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Magic in SR6?

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Marcus

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« Reply #75 on: <07-12-19/2158:47> »
Goodness Dez. I understand you're doing the grad school thing, and that's totally great. But perhaps aim for 2 paragraphs?
I feel like reading the opening remarks at the UN here.
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dezmont

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« Reply #76 on: <07-12-19/2159:44> »
Goodness Dez. I understand you're doing the grad school thing, and that's totally great. But perhaps aim for 2 paragraphs?
I feel like reading the opening remarks at the UN here.

LISTEN, when I get nervous about having to write something, I write something else!

Where do you think the 6000 words on martial arts came from?!?

It is an impractical solution to the problem as opposed to just... finishing the work, but there ya go.

The TL;DR was basically that just because people might break the game doesn't mean the game should be broken, because 'baseline' balance matters a lot to players on an emotional level as well as just in terms of basic usability.
« Last Edit: <07-12-19/2205:43> by dezmont »

Marcus

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« Reply #77 on: <07-12-19/2208:48> »
LISTEN, when I get nervous about having to write something, I write something else!

Where do you think the 6000 words on martial arts came from?!?

Clearly a good habit and skill to have. But I would suggest the forums are not something you need to be nervous about.
We may get tense from time to time, but all the regulars are just the SR family. Maybe a slightly dysfunction and very opinionated family.
But still the SR family.
« Last Edit: <07-12-19/2213:21> by Marcus »
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dezmont

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« Reply #78 on: <07-12-19/2213:49> »
LISTEN, when I get nervous about having to write something, I write something else!

Where do you think the 6000 words on martial arts came from?!?

Clearly a good habit and skill to have. But I would suggest the forums are not something you need to be nervous about.
They may get tense from time to time, but all the regulars are just the SR family. Maybe a slightly dysfunction and very opinionated family.
But still the SR family.

I am familiar with those! And I trust you are all nice people, I was more talking about distracting myself from writing I HAVE to do as coursework by doing writing I don't have to do because if I stare at my research sources for any longer I would go nuts.

Probably shouldn't word barf on unsuspecting unrelated people though just to contain that spicy hot academia energy, so I will try to trim the fat from posts in the future!

Lormyr

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« Reply #79 on: <07-13-19/0756:38> »
i have the 6e stats but I knew the 5e ones. Which I think make the 6e ones a error. Though admittedly I don’t have any other grenades to reference. But effectively the molotov in 6e is doing the same damage as the 5e where other weapons do less. The 6e ones damage should be 1/2d most likely and that’s being generous. Probably 4 damage really. But I don’t know if it’s damage scales up with net hits.

Not sure why SR5 on seems to want to make grenades 100% kill weapons but that is what it’s looking like.

Base explosives damage is largely unchanged from 5e, but the damage formula from impact differs. Ground zero 16P, close range 12P, near range 8P, 20m radius total is average. For a fully comparative DV chart:

Bows: 1-7P
Tasers: 4-6S
Melee Weapons: 1-5, S and P
Monofilament Whip: 6P
Holdouts and Light Pistols: 2-3P
Machine Pistols: 2P
Heavy Pistols: 3-4P
Submachine Guns: 3-4P
Shotgun: 4-5P
Rifles: 4-6P
Machineguns: 4-7P

Explosive ammo will get you +1 DV. SA fire mode will get you +1 DV, or +2 DV for BF. So the damage on ranged weapons remains solid overall.

Highest damage resistance dice pool is 14 for comparison. Thats a troll with exceptional attribute for body and bone density 4 or quickened increase body at max.

Adept combat sense (but not mage combat sense) still adds dice to defense tests to avoid hits. Indirect aoe combat spells now allow a defense test to avoid, but non-magical aoe attacks (grenades, gases, ect.) still do not and require a 1/round maximum minor action to potentially avoid some/all of the radius.

So yes, grenades are even more of a 100% kill weapon in this edition than they were. I don't understand what is so damn hard about understanding that any time one character wants to affect another character there should always be an opposed roll of some kind (attacker roll vs. defense roll).
« Last Edit: <07-13-19/0801:21> by Lormyr »
"TL:DR 6e's reduction of meaningful choices is akin to forcing everyone to wear training wheels. Now it's just becomes a bunch of toddlers riding around on tricycles they can't fall off of." - Adzling

Marcus

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« Reply #80 on: <07-14-19/1751:23> »
Wait magic AoE has a defense test but tech AoE does not? Wow.
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Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #81 on: <07-14-19/1753:14> »
Wait magic AoE has a defense test but tech AoE does not? Wow.

