[RelentlessImp]

So, for the very first time in SR4, I'm making a Hermetic magician. Until now I've been playing elves and pixies with Charisma-based traditions, sometimes out of Street Magic, sometimes created for the character. Now, though, I'm going with an Ork, and going full bore Hermetic with him. Let me know if there's anything that needs adjusting out of this sheet, any glaring weaknesses I should shore up, etc. I know his Drain's not going to be spectacular with Orks having a lower Logic cap, but I felt like I should at least try it once.

Brief bit of fluffiness: The character is a Russian, son of a nuclear physicist father and supermodel mother. He inherited dad's genius, and mom's looks - until expressing as an ork at puberty. His five sisters also expressed as orks, but he got to keep the looks, so his expression isn't as visible as his sisters. Pops lost his job at a nuclear plant due to a mental breakdown of not being able to reconcile magic and science, they moved from Mother Russia, finally settling in the UCAS when the character was six where pop could get work with a A-rated corp doing what he loved - pure research. Mom wound up killing herself after her career tanked when she SURGED into a full-on catwoman, fur and all in 2061. The character has minor gang connections - a local go-gang was security for their wageslave community, working in tandem with some of the A-corp's security forces. He underwent Awakening when a bit of gang violence threatened his sisters, hammering out a stunball that nearly killed him - and did kill a bunch of gangers, and knocked out a bunch more. He did well in school, earned a scholarship to attend MIT&T, and hasn't been back home since. Graduated summa cum laude with a PhD in physics and magical theory; now runs the shadows to fund his own research into the mingling of the two, eschewing corporate job offers after seeing what his mother's death and working for the A-corp did to his father. Currently interested in researching why and how physics and alchemy interact with each other.

His primary party role is supposed to be a combat mage with a minor in magical support and some fire support in the form of an SA/BF pistol so he can both shoot from cover and lay down suppressing fire.
Attributes (170 + 20 Metatype [Ogre] + 50 Special Attrbutes)

Body	Agility	Reaction	Strength
5	3	4	3
Charisma	Intuition	Logic	Willpower
1	5	4	5
Edge	Magic	Essence	Initiative
2	5	6	9

Positive Qualities (30)
Magician (15)
Restricted Gear (5)
Mentor Spirit (5) (Sun for +2 Fire Spirits/Combat Spells)
Human-Looking (5)
Negative Qualities (-35)
Striking Skin Pigmentation (-5)
Extravagant Eyes (-5) - These two as per RC stating that metavariants qualify for Metagenetic Qualities, page 110, bottom of the left column.
Incompetent (Pilot Ground Vehicle) (-5) - Yeah, this one's cheap, and possibly crippling, depending on how things go.
Mild Compulsive (-5)
Spirit Bane [Watcher Spirits] (-10) - This one makes me uncomfortable, I think. Are Watcher Spirits more or less likely to foul things up? They don't have the combat ability to kill a person; should I switch this to something else?
Mild Addiction [Deepweed] (-5)
Distinctive Style [1] (0)

Active Skills (78)

Skill	Rating
Spellcasting	6
Counterspelling	4
Summoning	4
Binding	1
Assensing	1
Perception	1
Pistols	1
Etiquette	1

Knowledge Skills (27/27)

Physics	5
Magic Theory	5
Spell Design	2
Street Drugs	1
Regional (Seattle)	2
Law	1
Economics	1
Geography	1
Engineering	1

Language Skills

Russian	N
Or'zet	4
English	3
Japanese	1

Spells

Lightning Bolt
Stunbolt	Stunball
Heal	Levitate (Physical)
Detect Enemies, Extended	Trid Phantasm
Improved Invisibility	Metal Wall
Increase Reflexes

Gear (159,745/160,000¥)

