Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: Haunters on <12-09-10/1103:36>
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What is the Max Initiation Grade?
I know that in the Shadowrun 20th Anniversary Edition, p. 198, it says that the Maximum Grade for Initiation is the character's Magic level, but one of the benefits is that the initiates natural maximum for Magic is 6 + Initiation Grade.
Does this mean an Initiate can have ∞ Maximum Magic so long as they keep alternating purchasing Initiation Grade & Magic?
That seems wrong and broken.
What is the true limit and what page is it on?
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As per RAW, the limit is in fact infinite. It gets really expensive to go higher, but as long as you get karma, you can get initiations and therefore more magic.
I have a problem with this as well, as it would mean that Immortal Elves would never worry about Horrors in the first place, since they can safely cast mile wide AOE spells and summon up 100+ Force rating Great Forms all day. Thoroughly ridiculous.
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We've discussed this before (detailed here (http://forums.shadowrun4.com/index.php?topic=1160.0)). It's based off your Current Magic Attribute, and since Initiation raises the Max Magic Attribute, you can then increase that, which increases the Maximum Initiation Grade.
So, yes, it's an ∞ cycle as long as you keep increasing both your attribute and initiation grade.
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As per RAW, the limit is in fact infinite. It gets really expensive to go higher, but as long as you get karma, you can get initiations and therefore more magic.
I have a problem with this as well, as it would mean that Immortal Elves would never worry about Horrors in the first place, since they can safely cast mile wide AOE spells and summon up 100+ Force rating Great Forms all day. Thoroughly ridiculous.
Oh, I don't know. I mean, once you get into 10+ grades, the Karma Cost gets pretty high. if an Immortal Elf is grade 50 with a Magic Attribute of 49, he'd have to pay 160 Karma to go up one grade and to raise his Magic Attribute to 50 would cost 250 Karma.
Since during the low-mana fourth age, most IEs were hiding out and blending in, they really didn't have much opportunity to gain a significant amount of karma, nor the study and practice of improving their magical abilities. I don't think they'd be "locked in" to the same level they were before the low-mana cycle, but they wouldn't had increased it by more than 1-3 grades and/or attribute increases during the 5,000 years.
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As per RAW, the limit is in fact infinite. It gets really expensive to go higher, but as long as you get karma, you can get initiations and therefore more magic.
I have a problem with this as well, as it would mean that Immortal Elves would never worry about Horrors in the first place, since they can safely cast mile wide AOE spells and summon up 100+ Force rating Great Forms all day. Thoroughly ridiculous.
Oh, I don't know. I mean, once you get into 10+ grades, the Karma Cost gets pretty high. if an Immortal Elf is grade 50 with a Magic Attribute of 49, he'd have to pay 160 Karma to go up one grade and to raise his Magic Attribute to 50 would cost 250 Karma.
Since during the low-mana fourth age, most IEs were hiding out and blending in, they really didn't have much opportunity to gain a significant amount of karma, nor the study and practice of improving their magical abilities. I don't think they'd be "locked in" to the same level they were before the low-mana cycle, but they wouldn't had increased it by more than 1-3 grades and/or attribute increases during the 5,000 years.
Note: I wrote this reply to the first guy who replied to me, but then everybody else answered, so while it may be redundant, I am far too lazy to re-edit my thoughts, so Nya.
I am still very new at this and am still trying to finish my first Shadowrun book, but my understanding is that Elves didn't arrive on the scene until 2011. This means that they only had 61 years to improve their magical arts. Considering that most people did not know what they were doing and research into magic started out with most people stumbling in the dark trying to understand the basics, I don't think that any living creature has had the opportunity to become that powerful, especially when their time is better spent in the corporate world (in order to afford connections around the globe to other's research notes, for example).
Plus that is what Sniper Rifles and a good spot a mile away are for. Or you can trick them into pissing off a Dragon.
p.s. Thanks for the answer :-)
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Ah, a newb.
Welcome to the sixth world. Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
It turns out that there are a group of Immortal Elves (http://ancientfiles.dumpshock.com/Immortals.htm) that, along with the Great Dragons, have been around since the Fourth Age*. No one's really sure how they became immortal, but they are. First introduced in the Harlequin (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=2063&it=1) campaign book, they've been popping up in Shadowland and such ever since (Jane Foster, the main protagonist in the Dawn of the Artifacts (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=dawn+of+the+artifacts&x=0&y=0&quicksearch=1&search_filter=&filters=&search_free=&search_in_description=1&search_in_author=1&search_in_artist=1) adventures is the newest edition to the group, being Ehran the Scribe's daughter and Harlequin's protégé.
So, welcome, enjoy the soykaf and remember, a wise man once said, "Watch your back, conserve ammo, and never cut a deal with a Dragon."
