[All4BigGuns]

Bonding the Power Focus prevents having enough karma to get Exceptional Attribute.

Look at the section I emphasized in what I quoted. That leaves 4 karma after paying for those two things (10 short of enough for Exceptional Attribute).

Oh, right! Got it! Then it's just a matter of which is more important - Magic 7 or Power Focus 6, since. You'd have to go for a max of Power Focus 4 to get Magic 7. At that point, it's a choice of how many hits you want to be able to get.

Well, if you're going Restricted Gear on the Power Focus, you might as well go for the Force 6 one since that's the highest you can get with the quality.

Now, all that said, in Karma Generation if you wanted to seriously over-specialize, you might be able to pull off having both, but that would be at the expense of being able to do pretty much anything else most likely.

[falar]

Now, all that said, in Karma Generation if you wanted to seriously over-specialize, you might be able to pull off having both, but that would be at the expense of being able to do pretty much anything else most likely.

Base of 13 dice on all Magic-Linked skills for ... 250 karma? That's just over a quarter of your karma. You'd be strapped for some other stuff, but you wouldn't be flat useless outside of magic, especially since you'd probably raise only one of those skills to a six+Spec.

[Whiskeyjack]

Yeah I was going to say, get a 6 and grow it if it's that important.

[halflingmage]

You can kick higher if you like:

Mage: max out on negative qualities gives you 50 karma.
F6 power focus =36 karma  + Restricted gear 10 karma

So you can do magic (6) + power(6) + skill (6) + spec (2) 20 dice for your fave skill.
Or the coolest part for me, 1 point skill gives 13 dice already, so it is really easy to branch into other magical domains.
(Rituals, alchemy and so on).

A drawback here is that you can't start with a way to sustain spells without penalty with this build.  No karma for Focused Concentration or for additional foci.  So depending on what you are running, you are giving back 2 to 4 of those dice right away.  It also requires resouces C which limits options for Meta and pushes skills down to D or E.  In a long campaign it may all be worth it, it might be very hard to get that kind of focus during play, but you will have some significant initial trade offs for it. 

[falar]

A drawback here is that you can't start with a way to sustain spells without penalty with this build.  No karma for Focused Concentration or for additional foci.  So depending on what you are running, you are giving back 2 to 4 of those dice right away.  It also requires resouces C which limits options for Meta and pushes skills down to D or E.  In a long campaign it may all be worth it, it might be very hard to get that kind of focus during play, but you will have some significant initial trade offs for it.

You can - you just need to use rules other than Priority/Sum-to-Ten. Both Point-Buy and Life Modules would allow you to have more foci easy peasy.

[Senko]

I hope your an intuition tradition because if your not then you will never soak high force spells.

It's not worth it to have an unbound sustaining foci at chargen, karma is what your always going to be hurting in, not money.  I would either bind it or drop it.

If you want to sneak I recommend getting increase attribute agility.  You can sustain it in the same foci as normally increase reflexes would. This would put you up to 8 agility making you a decent sneaker ( be aware Astrally you will be a Christmas light)

Don't forget a mentor spirit.

Why is that? the only intuition tradition can soak high drain spells part?

[Whiskeyjack]

Because of the 3 possible Drain stats, the OP's character only has a worthwhile rating in INT.

[Facemage]

The problem with the high drain (for example 4 or even 5) is that sometimes even very high drain pools fails, if you don't have edge, or do not want to use it. Which means very high stun damages. For example for drain 5 and 19 dices, the probability to get at least two stun boxes is 7.9%.

Can you use run for your life to avoid opium den (no covering fire)?

[Whiskeyjack]

I need to review Opium Den but my initial reaction is that it's a spell that can easily be tweaked to hell with reagents.

[falar]

You are correct. The big thing is the radius of the effect. You can easily cast it at a Force 4 if that will get all your dudes and use reagents to set your limit at what-have-you.

Also, consider a Fetish for it.

[Facemage]

I compared combat and illusion area spells. Essential differences are:

1. You need to sustain area illusion spells
2. Indirect combat area spells need high force.
3. It is possible to use illusion spells with reagents, radius is small.
4. Area combat spells give synergies to stun bolt and clout.

If you do it right the effect is almost the same for both strategies.
Combat spells:
Spellcasting 6
Charisma 8
Willpower 5 (+4)
Magic 7
Power focus 4
Compat spell specialization 2
Mentor spirit 2
Centering 2
Sustaining focus 5 (health)

Force 7 fetish ball lightning
Total: 21 dices: On average damage is 11P with -7AP. Additional electricity damage.
Drain: 4, dicepool 19
Damage against elite soldier (19 dices): 7P. => -3 to actions with electricity penalty, -5 to initiative

Opium den:
Spellcasting 6
Charisma 8
Willpower 5
Magic 7
Power focus 4
Illusion spell specialization 2
Mentor spirit 2
Centering 2
Sustaining  focus 5 (illusion)

Force 5 fetish opium den
Total: 21 dices: On average 7 hits.
Drain: 2, dicepool 15
Effect against elite soldier (10 dices): -4 to all actions.

If you cannot avoid area illusion spells by using run for your life, they are better. Otherwise quite similar.
Counterspelling is more powerful against illusion spells.