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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ The hardest thing about SR4 is....

Posted by: Donk Sep 3 2007, 06:06 AM

unlearning SR3 and replacing with SR4 rules.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 3 2007, 06:57 AM

...fixed vs. variable TN
...skill caps
...magic that has become even more powerful & easier to cast.
...spirits that can now sustain health spells
...Astral barriers useless against ritual magic
...magic working in space
...blurring of distinction between Hermetic and Shamanic traditions
...no more real Riggers
...no more "Jacking in" to the matrix
...anyone, even a Mage, can now hack the Matrix (& watch out for those Hacker Adepts)
...Technomancers being "magic" instead of tech oriented
...no more counter attacks in Melee combat.
...wireless everything.
...glitches (who in their right mind will ever take the Gremlins flaw again?)
...commlinks with associated IDs as a necessity just to get though the day (kind of took the "shadow" out of Shadowrun)
...the hacking rule mechanic according to RAW
...Logic being a relatively useless attribute (see above)
...knowledge skills nerfed in their usefulness
...Social Adepts who make Johnsons pee in their pants
...Adept improvement
...Edge Attribute
...Avoid Certain Death and Longshot rules (see above)
...lowered resources cap (by 75%)
...Cyberlimbs still sucking
...Bone lacing going from a (P - permit) to an (F - illegal) legality.
...Bioware still being prohibitively expensive even after 15 years of development
...Bioware now costing essence, even for cultured implants.
...Docwagon contracts still being expensive.
...BPs instead of for purchasing Contacts
...the fact though they tried their best, Min-Maxing is still alive and well
...all the cool toys we all came to know & love suddenly gone until whatever new supplements they will be in are released. Because of the mechanics change, previous sourcebooks were useless.
..."Freebie BP" negative qualities (like Incompetence, & Sensitive System for mages)
...Perception being a Physical Skill
...the whole Initiative mechanic. In the past someone with 1d6 of initiative still had a chance for 2 IPs.

...did I miss anything?

Posted by: Adarael Sep 3 2007, 07:03 AM

*raises hand*
Mages used to be able to hack the matrix. I played one who did, anyway...

(Admittedly, they can generally do it a lot better for a lot cheaper, now.)

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 3 2007, 07:09 AM

...yeah, but they took a heavy hit to do it back then.

Dedicated Deckers were still the cowgirls and cowboys of the data stream & nobody else really could touch them.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 3 2007, 07:13 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 3 2007, 04:57 PM)

...magic working in space

Magic worked just fine in space in SR3 ... if you were a high enough Grade ... or you had Filtering.

QUOTE

...anyone, even a Mage, can now hack the Matrix (& watch out for those Hacker Adepts)

And this differs from SR3 how? Especially after the release of SotA64.

QUOTE

...Technomancers being "magic" instead of tech oriented

Otaku were basically magical in SR3. In fact, it was a bone of contention for quite a few people. Again, what's the difference?

QUOTE

...knowledge skills nerfed in their usefulness

There is a precedent, I believe in Augmentation, whereby Knowledge Skills can be used to augment (no pun intended) a person's actions. I think it's in the Medicine section.

QUOTE

...Social Adepts who make Johnsons pee in their pants

See SotA64!

QUOTE

...Cyberlimbs still sucking

You're kidding, right? Cyberlimbs rock now better than in any previous edition of Shadowrun.

QUOTE

...Bioware now costing essence, even for cultured implants.

Bioware cost Essence in SR3. I'm confused.

QUOTE

..."Freebie BP" negative qualities (like Incompetence, & Sensitive System for mages)

Strange. I find that it's the rare mage that doesn't take any cyberware. At least in my experience. Certainly every single one of mine has done so, even the couple that have had the Sensitive System Quality.

As for Incompetence, well there have been dozens of threads on the subject, and quite a fair amount of GMs seem to think that there is little problem, as long as discretion is used ... which is the case with all parts of chargen anyway.

Posted by: Jaid Sep 3 2007, 07:27 AM

QUOTE (Fortune)

QUOTE

...Bioware now costing essence, even for cultured implants.

Bioware cost Essence in SR3. I'm confused.

no, actually, SR3 used bio index iirc. i don't really remember how exactly it work, but i do remember thinking bioware was a nuisance =P

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 3 2007, 07:29 AM

...I'm going to dispense with quoting the responses since I need to log off soon

...in SRIII you tried to cast magic in space & you usually went insane.

...it was a lot harder for mages to deal with the matrix since they had hefty negative modifiers and had to sacrifice 1 point of MA for the datajack.

...an Otaku's abilities were not affected by essence loss for implants. In fact they actually needed some cyber to even function in the matrix.

...I have not read all the way through Augmented yet but according to the core rules they were basically treated as fluff skills & could not be used to support related active skills.

...Kinesics only had three levels max and cost 1 PP per rating. Now it is limited only to the Adept's MA and costs .5 PP.

...you still have to buy up the attributes for cyberlimbs to match the character's attributes.

...SRIII had an Essence Index which was capped at 9. If bioware exceeded this, it was prone to overstress but didn't necessarily kill the character.

...I haven' had an awakened character in the games I ran who didn't take Sensitive system just for the 15 BPs even though it didn't necessarily fit in the character background.

Posted by: The Jopp Sep 3 2007, 07:36 AM

QUOTE (Fortune)

QUOTE

...Cyberlimbs still sucking

You're kidding, right? Cyberlimbs rock now better than in any previous edition of Shadowrun.

I have to disagree here, to a point.

Sure, cyberlimbs are â€œbetterâ€? than before but far too expensive as their fluff suggest. Cyberlimbs are stuff for the poor according to fluff but cost at least 4+ montly middle lifestyles.

We added a few houserules to correct that problem.
Cut prices in half for all limbs from Obvious limb prices
No cost difference between synthetic and obvious (they have their respective advantages)
Lower essence cost for skull and torso to Torso: 1 skull: 0,5
Availability: 3
Starting attributes are 3+Racial

With the above as a base a second hand cyberlimb with minimum attributes for a poor troll with some savings it costs him 5K for a limb.

Posted by: Kyleigh Wester Sep 3 2007, 08:12 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid)

for purchasing Contacts
...the fact though they tried their best, Min-Maxing is still alive and well
...all the cool toys we all came to know & love suddenly gone until whatever new supplements they will be in are released. Because of the mechanics change, previous sourcebooks were useless.
..."Freebie BP" negative qualities (like Incompetence, & Sensitive System for mages)
...Perception being a Physical Skill
...the whole Initiative mechanic. In the past someone with 1d6 of initiative still had a chance for 2 IPs.

...did I miss anything?

This about sums up why my GM refuses to run fourth. I've volunteered to be the GM for out fourth campaign if we ever do one, but there will be a decent load of house rules. Though the logic thing pisses me off more then anything. It literally ranks up with one of the most blatant overlooks i've seen in any game....ever.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 3 2007, 08:13 AM

To me the simple problem I have scalability...

1-7 is to small of range.

There needs to be more then even 3 dice (1 hit) to reflect a 'professional' and 'the best world renowed'.

If the system had been moved to a d10 system maybe... but even 11 ratings mean a fairly small difference between a nobody, a amature, a professional, and 'the best'

A 'new character' off the street should not be Fastjack's skill level. (sure Fastjack is going to be a lot more 'rounded' but he should still also be able to smack around any starting character...

The difference of pistol 4 and pistol 7. (a well trained professional and 'the best') is stastically a single hit....

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 3 2007, 08:53 AM

i think the problem is to look at them as a new kid of the street or school.

they most likely have a professional background of some kind or other.

how else did they scrounge up up to 250000 worth of gear?

if one wants to play fresh of the street people, limit the max skill to professional level, and cut back the overall BP.

oh, and a professional is level 3. level 4 is veteran...

Posted by: Draconis Sep 3 2007, 09:36 AM

Actually with nano introduced sensitive system isn't a given anymore.
I took the magic hit and got nano, my teammate didn't. He pays for that almost every run.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 3 2007, 09:37 AM

Hobgolin..

I can make it 'street' level no problem by lessening build points...

My problem is

A USMC Marine Corp Sniper (Rifle 4 a veteran / seasoned professional) and Carlos Hathcock (perhaps the most famous US sniper). THe difference is 3 dice one statistical HIT?

7 levels (or 8 if you included incompetent) to me is to narrow especially with how little effect 'a die' has (I.E. each level) on overall effect.

1 net hit is s tiny gain for going from "average beat cop" to Carlos Hathcock...

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 3 2007, 10:18 AM

well the feat that hathcock pull most likely involved edge and a lot of exploding dice, and thats on top of something like cover modifiers, range modifiers and called shot for extra damage (or something similar).

as in, i would say that some of the stuff he did was just as much about luck of the moment as pure skill. thats not to say he was not skilled, but that myth has a habbit of making people larger then life.

but the really big thing is that in SR4 the attributes have much more to say.

a average person with pro skills are looking at 6 dice, while a top person with top skills would be throwing 12 dice or more.

so can we say that hathcock had above average stats?

thats the really big thing going from SR3 to SR4, in SR3 you would get some attibutes to get cheaper skills, maybe roll body when ever you got hurt, and have them count into the dice pools, but beyond that they just sat there doing close to nothing. in SR4 on the other hand, they are much more important.

Posted by: eidolon Sep 3 2007, 01:59 PM

QUOTE (Donk)

unlearning SR3 and replacing with SR4 rules.

Heh, that was rough at first, but I got past it by actively ignoring myself while reading SR4 stuff.

"What's that, brain? It worked how in SR3? SHUT UP JERK I'M READING!"

Actually, the hardest thing for me so far is finding the damn time to read the books.

Seriously, I've done a good skim of the core book, and have read the first bit of Emergence. I did manage to finish System Failure, which I hadn't read previously because I hadn't been sure I was going to move to SR4.

Yeah. Time. Bah.

Posted by: toturi Sep 3 2007, 02:01 PM

QUOTE (eidolon)

QUOTE (Donk @ Sep 3 2007, 12:06 AM)

unlearning SR3 and replacing with SR4 rules.

Heh, that was rough at first, but I got past it by actively ignoring myself while reading SR4 stuff.

"What's that, brain? It worked how in SR3? SHUT UP JERK I'M READING!"

Helps if you put Yoda on loop. "Unlearn... unlearn you must!"

Posted by: Fortune Sep 3 2007, 02:51 PM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 3 2007, 05:29 PM)

...in SRIII you tried to cast magic in space & you usually went insane.

Unless they used Filtering or were a high enough Grade, exactly like in SR4.

QUOTE

...it was a lot harder for mages to deal with the matrix since they had hefty negative modifiers and had to sacrifice 1 point of MA for the datajack.

There have been no negative modifiers to mages using the Matrix since SR1 (or maybe 2). As far as a sacrifice of Magic, so what? Maybe people are too caught up in 'class mentality', but one of the good points of Shadowrun is that there are an infinite number of ways to build a character, and none of them are necessarily wrong (concept-wise).

QUOTE

...Kinesics only had three levels max and cost 1 PP per rating. Now it is limited only to the Adept's MA and costs .5 PP.

But a lot of the other stuff wasn't as limited, and everything still combined just nicely. The fact that there were a ton of things that dropped the TN in SR3 for Social Adepts made a huge difference.

QUOTE

...you still have to buy up the attributes for cyberlimbs to match the character's attributes.

At a measly monetary cost. No capacity is used whatsoever in reaching your own attribute level.

QUOTE

...I haven' had an awakened character in the games I ran who didn't take Sensitive system just for the 15 BPs even though it didn't necessarily fit in the character background.

Maybe this is not indicative of a problem with the Quality, and more a problem with the games you are playing. I have found that most people I game with are mature enough to either not abuse the system in the first place, or are at least open enough to discussion to deal with the situation.

Posted by: knasser Sep 3 2007, 05:34 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Sep 3 2007, 10:18 AM)

In my experience, in a lot of areas the difference between someone who is good at something and someone who isn't, is not one of capability but of consistency. When the dice pools are small, the difference in hits is actually proportionately more significant.

Don't forget that attributes are also a factor in the skill roll, giving a much larger range than skill alone.

-K.

EDIT: And while I'm here - hardest thing about SR4 is dealing with all the broken hearted SR3 fans.

Posted by: Alex Sep 3 2007, 08:00 PM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 3 2007, 01:57 AM)

...glitches (who in their right mind will ever take the Gremlins flaw again?)

*raises hand*

Oh, wait, you said in their right mind didn't you. Never mind.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 3 2007, 09:25 PM

I would say that Carlos Hathcock was combination of extremely high skill, extremely high agility attribute, and natural talent for the work he performed. He does not hold the record for most kills, but some of the more outstanding ones, one until recently was a record for the longest kill.