*My bad, I said fourth age in my previous post when I meant fifth age. Damn cold weather and arthritic fingers! ;)
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As per RAW, the limit is in fact infinite. It gets really expensive to go higher, but as long as you get karma, you can get initiations and therefore more magic.
I have a problem with this as well, as it would mean that Immortal Elves would never worry about Horrors in the first place, since they can safely cast mile wide AOE spells and summon up 100+ Force rating Great Forms all day. Thoroughly ridiculous.
I disagree about being able to summon up 100+ force great forms. This definitely isn't true. You have to remember that drain comes from the spirits successes not net successes. So you get much over force 12 and they start being able to get enough successes that you cannot survive drain since it is their number of successes X2 that becomes your drain code. Even with a powerful focus you won't get enough dice since your magic rating isn't part of the drain resistance it could be 100 and it doesn't help one bit.
The thing with the spells item is that with a bit of counterspelling it becomes possible to resist spells even if they do hit an AOE of a mile or two. Again if you have to cast at a really high force say 30 to get the spell through again drain is going to do a number on you. If the horrors have massive numbers and a few really powerful creatures it wouldn't take long to overrun the earth. Metahumanity couldn't afford to trade 1 immortal elf per mile to hold onto things for long.
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I was just going to give you a high-five on that WTW, but then I remembered this:
Centering: A character who learns to center has an easier time resisting the Drain inherent in magical activities. By using a mundane activity appropriate to her tradition to quiet her mind and block out distractions, she adds a number of dice equal to her grade of initiation to all Drain Resistance Tests. Centering requires a Free Action, which must be taken in the same Action Phase as the Drain Resistance Test. The character must be physically able to move and/or speak freely in order to center, and may attract attention to herself. Centering techniques include acts such as chanting in Latin, dancing, making arcane gestures, and so on.
So, a grade 100 initiate would get 100 dice on Drain Resistance as long as she can center herself.
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So they can double-dip into resistance, essentially putting drain in the "who cares" column.
You were right the first time. It was the Fourth Age. The Fifth Age is our age, today.
Of course, not for very much longer. The Sixth World is right around the corner.
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Actually, the Fifth Age is the low-mana point. Fourth Age was Earthdawn, that's why I corrected myself.
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It turns out that there are a group of Immortal Elves (http://ancientfiles.dumpshock.com/Immortals.htm) that, along with the Great Dragons, have been around since the Fourth Age*. No one's really sure how they became immortal, but they are. First introduced in the Harlequin (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=2063&it=1) campaign book, they've been popping up in Shadowland and such ever since (Jane Foster, the main protagonist in the Dawn of the Artifacts (http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=dawn+of+the+artifacts&x=0&y=0&quicksearch=1&search_filter=&filters=&search_free=&search_in_description=1&search_in_author=1&search_in_artist=1) adventures is the newest edition to the group, being Ehran the Scribe's daughter and Harlequin's protégé.
So, welcome, enjoy the soykaf and remember, a wise man once said, "Watch your back, conserve ammo, and never cut a deal with a Dragon."
I was under the impression that Immortal Elves were simply elves that survived through the 5th age without being persecuted and burned at a stake for being witches ....correct me if i'm wrong. I mean, no more elves could be born because the awakened DNA was in-active. I don't really know much about pre-sixth world history, so I don't even know what happened to all the metas of the 4th age....did they just turn into humans, or did they just die out slowly because they couldn't replenish their numbers? If the latter is true, then the elven population would just taper off as they slowly died of non-natural causes throughout the 5th age. Wouldn't the immortal elves be the ones who managed to stay on the down-low and basically survive the 5th age. Of course during this time period they would have no magic attribute so I assume they would just get back the powers they had at the end of the 4th age at the beginning of the sixth age. Weren't the immortal elves also around to protect the dragons while they slept?
One cool idea would be that you can spot an immortal elf because a lot of them cut off their ear tips to blend in during the 5th age.....so they would be elves with round ears with a scar at the top! I think i'm gonna use that idea....does anyone know if this works?.....It won't work if Immortal Elves simply morphed back into looking like humans during the 5th age. This idea would also still work if all the meta's just died at the end of the 4th age.....and immortal elves found a way to circumvent this. If Meta's just turned to dust at the end of the 4th age then that would explain the lack of a ton of fossils being found.
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I don't really know much about pre-sixth world history, so I don't even know what happened to all the metas of the 4th age....did they just turn into humans, or did they just die out slowly because they couldn't replenish their numbers?
In Earthdawn, T'Skrang and Windlings are suffering from negative population growth.
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The didn't quite "morph" back into humans, but they were able to hide themselves among humanity without cutting off their ears. Most elves in the Earthdawn era were just like elves today. Their lifespan may be in the hundreds of years (no one's really saying exactly how long they live). Only a small fraction of elves are truly "immortal".
