[MacAnu]

I posted this on another forum, and figure I should probably post this here too.

I think I've backed out the karma costs of metatypes and magic/technomancer qualities.  This could be useful for people who are developing a KarmaGen system.  This can also be used for a hybrid priority karmagen system, for those who like the priority system but not the min-max it encourages, or for those who like karmagen but want a bit more restrictions/guidelines on how the karma is spent.

EDIT: I didn't make this clear enough.  My questions were "If we assume all priority levels provide the same amount of karma no matter what category they're spent on, how much would the metatype and magic/resonance qualities cost?" and also "If we wanted to design a karmagen and/or a priority karmagen system, how much karma should people start with?"  My question wasn't really "What is the karma value of characters you can generate using the Priority system?" which clearly depends on how you min-max your characters.

TLDR: Characters seem to be built with roughly ~745 or 750 (748 or 753?) karma.  Priority A adds 225 karma, Priority B adds 140 or 135 karma (only really affects the derived cost of Trolls), Priority C adds 70 karma, Priority D adds 25 karma, and Priority E adds 0 karma.  Additionally, players start with ~165 karma in Attributes, ~90 karma in Skills, 10 karma in Metatype/Special Attributes, and maybe 3 karma in Resources.  Together with the 25 extra karma all characters get, that adds up to 745-753 depending on your assumptions.

Along with the first rank in the appropriate special attribute:

• Adept and Aspected Magician costs 15 karma
• Magician and Mystic Adept costs 20 karma
• Technomancer costs 40 karma.

Assuming racial bonuses to skills are added at the end and thus don't affect karma costs of attributes (either only at chargen or all throughout the campaign):

• Human costs 0 karma
• Elf costs 35 karma
• Dwarf costs 70 karma
• Ork costs 80 karma
• Troll costs 150 or 145 karma (depending on whether Priority B provides 140 or 135 karma)

My thoughts:

• Technomancer is really expensive!
• The discount for Aspected Magicians is tiny!
• I'm fairly confident in ~165 karma for attributes before priority level.  I'm less confident in the ~90 karma for skills before priority level, but it's probably in the right ballpark.
• I can't decide whether Priority B is 135 or 140 karma.  Doesn't matter too much though.

You can use this to create a chargen system that's a hybrid between the priority system and the karma system.  Basically, take the priority system as in the book.  When you assign a priority level to a category, instead of gaining the defined benefits, you get the appropriate amount of karma to spend on stuff in that category (e.g. only on attributes for the Attributes category; only on the special qualities, appropriate types of active skills, and spells/complex forms in the Magic/Resonance category, etc.).  To avoid ending up with odd amounts of karma, allow for some limited amount (10 per category?) of carryover and borrowing of karma between categories.  Due to the way the karma works out, you might want to consider moving the Magic/Resonance category first in the process, or let players choose whether they want Magic/Resonance or Metatype/Special Attribute first.  While this suffers from a lot of the downsides of both systems along with more bookkeeping, it does have some benefits.  This is a good system for people who like the priority system but don't like how it encourages players to min-max character generation to reduce future karma costs.  This is also a good system for people who like the karmagen system but want some guidelines on where players must spend their karma (so, probably very few people who like karmagen ).

Derivations are below.


The basic assumption I'm using is that each priority level provides roughly the same karma boost no matter what category it's assigned to.  In other words, going from a C priority to a B priority provides the same boost in karma no matter if it's in Resources, Attributes, or Metatype.  However, the starting karma in each category might be different.  I can't prove this is how the designers built the priority system, but it makes a lot of sense.  I used the Resources category to pin down the benefits of each Priority level.  I used the Attributes and Skills categories to confirm that those karma levels are reasonable.  This will allow me to back out the costs of the Metatypes and Magician/Technomancer qualities.


