Mystic Adepts and Power Points:
With the errata increasing the cost of Power Points for Mystic Adepts from 2 to 5 per point it would make sense to allow a Mystic Adept at character creation to apply their allocated spells, rituals, and preparations towards power points. In other words an ‘A priority’ Mystic Adept receives 10 Spells as part of their package. They could then have 6 spells, a ritual, and 3 Power Points of Adept Powers and if they wanted to they could also spend their karma for more Power Points just like they can for spells.
In gameplay a Mystic Adept may purchase more Power Points just like they would purchase a spell or preparation. They spend 5 Karma per Power Point up to their limit of their Magic Rating. So, a Mystic Adept who only purchased one power point in character generation to represent that the PC had just discovered their Adept abilities but had a Magic Rating of 5 could then purchase 4 more Power Points for 20 Karma during gameplay.
Use the rules on SR5 for learning new spells. Increasing Power Points requires a teacher or experimentation. Each day the Mystic Adept must spend 8 hours practicing or studying or start over.
With Teacher: Arcana + Intuition [Magical Lodge] Test. The time is equal to 12 days divided by the number of hits. Teacher can add extra dice (SR5 p 141.)
Without Teacher using experimentation: Arcana + Logic [Magical Lodge] Test. The time is equal to 28 days divided by the number of hits. This covers 1 Power Point worth of new powers.
Adepts and Ways:
The bonus Power Points provided by Ways is a needlessly complex and confusing system that encourages min/maxing when the purpose of the Ways should be to provide some aid mechanics-wise but mainly to provide roleplaying opportunities. As the Quality has a static cost the benefit should also be static and have the same value across characters in my opinion. The Magician’s Way doesn’t really add anything useful and I think was just carried over from the previous edition via inertia and is basically the equivalent of an “Undecided Way”. Ways should be mainly earned in game barring the really dedicated at character generation as it seems to me that a Way would be something learned after Initiating. Thus, no increased Karma cost when learned in game however the Way must be taught by an Instructor and Initiated Adepts aren’t cheap to hire. In game time it should take about three months of training or a season.
Now, a Way provides 1 Power Point that can be spent on the Powers listed under each Way. For every Grade the Adept gains the Quality provides .25 Power Points that can only be spent on the listed Powers. This bonus can be postponed to purchase more expensive Powers. (This allows for the Quality to provide benefits down the road like the existing rules would allow for increasing the adept’s Magic Rating by 2. A min/maxed character in standard rules with a Magic Rating of 6 could gain 1.5 Power Points at character generation through a Way so my option is a little weaker but allows for more freedom in choice of Powers and equal benefit to all Adepts.)
The Magician’s Way really serves no purpose that I can see. The enhancements for the Way can be folded into the Undecided list and the Way itself should be discarded. Digital Celerity really fits better with the Invisible Way thematically. This gives the Adept who doesn’t purchase a Way some Enhancements they could learn.
New Enhancements:
“Domain of the Spiritual” and “Domain of the Warrior” are reworked and balanced as Enhancements instead of Metamagics as their value even improved as I have done is simply not equal to Centering, Masking, or gaining an additional Power Point. Each Way will get their own new Domain that will instead of acclimating an Adept to a flavor of background count actually aligns the Adept to the BC.
An acclimated Adept takes no penalties from a positive BC of the Domain’s type; while an aligned Adept would gain benefits from the positive BC as they are in tune with the mana in the area. It basically provides the Adept with the same benefits a magician would have from their magical Tradition.
Each way has an unique “Domain” Enhancement that they can learn that applies to their expertise.
The Athlete’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the Game” which grants alignment to BC created at sporting events, gyms, and competitions of any type. The emotions running through the mana are close enough at an Urban Brawl match to a tennis match to a poker match.
The Artist’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the Show” which grants alignment to BC created at artistic, dance, plays, concerts, and performance events of any type. It also provides acclimation of up to 1 + Grade to any BC at any type of showcase for the arts even if there is no performance such as a museum, art collection, library, or art gallery.
The Beast’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the Totem” which grants alignment to BC found in the favored habitat of her totem. “Desert, Forest, Jungle, Mountain, Polar, Urban, or other terrain.” This can be dangerous to the Adept for if the terrain has been polluted or irradiated than the distorted mana flowing through them can start the Adept on the toxic path and play havoc with their emotions making it more difficult over time to relax, sleep, and not be a curmudgeon.
The Burnout’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the Tech Geek” which grants alignment to BC found in places of high technology and scientific advancement. A cyberdoc’s surgery room, a corporate research facility, a garage filled with prototype vehicles, a server farm, or an inventor’s lab all have a similar feel in the astral.
The Spiritual Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the Spiritual” which grants alignment to BC found in places of worship and sacred locales regardless of Tradition, religion, or philosophy. Any complex with a chapel or holy place makes it easier for the Adept to adapt to different aspects of local mana allowing for acclimation of up to 1 + Grade of BC throughout the location. This could be as small as a small hospital or as large as an entire Arcology as long as the complex is a single “entity”.
The Invisible Way provides an Enhancement “Scouting the Joint” which grants a sped up acclimation period for the adept when studying an area’s mana. The Adept must be able to Assense the Astral Realm. Each day spent studying the target area allows the Adept to acclimate to one point of BC with a maximum over a period of days of up to 1 + their Grade or their Assensing Rating whichever is lower.