Likewise, the other races didn't morph back, but as the mana-level fell, more and more human babies were born to the other races (except, of course, Obsidamen, Windlings and T'skrang, later on that). As the older generations died off, people lost their "race".
The Obsidamen most likely rejoined their liferocks and "fell asleep" as the mana-level dropped. They may be back at a certain point in the future. No one really knows.
The Windlings have become Pixies in the Sixth World. Not sure where they went in the low mana-cycle (maybe they hid and have been here all along), and nothing's really been said of it.
T'skrang *shrug* I honestly have no idea. Maybe they reverted to human form, maybe they died out. Some SURGE traits can say that their genetics still exist in metahumanity, but nothing's been mentioned.
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Some of the Immortal Elves are holdouts from the 2nd Age, the Age of Dragons. Those folks are truly old. Isn't DaVinci an IE from the 2nd age?
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So, a grade 100 initiate would get 100 dice on Drain Resistance as long as she can center herself.
Yes, and still die. Let's say Drain in this case is a fairly normal non=overcasting Force/2, or 50S. 25-33 of that can be sucked up by 100 dice of drain resistance. Result, unconsciousness at best.
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So, a grade 100 initiate would get 100 dice on Drain Resistance as long as she can center herself.
Yes, and still die. Let's say Drain in this case is a fairly normal non=overcasting Force/2, or 50S. 25-33 of that can be sucked up by 100 dice of drain resistance. Result, unconsciousness at best.
Good time to spend a point of Edge and explode those sixes! ;D
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Or have a bunch of spirit pacts.
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One point of Edge buys all those rerolls.
Using straight odds , let's say you get 33 hits, then buy a reroll. That's another 22 hits, for a total of 55. That drain disappears from just the Centering.
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One point of Edge buys all those rerolls.
Using straight odds , let's say you get 33 hits, then buy a reroll. That's another 22 hits, for a total of 55. That drain disappears from just the Centering.
So you can summon / cast exactly as many obscene-Force spirits/spells as you have Edge, good job. Especially when someone then sneaks in for that point-blank shot while you're unaware.
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When is this? After you have your Force 100 spirit or your Force 100 Armor spell you locked on prior to doing anything? Having 25 auto-hits means not worrying the small stuff (like guass rifles). Since it takes, what, a single IP to summon that Force 100 spirit and sic him on someone, I'm pretty sure your armor spell will suck the damage you might take while summoning. Then it's "Say goodnight, Gracie."
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When is this? After you have your Force 100 spirit or your Force 100 Armor spell you locked on prior to doing anything? Having 25 auto-hits means not worrying the small stuff (like guass rifles). Since it takes, what, a single IP to summon that Force 100 spirit and sic him on someone, I'm pretty sure your armor spell will suck the damage you might take while summoning. Then it's "Say goodnight, Gracie."
Keep the playing field level, Gun Nut, how much karma is this mage at right now, just for Initiation 100 and Magic 100, assume he never learned anything else beyond initiation and magic, and started at Magic 5. Assume he was a member of an Magical Group and performed a Group Ordeal every time he initiated... That's still 35558 Karma. And his body is still at 2, his reaction is still at 2. He only knows the spells he learned as a child.
Who other than an IE or a Great Dragon is going to have karma like that? And from everything I've read, the description you give fits IEs and Great Dragons (heck, IE's probably don't have over 35k in karma). If you can rack up that kind of karma, first of all, I don't care that you can perform these grandiose feats and secondly, your enemies are liable to be as karma loaded, have invented a whole new generation of magic-penetrating bullets specifically built to that mage's specifications.
More over, the Armor spell provides Armor equal to Net Hits (not Force), so no, I'm not trying to get through Armor 100, I'm trying to get through armor of 35. With the right weapons, that's doable. Assuming he learned armor as one of his first spells out of the box.
The problem is, you're looking at the breakdown point of 35k+ karma. Of course stuff isn't going to work. Newtonian physics and the Law of General Relativity both break down for sufficiently large / small objects. So if reality doesn't work in the extremes, I have no problem with game mechanics doing the same. Especially when he has to spend so much edge just to survive the initial spell casting
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Who other than an IE or a Great Dragon is going to have karma like that?
The theoretical "100 Magic initiate" in question is in fact an IE, though, no?
-k
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Very much so. Even just granting the guy a single point of Karma per year, that IE has 5000 to 7000+ karma to spend on whatever. His magic pools will become ridiculous just on that.
My overall point is that Immortal Elves have nothing to fear from anything, including the return of the Horrors, if magic accumulation is an infinite progression. While even great dragons respect them, they don't wet themselves at the thought that an Immortal Elf might randomly think about tossing the equivalent of a nuclear weapon at them and shrugging off the drain four times a round.
