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Message no. 1
From: wafflemiester <evamarie@**********.NET>
Subject: Re: Unobtrusive Spells (centering)
Date: Tue, 23 Jun 1998 13:40:25 -0500
> Re: Unobtrusive Spells (Nexx Many-Scars , Mon 15:31)

> I know this isn't canon, but why not? It seems to me that magicians are
> learning a method of concentrating past pain and distraction with centering...
> why wouldn't it work with other kinds of skills (admittedly, your singing
> centering skill won't help you much if you're trying to make a stealth test
> but...)

Yes, it always seemed odd that centering could reduce penalties ON
magic use, but not those caused BY magic use. Thsi shouldn'tallow
genric use on all skills, but I could see "centering to sustain" as a a
metamagic technique that allows centering to (at most) ofset the penalty
sustaing a spell adds to other activity. This fits with the concept of
"singing your peoples song" while in combator whatever- you're keeping a
spell up (without distraction) by performing your centering actity.
I'm tempted to propose "centering to percieve", which would off set the
penalty for percieving while doing mundane activities, but I'd expect
the energy of the centering would just make your perception MORE
confused.

-Mongoose
Message no. 2
From: Damion Milliken <milko@***.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Unobtrusive Spells (centering)
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 15:26:14 +1000
wafflemiester writes:

> Yes, it always seemed odd that centering could reduce penalties ON
> magic use, but not those caused BY magic use. Thsi shouldn'tallow
> genric use on all skills, but I could see "centering to sustain" as a a
> metamagic technique that allows centering to (at most) ofset the penalty
> sustaing a spell adds to other activity. This fits with the concept of
> "singing your peoples song" while in combator whatever- you're keeping a
> spell up (without distraction) by performing your centering actity.

I really like the sounds of this, actually. Good idea.

> I'm tempted to propose "centering to percieve", which would off set the
> penalty for percieving while doing mundane activities, but I'd expect the
> energy of the centering would just make your perception MORE confused.

OTOH, I think that centering is not something that could really help with the
distraction caused by perceiving two worlds simultaneously, or, if it did,
then what it would do is transfer the modifier from physical activities to
magical activities. ie, instead of having a +2 to activities involving
physical space, you could center to have a +2 to activities involving astral
space (or a +1/+1 split perhaps). This is somewhat inline with your ideas
that centering would confuse the perception, too.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: milko@***.edu.au
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