Shadowrun
Shadowrun General => The Secret History => Topic started by: Parker on <01-25-15/0244:56>
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Was watching 'Deadman Wonderland' on Adult Swim and the episode reminded me of some other examples, (both TV and literary), of supposed blood-magic powers analogous to a physical adept's power(s) through traditional mana-based magic. So what'ya think? Could a phys-ad follower of the Blood Path create simple melee weapons and/or armor from their own blood or obtained from sacrifice? Awaiting replies. Whether actual opinion or verbal smack-downs don't matter. 8)
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Seems like an obvious expression of existing powers like Mystic Armor and Killing Hands. It doesn't have to literally be blood, but just look like it; although using actual blood from a sacrifice would be dope as Hell.
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Hm. I'd agree with Crimsondude. I might consider this sort of thing a F/X variation of the Power Bleed blood adept metamagic - though obviously they'd get more bang for their buck if they were to swipe someone else's power. While the only adept power I can find with Reach is Spirit Ram, there's nothing to say that a GM can't create something (perhaps 0.5 PP per +1 Reach, max 3? Prerequisite of Killing Hands?) that grants it - and then an adept could combine it with Killing Hands to manifest a sort of mystic construct / psi sword / mana lance / whatever you want to call it in the shape of a weapon, enabling them to use it with their weapon skill.
Actually, I kind of like that idea, just seperate from the Sacrifice / blood magic questino ...
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Oh, I definitely want to avoid giving it enough projection to provide a Reach bonus.
Blood claws, spikes, or short blades, though preferably running parallel to the body, would work. I'm not in favor of a blood katana or something like that. I guess it would work, and it emphasizes the powers inherent in Threats that aren't available to PCs, but ... YMMV.
Don't forget elemental effects, too (Generally, treat as Water).
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Gross water.
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Oh, I definitely want to avoid giving it enough projection to provide a Reach bonus.
Blood claws, spikes, or short blades, though preferably running parallel to the body, would work. I'm not in favor of a blood katana or something like that. I guess it would work, and it emphasizes the powers inherent in Threats that aren't available to PCs, but ... YMMV.
Don't forget elemental effects, too (Generally, treat as Water).
While I agree a blood katana would be a little silly, something more along the lines of blood lance would be pretty awesome. Something where you cause a wound and the blood strikes out viper-quick, impaling the target from a decent distance away. Consider it a melee attack with a +2 or +3 Reach; or a ranged one, I suppose. What'd be worse is letting a successful attack with that allow you to do it again, and again, until nobody is in range. Extremely powerful move, provided people clump together (like in horror movies).
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Oooooooh.
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Interesting idea - definitely would make a good NPC at the very least. You could have an option to transfer drain/stun when your adept power time elapses through an attack that does damage = to your stun with a successful hit. Might be too imbalancing for PCs, but it could be interesting use of blood magic with a more physical component.
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I'm thinking more of the 'distance strike' from previous editions - but you can either create and 'throw' multiple blood lances at (Willpower? Magic? probably Magic)P damage per lance, at a cost of 1 blood point per lance, or throw one (more powerful) lance and put more blood points into it, increasing your damage by +1 per blood point spent.
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I'm not familiar with 'distance strike' --- I'll have to go back and check it out; sounds interesting. Can the blood point cost be paid by the adept and/or their victims? I remember reading some fluff where a blood mage could cut themselves to power their spells (or at least boost their power). I'm still making my way back through 3rd and 4th edition sourcebooks. IIRC, blood magic was around in 2nd edition, but not for PCs....
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Distance Strike let adepts make an Unarmed attack up to (Magic)m away.
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And blood magic can be sourced by the mage/adept themselves, yes. In Shadowrun it's more potent with an unwilling victim. I would never allow an adept to gain blood points from the blood lance attack itself, though.
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First this is a great thread.
I agree with you Wyrm, but how about another power/spell that can be used to reacquire blood points.
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... uh, no? That's what the Sacrifice metamagic is for. IMO, there should be nothing else that enables you to do so. Otherwise you wind up with a moderate-to-high initiate blood mage standing on top of the Aztechnology-Seattle pyramid with a massive blood-storm surrounding them as first thousands, then tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands of people die to feed the terrifying whirlwind of blood, death, chaos, and destruction that finally summons the Horrors across the span between worlds, all with minimal Drain for him.
... sounds like a great run - and a Harry Dresden novel. Now all you need is a tyrannosaurus rex to necromancy back to pseudo-life and ride around upon ...
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You mean Harlequin's Back? :P
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Maybe - but with a much more, err, visible effect. Higher death toll. You know, wipe out a major city, that sort of thing ...
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Lol, that was a good book actually. Funny thing, the Dresden books have a kind of SR feel to them.
As for the my point, kinda of a significantly weaker version of the sacrifice metamagic, and a decent drain code. But, I generally enjoy more pink/crazy games. But if it would be way to powerful than I can understand.
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Sounds more like something out of either Warhammer universe.
But yes, as an NPC power it sounds emencely awesome. Maybe tie it in with either Aztechnology (duh) renegades, some cabal (possible Fear the Dark) or even a copy cat of the Mayan Killer
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There really isn't a weaker version; you either gain blood points or you don't, whatever the ratio. Gaining blood points means gaining power, which can simply feed into the next time you use the spell/ability/whatever. If it's 'weaker', really it just means you need to slaughter more people, and those who would do it in the first place aren't going to blink at a few (or a few dozen) more corpses.