Back to the main page

Mailing List Logs for ShadowRN

Message no. 1
From: The Great Cornholio <ChemPhD2Be@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 01:02:06 EDT
Speaking of physical sorcerers, there's a loophole discussed in Awakenings I
wanted to get some input on. According to Awakenings "The physical magician
character spends Magic Attribute points on physical adept powers according to
the Shadowrun rules, but must allocate at least one Magic Attribute Rating for
using magical skills (i.e. spells, sorcery conjuring) p 119

Now the loophole is that any mage, herme or shaman, can, according to this
rule, suddenly upon acheiving a new magic point by initaition, decide, "Hey.
I think dem Killing hands are pretty nifty" and become a Physical Magician.
How does this sit with the ranks? Should a mage character declare at creation
that he's a physical mage, or does he have to spend one Magic Attr. Rating on
physical powers, or does he just decide to "multi-class". If that's the case,
what's the advantage of being a regular phys. ad?

TGC, spawning controversy and getting his fix after not playing SR for 2 years
now...
Message no. 2
From: "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 01:11:16 EDT
n a message dated 9/10/98 1:02:59 AM Eastern Daylight Time, ChemPhD2Be@***.COM
writes:

> Now the loophole is that any mage, herme or shaman, can, according to this
> rule, suddenly upon acheiving a new magic point by initaition, decide,
"Hey.
> I think dem Killing hands are pretty nifty" and become a Physical Magician.
> How does this sit with the ranks?

Uh, No!

First and foremost we must remember that Physical Magicians are an OPTIONAL
rule and as such the gamemaster can just disallow it.

Second, I would think that a Physical Mage is a completely seperate tradition
that does not allow a mage or shaman to become one over night. (It even says
it is a differnt path in the awakenings book) So I would have to say that if
you did not allocate any magic rating points to adept powers you are not a
physical mage.

Also physical mages do not start the game off with access to astral space,
which sets them far apart from the mage or shaman character. IMHO

-Bandit
Message no. 3
From: "Ratinac, Rand (NSW)" <RRatinac@*****.REDCROSS.ORG.AU>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 15:46:47 +1000
> Speaking of physical sorcerers, there's a loophole discussed in
> Awakenings I
> wanted to get some input on. According to Awakenings "The physical
> magician
> character spends Magic Attribute points on physical adept powers
> according to
> the Shadowrun rules, but must allocate at least one Magic Attribute
> Rating for
> using magical skills (i.e. spells, sorcery conjuring) p 119
>
> Now the loophole is that any mage, herme or shaman, can, according to
> this
> rule, suddenly upon acheiving a new magic point by initaition, decide,
> "Hey.
> I think dem Killing hands are pretty nifty" and become a Physical
> Magician.
> How does this sit with the ranks? Should a mage character declare at
> creation
> that he's a physical mage, or does he have to spend one Magic Attr.
> Rating on
> physical powers, or does he just decide to "multi-class". If that's
> the case,
> what's the advantage of being a regular phys. ad?
>
> TGC, spawning controversy and getting his fix after not playing SR for
> 2 years
> now...
>
Uh, I think that somewhere it says you have to begin with both a physad
magic rating AND a magical skill magic rating. Also if it was possible
to do that (which is totally against the spirit of the rule, if not the
letter), your mage is going to immediately lose any and all access to
astral space. What? you say. Where does that come from? Well, no
physical magician has any access to astral space without buying the
physad astral perception power. So, if you're going to use the letter of
the law to use that loophole, there's a 'letter of the law' rule which
is going to stick it to you.

Anyway, I defy you to find a GM who'd let you use that in any campaign
that he or she is at all serious about. :)

Doc'
Message no. 4
From: "D. Ghost" <dghost@****.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 00:49:35 -0500
On Thu, 10 Sep 1998 01:11:16 EDT "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
writes:
>n a message dated 9/10/98 1:02:59 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
>ChemPhD2Be@***.COM
>writes:
>> Now the loophole is that any mage, herme or shaman, can, according to
this
>> rule, suddenly upon acheiving a new magic point by initaition,
decide, "Hey.
>> I think dem Killing hands are pretty nifty" and become a Physical
Magician.
>> How does this sit with the ranks?

>Uh, No!
>
>First and foremost we must remember that Physical Magicians are an
OPTIONAL
>rule and as such the gamemaster can just disallow it.

Correct so far ...

>Second, I would think that a Physical Mage is a completely seperate
tradition
>that does not allow a mage or shaman to become one over night. (It even
says
>it is a differnt path in the awakenings book) So I would have to say
that if
>you did not allocate any magic rating points to adept powers you are not
a
>physical mage.

