| From: | Richard Bukowski <bukowski@**.BERKELEY.EDU> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Ramblings on magic and FAB |
| Date: | Sat, 13 May 1995 16:40:32 -0700 |
exclusivity bonuses and fetish bonuses taken by characters?
Personally, I find a +2 force bonus without any corresponding drain
modifier pretty f*ing powerful. I have a wolf shaman in my group who
took sleep with expendable fetish required (thank the gods she didn't
take exclusive); she nails people with a force 6 mental attack spell
and resists 2D drain. With the modifiers for totem (+2 combat
spells), plus her combat spell focus (power 2) and magic pool
(specialized, of course, in combat spells, for an 8), she has
12 pool dice to add to her 6 attack dice and 6 drain resistance dice.
Needless to say she flattens people by the truckload and never takes
drain (6 dice vs. a TN of 2 _expects_ to produce 5 successes; add just
3 pool dice and she's taking an L drain only if she _really_ gets
unlucky, while throwing that force 6 stun blast, with, of course, 9
pool dice left over for attack boosting or shielding). I believe she
didn't take exclusivity simply because it wouldn't help statistically;
she's already down to 2 on her drain TN!!! And fetishes are not hard
to come by... easy to make, easy to buy, and cheap to boot. She even
had a special case made to store some in case of a fireball or some
such; reinforced steel/leather lined case holding 10 spare fetishes
for emergencies. Yarg.
Oh, did I mention all my players (and me :)are CS nerds, and the
aforementioned wolf shaman is played by my SO, who was an applied math
undergrad? The first thing she did when learning Shadowrun is to make
a huge pile of charts giving the expected number of successes, plus
the % chance of getting at least (n) successes when rolling (x) dice
against TN (y). None of my players will sustain a spell anymore
because these charts show the gruesome statistical effect of a +2 to
_any_ TN.
I'm of the opinion that they goofed royally when designing the rules
for exclusive and fetish spells. I think they're much too much bang
for a negligible disadvantage... I liked the rule that they only add
dice, not actual force, to the power of the spell, but my players
would lynch me if I tried to change the rules on that now, in the
middle of the game. Does _anyone_ out there worry about exclusivity?
I don't think in all my years of playing that I actually tried to cast
a spell while sustaining another spell more than once or twice.
That's because I know for a fact I'll take drain if I do, with the +2
TN modifier for sustaining. So, if I'm not going to bother anyhow,
why not take "exclusive" and boost the hell out of the effectiveness
of my spells, not to mention spending 2 less of my precious Resource
force points at character generation? Sheesh. And the only time the
fetish thing is a disadvantage is if you get captured. And how often
does that happen? Hmmmmmm... <evil GM grin>
Enough on those modifiers. Now I'd like to attack Shadowrun on a
different ground. :) I just bought Corporate Security Handbook (CSH)
yesterday, and boy am I disappointed. Silly me, I thought there would
be something in it I could actually use. But no; the only thing in
the whole book that I didn't have in my corporate security setups
ALREADY by common sense (come on, guys. A new bunch of drones? That
stick to walls and shoot at things? New squirt guns? Oh, gee,
_that's_ original) is FAB. The whole stupid book is a huge sales
brochure for FAB. FAB walls, FAB nets, catch those Evil Astral Mages
today, it slices, it dices, just look at that tomato...
Okay, so the only new idea in it is FAB. That would actually be fine
with me, IF THEY HAD GIVEN RULES FOR IT THAT I COULD @!#@$!$@ USE!!!!
But no. I had thought of FAB YEARS AGO. It's a pretty g*d d**n
_obvious_ idea; if astral entities can't pass through living matter,
build a wall out of living matter. What's alive and easy to
feed/maintain/doesn't need exercise or light, or need to move at all?
That's right, folks, bacteria. Pretty straightforward. But, there's
all those nasty problems that come up. Can an astral entity interact with
such a wall? Can you slip through cracks? Can you now make astrally
potent bullets by filling them with bacteria? Can two walls of
bacteria crush a purely astral entity between them? Can a pile of
bacteria dropped on an astral entity already standing on a pile of
bacteria be physically supported by that astral entity?
Okay, so FASA comes out with a book that pushes FAB. Great, sez I.
They'll address all these problems that immediately occurred to me
when _I_ first thought of it 6 f**ing years ago. So what do I get for
my $18? THEY MENTION ALL THE PROBLEMS, AND DON'T ANSWER ONE FRAGGING
ONE OF THEM. You get all of these problems mentioned in the sidebars.
Answers? None. What does it say in the GM rules section? "FAB can
be wierd in the game; make sure you and your players understand its
use before you use it." NO I DON'T UNDERSTAND IT'S USE FASA; YOU
WERE SUPPOSED TO EXPLAIN IT, THAT'S WHY I SPENT $18 ON YOUR FRAGGING
BOOK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As you can tell, I'm a bit upset about the whole thing. ("I am not
bitter!" :):) Sorry to take up your time, but I wanted to vent.
Rick