The easiest category to convert is Resources.  Using 1 karma = 2000 nuyen, we get the following levels of karma:

• E: 6k nuyen = 3 karma
• D: 50k nuyen = 25 karma -> +22 gain from previous level
• C: 140k nuyen = 70 karma -> +45 gain
• B: 275k nuyen = 137.5 karma -> +70 gain
• A: 450k nuyen = 225 karma -> +85 gain

This is mostly good, but there are some oddities.  Priority B stands out for fractional karma.  Priority E is also at an odd amount, probably to avoid players starting with nothing.  I decided to round Priority B to 140 karma, but it might be rounded to 135 instead (how you round this really should only affect the cost of Trolls).  I also treated Priority E as 0 karma; if you want to use priority karmagen, you might want to just give every player 3 base karma in this category.


I used the Attributes and Skills categories to check if these karma levels were reasonable approximations across the different categories.  First, I wanted to see if I could make a reasonable attribute spread with X base karma + the karma from each priority level which matches the number of points granted by the priority chargen method.  The target I was aiming for is a player who wants to take advantage of the flat costs of the build point system to get a high attribute, but also keep some balance in the other attributes and avoid dumping too many.

• E: 5/3/3/2/2/2/2/1 = 12 points and 165 karma; w/o the base karma, 0 karma from Priority level
• D: 5/3/3/3/2/2/2/2 = 14 points and 190 karma; w/o the base karma, 25 karma from Priority level
• C: 6/4/3/3/2/2/2/2 = 16 points and 235 karma; w/o the base karma, 70 karma from Priority level
• B: 6/4/4/4/3/3/2/2 = 20 points and 305 karma; w/o the base karma, 140 karma from Priority level
• A: 6/5/4/4/4/4/3/2 = 24 points and 390 karma; w/o the base karma, 225 karma from Priority level

Since I could build reasonable attribute distributions using the derived karma benefits from each priority level, I think this shows that they're roughly accurate.  Of course, you might have a different idea of what the attribute spreads should look like -- that would most likely affect the base karma all players start with in Attributes.


For Skills, I did something more approximate since there are more permutations.  I just split the build points into level 6 skills and level 3 skills and odd points I plugged in somewhere (skill groups I handled separately).  Again, the idea was to confirm I'm in the right ball-park.

• E: 1x Skill at 6, 4x Skills at 3 = 18/0 points and 90 karma; w/o the base karma, 0 karma from Priority level
• D: 1x Skill at 6, 6x Skills at 3 = 22/0 points and 114 karma; w/o the base karma, 24 karma from Priority level
• C: 2x Skills at 6, 6x Skills at 3, 2 point Skill Group = 28/2 points and 114 karma; w/o the base karma, 81 karma from Priority level
• B: 2x Skills at 6, 8x Skills at 3, 3/2 point Skill Groups = 36/5 points and 225 karma; w/o the base karma, 135 karma from Priority level
• A: 2x Skills at 6, 1x Skill at 4, 10x Skills at 3, 4/3/3 point Skill Groups = 46/10 points and 334 karma; w/o the base karma, 244 karma from Priority level

Definitely a lot fuzzier, especially with Priority A.  Still, it's pretty close to the karma from Priority level derived from Resources, so I'm comfortable moving ahead with those numbers.


Now I can derive the costs of metatypes and magic/resonance types.  Let's start with Magic/Resonance first since it's a bit more clear-cut.  To derive the cost of each special type, I took the lowest Priority level which offered that type and added up the costs of the other benefits.  The residual karma from that priority level is the amount that type costs.  For simplicity, I bundled in the first point of the appropriate attribute (Magic or Resonance) with the quality; if you don't want this, subtract 5 from these costs.

• Adept: Magic 2 = 10 karma; 25 from Priority D - 10 = 15 karma.
• Aspected Magician: Magic 2 = 10 karma; 25 from Priority D - 10 = 15 karma.
• Magician/Mystic Adept: Magic 3 = 25 karma, 5 spells = 25 karma; 70 from Priority C - 25 - 25 = 20 karma.
• Technomancer: Resonance 3 = 25 karma, 1x CF = 4 karma; 70 from Priority C - 25 - 4 = 41 karma (round to 40 karma).