Whoops! Wrong. It only says you must allocate at LEAST one point
towards being a mage. That is the only such statement made. Once you
Mage magic attribute (as opposed to your physad attribute) drops to zero,
you become an overpriced physical adept. The autor may have assumed that
the player of such a character would put at least one point into physad
abilities (otherwise, what's the point?), but that was not explicitly
stated as a requirement. You'd have to ask Steve Kenson for more info on
that.

>Also physical mages do not start the game off with access to astral
space,
>which sets them far apart from the mage or shaman character. IMHO
>
>-Bandit

Yup. Also, they won't ever astrally project either ... (So no summoning
Great Forms [In SR2, that is ...])

D. Ghost
(aka Pixel, Tantrum, RuPixel)
o/` Trideo killed the Video Star ... o/`

_____________________________________________________________________
You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail.
Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com
Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]
Message no. 5
From: "Ratinac, Rand (NSW)" <RRatinac@*****.REDCROSS.ORG.AU>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 16:03:35 +1000
> >Second, I would think that a Physical Mage is a completely seperate
> tradition
> >that does not allow a mage or shaman to become one over night. (It
> even
> says
> >it is a differnt path in the awakenings book) So I would have to say
> that if
> >you did not allocate any magic rating points to adept powers you are
> not
> a
> >physical mage.
>
> Whoops! Wrong. It only says you must allocate at LEAST one point
> towards being a mage. That is the only such statement made. Once you
> Mage magic attribute (as opposed to your physad attribute) drops to
> zero,
> you become an overpriced physical adept. The autor may have assumed
> that
> the player of such a character would put at least one point into
> physad
> abilities (otherwise, what's the point?), but that was not explicitly
> stated as a requirement. You'd have to ask Steve Kenson for more info
> on
> that.
>
Okay, with this being pointed out (I guess I didn't read the wording
carefully enough) I would make one caveat to what I said earlier. A
physical magician can start out with no physad powers - but he'd still
HAVE to be specified as being a physmag at the start of his career and
he would start out with no access to astral space. He could then buy
physad powers as he gained initiate levels.

On consideration, I'd actually let my players go this route if they
really wanted. It doesn't really give them any great advantage over a
physmag who starts out with physad powers. No standard mages and shamans
deciding they want to become physical magicians or shamans in the
future, though.

Doc'
Message no. 6
From: K in the Shadows <Ereskanti@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 02:30:07 EDT
In a message dated 9/10/1998 12:56:45 AM US Eastern Standard Time,
dghost@****.COM writes:

> So I would have to say
> that if
> >you did not allocate any magic rating points to adept powers you are not
> a
> >physical mage.
>
> Whoops! Wrong. It only says you must allocate at LEAST one point
> towards being a mage. That is the only such statement made. Once you
> Mage magic attribute (as opposed to your physad attribute) drops to zero,
> you become an overpriced physical adept. The autor may have assumed that
> the player of such a character would put at least one point into physad
> abilities (otherwise, what's the point?), but that was not explicitly
> stated as a requirement. You'd have to ask Steve Kenson for more info on
> that.
>
Oh please, do ask him, It will save me the time and trouble (okay, it's not a
trouble, I just don't want to be the target of *MY* own inquiries :)

-K (who has answers, he's just sleeping and *FREEZING* from this cold wave)
Message no. 7
From: David Foster <fixer@*******.TLH.FL.US>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 08:33:29 -0400
On Thu, 10 Sep 1998, M. Sean Martinez wrote:

->Second, I would think that a Physical Mage is a completely seperate tradition
->that does not allow a mage or shaman to become one over night. (It even says
->it is a differnt path in the awakenings book) So I would have to say that if
->you did not allocate any magic rating points to adept powers you are not a
->physical mage.

I do not have Awakenings, but I've heard a lot about Physical
Mages and like the idea (when MiTS comes out, I want to play a physmage).
If the mage or shaman has ever used projection, would be a better
indication, not whether or not they've allocated any magic rating points
to adeptual powers. You're saying that if a physmage allocates all six
starting magic points towards magic, sorcery, etc, they can't be a
physmage any more.

->Also physical mages do not start the game off with access to astral space,
->which sets them far apart from the mage or shaman character. IMHO

Perception and Projection? I thought it was just projection.

Fixer --------------} The easy I do before breakfast,
the difficult I do all day long,
the impossible only during the week,
and miracles performed on an as-needed basis....

Now tell me, what was your problem?
Message no. 8
From: "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 08:26:40 EDT
In a message dated 9/10/98 8:25:15 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
fixer@*******.TLH.FL.US writes:

> Perception and Projection? I thought it was just projection.

