From flashlife-request@kpc.com Mon Apr 26 20:21:30 1993
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Date: Mon, 26 Apr 93 20:21:24 PDT
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Subject: Flashlife   V3 #11
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Status: R

From: Carl Rigney (moderator) <flashlife-request@kpc.com>


Flashlife  Mon, 26 Apr, 1993   Volume 3 : Issue 11

Today's topics:

  Comment on Street Index/Avalability for Spells	(York H. Dobyns)
  Martial Arts in Shadowrun II 				(Carl Rigney)
  Ideas on fixing the Shadowrun magic system  		(Chris Siebenmann)
  Fletchette ammo... 					(Steve McClaire)
  Re:  Fletchette ammo... 				(Carl Rigney)

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Date: Thu, 28 Jan 93 11:23:29 -0500
From: "York H. Dobyns" <ydobyns@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Subject: Comment on Street Index/Avalability for Spells

Attaching a Street Index and Availability rating won't keep spells out of
the players' hands, because it's easy--almost trivial, at low Force ratings--
to design your own. For 3 initial skill points a character can start out
knowing Magic Theory 1/Hermetic(or Shamanic) 3/Spell Design 5. (It seems
completely obscure to me, by the way, why any active magician would learn
Magic Theory in any form other than the Concentration appropriate to her
particular Path, and almost as obscure why a PC-type adventuring magician
would not take the specialization in Spell Design; there seems precious
little use for more general varieties of the skill, unless one is an
academic or a researcher.

The above paragraph applies the concentration/specialization tree for
Magic Theory as described in SRII: I don't recall if that has changed
from the original rules.

Worse (at least from the standpoint of someone who is concerned about
keeping spell availability under tight control) is the fact that Magic
Theory, not being itself a magical skill, can be made into a skillsoft;
and, not being an Active skill, you don't even need skillwires to use
it. A mage with minimal headware and lots of cash can get as high a
rating as the market can offer.

Magicians who don't know how to design their own spells could still
suffer from restrictions, but why bother when it's so easy for them to
learn to design their own? 

Personal to Carl Rigney: I have SR II now and am working on the promised
review. My work schedule is such that the only date I can commit to is
Real Soon Now.



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Date: Sat, 20 Feb 93 02:50:48 PST
From: cdr@kpc.com (Carl Rigney)
Subject: Martial Arts in Shadowrun II

Remember our discussions a couple of years ago on Martial Arts
in Shadowrun?  Nope, I don't either.  But I have been thinking
some more about it because I have a new character with Aikido.

I was thinking of:

Throw: One damage level less but net successes means the target
is on the ground.

Hold: One damage level less (or at the attacker's option, two) but
the target must roll unarmed combat vs. twice the number of net successes
to break free.  (Or perhaps it should be an unarmed combat vs. unarmed
combat resisted test with the holder getting -1 per original success and the
attacker getting +1.)

Killing Strike: One damage level less and/or half power, but does physical
instead of stun damage.  (Not appropriate for Aikido, mind you.)

The other part to simulating Aikido is that you can concentrate in it
for the purposes of defense, so for example you'd have
Unarmed Combat 3, Aikido 5, and roll 5 dice on defense but only 3 dice
when attacking.  (More properly, you'd never attack.)

Comments?

--
Carl Rigney
cdr@kpc.com



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Date: 	Mon, 22 Feb 1993 13:46:47 -0500
From: Chris Siebenmann <cks@hawkwind.utcs.toronto.edu>
Subject: Ideas on fixing the Shadowrun magic system 

 Let's talk about radical changes to the stock Shadowrun magic system
(I can't call it a reform by this point). I recently realized what
bothered me most about SR magic, and why it felt so wrong: all those
instant spells, aka the 'just like AD&D' phenomenon.

 My cure is simple: delete normal magic. Entirely.
 Ritual magic remains, as do spirits and elementals, although all should
be changed somewhat (note that all these are currently ideas, and
haven't been playtested).

 Spirits are probably the least changed; I don't think they need
any big changes. You may want to make normal spirits a bit more
powerful, but probably not.

 Elementals need to be fiddled a bit; you should probably cheapen
elemental summoning, at least for low-force elementals, and make
it faster. I can also see improvised elemental summonings, depending
on circumstances. A lot of this depends on how much you want
hermetic mages throwing their weight around; if you keep all the
costs stock, hermetics are going to be very cautious about when
and where they summon and use up elementals.

 I'd delete watchers entirely, if you even play with them (I don't;
I consider them a loathsome invention designed expressly for
munchkin uses). If you want more active mages, feel free to keep
them; I'd consider some penalty for summoning them (besides having
to put up with the stupid things nattering at you). Maybe they
should be something only initiates can summon.

 It's probably necessary to invent a 'fast' version of rituals;
this should definitely require materials and obvious happenings.
My personal inclination is to restrict it fairly heavily. For
shamans I would say that you can only do fast rituals with spells
you would normally get totem bonuses for (and you loose the bonus
dice); for hermetics, you should have to completely burn at least
one elemental, plus materials. You should probably take a +2 or
more target modifier.

 People should (under restricted situations) be able to buy spells as
'innate abilities', gifts from their magic; restrict this carefully
(perhaps enough of a restriction is that if you are gifted with a
spell, you can never cast it ritually, but I suspect more is needed).
Shamans should only be gifted from spells that they get bonuses on
and that are appropriate to the totem and character. Hermetics are
more difficult to handle; a hermetic who wants to be gifted should
be required to specialize somehow, either in field or elemental
type or both, and then be giftable only from spells covered by that.
Perhaps a reasonable further restriction is that you can only have
your Magic Rating in total force of gifts, but I'd have to play
with this to test it out.

 Thoughts? Comments?

---
"Tikki has a number of things in her favor, things which make a run on the
 Park likely to succeed -- determination, skill, experience, the right
 equipment, and a complete fold-out survey of all security systems currently
 on-site."
cks@hawkwind.utcs.toronto.edu	           ...!{utgpu,utzoo,watmath}!utgpu!cks



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Date: Tue, 16 Mar 93 14:50:52 PST
From: Steve McClaire <stevemcc@microsoft.com>
Subject: Fletchette ammo...

Anyone hear an 'offical' clarification on how armor affects fletchette 
ammo?  If I remeber the rules correctly, it says something like 
"...double impact or ballistic, whichever is higher..." armor is used.  
You could read this as either 1) use higher of 2x impact or 2x 
ballistic, or 2) us higher of 2x impact or 1x ballistic.  Option 2 
makes fletchette ammo pretty effective against anything but heavy 
armor, whereas option 1 makes it nearly useless.  Comments?

Steve



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Date: Tue, 16 Mar 93 16:41:51 PST
From: cdr (Carl Rigney)
Subject: Re:  Fletchette ammo...

I'd always seen it interpreted as option 2.
Option 1 would be phrased as "double the higher of impact or ballistic."

--
Carl Rigney	cdr@kpc.com



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End of Flashlife
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