To me such an individual as Carlos Hathcock, trying to translate him into SR game terms is doomed to failure. The SR game system is not capable to doing it anywhere near his actual level of expertise.

WMS

Posted by: kzt Sep 3 2007, 10:02 PM

Yeah, HERO would work a lot better for that. It's got other issues, but it does skill ranges a lot better.

Posted by: Cheops Sep 3 2007, 10:04 PM

QUOTE (knasser)

EDIT: And while I'm here - hardest thing about SR4 is dealing with all the broken hearted SR3 fans.

\signed.

I got lucky and had 2 complete noobs in my SR4 group. My other 2 players have similar play style to me and had such long running characters in SR3 that they didn't really get much experience with the ENTIRE system.

The difference between someone with skill 7 and 4 is that if the shot suffers -3 dice pool modifier the skill 7 person still has the same skill as the 4. Gun duel at 10 paces, no wind, clear visibility the skill 7 can shoot you in the face and roll the same number of dice.

Kinesics works fine for me. It is much harder for Adepts to get Power Points now. Before the Adept got 3 levels of initiation = +3 magic, +3 metamagic and then started paying 20 karma to get +1 power point once initiation was too expensive. That problem is gone now. Adepts got MASSIVELY hosed in 4th in my opinion.

As far as Logic and Hacking goes I'm fine with it not playing a role as long as the fluff remains the same. Older books had mentions that literacy was actually on the decline because no one NEEDED to read anymore. It's all visual. Even the programming suites were described as the programmer mostly just taking iconic representations of blocks of code and inserting them into the program. You didn't even need to read or write to program! Mind you you still needed the Knowledge skills to write the program plans but I'm sure that'll make an appearence in the
Advanced Programming rules in Unwired.

Overall my group has found that the 3 worlds of SR work smootly and realistically together and that character creation and building is EVEN more open and interesting than ever.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 3 2007, 10:37 PM

QUOTE

...did a bit of research and you are correct the +4 modifier was dropped in SRIII. However to even be a reasonable Decker would take away from the character's focus on their magical abilities (mages were still Karma whores back then). In 4th ed if you go by RAW, it is programme rating, not attribute that adds to the hacking pool. So let's say, a shaman with a low to middling logic could still be a better hacker than she could as a decker.

For one, the investment isn't as extreme (cyberdecks and utilities were horribly expensive compared to commlinks and programmes). All Mages had foci to buy and bond and Hermetics needed summoning materials. In SR4 you only need to pay for conjuring materials if you wish to bind a spirit. Second she doesn't need to sacrifice that point of MA to get a datajack as everything is wireless. If need be she can use a trode net and get the same performance as if she was hard wired. In SRIII using trodes meant you were a "turtle" with very limited capability (this is the path mages in my campaigns took who wanted to dabble in the matrix as nobody wanted to sacrifice even that 1 point of magic).

QUOTE

...keep in mind some of those same edges such as Friendly Face and Good Reputation were also available to the NPCs as well, and what decent Johnson wouldn't have them if he or she wanted to keep their job. Heck any corp with decent resources would recruit and groom social adepts of their own. As a GM I was also very careful on the allowance of the Aptitude edge (which was suggested in the rules for it could easily upset game balance).

I never had issues with Johnson's being walked all over as they were in SR4 because for one thing, there were no elementals which could sustain Health spells on a character in SRIII. That made a huge difference in 4th ed. Now you have that elf face adept with a 12 Charisma 5 negotiation, 5 Kinesics, +2 improved ability, First Impression Quality against the mundane J who has a 5 charisma 5 negotiations and maybe the First Impression quality.

QUOTE

At a measly monetary cost. No capacity is used whatsoever in reaching your own attribute level.

..you are of course referring to the Custom Cyberlimb option in Augmented. Again I am at a bit of a loss to reply on this as I just obtained the PDF and have not read through everything yet.

QUOTE

...yes I will agree, this was a player issue. Granted, none of my Adepts have taken it (though I do have one mundane with the quality who has some cyber). It is just that every time I see someone with a new awakened character, that is the first NQ on the list. Now I can't tell them they can't take it, but there has to be some kind of disadvantage for the character otherwise it isn't a Negative Quality. Maybe next time I need to do something extreme like have Ares or Aztechnology abduct a mage or adept with this NQ and stick a datajack in them.

Addendum: Since Augmented came out I understand there is some sort of Nanoware that can be bought which effectively negates the flaw. If this is so and a character takes it - there goes the next 30 karma to buy that NQ off.

Posted by: Kyleigh Wester Sep 3 2007, 11:54 PM

I agree with KK in the matrix flaws. Yes, in SRIII a mage could use the matrix, but they'd never be able to master it like a decker could. A good decker is likely going to have a mil or more invested in decks and an ass load of headware to boot in SRIII, in SR4 hacking is a much easier task and can be more easily handled by mages or non-deckers. Not to mention the rigger class is gone.

One point the, KK, if I remember correctly in SRIII, using magic in the shadows, you could get a datajack and then take a single gause and be alright for the most part. Something simple like hand signs would probably work fine. I don't hate SR4, I just think it's broken in some aspect. I'd suggest anyone running SR4 invest in house rules. That's what i'm doing.

Posted by: Cthulhudreams Sep 4 2007, 12:21 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 3 2007, 05:37 PM)

I never had issues with Johnson's being walked all over as they were in SR4 because for one thing, there were no elementals which could sustain Health spells on a character in SRIII. That made a huge difference in 4th ed. Now you have that elf face adept with a 12 Charisma 5 negotiation, 5 Kinesics, +2 improved ability, First Impression Quality against the mundane J who has a 5 charisma 5 negotiations and maybe the First Impression quality.

This strikes me as a bit silly.

Look at from the corp perspective - I don't send you out with a bottomless expense budget. I (the black ops line manager) assign an expense budget, you (The johnson) work with it. If pretty boy elf won't work with the expense budget, he doesn't get the job.

And whats more, if the johnson does not keep some of the budget, he gets a bad performance review. In the rest of the company thats not a problem, you get put in a remedial program and maybe miss a promotion. However, this is black ops, and they have a strict performance plan for dealing with people who don't uphold the companies end of the deal - and if you don't improve while on the performance review you are going to get killed. Or assigned to investigate mana storms in australia. either way, same outcome.

Therefore Johnsons arn't going to walk into the trap over and over. For starters there is a fixed upper limit on budgets that the johnson cannot exceed without authorizations form his manager - which he is never going to ask for unless he really has to, to avoid losing face with the boss. Even asking for it once in a year means you are going to get put on the performance review plan if the controller gets involved. Asking twice in one year? That means the black ops controller will get personally involved, which will then end your career. Thus he isn't going to do it. Non negioatible. Secondly, the team is going to get a rep as 'expensive' and 'low value' and won't get the jobs.

Whats more, the thumbscrews are going to get put on both the fixer that recommends them and the johnsons that are hiring them to keep down the expenses budget. Why are we dealing with these clowns who charge through the nose but don;t do top shelf stuff.

So really no-one is going to want to deal with the team because they cannot get something done that suits everyone. Now this is a co-operative storytelling game so your not just going to screw the team, but you can start putting longer downtime between jobs, and start escalating the danger levels for the same fixed budget range - as people are only coming around when they cannot get anyone else to do it. Drop some subtle hints via the fixers 'Man, everyone seems to think you guys are really expensive low value adding talent, Mr J keeps saying you guys cost to much!' and go from there.

Posted by: dog_xinu Sep 4 2007, 12:34 AM

QUOTE

...blurring of distinction between Hermetic and Shamanic traditions

I dont agree. They just made the rules more streamlined. Elementals are not uber powerful and doesnt take horrible effort to get one. The difficulty is now equal and so it the power level.

QUOTE

...anyone, even a Mage, can now hack the Matrix (& watch out for those Hacker Adepts)

we had this in SR2/SR3 but it was just a little uglier.

QUOTE

...wireless everything.

Not everything is. BY default it is but people can still hardwire stuff.

QUOTE

...the fact though they tried their best, Min-Maxing is still alive and well

there will always be min/maxing. even on the dreaded D20 DnD has min/maxing. min/maxing is what players do with their characters. Some players try to minimize their min/maxing but it is hard to make a kick butt character when you dont.

QUOTE

...all the cool toys we all came to know & love suddenly gone until whatever new supplements they will be in are released. Because of the mechanics change, previous sourcebooks were useless.

I bet most of them will be back with the new rules. some wont. if you have to have the stuff from SR3, play SR3.

QUOTE

...Perception being a Physical Skill

no! no! no! it is an ACTIVE skill. It is something you have to do.

QUOTE

...the whole Initiative mechanic. In the past someone with 1d6 of initiative still had a chance for 2 IPs.

yeah everyone only has 1 IP unless they get cyberware/bioware/magic to give them additional. So faster init is not the only factor. The number of passed is another factor. It makes it more well balanced.

Now we can sit down and "debate" the good points and bad points of any game system or any edition of a game system, and we can find things that we dont like. Some of the points you made you made them to be out as a bad thing where I see them as a good things. Just differences of opinions.

I have played all the editions. Have most of 1st, all of 2nd and 3rd, and I *personally* think that 4th is the better version. I had to play it a little while before I came to that conclusions.

dog

Posted by: Cthulhudreams Sep 4 2007, 12:38 AM

QUOTE (dog_xinu)

Or you could make a game with no bad choices at character creation!

That pretty much eliminates min maxing

Posted by: Fortune Sep 4 2007, 12:39 AM

QUOTE (dog_xinu)

QUOTE

...Perception being a Physical Skill

no! no! no! it is an ACTIVE skill. It is something you have to do.

No, it is a Physical Skill (as in the category). You can even get a Reflex Recorder for it.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 4 2007, 06:33 AM

QUOTE (Cthulhudreams)

...Look at from the corp perspective - I don't send you out with a bottomless expense budget. I (the black ops line manager) assign an expense budget, you (The johnson) work with it. If pretty boy elf won't work with the expense budget, he doesn't get the job.
< snip >

...your points are well put and echo responses to the same concern I had expressed in past threads relating to this very topic.

I have since adopted a lot of these suggestions.

At the time this was getting out of hand it revolved around a single player who had abused the magic and adept system to the Nth degree. The character in question was a control/social mystic adept who used a Spirit of Man to boost her already obscene Charisma. It was either escalate the conflict (which didn't work) or throw up the hands and give her the top price just to keep things moving along for the other players. The thing is this same player also was in my old SRIII campaign with a similar type of character and never was able to pull off the level of stuff she did in 4th ed.

One of the downsides of your last suggestion is that the team doesn't accept the offer and walks. Basically the game session is over and everyone just wasted their time getting all their stuff ready and travelling to the location where the game was held. This was a distinct possibility I faced and personally I was not into doing all the prep work and drag myself halfway across town only to pack everything up after 15 minutes and go home. So it usually came down to cave into (and feed the ego of) the one player so the other players had a mission to go on, or have the Johnson stick to his offer & pack everything in when the team's spokesperson declines the offer.

Yes this was a player issue, but one that I feel was precipitated by the way the mechanics were set up.

Suffice to say, this particular situation has since been resolved.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 4 2007, 06:59 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 4 2007, 04:33 PM)

One of the downsides of your last suggestion is that the team doesn't accept the offer and walks. Basically the game session is over and everyone just wasted their time getting all their stuff ready and travelling to the location where the game was held. This was a distinct possibility I faced and personally I was not into doing all the prep work and drag myself halfway across town only to pack everything up after 15 minutes and go home.

See, I don't get this. I've had my groups turn down jobs all the time, and it doesn't ever spell the end of the gaming session. All it means is that I have to do some stuff on the fly, or better yet, have the players (and their characters) set the direction of the game. Even if worst comes to worst and I can't think of anything, some kind of social situation and/or shopping trip would work. Anything but end the session prematurely.

Posted by: kzt Sep 4 2007, 07:06 AM

QUOTE (Fortune)

We've turned down only a very few across a series of campaigns. The only one I can think was one where it just didn't smell right, in the Tir. I can't remember if we didn't take it at the meet or if we returned the money and walked away. We were later told it was to be a hosejob, so we were glad.

And there is the after the failed meet scene when everyone is sitting around talking when "Come out with your hands up, we have you surrounded" comes over the PA system. . .

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 07:08 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 4 2007, 01:33 AM)

Sorry, that doesn't make sense to me. When I gmed, my players also declined some offers - some where only there to BE declined, but even if they declined a "good" job (meaning: One I had prepared) I would have never thought of going home at this point. Normaly I then used one of my backup jobs or improvised...

