Initial Ramblings of a Mad Man, Our first 'test game', and opinions. Options

[Sphynx]

First off, let me say that I do not object at all to criticism here. I've already seen that in our feverish attempt to make characters we'd overlooked some indiscrepencies, so I expect I might have missed some rules.

I think the biggest problem so far is cyberware. In 3rd edition, the best cyberwares were the ones that altered TNs, after the first game, and seeing how little difference their cyberware made, the street-sam types in our game are feeling they could have done alot better without the cyberware. The only pieces of cyberware that the team was happy with was the commlinks and Wired Reflexes (of course). Nobody even got cybereyes or ears, since contact lenses and glasses were so much cheaper and all.

Magic seemed the same but different, hard to explain. No objections to the changes so far, (they didn't use any combat type spells yet), but it does seem alot harder to resist drain. We'll test more of that this evening I suppose, see if you take as much drain in combat spells as you do damage. :P

Anyhows, after the first game, there's some character alterations going on. Seems the StreetSam types are wanting to trade in their cyber for Synaptic Accelerators II, and alot less cyber overall. After seeing the phys ad with Synaptic Acc 2, +6 Pistols, and a SmartLink (external) and still have room for 2 levels of Muscle Toner and Muscle Aug, the Sams feel a bit out-classed

PS: Feel free to point out for me/them why/where/how it's more beneficial to be a Sam.

PPS: We're still just testing waters, that's why it's ok for them to be changing characters. No need to post about the wrongness of allowing players to trade-in their cyber for something else. :P

It seems alot of the book is dedicated to Decking, something we've never really delved into. Since everyone just did their best to 'convert' their 3rd edition starting characters over, we didn't get to test that either. I'm assuming/hoping that it's in Decking that Sams are alot more interesting... ? Our "rigger" hadda work last night, so he missed the game, we'll try to test some of that tonight as well.

Things I liked:

1 spell for Increased Reflexes. Very nice
Perception is a skill, not Intelligence. I've been House Ruling something similar for years.
400 points is 'low powered', compared to 3rd edition characters. I like that people, post char-gen still have alot of room to 'build up'.

I don't think anyone has a maximum in any attribute in our games, though some have multiple attributes at maximum-1.

Nobody has a Starting magic of 6, everyone started at 5, even the Adept with 2 esence of wares.

The main thing I don't like as a GM, is Edge starting at higher than 1 as an option. Couple of characters have Edges of 5 in our group, and as an old-school player, that 'karma pool' a low levels just feels wrong. :P I'll get use to it though. ;)

Anyhows, those are my initial ramblings of our first test-game. We'll test every night this week, and play 'set in stone' characters on Friday night to begin our campaign. Tonight... Food Fight. :P

Sphynx

[Jaid]

the main advantages to street sammies are:

1) BPs. that adept is blowing 50 BPs on a magic score (of which he only gets to keep 30 points worth), then blowing some money (ie more BPs) on a synaptic booster.

2) no bottomless karma holes. that is, the sammy can buy regular skills a lot more often than the typical adept (both in chargen and after)

3) multifunctionality. Sammies can fill in multiple jobs far more easily than an adept, generally speaking. largely because of points 1 and 2. for example, you could easily be a sammy/hacker or sammy/rigger (maybe even all 3, but probably not all that well).

anyways, basically your street sammy is gonna be the team's swiss army knife. he's the one who can look at skills like demolition and say "yeah, i have room for that, even though i'm focused on guns", or oddball weapon skills ("yeah, i know how to use a pain inducer").

on that note, have you been equipping your Sammies with skillwires? that will probably help a lot...

[Lord Ben]

Sammies are nice because they can easily top out their agility, reaction, and body and still get 3 or 4 initiative passes.

My Orc sam easily got to 13 body, 9 agil, 9 reaction within a couple sessions. Sure, an adept can get a high score in their attributes + abilities but that's their one trick. A Street sam can be nearly as good at that one skill, and a lot better in all the others.

[Phantom Runner]

[milspec]

[ogbendog]

another problem with glasses is that the availability adds up. I'm running a mage with cyber eyes, they have SGL, flash comp, thermo, low light, vision mag, vision enhance +2

in glasses, that would be 0+4R+2+6+4+2+4 = availability of 22.

Have them double check the availability of thier glasses and make sure it's 12 or less

[Cheops]

I use the new essence loss=part of your body rule that exists in SR4 now to rationalize putting that stuff in your eyes. If you paid essence for the gear then it resists with your body and armor as applicable. If you didn't then it resists just like any other object which usually means goodbye goggles/contacts. I can't imagine how much it would hurt to be wearing contacts when a grenade/flash bang/tear gas went off nearby. Melt to your eyeballs. Ouch!

Sams are definitely versatile. I personally like the one man platoon or else the panzer sam. The first has hordes of drones and weapons platforms so that if he plans ahead he has "buddies" helping him (and can be vastly improved by the team's technomancer). The second has around 30 resistance dice, 10 dodge dice, and 10 dice in firing a BIG gun. Both should have skillwires and then upgrade the skillwires to rating 5 ASAP.

[Sphynx]

ogbendog, that's why I said Lenses+Glasses combos. They have Avail 12 Lenses under Avail 12 Glasses.

Thanks for the tip milspec, I think he had it at 4 (+2 for SmartLink), will check that it's not greater than his Magic rating though.

[Aku]

[BetaFlame]

[Jaid]

it's cyberware. by definition, it's implants. it doesn't cost you any essence to go in for plastic surgery either, but that doesn't mean the changes are not part of your body. the covers are permanently part of your body... they just don't change how it works at all.

i would expect that continuously wearing contacts will cause you problems. not to mention the difficulties of what happens if the contacts get knocked out of place. good luck getting at them without the help of a cyberdoc.

