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Message no. 1
From: danturek@*******.com (D. T)
Subject: Top 1%
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 23:28:23 -0400
Valeu, John W. EM3 (AS40 R-3) <valeuj@*****.navy.mil> who refused to indent
said:

>The only downside I can
>see to the refocus of magic would that magic would be more prevailent in
>SR.
>As it stands less then 1% of the world's population is Awakened in some
>form
>(fully or auspected). And that's Cannon.


I believe the percentage slowly raises over time. But even 1% is a
considerable number. In Fringeworthy only 1 in 100,000 has a special ability
- and that gives you thousands! 1% means you probably knew someone that
could work magic. Odds are good they got scooped up by a special school and
got a full-ride scholarship to a corporate college. Yet Seattle Sourcebook
has two Universities that teach magic as specialties. It's even on the trid
(sort of). Add on to those numbers all the mundanes that work with magic and
special interest groups and magic would sound relatively common, even if not
in use for most individuals.

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Message no. 2
From: failhelm@*****.com (failhelm)
Subject: Top 1%
Date: Tue, 14 Sep 2004 21:19:01 -0700 (PDT)
--- "D. T" <danturek@*******.com> wrote:

> Valeu, John W. EM3 (AS40 R-3)
> <valeuj@*****.navy.mil> who refused to indent
> said:
>
> >The only downside I can
> >see to the refocus of magic would that magic would
> be more prevailent in
> >SR.
> >As it stands less then 1% of the world's population
> is Awakened in some
> >form
> >(fully or auspected). And that's Cannon.
>
>
> I believe the percentage slowly raises over time.
> But even 1% is a
> considerable number. In Fringeworthy only 1 in
> 100,000 has a special ability
> - and that gives you thousands! 1% means you
> probably knew someone that
> could work magic. Odds are good they got scooped up
> by a special school and
> got a full-ride scholarship to a corporate college.
> Yet Seattle Sourcebook
> has two Universities that teach magic as
> specialties. It's even on the trid
> (sort of). Add on to those numbers all the mundanes
> that work with magic and
> special interest groups and magic would sound
> relatively common, even if not
> in use for most individuals.

The 1% is true, but isn't it also true that very few
awakend (est. 10% MITS?) obtain training of any kind.
Of those that get training very few get any good
training. This makes trainers, mages, and especially
powerfull mages exceedingly rare, especially amongst
running crews.

I love magic, but in Shadowrun, its too easy for a
single mage to single handedly eliminate hundreds of
targets with a single spell. Minor assistance from a
foci and everyone is toast. Never mind a full
compliment of spirits/elementals and foci.'

Magic in SR must stay rare, or there will be a lot of
dead people...see currupt astral space...see
Earthdawn.

- Failhelm
Message no. 3
From: lists@*******.com (Wordman)
Subject: Top 1%
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 01:39:33 -0400
On Sep 15, 2004, at 12:19 AM, failhelm wrote:
> --- "D. T" <danturek@*******.com> wrote:
>> 1% means you probably knew someone that could work magic.

I went to high school with around 1500 people. 1% would mean that 15 of
them could do magic. Can you think of 15 people in your high school
that you'd .want. to be able to do magic?

> Magic in SR must stay rare, or there will be a lot of
> dead people...see currupt astral space...see
> Earthdawn.

That's kind of what I was getting at in starting this thread: magic
changes everything
Message no. 4
From: danturek@*******.com (D. T)
Subject: Top 1%
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2004 23:26:49 -0400
From: Wordman <lists@*******.com>
>I went to high school with around 1500 people. 1% would mean that 15 of
>them could do magic. Can you think of 15 people in your high school that
>you'd .want. to be able to do magic?

Actually, I can, but we had cool people :)

I've always broken magic into 5 parts, physical, summoning, astral,
enchanting, and sorcery.
A full magicker is 1 in 10, or 00.1%
An aspected mage (or whatever) is the other 9/10.
So maybe you had one full mage, one full shaman, 3 physads, 3 summoners, 3
astral (only one of which can project, the other 2 can only assense), 2
enchanters, and 2 sorcerors. That's only 4 that cast spells. But you
probably rubbed shoulders with one of them at some time, unless you or they
had cooties :)

Failhelm said:

>The 1% is true, but isn't it also true that very few
awakend (est. 10% MITS?) obtain training of any kind.
Of those that get training very few get any good
training. This makes trainers, mages, and especially
powerfull mages exceedingly rare, especially amongst
running crews.

Yes/No. Obviously the training would be expensive - just look at the prices
for summoning compared to lifestyle costs. Yet megacorps and governments can
easily soak that. I use that a lot in my campaigns - the best trained work
for the government, corps, or oraganized crime. Yet there are colleges that
teach - how do you handle that? Not all characters start SINless.

But it does keep the SINless from being trained - unless they are willing to
sell out. In the old editions you could tell by assensing a person whether
they could do magic. It made sense to me that corporations would offer some
kind of free checkup day for the kiddies at the public school, or even the
photographer on picture day. Offer the parents a huge sum in a full ride
scholarship or even just give both parents a job in the corps and you know
you get to raise and train the kid as one of your own.

I am curious how you would handle an untrained mage.

>I love magic, but in Shadowrun, its too easy for a
single mage to single handedly eliminate hundreds of
targets with a single spell.

Hundreds? Maybe with a high force and accurately placed/timed illusion....

>Minor assistance from a
foci and everyone is toast. Never mind a full
compliment of spirits/elementals and foci.'

Yes, the ability to easily add on power to mages is kind of annoying. In the
1st edition there was a wording on Sorcery and Spell Defense that I took
kind of liberally. Effectively I allowed mundanes to take Sorcery to work as
Spell Defense, but you can only defend a number equal to your magic
attribute +1 and you must always defend yourself first - meaning a mundane
can ONLY defend themselves. Of course, such a skill is useless if magic is
insanely rare. The Dragon/IE will still kill you even if you bumped your
Sorcery/Spell Defense/Personal Spell Defense skill through the roof. If
magic is more common, it keeps it checked a little. Any sane PC or other
"strong negotiator" will have dumped some karma into it.

>Magic in SR must stay rare, or there will be a lot of
dead people...see currupt astral space...see
Earthdawn.

Rare, yes. But I'd rather see more magic than say, vulcan machine guns,
rockets, etc. Magic is versatile, but usually too expensive Karma-wise for
PCs to get too strong. Remember I am dated, and the costs of initiating were
much higher in the old days.

In SR there are few magic items, and they are not made for mundanes. That
has always added a certain unique flavor to the game. I think magic is a
good spice, and of course too much spice will make you queasy, but none at
all is bland indeed.

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