The Speaker’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of the fae” which grants alignment to the BC found in fae touched areas and those created by magicians of the Path of the Wheel Tradition which is particularly useful in Tir Nan Og. They are also acclimated to up to 1 + Grade of BC aligned to Druidism, Wicca, and other nature based Traditions. It also provides a situational bonus dice equal to their Grade to use with social interactions with the faerie and other fey touched beings like other Adepts of the Speaker’s Way or magicians following an “Elven Path”.
The Warrior’s Way provides an Enhancement “Domain of War” which grants alignment to the BC found in areas where blood has been spilled in combat or about to be. It acclimates the adept to 1 + Grade of BC for the emotions of Hate, Anger, Fear, and Despair.
Artificing:
Focus Formulas:
It is assumed that a Formula has a narrow depiction of the Telesma and that most that available on the market are generic like a gold ring or an Horizon Rapier or a Evo Combat Axe. Thus, a weapon focus formula with a Force of 3 using a MCT Katana would need to be retooled to use an awakened Telesma made from a dragon’s talon into a dagger.
Create Original Formula: Arcana + Magic [Astral] (Force x Focus Multiplier + Telesma Rating, 1 day) Extended test.
Retool Formula for different Telesma: Arcana + Magic [Astral] (Force + Telesma Rating, 1 day) Extended test.
Retool Formula for different Tradition: Arcana + Magic [Astral] (Force, 1 day) Extended test.
Formula for upgrading an existing Focus: Arcana + Magic [Astral] (Change of Force + Telesma Rating, 1 day)
Formula for stacking a Focus: Arcana + Magic [Astral] 2(Original Formula for effect 1 + Original Formula for effect 2…, 1 day)
Artifact Assensing:
As a response to dragons and dragon sympathizers assensing the auras of Artifacts with Telesmas that incorporate draconic reagents they developed a technique to protect themselves.
This is a process that attempts to create a generic template of an aura to mask over the creator’s aura during the crafting of a focus. The reason for Talismongers doing this ties directly into the dangers that talismongers found themselves in during the Dragon Civil War with dragons and their sympathizers analyzing foci with telesma made from dragons. Doing this doesn’t add any additional time to creating foci.
The rules as they stand in SR5: “Make an Opposed Test of Artificing + Magic [Astral] vs. twice the Force of the focus. You can use the net hits to learn about the aura of the artificer who crafted it (see Assensing Table, p. 313). This can be attempted once a day per focus.”
The rules for assensing an artifact make no sense at all. This would mean that it would be easier to assense the creator of a cheap trinket of a focus than a mighty artifact. This is counterintuitive to me and besides Force seems like an odd thing to have as a limit for this anyway. I can see why they might have chosen Artificing but Assensing makes a lot more sense given that is what you are doing. I chose Artificing as the limit as not knowing much about foci and how to make them would be a big disadvantage.
Game Mechanics:
When crafting a focus using a 5th generation Enchanting Lab the Artificer can protect themselves from potential harm by placing a generic and shifting signature into the Focus making it difficult to assense. Artificers with Flexible Signature and/or Masking are even better at hiding their signature inside the focus.
Artifact Assensing Test: Assensing + Intuition [Artificing] (Force hours) v Magic + Arcana + Grade (Flexible Signature) + Grade (Masking)
Use the net hits just like you would for a normal assensing total.
May make one attempt a day. This is not an extended test and each attempt stands alone.
Focus Addiction, Assensing, and Astral Signature House Rules:
This House rule removes Focus Addiction as a mechanic and places it as a story related function or as a negative Quality. I don’t like the sweeping generalization that all magicians would be vulnerable to focus addiction and that there aren’t ways to minimize those problems. By keeping focus addiction as a part of the story you open up the chance for a player to roleplay becoming addicted or for NPC’s to experience and provide an in game warning without being so hamfisted.
To maintain game balance after the removal of the Focus Addiction mechanic I have raised the cost for purchasing foci much higher as part of the after effects of the Dragon Civil War and because of the requirement to spend Karma or Radical Reagents to finalize a focus during its creation. With demand so high for foci and so many talismongers, talisleggers, and Artificers dead or in hiding the apprentices who are taking over business can’t afford to waste Karma that could be improving their skill and instead burn radical reagents which are equivalent.
The other mechanic that balances focus use and adds to the flavor of the magic fluff is how bonding, use, and activation of foci alter auras and astral signatures.
When a focus provides assistance to the magic (adds to dice pool) that created the Astral Signature it adds its Force to the number of hours the Astral Signature lasts.
It is harder to hide in the astral realm when carrying an arsenal of magical foci and harder to hide your astral nature when being assensed.
This also applies to the astral detritus left behind on objects interacted with by the magician making it much easier for a Psychometrist to use their power to assense the item and any astral signatures on it.
Unmasking foci make the magician a little more vulnerable to rituals in that the foci make it a little easier for outside magic to penetrate deeper into their astral form. The magic just flows in like a conductive wire for electricity following the path the karmic bond takes from the focus.
In my games I emphasize that it is normal for Lone Star or Knight Errant to have a magical investigator for most magical crimes involving assault or murder. A runner can hope that the investigator is to swamped to arrive before the signature fades but that often depends on the location of the crime and who it effected.
