[Ren]

It seems there are a lot of overlaps between JDA's character and the one i'm working on (almost complete, gear and background need a few more touches). I was considering a different build also, so i just wanted to ask our GM, what's his take on custom magical traditions. I'd possibly work with the following, and the magician is already done (just need to adjust a few things, as previous version used CHA*3 free contact points).

Basically i wanted to play a necromancer who views spirits as the souls of the departed who look after the world they left behind. They cannot act by themselves so they have to find physical mediums for that. The necromancer sometimes allows those spirits to follow their agenda and in exchange he gets their help other times.
The tradition has to be a possession-type and with human-like spirits to summon. The woodoo is very similar (except for the background) but i have issues with the water spirit not fitting in. Is it possibble to exchange it for beast? (Beast is at least a living being, and as a hunter he is fitting for the detection spell support.)

[AffreuxLex]

It seems there are a lot of overlaps between JDA's character and the one i'm working on (almost complete, gear and background need a few more touches). I was considering a different build also, so i just wanted to ask our GM, what's his take on custom magical traditions. I'd possibly work with the following, and the magician is already done (just need to adjust a few things, as previous version used CHA*3 free contact points).

Basically i wanted to play a necromancer who views spirits as the souls of the departed who look after the world they left behind. They cannot act by themselves so they have to find physical mediums for that. The necromancer sometimes allows those spirits to follow their agenda and in exchange he gets their help other times.
The tradition has to be a possession-type and with human-like spirits to summon. The woodoo is very similar (except for the background) but i have issues with the water spirit not fitting in. Is it possibble to exchange it for beast? (Beast is at least a living being, and as a hunter he is fitting for the detection spell support.)

I like custom things, it makes people unique.  Plus there is plenty of lore where people believe spirits are dead people.  Nothing that I've seen to prove one way or another so it may even open up some philosophical debates in game.  Go ahead with the water/beast switch.

Since you and Gustovness have some previous history together, would the two of you be interested in having your characters know each other previously to help smooth over the initial team introduction?  It might be a little confusing to start with what I have planned out and it may just help things along.  I don't mean as in good friends or anything, just that your paths have crossed a time or two in the past and you might even remember each other's alias if you stop to think about it for a minute.

[Gustovness]

Cuco is in need of a group of magicians to join.  This is not a pressing matter for him since his skills are so terrible he doesn't have much expectation that anyone will let him in.  This can open up the door for a couple of different scenarios:

• Ren's character is part of a group that Cuco is considering joining in order to expand his abilities.  Ren's group is contacted for the initial run and decides to send Cuco along with Ren to see if he'd be a good fit.  I'd be okay with this if the group is more critical about personality fitting in rather than skills.  Cuco is going to be instantly turned off if the grounds for his being initiated into the group have to do with his current skill level.
• Ren is not part of any group either and he met Cuco on a matrix node that's dedicated to self instruction for spell slingers.  Other than meeting up a few times for soykaf in meatspace and practicing their craft, they've never actually gone on a run together.  Their fixer reaches out to one of them and agrees to let them bring a friend along who might contribute to the team. Big surprise when the other finds out that they're also a shadowrunner...
• or... neither of the above.  Maybe none of these work for the RP that Ren is hoping to fit into his character in which case, screw it!  We can just meet up for the first time on our run like everyone else.

[Ren]

The second option seems more feasible as my character will be trained in instruction. And he regularly teaches people the Mob assigns to learn (you'll see why from the background, which i'll post later today). Maybe it was a reward for a job or a service paid for, that Coco could participate on one of those.