These costs work out pretty well at higher levels too.  For example, Priority B:

• Adept: Adept = 15 karma, Magic 6 = 100 karma, Rating 4 Skill = 20 karma-> Total = 135 karma
• Aspected Magician: Aspected Magician = 15 karma, Magic 5 = 70 karma, Rating 5 Skill Group = 50 karma -> Total = 135 karma
• Magician/Mystic Adept: Magician = 20 karma, Magic 4 = 45 karma, Rating 4 Skill x2 = 40 karma, 7 Spells = 35 karma -> Total = 140 karma
• Technomancer: Technomancer = 40 karma, Resonance 4 = 45 karma, Rating 4 Skill x2 = 40 karma, 2x CF = 8 points -> Total = 133 karma

Finally, Metatypes/Special Attributes.  First, we must assume that attribute bonuses from metatypes are applied last in CharGen.  Otherwise, there's no way a priority karmagen system can match what comes out of the priority system.  Second, I'm going to derive the metatypes from the lowest priority level where it shows up, similar to the previous section.  However, things don't quite match up when more special attribute points come into play.  Finally, since humans get a Special Attribute point at Priority E, there's a base of 10 karma in this category.

• Human: Costs 0 karma.  Priority E = 0 karma + 10 base karma, minus 1 point of Edge = 10 karma.
• Elf: Costs 35 karma.  Priority D = 25 karma + 10 base karma.
• Dwarf: Costs 70 karma.  Priority C = 70 karma + 10 base karma, minus 1 point of Edge = 10 karma.
• Ork: Costs 80 karma.  Priority C = 70 karma + 10 base karma.
• Troll: Costs 150 or 145 karma.  Priority B = 140 or 135 karma + 10 base karma.

Let's check whether things line up for humans:

• Priority D: 1->4 Edge = 45 karma; 1->3 Edge and 1->2 Magic = 25+10 = 35 karma.
• Priority C: 1->5 Edge and 1->2 Magic = 70+10 = 80 karma.
• Priority B: 1->6 Edge and 1->3 Magic = 100+25 = 125 karma.
• Priority A: 1->6 Edge and 1->5 Magic = 100+70 = 170 karma.

Things definitely break down at the higher priority levels, but it's pretty accurate at lower priority levels.

[Rapier]

Skills are even better than that Karma wise, theres a cap at one level 6 skill and thats it so you can have 2 group 5 skills; you cant have 2 lev 6 skills like in your calculations though.. IMO Skill A priority is the way to go no matter what.

[ZeConster]

Skills are even better than that Karma wise, theres a cap at one level 6 skill and thats it so you can have 2 group 5 skills; you cant have 2 lev 6 skills like in your calculations though.

Huh? I don't remember seeing an "only one skill at rating 6 max" rule.

[Crunch]

Huh? I don't remember seeing an "only one skill at rating 6 max" rule.

It's not there in this edition.

[Xenon]

with prio A on skills you can have multiple skills with rating 6 and 1 skill group at 6 and one skill group at 4 (because you only get 10 skill group points to distribute - there is no cap on number of skill groups at 6. nor skills. in this edition).

Finally, Metatypes/Special Attributes.  First, we must assume that attribute bonuses from metatypes are applied last in CharGen. 

They don't.
Not that it matter since all attributes cost the same at all steps of chargen (1 attribute point), before you reach step 7 that is. But it will matter a lot if you try to calculate karma cost.

people more often than not select a race that have attributes bonus to attributes they intend to place 3-6 points in. you also don't really start with negative attributes. orks, for example, start with charisma 1, not 0. and most orks never intend to raise charisma to higher than 4 anyway (so the lower metatype maximum attribute does not really "cost" or "return any karma" as it it were. It would if ork had started with charisma 0 and was forced to spend 1 valuable attribute point just to reach 1. but they don't).

