New to Shadowrun, would like some pointers on chargen

[Zeezy]

So, I finally decided I wanted to try Shadowrun, and as it happens, someone was actually going to start a campaign of it just as soon as all interested submitted a character sheet. I'm trying to make a sort of party face, but I don't have a good idea of how to go about that except for being awesome at the Influence skill group (which doesn't necessarily entail taking the group itself, perhaps forgoing Leadership). I already have a first draft of my character, but I don't want to be called a dumbass I want to see if I can tweak it with suggestions before I submit it for your approval (and subsequently the GM's). 500 BP, can buy up to 14/12R availability gear without GM fiat. If you feel it would help, I could show what I have so far.

I should preface by saying the campaign setting is James Cameron's Avatar. It's not inspired by it, Avatar is the setting. The megacorps were shoehorned in to take an active interest in Pandora, and that's where the PCs are being shuttled off to after a 6-year flight in cryostasis. The other runners are decidedly pro-Na'Vi. I am not. My character would be neutral at best, and racist at worst (haven't decided which yet). I doubt this will create complications, because I could still get grouped with the other runners by chance, and the GM is good at running solo adventures even if I don't.

Oh, could anyone (preferably Frank) explain how to flip the "Allow Hacking?" switch on my gear? I read the post showing how it's done, but I still don't completely understand.

[Username17]

Oh, could anyone (preferably Frank) explain how to flip the "Allow Hacking?"

Ugh. So for the moment I am assuming that you are using the "official" rules in all their retardedness.

So you have a commlink, and you have a wireless gun turret, and you want to make sure it isn't ever accessed by hackers. No problem! Here's how you roll:

• So you have something on your body. Anything on your body, and it is skinlinked to you, and it is skinlinked to your commlink. And it's a thing, so it has an access ID and it can be entitled to a persona.
• Your wireless gun droid is set up so that it only accepts logins or commands from the access ID of that thing on your body.

So how does this work? Well, when you aren't actively sending commands to your gun drone, there is no way to hack the gun drone at all, since to log in to it or send it any commands they would need the access ID of your belt buckle, but to get that information they need to make a matrix perception test on that icon, which in turn isn't even on the Matrix when you aren't sending. When you are sending and receiving, it's just on the edge of possible - in that they would have to successfully intercept your traffic, then decrypt it, then analyze it, then spoof it. And even then that does not in fact log them in to anything, that just gets them to square one of being able to attempt to hack into the system. But even if they got that far, you can set any set of permissions you want, so you could just set it up that there wasn't anything to achieve with an account on that wireless gun drone.

But that all assumes that you need to remote control something. If you don't, you don't even need to send an encrypted copy of the relevant access ID through the air. Imagine for a moment that you were just concerned about the integrity of the Commlink. It's in the same situation, where the enemy hacker would need to sniff out the packets and decrypt them and analyze them so that he could find an access ID that he could spoof just to be able to attempt to hack into your commlink. But there are never any packets in the air to sniff, because your belt buckle is skin linked to your commlink and never sends any wireless packets.

So the enemy hacker not only has a very long list of tasks he needs to accomplish before he can get started, but one of them is contingent on waiting for one of your devices that never ever sends wireless signals to send a wireless signal.

-Username17

[Quantumboost]

Observations of a comparative noob GM, based on one of my players' characters and extrapolation:

First, if you want to be super-face, be an Elf. The boost to charisma is worth almost as much as the metatype cost by itself (more if you're actually investing in >= 6 Charisma).

You can either go Adept or bioware to get your Social bonuses (Kinesics and Facial Sculpt are good for the former while Voice Control and Linguistics don't hurt, and for the latter tailored pheromones and enhanced pheromone receptors add to the raw dicepool). Alternatively, you could take "Magician" as your secondary Schtick and pick a Charisma tradition, and still be a damn good face who also casts any crazy spells you happen to particularly care about.

Skillwise, it's good to have Disguise in addition to the Social group, so that you can actually throw around your ridiculous Social dicepool without being identified by whoever you're using it on. Also, your Charisma is crazyhigh, so you can add any other Charisma-based skills you happen to find.