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 07:33 AM

QUOTE (Cthulhudreams)

Look at it from a game mechanic point of view. The roll ensures that the Johnson sucks it up and takes the fall. All the negative aspects of the result of the roll should already be factored into the roll itself. If the negotiator wins despite the negative modifiers these negative repercussions would produce, then the Johnson sucks it up. It is not the pretty elf boy won't work within the budget, it is the pretty elf boy convinced you that the budget is too small and it is unworkable. Since you have been convinced, you get the short end of the stick to work it so that the pretty elf boy gets his nuyen and you get your job done.

If "you" don't want to walk over the trap again and again, then I suggest "you" take a dive off the tallest building because "you" obviously cannot take the stress. Secondly, because it was "you" who lost the roll, the streets(fixers, other Johnsons, etc) is going to take the point of view that it is either your corp is cheapskate or "you" are, any ill effects would be such that "you" are left holding the bag, not the runners. So win that roll.

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 07:45 AM

Personally, I wouldn't allow that a simple roll makes the target brainless Even if the Johnson succeds very well, the Runners will NOT work for free... So, I would rule that there are limits: A very good negotiation result will make the Johnson go to his limit - but he will not use more than his budget is, simply because he is not allowed to do so. At the very best, he will call his boss and ask.

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 08:22 AM

QUOTE (Irian)

Personally, I wouldn't allow that a simple roll makes the target brainless

Even if the Johnson succeds very well, the Runners will NOT work for free... So, I would rule that there are limits: A very good negotiation result will make the Johnson go to his limit - but he will not use more than his budget is, simply because he is not allowed to do so. At the very best, he will call his boss and ask.

I don't suppose you allow people to get dead with 1 or 2 simple rolls either?

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 08:29 AM

Please, show me the table where the threshold for "Convincing the Johnson to give you his suit" is shown.

Sorry, but it's clear that combat kills. Look at the wars, it really happens. But social skills are no magic. There simply are limits - unless you use a spell. How often does it happen, that professional negotiators (Glithces excluded) pay more money than they have?
Or do you allow to negotiate "Please, commit suicide!"? If the Johnson looses, he takes the suicide pill?

But let's make it short: Please, show me the page in the rule books where the threshold for such actions is given. As long as you can't do that, common sense must suffice.

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 08:57 AM

I'll do that as soon as you show me where RAW states that there is a limit. Common sense tells me that if the rules do not state a limit, there isn't one. As long as you cannot do that, common sense simply cannot suffice.

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 09:03 AM

So you really think, there is no limit? That's fine for you, then have fun playing in a group where it's possible to negotiate the Johnson into stripping and making out with the troll bouncer before commiting suicide.

Sorry, of course there ARE limits. That's not even common sense, that's simply reality. We can argue about where the limits are, ok, but not about IF there are limits.

Same thing as with guns: There are limits you don't need to mention. You can vaporize someone with a (normal) heavy pistol, no matter if you got 1 or 10.000 hits. You can kill one for good, sure, but even with 10.000 hits you can't hit the ZÃ¼rich Orbital with a Hold-out. Limits. Simple. You can argue where the limits are, but normaly you can always define something, that's clearly outside the limits.

Posted by: Blade Sep 4 2007, 09:11 AM

QUOTE (toturi)

I don't suppose you allow people to get dead with 1 or 2 simple rolls either?

Not if the only part of the body that could have been hit is a finger.

Some spells or adepts power can lead to negociation magic with very powerful results ("yes sir, I will now kill myself").
Some very good persuasion techniques can lead to interesting results but might require more time and need to have some consistency.

An example comes to my mind: the runner is caught naked and heavily wounded, his arm tied behind his back by a security guard who happens to be the brother of another guard he just killed. He wants the guard to free him and give him his weapon. With manipulation spells and some adept powers (such as commanding voice), it's possible to get him to do it.
Without that, it seems impossible... But it is.

A really convincing runner (with pheromones, kinesics, high charisma, etc.) can for example tell the guard that the rest of his team is arriving and that the guard can get away with his wounded brother, saving both their lives. It won't be easy to convince the guard, but the negative modifiers and the threshold should reflect that. If the runner succeeds, the guard will be convinced... or at least he'll check if the runner said the truth.

But in that situation, I don't see how the runner could be able to convince the guard (we'll suppose the guard is sane) to kill himself without any mind control. That's what I'd compare to killing someone by shooting one finger. A strict application of the rule will consider it possible, but that's another reason why we have GM instead of computers (or zombies).

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 09:15 AM

QUOTE (Irian)

Why the hell can't you hit Zurich Orbital with a Hold Out with 10000 hits? The limits are clearly stated in the book. The limits, if there are, are already clearly stated. No, that isn't reality. That's reality in real life. But reality in SR is defined by its rules. And there's no limit.

You keep thinking real life when you should be thinking Shadowrun when talking about Shadowrun rules.

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 09:25 AM

You're wrong. As long the shadowrun rules do not cover the game reality 100% (and they never will, because they never can), there will always be things that aren't possible, even if there's no rule forbidding it. Rules are almost never complete and never ever perfect. That's why we have GMs. Or are GMs.

But that's fine, simply play the way you want and let's agree on disagreeing.

Posted by: Draconis Sep 4 2007, 09:29 AM

QUOTE (toturi)

Ok those lines scare me. Uh the rules can't and don't define every last thing. Otherwise you'd have rule books that are multi volume encylopedias. A little common sense goes a long way.
Why not start flying around and walking through walls? The book doesn't say you can't.

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 4 2007, 09:35 AM

levitate spell, ghosts, spirits and projecting mages?

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 4 2007, 10:06 AM

Well if you're going By The Book then you wouldn't be able to hit Zurich Orbital with a hold out pistol even with a billion squillion (that's a number, really!) hits - it's outside the 50m extreme range of a hold out pistol (assuming you were firing from sea level).

Taking the rules to be absolutely ironclad is not a sensible approach in my mind, there are simply things that the rules system cannot either account for or was never thought about in the first place. Limitations should be there, in game, combined with common sense, or else i get to spend three days chipping away at skyscrapers foundations with a toothpick to destroy one corp facility on the third floor - unrealistic and just plain stoopid.

Posted by: Draconis Sep 4 2007, 10:07 AM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Sep 4 2007, 09:35 AM)

levitate spell, ghosts, spirits and projecting mages?

You know I was seriously waiting for that. Gee I never considered that sparky, I play a mage every damn week.
I'm not in the mood so i'll let it slide, you know what I meant.

Posted by: Crusher Bob Sep 4 2007, 10:12 AM

Consider the sharp con man (9 dice) vs the yokel, defaulting from Cha 2, so rolling 1 die. Can the con man convince the yokel to trade his cow for magic beans? If we bump the con man to 10 dice (so he's quite good) that gives him a 9 dice advantage over the yokel. Now here's the problem, if we compare the con man to the pronomancer (with 24 dice), the pornomancer has more of advantage over the con man than the con man had over the yokel.

So you want the con man to be able to bilk the yokel out of his cow, the pornormancer should be able to bilk the con man just as easily.

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 4 2007, 10:12 AM

But no where in the rules does it expressively not permit a mundane character from walking through walls or flying around without the use of magic - so why bother with spells and spirits?

No - it's common sense that joe mundane can't walk through walls or fly - we take that for granted as much as we do breathing. So why can't that common sense be used elsewhere with the rules as well?

Posted by: Cthulhudreams Sep 4 2007, 10:47 AM

I don't get people who don't think that 'talking to people' should have real rational limits.

If the johnson is going to get *Shot in the face* if he engages in action XYZ he.. isn;t going to do it.

Or do you think that the elf can persuade security guards to commit suicide by walking up and saying "you know, it would be a really awesome idea if you just killed yourself now"

Crazy cults aside (that incidentally take months/years of conditioning and isolation when it works in real life!) that sort of shit just doesn't happen.

But hey if you want to go into rules discussions in that the rule doesn't provide any limits - it also doesn't say what happens when you suceed with that negotiation check either.

So whats going to happen is the Johnson is going to see the elfs perspective, settle for an average performance review instead of a great one and up the ante by 1:nuyen:

And then blacklist them as 'not suckers'

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 11:13 AM

QUOTE (Mr. Croup)

Because there are rules for magic to walk through walls and fly around, then you could assume that the joe mundane cannot do such without. An induction if you will, no common sense required.

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 11:15 AM

Sorry, but "If A, then B" doesn't allow you to conclude "If not A, then not B".

"If you're a mage, you can do it" does NOT say "If you're not a mage, you can't do it."

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 4 2007, 11:30 AM

what is this, logics 101?

if one end up the GM of a group with a negotiations god, keep a 2x4 handy, or just say no...

Posted by: Grinder Sep 4 2007, 11:42 AM

QUOTE (Irian)

Sorry, but "If A, then B" doesn't allow you to conclude "If not A, then not B".

"If you're a mage, you can do it" does NOT say "If you're not a mage, you can't do it."

Yep, that's like "He can see me, so I can see him."

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 11:59 AM

QUOTE (Irian)

Sorry, but "If A, then B" doesn't allow you to conclude "If not A, then not B".

"If you're a mage, you can do it" does NOT say "If you're not a mage, you can't do it."

The assumption would be that the rule was put there to tell you how you can do such a thing. So if you want to do such, you follow those rules.

Rule A: If X, then Y.

Of course, if you want to do Y without X, there's no rule forbidding it. But you are not following Rule A.

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 4 2007, 01:09 PM

QUOTE (toturi)

...no common sense required.

that's sort of becoming a running theme for you on this thread isn't it? ;D

If you want to selectively apply realism to your games, feel free, it's your game and if your players are ok with it, fair dinkum. Personally i wouldn't touch it with a sixty foot pole. I'm walking away from this debate before it gets sillier than it already is. I can waste my time in much more constructive ways...

(like doing my job, for instance, but who would want to do that?)

Posted by: eidolon Sep 4 2007, 01:27 PM

QUOTE ("toturi")

then you could assume

You can't go around stating that the rules are ironclad, and implying that they require no outside arbitration because clearly the rules are all you need, and then start saying that there are things that you can assume even though they aren't in the rules.

Well, you can (and just did), but it pretty much shoots your argument in the face for money.

Posted by: raphabonelli Sep 4 2007, 01:27 PM

Maybe some people here should be writing some kind of "Runners of the Stick" since they think about the rules the same way Rich Burlew does to write Order of the Stick (purposefully "forcing" the rules to the point were they break - applying the rule to the litteral without commom sense applied and so on).

At least, would be funny.

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 4 2007, 01:39 PM

QUOTE (raphabonelli)

At least, would be funny if it wasn't so true.

sorry.

Couldn't help myself.

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 01:58 PM

QUOTE (eidolon @ Sep 4 2007, 09:27 PM)

QUOTE ("toturi")

then you could assume

No, I'm assuming that all I need is to follow the rules that state that I can do something. Not do-something-that-is-not-forbidden-in-the-rules. If there are rules that allow me to fly in the rules, then in order to fly, I need to follow those rules. So my argument still stands.

QUOTE

Because there are rules for magic to walk through walls and fly around, then you could assume that the joe mundane cannot do such without.

So in order to walk through walls and fly around, I assume joe mundane cannot do such without those rules. I am following the rules. So I am not assuming something that is not in the rules per se, but following those rules strictly instead. It pretty much shoots your argument in the face for

Posted by: The Jopp Sep 4 2007, 01:59 PM

Reminds me of the old thread about taking the rules literally.

A shadowrunner can never walk, they must always run, and stay in the shadows â€“ except when they live their fake SIN as an ordinary citizen and must act according to their chosen â€œrealâ€? professionâ€¦

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 02:25 PM

QUOTE (toturi)

Ok, would you kindly show us the rule that says, that you can convince the Johnson to give you more money than he has or even to commit suicide?

Posted by: The Jopp Sep 4 2007, 02:46 PM

QUOTE (Irian)

QUOTE (toturi @ Sep 4 2007, 08:58 AM)

Ok, would you kindly show us the rule that says, that you can convince the Johnson to give you more money than he has or even to commit suicide?

The only thing i can think of is the Commanding Voice power and that is not very effective as he will remember what happened and change his mind later.

Sure, he can be commanded to kill himself and fail in resisting it but not with regular Etiquette skill enhancing powers.

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 4 2007, 02:53 PM

As my father used to say: You can take a horse to water, but you can't make it wash it's face.

Face it ladies and gents, there's no point arguing any further with toturi as he/she is clearly happy as a rules lawyer and isn't going to change his/her stripes any time soon. In fact, i'd daresay the more we debate the idea that he/she has the wrong end of the stick the more he/she is going to clutch the end of the stick for dear life in spite of the reasoned arguments leveled against his/her point of view. So, unless we want several pages of circular argument that equates to nothing (i know it's sort of a tradition around these parts), i suggest we just let it drop and go onto other subjects...