One extra point in an attribute is worth about 25 karma (the cost of raising the attribute from 4-5)
Attributes with +2 points are worth about 55 karma (the cost of raising the attribute from 4-6)
Attributes with +3 points are worth about 90 karma (the cost of raising the attribute from 4-7)
Attributes with +4 points are worth about 130 karma (the cost of raising the attribute from 4-8)

probably more. most orks would probably start with at least 5+2=7 in strength, but for sake of argument let us assume they only placed 4 points in strength for a total of 6. That would make the strength attribute for this ork being worth 55 karma (compared to if a human with strength 4 had to spend karma to raise it to 6).

[Medicineman]

TLDR: Characters seem to be built with roughly ~745 or 750 (748 or 753?) karma.

hmmm
I made SR5 chars with the Prio System that are worth 500-550 BP (in SR4A) even without the additional 25/50 Karmapoints  and 500-550 BP is a lot more that 750  Karma.
Some smart Guy (Apple maybe ? ) on Dumpschock calculated 450 Karma for worst kombination of the Priosystem and (IIRC)1150 or 1250 Karma for best Kombination
so much for that  calculation

HokaHow
Medicineman

[Rapier]

You are right a misread the the highest you can raise a skill to 6 and one skill as opposed to all skills.

[Crunch]

TLDR: Characters seem to be built with roughly ~745 or 750 (748 or 753?) karma.

hmmm
I made SR5 chars with the Prio System that are worth 500-550 BP (in SR4A) even without the additional 25/50 Karmapoints  and 500-550 BP is a lot more that 750  Karma.
Some smart Guy (Apple maybe ? ) on Dumpschock calculated 450 Karma for worst kombination of the Priosystem and (IIRC)1150 or 1250 Karma for best Kombination
so much for that  calculation

HokaHow
Medicineman

I suspect as our body of play gets larger (most of us are just theorycrafting based on a small sample set at this point), we will find that SR4 to SR5 Chargen karma values are not "apples to apples" comparisons. The expanded importance of skills (with 12 as a max rating, fewer die pool mods, and higher defense pools) make it hard to make what seem like simple comparisons.

[Xenon]

It is harder to calculate the true value of special attribute points since you only have one (or two). if you have magic attribute it is worth quite a lot to reach magic 6. you have to either pick a metatype with special points or a very high magic attribute. leftover karma at step 7 can only realistically be used to increase magic rating by 1 point (which would cost 30 karma).

but if we pick two metatypes that start with same amount of special attributes it is not that hard to calculate how much more one is worth than the other.
elf(0) - metatype prio D
orc(0) - metatype prio C
troll(0) - metatype prio B

for an agile face - maybe a shamanistic mage - Elf would be "worth": 80 Karma
+1 Agility: 25 Karma (4->5)
+2 Charisma: 55 Karma (4->6)

for a strong and well build - maybe a street samurai - Ork would be worth: 145 Karma
+3 Body: 90 Karma (4->7)
+2 Strength: 55 Karma (4->6)

for a super strong, well build but not charming unarmed - maybe a physical adept - Troll would be worth: 260 Karma
+4 Body: 130 Karma (4->8 )
+4 Strength: 130 Karma (4->8 )

Then there is the question if natural low light, thermographic vision, + reach and + armor is worth...
Orc would cost little less if he had to start by buying charisma and logic from 0... but they don't. Ork actually start at 2 charisma and logic from (one free point in each(!) - but lose one point due to metatype). So no reduction in price for that. Having a lower metatype maximum attribute might be a limitation, but we don't charge extra for having a higher metatype maximum attribute so I think they even out.

Orc should cost about 65 more Karma than Elf
Troll should cost about 180 more Karma than Elf and about 115 more Karma than Ork

As for special attributes. Picking a Troll(5) instead of Troll(0) would mean that instead of picking Physical Adept with magic 6 at B (which you can't since B would have been taken by Troll(0)) you can pick Physical Adept at D with magic 2 (and still get Magic 6 and even +1 Edge). Special attributes are "worth" a lot more than a random physical or mental attribute because in the prio system there are so few ways to raise them. You only have metatype or magic. That's it.