Nope they may buy perception, and they may never have projection.

-Bandit
Message no. 9
From: "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 08:56:20 EDT
In a message dated 9/10/98 1:57:04 AM Eastern Daylight Time, dghost@****.COM
writes:

> Whoops! Wrong. It only says you must allocate at LEAST one point
> towards being a mage. That is the only such statement made.

I am well aware what the book says and what the book dosen't say. Sometimes
you have to take the rules for what they are trying to say as oppossed to what
they say since FASA has a habit of cutting text to save space and no author
can fully predit how his or her work will be interperted.

Gamers are such an inventive lot, afterall :)

A physical magician is simply a combination physical adept and mage (or
shaman) that by their very nature spend time studying ways to control the
energies of astral space (SR2 Magic skills) and improve their physical
abilities. By being such, it is logical to determine that they must start out
with both physical adept and magical abilities. To go one way or the other
would mean simply you have a Physical Adept or a Mage (or shaman)

Course, it did not take long to figure out why a player would want to have a
Physical Mage with all 6 points of power allocated to Magic. Such a character
would start off and never have any geas. Which, IMHO is very much munkin
cheedar.

> The autor may have assumed that
> the player of such a character would put at least one point into physad
> abilities (otherwise, what's the point?), but that was not explicitly
> stated as a requirement.

I agree that this is most likley the case, but the text may have been viewed
as repetive by the author and deleted to save space. Happens all the time in
the game industry.

If I ever write my own game system, I plan on making the rules read like a
military cook book. Easy to follow, easy to tell exactly what the rules ment
to say and long as hell. :)

> You'd have to ask Steve Kenson for more info on that.

I'll just wait for MiTs to come out, since they will most likely be covered in
there, and I really don't allow them in my game anyway except for an rare NPC.

-Bandit
Message no. 10
From: Nexx <nexx@********.NET>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 09:12:27 -0500
> > Whoops! Wrong. It only says you must allocate at LEAST one point
> > towards being a mage. That is the only such statement made. Once
you
> > Mage magic attribute (as opposed to your physad attribute) drops to
zero,
> > you become an overpriced physical adept.

I actually allowed this for full magicians before I got Awakenings, simply
because I decided that full magician meant you had access to all kinds of
magic, not just spellcasting and summoning.
Message no. 11
From: The Great Cornholio <ChemPhD2Be@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 19:19:31 EDT
In a message dated 98-09-10 01:56:29 EDT, dghost@****.COM writes:

<< >Also physical mages do not start the game off with access to astral
space,
>which sets them far apart from the mage or shaman character. IMHO
>
>-Bandit

Yup. Also, they won't ever astrally project either ... (So no summoning
Great Forms [In SR2, that is ...]) >>

You guys got that right. I completely spaced that Phys Mages can't astrally
project. Oops. My bad.. :-)

TGC
Message no. 12
From: The Great Cornholio <ChemPhD2Be@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 19:27:47 EDT
In a message dated 98-09-10 08:57:45 EDT, ElBandit@***.COM writes:

<< Course, it did not take long to figure out why a player would want to have
a
Physical Mage with all 6 points of power allocated to Magic. Such a character
would start off and never have any geas. Which, IMHO is very much munkin
cheedar. >>

Certainly would fit a Coyote shaman.

GM: The Coyote Shaman player looks mad that you've snapped his Incr. Reflexes
quickening.
PLayer: Serves that devious NPC right. He's been screwing us out of nuyen
for too long!
GM: He attacks you with Unarmed Combat.
Player: Ha!
GM: Killing Hands D, with 6 successes.
PLayer: HOLY TOLEDO!

:-)

Starting off without geas isn't bad. I've got credit cards. I don't use them
a lot. Does that mean I'm a munchkin for not maxing them out? I

TGC
Message no. 13
From: Randy Nickel <LrdDrgn@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1998 22:58:08 EDT
In a message dated 9/9/98 10:02:59 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
ChemPhD2Be@***.COM writes:

> Now the loophole is that any mage, herme or shaman, can, according to this
> rule, suddenly upon acheiving a new magic point by initaition, decide,
"Hey.
> I think dem Killing hands are pretty nifty" and become a Physical Magician.
> How does this sit with the ranks? Should a mage character declare at
> creation
> that he's a physical mage, or does he have to spend one Magic Attr. Rating
> on
> physical powers, or does he just decide to "multi-class". If that's the
> case,
> what's the advantage of being a regular phys. ad?
>

I play a physical adept/sorcery adept. It's a pretty cool combo, especially
under SR3.