Thus, mages are very careful about casting spells in high security areas that will involve them not having the time to wipe their astral signatures.
Corps have forensic magicians on call for analysis and access to astral photography.
If you cast a force 6 spell and used a force 4 focus that is a 10 total which is going to take a long time to fade away or wipe guaranteeing that any AA is going to have the time to get a forensic magician or a Quicksilver camera and then they have your signature on file.
Anonymity is a key component of most Shadowrun games and losing that can be a nightmare.
After the third or so magical crime of note with the same signature it is likely the police or corp will put a special investigator to task to find out more.
Particularly heinous crimes or activities that cause a severe loss of face or nuyen may lead to ritual magic and use of the astral signature in the creation of a sympathetic or symbolic link. When a corp or any organization gets hit hard in order to save face they need to leave a message.
Thus, you have a fun adventure with the magician having to be the johnson and hope the team he hires can alter or remove all astral evidence or go to jail or worse. Or the magician has to initiate and learn masking and flexible signature posthaste. Ready made plothooks!
Game Mechanics:
Adds the Force of a Focus that aids a magical action to the hours that an astral signature persists.
Unmasked Foci bonded to an individual makes that person easier for others to assense and when ‘observing in detail’ it is harder for the magician to be stealthy or hide.
If the total Force of all the Foci bonded to a magician is less than or equal to their Magic Rating than add a die to all ‘observing in detail’ attempts of reading their astral signature, their aura or any attempt to avoid detection from an astral observer. If greater than their Magic Rating add two dice and for each multiple of their Magic Rating add an additional die.
This bonus is added to memory tests for others to remember the target’s astral signature.
This bonus is added during attempts to Astrally track the character.
This bonus is added to the lead ritualist’s Test when using a material, sympathetic, or symbolic link with the magician as a target.
This bonus is added when enchanting a symbolic link of the target.
Talismonger’s Guide to Hunting and Gathering Reagents:
Wrote this up for a campaign with a PC as a talismonger with the rest of the team as her employees. The campaign deals with the chaos in the Talismonger community after the casualties of the Dragon Civil War. Since the system in the books is pretty sparse and basic I came up with something more realistic that would make it clear how much of a difference an hot spot makes in the bottom line of a talismonger.
In my next post I will be further explaining the value of the Grade of the reagent which is glossed over in Street Grimoire and just priced in Shadow Spells. I also came up with a new mechanic called Glitch Prone to handle the poor grades of the reagents. I don’t follow the pricing of Reagents shown in Shadow Spells partly because I use an house rule for how reagents work and partly because demand is up and supplies are down these days.
There are two types of search when looking for Reagents. The Hunt and the Gather. When Hunting in order to avoid harming the reagents the Hunter needs to use treated and clean weapons of the bow and arrow or melee type as more high tech weapons harm the quality of the reagents.
First of the Talismonger picks an area to Hunt and/or Gather in and the GM decides the state of the area and rolls for how many reagents it would be possible to harvest in that area if harvesting. If Hunting the GM decides what critters are in the area and their possible qualitative and quantitative value for reagent harvesting. If Gathering the key for the talismonger is to find the reagents, notice their quality and harvest them correctly.
Depending on hazards of the location whether urban or wilderness the PC is likely to need to make a Survival Test or three as most talismongers are going to be covering a lot of ground searching for as many reagents as they can find as quickly as they can find. In many cases this could lead to many days in places far from civilization. As some locales are hidden or out of the way or difficult to travel in and out of the smart talismonger doesn’t want to make many different short trips if one long trip can get the job done.
A smart talismonger has bodyguards or security when traveling in dangerous areas as they will be significantly distracted by the process of assensing an area to gather and harvest reagents or hunting a critter. It is far too easy for a hunter to be on the scent of one critter and get blindsided by the critter they didn’t know was also in the area.
It would be wise to have someone skilled in Outdoors Skills like Navigation to get to the region and go from area to area and Survival to…survive. When Hunting a critter someone with a good Hunting Knowledge and Tracking Skill will make the difference between an happy bottom line and a disgraceful snipe hunt.
Game Mechanics:
An Arcana + Logic [3] Test would be appropriate if the Talismonger is searching for a reagent appropriate for their or a client’s needs. Say a client who is a Mountain shaman wants a Power Focus than the Talismonger would spend some time to consider what kind of specimen or source would provide the best results as a part of a telesma. This is part of the process of tailoring the focus to the client. Net hits above the threshold of this test and successful gathering of the specified reagents to be used should provide tangible benefits to the talismonger like a bonus die per extra hit on a test as well as to the client such as lessening the Karma cost by the extra hits that the shaman would need to bond with the focus. A good talismonger should have a strong sense of how mana and reagents work. This also rewards the PC’s for going along with the GM’s adventure plot.
Hunting:
Tracking Skill and Hunting Knowledge Tests are par for the course once the team has made it to the area.
Once found the critter can be slain but depending on the way it was slain the reagents could be harmed.
The GM will have to decide the Potency of the critter and make some rolls to determine the reward for the team.