It is with great self restraint that i'm not adding "who am i kidding?" to the end of this post.

Oh.. woops...

Posted by: Irian Sep 4 2007, 02:53 PM

Even with commanding voice it's not very likely, that you can kill someone that way, because it says, that the target either does what you want OR stands around confused - GameMaster's Choice Personally I would allow such an extreme command only to succed if the target rolls a critical Glitch, but that's something each GM must decide himself...

But yes, of course, with Commanding Voice, Spells, etc. you can tell him "Give me all your money!". But we're talking about the skills Negotiation, etc. here, combined perhaps with Kinesics, but not with Spells or something like that.

So the question is still on the table: Where does it say, what you can get on a very successfully Negotiation roll?

If toturi didn't talk nonsense, there must be a paragraph somewhere that states, that you can convince your target to do almost(?) everything (otherwise his statement "all I need is to follow the rules that state that I can do something." makes no sense). I am very sad that I missed that paragraph and hope that someone can enlighten me.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 4 2007, 03:28 PM

QUOTE (Fortune)

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 4 2007, 04:33 PM)

...this is pretty much now why I am in with a new set of players (hence my statement "...this particular situation has since been resolved").

The group I am with now does a much better job of acting on their own initiative instead of waiting for me to do something. A lot of times, I am just sitting there taking notes as they make the moves. I rarely have to do much prompting and even though they may deviate from the main plotline from time to time they are still very aware the characters are being paid for performing a particular mission. The characters are also a lot more "realistic" in their sights in that the didn't "ask for the moon" at the initial meet.

As to improvising an entire run session from the ground up, that is nice when you have something to fall back on as a foundation. In SRIII that wasn't so much an issue due to the wealth of supplements, heck if worse came to worse I could have always "taken twenty" (sorry) and modified something from the Missions supplement to throw at them.

When we were doing 4th ed all I basically had was the core rules and Street Magic to go on (the latter which I had just got & barely had a chance to look through). There just didn't seem to be enough foundation to go on for me and converting anything from previous editions would have taken way too much time as the entire game mechanic was changed. I'll admit I am not the best improviser. In an ongoing campaign it is one thing for me to "roll with the punches" and come up with stuff on the fly, for I still have some sort of background to work from. To just come up with an entirely new mission off the top of my head with little or no background is another.

RiS participants stop here

[ Spoiler ]

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 03:31 PM

Most of the time the actual details of the result of a roll is described by the GM. The paragraph detailing Social Skills only states that when the character attempts to influence another, it is an opposed test. From the example, in the book, we can see that successful "influence" will result in an outcome that is favorable to the player or PC. Nothing within "Using Charisma-linked Skills" allows the player to dictate the details of that roll - just like a street sam's player does not have the ability to describe the result of his PC's pistol skill, how that result is described is the GM's responsibility. For the most part, the player does not have the ability to say that his PC goes up to the guard and convinces him to kill himself. All he can say is that his PC scored so many hits and if the GM is rolling in the clear, so many hits more than the NPC.

So by "using Charisma linked skills" alone, there is no rule that says you can "convince the Johnson to give you more money than he has or even to commit suicide." Because the description of the result is still in the GM's hands.

[ Spoiler ]

Posted by: Blade Sep 4 2007, 03:36 PM

Err, you mean that the player can't say "I try to convince Mr Johnson to give us more money" (or even better roleplay his question to Mr Johnson) but can only say "I use con on Johnson" ?

And then it's up to the GM to decide the outcome of the action ?

Posted by: toturi Sep 4 2007, 03:51 PM

I mean the player can say "I try to convince Mr Johnson to give us more money using X skill". But the GM decides how much and in what manner. But strictly speaking, I could see a GM running it your way, Blade.

Posted by: Big D Sep 4 2007, 04:37 PM

QUOTE

...did I miss anything?

Uberallies, ally sustainment, Task spirits?

On the social monster side-topic... how many places does RAW have to stress the necessity of GM calls? C'mon, GMs are explicitly given suggestions on making major house rules to key elements of the system, and we're arguing over whether "if it doesn't spell it out, it doesn't allow/disallow it"?

The whole "How much will the Johnson pay" thing has already been beaten to death several threads over. The closest thing to consensus (and my personal favorite) is that the Johnson has $X, would like to pay no more than $X-$Y, and, if he had to scramble, mortgage his house or career, *might* go as far as $X+$Z. But social skills can't add lots of zeros to a credstick.

If you want to mind-control the Johnson into giving you all of the money, then shooting himself, fine. That's what MIND CONTROL spells are for. Don't bother trying that with Social skills, and expect repercussions, because you can't Mind Control *or* Con your way past all the people you just annoyed.

Posted by: Malachi Sep 4 2007, 04:40 PM

When a player reaches that point of power-gaming, my final weapon is almost always "turning the tables." If a player is consistently, and blatantly "breaking" the game and flaunting their abilities as a Social Adept or whatever, I usually just pull out an NPC who has exactly the same skill set as them.

So when your social-muncher finally burns you (as the GM) for the final time, just have the other PC's run into a corp assassin who has the same uber-muncher social skills and have him convince every other PC in the group that their social adept friend has been swindling them, and is planning to kill them, so you better kill him first. Then when your mucher/rules-lawyer PC argues with you, use every one of his arguments against him for why the NPC assassin can do just that.

After the PC is dead, maybe you can have an "I won't do it if you won't do it" talk for the next character.

Posted by: jklst14 Sep 4 2007, 06:43 PM

If a player spends a ton of points on something, they should be good at it (social fu, combat, magic, hacking, whatever). I have no problem with Social Adepts, as long as a player plays them sanely and realizes that social skills often take time to work. So while fast talking a bouncer takes seconds, slowly manipulating the King of Rohan so that he falls under your malign influence takes a long time.

So if the super social adept said "My male elf pornomancer adept walks up to the Mafia Don, turns him gay, seduces him and convinces him to give me all his money. Oh, and I rolled ten successes", I would say no.

But if he said this:
"I'm going to try to meet some low level mob flunkies and get some work. I'm going to work my way up the ladder, eventually becoming a made man. I'm going to charm my superiors and establish alliances with other mobsters. I'm going to try to get promoted to captain of my own crew. I'm going to make sure the mob boss notices me. I'll use my social fu to get him to like me. I'll offer good advice and eventually, I'd like to be his consiglieri. Then, after he trusts me, after years of loyal service, I'll stab him in the back, take over the organization, and marry his hot young wife who I seduced in the meantime."

Or this:
"I'm going to have my sexy lady social adept research everything about the Don and find out what his turn ons are. I'll get a job working at his favorite bar/nightclub/strip club and I will try to get close to him. Then I'll try to seduce him. Later, I'll try to get him to divorce his wife then convince him to marry me. Then I'll get myself named in his will"

I'd let him roleplay it out over the campaign, make his die rolls and give him a chance to succeed.

-JKL

Posted by: Cheops Sep 4 2007, 06:51 PM

QUOTE (laughingowl)

Sorry to derail the thread back to this earlier statement but I'm am literally sitting here studying about Binomial Distributions and I have to take up issue with this.

Sure the Means of the two skills only differ by 1 but that's not the full story.

Let's say that both marksmen, using only their skill dice, need to roll 4 hits to succeed. The 4 only hits 1.2% of the time while the 7 hits 16.82% of the time. In addition, they get 0 hits 4=20% of the time and 7=6% of the time.

The skill 7 shooter also has less risk per unit of return (coefficient of variation) than the skill 4 guy. Which means it is less risky for him to expect large returns. So at skill 7 I know I can reliably hit you in the head whereas at skill 4 I'm just aiming for CoM.

Posted by: DireRadiant Sep 4 2007, 06:58 PM

it's not SR3...

Posted by: Malachi Sep 4 2007, 07:11 PM

QUOTE (Fortune)

No, it is a Physical Skill (as in the category). You can even get a Reflex Recorder for it.

I hadn't caught this so I checked... indeed Perception is listed under Active Physical Skills. Fortunately, this is an easy fix. No skill linked to a Mental attribute can be considered a Physical skill, therefore no Reflex Recorder for it.

Looks like this might have been a case of "Where else do we put it?" Since Perception is definitely not a: Combat, Magical, Social, Technical, or Vehicle skill, it got dumped into Physical. A new category (Mental Active skills) almost needs to be created to avoid some of these unreasonable situations (Reflex Recorder nonsense), or amend the Reflex Recorder to say:

QUOTE

The reflex recorder adds 1 to the
rating of a specific skill or skill group (Combat and Physical
skills only) linked to a Physical attribute

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 4 2007, 07:20 PM

QUOTE (Cheops)

QUOTE (laughingowl @ Sep 3 2007, 08:13 AM)

thats some highly interesting numbers

Posted by: Malachi Sep 4 2007, 07:24 PM

QUOTE (jklst14)

I don't have a problem if the time is taken, either. However, most of the time, players that super munch their dice don't want to take the time. Often they don't even want to RP the social encounter (which I always make them do anyway). Most of the time, dice-munchers just want to throw their 25 dice and get what they want, right now.

Posted by: Kerris Sep 4 2007, 07:39 PM

Oftentimes, I have a problem with roleplaying a social encounter. The player doesn't necessarily know what to say or how to act. Roleplaying a social encounter, especially one where you're trying to manipulate a character with skills your character has (but you don't), is near impossible.

In these cases, it might be that the group as a whole comes up with ideas as to how the character handles the situation in-game, giving ideas on actual dialog and such. But the dice do the talking.

A player shouldn't have to do research into rocket science in order to play a rocket scientist. A player shouldn't have to know how to speak effectively in order to play a social adept.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 4 2007, 08:01 PM

QUOTE (Malachi)

Looks like this might have been a case of "Where else do we put it?" Since Perception is definitely not a: Combat, Magical, Social, Technical, or Vehicle skill, it got dumped into Physical. A new category (Mental Active skills) almost needs to be created to avoid some of these unreasonable situations...

...that would definitely put to rest the inconsistency of Perception being affected by the Infirm quality.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 4 2007, 09:41 PM

QUOTE (Malachi)

... or amend the Reflex Recorder to say:

QUOTE

The reflex recorder adds 1 to the
rating of a specific skill or skill group (Combat and Physical
skills only) linked to a Physical attribute

You would think that was already considered when you take a look at Enhanced Articulation. There it lists that EA works for all Physical Skills linked to a Physical Attribute.

Posted by: mfb Sep 4 2007, 10:50 PM

i don't see the problem with making perception a recordable skill. learning to keep your head and eyes moving so that you can take in more of your surroundings, learning to make the most of your peripheral vision, learning to move your head to shield your ears from wind and other background noises--there's no reason these shouldn't be able to be recorded.

Posted by: Naysayer Sep 4 2007, 11:38 PM

Especially in a world where almost every (meta)human ability in existance can be bought on a microchip anyways.

Posted by: Cain Sep 5 2007, 12:02 AM

Going back a bit, nerfing a social adept in play, especially after the player has spent a lot of time and effort into creating that character is just plain cruel. Not evil, as in the Evil GM's Union, but just plain mean-spirited and cruel. It's one thing to put the kibosh on a character *before* game begins, b ut afterwards? That's blatant GM abuse.

And to hit on another topic: a tactical game that relies heavily on GM handwavium is, IMO, a poor system. Rules are meant to clarify the situation, so the amount of time where you rely on guesswork is minimized. This also reduces the appearance of GM abuse.

Posted by: Cthulhudreams Sep 5 2007, 12:23 AM

QUOTE (Cain)

Pfft

it's entirely reasonable to put the thumb screws on. But you don't just do it, you talk the player aside and say something like

"Okay this is my problem <blah>. My proposed solution is that you are always going to get a *fair to good* rate from the johnson - the big bonus you are going to get for that awesome skill is lots of extra little tidbits of intel that the johnson has. So he might be able to give you accounts that a corp hacker set up when he scoped out the situation, some survelliance info, etc, that he wouldn't give out normally 'cause the guy likes you. He might also direct more high profile work through next time. If you keep performing you'll get a top shelf rep and rates etc will pick up to match (but so will risk). If you want to reshuffle your abilities around a bit, I can work with you on that."

Which isn't taking a huge dump on him, does give him a sizable ROI on his skill investment, and if he feels screwed you can rework the character with him too.

face to face character interaction rules are always going to have a strong handwavium aspect imho, because the GM has to emulate fairly dynamic situations. If you could define this stuff rigidly, computers could manage RPGs with great interpersonnal dynamics.