I like it when game systems can incorporate even epic powered characters into them, while keeping them grounded in the RAW. These guys drift into Starkiller status with the open end like it is. It even allows regular characters to accumulate enough Karma to dip into the double digits of initiation and drop some hideous ruination on their targets. Granted, it would take tons and tons of karma to do so, but it still irks me a bit.
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Well, I just crunched some numbers. If an IE started with a Magic Attribute of 6, to get to an Initiate Grade 100 and Magic Attribute of 100, it would cost 16,680 Karma. So, it is possible...
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My overall point is that Immortal Elves have nothing to fear from anything, including the return of the Horrors, if magic accumulation is an infinite progression. While even great dragons respect them, they don't wet themselves at the thought that an Immortal Elf might randomly think about tossing the equivalent of a nuclear weapon at them and shrugging off the drain four times a round.
The thing is, that they have. A shot to the face is a shot to the face, even if you have a high magic score. Yes, they dont age, get sick, and such. But they still need to take care of their meat. And as for dragons, some do respect a few IE's, but these two groups are still enemies. Immortal Elves want to kill all dragons, and some dragons have more than a grudge against them (like Alamais, who really hates them, especially those from the Blood Wood, like Alachia). The only things that keep them from waging war is that they don't benefit from it. And off course they could forge a temporary alliance to figh the Horrors, but only that. With Big D dead, and his brother Ghostwalker back in business (Icewing overslept, heh), things won't be as civil as they were.
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Well, I just crunched some numbers. If an IE started with a Magic Attribute of 6, to get to an Initiate Grade 100 and Magic Attribute of 100, it would cost 16,680 Karma. So, it is possible...
Hrm...
Using Magic 5 & assuming group ordeals for all initiations, I came up with 35,558 Karma. We shouldn't be that far off from one another. Maybe my math has some rounding errors (from the 0.6 multiplier from group ordeals), but I wouldn't think they'd be that big.
Equations are:
Initiation Karma = (10+(New Grade x 3)) x 0.6
Magic Karma = New Magic x 5
right?
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Stop with the damn numbers. I'm suffering drain from trying to grasp that.
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I whipped up a quickie spreadsheet to do the crunching. I came up with 34,865 assuming starting magic 5 and buying up everything. Assuming a 7000 year lifespan, it would require just under 5 karma per year to pull off, assuming ONLY initiations and magic rating purchases. So, still possible.
I uploaded it here http://www.mediafire.com/file/56ez95lbs7ikyfg/Shadowrun%20initiation.pdf (http://www.mediafire.com/file/56ez95lbs7ikyfg/Shadowrun%20initiation.pdf). Feel free to point out any mistakes.
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Well, I just crunched some numbers. If an IE started with a Magic Attribute of 6, to get to an Initiate Grade 100 and Magic Attribute of 100, it would cost 16,680 Karma. So, it is possible...
Hrm...
Using Magic 5 & assuming group ordeals for all initiations, I came up with 35,558 Karma. We shouldn't be that far off from one another. Maybe my math has some rounding errors (from the 0.6 multiplier from group ordeals), but I wouldn't think they'd be that big.
Equations are:
Initiation Karma = (10+(New Grade x 3)) x 0.6
Magic Karma = New Magic x 5
right?
My bad, I hadn't "added" the New Magic's together... Without Group Ordeals, it comes out to 44,400. So, over 7,000 years, they'd have to earn about 6˝ Karma a year and ignore all other skills/attribute advancement.
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It's still possible, it just becomes a lot less likely.
And a few points off of 100 are kinda trivial, at this point.
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Yeah, but even 50 Initiate/Magic would run 12,200 Karma...
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You better get gaming then. :D
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One point of Edge buys all those rerolls.
Using straight odds , let's say you get 33 hits, then buy a reroll. That's another 22 hits, for a total of 55. That drain disappears from just the Centering.
If you get the successes with your 1 reroll using edge. It isn't like in previous editions where you could keep rerolling till you got the result you wanted. All it takes is one time not making it and your toast. That would be an embarrassing way for an IE to die.
The summoning debate is even worse since you double the number of successes that the spirit has, and it can spend edge also to reroll its failures, and if I were a force 100 spirit I sure would. So now it has 55 successes using the same formula you did above and the mage needs 80+ successes to not be toast.
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Yeah, but even 50 Initiate/Magic would run 12,200 Karma...
And that's assuming you never want to bind a spirit to long term service, quicken a spell, rebuild your Edge attribute after a few close calls, have other stats above 2s and 3s, learn to drive a car, speak english, etc.