Form-Fitting Body Armor Full Body Suit w/ Nonconductivity 6 Mortimer Greatoat Line w/ Gel Packs, Fire Resistant 6 SecureTech PPP Shin Guards, Upper Arm Casings, Upper Leg Casings (Total 13/11 B/I, Encumbrance 10/10) Force 4 Power Focus Force 3 Health Sustaining Focus Tag Eraser Earbuds R3 w/ Audio Enhancement 3 Goggles R6 w/ Image Link, Smartlink, Vision Enhancement 3, Vision Magnification, Flare Compensation 1 R4 Fake SIN w/ R4 Fake Licenses (Concealed Carry Savalette Guardian, Magic) Savalette Guardian w/ Barrel Extension, Underbarrel Weight, Personalized Grip 50 rounds Stick-n-Shock 50 rounds Regular Ammo Hidden Gun Arm Slide 5 Spare Clips for Savalette Guardian AR Gloves Subvocal Microphone Magecuffs Magemask White Noise Generator Hermes Ikon Commlink w/ Novatech Navi OS & Biometric Lock -Analyze 4, Browse 4, Command 4, Edit 4, Reality Filter 4, Scan 4 AREs: Virtual Surround Music, Virtual Pet Contacts (13) Contact C/L Talismoner 3/3 Fixer 3/2 Armorer 1/1 Lifestyle (13LP, 3040/month) Comforts 3 Entertainment 3 Necessities 3 Neighborhood 3 Security 3 Aspected Domain (Hermetic) 5 Lax Security -2 No Privacy (Matrix) -1 Network Bottleneck -1 Black Hole 1 -2 Trigger Happy Landlord -1 Ogre Stomach -20% 7BP left to spend. No clue how to most effectively spend it.

[All4BigGuns]

I'd say ditch the ork part personally, unless you REALLY want to be one. If I remember right, you lose out on the maximum for your hermetic drain stat as an ork. (Then again, I prefer to change a little line I've seen a few times away from pushing ork more toward "be human unless you really want another 'race'".)

[RelentlessImp]

I'd say ditch the ork part personally, unless you REALLY want to be one. If I remember right, you lose out on the maximum for your hermetic drain stat as an ork. (Then again, I prefer to change a little line I've seen a few times away from pushing ork more toward "be human unless you really want another 'race'".)

They do. Their Logic caps out at 5, but I'm okay with 'only' having 9 dice to resist drain. If I felt like gaming it I'd switch him to an Intuition tradition like Buddhism, but I don't play intelligentsia characters very often, and the thought of an ork chatting in highly technical terms about both magical theory and physics amuses me (not as much as it being a troll, but hey). This image inspired the character, and while there's no real reason he couldn't just be a human, I find myself wanting to play something classically 'beefy' to boot.

And hell, if I wanted to game the drain resist stat, I'd go back to playing elves and pixies with Charisma traditions.

[All4BigGuns]

On other notes, I'd say to ditch Dodge and divide the points in it among Assensing and either Summoning or Binding (whichever you'd rather have higher). Also, I'd drop the Ball Lightning and Stunball (especially the former, the drain on it is ridiculously high). Don't worry about Edge, really, I don't think it's worth buying up, but a lot of the times I've spent Edge, I've just gotten "okay, your target is spending Edge too".

[RelentlessImp]

On other notes, I'd say to ditch Dodge and divide the points in it among Assensing and either Summoning or Binding (whichever you'd rather have higher). Also, I'd drop the Ball Lightning and Stunball (especially the former, the drain on it is ridiculously high). Don't worry about Edge, really, I don't think it's worth buying up, but a lot of the times I've spent Edge, I've just gotten "okay, your target is spending Edge too".

Any particular reason on these? I like being able to avoid being shot at when the crap hits the fan. As to Ball Lightning and Stunball, I'd like to keep at least one area-effect option for combat, for that room of hardened armor fuglies that are entrenched and beyond the gunbunny's reach. Also, sorry to hear about the Edge bit, but I see a lot of people around here commenting on Edge needing to be higher than 1... not sure if that's your DM or a common issue.

[All4BigGuns]

On other notes, I'd say to ditch Dodge and divide the points in it among Assensing and either Summoning or Binding (whichever you'd rather have higher). Also, I'd drop the Ball Lightning and Stunball (especially the former, the drain on it is ridiculously high). Don't worry about Edge, really, I don't think it's worth buying up, but a lot of the times I've spent Edge, I've just gotten "okay, your target is spending Edge too".

Any particular reason on these? I like being able to avoid being shot at when the crap hits the fan. As to Ball Lightning and Stunball, I'd like to keep at least one area-effect option for combat, for that room of hardened armor fuglies that are entrenched and beyond the gunbunny's reach. Also, sorry to hear about the Edge bit, but I see a lot of people around here commenting on Edge needing to be higher than 1... not sure if that's your DM or a common issue.