If you can max out Elf Charisma and have the skill group at 4, you'll already be tossing 12 dice, on top of which you can pile Kinesics, Tailored Pheromones, or a Spirit of Man sustaining a Charisma boosting spell on you - depending on what qualities you picked up. The raw 12 dice on Social/Disguise cost 146 BP under the base system (including Elf quality, full Charisma, and skill costs), leaving you plenty left over to pick up "don't die" attributes and a secondary schtick like ninja or magician.

As a character at all, having decent Body and Willpower is probably a good move. Also some low-profile armor.

[Zeezy]

Good to know I was more or less on the right track. I was going mundane, but I don't have any qualms with magic so long as I can afford it BP-wise. I doubt I'll get any better advice without supplying a character sheet for critique, so here's what I have so far:

Points spent: 459/500

Metatype: Elf (30 BP)
Attributes: (275 BP)
Bod: 3 | Wil: 3
Agi: 6 | Log: 4
Rea: 4 | Int: 4
Str: 2 | Cha: 8
Edge: 4

Active Skills: (108 BP)
Con [Cha]: 3
Etiquette [Cha]: 4
Gymnastics [Agi]: 2
Negotiation [Cha]: 6
Perception [Int]: 3
Pilot Ground Craft [Rea]: 2
Pistols [Agi]: 2

Group: Stealth [Agi/Int]: 2

Knowledge Skills: (24 free)
Corporate Politics: 4
Psychology: 4
Security Design: 1
Underworld Politics: 4

Languages:
English: N
German: 2
Japanese: 3
Na'Vi: 2
Sperethiel: 4

Positive Qualities: Blandness, Human-Looking (15 BP)

Contacts: (31 BP)
Mafia Consiglieri (Loyalty 6, Contact 6)
Fixer (Loyalty 3, Contact 6)
Runner (Loyalty 6, Contact 4)

[Orca]

Just IMO - you're kind of squishy at the mo. Reaction 4, gymnastics 2, no magic or cyber and 3 body could get you killed by accident. What sort of way would fit best with your character is the question. Just remember that at least one extra initiative pass is almost essential even if you only want to take defensive-type actions in combat.

Since you've somehow spent a lot of points already, cyber may be the best way to go.

[cthulhu]

If you're playing avatar, many of the constraints that bind you in a normal game are fucking irrelevant. Who gives a shit if you are wandering around with an assault cannon - either you are a marine and it's legal, or your a navi, it's not and the marines were going to try to kill you anyway. Which is when that assault cannon comes into play.

As a result conceal-ability and legality (an important restriction in the base game) are totally irrelevant IN SPACE.

So with this in mind, pistols is getting dumped on from a great height. Pistols was barely worth it in real shadowrun. In SPACE, it's a huge turd. Take automatics and get an assault rifle, or take heavy weapons and a bigger gun. Pistols is a cruel joke.

Secondly, your body is too low. The lightest weight power armour in the game takes 4 body to wear. If you're expecting to wear power armour, you need another point of body. As everyone in the movie is wearing power armour, I expect that you should expect to wear power armor. Power armour will make you much less squishy.

Con [Cha]: 3
Etiquette [Cha]: 4
Negotiation [Cha]: 6

^ Take the skill group.

Finally, you're kinda shitty at the moment due to a total failure to be good at combat or be super pro at talking to people. You have 41 BP of cash floating so use that to fix the issues, with cyberwear up the ass. You have 1 IP. Generic Marines will have 2. People who are good at combat will have 3 or 4.

Finally, there is tailored pheromones that are +3 to talking, so you need to have those.

[Orca]

Your contacts are amazingly loyal and mostly so good they'll never have time for you (Contact level 6 = roll a 6 on a d6 to actually get hold of them). This is a fine way to waste points. Contacts at level 3-4/loyalty 3 are good and competent friends.

I agree with cthulhu about the pistols. You really, really don't want to be shooting 9' blue guys or jungle triceratops or even guys in power armour with a pistol, it'll only make them angry.

[Zeezy]

Well, I hadn't bothered with gear yet, mainly because I just wanted to post what I had so far. I'm glad I did, because I seriously hadn't thought to request power armor for my character.

