[忍]

I'll start this off with the Hedge Witch/Wizard (expertise?). Can drain be reduced to zero?

Also The Aware does not state whether or not they can cast/summon/prep anything. "Their lone magical ability" doesn't explain what they can choose for their one Magical skill (or any other skill).

[SilverStallion]

The opposition metamagic (required to be taken by Pariahs) doesn't appear to exist.

Expanded Aspects feel as though they should have prices listed for Karma Buy

To answer one of your questions, it looks as if The Aware do not have any of the skills by the table o n the top of page 47. (Presumably the "lone magical ability" they choose would be assensing.)

Is Growth always resisted? The rules don't seem particularly clear in general on when manipulation spells are resisted (besides many of them being explicitly called out). The use of "net hits" in the description makes me believe it is resisted, but it also seems nearly useless in that case.

[SilverStallion]

Romani tradition points towards Wild Hunstman as a mentor spirit many Romani follow. I can't seem to find it anywhere.

Related, but was their drain code of Willpower + Willpower intended?

[Wakshaani]

I'll start this off with the Hedge Witch/Wizard (expertise?). Can drain be reduced to zero?

Also The Aware does not state whether or not they can cast/summon/prep anything. "Their lone magical ability" doesn't explain what they can choose for their one Magical skill (or any other skill).

Astral Perception is the only magical ability that they get. There's a chart that shows what each type of magician and what parts of magic they can access, to make life easier. (There's a small nerf to Mystic Adepts there, in fact.)

The one magical skill is *probably* going to be Astral Perception, but somebody might have some wild concept for a character in mind, so, they get the option to choose whatever. (But they should really be picking Astral Perception.)

[忍]

Assensing?

[Ogrepot]

Ok i just finished reading Forbidden Arcana:

-The Aware has 1 skill, i guess Assenssing or Astral Combat, since Astral Perception makes him dual.
-We need the points for the Karma buy and Life Modules (in my campaigns i always use life modules)
-I like the return of the "Apprentice" though
-I like the qualities also

[Jack_Spade]

Don't know if it was intentional or if it's a mistake, but

BAREHANDED ADEPT

allows a physical adept to cast a number of touch spells through their unarmed combat skill, without specifying that they need to be combat spells. If it was intentional this is a phenomenal ability, otherwise likely not worth the trouble with all the restrictions (Double Drain, max Force Magic/3)

[Jack_Spade]

Another one:

Harmonious Defense states " Note that whenever an adept uses harmonious defense, they automatically begin perceiving astrally."

Bearing in mind that adepts usually have to purchase the ability to astrally perceive, this reads as if getting this meta magic also gives you an ability worth a power point.


Edit:
Claw and Barrage spell are useless as written:
Claw has +3 and Barrage +4 more drain than a comparable elemental indirect damage spell, yet its only feature is two points less damage and four more AP.
Guess what: Casting a Fireball at 4 more Force will have the same AP and Drain but doesn't lose two points of damage and also gives a nice secondary effect.

[Reshy]

This power can be exploited for indefinite regeneration by taking a point of magic damage, and then not resting to regain physical damage boxes.  Still can spellcast till your stun boxes are full, and then rest an hour at a time till you get them back.  This means however that since you won't ever recover that 1 physical box, you have indefinite regeneration, because regeneration by definition cannot heal magically inflicted damage.  Aside from that, I don't know if the power is effective enough working as intended, but I'd have to check through play.




This ability allows you to detect qualities that they really ought not to, from things like whether or not you have a SIN, to if you have friends in high places, to alibi, etc.  It also removes all the possible surprise from Drakes, Infected, Blood Mages, Toxic Mages, etc. because you can just see if they have whichever traits associated with those (Drake or infected qualities, blood magic metamagics, etc.).  Honestly, I don't believe it should be able to see qualities or what specific metamagics a person knows, that'd make it too powerful and impossible to surprise someone with this quality.

[忍]

What's the Mentor Table for?