Magical and mundane area attacks use different rules mechanics.
RPG mechanics exist to give structure and consistency to the game world, true, but at the end of the day, you’re fighting dragons with algebra and random number generators.

BeCareful

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« Reply #82 on: <07-17-19/2317:55> »
One other thing, which I worry more about possible reactions to it:

From what I surmise, Mystic Adepts in 4th were seen as less useful than a magician or adept; in 5th, they had all the advantages of both with only one major disadvantage, which wasn't as much of a disadvantage as it seemed on paper.

My hopes, for 6th, is that you can pick magician or adept at chargen, but you have to choose which side to prefer, with no ability to be superlative in both. That way, you can be mainly a magician with a little qi, or mainly an adept who can do a spell or two.
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dezmont

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« Reply #83 on: <07-18-19/0602:10> »
Mystic adepts are just a tough nut to crack because their entire gimmick is giving you access to basically the whole buffet of magical options, so limiting their choices sorta goes against that, but if you force a literal divide of resources they become too weak.

5e maybe was on the right track in terms of how they handled their adept side, mainly that Mysads in 5e didn't get a major benefit adepts got by raising magic. But it didn't work because they didn't lose anything relevant from their mage side (Astral projection, while cool as heck, is sorta a joke because... spirits exist and are so overwhelmingly better than a projecting mage in every way that astrally projecting not only isn't meaningful to lose, but astral projecting is almost always actively a bad idea to do in any situation) and the mage side was the stronger side, to the point where despite mysads obviously being 'stronger' than mages, the mere at gen opportunity cost of being a mystic adept was big enough that they didn't actually overtake mages in terms of character optimization: Spending a bunch of karma at gen on PP to get increase reflexes really was you spending 20% of your gen karma budget on a +1 bonus to dicerolls, which is good but didn't fit into high end builds, which says a LOT about how strong 5e mages were when what was essentially 12 karma for a generic +1 to everything wouldn't make the cut!

While "Buffs over nerfs" is a bit of a meme that doesn't really reflect good game design, it may be that the best way to make mystic adepts work is to not take away their options per-say but give adepts and mages something that makes the choice to give up being a 'pure' archetype not as clear cut. Adepts could stand to get a buff anyway because the entire scheme of a hyper-specialized power source resource where you can only augment a few very specific things doesn't really work with how SR PCs are made, and it would be nice for astrally active mages to be the biggest meanest things on the astral plane with lots of cool astral tricks and toys rather than being idiots who are going to get eaten by a force 4 spirit.

Either way, I don't think 'try to limit mystic adepts by removing specific aspects of magery' is a good plan because that is pretty binary: Either you have enough magic stuff to basically get all the good stuff, or you don't. Like if you only get one of enchanting, sorcery, or conjuration, then its super obvious (at least with 5e's balance between those abilities and adept powers) its crazy not worth it to be an adept ever, because sorcery+conjuration is going to be way stronger than anything you get as an adept. But that has a lot to do with how 5e handles buffs and spirits. 6e seems to have toned down buffs, but not as much spirits, and so if you did that and spirits ended up being the 'good part' of mages, then you still have mystic adepts being way better than being a mage.
« Last Edit: <07-18-19/0605:24> by dezmont »

Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #84 on: <07-18-19/1258:52> »
The best way to fix mystic adepts is to fire them out of a canon into the sun and accept they were a bad idea from the getgo back at what end of 2e did the idea start to fester.

Barring that go the 4e route. Too weak is better than too strong. You take it so for the idea not to break the game.

That being said two separate magic attributes you had to invest in might work given scaling karma
Costs but it kind of depends on how many special attribute points you can get etc at char gen. Given catalysts history I suspect that would still be broken.   

Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #85 on: <07-18-19/1400:40> »
Speaking as someone who thinks MysAds are hideously OP in 5e and resultantly has something of a hate-on for them:

I'm ok with 6w's version of MysAds.  I wish they were nerfed further, but in all fairness they're someplace between 4e and 5e.  If you DO like MysAds, they still should feel like they're viable.
RPG mechanics exist to give structure and consistency to the game world, true, but at the end of the day, you’re fighting dragons with algebra and random number generators.

dezmont

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« Reply #86 on: <07-18-19/1705:04> »
Barring that go the 4e route. Too weak is better than too strong. You take it so for the idea not to break the game.