A new problem came up, though. I finally got in touch with the other players, and apparently my MC didn't tell me the whole story regarding their roles: the Technomancer was also playing a face, and apparently general consensus is they want a medic of some sort. I could just scrap my work thus far and make a mage, but I'm reluctant to do so considering the effort I put into making what is effectively my first foray into Shadowrun. Should I just go ahead and make a mage, stick with my current character, or somehow hybridize the two roles (or make a medtech)?

I'll post an updated sheet once I've decided on what role my character will adopt.

As a result conceal-ability and legality (an important restriction in the base game) are totally irrelevant IN SPACE.

...if I choose one of the openly hostile corps. The MC said we need a reason to be sent to Pandora, and getting a long-term mission from a corp's Mr. Johnson (of our choice) is the easiest route. Some corps hate Pandora (Ares, S-K, Shiawase), some corps are on good terms (EVO, Horizon), and the others aren't taking sides -- not openly, anyway. If I tell the MC I would prefer my fixer to set me up with a corp neutral to Pandora's natives (Renraku seems most promising), then I'll want to keep that neutrality as much as possible until such time passes that they want to unveil their plans for intergalactic domination (what megacorp doesn't have those plans?). The friendly corps will probably even have their own battle-ready hirelings on planet to deal with people who are there to take a piss in the Na'Vis' cereal.

Your contacts are amazingly loyal and mostly so good they'll never have time for you (Contact level 6 = roll a 6 on a d6 to actually get hold of them). This is a fine way to waste points. Contacts at level 3-4/loyalty 3 are good and competent friends.

Fixed, thanks. Changed the contacts to have a L4/C4 Consiglieri, a L3/C5 Fixer, and a L6/C3 Runner. Does this look good, or should the Fixer be at C4 as well? (Mind, this contact is probably going to be pure flavor, considering the campaign is taking place rather far away from home. The Runner's going to be the only one who will willingly come with me to Pandora.)

[Quantumboost]

A new problem came up, though. I finally got in touch with the other players, and apparently my MC didn't tell me the whole story regarding their roles: the Technomancer was also playing a face, and apparently general consensus is they want a medic of some sort. I could just scrap my work thus far and make a mage, but I'm reluctant to do so considering the effort I put into making what is effectively my first foray into Shadowrun. Should I just go ahead and make a mage, stick with my current character, or somehow hybridize the two roles (or make a medtech)?

Making a full-blown medic is pretty easy and low-cost. You get a Rating 6 medkit (the best in the book, and VERY cheap), drop points to get either First Aid and Medicine or the Biotech group up to 4, and have a half-decent logic. That's pretty much all there is to it, though having the Heal spell on the same character isn't a *bad* thing. You could make a half-decent field medic by just having an R6 medkit and dropping one or two ranks each into First Aid/Medicine.

So you could easily do either a Hermetic or (based on your current character) Shamanic magician who dabbles in medicine enough to keep the team on their feet.

[cthulhu]

As a result conceal-ability and legality (an important restriction in the base game) are totally irrelevant IN SPACE.

Some corps hate Pandora (Ares, S-K, Shiawase), some corps are on good terms (EVO, Horizon), and the others aren't taking sides -- not openly, anyway.

It doesn't even matter what they think of Pandora. Pandora is full of giant animals that can eat you.

In the real world when we go to these locations, like africa, and wander around near the wild life, like on safari, armed professionals carry rifles for the express purpose of shooting the shit out of any animals that get stroppy. Some of the guns are really big. All of them would raise eyebrows if you started wandering around with them in New York or Sydney.

Concealibility doesn't matter at all - because it's EXPECTED that you will have a really big gun to fend off the wildlife. Legality doesn't matter at all, because you are working for the government!

[Zeezy]

Making a full-blown medic is pretty easy and low-cost. You get a Rating 6 medkit (the best in the book, and VERY cheap), drop points to get either First Aid and Medicine or the Biotech group up to 4, and have a half-decent logic. That's pretty much all there is to it, though having the Heal spell on the same character isn't a *bad* thing. You could make a half-decent field medic by just having an R6 medkit and dropping one or two ranks each into First Aid/Medicine.

So you could easily do either a Hermetic or (based on your current character) Shamanic magician who dabbles in medicine enough to keep the team on their feet.

The only qualm I have with making a mage is I'd have to ditch my cyber/bioware, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, since magic can replicate a lot of it and do more on top of that. It's nice to hear that I wouldn't necessarily be making a bad career choice by eschewing magic as a medic, though. I'll weigh my options and see what I come up with.

