That's easy. Instead of setting the glitch "threshold" at half the dice pool, set it at the skill rating.

This is why I so often get pissed at people for disregarding my advise on house rules. I work on game design, and any seemingly simple change can have huge impact on the rest of the system. Increasing skill &/or attribute levels will affect just about everything, up to and including base damage values potentially needing to be reworked.


Oh, great idea. Defaulting is always a Glitch, and my Agility 3, Pistols 6 character will never glitch with a +4 modifier to damage.

Doesn't work either for a number of reasons.

I agree that glitches are only for tiny DPs, but that doesn't mean this proposed rule wouldn't affect them along with everything else. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) If your DP is bigger, then penalties have a harder time *reducing* you to glitch territory. Glitches are caused at least as much by big penalties as they are by small 'natural' DPs. That's why (I assume) they changed the Cover rules.

Yes, the trick with house rules is to change the methodology but still return the same general value ranges, so you don't break all the systems reliant on those outputs. It's either that or rewrite an entire system start to finish based on the new methodology and values.



And if you always want to use a dice pool of 5 or less, more power to you. As for defaulting, make it a minimum glitch-threshold of 1.

This is, of course, directed at the problem Draco mentioned, of exceedingly high Attribute potentials inevitably drowning out Skill contributions (especially when you start throwing on extra 'ware modifiers), as well as the fact that glitch percentage goes way down as dice pool increases, regardless of where the dice come from. Above, the Attribute 7 + Skill 2 character would do worse than the Attribute 2 + Skill 7 character, because the former would glitch far more frequently than the latter.

The problem with glitches as written is that by the time you get to 12-14 dice glitches are exceedingly rare, and by the time you get to 20 they're an insignificant factor.

So it's not necessarily a fantastic idea (though there are very few numbers to pull from the hat that can be applied to make glitches more common), but it's not really worth a "hurr durr sucks" response.

That's probably part of it. Also, even if you modify a shooter's dice pool down to 1 die, they still have at least a 1-in-3 chance of hitting the target, which puts an awfully large burden on the target to make dodge rolls. Giving cover dice to the defender at least gives them the chance to dodge after a few shots fly their way.

The biggest advantage of the SR4 system is also its biggest weakness -- the lack of variable target numbers to make things incrementally more difficult without the exponential difficulty adjustments involved in increasing thresholds. Cover worked great as a positive target number modifier, but works kind of crappy as a negative dice pool modifier.

I know a street sam who would like to differ.

She's glitched and crit glitched on initiative.

I mean, there's always a chance. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) It's just insignificantly small… unless your Init DP is lowered from wound penalties, like I said!

again. think about it.

Seems a bit overpowered outside of chargen. Why not let them select a single skill and a single attribute as favoured abilities? They increase the skill at the same cost as knowledge skills and the attribute at the pre SR4A cost of (New Ratingx3) karma? And wasn't part of the reason of capping skills low this edition around to reduce the crazy SR3 dicepools where characters often had skills rated 12?

Got my Cyberlogican's Cyber Suite in Delta at about 300 Karma... Unfortunately, it only included a MBW 2. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

Our GM is currently experimenting with Bonus Dice capped at Skill Level. This does not include Dice gained from Specialization, nor Circumstantial Dice gained from Situation. It generally only applies to Bonus dice, gained from Equipment, that provide a bonus to the Skill rating; Bonuses to Attributes are not included in this calculation, as they are bonuses to the Attribute directly. Not sure how well it functions, though, because I usually do not stack bonus dice above skill level anyways. He seems to like it.

Yeah, Shadowrun rule system performs poorly on the higher end of the power scale. However, most rule systems tend to do that; and really, why would someone that capable be shadowrunning, instead of running the show from the shadows?

That is the point where they retire, unless they just really liking shadowrunning.

And if they really like shadowrunning, I'd be hard-pressed to find adequate opposition for them, whether with high-level initiation (which costs a bunch, btw) or without it.

That high end of the Scale, though, floats around a great deal, depending upon the table. At 300 Karma, my current team's Prime Runners are still easily challenged. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

Yep. People who just keep on improving in their schtick, to the exclusion of pretty much all else, leave the same gaping holes they had from chargen, which can be used. People who branch out will only grow to the point of outclassing everything else slowly, with the advantage of not being severely hamstrung if one person in a team goes down.

This is oh so true... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

At our table, most of the characters have broadened their concepts with the received Karma. One of the Mages has just Increased his magic and Initiation, and is saving up for a Force 5 Ally Spirit (with Benefits... Heh (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )... He still has very large glaring holes in the concept. And his Karma expenditure for Spells is barely even a percentage. Bought 3 New Spells since Character Creation... He really needs more spells.

I somewhat disagree. It's almost always more efficient to raise an attribute than individual skills.

Raising the attribute increases the pools for it and all the linked skills. Even with the new cost changes... the two banners for this are generally agility and logic (both with a large # of linked skills). It's generally better to raise agility, than it is to raise the firearms group (if it already hasn't been broken w/ a specialization), even though they both cost the same... the firearms group won't enhance your ability with sneaking/thrown/melee/heavy weapons in addition to small arms. And the cost for individual skills is even more expensive than the groups.


That said... that's not a bad idea to mark a few skills as tag skills. I don't agree w/ tag attribute... but say pick 4 tag skills for a human character doesn't seem a bad way to go. Now that I recall... the old Fallout games had something like that and it worked really well.