I strongly disagree. The worst thing you can do is create trap options based on something really cool that will attract new players who are lured by the promise of cool powers and fun times and fall on their face.

That said there are gradients. Way way way way too strong is worse than way way way way too weak, because one warps the game and the other is merely a trap, but 'kinda just better than everything else' is better than 'kinda not fun to play' as players are pretty forgiving of power differences as long as they feel like they get to have their own scenes, spotlight times to shine, and aren't constantly being shoved out of the way.

Of course perceived power matters a lot and can create animosity, and Mysads naturally attract jellous eyes due to their ability to use every relevant power source from 'ware to magic to drugs (sorry technos  :-\ ). So even in 5e where being an adept wasn't actually optimal because adept powers are so much weaker than spell buffs anyway and generally were not compatible (so it was better to take that mysad karma and get yourself some good qualities and a nice power focus), it still felt unfair on principle. Same reason many people wish Mage burnouts were nerfed so bad that they can't ever get 'ware ever, because 'ware is 'mundane stuff' even though burnouts are interesting, an integral part of lore, and mostly exist as a problem of a few specific design choices rather than the entire concept being no good. So Mysads have this other problem where if they are working they FEEL really unfair because... well it sorta is unfair they get their cake and eat it too from an in universe standpoint... or they just aren't working and everyone feels bad for them and they are a trap option because they are so cool but don't work.
« Last Edit: <07-18-19/1710:21> by dezmont »

Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #87 on: <07-18-19/1718:58> »
Barring that go the 4e route. Too weak is better than too strong. You take it so for the idea not to break the game.

I strongly disagree. The worst thing you can do is create trap options based on something really cool that will attract new players who are lured by the promise of cool powers and fun times and fall on their face.

That said there are gradients. Way way way way too strong is worse than way way way way too weak, because one warps the game and the other is merely a trap, but 'kinda just better than everything else' is better than 'kinda not fun to play' as players are pretty forgiving of power differences as long as they feel like they get to have their own scenes, spotlight times to shine, and aren't constantly being shoved out of the way.

Of course perceived power matters a lot and can create animosity, and Mysads naturally attract jellous eyes due to their ability to use every relevant power source from 'ware to magic to drugs (sorry technos  :-\ ). So even in 5e where being an adept wasn't actually optimal because adept powers are so much weaker than spell buffs anyway and generally were not compatible (so it was better to take that mysad karma and get yourself some good qualities and a nice power focus), it still felt unfair on principle. Same reason many people wish Mage burnouts were nerfed so bad that they can't ever get 'ware ever, because 'ware is 'mundane stuff' even though burnouts are interesting, an integral part of lore, and mostly exist as a problem of a few specific design choices rather than the entire concept being no good. So Mysads have this other problem where if they are working they FEEL really unfair because... well it sorta is unfair they get their cake and eat it too from an in universe standpoint... or they just aren't working and everyone feels bad for them and they are a trap option because they are so cool but don't work.

4e wasn’t a trap option in my opinion. Weaker than a pure mage because pure mages were too good but it was basically a better themed burnout mage using adept powers in place or cyber. And that is what they should always have been if they existed. If you get more bang than that you are just broken. And damage the game for everyone around you.

Lormyr

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« Reply #88 on: <07-18-19/1726:02> »
Mystic Adepts are still king in 6th, they just come out of the door a bit slower. In short, your single magic attribute governs both "sides", but you have to split your initial score for the purpose of spells and power choices at chargen.

The real nerf was defensive magic, and not being able to stack both combat senses, both armor/mystic, both natural immunity/prophlyaxis, ect. That is where they were truly OP in 5th imo.
"TL:DR 6e's reduction of meaningful choices is akin to forcing everyone to wear training wheels. Now it's just becomes a bunch of toddlers riding around on tricycles they can't fall off of." - Adzling

Shinobi Killfist

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« Reply #89 on: <07-18-19/1728:52> »
Mystic Adepts are still king in 6th, they just come out of the door a bit slower. In short, your single magic attribute governs both "sides", but you have to split your initial score for the purpose of spells and power choices at chargen.

The real nerf was defensive magic, and not being able to stack both combat senses, both armor/mystic, both natural immunity/prophlyaxis, ect. That is where they were truly OP in 5th imo.

Probably another edition where they are banned at my table then.