Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: funkytim on <12-29-20/2353:34>
-
I was looking a creating a mage in shadowrun 6. It seems to me that there is no advantage to taking magic as a higher priority than D. Especially if you are putting resources at E. Magic at A gets you magic 4 and 8 spells. You need at least a Metatype of priority D to get Magic attribute 6 without spending karma and you would have two points left for edge. If you moved magic to D and Metatype to C You would have a nine points to put into magic and edge giving you a 6 magic and 4 edge. The 2 edge would cost 35 karma to get from 2 to 4 and the 6 spells you lose cost 30 karma. That's 5 extra karma without taking into account all the extra attributes and skills you get from by moving those two up to A and B.
Anyway, here is my question. Does taking advantage of this frowned upon by GM's as being a "rule lawyer" or is this how people are using character creation for mages? Thanks for the input.
-
You can't buy spells with chargen karma, so that's basically the driver for a higher magic priority pick.
-
That it is not possible to buy spells from CharGen karma is news to me. The text just says "spent on skill or attribute advancement, as well as additional funds" but somehow I was always assuming you can do everything with that Karma that you can do with later Karma. The German rule book even states " zum Beispiel für Verbesserungen von Fertigkeiten oder Attributen ausgegeben, vielleicht auch für zusätzliche Geldmittel" which translates into "for example for advancement of skills or attributes, maybe also for additional funds".
Would it be helpful to clearly state what is NOT allowed to buy from chargen Karma?
- Can a mage buy alchemic formulas or rituals?
- Can a technomancer buy complex forms?
- Can a technomancer buy submersion or a mage initiation?
-
You spend chargen karma during step four of the chargen process.
Each character receives 50
Karma to make a little move forward. The points
are spent on skill or attribute advancement, as
well as additional funds to get those last gear
pieces you might have missed or an additional
quality (though the limit of six qualities still applies).
See Character Advancement (p. 68) for the
price of buying these advances.
Remember that you can spend Karma to buy
cash for the next step at a rate of 2,000 nuyen per
point of Karma, or 5,000 with the In Debt quality.
TL;DR: You can spend karma on:
1) Attributes
2) Skills
3) Qualities
4) Gear
4a) Converting karma to nuyen for more 4) Gear.
So this means no:
Initiating
Buying Spells
Buying Complex Forms
Bonding Foci
etc. etc. etc.
The lone caveat I'm aware of:
Martial Arts are purchasable with chargen karma (Firing Squad, pg 97). That retroactively adds a 5th thing you can spend chargen karma on.
Edit: I see you're referencing the German language edition, which I can't comment on. Not only do I not speak German, Pegasus is empowered to make what end up being in effect changes to the game. As an example, as of the last time I checked the Pegasus CRB they had a different erratum for the Ares Dragon's body stat than CGL issued. So, it is what it is, depending on which edition you're playing! If in the German language edition Step 4 doesn't copy the CGL's text that fails to allow for spells, then maybe it is possible to buy spells in the German language version of the game. But that has no bearing on the CGL/English language edition.
Edit edit: It's been brought to my attention since I originally posted that chargen karma is indeed fully fungible in the German/Pegasus SR6 rules. And I must concede that there is no formal ruling given for English that is conflicting with that, so if your table prefers it that way, by all means play it that way. But do bear in mind that if you play it that way, then yeah... the Magic Priority pick IS basically broken as the OP discovered. Also bear in mind that for SRM, there very much IS a formal "clarification" that in organized play the restrictive reading is in play. So bear that in mind if that's what you're building a character for.
-
That it is not possible to buy spells from CharGen karma is news to me. The text just says "spent on skill or attribute advancement, as well as additional funds" but somehow I was always assuming you can do everything with that Karma that you can do with later Karma. The German rule book even states " zum Beispiel für Verbesserungen von Fertigkeiten oder Attributen ausgegeben, vielleicht auch für zusätzliche Geldmittel" which translates into "for example for advancement of skills or attributes, maybe also for additional funds".
Would it be helpful to clearly state what is NOT allowed to buy from chargen Karma?
- Can a mage buy alchemic formulas or rituals?
- Can a technomancer buy complex forms?
- Can a technomancer buy submersion or a mage initiation?