Talismongers with control over an area or with ethical reservations about killing the critters can use non-lethal incapacitating weapons and try and harvest what they can from a critter. In many cases this is the smarter choice depending on how the reagents express for that species. For example a talismonger in Wales is famous for making Foci out of the superior reagents made of shorn wool from his awakened black sheep.
Trapping and Fishing are other options that a Survival Test can help with. Non-lethal Trapping simply traps the animal in such a way as to do no physical harm to the animal and thus avoid harm to the reagents prior to harvesting.
The Specimen:
The GM decides on the Potency of the Critter by comparing the power level of the critter to a starting PC with some consideration about how “magical” the critter is, how important the critter is to the talismonger’s tradition, and the nature of the specific critter that is being hunted like if it is an Alpha or an Omega.
Potency:
Superhuman Rating: Prime Quality with 5d6 or more raw reagents
Superior Rating: Prime Quality with 1d6 or more raw reagents
Equal Rating: Superior Quality with 1d6 or more raw reagents
Inferior Rating: Baseline Quality with 1d6 or more raw reagents
Spirit’s Potency:
Of Talismonger’s Summoning Tradition: Superior Quality with Force reagents
Of Different Tradition: Baseline Quality with Force reagents.
If Great Form: Raise Quality by 1 and Force x 2 reagents.
Hunting Techniques:
Best Practices: No Modifier
Non-lethal Trapping techniques, treated traditional fishing equipment, careful harvesting of living animals especially domesticated animals, capture using weapons like bolas or some manipulation magic, or when a critter is killed by melee and archery weapons that are specially treated and cleansed.
Poor Practices: Quality -1
Using melee or archery weapons which have ‘dirty’ mana. The same residue that a Psychometrist can read from an object can harm the integrity of the mana in the critter and thus the reagents. Indirect Combat Spells and some Manipulation spells as well. Methods that cause the critter to endure long term negative emotions or pain prior to harvesting can spoil the reagents as well.
Bad Practices: Quality -1 per box of damage from a bad source
Direct Combat Spells that do physical damage scramble and mutilate a target’s mana on a massive scale as do firearms and demolitions. Direct Combat Spells that do Stun damage may only disrupt its mana temporarily and can be used to capture and then after a sunrise or sunset allow harvesting without penalty.
Harvesting Modifiers:
The Goose who laid the Golden Eggs: Lessen the amount of reagents harvested by at least half but the talismonger is able to harvest reagents without harming the critter. The GM should decide how long of a period is necessary for reagents to renew depending on the form of the reagent. Taking a tail feather from an awakened bird means you have to wait until the tail feather grows back. This also works for domesticated animals.
Fresh: No Modifier.This is when a talismonger harvests the corpse of a critter or any once living matter before the corpse had experienced its first sunset or sunrise which will disrupt the mana in the critter just like dawns and dusks wipe out temporary magical lodges.
Didn’t use an Alchemy Kit to Harvest: Lowers Quality by 1 and makes transportation difficult as a kit enables the talismonger to coax the mana into a few small areas. Instead of reagents weighing less than a dozen grams a piece now have a weight of at least a kilogram per dram.
Mana Level: If the critter had spent most of the latter part of its life in an high or low Background Count or Domain than the GM can add a d6 or subtract a d6.
Not Fresh: Lowers Quality by 1. This could be shed fur or a scale that fell or rubbed off found at the critter’s home or when a critter is slain and brought to a talismonger after a sunset or sunrise has past.
Ancient or High Status Critter: Raises Quality by 1
Final Potency and Quality of the Specimen:
Tally up all the modifiers above until you have a Quality modifer and roll to see how many drams are there. A Quality raised by 1 that was of Baseline starting Potency and Abundancy increased by 1d6 would yield 2d6 Superior raw reagents.
Harvesting the Reagents:
First an Assensing + Intuition [Astral] (# of reagents, minute) Extended Test to locate and understand the mana and its concentration within the specimen. The character can only harvest the reagents that she can find in this process. Thus, if she stops getting six hits than that is how many reagents she can harvest as a maximum.
Then make an Alchemy + Intuition [Astral] (2x # of reagents, hour) Extended Test to concentrate and focus the mana in the specimen and harvest the reagents. Every hit on the Test can be split between concentrating the reagent and harvesting the reagent. A talismonger in a hurry can choose to skip the concentrating part and instead of reagents weighing under 12 grams a piece each reagent weighs at least a kilogram apiece. Once Harvested a reagent can’t be further concentrated without disrupting the mana making bulky reagents less valuable and useful for many endeavors. Superior 5th Generation Alchemy Kits also lower the time interval required in half and provide other benefits.
If attempting to harvest from a critter in a renewable way than an additional hit on the above test can be spent to carefully harvest without harming the critter or its ability to recover its reagents in the future. The GM should decide how much can be harvested safely but no more than half of its total reagents should be available without harm.
An Animal Handling Test may be necessary should the critter be awake and mobile. More reagents can be harvested in a renewable way from a calm, alert, and trusting critter. In many cases this isn’t possible and the critter should be harvested while immobile or unconscious. When a critter is in that sort of state its mana is in flux making it more difficult to concentrate the mana into reagents safe to harvest without harming the critter.
Gathering:
Parabotany, Parageology, Magical Theory, and other knowledge tests can help out with finding good spots to gather reagents.
