no hope of rescue. |
|Andrew Halliwell |Consider how lucky you are that life has been good |
|Principal in:- |to you so far... |
|Comp Sci & Visual Arts | -The BOOK, Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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