Concealibility doesn't matter at all - because it's EXPECTED that you will have a really big gun to fend off the wildlife. Legality doesn't matter at all, because you are working for the government!

I suppose not. I'll just have to see what kind of state Pandora is in -- whether Evo and Horizon are in full control of civilized portions, or if I can go walking around pointing a LAW anywhere I damn well please. Until then, I'll work under the assumption that I can carry anything I want and only have to worry about the local fauna.

[cthulhu]

You should also slap everyone on your team into taking first aid 1 and providing their own first aid kit.

Medic isn't really a job in SR. Any mage can do it for free in addition to whatever else it is that he does.

[Zeezy]

I merely said... that there are NO mages ON Pandora currently. [...] I am saying that Mages don't mesh too well with pandora... they tend to go slightly insane and die.

So, Pandora was here, mages are babbys. Here are some interesting snippets from the conversation:

The MC: Its related to Pandora info I know of from official statements by James Cameron and his writing staff.
The MC: Related to how things communicate on planet, and what it effects.
The MC: Knowing what Mages can perceive/manipulate, they kinda... disrupt the flow, and instead of "ignoring and going around" the impediment to energy flow. It is like a hole in the ground... the energy keeps increasing until something in the mage gives and they die.
The MC: That is why some of the "Shaman" among the Na'Vi can get glimpses of what is to be. They tap into the magical storage that is Pandora. Energy used for magic, is the same used by "Unobtanium", its just the FIELD is massive on Pandora.
The MC: Way more than anywhere else known.
The MC: How to protect yourself from it, is very hard to determine, but Technomancers aren't immune to the effects, they are just less likely to have problems, because there is a "matrix" to tap into.
The MC: Which will confuse the CRAP out of technomancers arriving on planet
The MC: Anyway... will not explain anything else until discovered in game
[...]
Zeezy: If magic is fucked up on Pandora, how can Metahumans live there?
The MC: Unless they are ACTIVELY connected to magical energy, therefore impeding it
The MC: They don't have a problem

If anyone's willing to tell me precisely why this is stupid (besides being a cop-out for "I don't want magic in my Shadowrun campaign," because I am willing to believe the MC thinks this is a valid flavor reason by Hanlon's Razor), you have my thanks in advance. Until then, I guess I'm sticking with what I have:

Metatype: Elf (30 BP)

Attributes: 280 BP
Bod: 4/6 (4) | Wil: 4/6 (4)
Agi: 6/7 (6) | Log: 5/6 (5)
Rea: 4/6 (6) | Int: 4/6 (4)
Str: 2/6 (2) | Cha: 7/8 (8)
Init: 8 (12) | Passes: 1 (3)
Edge: 4/6 | Ess: 1.625

Active Skills: 128 BP
2 (2) Dodge
3 (3) Perception
2 (2) Automatic Weapons
4 (4) Group: Biotech
4 (4) Group: Influence
2 (2) Group: Stealth

Knowledge Skills: 27 free points, 2 BP
3 (3) Corporate Politics
3 (3) Psychology
1 (1) Security Design
2 (2) Pre-Crash Speed Metal
4 (4) Chemistry
4 (4) Biology

Languages:
N (N) English
2 (2) German
3 (3) Japanese
2 (2) Na'Vi
4 (4) Sperethiel

Positive Qualities: 20 BP
Blandness
Human-Looking
Restricted Gear

Negative Qualities: -35 BP
Incompetent (Archery, Automotive Mechanic, Electronic Warfare, Instruction, Intimidation, Longarms)
Scorched

Contacts: 25 BP
L4/C4 Mafia Consiglieri
L3/C5 Fixer
L6/C3 Runner

Funding: 50 BP (250,000¥)

-1,000: FN HAR
-1,000: >Internal Smartgun System
-1,000: >>Ultrasound
-50: >Skinlink
-750: >10 clips of ammunition (75/ea, regular ammo)
-420: >4 clips of ammunition (105/ea, flechette rounds)
-16,800: Light military armor (@40% Markup)

-1,000: Renraku Sensei Commlink
-600: >Renraku Ichi OS
-50: >Skinlink
-50: >Subvocal Microphone