Except they don't.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 5 2007, 12:34 AM

QUOTE (Big D)

QUOTE

...did I miss anything?

Uberallies, ally sustainment, Task spirits?

...meant to get back to this one. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately since I was the GM at the time) we didn't get this far before I closed my SR4 campaign to devote my energies to GM-ing my SRIII RiS campaign.

Posted by: Wasabi Sep 5 2007, 12:56 AM

The hardest thing hasn't changed since first ed: Finding players who appreciate legwork enough to do it under pressure and that 'clique' enough to be cohesive.

I suppose the corollary is also true that finding a knowledgable, entertaining GM challenging enough without being an horse's behind is also hard.

The rules are mutable, player personalities are not.

Posted by: Cain Sep 5 2007, 01:30 AM

QUOTE

"Okay this is my problem <blah>. My proposed solution is that you are always going to get a *fair to good* rate from the johnson - the big bonus you are going to get for that awesome skill is lots of extra little tidbits of intel that the johnson has. So he might be able to give you accounts that a corp hacker set up when he scoped out the situation, some survelliance info, etc, that he wouldn't give out normally 'cause the guy likes you. He might also direct more high profile work through next time. If you keep performing you'll get a top shelf rep and rates etc will pick up to match (but so will risk). If you want to reshuffle your abilities around a bit, I can work with you on that."

Which isn't taking a huge dump on him, does give him a sizable ROI on his skill investment, and if he feels screwed you can rework the character with him too.

Which isn't the same thing as nerfing the character. Talking to the player and saying: "Look, this just isn't working" isn't the same thing as some of the suggestions in this thread, which involve sudden rules-changes or GM escalation.

It's one thing to try and work things out. It's another to just yank the rug out from under a problem character.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 5 2007, 01:45 AM

QUOTE (jklst14)

Amen JKL..

The first one ... no..

The second one... ohh so many story arcs.... ohhh soo much fun ....

Not only would I allow it, but I would certainly work it into the campaign, and probably give the social adept a few bonus karma relating to developing that arc (as well as what ever is run).... I do tend to run my games more like an old episode of love boat or so, where 3-4-5 stories might be running at once....

Especially for something epic along these lines...

And to answer others:

You can you your social adept to:

I con the Johnson.

I convince the Johnson to give us more money.

I convince the johnson to give us more money, tell us everything about the job / himself / his corporation / and the opposing side, and convince try to convice him I am Maria Mecurial.

However the 'results' are up to me (the GM) ... sure the number of hits will determine how much you shift it towards what you want...

But YOU can't say I got ten hits, he pays me Â¥5,000,000,000,000 to walk his dog ... Now if they only thing you were doing is talking him into 'more money' you will get 'more money' then you would have gotten with nine hits, and certainly more then if you got zero ... but I have to determine how much more money, based on what you are doing, and what he can afford. (or at teh extreme silly range, what he has... he can't pay you more then he has, no matter how bad you seduced him.... even if you do convince him, donating everything he has to you and then killling himself while calling out your name (fake one of somebody you hate) will get him enternal life and a million virgins... he can't give you more then he has...

Some times the rules will speify what each 'hit' does (such as combat) more often though we get 'each hit improves the amount of sucess' (and 4 or more net hits are an exceptional sucess).

However what a sucess is is still up to the GM in most cases (though as mentioned a few the rules do give HARD results)...

Posted by: Whipstitch Sep 5 2007, 02:17 AM

I'm pretty much on the same boat as Toturi and Laughingowl on this one. GMs have options when it comes to dealing with Social specialists. That players do not dictate the response of a given NPC should be a given. Another smart move is to simply make sure the real big movers in the Shadowrun world rarely deal with the PCs directly (kinesics and pheromones require a certain amount of close proximity to be effective). After all, the big boys all want to cover their asses against potential threats, and mind influencing 'ware and magic are definitely threats. People know this stuff is out there, that's why Pheromones are illegal as hell and mind control magic gets cracked down on in the majority of jurisdictions, corp and country alike. Playing it smart and simply being proactive with what kind of characters you want to see at your table has worked fine with my group, and our GM is liberal enough to allow Cyber Social adepts and teamwork tests at the negotiating table.

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 02:36 AM

laughingowl, it is true to a certain degree that the GM controls the description of the results. But as I have stated before, this will go out of the window once the player can add his own comments to the GM's descriptions and then it is not so much that the player cannot add "even after he pisses on the Don's mom" but that the player and the GM has to sit down and talk about why he wants to add that.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 5 2007, 03:05 AM

QUOTE (toturi)

The GM CONTROL ALL DESCRPTIONS OF WHAT HAPPENS...

the player may state what they TRY to do....

but the GM is the only one that can say 'What happens'.

The player can say: "I attempt to charm his pants off, so much that he is drooling on the floor, begging me to allow him to kiss my feet!"

However, they player can not say:
"I charm his pants off, so much that he is drooling on the floor, begging me to allow him to kiss my feet!"

Even if they have 20 automatic sucess somehow.... that might not be enough.. That they 'charm him' is almsot a given ... (unless he was gelded at birth, mistreated by women his whole life, and conditioned so any thought of sex, makes him think he is about to die)... however, how he acts those desires depends on the person...

The player may WANT him to do those things... and 'averageman John' may very well likely do that, but the only one that can say what 'X net hits' result in on a social test is THE GM....

While the GM shouldn't handwave (or very very rarely) ... a X net hits has a result more favorable (and closer to what they player wants) then X-1 net hits.... Nothing states what each net hit does, and something like social skills nothing really can... way to many factors invovled.

Players state 'desired' results...

GMs state 'results'....

Sure if players and GM are comfortable together alot of times, the players will state results... and often as the GM, if the results are inline with the 'rolls' I will go with what the player states...

However, anyone in any game I have ever played or run... clearly understands... it didnt happen until the GM says it happened...

Case in point:

One of the best geek jobs I ever pulled...

Player ChunkySalsatobe (well known for using grenages everywhere... even downtown Seatle to clear the pedestrains while chasing somebody)... (rolls some rice) I grab my High Effenciy Offensive Grenades, with 5 dice 7 or better, the grenade should land right in the call box, lets see how tough the baslistic glass is on that both...

GM: (rolls some dice) Actually you notice a sligth tug, funny sensation as you pull the grenade from your belt, your think you even here a small 'ting' .... (some calculations go though figuring out the size of his armored car.. and rebound effects...) Ok soak instant-death

(as it works out hand of god, saved, him... though considering the 3 incenary grenades he had on his belt 2 of them cooked off... and set his car on fire... where he had 120 grenades in his trunk YES ON checking his sheet 120 grenades of various types... the secondary explosion did him in)

Players can not know all the factors... PLAYERS can not state outcomes...

Players state intentions...

GMs state outcomes...

Player MAY state desired outcomes... and GMs (if reasonable) will often run with the outcomes... but ONLY GMs can state outcomes.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 5 2007, 03:23 AM

QUOTE (toturi)

Ok by the rules.. social tested don't do anything...

Nothing in the 'mechanics' says the opposed side has to do anything... sure they give you what oppose rolls are

QUOTE

CHARISMA-LINKED OPPOSED TESTS
Skill Used Acting Character Rolls: Target Character Rolls:
Con Con + Charisma (Con or Negotiation) + Charisma
Etiquette Etiquette + Charisma Perception + Charisma
Intimidation Intimidation + Charisma Intimidation + Willpower
Leadership Leadership + Charisma Leadership + Willpower
Negotiation Negotiation + Charisma Negotiation + Charisma

But never in the 'rules' do they tell you '1 net hit on a Intimidate rolls makes a guy piss his pants, 2 net hits crap himself, 5 or more net hits and he starts babbling incoherently)...

The one 'fluff' example though we have makes it very clear what is suppose to happen:

QUOTE

Crazy Mary rolls 5 hits, and the exec rolls 2. With 3 net hits (5 â€“ 2), the gamemaster decides this guy is so afr aid of Mary that not only does he escort her into the office complex, but he takes her in through a back entrance to ensure that no guards will see them

Gamemaster decides... very key words...

It is SUBJECTIVE... the game master needs to decide what the effect will be...

1 net hit will always be less result then 2 net hits, which will always be less then 4 net hits, etc...

However,

2 net hits may NOT be (very unlikely to be matter of fact) twice 1 net hits...

Sometimes you will have guidelines...

Each net hit on a negotation roll will allow: Â¥500 extra per person, or 10% payment up front to help outfit....

more often then not, the GM has to decide how much each net hit would have...

Also to the 'word on the street says you are too high priced... we can't afford you...'

Doesn't matter if the 'players' made the roll and 'won'... still doesnt change they are charging alot... the 'Johnson' himself may or may not be conviced (depening on pure negotation, con, etc was used), but word on the street would still go Team X is getting Â¥100,000 to rob a stuffer shack in the barrens... man hate to see what they ask for on a 'real' job.

Also doesnt stop the Johnson boss from hearing of it all and after the fact going... Hmm Jimmy said they guys were good and really need more money... though the boobs did a half ass job. Promote Jimmy to waste inspection duty and flag the file on team X... until three mangers recommend otherwise, they get paid standard rates, or we go with somebody else... they aint worth what they ask for...

Posted by: Zhan Shi Sep 5 2007, 03:25 AM

My "gripe" is not about any of the rules, but more about style. Conciously or not, I think the developers are going the White Wolf route, using the "dystopian future" thing as an excuse for prurience. Maybe I'm just too attached the the "old" SR way of writing. But I sincerely hope they go no further down this new road. SR has been the best rpg on the market for at least the past 7 years, IMHO, and I look forward to seeing it remain so for many years to come.

Posted by: Whipstitch Sep 5 2007, 03:51 AM

Meh. Personally, I don't think they've handled anything particularly distastefully. But then again, my brain translates "penile implant" into meaning "waste of time and essence" virtually instantaneously, so it could just be me. I honestly don't view the game as being prurient at all, and even if it were, I doubt I would particularly care if the game could be played in such a manner. It's certainly more in keeping with the dystopian theme than the previous editions and their "We shoot working Joe security guards right in the face but it's OK because we're really just standing up for the little guy!" angle, which could quickly become outright laughable with some, or hell, maybe even most groups.

Posted by: Malachi Sep 5 2007, 03:54 AM

QUOTE (Zhan Shi)

My "gripe" is not about any of the rules, but more about style. Conciously or not, I think the developers are going the White Wolf route, using the "dystopian future" thing as an excuse for prurience. Maybe I'm just too attached the the "old" SR way of writing. But I sincerely hope they go no further down this new road. SR has been the best rpg on the market for at least the past 7 years, IMHO, and I look forward to seeing it remain so for many years to come.

Wow, I had to look that one up.

QUOTE

prurience: feeling morbid sexual desire or a propensity to lewdness

Ah yes, I agree. I was sad to see the shadow-slang go away, replaced by boring modern profanity. I found it an import nuance for giving the characters a sense that this is a different time and culture. The increased sexual content also seems to be an attempt to make the game more "edgy" and appeal to a different market that wants that sort of thing. I just hope it doesn't sully the overall quality of the game.

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 04:10 AM

QUOTE (laughingowl)

Player MAY state desired outcomes... and GMs (if reasonable) will often run with the outcomes... but ONLY GMs can state outcomes.

No, most of the time only the GM can state the description of the outcomes. There is an exception.

Posted by: Cain Sep 5 2007, 04:59 AM

QUOTE

It bugs me more that the shadowslng only mostly went away, to leave just enough to be completely jarring and incomprehensible.

As far as the sex thing goes, I wouldn't mind it if it had been handled tastefully. Prurience is a good word for how it's been handled, though. Every time I read the orgy spell, I hear Beavis and Butthead: "Uh. Uh-huh-huh."

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 5 2007, 06:20 AM

QUOTE (toturi)

QUOTE (laughingowl @ Sep 5 2007, 11:05 AM)

Player MAY state desired outcomes... and GMs (if reasonable) will often run with the outcomes... but ONLY GMs can state outcomes.

No, most of the time only the GM can state the description of the outcomes. There is an exception.

When is the exception?

Posted by: Irian Sep 5 2007, 07:44 AM

QUOTE (laughingowl)

Also to the 'word on the street says you are too high priced... we can't afford you...'

Just as a sidenote: This is something, I would integrate into the outcome of the Negotiation roll, because Negotiation will also show you, what your Johnson CAN and WANT give you... I would let the player decide to get the maximum, but stay in the Johnson's "That's ok" limit or get more, but risk a "You're expensive" reputation... Normaly a very good Negotiater should decide that before he starts...

