I am entirely unsold on making Armor basically redundant except for edge farming. Unless there's something that makes heavier armor somehow viable beyond edge gain, this will indeed be underpants troll edition, and that'd just suck.

But think of all the "eat my shorts" jokes.

Anybody else have their grubby mitts on that box?
Can somebody confirm or deny this?

Hey, this is what Hardy wants, make cybered characters entirely redundant in SR. Because this is the essence of cyberpunk, I guess.

I got the digital version, and yeah the spell description says the following
-------
stats
Range:T
Type: P
Duration S
Drain Value 3
Damage ---

Roll Sorcery + Magic and add net hits to
target’s Defense Rating and to Body for
Damage Resistance tests.

---------------

So yes it is correct so far. This may change in the final book, but yeah it's RAW.

Compare this to Lined Coat or Armor Vest which give +3DR, or Armor Jacket gives +4DR

Edit: to be fair say you got 6 sorcery and 6 Mag, with 12 dice that's still an average of 4 hits. YMMY of course, but overall its 4.
But yeah, that bonus to damage resistance is gonna be handy.
Course Edge can change this a bit. For 1 Edge you can reroll one die (post), but for 4 edge you can add Edge to the roll and explode 6s, so if you plan to armor up, do it early with edge and sustain.

That way you go into the fight with the enhanced DR, giving you a better chance of getting edge due to advantage.

underpants mage troll edition.

nah.

you gotta stack it with the armour so that you get some armour that actually protects you (ie the spell) *and* edge generation.

but really, it was already underpants mage troll edition. we already knew that armour wasn't going to actually provide any protective value, which is the underpants part, we know that metahumans no longer take penalties to any stats, and can spend their bonus stat points on racial attributes (which was most likely to make trolls if not the best, one of the best, simply because body attribute is so much more important when armour does nothing), so that covers troll, and mage, well... let's face it. shadowrun has been mage edition for a while now. we can't really blame *that* on 6th edition (or at least, we can only blame them in the sense that we can blame them for not fixing a problem that has been around for quite a while now).

Someone on Reddit pioneered the Underpants Troll with Badger Backpack as a suggestion, as if you carry a rabid badger around in a sack you can stuff your hand in to start combat any time you want Edge it becomes a battery. Pull its teeth first so you're always at an advantage on its attacks.

That someone on Reddit may be as much of an idiot as the GM who actually allows these kinds of shenanigans, but I like the image that conjurs. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

What maluses does a mage get for sustaining a spell? Because othewise, it doesn't seem that off balanced. The spell is as strong as an armor jacket in average.

If we go back to older editions (2nd or 3rd) I remember that spell being as strong as an integral armor (but I may recall incorrectly).

it's giving soak. that is literally infinity more times more than armour gives in 6th edition. so comparatively, it is quite strong.

I'm reading this wrong then?

It seems to give additionnal dices, like armor no?

Or do I miss something on armor?

In 5th ed, when you wore armor you resisted damage based on Body plus Modified Armor (after accounting for any AP). The Armor Spell added to your Armor Value and could stack.

In 6th you only roll Body to resist damage, armor does nothing to help resist. The +xDR means additions to your Defense Rating- NOT Damage resistance, and Defense Rating only really applies to determining does someone have advantage over you with their weapon or not.

So say you have Body 3 and are wearing Armor Vest ( +3DR), your Defense Rating is 6.

Let's say I bop you with a Katana with an Attack Rating of 10, my AR is 4 higher than your DR of 6 so I get a bonus Edge to use.

Now if do score a hit Katana is Damage 4P plus any net hits.

You wearing that Armor Vest get to only roll your 3 Body dice to soak damage, the Armor Vest does nothing to help soak any of that damage.

The Armor SPELL on the other hand not only would add to the Defense Rating, but it also adds to your effective Body Rolls, so if I was a 2 Body Mage but had gotten 4 hits on Armor spell, my Defense would be 6 like yours, but when it comes time to roll dice to soak I get to roll 6 dice instead of the original 2 from my Body because the Armor spell helps with both Defense Rating AND Body rolls against damage.
So the Armor spell offers a lot more than mundane armor does.

That said, there will probably be some forms of cyber/bioware to help boost body like bone lacing or such, but worn armor has gotten a bit of a shake up.

The only drawback a mage gets for using Armor Spell is the usual -2 to rolls for sustaining, but with abilities like Concentrated Focus or a simple Sustaining Foci, this is not so much a hurdle in the long run.

As in, isn't worth shit anymore.

i can understand the confusion. without having paid close attention, i would have thought "oh, surely defense rating must actually be related to defense in some meaningful way, probably by lowering the amount of damage you take, just like armour has worked for the past 5 editions of shadowrun, just like it would make sense for it to continue to work, because that's pretty much exactly what armour does".

but no, in the new edition of shadowrun, as has been noted, defense rating just determines whether someone gets a point of edge for attacking you, and whether you gain a point of edge for being attacked. and in neither case does edge gained in this manner need to be spent on anything related to the armour; if the attacker has the bigger number by 4 or more, they get edge which does not need to be spent on the attack, and if the defender has the bigger number by 4, they get edge which does not need to be spent on soak.

so... yes the spell gives additional dice to resist damage. no, that isn't like armour; armour doesn't help you resist damage. it just... makes you more lucky? or... makes your enemies less lucky? well, something like that, anyways.

Armor in SR6 appears to only give DR, not dice to soak. DR appears to be solely used to see if attacks generate Edge.

It is not a very transparent system.

Just wow. If they keep that up, I'm out of 6th already.

Then plenty of AR, DR enhancements to hardware will be possible?
Any large advantage has always been a big deal when a someone does not have the weapon or the armor or the skills to match.
The big Edge gain from enhancements going straight to test dice makes sense in that way.
It will still be a confrontation to avoid for many a character.

DR? Direct Reality? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

That's a big assumption you're making that nothing in the materials released so far backs up.

Either that or there are still a few situational modifiers to account for, or some of both?
And I heard it mentioned that only a Edge bonus is given in certain situations rather than a bonus dice modifier.

Ummm

Honestly, that's the kind of thing that sound so idiotic that I can't imagine that it's really the rule.

Like what???? You can't have playtesters and something like this go through.

They didn't do proper playtesting because it was "too much effort".

Can it be said that once an attacker scores a hit, the amount of damage you actually take is more than just armour but the advantage you assume?
So the chance to soak up that damage can be expressed with edge.
For example, A suprised defender may not be able to resist the same damage as an aware defender due to loss of advantage.

Considering they ignored playtesters last time around, I'm not surprised. Why even let people test the product if you're not going to listen anyways? That just unnecessarily stretches the release cycle (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)