-100: Micro-Camera
-100: >Vision Magnification
-50: >Skinlink
-100: Micro-Camera
-100: >Low-Light Vision
-50: >Skinlink

-4,000: Fake SIN R4
-400: Fake Firearms License R4
-400: Fake Concealed Firearms License R4

-100: Ocular Protective Covers
-500: Datajack
-8,000: Skillwire R4
-64,000: Alphaware Wired Reflexes R2
-20,000: Reaction Enhancers R2
-45,000: Tailored Pheromones R3
-25,000: Platelet Factories
-10,000: Sleep Regulator

38,480 nuyen left

The MC gave me a hard time with the armor because he doesn't understand that only the number matters with how available an item is, and tho R/F designator just explains how legal it is. I'll end up buying some Skillsofts to help round out my budget and fill in some gaps, but other than that, I'm wondering if I fell for any newbie traps.

[edit: forgot about the rule that halves essence cost for bioware if its unmodified cost is lower than your cyberware's, and vice-versa; adjusted accordingly]

[CatharzGodfoot]

The ideal healer would probably be a hermetic dwarf with logic boosters. With maxed Logic you're an excellent doctor, and with the addition of maxed Will you can blast with impunity (including healing magic). You can even sneak in a hacker side-shtick without much BP cost, although having a high logic is sadly useless for that in the standard rules.

I don't know anything about Avatar: The Smurfs of Fern Gully, but the normal way to represent the strangeness for mages would be a constant background count. This could be surmountable, depending on how high it is.


Oh and nice job on Incompetent. Now the GM is basically obligated to throw in the occasional broken-down car, archery contest, teachable moment, etc.

[Quantumboost]

Concur. If Pandora is specifically accessible to Shamans but not anybody else, that basically just means that the entire planet is a Rating 6 Domain aspected to Nature Worship (possibly specifically AmerInd Shamanism, but I'd have a hard time believing that). That in itself would penalize most starting characters who don't follow such traditions - a Hermetic on a Rating-6-Domain Pandora wouldn't even have any magic. A Shaman there would become ridiculously powerful, as they'd have like +6 to their Magic dicepools.

Your GM should read page 117 onward of Street Magic, which describes how aspected mana and the like works out. Note that there actually are domains that strong on Shadowrun's Earth (Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Auschwitz are R6 domains, almost definitely aspected to Toxic magic), and that anything stronger than that turns chaotic and is basically harmful regardless of whether you're aspected to it.

The idea of the planet acting as a Matrixlike network in itself is interesting. It sounds, though, like your GM is extremely confused about what Technomancers are: they *aren't* magical in any capacity whatsoever, they just have weird bioelectric abilities that allow them to directly interact with networked devices. The fact that Pandora has weird effects on the mana field means precisely dick to Technomancers, though all the synapses in the whole "planetmind" could easily have actual effects on the Resonance.

[Zeezy]

Oh and nice job on Incompetent. Now the GM is basically obligated to throw in the occasional broken-down car, archery contest, teachable moment, etc.

I'm OK with this. At best it adds levity to the session, at worst it makes her look like a bumbling fool. Either way, it's (probably) not going to kill her to close off those options.

Concur. If Pandora is specifically accessible to Shamans but not anybody else, that basically just means that the entire planet is a Rating 6 Domain aspected to Nature Worship (possibly specifically AmerInd Shamanism, but I'd have a hard time believing that). That in itself would penalize most starting characters who don't follow such traditions - a Hermetic on a Rating-6-Domain Pandora wouldn't even have any magic. A Shaman there would become ridiculously powerful, as they'd have like +6 to their Magic dicepools.

It's worse than that. He's claiming that anyone Awakened who visits Pandora ends up spontaneously combusting. He hinted that it has something to do with the Unobtanium, as the chat log shows. I'm perfectly cool with the MC saying "I don't want magicians in my campaign," but ... actually, no, I'm not cool with it. I'd appreciate it if he'd explain his reasoning for punishing magical characters, but I guess I'll just have to find out myself.

Your GM should read page 117 onward of Street Magic, which describes how aspected mana and the like works out. Note that there actually are domains that strong on Shadowrun's Earth (Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Auschwitz are R6 domains, almost definitely aspected to Toxic magic), and that anything stronger than that turns chaotic and is basically harmful regardless of whether you're aspected to it.