Posted by: Doctor Funkenstein Sep 5 2007, 08:13 AM

QUOTE (hobgoblin)

how else did they scrounge up up to 250000 worth of gear?

Yeah. How could professional thieves and criminals have possibly scraped together anything valuable. It's a real mindbender. Especially for criminals and thieves like hackers. Absolute crazy talk, that!

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 09:09 AM

QUOTE (laughingowl)

QUOTE (toturi @ Sep 5 2007, 04:10 AM)

QUOTE (laughingowl @ Sep 5 2007, 11:05 AM)

Player MAY state desired outcomes... and GMs (if reasonable) will often run with the outcomes...Â but ONLY GMs can state outcomes.

No, most of the time only the GM can state the description of the outcomes. There is an exception.

When is the exception?

Critical Success.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 5 2007, 09:15 AM

QUOTE (SR4 pg. 59)

A critical success means that the character has performed the task with such perfection and grace that the gamemaster should allow her to add whatever flourishing detail she likes when describing it.

'Flourishing detail' does not necessarily equate to 'outcome'.

Posted by: Irian Sep 5 2007, 09:18 AM

Agreed. The GM decides about the outcome, but the runner can look as cool as he/she wants while getting it

Posted by: Blade Sep 5 2007, 09:53 AM

Sure, if it allowed the player to describe the outcome, I see what it would lead to:

"Ok, I created a mage specialised in counterspelling with the magic resistant quality, a fire resistant body armor and all kind of possible fire resistance bonuses. I ask a friend to cast a fireball at me. I roll 59 dice. Cool! I have 4 net hits! So here is what happens:

I negate the fireball. Lofwyr who was passing by is so impressed that he decides to give me all his money and tons of karma. Oh, and I get two hot elf chicks in the process."

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 09:56 AM

QUOTE (Fortune @ Sep 5 2007, 05:15 PM)

QUOTE (SR4 pg. 59)

A critical success means that the character has performed the task with such perfection and grace that the gamemaster should allow her to addÂ when describing it.

'Flourishing detail' does not necessarily equate to 'outcome'.

whatever flourishing detail she likes

The outcome is described by the GM which the player is able to add whatever detail she likes to. The outcome is still determined by your dice rolls. Positive net hits should not have negative outcomes. Negative net hits should not have positive outcomes.

Posted by: Doctor Funkenstein Sep 5 2007, 11:56 AM

No, that's not what it says.

It says the GM still determines the outcome based upon the events, and the player should (ie, within reasonable limits) be allowed to add unimportant, flashy details to it. Yes, that critical success totally knocked the General's rank insignia off when it hit his chest. No, the critical success didn't cause the bullet to richochet off the General's insignia, nail his six guards between the eyes, before finally ricocheting back to the General and killing him dead.

As Fortune said, "flourishing details" doesn't equate to "outcome." It equates to "adding some fluff to the description, as long as it doesn't interfer with the outcome in any notable way."

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 01:19 PM

QUOTE (Doctor Funkenstein @ Sep 5 2007, 07:56 PM)

No, that's not what it says.

It says the GM still determines the outcome based upon the events, and the player should (ie, within reasonable limits) be allowed to add unimportant, flashy details to it.Â Yes, that critical success totally knocked the General's rank insignia off when it hit his chest.Â No, the critical success didn't cause the bullet to richochet off the General's insignia, nail his six guards between the eyes, before finally ricocheting back to the General and killing him dead.

As Fortune said, "flourishing details" doesn't equate to "outcome."Â It equates to "adding some fluff to the description, as long as it doesn't interfer with the outcome in any notable way."

No, it does not say that. It says "any flourishing detail she likes". It does not say fluff, or any unimportant, flashy detail or does not interfere with outcome in any notable way. No, it does not say those things. It means that the player cannot change the outcome from a positive one to a negative or a negative to positive, it means that the player get to add a detail that flourishes the description of the outcome.

GM: You convince the Johnson to increase your pay willingly.

Player: To the amount I want. This is the flourishing detail I like.

GM: You hit the general and you see him drop to the ground in a spray of blood.

Player: Dead.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 5 2007, 02:58 PM

QUOTE (American Heritage Dictionary)

Flourish, Flourishing

v. intr.

1. To grow well or luxuriantly; thrive: The crops flourished in the rich soil.
2. To do or fare well; prosper: "No village on the railroad failed to flourish" (John Kenneth Galbraith).
3. To be in a period of highest productivity, excellence, or influence: a poet who flourished in the tenth century.
4. To make bold, sweeping movements: The banner flourished in the wind.

v. tr.
To wield, wave, or exhibit dramatically.

n.

1. A dramatic or stylish movement, as of waving or brandishing: "A few ... musicians embellish their performance with a flourish of the fingers" (Frederick D. Bennett).
2. An embellishment or ornamentation: a signature with a distinctive flourish.
3. An ostentatious act or gesture: a flourish of generosity.
4. Music A showy or ceremonious passage, such as a fanfare.

QUOTE (Dictionary.com)

flourÂ·ish

â€“verb (used without object)
1. to be in a vigorous state; thrive: a period in which art flourished.
2. to be in its or in one's prime; be at the height of fame, excellence, influence, etc.
3. to be successful; prosper.
4. to grow luxuriantly, or thrive in growth, as a plant.
5. to make dramatic, sweeping gestures: Flourish more when you act out the king's great death scene.
6. to add embellishments and ornamental lines to writing, letters, etc.
7. to sound a trumpet call or fanfare.
â€“verb (used with object)
8. to brandish dramatically; gesticulate with: a conductor flourishing his baton for the crescendo.
9. to decorate or embellish (writing, a page of script, etc.) with sweeping or fanciful curves or lines.
â€“noun
10. an act or instance of brandishing.
11. an ostentatious display.
12. a decoration or embellishment, esp. in writing: He added a few flourishes to his signature.
13. Rhetoric. a parade of fine language; an expression used merely for effect.
14. a trumpet call or fanfare.
15. a condition or period of thriving: in full flourish.

I don't think the word means what you think it means.

Posted by: Irian Sep 5 2007, 02:59 PM

Flourishing. Meaning "ornamenting". Something that doesn't really change the thing, but surrounds it in a decorating way.

Edit: Too late, Fortune did it much better

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 03:12 PM

Yes, so the GM describes a successful action and you add whatever "flourishing details" you want to it. Unless the detail doesn't embellish a successful action or does not make the result any more dramatic, it is a "flourishing detail" even under those definitions. The detail does not change the fundamental fact that the action succeeded, it embellishes it, it makes it dramatic. It is unlikely the player will choose a detail that downplays the success. The word is meaningless in the context.

Posted by: Irian Sep 5 2007, 03:16 PM

That's nonsense, please stop it already. A detail CAN change the outcome dramatically. Simply example: You not only hit someone, but the bullet penetrates the target and kills the three people behind it. That's a detail that doesn't change "Success or Failure" but it really changes the outcome. And it's surely not a "flourishing" detail.

Posted by: toturi Sep 5 2007, 03:26 PM

QUOTE (Irian @ Sep 5 2007, 11:16 PM)

Change it to hit the 3 people behind and it can be a flourishing detail - kill only factors in when you roll damage. Just not the way you want it to flourish! Which is why I said it is meaningless in context.

A flourishing detail does not alter the fundamental nature of the success or its premises.

Posted by: NightmareX Sep 6 2007, 11:13 AM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid)

Suffice to say, this particular situation has since been resolved.

How KK?

Posted by: Spike Sep 6 2007, 06:42 PM

QUOTE (Cain)

QUOTE

Speaking of shadowslang:

Dreck as apparently an increasingly popular real world 'polite' invective. I've seen it in mainstream news articles, I believe I've heard it on TV.

On the otherhand, I grew up in a swearing household (is that even a term?) and one thing that was laughable to me way back as a nipper when I got my SR1 after months of waiting was the silliness of made up swear words.

While some have grown on me a bit, in general I'm happier when 'Shit is Shit' and not 'Dreck'.

Adding color to the world through langauge is all well and good, but focusing on the 'invectives' just makes it silly and... well... prudish.

Posted by: Adarael Sep 6 2007, 08:01 PM

Well, shit is only shit and not dreck if you're talking to people who don't swear in yiddish. I worked for a guy when I was a teenager who only swore in yiddish.

He kept saying 'the dreck that comes out of most people's mouths drives him meshuggah.'

Posted by: Malachi Sep 6 2007, 08:35 PM

I can concede that the Shadowslang is a matter of personal opinion. Some people may think it sounds silly to have these "imitation" words. I, conversely, find that profanity greatly degrades the quality of the work from an artistic standpoint (couldn't you think of anything else to say?).

I should also note that the shadowslang was not exclusively invectives but also general expletives ("Oh drek!"), adjectives ("The run got all fragged up!"), and neither ("What's up omae?")

Posted by: Dashifen Sep 6 2007, 09:31 PM

I never thought the imitation words were silly, but I actually find the use of curse words to add to artistic standing of SR4. But, then again, I tend to curse like a sailor so my perspective may be skewed.

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 6 2007, 09:33 PM

QUOTE (Irian)

QUOTE (laughingowl)

Also to the 'word on the street says you are too high priced... we can't afford you...'

Trian..

This I totally agree, with players can very well chose 'lesser' results...

If I had decided that they run paid 10,000 and each hit was a linear 500 extra (rarely will I do a linear, but alot of pre-written are...) ...

If the run got an amazing 30 net hits (Bothered to use edge for some reason... and alot of exploding dice..)

I MIGHT allow them to get the full 25,000 nuyen ... However I wouold probably also give something like:

"You steady and skillfull negoationtion convinces the Johnson that the details of this job are going to require atleast an extra 15k to cover expenses and risks, however, during the talks, the Johnson seems to get worried when the amount broke 18,000. You are pretty sure the 18k is all he was budgeted / allowed. While he seems to think he can scrape the extra together and is willing to pay it, you get the distinct impression he is going to have to be explaining the extra 7k (or covering it himself)"

The player could then chose to be 'generous' and balk down the payment some, (which would earn corresponding direct street cred and or very like in this case get a loyality 1 contact out of this johnson (since they bailed his arse out).

Posted by: laughingowl Sep 6 2007, 09:41 PM

QUOTE (toturi)

QUOTE (laughingowl @ Sep 5 2007, 02:20 PM)

QUOTE (toturi @ Sep 5 2007, 04:10 AM)

QUOTE (laughingowl @ Sep 5 2007, 11:05 AM)

Player MAY state desired outcomes... and GMs (if reasonable) will often run with the outcomes...Â but ONLY GMs can state outcomes.

No, most of the time only the GM can state the description of the outcomes. There is an exception.

When is the exception?

Critical Success.

tourti:

Coming into it a little late but since your post was a reply to me...

As others have said...

Flourishing detail is not chaning the 'outcome' it is adding adjectives to the outcome...

With an amazing shot, your shot drops the squad leader of the opposing security team...

(player) "Putting the round directly between his eye exploding his head like a watermelon..." (good flourishing detail, doesnt really change anything ... unless they needed his old headware memory

(player) "covering the three nearest security guards in the splattered blood and brains...." (even this I would probably allow as no 'real effect' (though if somebody made an intimidation attempt to make them run, this 'flourishing detail' probably WOULD get a -1 threshold or so...."

(player) "covering the visor so they are totally blind and can't see whats going on....." (HELL NO.... the player now has gone from 'flourishing detail' to 'additional effect' the PLAYER can not make this call....

Now that being said... if they player scored very very well I might make the rulling to allow the above .... if I felt he had enough additional sucess on the attack roll... that he could have aimed in such a way to also cause this... but that is 'outcome' not 'flourishing detail' and that is my call (especially since no rules cover it.....

Posted by: Wounded Ronin Sep 6 2007, 10:44 PM

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid)

QUOTE (Cthulhudreams)

The true way of the Jedi is to have a couple of runs reserved as emergency runs so that there is always a decent alternate.

Posted by: Kyoto Kid Sep 7 2007, 03:29 PM

QUOTE (NightmareX)

QUOTE (Kyoto Kid @ Sep 4 2007, 01:33 AM)

Suffice to say, this particular situation has since been resolved.

How KK?

...old group dissolved, eventually, new group formed.

Again this was more heavily detailed in another thread and centered around a fairly disruptive and spotlight hogging player (who BTW, was also a long time acquaintance which made things even more difficult). The rest of the members basically said they had enough with this player and after the session was over mentioned they were not returning. Needless to say I felt totally embarrassed by the whole affair as I had brought a couple of the new players on board.

Back then, it was a very difficult situation for my hometown seemed pretty starved of SR players. Lots of people into the game that shall not be mentioned, Vampire, and Warhammer, but not so much SR. At the time, if I wanted to play SR, I felt had to make the best of a not so good situation. Yes, a big mistake in 20-20 hindsight.

