[All4BigGuns]

Step 1: Hack Aesir satellite weapon platform.
Step 2: GTFO of Dodge
Step 3: Blast Insect Spirit nest with Thor missile
Step 4: Profit!

[schenn]

Also, 5E isn't 2E. Spirit fights aren't as nasty as they used to be.

[kyoto kid]

...if you have very superior firepower,  they're not.  We didn't. 

Keep in mind they get their hardened armour bonus in auto hits You pretty much need to have to characters team up, one going full lead hose with 10 rounds to bleed of it's dodge pool after which the second character with a sniper rifle does a B-E DT with a decent base DV to blow through its armour.  We had the auto fire component but not the sniper rifle. Again, you want to put a bug (or for that fact any) spirit down as fast as you can.

[Rift_0f_Bladz]

You can get AP -6 (or -8 with handloads and the depleted uranium rounds) on full auto weapons. Which will hurt harden armor values pretty well. That will reduce harden 18 down to 12, or 9 auto hits to 6. It is not a lot, but it is something. So, know spirits can be dealt with. You just have to expect them. Part of why you should always carry adps rounds (and hopefully someone with an EBR).

Edit: for mistakes

[kyoto kid]

....as this was a Missions session, depleted Uranium is not available (as Hard Targets has not been approved yet) and most likely will not be allowed because of the cancer side effect.  With an availability of 28 and base cost of 1,000¥ for 10 rounds, even if it were allowed , it would be extremely difficult and expensive to obtain under the Missions guidelines. 

Overwhelming firepower is the only real solution.

[Rift_0f_Bladz]

Even with missions, adps is still an option. But yes, it was not a kick-in-the-door style scene. But, even with mission rules it could be done. Just takes prepping for a bug hunt (which honestly, its Chicago, so you should prep for a bug hunt).

[Herr Brackhaus]

If Banishing didn't result in a Drain Value of resisting spirits Hits (not Net Hits) x 2, this could be a more effective way of dealing with spirits.

Even with the high drain values it might be worth the risk; the Spirit rolls Force + Summoner's Magic against your Magic + Banishing, so you might get lucky. Of course, you might get unlucky and blow your brain out of the back of your skull in the attempt, but hey, the Shadows are a grim place, chummer.

ETA:
Shadow Spirits, Master Shedim, and Insect Queens all have Banishing Resistance (services equal to Edge + services owed to summoner). Ouch...

[schenn]

APDS, you can also add a Bulls-Eye double tap to that to get more base AP out of your weapon before you even add the APDS, etc.

Think of it this way, if it were a goon in mil-spec, it would have just as many auto-hits in their armor.

Again, its not about just crushing everything you run up against, that's more D&D style.  Shadowrun is more tactics. What can I do in this situation to improve my odds.

Regardless of armor ratings and dodge ratings, everyone only has 8 + (body / 2) in hit points and 8 + (will / 2) in stun points (+ or - a couple with qualities and wares). As long as you can dodge their hits as well as they can dodge yours, then you'll win that battle of attrition by virtue of being a player and having more resources to draw on, such as the other runners who are with you.

[All4BigGuns]

If Banishing didn't result in a Drain Value of resisting spirits Hits (not Net Hits) x 2, this could be a more effective way of dealing with spirits.

It does seem like it would be better for Summoning, Binding and Banishing Drain values to be more along the lines of half the spirit's Force (-2 for Summoning and Banishing, +2 for Binding). This way it would still be harder and more draining/risky to use the skills on the higher Force spirits, but there isn't the possibility of a Force 6 blowing your skull up and a Force 8 going down like it's nothing.

[Mirikon]

Meh. If there wasn't the element of risk, then you'd have the roll-players calculating exactly how much it would take to always get F12 spirits on your side. Spirits are powerful force multipliers, the balance to that is that drawing on their power has the risk of causing your brains to run out through your ears. Eliminate or substantially reduce the risk, and you unbalance everything else. Make the risk a static value, and you eliminate the randomness that causes people to gamble on getting that good roll, or spending some edge to nudge the odds in their favor.

[All4BigGuns]

You don't design a game based off what the most ardent number-crunchers may or may not do. What those sorts do should be utterly ignored in the design.

All taking their actions into account does is make it so even more people have to move toward that to succeed.

[Mirikon]

No, Guns. Good design does indeed take into account how players may try to break the game, and look to prevent that, to the best of the designers' ability. As I said, spirits are powerful force multipliers. More than one crew has been saved by a timely spirit's arrival to hammer the opposition long enough to cover an escape, or to take out a key player so that they can advance. Such power has a requisite cost attached, and that cost is playing Russian roulette with your brains, much the same as casting spells can easily cause your brains to bleed out. Risk versus reward. HIgh reward options demands high risk, or you might as well type in the Konami code and be done.

[All4BigGuns]

No, it really shouldn't.

The design philosophy of taking the hardcore "crunchers" into account through things like the way spirit Drain works, low points and resources in generation, high costs for gear/implants and high advancement costs just further encourages more people to take the route of crunching the numbers. Making things the other way around more encourages what so many say they want to see--well-rounded and 'spread out' characters.

Basically, the ones getting hurt by that philosophy are the ones who DON'T do those things.

[Mirikon]

Nope. Because the 'normal' ones don't need to summon a F12 spirit in a fight when a F4 or F6 will do just fine. Because the non-crunchers will find other ways to solve a problem than by beating it with a hammer until it falls down. Taking steps to block the people who would break the game only hurts the crunchers and the people who refuse to THINK. For those people, there's World of Warcraft. To use video game comparisons, a Portal player (who is forced to think laterally and consider more than brute force solutions) would do far better with Shadowrun than a Call of Duty player (where everything is solved with violence).

Don't get me wrong, I love D&D, and one time in my group, after the rogue failed to pick the lock on the chest, the fighter looked to the DM and said, "Does it speak clubbish?" before breaking the chest to get the stuff inside, and we still talk about that to this day. But if you're thinking of brute force solutions in Shadowrun, then you're in for a long haul. Shadowrun is designed for risk and rewards to be on level with eachother. High reward actions, like bringing a powerful force multiplier onto the field (or kicking it off your opponent's field without brute force methods), carry high risks, because that's game balance. The randomness keeps people from getting too confident, for the same reasons why there are a million jokes about D&D characters fighting at full strength and using their most powerful abilities at 1 HP. That design choice is also why you have defense tests and damage resistance tests to try and soak damage, where sometimes a character might survive being shot by a sniper rifle, but fall to a Predator V on SA. It makes things unpredictable, which makes it so that risky actions can succeed if the dice gods are with you (rather than being something you look at a table and see if it is one of your A, B, or C choices from the game menu. It also makes it so that when the dark god Murphy can show up anywhere, anytime. A character may succeed at sniping a target from 2 kilometers out, but critically glitch a test and break their leg on their way to the next objective.

[All4BigGuns]

Sorry, but that, IMO, reeks of saying that what you're describing is "The One True Way" of playing the game.