[Ren]

And the background for Puppeteer, the elven magician.
Michael was born in 2033 to elven father Daloren and human mother Jane. His father had a small gift and curio shop in Puyalup that has luckily seen enough customers to provide for the family. His father was a dreamer and a magic-nut, always pursuing some hazy goal. His mother was the restraint on these. The little Mike grew up between these two worlds, one full of stories and dreams, the other rational but caring.
Things got better and worse at the same time when in 2039 his mother died because of an untreated infection and it became clear that Mike had magical talents. His father decided that he has to give every opportunity to the boy so Mike went to a school for gifted young people, where he excelled when it came to the denizens of the metaplanes. After a few years he continued learning under an elven priest who gave him belief and purpuse beside knowledge.
In the crash of '64 his father was on a business trip, unfortunately in Boston. He lost his life during the riots. This was more than one shock for Mike because some "businessman" approached him after inheritance was taken care of and have shown him some contracts, according to which he owed them a lot of nuyen. His father accumulated this debt to be able to pay for his schools. These people were from the Ciarnello family and "persuaded" him to work off the debt by using some of his skills for them.
From then on, Mike had to accept a steady job of making fetishes for the Mob and teaching people they told to, as well as some "extra" work in the shadows. Still he wasnt able to completely pay off the debt as he pursued some dreams - not as far-fetched as those of his father but still costly.

[mtfeeney = Baron]

This should be a very fun game to watch.  That is a very... what's the word?  Captivating?  A captivating background story.

[Gustovness]

Alright, Ren, let's say we met on an uneventful street level run together once.  Everything went smoothly, and we made contact.  I just want to be careful with tying Cuco too close to the mob before the game even starts.

[JDA]

AffreuxLex, thanks for the suggestion. I will add a mild gambling addiction Alex with the build points I'm going to add a bookie as a contact 3 connect. / 1 loyalty. I also need to know how you treat the gambling skill. Is it an active skill or knowledge skill. As I will purchase an active soft or know soft in gambling with the 1build point I have left over. I have seen that different GM's have their own opinion.

[JDA]

Alex is an Elvin female 5’11 weighs 146 with blue eyes. She will always appear to be dress for the occasion. People always remark at how calm she always is, but her close associates can see the storm that rages in her eyes and have witnessed first hand her passive aggressiveness temper . Even in conversation you can note that she is has a warm, inviting sprit and will be quick to engage herself into the conversation. It is here that her element of being in control and calculating really comes to front. Alex is confident that she can take any conversation and guide it to a means that suit’s her interest, as well as very ambitious to succeed. Two traits that the corporate world has no doubt taken noticed of with the training in negotiations that they’ve provided her. Having had a taste of the corporate life and its rules and rigors she has developed a great distaste of, what she sees as a preordained life that goes from one routine to another.
 Seeking liberation from the life that she was destine to live she began to developed “escapes” from predictability and soon found herself attracted to gambling. It didn’t matter the game (be it poker, horse’s or sporting events), she simply loved the unpredictability of the human spirit and began to seek this escape as much as she could. This habit has been rewarding at times and costly and embarrassing at other times, as there can be wagers that don’t just involve Nuyen. It is odd to but when it comes to gambling the feeling of not having control of an outcome is exciting.
However, this soon proved to not be enough of an escape from the routines of life. It was only while visiting a friend at a bar, (watching a game that she had a bet on) that the notion of running the shadows entered her mind and the liberation that that would bring. She thought about the freedom of choosing her own course and making the nuyen that she felt she was entitled to. These thoughts were furthered advanced in her reading of “Atlas Shrugged” and she wonder why is she wasting her talents to benefit a corporation that in reality just bores the shit out her.

[JDA]

Found some info. Suggesting that gambling is a knowledge skill, if that's how you see it. I would like to make the following modifications to char. Sheet. I've already added the addiction and created the contact.
I'll buy two know sorts
Rating 3 sport teams and stats
Rating 2 horse racing
I would also like to change my language skill Spanish rating 4 to gambling card games rating 4. That would flesh out the character and make it make sense with the background. Let me know what you think

[Csjarrat]

Found some info. Suggesting that gambling is a knowledge skill, if that's how you see it.

well i cant find any gambling related skills in the main core books, so that looks like the most elegant solution to me :-)

[AffreuxLex]

Things got better and worse at the same time when in 2039 his mother died because of an untreated infection and it became clear that Mike had magical talents.

 Did it become clear that Mike had magical talents because of his mother's untreated infection?  That isn't how I read it but I thought I should ask for clarity.