After the dust settled and a bit of "damage control", I started looking for a new group for the RiS run. This time I spoke with prospective players one on one before we had our first meeting, telling them a bit about, the campaign setting, what style I ran in etc. A couple from the former group also re-joined. I guess this time my "Edge" paid off and I now have a very good group of players (and to my surprise, two campaigns going, one I am running (RiS) and one I actually get to play in instead of being the GM).

...however, let's put this to rest for it really has little to do with the main topic.

Posted by: toturi Sep 7 2007, 03:40 PM

QUOTE (laughingowl)

Except for the fact that unless you are invoking the GM-trump-card rule, it is "flourishing detail that she likes". It would mean that as long as the player holds out on the "she likes" part(I do not think anyone is actually going to dispute what that means), it would be an impasse so long as you continue to define "flourishing" to exclude what she wants to add.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 7 2007, 04:39 PM

Sure, as long as it doesn't change the basic outcome of the action.

Posted by: Donk Sep 10 2007, 09:59 PM

Allrighty Then,

I think this topic has strayed a bit Tangentilly a bit long enough....

Does anyone have and "hardest thing" comments about Street Magic and/or Augmentation?

-Donk

Posted by: toturi Sep 11 2007, 01:51 AM

QUOTE (Donk)

Allrighty Then,

I think this topic has strayed a bit Tangentilly a bit long enough....

Does anyone have and "hardest thing" comments about Street Magic and/or Augmentation?

-Donk

You mean apart from Blud-lactus and its cyber tits and dick/s?

Them cyber penile implants are really hard.

Posted by: Zhan Shi Sep 11 2007, 03:30 AM

I found Augmentation to be very tittilating.

Sorry, could'nt resist.

But to answer your question, I did'nt have anything against either book rules wise. You may want to check out the Augmentation: ask the developers thread.

Posted by: Hartbaine Sep 11 2007, 03:34 AM

Is aug only avail as an E-Book or something? I usually order my stuff from Amazon, since I live an hour or so from the nearest actual city, so far it's not avail there...

Am I not in the loop or something???

Posted by: Zhan Shi Sep 11 2007, 03:40 AM

No, it's been published. I would recommend nobleknight.com. Never had a problem with them.

Posted by: Fortune Sep 11 2007, 03:41 AM

From the Shadowrun Web Site ...

QUOTE

Augmentation Street Date â€” August 31st!

Just a reminder that the street date for Augmentation is this Friday, August 31st. This means if your local gaming store has already ordered it, they should have received their copies this week and are allowed to start selling it on Friday. If stores have yet to order copies, they can start getting them within days of ordering them. Call your local game store and let them know you want Augmentation from Catalyst Game Labs!

Posted by: Hartbaine Sep 11 2007, 03:43 AM

Awesome, thanks.

Posted by: dhyde79 Sep 11 2007, 05:33 AM

ok, lemme reach back and comment on a couple things here.....

(from page 1)

QUOTE

this has always been a huge pet peeve of mine, and I don't say this to dog the achievements of one man, but, army snipers, marine snipers, and snipers of all other branches of the service have had just as much happen that, had the right people decided to try to measure things out and make a big deal out of, would have gotten them just as much credit as Hathcock got, he just was one of the first and did it in a place that wouldn't get anyone in trouble for admitting that they did it.

QUOTE

...Perception being a Physical Skill

I'm still coming to terms with this, as well as Dodge being a required skill instead of something you rolled your quickness attribute to test, as well as having to have a counterspelling skill (to have spell defense dice)

once you start to think about the fact that there are some that are WAY more perceptive than others, it makes sense that it became a skill. I understand it, I just hate having to remember it.

(from page 2)

QUOTE

(toturi)
Look at it from a game mechanic point of view. The roll ensures that the Johnson sucks it up and takes the fall. All the negative aspects of the result of the roll should already be factored into the roll itself. If the negotiator wins despite the negative modifiers these negative repercussions would produce, then the Johnson sucks it up. It is not the pretty elf boy won't work within the budget, it is the pretty elf boy convinced you that the budget is too small and it is unworkable. Since you have been convinced, you get the short end of the stick to work it so that the pretty elf boy gets his nuyen and you get your job done.

(irian)
Personally, I wouldn't allow that a simple roll makes the target brainless Even if the Johnson succeds very well, the Runners will NOT work for free... So, I would rule that there are limits: A very good negotiation result will make the Johnson go to his limit - but he will not use more than his budget is, simply because he is not allowed to do so. At the very best, he will call his boss and ask.

(toturi)
I'll do that as soon as you show me where RAW states that there is a limit. Common sense tells me that if the rules do not state a limit, there isn't one. As long as you cannot do that, common sense simply cannot suffice.

please, tell me that this arguement was to prove a point and not actually serious, there's NO way you can talk someone out of money they don't have. it's really just that simple....I don't care how good your negotiations roll was, if the J only brought "X" amount of money, that's all you can talk him into paying you, or, you may talk him into more but when he gets back and you complete the run, you may find out you're being paid the excess in merchandise or company credit or something totally non-tangable

QUOTE

Why the hell can't you hit Zurich Orbital with a Hold Out with 10000 hits?

did I miss the page that says that you get extra range for every "X" number of hits?

as far as the arguements against having the sexual augmentations and rules in the books, honestly, my opinion stands at this: if you're mature enough to play a game in which you're running about planning and killing people, you certainly should be mature enough to accept that sexuality is a fact of life, and there are many parts of the world that're far less closed off about things of a remotely sexual nature than most people are in the US. Personally I wouldn't hesitate to utilize them....for example, how about a character who was in a catastrophic vehicle collision and lost the left side of his body from half way down the hips on, so, his left leg is fully cyber replaced, and, so that he might actually have some hope of maintaining a slight bit of dignity, he had a cyber-penis installed so that he might actually be able to please a woman if he by chance were to actually get a romantic interest NPC...

as far as the cussing and such goes, I honestly would like a mix of both, I can see the arguements that the current profanities have been around and they're not likely to go away, however, I also use ones like "frag" and "drek" while at work communicating with coworkers to convey the point of profaning without risking getting into trouble for using "vulgar language" and offending a customer.

all in all, I like 4th, I liked 3rd...I think I'm going to have far less math to do in 4th than I had in 3rd, which, makes me happier when gaming. (but a lot more to do in character gen)

Posted by: hyzmarca Sep 11 2007, 06:01 AM

My issue with the codification of the cyberpenis and breast implants isn't the fact that they're sexual so much as the fact that Pamela Anderson is down a point of magic.
Playing a guy who was in a horrible car accident and has his penis replaced is great. But if you're playing a mage who had his penis replaced you automatically loose 10 BP and have your Magic cap reduced by 1.
The result is mechanical penalties for fluff roleplaying choices. Fluff roleplaying choices should have fluff roleplaying advantages and disadvantages.
I'm not advocating that everything must be balanced. That's silly. But codified penalties for pure fluff choices does nothing but penalize those who want to use the fluff in their roleplaying.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 11 2007, 06:02 AM

QUOTE

Interesting, so Sargent York's feat, any old sniper of the day could have done? That is kinda like saying "The Blonde Knight Of Germany"(Eric Hartmann) record of kills any old pilot could have done.

Yes it takes skill, training, but it also takes being at the right place, right time and right person.

From my experience US Military Snipers take well deserved pride in what they have accomplished, everyone whom(Mil Snipers) I have spoken with hold Hathcock in high esteem. Not only for the unique feats he accomplished, but also for what he did to bring US Military Snipers schools/training to SOTA.

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

During acts of War or so called ones, many things are done, some not real nice to know that they take place, but that is why it is called War.

Posted by: mfb Sep 11 2007, 06:30 AM

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

Posted by: toturi Sep 11 2007, 06:42 AM

QUOTE (dhyde79)

QUOTE

(toturi)
Look at it from a game mechanic point of view. The roll ensures that the Johnson sucks it up and takes the fall. All the negative aspects of the result of the roll should already be factored into the roll itself. If the negotiator wins despite the negative modifiers these negative repercussions would produce, then the Johnson sucks it up. It is not the pretty elf boy won't work within the budget, it is the pretty elf boy convinced you that the budget is too small and it is unworkable. Since you have been convinced, you get the short end of the stick to work it so that the pretty elf boy gets his nuyen and you get your job done.

(irian)
Personally, I wouldn't allow that a simple roll makes the target brainlessÂ Even if the Johnson succeds very well, the Runners will NOT work for free... So, I would rule that there are limits: A very good negotiation result will make the Johnson go to his limit - but he will not use more than his budget is, simply because he is not allowed to do so. At the very best, he will call his boss and ask.

(toturi)
I'll do that as soon as you show me where RAW states that there is a limit. Common sense tells me that if the rules do not state a limit, there isn't one. As long as you cannot do that, common sense simply cannot suffice.

QUOTE

Why the hell can't you hit Zurich Orbital with a Hold Out with 10000 hits?

did I miss the page that says that you get extra range for every "X" number of hits?

It was totally serious. If the GM so chooses to state that the effect of the successful roll was that the Johnson pays more, then it is so. Or if the roll was a critical success, then the player may have a say as to what detail she would like to add.

Whoever said you were out of range? Like everyone else, you ASS-U-ME that Z-O is out of range. Did I miss the page that says you were out of range?

Posted by: Cain Sep 11 2007, 06:43 AM

QUOTE

It's not so much that Perception is now a skill (although the fact that you can now skillwire it is just silly) but that it's a physical skill. The only physical skill that doesn't link to a physical stat. So, if you're infirm, you're also oblivious... but you can buy a reflex recorder to make up for it. Like so many other things, this is just too silly for the game.

QUOTE

Once again, canon sillyness. According to RAW, there's no upper limit to the number of successes you can get. So, there's no limit to the amount of money you can squeeze out of a Johnson. What's more, since this is likely to be a critical success, you can also talk him out of that nice watch he's wearing and the designer jacket his wife just blew a month's salary on.

Even if the excess is merchandise or corp scrip, it's more money for the team. There is absolutely no limit to how far a social adept could theoretically go. One point of Edge, and the 30-dice pornomancer gets exploding 6's... talk about disgusting.

QUOTE

as far as the arguements against having the sexual augmentations and rules in the books, honestly, my opinion stands at this: if you're mature enough to play a game in which you're running about planning and killing people, you certainly should be mature enough to accept that sexuality is a fact of life, and there are many parts of the world that're far less closed off about things of a remotely sexual nature than most people are in the US.

In addition to what Hyzmarca said, there's the fact that it took up time and effort that could have been spent on something more useful (Like an index), took up a ton of space that could have provided more usfeul stuff (like more cyber- and bio- toys), and was generally handled with all the maturity of Beavis and Butthead. Your opinion is valid, but it doesn't address the problems with how Augmentation deals with sexual augmentation.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 11 2007, 06:55 AM

QUOTE (mfb)

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

Oh what stories are those?

References please.

WMS

Posted by: Draconis Sep 11 2007, 07:32 AM

QUOTE (toturi @ Sep 11 2007, 06:42 AM)

QUOTE (dhyde79 @ Sep 11 2007, 01:33 PM)

QUOTE

(toturi)
Look at it from a game mechanic point of view. The roll ensures that the Johnson sucks it up and takes the fall. All the negative aspects of the result of the roll should already be factored into the roll itself. If the negotiator wins despite the negative modifiers these negative repercussions would produce, then the Johnson sucks it up. It is not the pretty elf boy won't work within the budget, it is the pretty elf boy convinced you that the budget is too small and it is unworkable. Since you have been convinced, you get the short end of the stick to work it so that the pretty elf boy gets his nuyen and you get your job done.

(irian)
Personally, I wouldn't allow that a simple roll makes the target brainlessÂ Even if the Johnson succeds very well, the Runners will NOT work for free... So, I would rule that there are limits: A very good negotiation result will make the Johnson go to his limit - but he will not use more than his budget is, simply because he is not allowed to do so. At the very best, he will call his boss and ask.

(toturi)
I'll do that as soon as you show me where RAW states that there is a limit. Common sense tells me that if the rules do not state a limit, there isn't one. As long as you cannot do that, common sense simply cannot suffice.

QUOTE

Why the hell can't you hit Zurich Orbital with a Hold Out with 10000 hits?

did I miss the page that says that you get extra range for every "X" number of hits?

This thread and logic still scares me. "Common sense tells me that if the rules do not state a limit, there isn't one." Otherwise known as the I can do whatever the hell I want unless you can show me the printed text that says otherwise clause.

