Analysis of Archetype Characters Options

[Crusher Bob]

I'm running some analysis on the Archtype characters, heres the start:

I've made a table listing all the skills they have (ignoring specializations, skill groups are broken down into their subskills) to see what the most 'popular' skills and stats are.

Here the data:

Top 5 skills (tie for 5th place)
5th place Unarmed Combat (AGL)
5th place Etiquette (CHA)
4th Place Automatics (AGL)
3rd Place Dodge (REA)
2nd Place Perception (INT)
1st Place Pistols (AGL)

Skills vs Stat breakdown:
This is what percentage of the skills use this stat:

AGL....0.31
BOD....0.00
REA....0.09
STR....0.06
CHA....0.10
INT....0.09
LOG....0.20
WIL....0.01
MAG....0.12
RES....0.02

Agility is the clear winner, with logic comming in second. Intuition is largely brought onto the list because almost everyone had the perception skill (31 out of 55 total skill points of skills based on intuition).

So, as expected, first rule of the shadowrunner: Max your agility.

[edit]
Edited to show linked stat to the top 5 skills.
[/edit]

[Aku]

ok, maybe i'm just misunderstanding, but is part two saying that none of the skills the archetypes have use body? none of the top 5 skills use body?

I'm confused....

[imperialus]

I would assume that none of the top five skills use body. Really there are only two (three) skills that rely on body, Diving and parachuting plus the all important "avoid getting dead" skill.

In terms of skills the two best attributes are agility and Logic. Strength Willpower and Body are the worst with Reaction and Intuition falling in the middle.

[Crusher Bob]

Yes, none of the archetypes have skills linked to body. Only diving and parachuting are linked to body (here come the troll para-jumping championships!).

The second part of my post is for all the skilsl the archetypes have. I can post the whole breakdown, but it's a bit long.

[Aku]

what might also be useful, would be the averages of the attributes for the archetypes.

[Crusher Bob]

Slave driver.

There are 16 archetypes, 4 humans and 3 of every meta

Averages with racial mods

B 4.19
A 3.69
R 3.75
S 3.94
Average Phys Stat: 3.89

C 3.13
I 3.81
L 3.44
W 3.50
Avg Mental Stat 3.47

Average Non-Edge Stat 3.68

E 2.88

averages without racial mods

B 2.69
A 3.5
R 3.75
S 2.44
Average Phys Stat 3.09

C 2.75
I 3.81
L 3.44
W 3.31
Avg Mental Stat 3.33

Average Non-Edge Stat: 3.21
E 2.625

Heh, we note how even the archetypes are dumping BOD, CHA, and STR. Looks like they are dumping edge as well...

[blakkie]

[Crusher Bob]

I'm starting to run the 'becks' analysis on the archetypes now.

I'm making the following assumptions:

Karma costs for race, edges/flaws, gear, contacts are BP x 2.
Karma costs for stats are based of the 'base' stat, before racial modifiers.
(will run another set with the racial mods too)

I'll also need to make the 'ultra cheese' version of the archtypes, that keeps the same general idea, but rolls more dice (usually by changing out skill points for stats). Then I'll Becks them as well.

Then I'll start monkeying with the karma costs (at first blush they are no good as written) to try to make all the archetypes come out around the same ballpark and the cheesier versions cost more (karma costs for stats will have to go up, most likely).

[Aku]

its interesting to note that even without any linked skills of note, Bod is still averaging a quarter point higher than everything else atleast...

[Crusher Bob]

That's largely because three of the metatypes have bonuses to body

troll (bod +4) Orks (bod +3) and dwarves (Bod +1)

This gives (12+9+3 ) /16 a point and a half to the body average.

Notice that strength is the next highest of the 'modified' average stats, again becuase 3 of the metatypes get bonuses to strength.

[blakkie]

[Crusher Bob]

Negative modifiers no longer reduce the stats, they only effect the maximum. So a troll with int 3 just pays 20 bp.

[Crusher Bob]

Here are the first run archetype costs (in karma)

Bounty Hunter 376 (Lowest)
Combat Mage 416
Covert Ops Specialist 433
Drone Rigger 475
Enforcer 462
Face 469
Gunslinger 450
Hacker 489 (Higest)
Occult invertigator 397
Eco Shaman 436
Smuggler 483
Sprawl Ganger 434
Street Sam 457
Street Shaman 427
Technomancer 467
Weapons Specialist 470

Average: 446

Average when the highest and lowest costs are dropped: 448

Droping the two highest and two lowest gives an average of 449

I'll double check the values tomorrow, and get started on the cheesier versions of the archetypes.