These are the factors that will determine how many and what quality the reagents might be in the area. It is possible that more than one source of reagents might be in an area and if that is true the grade of the raw reagents may differ between the various sources in the area. The Status of an Area might be excellent but if it is well known it is probably being harvested regularly and thus not as objectively good an area as another. All the pieces connect.
Source:
The Source of the reagents could be a gold vein, a stalactite, a critter nest, ancient bones, moss on a gravestone, feathers discarded by an awakened eagle, petrified shit from a blackberry cat who ate the wrong magical compound, a chess set used in a grandmaster match, the discarded wood shavings leftover from making icons of Cthulu by a lunatic carpenter obsessed with HP Lovecraft, old amusement park coins discovered in a junked automated fortune teller, the smaller piece of a wishbone broken and discarded in tears by a child, and more.
The Abundancy of the Source:
Potent: 3d6 base reagents.
Baseline: 1d6 base reagents.
Poor: no base reagents.
The Purity of the Source:
Pristine: Raise Quality by 1.
Typical: No Modifier.
Poor: Lower Quality by 1.
The Status and Potency of the Area:
Prime: Rare pristine places free of physical and astral pollution and very little interaction with metahumanity. Or places of relatively pure purpose, emotion, and intent. Cathedrals, a memorial, a family graveyard tended lovingly for a dozen generations, an old half forgotten out of the way research library at one of the first universities like Salerno or Oxford, the original historical set of buildings at West Point, or a sept’s castle. Prime base Quality
Superior: Clean or Esoteric locales like a bucolic village or well maintained park with little but good natured traffic. A centuries old graveyard open to the public but off the beaten path, an old bookstore district, a community church where famous abolitionists gathered, a research lab at a quality university. Superior base Quality
Baseline: Mundane like most areas on earth: Baseline base Quality
Subpar: The nicer part of the Barrens. Subpar base Quality
Inferior: The bad part of the Barrens. Inferior base Quality
Tainted: Whole swathes of Tsimshian. Tainted base Quality
Resting State of the Area:
Untouched: Hasn’t ever been harvested. Quality raised by 2 and number of drams is raised by 3d6.
Unspoiled: Hasn’t been harvested in years. Quality raised by 1 and number of drams is raised by 2d6.
Fallow: Hasn’t been harvested in months. Number of drams is raised by 1d6.
Cultivated: Has been harvested this month. No Modifier.
Recently Harvested: Has been harvested this week and most of the reagents were found. Lower Quality by 1 and drams by 1d6.
These two factors can also define the Resting State of the Area and can both impact the above States.
Over Harvested: Area has been Harvested more than once a month for a year. Lowers Quality by 1 and drams by 1d6.
Tapped Out: Talismongers regularly harvest every single reagent in the Area for a year. Lowers Quality by 1 and drams by 3d6.
Harvesting the Reagents:
First an Assensing + Intuition [Astral] (# of reagents, minute) Extended Test to locate and understand the mana and its concentration within the specimen. The character can only harvest the reagents that she can find in this process. Thus, if she stops getting six hits than that is how many reagents she can harvest as a maximum.
Then make an Alchemy + Intuition [Astral] (2x # of reagents, hour) Extended Test to concentrate and focus the mana in the specimen and harvest the reagents. Every hit on the Test can be split between concentrating the reagent and harvesting the reagent. A talismonger in a hurry can choose to skip the concentrating part and instead of reagents weighing under 12 grams a piece each reagent weighs at least a kilogram apiece. Once Harvested a reagent can’t be further concentrated without disrupting the mana making bulky reagents less valuable and useful for many endeavors. Superior 5th Generation Alchemy Kits also lower the time interval required in half and provide other benefits.
Final Potency and Quality of the Source:
Tally up all the modifiers above until you have a Quality modifer and roll to see how many drams are there. A Quality raised by 1 that was of baseline starting Potency and baseline starting Abundancy increased by 1d6 would yield 2d6 Superior raw reagents.
Glitch Prone:
This quality of a reagent is a way for the GM to show the dangers of cheap reagents and gives a mechanic to the story fluff in Street Grimoire that talked about foci made from inferior reagents. It would be easy to apply this mechanic to making new negative qualities for characters, guns, computers et cetera so feel free to do so.
Minor Glitch Prone: Whatever magical test the reagent is used for is modified so any 2’s rolled are counted as a 1 for declaring a glitch or critical glitch.
Major Glitch Prone: Whatever magical test the reagent is used for is modified so any 2 or 3 rolled are counted as a 1 for declaring a glitch or critical glitch.
Critically Glitch Prone: Whatever magical test the reagent is used for is modified so any non hit is counted as a 1 for declaring a glitch or critical glitch.
Grades of Reagents:
The Grade of a refined reagent is determined by the lowest grade of a component. So 9 Prime raw reagents and 1 subpar raw reagent yields 1 subpar refined reagent making accurate discovery of the grade of all reagents important during the refining process especially with Orichalcum as the purity of the Orichalcum becomes a big deal at that level of cost. The benefits of Prime and Superior Grade reagents will be described in my next post.
Prime: 50% higher base cost and 50% faster to refine than baseline reagents.
Superior: 25% higher base cost and 25% faster to refine than baseline reagents.
Baseline: No modifer to base cost or refining time.