Though in theory, un-capped magic can occur, in practice, you just need too much of the other stuff to live to see 50+ magic to reach it in any kind of sensible manner. Just think of how many different etiquette and language skills said IE needs to have lived until now:
Let's say he lived in Italy, from whenever BC to present, this gives us:
Caveman, Phoenician, Roman, Vandal, Visigoth, early Italian, middle-ages Italian, Renaissance Italian, Modern Italian, then English, if he's going to be involved at all in America.
That's just to ask for some water and food. If he's going to get around, add to that:
Riding, Pilot Chariot, Pilot Carriage (yes, they're different enough), Pilot Ground Craft. In Italy, he probably would need to get some Pilot Watercraft, too.
Now, if he wants to survive the fifth age (no magic):
Clubs, Blades, Archery, Exotic Ranged Weapon (flint-lock musket), Pistols
All of this also assumes he has no desire to enter the business world, or otherwise learn the plethora of ways he could make money and survive as anything other than a bandit in the woods, awaiting magic's return.
All that is a lot of karma. So yes, in theory, an IE could get to 100 Initiation and 100 Magic (or 50/50) in the 7000 years, but he wouldn't actually live long enough to do so without also learning the majority of the skills I've just laid out. Heck, I'd argue that he couldn't initiate or raise his Magic attribute during the 5th age at all, there's no magic or astral to tap into during this time, so even if he stored up the karma, he'd still have to spend the years doing little else but increasing his Initiation and Magic once the 6th Age began. Remember, each grade is said to take months to obtain (SR4A, pg 198). This could easily translate into years, especially if the GM decides to peg time to difficulty and difficulty to initiation grade.
So, yes, it's theoretically possible to get your magic up to 50 or 100 (and, therefore, initiation up there, too), but even with an iE lifespan, there is too many other things you need to do to survive the no-magic era for it to be practical to get up there. 15, 20, maybe. But, how many years in a no-magic world will you go without something qualifying as an "adventure", how much more likely are you to spend years as a shipwright (whoops, more karma expenditures) or a monk in a monastery (again, more things to learn, more karma not going to magic / initiation) and earning no karma, than hunting down and slaying beasties in the wild and performing sufficiently crazy hijinks to qualify you for those karma points?
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All that is a lot of karma. So yes, in theory, an IE could get to 100 Initiation and 100 Magic (or 50/50) in the 7000 years, but he wouldn't actually live long enough to do so without also learning the majority of the skills I've just laid out. Heck, I'd argue that he couldn't initiate or raise his Magic attribute during the 5th age at all, there's no magic or astral to tap into during this time, so even if he stored up the karma, he'd still have to spend the years doing little else but increasing his Initiation and Magic once the 6th Age began. Remember, each grade is said to take months to obtain (SR4A, pg 198). This could easily translate into years, especially if the GM decides to peg time to difficulty and difficulty to initiation grade.
Not really, the SR4A give some examples and one of them is months of research and writing a scholarly thesis the other is a shaman who might undergo a vision quest and seek guidance from her mentor spirit, translated into an astral quest, that takes only a couple of hours (max. days). The quintessence is the actual time period of an initiation is flexible.
And only additional the 5th world wasn't without magic or astral space it was only a very low level of Mana but something was there every time. It takes much more effort to gather enough Mana to do magic effects but some IE (like Aina) done it. Another thing to keep in mind is that the secrets and knowledge about the arts of magic that a IE could have conducted in this years of the 4th World is more than a magician of the 6th World could imaging...
And if I recall it right, some of the IE were bad-ass Magician and such back in ED-Times (circle 12-14 in more than one discipline).
Leonarus alias Leonardo alias Brightlight alias Dr. Antonio Vieri was a walking great library back in the days, his knowledge was compared to that of great dragons, and he had his own magic tradition, and technics and powers nobody else had at that time, maybe not even today (in the 6th World)...
Such characters are considered with reason as Superhuman, so they aren't bound by normal PC rules (see SR4A p. 285), and can do or become anything the GM decides.
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One point of Edge buys all those rerolls.
Using straight odds , let's say you get 33 hits, then buy a reroll. That's another 22 hits, for a total of 55. That drain disappears from just the Centering.
If you get the successes with your 1 reroll using edge. It isn't like in previous editions where you could keep rerolling till you got the result you wanted. All it takes is one time not making it and your toast. That would be an embarrassing way for an IE to die.
The summoning debate is even worse since you double the number of successes that the spirit has, and it can spend edge also to reroll its failures, and if I were a force 100 spirit I sure would. So now it has 55 successes using the same formula you did above and the mage needs 80+ successes to not be toast.
Um, yes, true. But the spirit could roll 0 hits and I could roll 100. Or the spirit could get 100 and I could get 0. But who cares? You can't base these what if's on either the best or worst case, only the one that makes the most sense from the perspective of probability. The most probable outcome. Otherwise you are just exercising some wish fulfilment. And given the rather large number of dice involved, the statistical average shoud pop up the most often.