[edit]

Whoops, forgot to account for spells on some of the magic using archetypes.

The numbers and averages have been corrected.
[/edit]

[2nd edit]
What would a SR book be without math errors in the archetypes?

The Troll bounty hunter is 2 points over
[/edit]

[Crusher Bob]

Here's the first 'improved' archetype

Troll Bounty Hunter:

This seems to be one of the weakest arechtypes, in that it really dosen't have anything goining for it. The improved version maxes agility and tries to make it useful for somthing.
(Spoiler tags to save space)

[ Spoiler ]

B 7
A 4 (6)
R 3 (6)
S 7
C 2
I 4
L 3
W 4

E 3

Initiative: 7 (10)
Essence 3.0

Active Skills
Athletics Group 2 (Climbing, Gymnastics, Running, Swimming)
Outdoor Group 2 (Navigation, Survival, Tracking)
First Aid 3
Longarms 4
Preception 6
Shadowing 4
Unarmed Combat 4

Gear 22 BP
Contacts 14 BP

Cyberwear
Wired 1
Muscle Toner 2
Reaction Enhancer 2

This version is much faster, better in a fight, more preceptive, and can act as a backup medic, plus the outdoor skills

This version costs 478 karma in the first run 'becks', compared to 456 for the original

[edit]
karma totals edited
[/edit]

[Crusher Bob]

Heh, the Combat mage is not built right either, it spends 220 points on stats (they probably forgot you get teh 1st point of magic free), not 230.

The stock combat mage costs 416 karma, as he is 10 BP short, this may not be surprising.

Up front, the combat mage dosen't look too bad. He probably should have a higher Logic (assuming he's a hermetic) so that he can resist drain on those killer spells.

'Improved' Combat Mage:

[ Spoiler ]

Elf 30 points

Stats 250 points

BOD 4
AGL 3
REA 5
STR 2
CHA 4
INT 3
LOG 5
WIL 5
MAG 5
EDG 2

Dropped STR, and AGL to concentrate on better magic abilities, the higher willpower and logic give bonuses to drain resistance. The higher Bod allow him to wear an armored jacket without getting any penalties, its not like he has any guns he needs to hide under a lined coat, now is it?

Skills (104 points)

Blades and pistols dropped in favor of more magical hoop kicking skills

Conjuring Group (Banishing, Binding, Summoning) 4
Astral Combat 3
Counter spelling 3
Etiquette 2
Perception 2
Spell Casting 6

I'm not convinced of the utility of a low dodge skill, as you sacrifice your action and don't seem to gain a whole lot.

Spells 24 (I assume the stock spell choices are not compeletly stupid...
Gear 4
Contacts 8

This version comes out to 461 karma, about average cost compared to the other archetypes

[edit]
karma cost edited
[/edit]

[Crusher Bob]

Archetypes are batting 0 for 3 now for staying within the rules, the Covert Ops specialist has equipment over starting availability.

This acrhetype suffers a bit from wanting to do too much at once an attempt to combine close combat, sneaking, electronics, and social enigneering just falls flat, besides having the character look like a pirate would have made it much cooler :grinbig:

[ Spoiler ]

BOD 2
AGL 5 (7)
REA 5 (7)
STR 2
CHA 3
INT 4
LOG 4
WIL 3

Edge 4

Essence : 4.2

Athletics Group (Climbing, Gymnastics, Running, Swimming) 3
Stealth Group (Disguide, Infiltration, Palming, Shadowing) 4

Etiquette 3
Exotic Weapon (monowhip) 6
Hardware 4
Perception 3
Pistols 1

Edges/Flaws
Blandness
Double Jointed
Weak Immune System

Gear 22 Points
Contacts 10 points

Ware
Rating 3 Cybereyes
Flare Comp, Low Light, Thermographic, Smartlink, Vision Enhancement 3

Rating 3 Cyber Ears
Hearing Enhancement 2, Balance Augmentor, Spatial Recognizer, Select Sounds Filter 4

Muscle Toner 2

Reaction Enhancers 2

Gear
Chameleon Suit
Thermal Damping 4

Monofilament Whip
Ares Viper Slivergun(Smartlink)
90 rounds + 2 spare mags
Fake SIN 3
Nanopaste Disguise (Small)
Autopicker 6
Cellular Glove Molder 3
Keycard Copier 6
Maglock Passkey 4
High Lifestyle (1 month)
Plus some crap I was too lazy to write down

13 dice with a monowhip, good enough to get rid of most things in close combat.

