Shadowrun editions...

[Username17]

Just recall that the balance issue is not "stun bolt is too effective". It's a complex action and it drops a dude, it doesn't compare favorably in build point cost to "owning a machine pistol", which drops a dude in two simple actions. The issue is that "fire bolt is too expensive". It has a pretty narrow niche (targets with a fuck tonne of counterspelling or targets carrying non-heat safe explosives), and the drain is up with crazy shit like Physical Barrier.

-Username17

[Rawbeard]

Yeah, drain on physical spells does not warrant their use. So trying to adress that is always a good idea. Just learn from SR4A's great idea of "Net hits add to drain, lol" to fix the discrepancy. Also removing some options of drain resist stacking might be a thing to adress. Even without similar cheese you can overcast without drain, but making it a little harder to do is also a good idea.

Ah, magic. Fun times. And that's not even going into summoning...

[Whipstitch]

I'd keep your expectations grounded as far as hoping for real variety in combat spell loadouts. Even if Combat spells are made very similar, they'll still end up rather like immortals: For most mages, there will be only one. After all, they all fill the same general niche of hurting dudes and as Frank pointed out, if you just wanted that capability, guns are cheaper. The real reason for combat spells being so popular is that they bypass ItNW and the fact that for many characters, magic and spellcasting are already sunk costs--Having Heal, Detect Life and Physical Mask alone are already worth the price of admission, so stapling on Power Bolt on top of that for 2 bp instead of sidelining into guns is a pretty sweet deal.

[TheFlatline]

I forgot- did SR4A address the BS spirit force rules? The ones where a low level summoner can like summon Cthulhu and break the game?

[Rawbeard]

HahaHaHahahaAHAHAha

[TheFlatline]

Yeah didn't think so.