Building Aspected Magician Principles: Aspected Magicians are practical magicians, not expert magicians:
That is, they use their magic to compliment a non-magic specialty, unlike magicians who are optimized to be magical specialists. This makes them more like adepts than full magicians. Aspected magicians are deckers, faces, combatants, etc. with magical tools at their disposal. It should not be their job to cover the role of magical specialist solely if a magical specialist is required, though many aspected magicians can pick up some of those duties in a pinch or compliment a more traditional magical specialist.
Aspected Magicians take advantage of low Magic ratings: While aspected magicians are closest in design to adepts, their difference is that adepts scale with higher magic (more magic = more power points and more potential initiations = more power points) and aspected magicians don't. Their value is that they can keep a low magic and leverage it for their particular roles.
There are a lot of great things that you can do well with just Magic 1, including: Assensing, Counterspelling, wield a weapon focus, use other foci, have a mentor spirit, learn a metamagic, and access magical qualities.
Ritual Spellcasting and Alchemy use Magic in dice pools, but they are not limited by Magic rating (but by magical lodge rating and reagents), allowing people to be good at them without a high Magic rating, cobbling dice pools together with mentors, specializations, qualities, and foci. Foci for these pools are more broadly applied than more typical spell/spirit ones. Ex. Magic 1, Ritual 6, Spec 2, Foci 4 gets 13 dice for ritual tests, which has very good odds against F4 rituals (eight dice). Mentor spirits, Restricted Gear with R8 foci, etc. you can get this much higher.
Priority D Magic is your friend (almost always): Besides some niche builds that are probably better built as full magicians anyway, you want to take Aspected at Priority D. The step up from E to D is rather minor in every other category, but going from mundane to Magic is a huge deal, opening a ton of fun things to play with and avenues for future growth.
This is also a bonus compared to magicians and adepts, because you need minimal investment at character generation in Magic, letting your magical character take advantage of having high priorities in other domains. Being able to be a more priority intensive metatype, having resources for 'ware/foci/gear, having higher edge, etc. can be really valuable for your character!
Aspected magicians can see meaningful growth in play:Unlike other shadowrun builds where even in the longest campaigns your characters aren't experiencing more than 20% growth (ex. 150 karma) and growth that happens is usually wide (ex. picking up a few new skills and such) instead of tall (ex.increasing maxed attributes), aspected magicians can see dramatic growth throughout their campaign. Ex. Raising Magic from 1 to 2 and picking up two metamagics is only 40 karma. This can ramp up a competent character at character generation into something much more interesting/powerful very early on. Compare to a Magic 6 magician who who needs 50 karma to initiate and raise Magic to 7. It's a a power boost, but it isn't all that dramatic in comparison nor change much about your character.
Basically, your initial build should be optimized enough to your non-magic specialty; you should have a character that highly competent in their role. But instead of investing in direct growth in that specialty, aspected magicians can target growth at the more dramatic and faster occuring magic area (learning new spells, metamagics, getting new foci, etc. raising magic from low to medium) that also indirectly makes you better at your specialty.
Character ConceptsI have more of a list somewhere, and I can post more builds if people like. The forums don't have a spoiler option anymore so I don't like putting full builds into comments unless desired.
Two characters I have played:
Intuitive Private Investigator -
Priority: EBDAC (human, any)
A social expert with minors (in this case infiltration and assensing/ guidance spirits) that takes up psychometry early in their career. This character type works just fine as a face, can mind their own in a fight, and brings unique magical elements to the table. This example character is an aspected conjurer, but works with any aspected magician (Aware and Apprentice included).
Osmosis:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6kA-rvHAq-reHJ3TF9SU29ZQ1U/viewChanneling VR Decker -
Priority: AEDCB (dwarf, conjurer)
This unique aspected conjurer is a VR decker that can summon its own body guard (F6 Guardian Spirit) when going VR limp. GM permitting, (I of course would allow it), after the character picks up channeling, the decker do matrix stuff in VR while a channelled spirit can animate their body--a VR decker that can leave its body functional in the hands of a spirit!
Waterloo:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6kA-rvHAq-rR3UyLUJfY29tMFU/viewOther concepts:
Anti-Magic Melee/Tank Cybersamuari -
A Magic 1 aspected sorcerer with high counterspelling and a weapon focus. This lets your physical focused character be able to be less vulnerable spells, particularly direct ones, and be able to go more toe-to-toe with creatures with hardened armor/astral. Compares to a melee adept, but trades some initiative/dodge for armor/hardiness/magical defense.
Channeling Melee Combatant
Priority: BADEC (ork,conjurer)
Basically max Agility and soft max all other physicals to be at max 7. Magic 4, Edge 3. Skills only go to a weapon, summoning, and basics. Use resources to get a weapon focus and a summoning focus, nice armor/outfits, cool car, etc. Once you get channeling, your combat prowess goes way up, getting a big initiative boost, a +4 to all physicals, and spirit powers.
Troll Face Conjurer!
Priority: AEDBC (Conjurer, Troll)
There is always someone who wants to play a troll face magician. Aspected troll face conjurers are actually a lot of fun! A Magic 4 troll with a cyberarm and some charisma boosters can be an excellent face, pistoleer, and summon meaningful spirits!
Necromancer!
Necromancy is kind of a crappily worded metamagic that has a lot of past edition copy and paste issues. It is not worth it for a character who actually is good at summoning spirits and casting spells. But as an Magic D Apprentice, a character can fulfill the pre-req of being able to summon spirits of man and use rituals and learn Necromancy. Necromancy is a metamagic that has a lot of rituals to learn within the single metamagic (karma efficient), and its rituals take minutes instead of hours (making them more practical in more campaigns). With just a little investment in a Ritual spellcasting pool, you can have a competent shadowrunner who is also a Necromancer!