Subpar: 25% lower base cost and 25% slower to refine than baseline reagents. Minor Glitch Prone.
Inferior: 50% lower base cost and 50% slower to refine than baseline reagents. Major Glitch Prone.
Tainted: 75% lower base cost and 75% slower to refine than baseline reagents. Critically Glitch Prone.
Unusable: No value and impossible to refine with current alchemical techniques. Can’t be used with magic.
Enchanter’s Equipment:
An Enchanter’s Lab is usually part of an Enchanter’s Magical Lodge and allows a Mage to create Enchantments with ease and style. The original Labs were very basic and for Hermetics were often little better than a chemistry lab but as time has gone on there have been many advances in Enchanting allowing feats impossible or difficult just a decade ago to be achieved today. 4th Generation Enchanting equipment was the norm in 2075 but in the wake of the Dragon Civil War and the loss of so many Talismongers and Enchanters who dealt with Draconic reagents and telesma created an huge lack of supply at the same time that demand increased via new Enchanting abilities. This spurred an aggressive burst of pure research and new manatech allowing yesterday’s apprentices to try and compete with yesterday’s lost masters.
5th Gen Lab provides a bonus situational die to all Enchanting Tests including Drain. Additional bonuses can be gained with the Forge artifact component of a Magical Lodge if the lab is within such a location.
The Lab cuts down the time to refine reagents to a mere 8 hour workday and will often speed up other Enchanting processes as if the calculated Force was 1 less. For example an Enchanting process that normally takes Force days with a Force of 4 would only take 3 days instead.
The key enhancement of the Fifth Generation Laboratory is that Alchemists with the Fixation Metamagic are able to bypass the need to learn the Advanced Alchemy Metamagic and are able to create Magical Compounds, Charms, Potions, Scrolls and other advanced alchemical preparations.
4th Gen Lab is the standard Lab as described in the rules. It takes a 10 hour workday to refine reagents. These have been basically the same for the past decade barring a few minor improvements.
3rd Gen Lab doesn’t usually have any penalties as anything really backward was probably updated but they can make certain Enchanting processes take longer to do especially refining reagents which takes a full 12 hour workday. Most shamans haven’t updated from these as the new 4th and 5th gen Labs really focus more on Hermetics and Wuxing Traditions. Most are twenty to thirty years old.
Microlabs allow the Enchanter to take their lab with them when they travel. They don’t provide a bonus die for all Enchanting Tests. A microlab cannot make a batch greater than one when brewing potions, alcohol, and other magical compounds because of space constraints. A 5th gen microlab gives the same access to Advanced Alchemy and Magical Compounds, Charms, Potions, and Scrolls. Microlabs weren’t produced during the time period of 3rd Generation Enchanting manatechnology.
Alchemy kits: are very portable tools for Alchemists and help with harvesting reagents, preserving, and focusing discovered reagents into a smaller more portable raw form. An Alchemist might take a vial and some rare herbs and powders and take a little blood from a slain paracritter and weave the mana from the corpse into the blood mixing into the vial or use a ritual athame to cut a wand from a lightning damaged tree and have the dozen “raw reagents” channeled into just the wand or takes a bucket of awakened berries and weaves the mana into an handful saving space and providing ease of use as no mage wants to carry a bucket of reagents while on a run. A fifth gen kit increases the Astral Limit by 1 and cuts harvesting time in half as well as concentrating the reagents into portable objects. A 4th gen is standard also concentrates reagents and a 3rd gen doubles the normal time. Includes Tool Cleansers and other items that allow for quality reagent harvesting.
Alchemy Kit Enhancements: Adding extra features like the Ghostbusters Enhancement that lets Talismongers salvage reagents from materialized Spirits or a kit tailored to a specific Tradition which raises Harvesting Test Limits by 1 if the Talismonger is of that Tradition. Think of a good enhancement and there is probably some doodads the alchemist can buy that will enable that aid.
Ties in with this post about Talismongering.
Astral Signatures and Foci:
If a sentient being is slain with any test directly aided by the use of a Focus than an Astral Signature is created that lasts Force hours.
When a Charm Focus is used for over a minute it creates an Astral Signature. The duration of the signature has a limit of the Focus’s Force and grows by 1 per minute of use of the Focus. This astral signature would look similar to an influence spell when assensed astrally. Thus, a Charm with a Force of 4 used for 3 minutes would create a Force 3 Astral Signature. If used for 5 minutes would create a Force 4 Astral Signature.
Any time a Focus contributes to a magical test then it adds its Force to the strength of the Astral Signature. A focus that provides four dice to a manabolt of Force 4 would have a total strength of 8.
Focus Addiction House Rule
Foci:
There are three major categories of Foci and they are Grand, Major, and Minor. Any Artifacts or other magical creations of Artificing fit into these three categories. So, if you invent something new for your game like using Artificing to create Legendary Critters or Chimera for the purpose of making a physical familiar or more powerful homunculi such as a Golem you can use these categories as a guide.
Grand Foci are Power, Shield, Battle, Charm, Genius, Muse, Stalwart, and Sublime Weapon. Karma to bond equal to F x 8.
Major Foci are Weapon, Combat, Detection, Health, Illusion, Manipulation, Invocation, and Initiate. Karma to bond equal to F x 4.