Reading through it myself, it's very likely that Pandora is one huge mana warp -- or, at least, the common landing sites on Pandora are. There's a chance that Pandora has some safe zones, but I don't think any mage who values his life would test that theory.

The idea of the planet acting as a Matrixlike network in itself is interesting. It sounds, though, like your GM is extremely confused about what Technomancers are: they *aren't* magical in any capacity whatsoever, they just have weird bioelectric abilities that allow them to directly interact with networked devices. The fact that Pandora has weird effects on the mana field means precisely dick to Technomancers, though all the synapses in the whole "planetmind" could easily have actual effects on the Resonance.

Here's the thing, though: what the fuck is on Pandora that would let them tap into the Resonance? It's possible that they can still access the Matrix, but without the technology prevalent on Earth, how are they tapping into the Resonance?

[Quantumboost]

It's vaguely plausible that since the entire planet's ecosystem is one gigantic neural meta-network, it could have "brainwaves" just intense enough to create something similar to being in active Matrix wireless signals. Similar enough that the 'mancers could actually connect to the Resonance through it, compile Sprites, and so on. The entire planet could just *be* a gigantic technomantic node or group of nodes.

It would be *weird* to someone used to technomancing technological systems, but their powers would still work.

[Orca]

I'd thought how magical Technomancer powers are in origin are was up to the GM. With that in mind, it's reasonable that they might interact with Pandora's bio net in odd ways. It also gives technomancers a reason to exist in the campaign, which is good.

Serious mana warps can easily be inhabited by nasty spirits who might choose to get rid of unwanted mages by, say, making them spontaneously combust. I don't know how having no mages in the party will change the campaign, but at least your face won't have to sit back while the mage controls thoughts (or whatever) again and again.

[Quantumboost]

I'd thought how magical Technomancer powers are in origin are was up to the GM.

Uh, no. Technomancer powers don't have auras, or any sort of magically detectable effects, unless they directly affect the contents of brainware - which is also the case for purely nonmagical nonresonance hacking. A VR-projecting technomancer's aura is still within their body. There is nothing to indicate that Technomancy is in any way magic within the setting, and plenty to indicate that it isn't.

A Technomancer's powers are *mystical* but definitely not *magical*.

[Neurosis]

I should preface by saying the campaign setting is James Cameron's Avatar. It's not inspired by it, Avatar is the setting. The megacorps were shoehorned in to take an active interest in Pandora, and that's where the PCs are being shuttled off to after a 6-year flight in cryostasis. The other runners are decidedly pro-Na'Vi. I am not. My character would be neutral at best, and racist at worst (haven't decided which yet). I doubt this will create complications, because I could still get grouped with the other runners by chance, and the GM is good at running solo adventures even if I don't.

can't read further eyes bleeding

note to your GM: way to take something I love (Shadowrun) and something I like okay (Avatar) and combine them into something I utterly hate through mystery genre alchemy

* So you have something on your body. Anything on your body, and it is skinlinked to you, and it is skinlinked to your commlink. And it's a thing, so it has an access ID and it can be entitled to a persona.

* Your wireless gun droid is set up so that it only accepts logins or commands from the access ID of that thing on your body.

So how does this work? Well, when you aren't actively sending commands to your gun drone, there is no way to hack the gun drone at all, since to log in to it or send it any commands they would need the access ID of your belt buckle, but to get that information they need to make a matrix perception test on that icon, which in turn isn't even on the Matrix when you aren't sending. When you are sending and receiving, it's just on the edge of possible - in that they would have to successfully intercept your traffic, then decrypt it, then analyze it, then spoof it. And even then that does not in fact log them in to anything, that just gets them to square one of being able to attempt to hack into the system. But even if they got that far, you can set any set of permissions you want, so you could just set it up that there wasn't anything to achieve with an account on that wireless gun drone.

But that all assumes that you need to remote control something. If you don't, you don't even need to send an encrypted copy of the relevant access ID through the air. Imagine for a moment that you were just concerned about the integrity of the Commlink. It's in the same situation, where the enemy hacker would need to sniff out the packets and decrypt them and analyze them so that he could find an access ID that he could spoof just to be able to attempt to hack into your commlink. But there are never any packets in the air to sniff, because your belt buckle is skin linked to your commlink and never sends any wireless packets.

