[kyoto kid]

I haz a sadz about Special Gear not being Char Gen legal.   

..well after reading the FAQ, not totally out of the question.

As is stated on P. 75

["We are not ruling out offering these as special rewards at the end of particular missions, but they cannot be taken at character creation or through expenditure of Karma afterwards"]

There are several missions/CMPs that do involve special rewards so it could be possible to end up with a smartlinked, personlised grip Auto Assault 16 that has almost sniper rifle accuracy.

[Hobbes]

Have to say, at 2 karma, Instinctive Hack is overpowered.

It would be if Hacking things in Combat was at all useful. 

In theory, a Decker or TM would have spotted most any silently running Icons long before (at least 6 seconds...) initiative is rolled and GIGO'd them.  But that would slow the game to a crawl.  Instinctive Hack is a Kludge to let a hacker character do something pre-combat without killing hours of table time on pointless Matrix rolls. 

Let the Decker brick a Mook's gun.  The big bads in Mission games typically don't have anything worth hacking.  There are a few, but not many. 

[Hobbes]

So, Dead SIN gives 20 Karma, and the only thing you have to do is not use the free Fake SIN and Licenses that it also gives?  Or is there some other way this negative quality comes into play?  I'm guessing it is supposed to be like having a real SIN, except you'll eventually get caught and have to pay back the 20 Karma loan you got at character creation.  A good deal for the person who needs the points now, and is willing to pay later.  Maybe Missions could have the character pay back 10 of the 20 points, and the other 10 get turned into a criminal SIN...

Negative Qualities rarely come up in Missions play in a significant way.  Phobias, Allergies, Addictions, Emotional Attachment, Weak Immune System, and on and on and on.  With a rotating cast of characters it's very difficult for a GM to keep track of what all is out there and work them into the story in a meaningful way. 

Dead SIN is actually one of the riskier ones because Missions occasionally takes you places where you get scanned 7 ways to Sunday and that would potentially trigger a 40 Karma pop in the nose. 

Its a cool story idea with less than ideal mechanics.  I don't like it personally, but if a player wants 25 Karma of Negative Qualities that will almost never trigger, they can easily find them. 

[Fedifensor]

I don't think there is any other valid interpretation.
Which is how we get long-running and painful to read arguments like the Adept Powers thread... 


The Blight rules can be interpreted as giving an alternate vector with alternate rules for that vector.  You may not agree with that interpretation, but that's different from saying there isn't one.  That is why FAQs and Errata exist - to clarify unclear rules.


I don't mind seeing specialty drugs that work better against a particular kind of target.  I do worry about Blight changing the game to the point where nearly every foe who doesn't care about the Forbidden availability starts packing a gun set up with capsule rounds.  Even with a good Body, any Awakened foe hit by Blight is effectively dead meat when contact-vector Blight neutralizes their magic and does Stun Drain.  It's just going to lead to an even greater push to min-max Defense pools, because that's a lot easier to do than get the 36 dice you'll need (on average) to fully negate the effect.  Or, I suppose mages can start wearing sealed suits whenever they can get away with it.  Regardless, Blight is now legal for SR games, and it's important to ensure there is a consistency across tables on how it is used.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Very fair critique Fedifensor.

I'm well aware of the inherent toxicity in the "there's only one way to read this" argument.  And still, despite being aware of that toxicity, I still only see one valid way to look at the question. It's either the DMSO + blight toxin has a different resistance mechanic but the same effect as "straight" blight, or DMSO + blight has a different resistance mechanic and a different but unstated effect.  Sorry, but as much of a pompous ass it makes me sound like to say it, but there's no logical way the latter can be the truth.

As for worries about game changing nature of blight:

1) on one hand, I *welcome* that game changing paradigm.  Wow, you can't just mop up a whole patrol of guards by siccing a spirit on them? Call it an *improvement* to the game in my mind.

as for the threat to characters:

2) SRM already has the 1st and 4th blanket rules.

3) Blight may be a miracle of chemical engineering, sure.  But dovetailing with why I think there's only one way to read the rule... it still obeys the general toxins rules.  When mixed with DMSO it has a contact vector, which means your chemical protection rating will add bonus dice to the drain test.  Honestly, if I were to break blanket rules 1 and 4 and target a player's fun, I wouldn't add capsule rounds with DMSO+blight to an NPC I'd add a dart weapon w straight blight.  I've seen way too many cases of fully soaking 12 drain to trust it to take away your magic.