Found some info. Suggesting that gambling is a knowledge skill, if that's how you see it. I would like to make the following modifications to char. Sheet. I've already added the addiction and created the contact.
I'll buy two know sorts
Rating 3 sport teams and stats
Rating 2 horse racing
I would also like to change my language skill Spanish rating 4 to gambling card games rating 4. That would flesh out the character and make it make sense with the background. Let me know what you think

The way I see it, gambling as knowledge would apply to what you know (shocking revelation, I know) and how you would apply it to situations.  Gambling as a skill would have to be something physical as in you know how to throw dice just the right way or shuffle cards in your hand.  This way seems like it would overlap with the palming skill.  So yeah, I'd treat it as knowledge.  Your changes are fine with me.

• Ren is not part of any group either and he met Cuco on a matrix node that's dedicated to self instruction for spell slingers.  Other than meeting up a few times for soykaf in meatspace and practicing their craft, they've never actually gone on a run together.  Their fixer reaches out to one of them and agrees to let them bring a friend along who might contribute to the team. Big surprise when the other finds out that they're also a shadowrunner...

The second option seems more feasible as my character will be trained in instruction. And he regularly teaches people the Mob assigns to learn (you'll see why from the background, which i'll post later today). Maybe it was a reward for a job or a service paid for, that Coco could participate on one of those.

I'm not too thrilled about Gustovness having a link to the mob, I prefer if it was something more benign.  Maybe he happened to be at the right place at the right time or maybe helped a mobster's mother cross the street or something so that the introduction was done without him knowing of any mob connections.  Or you could just drop the whole thing all together.  Up to you guys.




In other news, I've decided to drop the house rule of Skill X2 max hits for now.  The more I think about solutions the more complex it gets so I'm just going to let it go for now.  I still like the concept but I' going to have to come up with something more elegant to try out sometime.

I've got a few last minute thoughts to bring together, work out some problems, and I think we're ready to start.  If you guys have any last minute changes you have until at least tomorrow evening, assuming I can figure out everything by then hopefully I'll be able to put up the first IC post.  Also, I've got two of the background rewards figured out, I'll spend some time tonight to figure out the other two.  You will all receive them in game.  No, at no point will I ever explain what they are or why.  *Evil GM cackle* 

Edit:
You guys need to figure out what gear you would typically have on you at a random time of day while not on a run and let me know what they are.  If it is not reasonable that your character would be walking around downtown in broad daylight with an Uzi and 500ft of stealth rope, please don't include such things.  *Evil GM ca.... Friendly GM smile*[/list]

[Gustovness]

Ok, so Ren's character is an instructor for the mob.  Let's just say I met Ren on the matrix and whatever little bit of interaction we've had has been purely social, non professional, and with no ties to the Mafia.

Cuco would walk around town with his lined long coat and extendable baton on any given day.  He has an amiable relationship with the local gangs, despite not being associated with them, so there really isn't any need for him to pack his pistol with him if he's running simple everyday errands inside his own neighborhood (groceries, soykaf shop, visiting friends, etc.)

His large and open yet modestly furnished studio apartment keeps his pistol in a small safe bolted into the floor under a small trap door with a rug thrown over it in the middle of the living area.  He only goes out with this on him when he plans on going out and getting drunk, doing a job, or leaving the relative security of his neighborhood.  He also keeps an armor vest in this safe...

For when it's too God damned hot for that jacket...

His steeple hat and staff are not enchanted, but he keeps them on display in his apartment when he's not on a run, staff up on the wall horizontally mounted and hat on a burnt mannequin.

If I gave a shit about people thinking I looked ridiculous with this hat on, I would have shaved off THE CAPTAIN a long time ago too...