This version costs 467 points in first pass Becks

It's probably worth it to trade off a point of edge for 50K more :nuyen: so that you can get some more ware. That version costs 478 karma.

The original cost was 433 karma.

So far, it looks like the base costs might be 'ok'.

If you want to help, make up some characters with 460 karma and try to cheese them out. Send me a PM and I'll send you the excel file I'm using.

[edit]
changed karma cost, recommended 1st pass karma total is 460 karma, not 450
[/edit]

[coolgrafix]

Love what you're doing. Someone has too much time on his hands. God bless 'im. =)

[Crusher Bob]

Crap, I've cleaned up my excel spreadsheets and it looks like my calculations for karma costs were off. How irritating. Now I'll have to do it all over again :wobble:

Bounty Hunter 456 (Over by 2 BP) (sigh, didn't add troll costs)
Combat Mage 416 (Short 10 BP)
Covert Ops Specialist 433 (Violates Starting Availability)
Drone Rigger 495
Enforcer 462
Face 469
Gunslinger 428 (10 Points Short)
Hacker 492 (Violates Starting Availability)
Occult invertigator 397 (2 BP Short)
Eco Shaman 451
Smuggler 483 (12 BP Over)
Sprawl Ganger 434
Street Sam 477
Street Shaman 427 (10 BP short)
Technomancer 457 (10BP Short, There is no Deception Complex form, hahahaha)
Weapons Specialist 470

Technomancers are so boned. Their whole character creation will have to be re-written (heres a hint, a rating 6 hacking program costs 6000Y) a 'regular' rating 6 program costs 3000Y) getting all programs at rating 6 would cost a hacker 22.2 BP in resources, the same thing for a technomancer would cost... err 126 BP, or 462 karma (assuming you started with 0 in every form)

I haven't read the rules of that section yet, but it says that there is a complex form for 'every program' (except biofeedback filter) there are 22 programs listed, so there would seem to be 21 complex forms.

There are 7 'Basic' forms
Analyze, Browse, Command, Edit, Encrypt, Reality Filter, and Scan

and 14 'Hacking' Forms
Armor, Attack, Black Hammer, Black Out, Data Bomb, Decrypt, Defuse, ECCM, Exploit, Medic, Sniffer, Spoof, Stealth, Track

(There is no deception complex form, that appears in the technomancer archetype. The word 'deception' only appears twice in the book, once on the archetype and once in the description of the Trickster mentor spirit.)

It looks like 7 outs of 16 archetypes don't have correct BP values, several more violate starting availability (avail 16 stuff, fake sin rating 4, large nanopaste disguise, maybe some other stuff)

[Crusher Bob]

Here's the estimated 'fixed' karma costs for the archtypes, assuming 1 BP = 2 karma

Bounty Hunter 452
Combat Mage 436
Covert Ops Specialist 433
Drone Rigger 495 Highest
Enforcer 462
Face 469
Gunslinger 448
Hacker 492
Occult invertigator 401 Lowest
Eco Shaman 451
Smuggler 459
Sprawl Ganger 434
Street Sam 477
Street Shaman 447
Technomancer 477
Weapons Specialist 470

This makes the new archetype averages:

Average: 456
Average without highest and lowest: 458
Average without two highest and lowest: 457

[Rotbart van Dain...]

[Crusher Bob]

I'm skipping the Drone rigger tonight, as it's late already. Re-computing the archetypes and cleaning up the excel files took a while

Take away the enforcer's wired two and he's not that impressive, this version can at least try to be scary

[ Spoiler ]

BOD 9
AGL 4 (6)
REA 4 (6)
STR 8 (10)
CHA 3
INT 3
LOG 2
WIL 3

Essence 1.0

Close Combat Group 4 (Blades, Clubs, Unarmed Combat)
Firearms Group 2 (Automatics, Longarm, Pistol)

Dodge 3
Etiquette 3
Forgery 3
Intimidation (Physical) 6
Pilot Ground Craft 1
Shadowing 3