Going Human(3) at D is not really worth it for +2 attribute points. But if it mean you can lower your prio on Mage down to C and still get 6 magic? thats another story. But in this case the "value" of raising human from Human(0) to Human(3) is what you can get for something else if you reduce Magic from A to C. Lots of skills and attributes. Or maybe spend your leftover karma and stay Human(1) and drop magic from A to B and still get Magic 6. If you can still get rating 6 magic with Magic B then everything you really lose by going down from A to B in magic is 15 karma worth of spells and 20 karma worth of skills (but the gain in Karma if you switch skills from B to A in place of Magic is HUGE!)

Looking at a character i did earlier that had skills A distributed like this:
skill 6 x 5 = 252 Karma
skill 4 x 2 =  80 Karma
skill 2 x 2 =  12 Karma
skill 1 x 4 =   8 Karma
skill grp 6 = 105 Karma
skill grp 4 =  50 Karma

Would end up being worth 507 Karma, far from optimized for Karma gain.






as for  Magic/Resonance
You "pay" for the ability to buy spells or power points or complex forms later in the game.
You also prio Magic/Resonance to get magic rating to 6.
The only way of doing that is with a higher Magic/Resonance prio OR with a higher Metatype prio.
leftover karma can only buy you one single point (from 4-5 or from 5-6).
Magic and Resonance rating is worth a lot more than individual attribute points since there is a big limit on the source where you can get them. high demand. low supply.  = high value
This is what is "really" worth something, not the few extra spells you might get.....

3 spells and two skills from 4->5 = 35 Karma
That is what differ magic A from magic B (plus the extra magic attribute)

If you calculate how much Karma skills A is worth (about 500-550 Karma)
And then calculate how much Karma skills B is worth (less. much less)
Take note on the difference in Karma.

Remove 35 Karma from this number.

This is "Karma Value" of Magic 4 -> Magic 6 (yes, this is quite a lot!!!)
Reason for this is supply and demand. Magic rating is in high demand but short on supply.
A lot of Mages pick Magic priority A just for the +2 Magic. The extra spells and skills are only 35 Karma...

[MacAnu]

Finally, Metatypes/Special Attributes.  First, we must assume that attribute bonuses from metatypes are applied last in CharGen. 

They don't.
Not that it matter since all attributes cost the same at all steps of chargen (1 attribute point), before you reach step 7 that is. But it will matter a lot if you try to calculate karma cost.

I know.  If you want to create a karmagen or priority karmagen system which lets you create characters similar to the characters created in the priority system, you have to make that houserule and apply racial attribute bonuses last (there are no racial penalties to attributes, only changes in the max attribute allowed).  It can apply only until the end of character creation (more consistent with the current system) or for the entire campaign (avoids min-maxing at chargen).

This is the only solution which makes it easy to create average representatives of the metatype.  If you discount the cost or add a karma refund to be used for attributes, it's easier to create a below-average strength and above-average charisma troll than it is to create an average strength and average charisma troll.  This doesn't make sense to me.

It is harder to calculate the true value of special attribute points since you only have one (or two). if you have magic attribute it is worth quite a lot to reach magic 6. you have to either pick a metatype with special points or a very high magic attribute. leftover karma at step 7 can only realistically be used to increase magic rating by 1 point (which would cost 30 karma).

Before I go on further, let me clarify what I was trying to do.  I wanted to back out the costs of the metatype and magic/resonance qualities.  I had a secondary goal to create a chargen system that's a hybrid between the priority system and the karmagen system which could create similar characters as the priority system (which weren't min-maxed).  I don't think I explained this too well in my OP .