Minor Foci are Qi, Enchanting (helps with Alchemy and Disenchanting), Metamagic, Spell and Spirit Foci as described on SR5 p 320. Karma to bond equal to F x 2.
Descriptions of New Foci:
A Shield Focus provides equal to its Force a number of dice that can be used to help with passive defense, active defense, Counterspelling, defense against Critter and Spirit Powers, and defense against Alchemical Preparations. It provides half its Force rounded up as a bonus dice for surprise tests as well. Often has design that brings to mind shields, pentacles, pentagrams, defense runes, and the seal of solomon and usually takes the form of badges, amulets, decorative pins, earrings, and belt buckles.
Developed in Tir Tairngire to protect the Princes from rebels this Focus is a popular one for those in positions of power under threat of assassination. Organized crime has very much taken to producing and using this Focus.
A Battle Focus provides a dice pool up to its Force that can be used with any personal Combat Skill Test including using a personal sized weapon and has at least a Skill Rating equal to twice the Force of the Focus. Often has martial designs and takes many different forms like a gauntlet, ring, crown, armband, or torque.
Developed by an open source metamagical project by magicians involved with the Desert Wars to enhance Adepts without using Qi Foci. Afterall a Qi Foci can’t be used by a second adept. This way mercenary companies could boost their adepts without losing the benefits later when the adept dies or retires. The focus refines what is already there and is not a replacement for skill.
A Charm Focus temporarily increases your effective Charisma rating for the purposes of any tests involving Charisma. For instance it would not effect a conjurer’s number of spirits they can bind as that is not a test even though it is limited by Charisma. The maximum Force of this Focus is three at the moment though millions of nuyen are being spent to improve this limit.
Charm Foci take the form of flashy jewelry, earrings, vests, hats, glasses, and even things like a platinum tooth or a tongue piercing. The telesma is always a noticeable and memorable item and has a distinctive style per the negative quality. If it is hidden from view it does nothing to aid the owner.
The invention of the Charm Focus was a factor behind the meteoric rise of Horizon to megacorporate AAA status. Already the Charm Focus has become a very popular sign of status among the extremely wealthy with magical talent especially those involved in politics be it corporate or government. Megastars and wannabe megastars with the bare minimum of magical talent required to bond with a focus from trid stars to news anchors are liquidating their fortunes to get themselves in the long line of buyers.
A Genius Focus temporarily increases your effective Logic rating for the purposes of any tests involving Logic. The maximum Force of this Focus is three. This focus overrides the benefits of Cerebral Boosters so whichever rating is higher is the only one that applies.
Invented by the Great Dragon Schwartzkopf at the Charles University of Prague. The research team compared before and after astral photographs of magicians before they received cultured bioware enhancements. By mimicking how the astral form changes to match the new physical form the team were able to make the physical form match the astral and achieve the same goal. At the moment because Cerebral Boosters are limited to just Rating 3 the researchers haven’t been able to surpass this as they don’t have any material to reverse engineer.
The focus often takes on draconic, air/winds, and lightning imagery whether it is a scarf, torque, or a headband and is normally worn near the head.
A Muse Focus temporarily increases your effective Intuition rating for the purposes of any tests involving Intuition. The maximum Force of this Focus is three. The focus overrides the benefits of Cerebellum Booster so whichever rating is higher is the only one that applies.
Invented by a professor of art history in her garage; Doctor Alkonis was searching for the nature or origin of creativity and may have found it via magical stimulation of the astral form’s cerebellum much like scientists discovered with boosting processing in the cerebellum via cultured bioware.
This focus often seems innocuous and could be a cameo locket necklace of a loved one which inspires or an armband with musical bells that hit the right tone with the right movement to put a dancer or a painter in the right frame of mind to create.
A Stalwart Focus temporarily increases your effective Body and Strength for the purposes of any tests involving those attributes. The maximum Force of this Focus is three. This focus is compatible with other means of enhancements and is of course limited to the +4 Augmentation maximum rule. As this just increases Body for the purposes of tests it doesn’t increase any derived component of body like additional boxes on the physical damage track.
Most often taking the form of gauntlets, belts, feather headdresses, armbands, and helmets this focus can take any form.
A popular focus for the elite Sioux special forces the “Wildcats” and even apocalyptic cults from Norway. Rumors say both groups ended up inventing this in parallel. Few are found outside of the two organizations though they are a sign of high status among the trolls of the Black Forest Kingdom.
A Sublime Weapon Focus provides its Force as a dice pool bonus with melee attack tests using the weapon. It also enhances Accuracy and AP by its Force/2 rounded up. There are currently three types of Sublime Weapon Foci. Whatever the type this focus when active is very noticeable in the physical and astral realms as it is wreathed in an aura appropriate for the type of focus.
An Elemental Weapon Focus adds to the Weapon an Elemental Effect (SR5 p 170).
There are two main types of Elemental Effects which are penetrative and impact. A Water or Blast effect may knockdown a target easier and cause additional stun damage. A penetrative effect increases physical damage by various methods like having a flaming sword or an electric trident.
Impact elemental effects like Water and Blast are put on blunt weapons and add twice their Force to the DV for the purpose of the Knock down called shot and add their Force to determine Knockdown on a normal attack in addition to having an Elemental Effect. The weapon adds its Force to the DV if the target is knocked down.
