[Katrex]

So I have this charecter concept which is fundamentaly a mage/spirit slayer.

Theres a few things i'd like to do, but i see no way of getting the points I need to do it, or any other cool things.

Idealy I'd like to have a mundane charecter capable of fighting spirits. Is there any way of making that possible.
But I also want him to be good in physical combat.
Astral sight, with high charisma strenght astral combat skill, But at the same point he needs good willpower decent body and high reactions/intuition. He basically needs every stat.
Now normaly i'd cut down on that by giving him a cyber arm /and or augmentations so that i could lower other stats... But

Characters taking this quality acquire a Magic attribute of
1 that may not be increased during character creation or raised
with Karma. This Magic point is, however, subject to normal
rules for the impact of Essence loss on Magic.

Which makes it what seems the MOST USELESS QUALITY EVER as it basicaly says, you can't scale with magic or ware, I get it that they don't want every street sam and his dog to take astral sight but there must be some other way.

So yes, mundane charecter, mage/spirit hunter, help.

[wylie]

high willpower

look over the spells and see what defends against them. those I would make the highest.
Knowledge skils that revolve knowing different aspects of magic

not sure about arcana, as mundanes can learn that skill, not sure if that would help

high perception to notice when magic is being cast, or to spot spirits, or to defeat invis/ concealmeant

cyber is up to you, but since you paid essence, spurs can hurt a spirit as well as normal person, though its willpower that does the damage modifer

[Katrex]

Well I found some interesting things, and also even more confusion.
If you have a spirit in a weapon the weapon can do astral damage, either as the weapon or as the spirits force/2  I'll pick the first
Now  i've read two things about weapon foci, they give +force dice on combat, or they have a Dv of their force... Not sure which is right.
Astral combat is Astral combat + willpower, but i'm unsure if damage is charisma/2 rounded up or not. And that said if you were doing astral combat with a katana with a spirit inside, would you use willpower or agility? and would you get a damage bonus from charisma, Ie would it be 6p +cha/2.

If someone could clarify astral combat for me it would be apreciated cus it doesn't seem very consistant in the books.

[Mirikon]

A fully mundane character will not be able to do much to a materialized spirit. Anything less than 11DV won't even scratch a Force 5 spirit. There are, however, things you can do to help yourself.

Qualities:
Magic Resistance
SURGE to get both Arcane Arrester and Astral Hazing

Abilities:
High Willpower and Body, the two stats you resist most spells and abilities with.
High Strength, for doing melee damage.

Gear:
Armor. Indirect combat spells and melee attacks still need to deal with it. Don't skimp.
The katana unique focus from Digital Grimoire.
Any weapon that does a lot of damage.
A spirit from an inhabitation tradition trapped in the form of a melee weapon.

[UmaroVI]

The answer is no, you just can't do it. You can make a character who is focused on anti-magic... but they are going to be a Magician or a Mystic Adept, and the reason for this is that spirits can go to the astral plane and as a mundane you can only do that with crazy drugs (and really, REALLY don't want to because you are helpless there).

If you just want to be a mundane who's good at fighting magicians/spirits, you can - the main things you won't have are the ability to protect other people from magic, or stop spirits from just going astral on you. That's not to say you'll be bad.

The core things you need are:
Arcane Arrester. This is the only thing that will stop Spirits of Man (or magicians) from WTFpwning you with combat spells. You can be a Fomori or Gnome (either is fine), or SURGE for it (less good, but if you really want to be a different metatype it's alright).
High Willpower (by "high" I mean "5, 6 if you are gnome)
Dareadrenaline
General "good at fighting" skills like anyone else, eg, body, armour, agility, reaction, etc. More specifically, you need to be rolling with weapons that hit armor/2, so your options are:
Various melee weapons/enhancements (stun clubs, shock gloves, etc). If you can use Martial Arts, this + Two-Weapon Style + Off-Hand-Training will let you kung-fu fight spirits to death in melee, which is actually quite useful as several spirit types are melee-oriented quite heavily. You CANNOT rely on this, though, because other spirit types will fly around zapping you.
Stick-n-shock
Gauss Rifle
White Phosphorus grenades (these are binary - Force 8+ spirits are immune, Force 7- spirits take damage).

You should have access to Guts - either a gland, or an autoinjector, or whatever. If you don't have Guts, 3/4 of the spirits out there will laugh at you running away Feared.

Optional:
Astral Hazing. It does let you hug spirits to death, but it has obvious drawbacks (eg, makes you super duper distinctive to anyone with astral vision, may annoy friendly mages).

Terrible ideas:
Attack of Will. It's a trap. Never use it. Don't try to be good at it.

[Katrex]

Thanks.
Also i was wondering is could you hit a non materialised spirit using an awakened weapon, and those magic eyedrops to see it's blurry image?

[UmaroVI]

The answer is "yes, but it's not really a viable tactic."

The big catches are:
The eyedrops just give you a blue glow, not a blurry image. That's, at the very least, -6 for blindfighting.

How do you get an awakened weapon? If you aren't awakened yourself, the only way to do this is going to involve a Possession or Inhabitation spirit ... meaning you are depending on another PC for a major part of how your character works.

Even with that - spirits have no reason to stay astral and near you. Why would they? They can't attack you from the astral, but they can fly.

Now, that said, the eyedrops are handy and worth using, because they'll stop spirits from jumping you.

[Katrex]

Well i was thinking about that unique katana that the other guy mentioned that can bond to non awakened charecters. In that situation without the astral combat skill do you think you could use it to attack astral forms, and would you use blades+agi blades + willpower or just willpower?