To do this, I started with the reasonable assumption that the designers created the priority levels to provide the same increase in karma no matter which category it's used in.  I derived the karma benefits from resources, which has a fixed conversion rate.  I confirmed this assumption was reasonable with the attributes and skills categories.  I could create reasonable attribute and skill spreads which matched both the priority table and the derived karma benefits of the priority levels.  I then used those karma values to back out the cost of the qualities, and again confirmed the system worked for higher priority levels of Metatype and Magic/Resonance.  This is different from trying to cost metatypes by "building up" their benefits, which is what you're doing.  Instead, I'm backing out how much they should cost based on how much each priority level gives.

Fortunately, dealing with the special attributes and the skills in Magic/Resonance usually wasn't required to back out costs.  In the Magic/Resonance column, the earliest priority with a special quality has it without skills.  I felt I could safely assume the Magic/Resonance attribute was for the first points.  The only places where special attribute mattered for the Metatypes column was for the base amount (Human on Priority E), and for the difference between Dwarf and Ork on Priority C.  I felt like I could safely cost those points as Edge 2 (Human bonus applies at the end).  If you think this should be higher, then it will increase the derived costs of all the other metatype qualities.  For example, if you think that 1 attribute point for Priority E Humans should be costed as Magic 5, then the derived cost of all metatype qualities needs to go up by 15.

Looking at a character i did earlier that had skills A distributed like this:
skill 6 x 5 = 252 Karma
skill 4 x 2 =  80 Karma
skill 2 x 2 =  12 Karma
skill 1 x 4 =   8 Karma
skill grp 6 = 105 Karma
skill grp 4 =  50 Karma

Would end up being worth 507 Karma, far from optimized for Karma gain.

This is precisely the type of min-maxing which leads some people to use a karmagen system.  When you have flat "bp" costs, there are two extremes.  You can max as many things as you can and dump the rest, which maximizes the karma value of your bps.  Or you can spread them out evenly, which minimizes the value of your bps.  I'd prefer the default to be a mid-point where characters are above average on a few things, below average on a few things, and average on the rest.

This is "Karma Value" of Magic 4 -> Magic 6 (yes, this is quite a lot!!!)

The Karma value of Magic 4 -> Magic 6 is 55, as per the table on p107.

[MacAnu]

TLDR: Characters seem to be built with roughly ~745 or 750 (748 or 753?) karma.

I made SR5 chars with the Prio System that are worth 500-550 BP (in SR4A) even without the additional 25/50 Karmapoints  and 500-550 BP is a lot more that 750  Karma.
Some smart Guy (Apple maybe ? ) on Dumpschock calculated 450 Karma for worst kombination of the Priosystem and (IIRC)1150 or 1250 Karma for best Kombination
so much for that  calculation

I assumed the default is a midpoint between the two extremes: min-maxing the stats to maximize karma, and spreading out the stats to minimize karma.  You can see this in the attribute spreads I chose for benchmarks:

• E: 5/3/3/2/2/2/2/1 = 12 points and 165 karma; w/o the base karma, 0 karma from Priority level
• D: 5/3/3/3/2/2/2/2 = 14 points and 190 karma; w/o the base karma, 25 karma from Priority level
• C: 6/4/3/3/2/2/2/2 = 16 points and 235 karma; w/o the base karma, 70 karma from Priority level
• B: 6/4/4/4/3/3/2/2 = 20 points and 305 karma; w/o the base karma, 140 karma from Priority level
• A: 6/5/4/4/4/4/3/2 = 24 points and 390 karma; w/o the base karma, 225 karma from Priority level

And 750 is almost halfway between 450 and 1150 .

I did an awful job of making this clear in my first post.  My questions were "If we assume all priority levels provide the same amount of karma no matter what category they're spent on, how much would the metatype and magic/resonance qualities cost?" and also "If we wanted to design a karmagen and/or a priority karmagen system, how much karma should people start with?"  My question wasn't really "What is the karma value of characters you can generate using the Priority system?"