As a GM I require anyone that wants to be a split adept to start as one. I
also assume that they are pretty rare.

Otter
Message no. 14
From: David Foster <fixer@*******.TLH.FL.US>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1998 09:33:46 -0400
On Thu, 10 Sep 1998, Randy Nickel wrote:

->I play a physical adept/sorcery adept. It's a pretty cool combo, especially
->under SR3.

I had, using the point system of SRComp, put together a Moon
Shaman (full) w/ Physical Adept. It was weak starting out but kinda blew
things out of the water after 200 Karma.

Fixer --------------} The easy I do before breakfast,
the difficult I do all day long,
the impossible only during the week,
and miracles performed on an as-needed basis....

Now tell me, what was your problem?
Message no. 15
From: Lars Ericson <lericson@****.EDU>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1998 09:39:50 -0500
David Foster wrote:
>
> On Thu, 10 Sep 1998, Randy Nickel wrote:
>
> ->I play a physical adept/sorcery adept. It's a pretty cool combo, especially
> ->under SR3.
>
> I had, using the point system of SRComp, put together a Moon
> Shaman (full) w/ Physical Adept. It was weak starting out but kinda blew
> things out of the water after 200 Karma.

Any character can blow things out of the water after 200 Karma, but I'm
guessing you meant relative to the other 200 karma characters. In my
opinion, the best campaigns are between 30-70 Karma.

--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Lars Ericson: Professional Vagabond
Smalley Research Group, Rice University
E-Mail: lericson@****.edu
WWW: http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~lericson/

"Raisin Hell -- a million raisins in every can."
-- Sifl & Olly Show
Message no. 16
From: "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 1998 19:57:14 EDT
In a message dated 9/11/98 10:43:18 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
lericson@****.EDU writes:

> Any character can blow things out of the water after 200 Karma, but I'm
> guessing you meant relative to the other 200 karma characters. In my
> opinion, the best campaigns are between 30-70 Karma.

My veterns have reached 400-500+ points of Karma. Its really entertaining to
write modules for them...

"Is 20 goons enough?"

Truthfully most of them are diverse in their skills, so it is not so bad. The
Cat Shaman has an 8 Ettiqutte, one of the sams has an 11 in his pistol skill.
But most have lower than 6 in their skills.

-Bandit
Message no. 17
From: The Great Cornholio <ChemPhD2Be@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 1998 16:32:07 EDT
In a message dated 98-09-11 10:43:39 EDT, lericson@****.EDU writes:

<< Any character can blow things out of the water after 200 Karma, but I'm
guessing you meant relative to the other 200 karma characters. In my
opinion, the best campaigns are between 30-70 Karma. >>

Bollocks to that! ANY run is good, regardless of Karma level. It all depends
up on the imagination of the players and DM.

Creating new characters after 100 Karam simply because the runs "aren't the
best anymore" would seriously depress me.

TGC
Message no. 18
From: Tomus Cone <brother_1@*******.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Sat, 12 Sep 1998 13:39:16 PDT
>Creating new characters after 100 Karam simply because the runs
>"aren't the best anymore" would seriously depress me.
>
>TGC
>
I'd have to agree. One of my characters went through a "why me?" phase
that was just hilarious. The others needed that proving time.

Dirk The Daring and Brother-1 speaking as one voice.


______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Message no. 19
From: K in the Shadows <Ereskanti@***.COM>
Subject: Re: Physical sorcerers?(tangent)
Date: Sun, 13 Sep 1998 03:34:32 EDT
In a message dated 9/11/1998 6:58:12 PM US Eastern Standard Time,
ElBandit@***.COM writes:

> > Any character can blow things out of the water after 200 Karma, but I'm
> > guessing you meant relative to the other 200 karma characters. In my
> > opinion, the best campaigns are between 30-70 Karma.
>
> My veterns have reached 400-500+ points of Karma. Its really entertaining
to
> write modules for them...
> "Is 20 goons enough?"
> Truthfully most of them are diverse in their skills, so it is not so bad.
> The
> Cat Shaman has an 8 Ettiqutte, one of the sams has an 11 in his pistol
skill.
> But most have lower than 6 in their skills.
> -Bandit

Ah yes, the "at what level does a character stop/continue on" topic/thread.
I'll be nice this time around. Bandit's characters to me sound very
interesting, as I also believe that at around 200 karma or so is when
characters become "Prime" as it were. BUT, everyone plays differently.

Me, well lets just say that I am making some changes, but I am still in this
game for *POWER* and won't ever lie about that one fact.

-K

Further Reading

If you enjoyed reading about Physical sorcerers?(tangent), you may also be interested in:

Disclaimer

These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.

Thwap!