Esp. since people are going to photocopy them anyway and claim fair use (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Any ideas as to when the emails will be going out for the updated version (I purchased from BC)?

Thanks in advance,

AJC

Already got the email notification hours ago.

Yesterday.

So if we purchased the SR4A PDF from BattleCorp we were suppose to receive an email so we can download the new pdf? If so, I didn't get an email (and neither did my spam filter). I tried signing into BattleCorp to redownload but I cannot (my BattleCorp account says: Ltd Ed. 20th Anniv. Shadowrun, 4th Ed. - Combo (LE & PDF) Link expired on: Monday 16 March, 2009 ).

Yeah, I didn't get the e-mail but I checked my account anyways. It was at the bottom, said I had until April 17th to do my 7 downloads.

Just checked my account again, and no such luck. Have sent an email off - hopefully will hear back early next week.

AJC

I'm on a mini-vacation right now so I don't have instant access to what's in the toolkit and what's not, but there are a bunch of things on my "support downloads" TODO list, and that's one of them.

Awesome. Thanks, Adam, good to know some things never change. You still rock. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

This is the second time that major adjustments have been made by player feedback to Catalyst(that I know of). The first was the compromise inclusion of the Unseen in TRO:3039 for Battletech. This is the second. Both times, the adjustments made the product better. Kudos to CGL!

OK...I look at the updated PDF, and I see they still have Holostreets listed in it.
Can we be taking this as a promise that Holostreets will be up when the book comes out?
Or is this just that they forgot to remove holostreets from the listing of the "Find us online" stuff?

First rule of Holostreets is... you don't talk about Holostreets.

Thank you for listening to us.

I'm extremely disappointed to see that Catalyst bowed to pressure from what was essentially a bunch of whining about a mage's inability to easily turn a drone into goo. Object resistance is SUPPOSED to be hard, not some walk in the park. The biggest mistake of 4th edition was making magic too easy, and the minute that someone finally tried to fix that, they lost their balls and caved into the "magic is supposed to be UBER!" crowd. I'd suggest a counter-protest against this kind of idiocy, but it would be pointless since the whiners outnumbered the reasonable people from the start.

So you're against Catalyst responding to the wishes of the fans? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

The OR table has still gone up, though. You need an extra three dice in your pool to achieve the same average results as pre-Errata.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RunningTheAsylum

And the only reason you support this is your mistaken belief that magic is to powerful in Shadowrun, one that very few people hold. Your entire basis for this is that magic can do everything mundane methods can, but better - you entirely ignore the cost associated with that.

For nearly everything magic can do, there is a mundane method of comparable or superior effectiveness, with equal or less cost. With the sole exception of spirits (& lesser extent, Direct Combat spells), SR4 magic is not overpowered, & even spirits can be argued convincingly for being balanced (& mundanes, again, have a comparable method in drones; less utility, vastly greater numbers).



Changing the Object Resistance table the way they initially did was very much a mistake - it made entire archetypes unplayable unless min/maxed to the point of absurdity.

Magic was rather ineffective against drones in 3rd edition, and mages did just fine. This is whining from a bunch of powergamers who are sad that their toy almost got taken away. Please stop repeating the same ridiculous arguments that you overheard someone smarter than you trying to pass off as the truth.

Mundanes can do everything that a magician can? Huh. Tell me, how do mundanes:

- Walk through walls?
- Enter astral space?
- Summon a giant creature out of thin air to attack their enemies?
- Provide concealment for an entire group of people?
- Increase the movement speed of everyone in the party by an exponential amount?
- Easily murder a giant Troll who skimped on his Willpower stat?
- Turn someone into goo and steal their cyberware?
- Create force fields?
- Become invisible?
- Completely supress all sound in an area?
- Increase their skill die pools far beyond what one can get via cyber/bioware?
- Create bulletproof armor out of thin air, allowing one to bypass security scanners while still being armed and armored?
- Murder someone from two blocks away with a mere thought, with a weapon that is completely invisible to the naked eye?

I could go on, but I'd rather not waste any more time answering such an idiotic, poorly thought out argument. And before some idiot tries to retort with "well how does a mage or adept hack a node?", the answer is "with trodes". And with the Improved Skill power, the Adept will be superior to any mundane at doing so. It's mostly programs doing the work anyway, so anybody with nuyen can hack.

And even if we leave game balance out of the picture (and really, why should we? If game balance doesn't matter, then we should all be playing Rifts), there's the matter of SETTING. Magic isn't SUPPOSED to easily affect complex technology, and these reduced OR tables are a joke. Cook the numbers all you want, but on the table, facts are facts. GMs shouldn't have to reject perfectly legal character sheets because the game designers are too lazy or too cowardly to write balanced rules and stats.

Only at the highest level of difficulty, and three dice isn't alway enough, or sometimes it's a way bigger chance:

At very low dice polls, you will only need an increas of 2 dice in order to have the same chance of success.

For example with 5 dice you have 4.53% chance of rolling 4 or more hits. You only need 7 dice to have the same chance of rolling 5 or more hits.

At very high dice pools, you will an increase of more than 3 dice to have the same chance of success.

For example with 16 dice you have 83.41% chance of rolling 4 or more hits. You will need 20 dice to get past the same chance (84.85%) of rolling 5 or more hits.

With even higher dice pools you will need even more dice to have the same chance of success.

I just wonden why nobody have complained that their gun-bunny has been nerfed aswell. After all the modifier at extreme range has gone from -3 (= -1 hit) to -6 (= -2 hits). That means that you will not be able to kill certain creatures with one shot just like you did before. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotate.gif)

Lars

If you're shooting from extreme range, you almost certainly have some form of vision mag (equipment, magic, scope).

I don't buy your argument, as it can just as easely be used on the magic/OR debate:

"If you are trying to affect drones or vehicles with magic, you almost certainly have some form of magic booster (power focus, spellcasting focus, specialization, mentor bonus)."

I'm not opposing the OR table being reduced to 1-2-3-5, but I just couldn't see the big problems with 1-2-4-6, and for the record I usually play the mage.

I don't play SR to beat the game or the GM, I play SR to have fun and be challenged, and when the odds are to low it's not fun and challenging.

Lars

Vision magnification is considerably cheaper and more common than a high-power focus.

You mis-read/present my statements, & entirely ignore my argument and the limiting factors of magic in an attempt to push your views. I will not argue with you over this.

I would, however, just like to say that I am damn good at balancing game mechanics. I do not always get it right the first time, but that is why I test & adjust as needed. I have years of personal experience. I have professional schooling. And it is my career choice.

Yes, there are some aspects of magic in SR4 that are overpowered. There are an equal, possibly greater, amount of mundane area's that are just as unbalanced. Some aspects of magic, particularly Adepts, are severely underpowered.

Vision Magnification is available at your local general store for 50:nuyen:, & does not require a ritual & Karma to use.

Even high-level corporate mages are highly unlikely to have a Focus providing a comparable benefit to their spellcasting.

Do you play SR to cast Turn to Goo on drones? The average magician in the average game isn't going to encounter the highest levels of OR. If they need to get past electronics, they should have teammates for that.