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Agonisis
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Join Date: Jan 2016
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Old April 13th, 2016, 09:03 AM
Im currently trying to raise my magic from 3-4. I started at 7 and took some ware. now when i raise it it charges me 40 karma (i'm assuming 5x old rating) and not 20 (5x new rating.) the drop down costs say 20. I'm just making sure i'm correct on this that it should be 20 and not 40 before i waste these busy people's time.
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Kiirnodel
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Old April 13th, 2016, 11:40 AM
I think it is a bug, at the very least because it is telling you one karma cost and then charging you a different amount.

This is sort of a blank spot in the rules. It doesn't specify one way or the other.

However, I would argue that the rules specify the cost is (5 × New Rating), not "what new rating would have been" before effects changed it. Nor does it specify anywhere that one should keep track of magic loss and recalculate karma costs based on the value pre-loss.
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Thrawn21
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Old April 13th, 2016, 02:35 PM
It is all fine and correct. Your internal magic rating is still 7, from that the essence loss substracts 4, so your effective magic rating is 3. Now you raise your magic rating from 7 to 8, (new level x5 -> 8x5 = 40 Karma). Now you substract again 4 from that, and your effective rating is 4 magic.

Essence loss does not cause you to actually loose a magic rating, it just prevents you to use it. So, be careful with wares as a magic user, it gets REALLY expensive to raise it again.
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Mathias
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Old April 13th, 2016, 02:56 PM
This is a known bug.

We asked Catalyst for confirmation on how this works a while ago, and finally got an answer last week:
Quote:
1) If a magically active character/technomancer loses Magic/Resonance due to essence loss, what is the karma cost to increase Magic/Resonance? Do you calculate the cost based on the base attribute rating, before taking into account the reduction due to essence reduction, or do you calculate it based on the current rating?

JMH: If there is no chance in getting the Magic/Resonance back through any other means besides Karma purchase, the lowered attribute should be considered the base, and that is what should be used.
Implementing that in Hero Lab, however, will take some thought and some work, meaning it will take a bit of time. Unless we can think of a better way to track it, every augmentation you buy after character creation will need to record itself on the Advances tab, so that each advancement that increases magic/resonance can calculate what the essence was at the time it was added (which is based on its position in the Advances list). And if you don't have essence holes turned on, each removal of an augmentation needs to be recorded, too.
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Agonisis
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Old April 13th, 2016, 04:18 PM
thanks, i am able to adjust it for now in the personal tab, so no big harm, was wondering if it was me tbh.
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adzling
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Old April 14th, 2016, 07:38 AM
Wow i'm surprised you got a response from Catalyst Mathias!

I'm not sure why this is so difficult to implement in herolab.

Wouldn't you just calculate:
Current Magic x 5 to determine improvement cost?

Why both tracking essence at all?

I'm sure i don't have a good grasp of what's going on under the hood of herolab.
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mMerlin
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Old April 15th, 2016, 09:11 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by adzling View Post
Wouldn't you just calculate:
Current Magic x 5 to determine improvement cost?
Actually, that would be "Current Magic + 1" x 5. The cost is based on the new rating, not the current rating.

Quote:
Originally Posted by adzling View Post
Why both tracking essence at all?
If I understand the RAW and their intent, (permanent) essence loss causes a permanent loss in magic (or resonance). Even if the Essence is regained at a later point, through one of the recovery / rebuild processes, the magic does not automatically come back. The maximum magic would increase though. The magic would need to be purchased with karma, starting from the where it ended after the loss.

I added "permanent" to the loss above, because something is telling me there is a variant where the essence loss is temporary. Works more like a background count that suppresses magic until you leave. I can not place where that happens. Just a niggling uncertainty. Mathias example of not having essence holes, where removing an augmentation would recover the essence is still a permanent loss. Removing the augmentation would increase the essence and maximum magic, but not the current magic rating.

Anyway, reducing essence needs to reduce both current and maximum magic ratings. Recovering essence will increase the maximum but not the current. Increasing magic with karma will cost based on the new rating, whether it is done before or after recovering essence. So HL needs to know the magic rating at the time of the karma spend.

Even without any possibility of essence recover, HL still needs to know what the current (and maximum) magic/resonance is at any time. Consider a starting character with magic 3, maximum 6. Add an augmentation, reducing essence by (up to) 1. Magic changes to current 2, maximum 5. Spend karma to increase magic, going to current 3, maximum 5. Add another augmentation, reducing to magic 2, maximum 4. Spend more karma to increase magic to current 3, maximum 4. HL needs to track all of the loses and gains, to be able to correctly come up with the karma spent and current values.

If I understand the code structure / flow, and Mathias wording about the considerations for implementation seem to match, there are cases where HL [re]calculates current ratings by starting from initial build values, and all of the actions in sequence from then that would affect the current value. Each essence loss and each karma spend, and the times they occurred, are needed to for example calculate the karma spent. The karma spend is (I think) recorded as "spend enough karma to increase magic from current to current + 1, as of date and time". Not "spend 15 karma to increase magic from 2 to 3 as of date and time". So HL needs to know the current values as of the time point of any action that could change them.
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Mathias
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Old April 15th, 2016, 09:23 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by adzling View Post
Wouldn't you just calculate:
Current Magic x 5 to determine improvement cost?
What "current magic"? Hero Lab does not track the order things were added in, except on the Advances tab, so without knowing what order things were added in, how can you know what the essence was at the time of that advancement?

What you see as "current magic", that gets displayed to the user, is the end value of a long series of calculations.

Last edited by Mathias; April 15th, 2016 at 09:40 AM.
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Smogg
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Old August 13th, 2016, 11:52 AM
How about a solution like this:
When you buy augmentations that drops your essence below the next whole number, an entry in the advancement log is added "-1 Magic/Resonance due to essence loss". This entry in the log would be used to adjust the Magic/Resonance.
Much in the same way a log entry is added when you buy gear (focus) and click "Bind".

With a deduction in the advancement log, it should be possible to keep track of the magic score at the time where you wish to buy a new level of magic.
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