[Csjarrat]

For everyday trips out of the house (nipping down to the shops, grabbing a soykaf etc) flea will be wearing her normal clothing, (AR enhance set to graphic equalizer mode + displaying track information of her current music choice), she will have her contacts in, her headphones on (streaming her music from her meta link (wireless on, broadcasting fake sin)) and will also have her bomber jacket on (chemical protection needed against the acid rain, and insulation needed because it can get bloody cold on that bike on a windy day!). she will be wearing a cap to cover the nanopaste trodes she uses to interface to her kit and give her some protection against unwanted prying eyes.
she doesnt live in the best part of town so tends to keep her crusader in the concealable holster in the bomber jacket just in case (wireless off).
if she has taken her bike out, she will also have her helmet, and tends to keep this in a satchel bag about her person when not wearing it. she always has her set of gecko tape gloves with her in case she fancies taking the scenic route home!
on high pollen count days she will also have anti-histamines (from medkit supplies) with her.
when out training she just wears light gym clothes and gecko tape gloves. she will have her survival knife strapped to her ankle, under trouser leg for concealment and her metalink piping music into her headphones + broadcasting fake sin. she will have contacts in as well for the AR overlays of the GPS feed and lap timing compared to her personal bests from her metalink.

she tools up fully for each job, but her day to day gear is fairly relaxed. Flea's running gear is hidden behind a loose panel in her wardrobes and under loose floorboards in the bedroom.
her flat is a fairly modest studio apartment on the 3rd floor of a fairly modest apartment block. the neighbours tend to keep themselves to themselves, but flea usually gets a "hello" from the old japanese lady down the hall if they cross paths on the way to/from the laundry room.
Her bike is parked in the underground car park in her reserved space and its security system is linked to her home node, which is a fairly basic model but has access to her music files and favourite trid feeds and comes with a basic MSP package. The building has a contract with lonestar, though geoff the night guard could do with putting in a few more hours at the gym! the security is average for the style of building, all apartments are fitted with basic maglocks of typical contsruction.
Her flat is decorated with AR paint, set to resemble swaying palm trees on the beach most days, occasionally being swapped out for a mountain top scene to change things up.
Kyoko's furniture is all the cheap stuff from the bargain line at kong wal-mart, but it all matches and is comfy enough for her needs.
she would love to get a bigger place some day, but for the time being, this suits her and is close enough to the barren's markets that she can free-run to/from "work" and she has an intimate knowledge of the local rooftops/alleys in case of any drama.



Day to day-
-clothing, AR enhance on
-aces high jacket, machine pistol in concealable holster
-metalink commlink
-headphones, contact lenses
-gecko gloves
-antihistamines
(if on bike, has helmet)

Exercise/training-
-clothing
-gecko gloves
-knife
-antihistamines
-metalink, headphones, contacts

[Ren]

Well, ready with Puppeteer. Here's starting money roll: 4d6=21

[spoiler=Puppeteer]== Info ==
Street Name: Puppeteer
Name: Michael Calleor Ellonvir
Movement: 10/25, Swim: 6
Karma: 0
Street Cred: 0
Notoriety: 0
Public Awareness: 0
Elf male Age 37
Height 187 Weight 70
Composure: 12
Judge Intentions: 12
Lift/Carry: 4 (15 kg/10 kg)
Memory: 8
Nuyen: 2100

== Attributes ==
BOD: 3
AGI: 2
REA: 2
STR: 1
CHA: 7
INT: 5
LOG: 3
WIL: 5
EDG: 2
MAG: 5

== Derived Attributes ==
Essence:                   6
Initiative:                7
IP:                        1
Astral Initiative:         10
Astral IP:                 3
Matrix Initiative:         7
Matrix IP:                 1
Physical Damage Track:     10
Stun Damage Track:         11

== Active Skills ==
Artisan                    : 2 [Carving]            Pool: 7 (9)
Assensing                  : 3 [Aura Reading]       Pool: 10 (12)
Astral Combat              : 1                      Pool: 6
Banishing                  : 4                      Pool: 11
Binding                    : 4                      Pool: 11
Con                        : 1                      Pool: 11
Enchanting                 : 2 [Vessel Preparation] Pool: 9 (11)
Etiquette                  : 1                      Pool: 11
Instruction                : 1                      Pool: 11
Intimidation               : 1                      Pool: 11
Leadership                 : 1                      Pool: 11
Negotiation                : 1                      Pool: 11
Perception                 : 1                      Pool: 8
Spellcasting               : 4                      Pool: 11
Summoning                  : 4                      Pool: 11