You can buy a spell formula you just can't spend the karma to learn it. Math wise its still by far the best choice to go D magic, you just have to be lame with 2 spells for a while. Spells are cheap to learn with karma, everything else you improved by not having A or B magic would cost buckets more karma. Spend some starting resources on buying a formula or 3 make your first 18 karma go to spells. Which is why this method for char gen balance is bad IMO. Its not about balance but trying to make it less fun to get people to avoid it.
-
Well now that I reread that section I can see that. The rules were different for in this regard for 5th edition so I guess I just assumed.
-
Unfortunately the Genesis character creator reflects the German rules, so though it is a popular character creator, it will let you do non Catalyst-RAW stuff even when set to English content.
And yeah that means in German rules that high Magic priority is a complete trap.
Honestly I liked it better at release when you had to live with whatever Magic rating was in the priority column.
-
Both versions stink.
IMO Karmagen is the only saviour from the dumbster fire that is 6th Editions character creation. Which gives me some weird tickles that this Edition might not introduce any alternative chargen methods after all.
Because remember, peeps: If its broken, don´t fix it. Just smile and keep pretending it's not broken. ;D
-
You spend chargen karma during step four of the chargen process.
Each character receives 50
Karma to make a little move forward. The points
are spent on skill or attribute advancement, as
well as additional funds to get those last gear
pieces you might have missed or an additional
quality (though the limit of six qualities still applies).
See Character Advancement (p. 68) for the
price of buying these advances.
Remember that you can spend Karma to buy
cash for the next step at a rate of 2,000 nuyen per
point of Karma, or 5,000 with the In Debt quality.
TL;DR: You can spend karma on:
1) Attributes
2) Skills
3) Qualities
4) Gear
4a) Converting karma to nuyen for more 4) Gear.
So this means no:
Initiating
Buying Spells
Buying Complex Forms
Bonding Foci
etc. etc. etc.
The lone caveat I'm aware of:
Martial Arts are purchasable with chargen karma (Firing Squad, pg 97). That retroactively adds a 5th thing you can spend chargen karma on.
Edit: I see you're referencing the German language edition, which I can't comment on. Not only do I not speak German, Pegasus is empowered to make what end up being in effect changes to the game. As an example, as of the last time I checked the Pegasus CRB they had a different erratum for the Ares Dragon's body stat than CGL issued. So, it is what it is, depending on which edition you're playing! If in the German language edition Step 4 doesn't copy the CGL's text that fails to allow for spells, then maybe it is possible to buy spells in the German language version of the game. But that has no bearing on the CGL/English language edition.
Edit edit: It's been brought to my attention since I originally posted that chargen karma is indeed fully fungible in the German/Pegasus SR6 rules. And I must concede that there is no formal ruling given for English that is conflicting with that, so if your table prefers it that way, by all means play it that way. But do bear in mind that if you play it that way, then yeah... the Magic Priority pick IS basically broken as the OP discovered. Also bear in mind that for SRM, there very much IS a formal "clarification" that in organized play the restrictive reading is in play. So bear that in mind if that's what you're building a character for.
So do the archetypes in the book follow these rules? The combat mage starts with 10 spells and the street shaman starts with 13. Without spending chargen karma on spells the max you could have is 8.
-
Unfortunately, no.
The archetypes were written at a stage of the book's development before all the rules got finalized, and were not given a final "combing over" to ensure they still complied with all the changes that got made since they were written. Once you start looking for them, you can find lots of errors in the archetypes rooted in this.
-
was issues with printed archetypes in last edition as well. not very good since a lot of (newer) people use them as reference and to double check if they understood and resolved rules as intended.... :/
-
Don't forget magic priority is key for mysads still if they want any power points...
I houserule that char gen karma can be used for anything in game karma can be used for...(char gen being a pretty arbitrary point in a PCs life) I am going to ask that spells learnt this way have to have the spell formula bought too so it's not quite as cheap an option but who wants to play a D&D level 1 wizard with 1 spell (ok, that reference is possibly seriously dated as I haven't played D&D in decades but you get my point :))
-
Don't forget magic priority is key for mysads still if they want any power points...
I houserule that char gen karma can be used for anything in game karma can be used for...(char gen being a pretty arbitrary point in a PCs life) I am going to ask that spells learnt this way have to have the spell formula bought too so it's not quite as cheap an option but who wants to play a D&D level 1 wizard with 1 spell (ok, that reference is possibly seriously dated as I haven't played D&D in decades but you get my point :))
Hey at level 2 you can be come a spells caster.
