It's nice to see you on the forums around here Rusty!
Texas is awesome isn't it? Screw Herb.
Thanks, man. Yeah, the Lone Star's been great to me so far. It's been fun seeing some of it from a motorcycle, too.
Great roads for riding on, that's for sure. And yeah, that whole...
thing...over at CBT just kind of rubbed me the wrong way. Oh well. I'll keep laying low for a while, yadda yadda yadda, and won't be submitting any fiction to 'em any time soon, I guess.
Presumably the same Critias of DSF fame?
Yup, that's me. And over on the Privateer Press forums, and Glocktalk, and...yeah. I try to use the same user name everywhere I go, and tend to have good luck about it not bein' taken yet.
Back to smartlinks/cybereyes: Personally, I don't see how someone with contact lenses or cool sunglasses can
get those other smartlink bonuses. I guess one could argue that a "mental command" could be sent via contact lenses if you blink your eyes three times to eject the magazine from your smartgun, or something...but how do you do it with goggles, or glasses, and would the GM then have you start switching your firing mode, dropping your magazine, or firing your gun whenever something made you blink?
It's a "common sense" ruling on my part, but I only let folds with implanted smartlinks get some of those little extras. The heads-up display on goggles can sure tell you how much ammunition is left in a magazine, let you do the guncam thing, and displays where the gun's pointed (to get you that +2 dice)...but I don't see how it lets you change from semi-auto to burst-fire. I'll readily admit that it's only MY take on things, and that my take doesn't matter in this conversation since I'm not even playing in the game -- just sharing my thoughts, is all.
I do want to point out that the mage with cybereyes is nothing new to SR4, or 4A. Mages have always been able to -- if they so choose -- dabble in cyberware, and be able to cast spells through
most implanted cyberoptics (they paid their Essence and earned their boost). Given how attributes are payed for in 4th, it's not as good an idea as it used to be...buying the extra-steep "6" in Magic only to then knock it down a peg just so you can see in the dark isn't always a great trade-off. I like Mages having the option to
make that trade, and I don't think it's
that that makes them potentially overpowering.
I think it's more just...well...the nature of direct combat spells in SR4, and the declining dangers of Drain from edition to edition. It's worth pointing out, also, that in the long run I think Possession traditions are potentially quite a bit more game-breaking than direct combat spells, but that's a different ball of wax entirely. I don't think you guys will run afoul of some of the munchkinny douchebaggery the way other groups might, but it's still stuff to keep an eye out for.
)