So the enemy hacker not only has a very long list of tasks he needs to accomplish before he can get started, but one of them is contingent on waiting for one of your devices that never ever sends wireless signals to send a wireless signal.

This is a very silly interpretation of these rules. Even if it is RAW, that doesn't change, and I can't imagine that it was Rules As Intended. In any case, it's a good thing no one actually play this way. Thank goodness for common sense being used to sub-consciously house-rule the more retarded bits by ignoring them.

By the way, if hypothetically the gun drone is autonomous (running off of its Pilot program) or just dormant and the belt buckle guy is not commanding it directly, even according to RAW nothing stops a hacker from just straight-up hacking the turret, right? Like just rolling a 'Hack on the Fly' action?

Just IMO - you're kind of squishy at the mo. Reaction 4, gymnastics 2, no magic or cyber and 3 body could get you killed by accident. What sort of way would fit best with your character is the question. Just remember that at least one extra initiative pass is almost essential even if you only want to take defensive-type actions in combat.

Since you've somehow spent a lot of points already, cyber may be the best way to go.

Seconded.

Medic isn't really a job in SR. Any mage can do it for free in addition to whatever else it is that he does.

What? 'FOR FREE'? Soaking the drain for healing someone who is seriously wounded (it is not hard to get seriously wounded in SR) is far from free. If you mean that 'Heal' is a spell every mage should have, I agree (unless it wouldn't make sense for character flavor).

Anyway, gonna stop editing this post now. Shadowtar hybrid making my head hurt.

[Username17]

This is a very silly interpretation of these rules. Even if it is RAW, that doesn't change, and I can't imagine that it was Rules As Intended. In any case, it's a good thing no one actually play this way. Thank goodness for common sense being used to sub-consciously house-rule the more retarded bits by ignoring them.

Fuck You.

Take your Oberoni Fallacy and shove it up your entire asshole.

SR4 Matrix rules are fucking awful, and the fact that absolutely everyone is running around ignoring large sections of the rules is NOT a good thing. It's hacking, the characters are supposed to be exploiting weaknesses in the system. If no one knows what the system is because the MC is ignoring massive amounts of the printed version, then hackers can't play their fucking characters.

-Username17

[cthulhu]

What? 'FOR FREE'? Soaking the drain for healing someone who is seriously wounded (it is not hard to get seriously wounded in SR) is far from free. If you mean that 'Heal' is a spell every mage should have, I agree (unless it wouldn't make sense for character flavor).

Anyway, gonna stop editing this post now. Shadowtar hybrid making my head hurt.

Oh noes... it's some drain. Whatever shall I do. Healing seriously requires an investment on behalf of the mage of 0.75% of available resources. It's not like he was not going to get a drain pool anyway.

[Neurosis]

This is a very silly interpretation of these rules. Even if it is RAW, that doesn't change, and I can't imagine that it was Rules As Intended. In any case, it's a good thing no one actually play this way. Thank goodness for common sense being used to sub-consciously house-rule the more retarded bits by ignoring them.

Fuck You.

Take your Oberoni Fallacy and shove it up your entire asshole.

SR4 Matrix rules are fucking awful, and the fact that absolutely everyone is running around ignoring large sections of the rules is NOT a good thing. It's hacking, the characters are supposed to be exploiting weaknesses in the system. If no one knows what the system is because the MC is ignoring massive amounts of the printed version, then hackers can't play their fucking characters.

-Username17

Well that seems disproportionately rude and aggressive by any reasonable standard.

[Neurosis]

Oh noes... it's some drain. Whatever shall I do. Healing seriously requires an investment on behalf of the mage of 0.75% of available resources. It's not like he was not going to get a drain pool anyway.

I didn't say it was expensive just that it wasn't free.

[Quantumboost]

Well that seems disproportionately rude and aggressive by any reasonable standard.

Until you realize that you were espousing the exact philosophy that is directly responsible for the SR hacking rules still being as bad as they are, and is actually insulting in the highest degree to anyone who actually cares about game design in Shadowrun - or in general.

Sure. "Disproportionate".