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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ The grapple hand...

Posted by: Sterling Aug 18 2007, 04:59 AM

I think the grapple hand is a wonderful piece of tech. I like how it allows the cybered samurai to be able to fight back if confronted by a physical adept with distance strike, or punch someone way far away (which could be argued into surprise, but that's a GM's decision).

The rules about it are pretty clear cut, the maximum length (30 meters), the skill use (exotic weapon: grapple hand), etc. But what it doesn't cover is something that makes its use in melee pretty ambiguous.

How fast can the hand retract? I'd almost houserule it could retract a number of meters of rope equal to the cyberlimb's agility, but that's not necessarily the best idea.

Is the retracting near-instantaneous, take a complex action, or just can be fired in a complex action and retract as a 'free' action but take a combat pass in terms of time? Technically, if it can retract in a single 'free action' that's feasible, especially if it can haul up a metahuman at a decent clip... which also isn't defined for the grapple hand or gun.

I'm statting a troll with a grapple hand, and I'm thinking of either buying it a custom (sized) shock glove or just spending the cash for a shock hand. All the debate about unarmed suffering from the massive penalty of range... g-shock hands for the win!! The only drawback I can see is that at some point, a fight will occur where the enemy dodges your grapple hand, and then goes to pick it up (making a grapple test? Heh heh) to tie it around a pole/wedge it in a car's rear bumper/feed it into some convenient spinning machinery/wail on it with a stun baton. That's going to be one of those 'umm.. I didn't expect that outcome!!' moments.

Posted by: neko128 Aug 18 2007, 05:25 AM

This thought reminds me of the recent Dr. McNinja. For those of you who aren't familiar...

In the current story, a robot bear attacks a teenager (at least, I think he's a teenager). It tries to bit him and claw him, and gets shot; so it releases its head on a giant cable, and throws it at the kid to bite him from range. The kid beats it by grabbing the head, and throwing it up into the clouds of a thunderstorm where it promptly gets zapped by lightning.

Sooooo... If the hand doesn't get retracted immediately, I'm envisioning lots of abuse of the hand as nearby people attach it to power lines, put it into chippers or furnaces, or even just super-glue grenades to it.

So whatever's realistic, some of it comes down to "How nice is the GM feeling?"

Posted by: Sterling Aug 18 2007, 05:34 AM

QUOTE (neko128)

Sooooo... If the hand doesn't get retracted immediately, I'm envisioning lots of abuse of the hand as nearby people attach it to power lines, put it into chippers or furnaces, or even just super-glue grenades to it.

That's a hysterical idea, except the 'rope' in question is myomeric, so you could then use it to (slowly) chase the person who superglued grenades to your hand.

Hell, fire it at an orc or cybered metahuman, miss, and watch them use a railroad spike to nail it to the ground.

I think though it should be (even if it is unrealistic) instant retract, if not for that very reason. The last thing you want to do is send it out and have it come back with a claymore mine duct-taped to it. If someone chooses to hold an action to 'intercept' your hand, that's fine. But it's much less useful to have a grapple hand (even a g-shock variant) if, when you fire it, you just made yourself an easy target for your enemies.

I mean, who wants to bellow 'Rocket PUNCH!', and then have your opponent shove your hand into something like a jet engine? Talk about anticlimactic.

But grapple and and the magnetic limb system... that could make for some fun tricks as well.

Posted by: hyzmarca Aug 18 2007, 05:50 AM

So I'm thinking about a housefule that you can install a graple-system as a cyberskull attachment and have a grapple head. With reinforced atificial teeth and cybernetic jaws, you can gram onto stuff with your teeth and reef the rest of your body in.

But yes, instant retract does seem like a good idea in combat, but less so in other situations, like climbing.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Aug 18 2007, 06:01 AM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

So I'm thinking about a houserule that you can install a grapple-system as a cyberskull attachment and have a grapple head. With reinforced artificial teeth and cybernetic jaws, you can grab onto stuff with your teeth and reel the rest of your body in.

...gives me an idea for a new character...cyberSunny

Lemony Snicketts goes Shadowrun

(...already have Violet)

Posted by: Sterling Aug 18 2007, 06:04 AM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

Well, I'm betting the motor that powers the winch can instantly retract the hand alone, but won't have the power to rocket you up the side of a building at 10 meters a second.