EDIT: Also, as a quick note, I thought you were speaking of non-average numbers of hits, so disregard most of what I said. (The point still holds, I just didn't entirely get it, for some reason). Speaking of spirits and Edge, if I'm not mistaken, the spirit will only spend Edge on the summoning test if the summoner is weaker (summoning over his magic rating) or is unpopular (has mistreated spirits in the past). If the summoner is popular with the spirit, he won't spend Edge. If the summoner is smart (he's Immortal and thousands of years old, meaning he's picked up a few things) he will only attempt to summon a super-high force spirit that is friendly towards him, reducing the chances of a spirit spending Edge to thwart the summoning significantly.
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Purchasing magic 99 and magic 100 costs nearly 1000 karma. Let's say our IE mage only got to 98 and saved that other 995 karma for all that other stuff.
It's still doable, but, yes, it is really unlikely.
UV makes a good point, though. The downcycle wasn't totally without magic, it was just so low as to be negligible to the world at large. An IE could, theoretically, pump up their initiations and magic ratings. It would just take longer, and would be a lot more difficult.
Even at 50 magic, a mage's power is ridiculous. I don't like the open ended magic rating. Or, rather, I feel it is too easy to bump up magic, even at the higher levels, when Immortal Elves are considered.
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Well, we're forgetting something... During the Downcycle Metaplanes were cut of. So, no Initiation, no Magic raising.
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Good point, Kot!
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Except that summoning did happen during the downcycle; excruciatingly rare, but it did occur. So the metaplanes were accessible, although in a greatly reduced fashion.
Evidence is that Aina could do so, if I'm recalling the book series with her and Ysrgrathe correctly.
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I don't think Aina/Ysrganthe counts. They had a bond between them allowing all the interaction.
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Well, summoning something from the Metaplanes that has a lot of power on itself is not the same, as entering the Metaplanes on the Initiation journey/vision quest. So, even if an Immortal Elf, or other mage could summon a spirit, doesn't mean he could Initiate to higher levels, or even enter any metaplane. And the summoned spirit would be as impaired by the abysmal magic level, as a mage on the moon in the Sixth Age.
As for Aina, she could summon Yrsgranthe, and the son she had with him because of their unusual connection. I don't know if she summoned spirits in the book. Maybe she did. Maybe there was a place she could do that. And Yrsgranthe always seemed different from other Horrors to me. Even his description in the Horrors sourcebook was interesting. Hell, he appeared as evil, but reasonable and almost namegiver-like.
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@Kot: There are always Domains and similar phenomena that allow access to magic, even during low-magic cycles. I don't know how amenable it would be to astral travel and metaplanar quests, although it ties in well with certain legends (including Camelot/Avalon).
@Gun Nut: I think the point was that the more you attempt DV 50S magic, the more likely you are to blow the roll, even with Edge. Any time you pull more drain than your Physical + Stun track combined, you risk rolling so poorly that the drain kills you. The average doesn't matter here, just the cumulative chance that you miss one of those rolls. The odds pile up against you surprisingly fast with repeated use.
FYI: If I recall correctly, Harlequin is supposed to be the most powerful magician of the Sixth World, with an initiate grade in the high double digits. Use that as a guideline for what's realistically possible over thousands of years, rather than hypothetical numbers. Why don't immortals get more done? For one thing, the more karma-worth stuff they do, the more they expose themselves to risks. Immortals are immune to age and disease, but not accidents, murder, or war. They're generally powerful enough to deal with threats, but eventually you run in to the same problem as casting DV 50S spells: If you repeat a low-risk thing enough times, you actually have a pretty big risk.
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@Kot: There are always Domains and similar phenomena that allow access to magic, even during low-magic cycles. I don't know how amenable it would be to astral travel and metaplanar quests, although it ties in well with certain legends (including Camelot/Avalon).
@Gun Nut: I think the point was that the more you attempt DV 50S magic, the more likely you are to blow the roll, even with Edge. Any time you pull more drain than your Physical + Stun track combined, you risk rolling so poorly that the drain kills you. The average doesn't matter here, just the cumulative chance that you miss one of those rolls. The odds pile up against you surprisingly fast with repeated use.
FYI: If I recall correctly, Harlequin is supposed to be the most powerful magician of the Sixth World, with an initiate grade in the high double digits. Use that as a guideline for what's realistically possible over thousands of years, rather than hypothetical numbers. Why don't immortals get more done? For one thing, the more karma-worth stuff they do, the more they expose themselves to risks. Immortals are immune to age and disease, but not accidents, murder, or war. They're generally powerful enough to deal with threats, but eventually you run in to the same problem as casting DV 50S spells: If you repeat a low-risk thing enough times, you actually have a pretty big risk.