[Reshy]

This effect would be balanced if it wasn't for the fact that you'll almost never use spells with a force lower than your skill rating.  Most characters will likely have 6-7 in spellcasting, and will be casting usually force 6 spells, which means the threshold to notice will always be 1.  So a penalty on top of an easily noticed effect doesn't help at all.  So in essence it's a free -1 drain to those using the perceiving magic rules by RAW, as the threshold will rarely be above 1 to start with.  So unless the formula for perception is altered, I don't see this as anything but a straight upgrade to the Mentor Spirit quality (which is already pretty good). 

Current formula is a threshold of Skill - Force, for reference.  So a -3 threshold penalty when you'll rarely if ever use spells below force 5 is just a straight upgrade till these rules get changed.  Not to mention indirect combat spells like fireball are already visible tangible effects, so you couldn't even hide that to begin with.  So a free -1 drain code for combat mages is a massive boon to an already good quality.

[SlashXVI]

This effect would be balanced if it wasn't for the fact that you'll almost never use spells with a force lower than your skill rating.  Most characters will likely have 6-7 in spellcasting, and will be casting usually force 6 spells, which means the threshold to notice will always be 1.  So a penalty on top of an easily noticed effect doesn't help at all.  So in essence it's a free -1 drain to those using the perceiving magic rules by RAW, as the threshold will rarely be above 1 to start with.  So unless the formula for perception is altered, I don't see this as anything but a straight upgrade to the Mentor Spirit quality (which is already pretty good). 

Current formula is a threshold of Skill - Force, for reference.  So a -3 threshold penalty when you'll rarely if ever use spells below force 5 is just a straight upgrade till these rules get changed.  Not to mention indirect combat spells like fireball are already visible tangible effects, so you couldn't even hide that to begin with.  So a free -1 drain code for combat mages is a massive boon to an already good quality.

Well there is still the possibility to cast most spells at force 1 using reagents to set the limit, which is reasonably effective for illusion, manipulation and direct combat spells, maybe even some detection spells. Whether that is a worthwhile tradeoff will depend on your individual group though.

[Reshy]

Well there is still the possibility to cast most spells at force 1 using reagents to set the limit, which is reasonably effective for illusion, manipulation and direct combat spells, maybe even some detection spells. Whether that is a worthwhile tradeoff will depend on your individual group though.

Still, for those who aren't interested in being subtle this is a straight upgrade.  Even in most circumstances it's a straight upgrade.  If you're using reagents you're probably not being very stealthy about the casting when you pull out 5 crystals from your knapsack. 

[SlashXVI]

Still, for those who aren't interested in being subtle this is a straight upgrade.  Even in most circumstances it's a straight upgrade.  If you're using reagents you're probably not being very stealthy about the casting when you pull out 5 crystals from your knapsack.

This seems like it was the idea behind the whole thing, trading in subtlety for more efficiancy. Whether or not that is balanced will hugely depend on how high you value subtlety in your group. In my groups there seems to be a huge enphasys on subtlety and I have players using reagents to mask their magic relatively often, thus I do see this as a worthwhile trade, however if I were running a more pink mowhawk style campaign I would not allow this. 
As for the reagent use not being subtle, that heavily depends on how you imagine reagent usage to work. I don't think you have to wave around some item in order to get its mana charge to affact your spellcast, clutching an amulett, counting prayer beads, sliding your hand into your poket to grab whatever reagent you have in there can all be possibilities that will not be drawing all that much attention to your casting.
Still since this whole mask thing does not seem to have any cost attached to it, there should be some drawback attached and unless this is something that would be aplicable to my group, I would allow players to use it.

[Jack_Spade]

Onward with errors:

p.129
"Corpse Lash" tries to sell me that a resistance test with Strength+Body would have [Physical] as a limit

same page "Blood Blade" has Duration: S but the text talks about persisting for Force minutes. It's likely meant to be like Blood Whip and have an Instant Duration.