I could see the whole 'cyberhead' deal but only with cyberzombies. You can stick a brain in a jar almost anywhere, but the cyberskull with your actual grey matter in it... I don't know if you could fire it off and still maintain blood flow, etc. Of course, there's the good chance you're poking fun. Maybe a set of GrappleJaws™?

Posted by: Catharz Godfoot Aug 18 2007, 08:28 AM

Someone adept at fighting with a grapple hand would probably treat it like an improved meteor hammer. The advantage over a normal meteor hammer is the grappling ability plus quick (though not instantaneous) changes in length. You'd probably need some special targeting software to make it useful to most people, but with a reflex recorder it won't take many years of training.

Posted by: The Jopp Aug 18 2007, 09:22 AM

I would suggest that an additional exotic skill be used.

Grapple Hand Whip

When you miss and the hand fail to retract fast enough you just whip that sucker around like indiana jones.

Posted by: PlatonicPimp Aug 18 2007, 02:35 PM

It already requires an exotic weapon skill to use.

It would be fairly difficult to use a grapple hand as a meteor hammer, seeing as how a meteor hammer requires 2 hands to use.

I'd just allow for instant retraction on the rocket punch, party to encourage it's use, mostly because I, as GM, don't want to bother with all the shit that comes up if it doesn't.

Posted by: Tarantula Aug 19 2007, 12:45 AM

Grapple Hand is listed as a Single Shot 1(ml) weapon. Going to the table for reloading in SR4, 312, we get for ml weapons, 1 complex action to reload 1 muzzle tube.

So, its a simple action to attack with it, as a single shot, then a complex to reload it for another use.

Posted by: Sterling Aug 19 2007, 07:42 AM

Hmm.. that's interesting, using the muzzle loader rule. I think I'll go with the general consensus, and use the simple action to fire, and then a simple (or free, I'm undecided) to retract. But a good catch, Tarantula.

Why I might not agree with you is the motorized portion that retracts the fist and rope. A muzzle loaded weapon doesn't have that advantage of having a built-in reload mechanism. But per the RAW, you are correct.

Posted by: Fortune Aug 19 2007, 08:41 AM

Keep in mind that a Complex Action is only 1 to 3 seconds in duration (usually 1 for cybered dudes). That's pretty quick to retract up to 30 meters of cable/wire/whatever and to properly seat the hand in place for another shot.

Posted by: Sterling Aug 19 2007, 11:06 AM

QUOTE (Fortune)

My point is, while it can indeed take a complex action to retract all the rope and reset the hand, the automated 'reload system' means that the action may not be something you need to focus on. But there are no rules for a complex action that occurs by a cyberware system, one that might be able to take care of itself. You could simply tell it to retrieve the hand and the rope, and it would chug away respooling the rope, and one to three seconds later you'd get the green light to fire it again.

It's hard to figure out. You could claim one needs to supervise the process, but you could also make the point the system is designed to recover all the rope and the hand all on its own.

Posted by: hobgoblin Aug 19 2007, 11:39 AM

as long as its a complex action, you have to take said action to reload it.

as in, im guessing it can be reeled in automatically, but to fit it back into the launcher and prime it you need to take that complex action. until then it will just be hanging there at the end of you arm.

edit:

where did the automated reload system come from?

also, if you want to give the target a extra surprise, wear a shock glove at that hand

Posted by: Kronk2 Sep 16 2007, 04:21 AM

Go go Gadget hand!

Posted by: CyberKender Sep 18 2007, 11:57 PM

Using the idea that it's a complex action to reload the hand is fine, but by the description used, that means that at 14, say, the hand is fired. It then sits on the ground until the troll's next action, where he reels it in and reloads. That doesn't seem right tho. If the thing insta-reels, then it should be almost as dangerous as a monowhip if you screw up. So, a compromise: On the next free action after firing the hand, the character can initiate the reeling in, which will take 3 initiative steps to finish, reeling in a third of it's length at each step. (e.g. If fired at 14, it begins retrieval at 13 and then finishes at 10.) However, the hand is not reloaded and ready to until the complex action to reload is performed. That way, it reels in fast, but not so fast as to be dangerous to the user, and it still allows the very quick a chance to glue/spike/etc the hand before it retrieves.

I rather like the idea of using it, partially extended, as a flail, tho.