Both Elves {Re: Ehran and Harlequin} are full-powered hermetic magicians and Initiates of incredible rank.
Harlequin is self-initiated to a double-digit grade, but even that statement only works for purposes of comparison because his magic functions differently. As a rule of thumb in role-playing Harlequin, if it exists as a spell he can probably cast it (or fake it quickly) at a level no player character can hope to resist. He also possesses enough self-activating protections and wards to make him virtually invulnerable to all save those who can use magic on his level (which means slottin' near nobody).
He's not in the high double digits, but he should be more powerful than any PCs in the game by a long shot. Of course, with most games, that could place him at 25...
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He's not in the high double digits, but he should be more powerful than any PCs in the game by a long shot. Of course, with most games, that could place him at 25...
Where did you see that in your Harlequin quotes?
Harlequin is self-initiated to a double-digit grade
Could mean anything from 10 to 99. And that was a different Edition, where the Magic Attribute improved with any initiation, too.
If you look at the values of Frosty in her Adventures (see Harlequin, Harlequin's Back and DotA I) and use the Superhuman rule for Harlequin himself and Frosty as Runner comparison. We could get a peak how much Karma Harlequin has probably picked up in the last 20 years. As rule of thumb, it should be about 200% of Frostys Karma value, and she is initiate grad 8, aso...
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With the magic level in decline, a Domain could be something that's considered a Mana Ebb, or Void in SR. During the downcycle the Mana level was so low, that it didn't allow any magic to those who didn't know it, leaving only legends from a previous age. And as for Avalon, i bet that's a leftover from the Age of Legends that the IE's brought with them. As most legends probably are in the Sixth World.
As for Harlequin, i'd stay with a Magic score of 25 and Initiate grade of 20. It's high above anything the players can get, enough to take a Great Dragon head-on. Game balance wise it's fair, looking at the GD's statistics in SR4A*. Though still Dragons aren't bogged down by the game mechanics - they wish spells into existence in a dynamic way*. And i'd add at least a few Initiate powers to any dragon, Great or otherwise, as they had to learn a few things eventually.
* Though i think some dragons, like Big D, or Ghostwalker, who were renowned for their magical skills in the AGe of Legends, have their magic scores way above 12. Probably around 20-25.
** Just like in Mage: The Awakening, only they mostly improvise. Being a creature of magic pays off...
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Ah, a newb.
Welcome to the sixth world. Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
It turns out that there are a group of Immortal Elves (http://ancientfiles.dumpshock.com/Immortals.htm) that, along with the Great Dragons, have been around since the Fourth Age*. No one's really sure how they became immortal, but they are.
As a point Jack I think there is some story of how some major being made dragons and dragons made man this pissed off the being that made dragons and started the war between him and the dragons the dragons made the other races to help all this took place in what would be the second age of man thus there should be Immortal Elves as old as the second age.
DON'T hold me to this but I swear I read that some place.
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It's ED history from the FASA times. Still around.
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Would't the creation of man, by definition, have happened in the First Age of man?
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Not if there was an extensive Alpha- and Betatesting Phase ;D
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Well, that was at the end of the Age of the Dark One, if you believe the Dragons myths. So, Age Zero, i think.
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He's not in the high double digits, but he should be more powerful than any PCs in the game by a long shot. Of course, with most games, that could place him at 25...
Where did you see that in your Harlequin quotes?
Harlequin is self-initiated to a double-digit grade
Could mean anything from 10 to 99. And that was a different Edition, where the Magic Attribute improved with any initiation, too.
If you look at the values of Frosty in her Adventures (see Harlequin, Harlequin's Back and DotA I) and use the Superhuman rule for Harlequin himself and Frosty as Runner comparison. We could get a peak how much Karma Harlequin has probably picked up in the last 20 years. As rule of thumb, it should be about 200% of Frostys Karma value, and she is initiate grad 8, aso...
My point is it doesn't say "HIGH" double digits.
As for Harlequin being 200% of Frosty's Karma? Well, it costs 608 Karma to get get to 8 Grade/Magic. So, 200% of that is 1200 Karma, which could put Harlequin at 13 Grade/Magic (for 1248 Karma). If he's around 25 Grade/Karma, that would be almost 600% of Frosty's Karma...
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My point is it doesn't say "HIGH" double digits.
And what exactly do you think "HIGH" is? Mathematically it would be 10 to 50 or not?
As for Harlequin being 200% of Frosty's Karma? Well, it costs 608 Karma to get get to 8 Grade/Magic. So, 200% of that is 1200 Karma, which could put Harlequin at 13 Grade/Magic (for 1248 Karma). If he's around 25 Grade/Karma, that would be almost 600% of Frosty's Karma...