[Jestercat]

I thought protective covers took capacity in cybereyes, ie they're attached to the eye itself? They're rather useful, though mostly I just take them for the coolness factor - like having a shadowy street sam who's eyes are flat black, looking hollow, or my current hacker who covers his in silver.

[Jaid]

no capacity is used, iirc. they are not attached to the eye, presumably.

exactly what they look like is a bit up to interpretation. on the one hand, i could see them being just sort of a cover directly over your eye. OTOH, i could also see them being big bug-eye type things (hey, it's +2 armor... it's gonna be thicker than regular contacts, you know)

[BetaFlame]

There's a cyber eye version, and a cosmetic version.

Maybe they have implanted anchors or something, but having the protective cover itself attached makes little to no sense. What happens after your first fire fight and they get chip, or scratched up? You have to have surgery to replace them?

Seems more likely that you can buy replacement covers, pop the old ones off, and pop the new ones on.

And people without cybereyes would need to have them taken off for eye exams and such. Corps/Military might shell for protective covers for their people, but short of SpecOps, I don't see them shelling for an entire cybereye package.

[Sphynx]

Aku: Possible, but if so, purely a House Rule. No rules indicate you can't stack the two, and unlike you I see it as completely possible and probable (since the book says that all this gear is usually DNI compatable, the 2 can probably talk to each other and auto-compensate).

As for secondary effects being mentioned. I can understand glasses being lost, my own group showed that when two handed in character sheets with a 10 nuyen 'strap' listed under their glasses. :P But I can't imagine Contact Lenses being affected. Your eyeball is more sensitive than the material they'd be making the Lenses out of in 2070.

Jester: Watchout, someone's likely to tell you how unprofessional your characters are with silver/black eyes, and how no runner would be caught dead working with them. :P However, I'm with you, I like having Silver Orbs for eyeballs. :P

[hobgoblin]

the classical view of eye covers are most likely taken from neuromancer.

more specificaly the character molly.

she have some kind of implantet mirrorshades over her eyes. the tear channels have been redirected into her mouth as there is no way for the water to escape the area behind the covers.

im guessing however that a more practical solution would be to have the mirrors somehow attach to small hooks or similar that would be surgicaly drilled into the skulle above and below the eye. this way one could remove them if needed. the seal around them would not be as tight tho, so im not sure if they would stop all manner of dust and similar.

[ogbendog]

[Aku]

[BetaFlame]

Aku, couldn't you use your Commlink to turn off the contacts or glasses so you could see with the other?

Isn't that why most things have a wireless interface now?

As far as the Protective Covers (Cosmetic) I think I am going to go with magnet anchors implanted on the bone ridge above and below the eye, and maybe on the bridge of the nose. They can be turned on and off with a wireless signal from your commlink.

[ogbendog]

it sounds like your players feel that samouri are kind of getting the shaft. So they'd probably agree to a house rule that you can't stack goggles and contacts.

so a samouri will end up with more/better vision mods than a mage. which should make them happy.

and try to attack them at least once at night so the guys with goggles and contacts don't have them in.

[Aku]

yes, you could, but then, they're not stacking the visions if they have one turned off, now are they? i just want to be able to avoid the "i can see everything all the time, because i've constantly got low light, and thermo, and vision mag zooming in and out to 50X and and and..." syndrome

[ogbendog]

you could say that they can only have goggles or contacts on one at a time, but that's a pain in the tuckas to remember which is on at any given time

[ElFenrir]

Well, the Sammie vs. Adept discussion has been around for awhile now.
I play an adept as a main character, and I gotta say, SR4 adepts are indeed beasts. He's actually well rounded between combat and social, especially intimidation, and the cost of some of those powers are SO cheap...and his skillset is nice and well balanced to boot. I even splurged and maxed out his Magic attribute, and he still ended up with a great skillset. He IS a bit of a karma vacum tho, between purchasing up a few more skills i'd like, and of course initating, upping the Magic after that, and bonding weapon foci. He doesn't have Reflexes however...I know thats the first one folks go for but there were so many other things i wanted.

the Sammie i have also a nice skillset for, and attribute wise, he sort of houses the Adept(due to ware of course), and his Initative as well. Of course, on the plus side, he can use ALL of his karma for skills and attributes. But, they each have their benefits and hinderances...the Adept can affect astral creatures, creatures with immunity to normal weapons(without whipping out a loud, obnoxious BFG), and abilities can up other skills as well as combat. The Sammie on the other hand has his advantages in other areas...he's a bit harder-bodied, typically has a bit more options in the combat area, and simpl;y put, doesn't have to spend 40-65 points for magic, and this can go elsewhere, like Edge.

Both can be versatile...if you play the points right, you can even make an effective Adept hacker/combatant, what with the cheap cost of increased non combat skills.

All in all, i find them quite effective, both of them. I don't hear anyone complaining about Adepts anymore, but i do hear a lot of Sammie complaints these day(in the older editions, it was opposite.) If you build 'em right, they are both some kickass characters.

[hobgoblin]

stacking googles and contacts? are people silly? the only thing the inner set would see if the display of the outer set :P

so if you put thermo on your contacts and then slip on a set of low-light googles. all you would see with your thermos on area heat-based reprecentation of the insides of said googles. maybe you can make out the shapes on the screen, no way would you get the benifit of both. want that? get yourself some cybereyes or put both features into the same device!

that or turn of one and put on the other ;)

[Grinder]