== Knowledge Skills ==
Biology                    : 2 [Anatomy]            Pool: 5 (7)
English                    : N                      Pool: 0
Literature                 : 3 [Death in Literature] Pool: 6 (
Mafia                      : 1 [Politics]           Pool: 6 (
Magical Theory             : 4 [Astral World]       Pool: 7 (9)
Magical Threats            : 3                      Pool: 6
Religion                   : 3                      Pool: 6
Sperethiel                 : 4                      Pool: 9

== Contacts ==
Antonio Biondi - maffia consiglieri (3, 1)
Lucas Swiftfoot - talismonger (3, 4)
Mist - smuggler (2, 2)

== Qualities ==
Albinism
Day Job (10 hrs/week - the mafia jobs)
Geas (ritual - has to do one of two main rituals each day, at dawn or dusk)
In Debt (5,000¥) (to the mafia)
Low-Light Vision
Magician
Mentor Spirit (Dark King)
SINner (Standard) (Michael Calleor Ellonvir)

== Spells ==
(Tradition: Necromancy, Resist Drain with WIL + CHA (12))
Area Thought Recognition (Limited) DV: (F÷2)+2
Clairvoyance               DV: (F÷2)-1
Compel Truth (Limited)     DV: (F÷2)-1
Heal (Limited)             DV: (Damage Value)-2
Influence (Limited)        DV: (F÷2)+1
Stunbolt                   DV: (F÷2)-1

== Lifestyles ==
Puyalup flat and shop  1 months
   Comforts:      Low
   Entertainment: Squatter
   Necessities:   Middle
   Neighborhood:  Middle
   Security:      Middle
   Qualities:     Workplace [1LP]  (small shrine and curio shop on ground floor)
                  No Privacy, Matrix (Rating 1) [-1LP]
                  Rough Neighborhood [-1LP]

== Armor ==

on every time he leaves home
----------------------------------------
Armor Vest                6/4
   +Fire Resistance 6
   +YNT SoftWeave
Bodyline urban fashion (Spinrad Industries)0/0
   +Chemical Protection 3
Form-Fitting Half-Body Suit4/1
   +Biomonitor
   +Nonconductivity 4
   +YNT SoftWeave

only when going someplace dangerous
----------------------------------------------------
SecureTech PPP Armor (Ensemble)2/4
   +YNT SoftWeave

== Weapons ==
Tomahawk (at prepared skeleton vessel 1)
   Pool: 1   DV: 3P   AP: -   RC: 0
Tomahawk (at prepared skeleton vessel 2)
   Pool: 1   DV: 3P   AP: -   RC: 0
Unarmed Attack
   Pool: 1   DV: 1S   AP: -   RC: 0

== Commlink ==
Novatech Airware (2, 3, 3, 3)
   +Iris Orb
   +Suite: Basic+ [Analyze 3, Browse 3, Command 1, Edit 3]
   +Encrypt Rating 3 [Copy Protection 3, Registration]
   +Empathy Software Rating 3

== Gear ==

ready at hand every time
---------------------------------
Detection Fetish
Earbuds Rating 3
   +Audio Enhancement Rating 3
   +Spatial Recognizer
Fake SIN (Johnatan Wickers) Rating 4
   +Fake License (Power focus) Rating 4
   +Fake License (Fetishes) Rating 4
Glasses Rating 4
   +Flare Compensation
   +Image Link
   +Vision Enhancement Rating 3
   +Vision Magnification
Healing Fetish
Manipulation Fetish
Power Focus (Bonded Foci) Rating 2
Stimulant Patch Rating 6 x2
Talisman x4
Tranq Patch Rating 6 x2

at home:
------------
Assaying Kit
Magical Lodge Materials Rating 6 (used in building the shrine in the "workplace")
Vessel Materials (prepared skeleton vessel 1)
Vessel Materials (prepared skeleton vessel 2)
[/spoiler]