Ware:
Wired 2, Muscle Replacement-2

Edges/Flaws
Same as archetype

Gear 13
contacts 9

This could use a bit more work, but at least this enforcer can sacre people... (rolls 9 +2 dice for intimidation, vs the 5 dice the original version rolled)

Costs 465 karma

[Crusher Bob]

Here, constant reader, is tonights archetype: the face:

[ Spoiler ]

BOD 3
AGL 3
REA 3
STR 3
CHA 5
INT 5
LOG 4
WIL 5

E 4

Electronics 2
Influence 4

Dodge 3
Intimidation 3
Perception 3
Pilot Ground Craft 2
Pistols 2

Gear 18
Contacts 30 (up the loyalty of all the faces contacts by one, a face that can't rely on her contacts seems a bit odd)

Ware:
Add Tailored Pheremones -3

I switchd the social skills to the skill group to be able to afford the tailored pheremones. This also gives the face the leadership skill, should it every come up.

470 karma.

Doof, I;m tired.

[Crusher Bob]

Here's the next archetype: The gunslinger

It's built with 460 karma weighting in at 419 build points

[ Spoiler ]

Ork

BOD 5
AGL 5
REA 5 (7)
STR 4
CHA 3
INT 5
LOG 3
WIL 3

Mag 5
Edg 4

Athletics Group 2 (Climbing, Gymnastics, Running, Swimming)
Dodge 4 Ranged
Etiquette 3 Street
Infiltration 3
Intimidation 3
Perception 3
Pistols (Revolvers) 6
Unarmed Combat 3

Edges/Flaws
Adept (5 BP)
Ambidextrous (5 BP)
Mild Allergy to Pollutants (+10 BP)
SINner (+5 BP)
Sensitive System (+15 Pts) Yay, free points

Adept powers:
Combat Sense 4
Improved Reflexes: 2



Passive defense is where its at, the adept already rolls 5 + 6 +2 +2 (slink) = 15 dice on the attack, adding two more is not really worth it. On the other hand 4 levels of combat sense is pretty sweet.

Ad a pair of smartlinked warhawks firing EX explosive ammo and you are good to go.

The first difficulty is that skill groups and some stats cost odd karma wihle evernthing else seems to be even.

Specializations are hard to resist at 2 karma per.

Sensitive system should probably be reduced to a five point flaw for the awakened.
The cost of being magical should probably be raised by 5 points (and maybe effect the essence cost of bioware as well).

Flaws can provide a significnt amount of karma (70 pts) which is roughly 1/6ths of your karma total, but only 1/10th of your bp total.

The cost of the stats almost certainly needs to be upped (but everyone already knew that already)

Improved ability should probably be limited to half skill, round down) (and kinestics needs to be nerfed)

A fix for wired reflexes/adept boots vs synaptic accelerators may need to be considered (1.5 essence/mp a level?, adepts are still better off just getting synaptic accelerators)

[coolgrafix]

[Crusher Bob]

I'm back.

Skipping the hacker (still need time to read that section), so our next guy up is the Occult Investigator.

I decided to go full out for a jack-of-all trades, to see what 460 karma could produce, which is a surprising amount in this case (the flaws help).

[ Spoiler ]

Human, Mystic Adept

BOD 3
AGL 3
REA 3
STR 2
CHA 4
INT 4
LOG 4
WIL 4 (159 karma)

Mag 5
Edge 3

total stats (207 karma)

Conjuring 3 (Banishing, Binding, Summoning)
Influence 3 (Con, Etiquette, Negotiation, Leadership)
Sorcery 3 (Counterspelling, Ritual, Spellcasting)
Stealth 3 (Disguise, Infiltration, Palming, Shadowing)
(skill groups 140 karma

Assensing 4
Data Search 4
Dodge 3 Ranged
Perception 4 Visual
Pistols 3 Semi-Auto

(skills 100 karma)

Edges/Flaws (+50 karma)
Mystical Adept (10)
Unlucky 20
Sensitive System 15 (is there any reason not to take this flaw? Will definitely fix)

Spells (5 spells) (25 karma)

Resources 25K (10 karma)

Contacts 14 points (28 karma)

Magic 3
Adept Powers:
Astral perception
1 point of adept powers to taste

The massive bonus from flaws and the fact that no skills are above 4, and the fact that the stats are all 'mid range' make the investigator able to get surprising breadth of abillity.