No, I meant, alone in the last 20 years since he became Jane's teacher. And Jane or Frosty has more than 608 Karma collected, think about Initiations, Magic improving, skill raising, spells, a.s.o.
And than you give Harlequin the double up! But this Karma isn't the only he got, it's only roughly the Karma of the last two decades.
Also he doesn't have to spend it for Initiations from 0 to s.th., he can spend it on everything, i.e. if he is initiat grad 50 he could spend 160 KP to get grad 51 or with a initiatory ordeal only 128 KP or he could raise first his Magic Attribute at 51 for 255 KP and so on...
We can use the 20 years Karma reward to calculate the 7,000 years, if we multiply that Karma by 350... ;D
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While Caimbeuile (Harl's real name) has been around seven millenium, he's only been really active a handful of times during those years. Granted, those periods of activity tend to generate TONS of karma to spend, so he's still got the lion's share of power.
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My point is it doesn't say "HIGH" double digits.
And what exactly do you think "HIGH" is? Mathematically it would be 10 to 50 or not?
As for Harlequin being 200% of Frosty's Karma? Well, it costs 608 Karma to get get to 8 Grade/Magic. So, 200% of that is 1200 Karma, which could put Harlequin at 13 Grade/Magic (for 1248 Karma). If he's around 25 Grade/Karma, that would be almost 600% of Frosty's Karma...
No, I meant, alone in the last 20 years since he became Jane's teacher. And Jane or Frosty has more than 608 Karma collected, think about Initiations, Magic improving, skill raising, spells, a.s.o.
And than you give Harlequin the double up! But this Karma isn't the only he got, it's only roughly the Karma of the last two decades.
Also he doesn't have to spend it for Initiations from 0 to s.th., he can spend it on everything, i.e. if he is initiat grad 50 he could spend 160 KP to get grad 51 or with a initiatory ordeal only 128 KP or he could raise first his Magic Attribute at 51 for 255 KP and so on...
We can use the 20 years Karma reward to calculate the 7000 years, if we multiply that Karma by 350... ;D
High would be 50-99, since that's more than 55% of the grades from 10-99.
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In FastJacks example it would be 420,000 (1,200 x 350)KP (and that would be low) since Harlequin is a Superhuman his starting BP would be from 600 to 2500 BP plus the 7,000 years of Karma. ::)
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My point is it doesn't say "HIGH" double digits.
And what exactly do you think "HIGH" is? Mathematically it would be 10 to 50 or not?
"High" would be 75-100 IMB, since 25-75 would be "middle".
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Would't the creation of man, by definition, have happened in the First Age of man?
Man was created in the first age this pissed off the old one in the second age elves dwarfs ect ect were born and maybe even made.
Or so I would think.
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What the hell is everyone arguing over anyway?
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In FastJacks example it would be 420,000 (1,200 x 350)KP (and that would be low) since Harlequin is a Superhuman his starting BP would be from 600 to 2500 BP plus the 7,000 years of Karma. ::)
Actually I'd say Harlequin was your normal 400 BP character maybe even 350 BUT that was in the 2nd age man some 20,000+ years ago. (2nd age 5k years, 3rd age 5k years, 4th age 5k years, 5th age 5k years, 6th age 61 years so far)
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What the hell is everyone arguing over anyway?
Y'know, I've lost track... ;)
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Elf. He was an elf. And i think he was from the Third Age, as he was mentioned as a knight of the City of Spires. Remember, that Immortal Elves breed. And Harlequinn is too much of a nice guy to be an elder IE.
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"Nice" guy?
Harlequin??
He's not a fiend, but he's not someone I would call "nice." Or sit down to tea with. Or be in the same city with.
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That's just 'cuz you don't like the elf. I'll have you know he sets an incredible tea service.
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I was comparing him to other Immortal Elves (except Frosty maybe). And i liked the Knight in ED. And the fact that he stood up to Alachia. And that he wasn't an elf-centered bastard.
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By that standard, yes, he's the nicest IE, ever.
Then again, devil rats are nicer than Immortal Elves, by comparison.
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At least devil rats make for good target practice.
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Just be sure to have enough ammo to kill them and any friends they bring along.
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Enough ammo? You're kidding right?
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I'd say enough white phosphorous grenades. And a flamethrower. As the old role says: Kill it with Fire. :P
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Indeed. Fire cleanses all. Or at least that's what always runs through my head when I watch shows on hoarders.
EDIT
Fixed an omission.
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My players have only met Frosty and (briefly) Ehran, so they probably still think Immortal Elves are reasonable. ;)
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Ehran reasonable. He had thousands of years to perfect being a pompous dick. And him being a genius doesn't help that matter.
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Pompous dicks are more reasonable than arrogant, racist bastards. No?