[Mirikon]

Since you'd be fighting in the physical, it would be Agility + Blades. If somehow you took drugs and astrally projected, or got astral perception, then it would be Agility + Astral Combat, same as any magician who was working in the astral.

As a note, Astral Combat, as a Willpower skill, can be taken by mundanes. Its just that mundanes would almost never get any use out of it.

If you want to be a mundane who can take on spirits, focus on being a bad-*** mother-****** who can put all kinds of hurt down on people. A simpler route, though would be to make yourself a magical creature. Ghouls, nagas, and Drakes can deal with spirits, but can be normal characters, without any adept or magician abilities.

[tzizimine]

One thing that might help... a mundane character with trained paracritters... granted you won't be doing the damage directly, but having a combat trained hell hound is possible, if expensive, at character creation. And they are dual-natured.


Also, Arcana for knowing spells and spell formulas and Magical knowledges (Magical Threats, magical groups, named spirits, parabiology, etc). As for what to do against spirits, while they are materialized, they can be hurt, but not by much. Materialization gives Immunity to Normal Weapons, so you have to have some heavy hitting stuff just to punch through that...


Know the Weaknesses (if any) of your spirits. Water spirit? Bring a flamethrower. Fire spirit? Bring a water cannon (from a fire truck). If you can get your hands on FAB (Florescent Astral Bacteria) equipment, that will give you some help with things on the astral plane. A FAB net can catch a spirit. A FAB covered wall will block a spirit. A FAB-filled gel round _should_ hurt a spirit, but none of these options last very long and good luck hitting something you can't see. Arsenal has some manatech items that are useful in a pinch, but developing solid strategies with these limited options is difficult.


As terrible an idea as this is, I have seen it put to good use: If you know your enemy mage likes using X spirit, find someone that has the X Spirit Bane negative quality. The spirit will attack them first, instead of you. (The dwarf rigger in my group has Spirit Bane: Beasts and, knowing this, the PC mage challenged an enemy shaman to a my-biggest-spirit-vs.-your-biggest-spirit challenge. The PC summoned a Fire Spirit. The shaman summoned a Beast spirit. The Fire spirit laid into the Beast spirit while the Beast spirit was busy chasing the dwarf. Winner: PC Mage.)


A generous GM may allow a good Perception roll to see if any enemy mage is using a fetish during a spell. If so, take the fetish and the mage can't use that version of that spell (but that doesn't mean the mage wouldn't have spent the extra 5 karma to learn a non-fetish version of the spell).


Honestly, fighting magic usually requires magic. But a magician with high Counterspelling and Banishing can shut down a lot of magic, and leaves the points you would normally spend on Spellcasting or Summoning for other things.


Oh... lastly, concerning Armor. Get the Elemental Damage Resistances (Thermal, Insulation, Non-conductivity, etc). Indirect combat spells always have an energy type so make sure you have resistances for it.


And a sniper rifle and the habit of hitting a target at over 400m. The largest "Detect Enemies" spell usually cast is Force 6 x Magic 6 x 10m = 360m. If the mage doesn't know you are there, he can't defend against you.

[kirk]

ummm, also optional, Mana Static. By the time it's up to speed the battle is usually done, but it's till extremely effective against spirits.

[Argent]

One thing that might help... a mundane character with trained paracritters... granted you won't be doing the damage directly, but having a combat trained hell hound is possible, if expensive, at character creation. And they are dual-natured.


Also, Arcana for knowing spells and spell formulas and Magical knowledges (Magical Threats, magical groups, named spirits, parabiology, etc). As for what to do against spirits, while they are materialized, they can be hurt, but not by much. Materialization gives Immunity to Normal Weapons, so you have to have some heavy hitting stuff just to punch through that...


Know the Weaknesses (if any) of your spirits. Water spirit? Bring a flamethrower. Fire spirit? Bring a water cannon (from a fire truck). If you can get your hands on FAB (Florescent Astral Bacteria) equipment, that will give you some help with things on the astral plane. A FAB net can catch a spirit. A FAB covered wall will block a spirit. A FAB-filled gel round _should_ hurt a spirit, but none of these options last very long and good luck hitting something you can't see. Arsenal has some manatech items that are useful in a pinch, but developing solid strategies with these limited options is difficult.


As terrible an idea as this is, I have seen it put to good use: If you know your enemy mage likes using X spirit, find someone that has the X Spirit Bane negative quality. The spirit will attack them first, instead of you. (The dwarf rigger in my group has Spirit Bane: Beasts and, knowing this, the PC mage challenged an enemy shaman to a my-biggest-spirit-vs.-your-biggest-spirit challenge. The PC summoned a Fire Spirit. The shaman summoned a Beast spirit. The Fire spirit laid into the Beast spirit while the Beast spirit was busy chasing the dwarf. Winner: PC Mage.)


A generous GM may allow a good Perception roll to see if any enemy mage is using a fetish during a spell. If so, take the fetish and the mage can't use that version of that spell (but that doesn't mean the mage wouldn't have spent the extra 5 karma to learn a non-fetish version of the spell).


Honestly, fighting magic usually requires magic. But a magician with high Counterspelling and Banishing can shut down a lot of magic, and leaves the points you would normally spend on Spellcasting or Summoning for other things.


Oh... lastly, concerning Armor. Get the Elemental Damage Resistances (Thermal, Insulation, Non-conductivity, etc). Indirect combat spells always have an energy type so make sure you have resistances for it.


And a sniper rifle and the habit of hitting a target at over 400m. The largest "Detect Enemies" spell usually cast is Force 6 x Magic 6 x 10m = 360m. If the mage doesn't know you are there, he can't defend against you.

+1 for this. I was going to suggest the paracritters, but Tzizi said it better than I could have with everything else.