Don't really need both of 'em. If you keep one, keep the stun one. Ball Lightning's drain is just utterly ridiculous.

As to the Edge, there's also the point that it's consumable and pretty much entirely 'at GM discretion' as to when it refreshes.  The consumable part is what gets me, as being consumable as it is, it really should cost drastically less.

[RelentlessImp]

Hm. What should I replace it with? I'm sitting on 11 spells, and given the karma-to-new-spells ratio I'd like to start as close to 12 spells as possible, if not right on the nose with it.

[Falconer]

Technically Ork is not a metavariant.   Only the variants in Runner's companion are.  But you went with Ogre so it's all good.

You also missed this tidbid:  A free negative quality all of your own for no points.  (p103, bottom right)
"All the advanced character options in this book automatically suffer the effects of Distinctive Style and do not get a BP bonus.",  at rating 1
+3 on perception checks to notice you
+3 on checks to track you down
So add 'Distinctive Style (rating 1) to your negatives list for no BP.  (so effecitvely your ogre includes this but gains the ogre stomach which is a fair trade in my book)

In your case, actually watcher spirits CAN kill you.  You have no astral combat abilities whatsoever... at astral speeds a watcher can attack you, and you can't defend yourself (astral combat is trained only).  So the only thing you can do is soak the 2 damage they'll do each time on willpower alone... and occasionally they will manage to scratch you.   Not to say you won't be able to nuke them before too long with a mana spell... you just can't defend yourself from their initial astral combat attack.  Considering your character can barely assense... I don't see him switching to astral much though.


You might consider a genetic heritage and grabbing a small amount of bio/cyber (1 point of essence max)... and getting the one which increases your logic natural max by 1 point.  Another option since the cheese (runner's companion) is in full play is taking a surged quality and buying the metagenic improvement logic.  But what you're doing isn't much different than another archetype... the troll street shaman (which suffers through it's own reduced charisma drain stat).  The main way that 5->6 helps a lot is in raising the augmented max from 7 -> 9.  (later on you might quicken a increase logic... or invest in cerebral boosters if you have a little bit of room for cyber/bio).


Especially given your low charisma... you really should have a point in etiquette.    Lets put this in perspective... you default a charisma check to avoid offending the gang across the street... you roll 1-1 dice... 0... care to longshot that with edge?!  Etiquette 1 (street specialization +2) probably is a good thing to look at spending some karma on early.

You can regain 25BP for these uses and more by dropping your magic from 6 to 5... you really don't need 6 magic especially with that rating 4 power focus.  (there's really only a few rare cases where hard maxing out a stat is worthwhile).  I didn't do all the math to see if you did it, but hard maxing a stat is 10 for the stat then +15 more for the hardmax (max one stat).

Spell selection is nice and varied... a bit heavy on combat spells but you're making a combat hermetic...  Many of them are a bit heavy on drain, so you should look at a 'centering' metamagic early on to start adding extra drain dice for the price of a free action as you initiate.

Overall though, not a particularly bad first character.

[RelentlessImp]

Technically Ork is not a metavariant.   Only the variants in Runner's companion are.  But you went with Ogre so it's all good.

Ogre is what I was speaking of in the notes.

You also missed this tidbid:  A free negative quality all of your own for no points.  (p103, bottom right)
"All the advanced character options in this book automatically suffer the effects of Distinctive Style and do not get a BP bonus.",  at rating 1
+3 on perception checks to notice you
+3 on checks to track you down
So add 'Distinctive Style (rating 1) to your negatives list for no BP.  (so effecitvely your ogre includes this but gains the ogre stomach which is a fair trade in my book)

Hm. Oops. I did miss that. Oh well! Adding.

In your case, actually watcher spirits CAN kill you.  You have no astral combat abilities whatsoever... at astral speeds a watcher can attack you, and you can't defend yourself (astral combat is trained only).  So the only thing you can do is soak the 2 damage they'll do each time on willpower alone... and occasionally they will manage to scratch you.   Not to say you won't be able to nuke them before too long with a mana spell... you just can't defend yourself from their initial astral combat attack.  Considering your character can barely assense... I don't see him switching to astral much though.