4) I played a Decker thru season 8 of Chicago.  Nothing to hack.  I still had fun because I built a character that wasn't one dimensional.  It's true you're encouraged to play what you want in organized play, but color me unsympathetic if you make a character that can't do anything if your primary schtick is denied.

5) An antidote patch costs 50¥.  It's not like it's hard to remove a toxin that affects your character.

[Fedifensor]

I'm well aware of the inherent toxicity in the "there's only one way to read this" argument.  And still, despite being aware of that toxicity, I still only see one valid way to look at the question. It's either the DMSO + blight toxin has a different resistance mechanic but the same effect as "straight" blight, or DMSO + blight has a different resistance mechanic and a different but unstated effect.  Sorry, but as much of a pompous ass it makes me sound like to say it, but there's no logical way the latter can be the truth.

Er, the stated effect is Stun Drain...which, since it can't be bypassed (for a time) by a patch, is significantly more powerful than Stun damage.  Narcoject, by comparison, ONLY does Stun damage...and it's one of the most powerful injection toxins in the game.

As for worries about game changing nature of blight:

1) on one hand, I *welcome* that game changing paradigm.  Wow, you can't just mop up a whole patrol of guards by siccing a spirit on them? Call it an *improvement* to the game in my mind.

I'm not a big fan of countering a known problem by introducing a new problem.  High Force spirits are a problem, and I feel Neo-Tokyo at least tries to counter this with the Magic Surveillance section of the FAQ.  A caster that drops a Force 9 spirit on a group of guards is like a Street Samurai using a grenade launcher to take out the same guards - not subtle at all, and inviting a huge response from the NTMP.

as for the threat to characters:

2) SRM already has the 1st and 4th blanket rules.

And yet, we still need a 90+ page FAQ.  I've seen enough SRM GMs (and module authors) break Rule 1 to know why.

3) Blight may be a miracle of chemical engineering, sure.  But dovetailing with why I think there's only one way to read the rule... it still obeys the general toxins rules.  When mixed with DMSO it has a contact vector, which means your chemical protection rating will add bonus dice to the drain test.  Honestly, if I were to break blanket rules 1 and 4 and target a player's fun, I wouldn't add capsule rounds with DMSO+blight to an NPC I'd add a dart weapon w straight blight.  I've seen way too many cases of fully soaking 12 drain to trust it to take away your magic.

Nothing in certain with dice, but on average you'll need 36 dice to soak 12 drain.  Even rolling well (1 hit per 2 dice), you're going to need 24 dice...which is doable with experienced mages if you build for it, but not trivial.

4) I played a Decker thru season 8 of Chicago.  Nothing to hack.  I still had fun because I built a character that wasn't one dimensional.  It's true you're encouraged to play what you want in organized play, but color me unsympathetic if you make a character that can't do anything if your primary schtick is denied.

I played a combo decker/face for Chicago, who only drew his Colt Agent Special (9 dice, including smartlink) if there was absolutely no other option.  Some of those modules for Chicago should have (at a minimum) had some OOC warning telling people that if they're playing a dedicated decker, they're not going to have much to do.  I have to roll my eyes on the rare occasions we finish a module without a combat, and someone complains they didn't get to fight...


Regardless, I'm not a big fan of countering a known problem by introducing a new one.

5) An antidote patch costs 50¥.  It's not like it's hard to remove a toxin that affects your character.

Does an antidote patch restore your connection to the manasphere, or remove Stun Drain (which, to my knowledge, only recovers with natural healing)?  It's at best +6 dice to the roll, and can't counter an immediate effect toxin unless it was used in the 20 minutes before the attack.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Er, the stated effect is Stun Drain...

No, see that's demonstrably incorrect.

The Stun Resistance test is in place of the Toxin Resistance test.

That is NOT the same thing as the effect.

[Fedifensor]

Er, the stated effect is Stun Drain...

No, see that's demonstrably incorrect.

The Stun Resistance test is in place of the Toxin Resistance test.

That is NOT the same thing as the effect.

If the Drain Resistance test was solely to determine whether the person loses access to the manasphere, I would agree.  However, it does Stun Drain, which is just as much of an effect as Narcoject's Stun damage.  In fact, any toxin that does damage (Physical or Stun) has it under the Effect line.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

So if the drain is the effect, for argument's sake what is the test for the toxin resistance test?

I ask because you're arguing one of two things: there's the effect of drain and there's no resistance test to prevent having to resist drain, or you're arguing that there's a resistance test in the form of testing against drain for no toxin effect.

