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Do people actually use Aspected Magicans?

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Ixal

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« on: <02-08-19/0433:33> »
Going through the builds in this forum it looks like aspected magicans are not used much, if at all.
Do you see them in your home games and if yes how do they perform?
Or is the general consensus that if you already go magic, the ability to project and use both spells and spirits is too good compared to the savings at chargen when being aspected?
« Last Edit: <02-08-19/0533:24> by Ixal »

PiXeL01

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« Reply #1 on: <02-08-19/0444:51> »
There’s no real reason to. Why should you start with less magic than an adept is what I don’t understand. I have seen a few conjuring aspects but no casters at all
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Wenlocke

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« Reply #2 on: <02-08-19/0515:55> »
Most irritating side effect of the magical tradition/adept changes was the removal of Shamanic adepts. Unlike aspected magicians, they cast only spells/summoned spirits associated with their totem (ie the totem had bonuses to cast), but had other magic skills as normal, which was actually an interesting RP thing as well as still possessing a modicum of versatility. I think there was a hermetic variety as well that just used one element (I used to have a couple of different illusionist builds, a phoenix adept, and I think the other was a water hermetic adept. This may have been 15 years ago so my memory is hazy.)
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Hobbes

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« Reply #3 on: <02-08-19/0706:43> »
I haven't seen one played in 5th Edition.  Mechanically you're better off with a Mage or Mystic Adept and just not taking the skill(s) you don't want and then call yourself an Aspected Magician.

For Aspected Magicians to be a mechanically desirable choice they need a significant buff. 

Michael Chandra

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« Reply #4 on: <02-08-19/0720:09> »
Aspected Magicians from core don't work in part because they don't get free spells or other compensation, so for casters they lose out big time. Unless your specific prio-build needs Magic D, there's no point. Fortunately now we got the other ways of aspecting instead.
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Beta

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« Reply #5 on: <02-08-19/0920:41> »
There are a few mechanical issues with aspected mages, as they were set out in fifth:
- being given a skill group rather than skills.  By RAW that skill group can't be broken until the spend karma stage, so if you actually want to be good at your core skill, you need at least priority C in skills, and need to route skill group points your magic group of choice (and that is not really optimal as often you only care about 1-2 of the 3 skills in the group).
- best case starting with 5 magic, so that again your build needs to have a free special attribute point or you need to drop a load of karma, should you want to start at magic 6
- As already mentioned, casters not starting out with any spells

Personally I've played two character that I originally concieved of as aspected, but in both cases I eventually gave up that plan (in one case went with full mage with weak summoning instead of an aspected caster, in the other went with a mystic adept with no spellcasting (but with alchemy) in place of an aspected summoner.

Most irritating side effect of the magical tradition/adept changes was the removal of Shamanic adepts. Unlike aspected magicians, they cast only spells/summoned spirits associated with their totem (ie the totem had bonuses to cast), but had other magic skills as normal, which was actually an interesting RP thing as well as still possessing a modicum of versatility. I think there was a hermetic variety as well that just used one element (I used to have a couple of different illusionist builds, a phoenix adept, and I think the other was a water hermetic adept. This may have been 15 years ago so my memory is hazy.)

Wenlocke, that was brought back in Forbidden Arcana (called "Apprentice")

Tarislar

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« Reply #6 on: <02-08-19/1100:44> »
I think that Aspected  Sorcerer & Conjurer got big buffs with some of the Positive Qualities in Forbidden Arcana (IIRC?)

Where they get free spells or bonus spirit types.

Magic-B  +  Skills-C was the only viable starting build method as it gave you 6 group points to cap out your Magic Group & then you just needed 1 point (Human-E) to get Magic to 6.

It let you do your magic niche & then have 4-5 really good other skills & great attributes which is often hard with a full mage.

Making a Conjurer with 10 spirit options & Spirit Whisperer sounds like fun.


Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #7 on: <02-08-19/1127:20> »
I tried making an aspected summoner.

Abandoned the character when I realized for 5th edition, Watchers aren't summoned but created by ritual spellcasting.
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Michael Chandra

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« Reply #8 on: <02-08-19/1130:02> »
At the very least Aspected should be able to do that through different means...

Incidentally, SSDR, what's your thoughts on the Arcana Aspected options?
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adzling

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« Reply #9 on: <02-08-19/1231:44> »
We have an aspected sorcerer at our table and he works just fine.

He's built as the team's combat mage and took the Dedicated Spellslinger quality which seems to help balance things a bit, making his spells cheaper.

When we formed the group I had three people out of 6 wanting to play mages so I forced one of the team to choose aspected to stop things going completely off the rails.

One of the mages was focussed on swords (kind of like a mystic adept without the adept powers) so it worked out pretty well (one full mage, one sword-mage and one aspected sorcerer).


Sphinx

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« Reply #10 on: <02-08-19/1347:45> »
I've never had a player create an aspected magician as a PC, but as a GM, I try to make my NPCs aspected instead of full magicians as much as possible.

Marcus

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« Reply #11 on: <02-08-19/1430:34> »
It was fairly disadvantageous until FA came down. There are cool concepts that some low magic options offer. Things like the astral adept. There is  nothing wrong with adept builds, they just aren't an vogue at the moment. But that sort of thing cyclies.
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DigitalZombie

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« Reply #12 on: <02-08-19/1533:25> »
I could also Imagine that the reason we dont see many aspected mages on the character forum, is because many groups have a Lot of aspected mage houserules that are specific to their table. Which kinda makes it hard to have strangers come up with suggestions regarding their newly created characters.

Michael Chandra

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« Reply #13 on: <02-08-19/1538:01> »
I've never had a player create an aspected magician as a PC, but as a GM, I try to make my NPCs aspected instead of full magicians as much as possible.
Same. My PR5 HTR-setup involves aspected alchemists, aspected conjurors and aspected combat mages. Alchemists make the preps for the SWAT-car-vault-of-ages, Conjurors send their Valkyrie Spirits with the team to provide Counterspelling and gun support, the combat mages are there to help deal with anything that's magically armored. That way, if the mage goes down, the Spirits are still at the ready and backup can be easily called upon (though it will take some time to arrive). Numerically there's quite a bunch of aspected arounds if I recall the books right, and aspected will be easier to employ since they're less allround.
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adzling

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« Reply #14 on: <02-08-19/1635:21> »
Id like to see your HTR team Michael, care to post somewhere?