[Redactedguy]

So, Shifters are a huge pain to build. I've been banging my head against this build for two days, TWO DAYS, and I'm not closer to even getting started with him.

The goal is to design a Sioux Wolf Shifter, whose driving purpose in life is to hunt. He grew up, before his shift into human form for the first time, speaking astrally with a Sioux shaman residing in the wilds of the Salishe Sidhe. Yoki-Yutu learned from him the ways of men (without truly understanding them of course) and eventually found himself waking up as one. Once he came to grips with his newfound ability, he saw the potential laid out before him.

Yoki-Yutu is a hunter, and he wants to use his newfound metahumanity to continue his hunting. He is actively seeking out the next great hunt, desiring to prove his prowess as the greatest hunter to have ever existed. He uses the shadows to seek out new threats and challenges and information on greater beasts to track. As discussed with my GM, there is a chance this lack of humanity paired with his ever increasingly difficult goal may eventually lead him down a path with a fair amount of blood shed (Blood magic in order to strengthen himself to the point where he could hunt Drakes and the like has been the most prevalent.

So here are the mandatory things:

-Mentor Spirit Wolf (Duh)
-Uneducated (Shifter requires it)
-Incompetent Acting (He not only doesn't understand lying or performing, but has zero desire to even try to learn anything. I don't foresee him using Charisma skills outside of POTENTIALLY intimidate.)
-Emotional Attachment (A flint knife worn on a pouch around his neck, even as a wolf, that will eventually be a foci of some sort)

But what I'm unsure of is:
Should I go mystic adept or Magician? I'm open to either, it just changes his focus a little. As a mystic adept he focuses entirely on the physical plane and only hunts flesh and blood things, but as a Magician it opens up a whole new plane to hunt on and suddenly he can pursue spirits that float in the Astral.

Whether to use Sum-to-Ten or Karma Build? I don't have a lot of experience with Karma Build, but if it will allow him to be a little more flexible with his skills then it might be worth delving into.

Spells/Adept Powers- Some basics are obvious and stick out to me (Stunbolt, Killing Hands, and either Improved or Increase reflexes) but I need some help selecting some spells for a wolf turned man who just wants to hunt.

Skills: I feel like these are gonna be spread so so thin and I'm really worried about that. Any ideas how to work around some stuff?

Obviously this is a tall task, and one that I'll be poking around for a while due to the sheer size of it.

[CraterShip]

This is an interesting concept, I am unsure of how much depth you can really get out of someone so focused on hunting only though. Most runs will require a bit more from time to time. If your gm is cool with it though, go for it. As to specifics, I'd say whittle the skills down a bit by really focusing on melee attacks, probably the skill group, unless you specifically want to focus on a single weapon type. Also could use throwing weapons, but cut out pretty much anything firearm related. Other focus would likely be stealth and athletics. Overall, not too many skills to worry about since anything technology or modern weapon centric could be cut out. I would also go more with the magician side than adept, gives the option of hunting in the astral plane and some more ranged ability with spells over weapons. Admittedly I've never tried mysad, but I like my astral projection too much. Overall, sounds like cha and log could both be dump stats, build into physical abilities and the skills mentioned above.

[Glyph]

The trouble with mystic adepts is that they have to spend Karma on their power points, and you are already spending 15 Karma to be a wolf shifter.  I would go pure mage.  I recommend A for Attributes, because of how improving them later is done for shifters; plus, you want some decent stats for Intuition and Willpower as well as your physical Attributes.  B for magic and C for shifter metatype will let you start with a Magic of 6.  Unfortunately, that leaves D for skills, and E for resources.  I would recommend mentor spirit as your only positive quality and taking 25 points in negative qualities, leaving you 30 Karma to spend to bolster your skills and starting money.

One example of possible expenditures: 26 total skill points - spellcasting/combat: 6/+2, counterspelling: 4, assensing: 2, conjuring: 6, perception: 3, sneaking: 4; 30 Karma - 15 to get outdoor skill group: 2, 5 to get athletics skill group: 1, 10 to get +20,000 starting money.


If you use sum to 10, the only possible change you might consider is taking A for Magic and dropping skills to E.  Yes, this is a net loss of 2 skill points, and they are bare-bones already.  But for the cost of dropping sneaking from 4 to 2, you gain 2 points of Edge and 3 additional spells.


I have not run the numbers on any builds, but I don't think point build (Karma) would work very well.  They have a high metatype cost, and high Attributes are costly due to their exponentially increasing costs.

[Hobbes]

-Emotional Attachment (A flint knife worn on a pouch around his neck, even as a wolf, that will eventually be a foci of some sort)

That has some funky RAW mechanical implications.  Emotional Attachment means you use that item whenever you can and a knife means any melee attack.  No worries for most characters but shifters generally are a little bitey.  If your GM is okay with it, carry on.

I've tried several Shifters, never am I happy.  Ask for Sumto10, pain in the ass builds are kinda what it's for.

Priority build.  Ugh.  Meta has to be "C" or better, Magic A or B, so you're stuck with either Skills or Stats at D.  erg.  For a Mage, stats "D" would be your best bet.  So.... Skills A, Magic B, Meta C, Stats D, Resources E and do what you can.  Sumto10 would let you go with Magic/Skills B, Meta/Stats C, Resources E.  A bit more playable out of the gate.

Mechanically, the only real "advantage" that Shifters get is you can throw karma at your metatype, think about Elf if you're going Shamantic tradition.  Wakyambi for an Intuition caster.  Gnome, werewolf, Herimetic...?   Okay, don't do that.  But certainly think about some sort of Elfie thing.  + Agility and + Drain stat for 5 Karma is a good deal. 

As a side note, Gnome-canine-herimetic-mage may actually be about the most mechanically effective shifter you can come up with.  You're basically paying 3 karma for 2 bonus Edge and a bunch of sensory improvements.  Hey.... I think I just found a mechanical reason to play a shifter....

[Glyph]

I just realized that my example is missing melee skills.  Unfortunately, all I can think of is to drop counterspelling or conjuring to get unarmed/bite.  If the knife is for melee (it could be a more utilitarian skinning knife or something), then skills will suffer even more.  Or maybe (assuming sum-to-ten) get Attributes: B, Magic: B, Metatype: C, Skills: C and resources: E.  It sucks to lose 4 Attribute points, but this might be one of those concepts where skills D or E just isn't enough.

[Thanael]

For a primal hunter feel i'd go with adept only, no fancy spells.

Check out Hobbes excellent thunderbird mentor spirit knife adept for some ideas. [Edit: linkified!]

PQ/NQ
Superhuman Psychosis
Revels  in Murder, if you can fit it in...

[Redactedguy]

Whoo, I've been out of town and coming back to see this has some responses is GREAT.

So, looking at this I see you all are struggling with the same choices I have. I pulled a rough draft of the Mystic Adept and I ran into 1 major problem: Money. I don't have any any left over karma to put into resources (Without cheesing with Debt, which I am sorely trying to avoid) to survive.

Adept might be the way to go, since I wouldn't have to put skills into Spells. But it totally locks me out of the astral in a ranged encounter. No magic means no fighting flying spirits in the astral.

Magician is gonna leave me physically weaker, not exactly the hunter I expect him to be.

GAH THIS PUZZLE SUCKS. However, looking at a Gnome Shifter into a Wolf sounds fracking hilarious so I'm gonna look into that. Will keep you all updated, thanks for your ideas.