Eh, a Force 6 Stunbolt is enough to drop a Watcher, I think, given they can only ever be Force 1. I just feel it's a bit cheesy because of that.

You might consider a genetic heritage and grabbing a small amount of bio/cyber (1 point of essence max)... and getting the one which increases your logic natural max by 1 point.  Another option since the cheese (runner's companion) is in full play is taking a surged quality and buying the metagenic improvement logic.  But what you're doing isn't much different than another archetype... the troll street shaman (which suffers through it's own reduced charisma drain stat).  The main way that 5->6 helps a lot is in raising the augmented max from 7 -> 9.  (later on you might quicken a increase logic... or invest in cerebral boosters if you have a little bit of room for cyber/bio).

I dunno if I'd call RC 'cheese', really. And I can't really afford Metagenetic Improvement (Logic) - it's 20 BP, which means the rest of my positive qualities would have to go to fit it in under the 35 BP limit.

You can regain 25BP for these uses and more by dropping your magic from 6 to 5... you really don't need 6 magic especially with that rating 4 power focus.  (there's really only a few rare cases where hard maxing out a stat is worthwhile).  I didn't do all the math to see if you did it, but hard maxing a stat is 10 for the stat then +15 more for the hardmax (max one stat).

I'd really rather not softcap Magic if I can help it. Yeah, I know, it's an easy 25bp freed up, but there's something about being able to overcast to Force 12 over Force 10. Those extra two points really say something.

Especially given your low charisma... you really should have a point in etiquette.    Lets put this in perspective... you default a charisma check to avoid offending the gang across the street... you roll 1-1 dice... 0... care to longshot that with edge?!  Etiquette 1 (street specialization +2) probably is a good thing to look at spending some karma on early.

Hmm. Etiquette is one of those often-overlooked skills. I might see what I can do about Dodge and spreading some skill point love around... I still don't see why anyone would want to not have dodge, though.

Overall though, not a particularly bad first character.

Not my first character; just my first Hermetic. And I'm pretty bad at spotting holes myself, so I typically ask a third party to look things over and see if I've missed anything huge.

[All4BigGuns]

Just thought of this--even though it should have been obvious to me--but you could take a look at Frostmane in my signature for a bit of assistance with making a hermetic (which is what that version is, haven't quite finished my shinto version yet). I have that version in a PbP on these forums at present, and her build seems to be working decently so far. With Force 10 (ignoring that stupid optional rule on direct spells) your stunbolt should do you fine. I soloed three individuals with her.

[ShinigamiWolf]

I find the over abuse of Edge to be a little on the crazy side. If your backstory is that he is incredibly lucky...by all means put more then one in it. However, I look at it as you can easily get a second or third bit of edge before the GM really plans to start trying to kill you with karma...but perhaps your GM isn't quite so forgiving as to ramp you up. Another think I haven't quite understood is why people seem to think you need 12 spells. I myself run four to six and have never had a really horrible feeling of lacking. If you are using spirits, you can get much of the same benefits of some spells from  your spirits themselves. I like going with, Stun bolt, Stun Ball, Power bolt, and Mana bolt. And then one or two other spells like heal and improved invisibility. Lightning bolt is a favorite of mine simply because of the side effects of it..but lets face it, a gun with stick and shock can do the same and not kick you for drain...and you don't waste bp or karma on it. Improved reaction is a fun one, if you have a sustaining foci for it, otherwise I'm not a fan...but for it to even give you a second initiative pass...you'd be need a Force 2. You could save a lot of money and bp/karma by simply using cram and only taking it when you're pretty sure shit is about to hit the fan. After all, you suffer the effects of the drug 7 hours later and most runs once combat starts...end in like what an hour or two tops?

[Hawke]

Hi there.

You have said your problem is a BP shortage.  Obviously you are not only an Ork, but an Ogre to boot.  And that is fine. It is for RP purposes and that always takes priority.

I am one of those Edge guys.  4 edge allows you to be potentially making amazing rolls at key times 4 times minimum per run.  It is up to GM discretion on when and if you get a refresh of your edge pool, but generally when you do something gnarly, or think outside the box or extravagant and pull it off, they will say you get an edge for whatever their reasoning is.  If your GM does not refresh the pool at all in the middle of a run, then edge is that much more important.  I once conjured a force 5 spirit with 11 net hits, and my summoning was at an 8 or so.  Yes, I did make the drain enough to not kill me.

