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Message no. 1
From: The Wyrm Ouroboros <aalberdk@******.SAN.UC.EDU>
Subject: Re: Mind Probe ( part xxx : revenge of.. return...
Date: Tue, 5 Oct 1993 08:41:38 -0400
> It seems that I am in late because the spell you describe seems to be from the
> SR2 rules, and the one I use is from SR1 ( I'll buy SR2 this afternoon ),
> which is Drain: (F)M1, and you can resist the drain with your willpower and
> this is not a touch spell.
> Yes it is too powerful.
> Also my player has 5 in Willpower, 8 in spellcasting, a power focus 2 and Mind
> Probe Strenth 4, and also I think a detection focus 3 but I'm not sure.
>
> Ben.

Ah, yes, the old 'my God, this is a horrid spell' fit about Mind Probe.
Yes, it's easily defended against, if you've got two people sitting
across a room from each other, casually 'fighting it out.' But consider
-- if you have a fresh, unwounded mage, and you've captured this poor
bastard -- +3 target because of S Stun, +3 target because of S Damage,
plus whatever other target numbers the GM may apply because of
torture/gentle inquiry/leading questions (called RP) by the players.

Now let's see them succeed.

--
Ouroboros
The (Dead) Wyrm of the .Net
Message no. 2
From: "GCS/MU d? -P+ c++ l u-(+) e+(++) m(+)(*)@ s/+ n-(---) h f+@ w+
Subject: Re: Mind Probe ( part xxx : revenge of.. return...
Date: Tue, 5 Oct 1993 11:25:07 -0400
It seems that I am in late because the spell you describe seems to be from the
SR2 rules, and the one I use is from SR1 ( I'll buy SR2 this afternoon ),
which is Drain: (F)M1, and you can resist the drain with your willpower and
this is not a touch spell.
Yes it is too powerful.
Also my player has 5 in Willpower, 8 in spellcasting, a power focus 2 and Mind
Probe Strenth 4, and also I think a detection focus 3 but I'm not sure.

Ben.

Thank you for your cooperation !

`````````````````````````````````````````````

Ahh, that would do it.... SRI magic rules were silly. I forget most of
them, but the one I remember is that spells are resisted as willpower vs.
sorcery (regardless of the force), so that Mr. Target rolls his willpower
against something gross like 8 or 10 in the resistance test -- and thus,
doesn't accomlish much. (I looked up mind probe in SRI... you're right,
it's much to powerful. Drain=M1?? Uh, please. I don't think so. This is
why FASA changed it. Hey, does that mean they did something smart?)

Note: SR1 characters are extremely difficult to convert to SR2. This is
because, for example, the very expensive heavy pistol you bought in SR1 did
9M1 damage now does like 6M, and the cheap Slivergun does something like
9S(f). Spells are pretty easy to convert, but check on such things as mind
probe, where they got smart, redesigned the spell, and it aint that gross
anymore. If you just convert the existing campaign to SR2, be prepared to
kill a character or 2.....

--Short Fuse

"What am I going to, ground out... Healthy Glow on him??"
--Blue Cross, our resident Bear Shaman medic

Further Reading

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Thwap!