That is one of my favorite things to do as the GM is to toss a Willpower 1 guy into the AOE of Direct spells and toss the opposing mage in at the same time. Players almost ALWAYS want to hit all valid targets in the area, so they use enough to get the mage and are blasted by Drain. The team mage gets the epic "slaughter everyone" moment and then the team gets to mop up while the mage finds cover and clutches at his throbbing head. Helps keep Direct Combat mage in check while everyone else does their thing.I usually do this midway through the adventure, and then allow a spot for people to recover from Stun at least once (which mages are usually pretty good at) before the end game, I don't usually get Direct spell spammers though. People in my group tend to like Manipulations and elemental attacks/manifestations. My real trouble is controlling adepts and Critical Strike/Martial Arts combos.
Indeed. However, most of our adept players seem to prefer Inflitration boost + Silenced guns as much as the melee adepts. In other words, we don't get full ninjas, we get ranged-only ninjas or samurai types.
Yeah, until the adepts grab that 8th level of Critical Strike and sling 20 dice for unarmed around.
It's easier to up the pistols dice pool. Smartlinks being one big reason. You get the picture.