You mentioned you wanted a beefy character, but your character, while "beefy" is still weaker than an ork.  Dropping 2 points in intuition might be worthwhile to add 2 points to body giving you 7 body.  This will let you have more meat, and thus wear more armor of some kind.  Which raises your survivability. 

Dropping your magic down to 5, and dropping your health sustaining focus will free up 25BP and 18BP? (unsure of the total for the focus) This should give you at least 30BP, and you can use that 30 and put in 3 points of Edge to give you 4 edge.

Before everyone goes nuts at the logic... The sustainment focus is for increased reflexes right?  You could summon a spirit for the day, nothing huge, just a force 3 or 5 spirit.  Have it (you are a hermetic mage... spirits are tools afterall) do its job and sustain the spell for you..  It will sustain for Force = combat rounds.  So a force 5 spirit could hold increased reflexes for 5 combat rounds.. that is a lot of action with 4 initiative passes.. oooh yeah you can have him sustain it better than a your current focus and get that +3 to initiative. 

Here is how combat will go... first round of imitative is normal.  Technically, depending on which rule you use, since everyone else will have more passes than you, you should go first or close to first.  You cast increased reflexes and boom, now you get 3 more passes, and you pass off the spell to your spirit.  Then you go on with combat.  If combat stops, your reflexes will stop and all is well.  You should have at least (because of your summon dice) 3 favors, so that is 3 spells that can be sustained during the lifetime of the service of the spirit (until dawn).  Just be nice to the spirit by starting forest fires, or feeding some giant flame constantly.  Maybe they will like fire based spells used in their presence.  Up to the GM, but you are basically replacing the fetish for a spirit. 

Negative side is that the spirit can be killed and you lose your increased reflexes... positive, if your fetish was destroyed, you don't have to spend karma to link it to yourself.  Maybe taking the quality spirit whatever... the one where a spirit type likes you a lot.

Hope this is good info


edited because length of magical service for sustainment is Force = combat round. 

[UmaroVI]

Hawke, that's bad advice for a couple reasons.

First, you are confusing bound spirit Spell Sustaining with summoned spirit tasks. You can't do that with a summoned spirit. You can summon a Spirit of Man with the power Innate Spell (Increase Reflexes) and have its task be "sustain this spell on me for 8 hours."

Second, a combat strategy that requires you cast a pretty visible (perception threshold 2 to notice, since it's force 4) spell on the first combat turn and then do nothing else, and hope that everyone is polite enough to ignore you until you can do something, is not a good one.

Spirit of Man holding an Increase Reflexes is a legitimate way to roll, but it's not a great one. The major drawback is opportunity cost - you could have had a spirit of man with Stunball and orders to help you out if you get into a fight, instead. Second, spirits of man can't overcast and cast at force x 2 dice pool, so a force 3 spirit of man is giving you probably 1, maybe 2 bonus IPs, not 3. A force 5 spirit of man will mostly give you 2 IPs, maybe 1 or 3. You need force 6 to even get the 4th IP on average - and at that point, honestly, just give the spirit of man Stunball and have it help in a fight, and do something useful on your first IP.

RelentlessImp:
I think you're pretty much good to go based on the current version. Being a noncybered ork with a Logic tradition is suboptimal, but it isn't crippling or anything and if that's what you want to play, go for it. I don't think that last point of Magic is worth the 25 bp, but it's at least a debatable choice. I would, however, really advise having 1 point less Agility and 1 point more Reaction. Reaction is way more important for combat mages, and 4 is a nice breakpoint because at either 4 or 5, you need a force 5 sustaining (health) focus with Increase Reflexes to jack it to your maximum of 9, and down the road, that's a nice thing to have.

[Mason]

The major drawback is opportunity cost - you could have had a spirit of man with Stunball and orders to help you out if you get into a fight, instead.

You could have had a V8! *Slap*

and 4 is a nice breakpoint because at either 4 or 5, you need a force 5 sustaining (health) focus with Increase Reflexes to jack it to your maximum of 9, and down the road, that's a nice thing to have.

Uhm...Increase Reflexes doesn't keep giving Reaction past the last threshold, so Force 5 is kinda pointless.

[UmaroVI]

Derp, I meant Increase Reaction there.