Penetrative elemental effects like Fire and Acid are put on slashing or piercing weapons. If the modified damage value of an attack causing physical damage is greater than AP modified armor rating then add the Force to the DV minus the appropriate specialized protection. (Ignore this if the DV is less than the specialized protection)
Depending on the elemental type the weapon may have secondary effects when penetrating armor or even just when hitting armor as in the case of Acid. The Artificer must know a spell of that Elemental type to create the Focus.
A Bane Weapon Focus adds to the Weapon a Slay/Slaughter Effect in addition to the standard Sublime Weapon bonuses. When used against the species or type targeted by the Bane Focus directly in combat add twice the Force of the Bane to the weapon’s DV.
Additionally add the Bane’s Force as additional situational bonus dice for any opposed Tests targeting the Bane category when the Focus is active. A Bane focus in the hands of an expert in Intimidation can be especially terrifying to the target.
The Artificer must know the specific Slay or Slaughter spell targeting a type for death.
Rumors are common with this type of rare focus. It is known that many megacorps and governments have Insect Spirit Bane Foci for their elite best of the best HTR teams and that developing this manatechnology was a major goal of Ares.
There is a tale about an artificer who crafted many of these Bane’s against Shedim after discovering a payload of naturally occurring orichalcum in his backyard. He had discovered his child had been possessed by a Master Shedim and wanted to make sure people had weapons to defend themselves. At least half a dozen artifacts were made before the Shedim found out and the artificer disappeared. These were mailed to different parts of the world with crafting instructions.
People who are initially neutral emotionally toward the Bane type tend to over time grow more and more inimical toward their Bane. For those already negatively charged against the Bane’s type the process towards antipathy is much quicker. The character wielding a Bane facing focus addiction can easily become irrational and quickly develop a Prejudice against the Bane type and receive no karma for the negative quality.
A Toxic Greater Weapon Focus adds to the Weapon an attack that corrupts the body and astral form of anyone who isn’t aligned with Toxic energies. The Artificer must be a toxic magician to craft this focus. Anyone who binds to this Focus will inevitably have their essence altered until their magic becomes as Toxic as the Focus. Taking a physical wound from a Toxic focus will require a Test resisting anaphylactic shock if it is a Pollutant or resist Radiation per rules on page 105 of the Street Grimoire.
A Combat, Detection, Health, Illusion, and Manipulation Focus grants bonus dice equal to its Force for any Tests involving its Category of Spells. Spellcasting, Ritual Spellcasting, and Counterspelling and also assists Conjuring Tests involving the type of Spirit related to that category of magic that their Tradition can summon. It can also sustain a spell of its type up to the Force of the Focus.
An Initiate Focus adds its Force to the mage’s Grade for the determining of effects for any Metamagics that she might know.
An Invocation Focus acts by increasing the character’s effective Magic Rating with most types of Conjuring tests and when using the Invocation Ritual to buff their Spirits to Great Form. For Banishing it raises the Limit by the Force of the Focus instead of adding dice.
Prices:
Add +1 Availability and 20% to the prices of Magical Compounds in published materials because of the heightened demand and low supply following the devastation to the Talismonger industry during the Dragon Civil War. Loss of all draconic reagents and telesma plus the loss of hundreds of top tier Enchanters, Talismongers, and Talisleggers who used or dealt with draconic reagents has had a staggering effect on the enchanting economy.
| Item |
Retail Price |
Availability |
| Raw |
20¥ per dram |
– |
| Refined |
450¥ per dram |
6 + 1 per dram |
| Radical |
5000¥ per dram |
8 +1 per dram |
| Flawless |
55,000¥ per dram |
10 + 2 per dram |
| Orichalcum |
175,000¥ per dram |
14 +3 per dram |
| Prime Grade |
+100% Base Cost |
+2 |
| Superior Grade |
+50% Base Cost |
+1 |
| Subpar Grade |
-25% Base Cost |
-3 |
| Inferior Grade |
-50% Base Cost |
-5 |
| Enchanter’s Lab 5th Gen |
75,000¥ |
12 |
| Enchanter’s Lab 4th Gen |
40,000¥ |
10 |
| Enchanter’s Lab 3rd Gen |
25,000¥ |
10 |
| Microlab 5th Gen |
100,000¥ |
12 |
| Microlab 4th Gen |
60,000¥ |
10 |
| Alchemy Kit 5th Gen |
10,000¥ |
12 |
| Alchemy Kit 4th Gen |
4000¥ |
10 |
| Alchemy Kit 3rd Gen |
1000¥ |
8 |
| Alchemy Kit Enhancements |
1000¥ each |
+1 |
| Minor Foci |
(F x 900¥) + (F x OR x 250¥) |
(F x 2) |
| Major Foci |
(F x 10,000¥) + (F x OR x 250¥) |
(F x2) +4 |
| Grand Foci |
(F x 110,000¥) + (F x OR x 250¥) |
(F x 3) + 3 |
| Focus Tailoring |
(Days x 1000¥) + (3 x Reagent) |
+2 |
| OR is Object Rating of Telesma |
Doesn’t include cost of Telesma |
|
Pen and Paper RPG House Rules 