Player: "I'm gonna pull a rabbit out of my ass and throw it at corpsec distracting him long enough for me to get away."

GM: "You're going to....wha?"

Player: "Rabbit...Ass... what part of that didn't you get?"

GM: "Um..I'm pretty sure you can't do that.."

Player: "Why not? Show me the rule that says I can't transport small furry mammals in my rectum!"

GM: "Screw this I'm going to go play Halo 3. Let me know when reality smacks you upside the head."

Posted by: Critias Sep 11 2007, 07:36 AM

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

QUOTE (mfb @ Sep 11 2007, 01:30 AM)

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

Oh what stories are those?

References please.

WMS

FWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!

That's the sound of "the point" flying right past WMS's head.

Posted by: toturi Sep 11 2007, 08:21 AM

QUOTE (Draconis @ Sep 11 2007, 03:32 PM)

The rules tells you what you can do. If those rules do not state a limit to those actions, then there is none.

Player: "I'm gonna pull a rabbit out of my ass and throw it at corpsec distracting him long enough for me to get away."

GM: "There are no rules for pulling rabbits out of asses. But if you roll Sleight Of Hand well enough, you can pull a rabbit out of your ass if that's what you like."

Posted by: hyzmarca Sep 11 2007, 08:34 AM

How big is the rabbit, how big is the PC, and does the PC regularly engage in exercises to increase his carrying capacity? Because, a small rabbit, yeah, it'll work. I'd require that it be on his carried equipment list, however.

Posted by: Draconis Sep 11 2007, 08:47 AM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

Well I had a Vampire character that once hid a painting....uh nevermind.

Yes equipment list, I can see the GM thinking. "Hmmm how did that one slip by me?"
Player: *points to character sheet* "Right here bitch, Rabbit in Ass. The ultimate hold out weapon."

Posted by: hyzmarca Sep 11 2007, 09:28 AM

http://www.videocaffe.com/video/w9PoMPXvfkM/Armageddon

While the keister actually is a viable rodent storage compartment, the original sentiment stands.

A better example would be that the game doesn't specify that you can't eat an aircraft carrier whole without chewing. But common sense says that you can't. Also, it would make aircraft carriers sort of useless.

Posted by: Kyleigh Wester Sep 11 2007, 09:30 AM

This argument is kind of silly considering that the game changes from GM to Gm, not just in house rules, but by how the house rules are taken. Personally, I take things with a grain of realism. Unless you actually shuved a rabbit up your ass before the mission, you can not pull it from there. You can't shoot space stations and you definitely can't take more money then someone has. If I played with players that insisted they could though, needless to say, all my Johnsons would have maxed out willpowers and pre-prepped anti social abilities so far out the ass that everytime the PCs open their mouth they lose 500 Nuyen. I can see it now. If theres anything i've learned it's never, EVER, piss off your GM. because he does have the power to fuck you.

I'd say it's best not to do physics defying stuff that pisses off your GM, because he can and will seek vengence.

Posted by: Draconis Sep 11 2007, 10:24 AM

QUOTE (Kyleigh Wester)

I'd say it's best not to do physics defying stuff that pisses off your GM, because he can and will seek vengence.

Ya after you shoot Z-O out of the sky it'll fall on you.

Posted by: darthmord Sep 11 2007, 11:54 AM

I believe the operative phrase is...

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons for you are crunchy and go well with ketchup.

Note, I've always assumed the GM was a dragon.

Posted by: eidolon Sep 11 2007, 01:42 PM

QUOTE (Draconic)

Otherwise known as the I can do whatever the hell I want unless you can show me the printed text that says otherwise clause.

When I'm getting ready to run a game, the first thing I do is go through all of the books with a magic marker and black out that clause.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 11 2007, 05:04 PM

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

QUOTE (mfb @ Sep 11 2007, 01:30 AM)

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

Oh what stories are those?

References please.

WMS

Wrong Again

I am attempting to find out if that poster has any real information to back up that.

Or was just regurgitating non factual information, with out verifying same.

As for verifying I would ask said poster to post such to
http://www.snipercentral.com/
http://www.marinescoutsniper.com/
http://www.socnetcentral.com/vb/

And then see that those in the "trade" have to say about that posters "So Called" information.

WMS

Posted by: Adarael Sep 11 2007, 05:07 PM

I prefer to leave that clause in there, and just black-marker the crap out of any player that uses it.

Preserves the books, don't you know.

And, uh... WMS? You did, in fact, miss the point. They were saying he could have gotten in trouble by talking about missions that 'didn't happen' - that is to say, missions that they didn't want him to admit occurred and were black ops, CIA-funded, or otherwise compromising to national policy/security secrets.

Sorry. You missed it.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 11 2007, 05:25 PM

@Adarael

From all I have read or heard about Carlos Hathcock he never spoke/wrote of anything that was not "allowed".

Did he do "Spook" missions, more than likely, but for me that will be unverifiable. Thanks the Gods, my clearance was never anywhere near that level.

As for the point, you are in part correct.

As for the original point, the "Spook" ops may have better shots taken or at better ranges and even with better rifles, but being "Spook" ops we will more than likely never know.

There is a possibility that Carlos Hathcock himself made better shots under even more conditions, but since if they did occur under "Spook" ops, we will never know.

For non "Spook" ops, Carlos Hathcock's accomplishments are most impressive. From what I have gathered he did not "Beat his own drum" to gain fame.

WMS

Posted by: Adarael Sep 11 2007, 05:30 PM

Let's back up. You asked:

"How could a counter-terrorist sniper get in trouble for talking about sniping?"
The responding funny was, translated,
"He could talk about black ops that nobody's supposed to know about."
You said,
"Prove he did any!"

It was just a funny. I don't think anyone was trying to make a serious point with the crack.

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 11 2007, 06:08 PM

OK lets back up

QUOTE

Carlos was not just another sniper. He was an outstanding, gifted and talented person. To me what is quoted above is Dogging his accomplishments, despite words to the contrary. That is like saying just any baseball player could beat Ty Cobbs records.

I said

QUOTE

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

Response was

QUOTE

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

How is counter sniper work and "Spook" ops related?

WMS

Posted by: Adarael Sep 11 2007, 08:48 PM

I imagine that CIA black ops in South America have occasionally needed a sniper.

Posted by: Jaid Sep 11 2007, 08:56 PM

QUOTE (Cain)

QUOTE

omg, not 2 paragraphs! and it must have taken them forever to balance those things, too, what with them having such a large amount of space!

woe is us, for clearly they could have made an index with that kind of empty space and with such a massive amount of time!

[/sarcasm]

and for the record, i don't see what's so horribly immature about the rules for the implants.

Posted by: Adarael Sep 11 2007, 09:00 PM

I'll tell you!

1) The cyber-wang is not called "The Mr. Studd Sexual Implant"
2) The description text is not "All night, every night, and she'll never know. Also available in "Midnight Lady."

(That's verbatim from Cyberpunk 2020, if you didn't know.)

Posted by: hyzmarca Sep 12 2007, 12:42 AM

QUOTE (Jaid)

QUOTE (Cain @ Sep 11 2007, 01:43 AM)

QUOTE

As written, there is nothing immature about them, and very little space is used. However, the fact that they have an essence cost discourages responsible use and encourages irresponsible use.

Players who spend a quarter of an essence point on a cyberpenis aren't just going to let it go to waste. They could be spending that essence on climbing claws, oral guns, and other things which aren't entirely useless. Instead, they chose to use an irreplaceable resource to get a robot penis. These augmentations will not remain in their pants. If they do, there there is no point in getting them at all.

Posted by: Mercer Sep 12 2007, 02:31 AM

As was pointed out to me on this site, the Midnight Lady ™ implant gave a bonus to Seduction rolls.

It seems to me that having a cybernetic hoo-haa isn't the sort of thing someone is going to know until they are already well-seduced, unless your seduction method is to walk up and say "I have a cybernetic hoo-haa." (Which, in all fairness, would work on approximately 99% of heterosexual guys.)

Posted by: Fortune Sep 12 2007, 02:35 AM

See below!

Posted by: Fortune Sep 12 2007, 02:35 AM

Maybe they incorporate actual 'performance' into the art of seduction.

Posted by: Buster Sep 12 2007, 03:34 AM

QUOTE (Fortune)

Maybe they incorporate actual 'performance' into the art of seduction.

Ah, a ventriloquist act. Like Jim Carrey talking out of his butt?

Posted by: Critias Sep 12 2007, 05:14 AM

QUOTE (WearzManySkins)

OK lets back up

QUOTE

A major part of what Hathcock did was counter sniper work, how could one get in trouble for that?

Response was

QUOTE

by telling stories about missions that didn't happen.

How is counter sniper work and "Spook" ops related?

WMS

Alright, Jesus. I'll explain it some more.

I'm just curious, though...Do you have to work really hard at being able to just completely ruin a mild joke and run the poor, hapless, funny into the ground? Or is it a natural gift? Anyways. Here we go.

Carlos Hathcock was a great guy and an incredible sniper, but he's not the greatest guy or the most incredible sniper. Period. There are often discrepancies (especially with snipers) between the occasional media favorite and the actual best.

For WWII, for instance, look at the famous Vasily Zaytsev (of Stalingrad fame), who has been the inspiration for several books, movies, video game levels in-jokes, etc. 242 confirmed kills. Now, that's pretty awesome, right? But...How many people outside of the sharpshooting community (and maybe Finnish history students, I don't know) have even heard of Simo Hayha, though? He's the Finnish sniper who's credited with somewhere between 505-724 Russian kills during The Winter War. At the conservative end, that's twice as many kills as Vasily, but when was the last time you saw a major motion picture starring a couple A-list movie stars about Simo?

It's much the same with Carlos, The White Feather. The guy's incredible, and no one's taking away from that. But he's not got the longest confirmed sniper shot, he's not the USMC sniper with the most confirmed kills, etc, etc. Why isn't the rifle and pistol complex at Marimar named after Chuck Mawhinney, the Marine sniper with the most kills (who also served in Vietnam)? What about Waldron, the US serviceman (an Army soldier) with more confirmed kills than either of them?

That's what we're getting at. Hathcock's the man, and make no mistake. He's been dead for several years and I'd still never want to pick a fight with him. But the whole thing that got this sad little ball of wax going was that some people get the limelight, and some people (who have more accomplishments in the same field) don't. That's all.

And the other snipers with longer shots and more confirmed kills than him are only counting -- and this is where MFB's little joke comes in -- the stuff that's a matter of public record. All the other guys that hold records, from Vasily to Mawhinney, are guys that did so at times of war, shooting targets they were supposed to be shooting. No super ninja secret ultra-classified stuff "that never happened."

For all we know, The ArchBishop Louis "The Sadist" Jones was building up a rebellion amongst the Swiss Guard, until the Pope's right hand man, Ryan Mercury, shot him from two and a half miles away with a .22 bolt action, last week...but the Church will never let such secrets come to light (as a random, and completely made up, "for instance"). That poor guy made an incredible shot, and we'll never hear about it. See? See there, that joke?

Snipers, especially, are likely to have quite a few remarkable stories to tell that they can't ever tell. It's the ones that do amazing things during times of open, publically accepted, war -- WWII, Vietnam, etc -- that are the only guys who even have a chance at any sort of public recognition, fame, or record book.

That's the joke, okay?

That's the thing you weren't getting, and were arguing, and ran right into the ground with your lack of hah-hah. Get it? Can the conversation move on, now?

Posted by: Draconis Sep 12 2007, 09:15 AM

I love rants.

Posted by: Mr. Croup Sep 12 2007, 09:34 AM

..and everyone forgets Rifleman Plunkett.

Poor Thomas Plunkett.

Posted by: Critias Sep 12 2007, 11:24 AM

QUOTE (Draconis)

I love rants.

Pfft. That wasn't me ranting, there wasn't enough cursing. That was me educating.

Posted by: Draconis Sep 12 2007, 11:51 AM

QUOTE (Critias)

QUOTE (Draconis @ Sep 12 2007, 04:15 AM)

I love rants.

Pfft. That wasn't me ranting, there wasn't enough cursing. That was me educating.

But his name isn't Jesus.....

Posted by: DTFarstar Sep 12 2007, 06:43 PM

Critias, if you don't mind I may sig your last post. You have no idea how many time I've said an approximation of those same words to people.

Chris

Posted by: WearzManySkins Sep 12 2007, 07:42 PM

@Critias
I quote AH

QUOTE

"My advantageous mongoose masturbates with abandon over your mother's skeleton."

Posted by: Hartbaine Sep 13 2007, 12:12 AM

That Armageddon video was too funny. I listen to Johnboy and Billy here at home on way to work in the morning.