[Fedifensor]

So if the drain is the effect, for argument's sake what is the test for the toxin resistance test?

The exact text is "they must make a Drain Resistance test in place of a Toxin Resistance test vs. the power of the toxin" (emphasis mine).  There is no Toxin Resistance test.  It does not say "in addition to", or otherwise mention a separate effect besides saying "Damage taken is treated as Stun Drain."


Now, maybe we can agree to disagree, and let a few other people get a word in edgewise about the overall content of the FAQ...

[Marcus]

One of the things about the setting is that itself regulates. Sure blight is gonna win ya a couple fights with magic users, but after that magic users will adjust. DMSO blight is totally legit. But so is packing around a remove toxin preparation. Or going to chem seal or some other proflactic method will be developed. A spell that prevent poisons effect, a slap patch antidote. Back in 4th we all switched to sticknshock. By the time anniversy edition was released every npc Under the sun had insulated armor. Yes tech got stronger but magic gas had 3 really strong books, so it all works out.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Using toxins, SR5 pg 409:

When a toxin comes into play, note its Speed to determine
when it takes effect. At the end of the appropriate
Combat Turn, the victim makes a Toxin Resistance Test
to see if the toxin takes effect. This test uses Body +
Willpower + the rating of any protective gear/systems;
each hit reduces the toxin’s Power by 1 point. If the
Power is reduced to zero, the toxic substance takes no
effect; otherwise, apply the effect depending on the
remaining Power level.

So game mechanics-wise, the process works thusly:

1) character is hit with a DMSO+blight capsule round. we check the speed: immediate.  It takes effect at the end of the same combat turn.
2) at the end of that same combat turn, we make the toxin resistance test.  Only we don't use the cited dice pools, because blight toxin specifically calls out a drain test in place of the standard toxin resistance test.  Specific > General.  In this specific case, each hit on the drain resistance test is simultaneously averting 1 point of drain damage (because it's a drain test) and lowering the power of the toxin by 1 (because the drain test is in place of the toxin resistance test).
3) If we did not reduce the power to 0 (i.e. you suffered any drain) we go on to apply the effect based on the remaining power of the toxin.  The passage discussing mixing DMSO with Blight never says the effect is changed/removed, only that the toxin resistance test is replaced.  Ergo, the effect is still there and we apply the formula to see how long the victim is a mundane now.

Now there IS certainly room to argue or ask for clarification about certain aspects, like what happens if you resist 11 of the 12 drain... since I reduced the power to 1 will I correspondingly only suffer the minimum result of 1 hour of being a mundane?  I'd argue no.. the effect lists a foruma of 12-body or magic, not Power-Body or Magic... so technically even if you resist 11 of the 12 drain you still suffer full effect as if you didn't reduce the power at all.  THAT is something that may not be intended, and certainly could be clarified if they choose to see it as necessary.

[Marcus]

Now there IS certainly room to argue or ask for clarification about certain aspects, like what happens if you resist 11 of the 12 drain... since I reduced the power to 1 will I correspondingly only suffer the minimum result of 1 hour of being a mundane?  I'd argue no.. the effect lists a foruma of 12-body or magic, not Power-Body or Magic... so technically even if you resist 11 of the 12 drain you still suffer full effect as if you didn't reduce the power at all.  THAT is something that may not be intended, and certainly could be clarified if they choose to see it as necessary.

That is a very god and interesting question SSRD, cause that's pretty crazy. We should certainly get an answer to that.
 

[Hobbes]

One of the things about the setting is that itself regulates. Sure blight is gonna win ya a couple fights with magic users, but after that magic users will adjust. DMSO blight is totally legit. But so is packing around a remove toxin preparation. Or going to chem seal or some other proflactic method will be developed. A spell that prevent poisons effect, a slap patch antidote. Back in 4th we all switched to sticknshock. By the time anniversy edition was released every npc Under the sun had insulated armor. Yes tech got stronger but magic gas had 3 really strong books, so it all works out.

If any of the Magical Boss fights in Missions make it to a 2nd turn you're probably looking at a TPK.  3 Spells from a high threat mage is going to wreck most teams, 2nd turn is just going to be mop up.  Geek the mage or die trying. 

[Marcus]

Im not sure i get your point Hobbes? The same can be said for most every fight SR. Magic or not. It's just more true with magic.

Blight is just gonna end them even faster, and make having a mage less critical.