[kyoto kid]

...while this is basically a rules question, posting this here as in Missions all improvements must be done during downtime using "Purchased Hits".

As I understand even for Adepts one needs Arcana to initiate.  Now while I feel for a dedicated physad, it is otherwise a rather useless skill since the specialisations only cover writing formulas which the character would never make use of.  Nonetheless it apparently is a requirement for all awakened characters 

So my character is looking at initiating again. She has the skill at 1 and as I understand, for the purpose of initiation, the test. is Arcana + Intuition, not Logic. It is also an extended test with an interval of 29 days (basically 1 month) so grade 1 would be 1 month grade 2 would take 2 months, and so on.  As the character has an intuition of 5, that would give her a pool of 6, so could she initiate three times before having to increase the skill?

[SichoPhiend]

The short answer is yes

The longer answer is that you need a number of successes equal to the initiate grade, so for grade 3 with a die pool of 6, it will take 3 months.  With a die pool of 8, grade 3 would take 2 months (2 hits in the first month at die pool 8, 1 hit in the second month with a die pool of 7 after the -1 for the extended test)

I'm bringing this up because if you're thinking about going further with initiation, it may be wise (in regards to how long it takes on your calendar and therefore how many months of lifestyle you need to pay for) to increase the arcana first.  After all, it'll only cost you 10 karma to raise it by 2.

[Hobbes]

Yeah a Pool of 8 dice would save you a lot of down time.  If that matters, depends on your lifestyle costs.

[kyoto kid]

...thank you. 

I still feel there should be a specialisation for Initiation Rite or something like that as again for the most part, the skill is pretty useless for physads (and in my view a waste of Karma for a "Karma sink" character) other than initiation.  In past editions there was no skill required for initiation, you just spent he Karma and initiated.