But yes, as I said above the problem with this design is it doesn't balance the options for char gen, it just makes some options less fun. 2 spells until you can spend your karma just isn't a fun option, but you'd be insane to do different given the karma costs.
-
Unfortunately, no.
The archetypes were written at a stage of the book's development before all the rules got finalized, and were not given a final "combing over" to ensure they still complied with all the changes that got made since they were written. Once you start looking for them, you can find lots of errors in the archetypes rooted in this.
Really Appreciate your input Stainless. Along with everyone else.
-
Speaking of the archetypes, anyone have any insight on whether there is a plan to correct these as a point of errata? I can rationalize them to a new player by saying that they are not "starting level" characters and either everyone uses one of these or everyone builds one themselves. They may be higher powered by comparison to starter characters, but maybe they are balanced to each other at least? Seems like the main things that would be borked would be skill and stat points perhaps (though the Trolls arm looks iffy at a glance -- haven't researched it tho).
I started making a player aid document for building your own or choosing a legal pre-built version because of the archetype issues not being addressed.
-
Speaking of the archetypes, anyone have any insight on whether there is a plan to correct these as a point of errata? I can rationalize them to a new player by saying that they are not "starting level" characters and either everyone uses one of these or everyone builds one themselves. They may be higher powered by comparison to starter characters, but maybe they are balanced to each other at least? Seems like the main things that would be borked would be skill and stat points perhaps (though the Trolls arm looks iffy at a glance -- haven't researched it tho).
I started making a player aid document for building your own or choosing a legal pre-built version because of the archetype issues not being addressed.
It actually is a possibility. Cant promise it will happen, but it's absolutely within the realm of plausibility.
A hitch is that they cant really be "fact checked"... since you have to make assumptions about what the priority picks were. Essentially, proofed pregens have to be rebuilt from the ground up.
-
Printed archetypes have been borked for several editions now (which is sad since they are one of the first resources that new players and GMs use when trying to get a grasp around the overly complicated chargen process that Shadowrun have) so I haven't really payed too much attention to them....
Two comments;- Have anyone actually done the math and figured out just how wrong they are?
- I know there have been some fan-made attempts to fix archetypes in previous editions. Anyone attempted something similar for SR6 yet?
-
I had a thought I might try it. I'm building in very general ways, aiming for starting characters for new players, omitting things like cyberlimbs that are badly explained or otherwise a poor of resources. I started with a decker, who came out pretty impressive even without super-optimizing with exceptional attribute type qualities.
That led me to a thought that I should also provide a new player with a "how to" guide, which led me to the fact that the Matrix rules are incomplete or only vaguely explained, and thus right on the edge of unusable for a totally new player using what landed in the book.
I think combat and sorcery probably work okay as written. Drone riggers might be salvageable since they would play at a character scale. I'd probably at least try stat up one of those. If I can get through the Matrix draft, I can get through anything. Thankfully the folks here have some walkthroughs that I can lean on.
-
Two comments;- Have anyone actually done the math and figured out just how wrong they are?
- I know there have been some fan-made attempts to fix archetypes in previous editions. Anyone attempted something similar for SR6 yet?
It was easier just to remake them, and yes. Should be a post in the character forms, but it's over a year old. May have to dig a ways to find it if you're curious to see my take on them. Eventually I'll re-do them to be Missions compliant and re-post them.
-
Plus, I don't know how that combat mage archetype would actually cast any more than a couple spells in a run. The logic and willpower are so low that most spells will cause drain damage every time a spell with over dv of 2 is cast. One bad roll and your dice pool mods will just start to build up.
-
For the benefit of those coming to this thread later, here's someone's rewrite of the current (and some past) archetypes for 6e:
https://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=30450.msg529613#msg529613
-
Plus, I don't know how that combat mage archetype would actually cast any more than a couple spells in a run. The logic and willpower are so low that most spells will cause drain damage every time a spell with over dv of 2 is cast. One bad roll and your dice pool mods will just start to build up.
The Combat Mage should have Logic 6 and Charisma 2 instead of Logic 3 Charisma 5. Her Contacts give this away - she has 6 points of Contacts which is how many she would get if she had Charisma 2. Dunno what happened, my guess is maybe she was a shaman at some earlier revision and she didn't get completely fixed.