Invincible Troll, Help with an annoying player/character Options

[Masterofthegame]

Okay, I have a problem. I have a troll in my group that has become truly obnoxious, and the last time he played kind of put it over the edge. He's so tough that the group has been sending him into fights alone, and just giving him cover.

Without specifically targeting him with high-force spirits or something I'm not sure how to realistically make him aware that he's not all-powerful. He doesn't even have a huge amount of Karma. 30 or 40 maybe. The problem is that he has a high body and high willpower, coupled with great armor and the group mage counterspelling he's nearly invincible. Follow that up with a quick improved invisibility, and he's nigh-unstoppable.

Add in a combat axe, Ares Alpha, and a Ruger super warhawk, and he's a killing machine. In the last game he got a lucky shot against a Citymaster with his warhawk, stopping it in its tracks, and then killed everyone inside when the troops came out to fight him. His high force invis made him almost impossible to hit, and his armor stopped anything that did hit. Between the mage's counterspells and his willpower, not even the old manabolt works.

He's so convinced that he has the ultimate character build that it has gotten obnoxious. All he ever does is talk about how he constantly saves the team.

So, what do I do? I know there is always the spirit option, and I've used it, which forced the team adept to actually get out and do something, but short of swarming him every time he gets out of the car, nothing seems to scare him.

[yesman]

bad guy sammy stick-n-shocks the mage that's counterspelling for the troll, then the bad guy mage geeks the troll with manabolts.

[laughingowl]

SR3 may be bleeding over to SR4 ...

But isn't that quickened spell just a visible neon light glaring as a sustained foci. So having somebody attack and destroy the quickened spell would help some. Or just force him to pass through a high rating ward (lodge).


Well from the descriptions no mention of full chemsuit/gas mask (and if worn regularly attract ALOT of attention).

Look at layering penalties.

Many checmical have effect even if they are 'resisted' (dice penalties etc).

A Pepper punch grenade (if allowed), a CS grenade, a nausea grenade while with his body/will probbably will not 'drop' him certainly should stack up some nice dice pool penalties.

Also electricity is always nice.

Let the enemies learn the parties MO. If the party always lets IT go in and smash, while the cover from back. Let the opponents lay a trap a few explosives, several drones, a lot of smoke and noise (and radio jammers) keep IT busy while the rest of the guards circle round to deal with the 'support'. One support is taken out opposing magic can deal with IT nicely.

If the 'star' remember killing (or even incapicitating) aint the only thing he has to worry about.

RFID tags, 'dye' grenades, bright neon pink foam glue grenades all can lead to be traced/followed/tracked which means 'copter and drones gunning for you.


Then the old standbye, sounds like he would have a very noticable street rep.... have a few copy cat mimicks. Other 'almost like him' trolls that start letting him take credit (and blame) for their actions..

If all else fails....

LPT2 (Large P-Offed Troll 2) get hassles one too many times, because of some 'joker' causing problems and LPT2 takes the heat.

LPT2 (exact same stats as Invicible Troll) starts following IT around. Next time IT starts combat LPT2 delays his action to go last and then opens up on IT. See if IT can take the same hits he can put out.

[FanGirl]

A munchkin, eh? What kind of negative qualities does IT have? He must have an Achilles' heel, and you would do well to find it and smash it into tiny little heel-bone shards. That's what I'd try to do. ;)

[laughingowl]

Also on the 'group mage hands back and counterspelling'

SR4 isn't counterspelling strictly LOS, so the mage has to be in sight (if not in melee) of the fight. If he hangs back to far, cause something to break LOS, if he is close enough that aint likely have somebody go for HIM.


A team working together can be almost un-beatable. UNLESS the opponents can justifably work together as well to exploit any weakness and then pound it.

[Samaels Ghost]

Don't forget wards and spirits. Spirits may not be able to take out your Troll, but a smart summoner will know that the invincible troll needs a mage to counterspell for him. Even if the spirit doesn't kill the team mage, the mage won't be able to counter-spell for him while distracted.

Also, keep in mind your mage has to be LOS to counterspell for Troll-boy. That puts him in a dangerous situation.

[Liminaut]

Smoke.

Nothing fancy, just have a drone start dropping smoke grenades on the covering team. Presto, no more covering fire. No more LOS for counterspelling. And I don't think Mr. Troll is invisible any more.

There's a pretty good chance he'll do OK in the fight, but this way he'll have to work for it.


And you know what? This is even modern day, bog-standard military tactics. Smoke 'em if you got em.

[WhiskeyMac]

I had this exact same type of character in my game back in my SR3 days as GM. He even went further and wanted to get custom made backpack fed assault rifles built into forearm guards. He was my splitting headache everytime we played.

How I dealt with him: :nuyen: . Make it so any deaths, any at all, will result in them not getting payed. Non-lethal methods only, otherwise bad rep and no Johnsons will hire them for ANY runs. After awhile he stopped killing everything he saw on a run.

After that I started using ice sheet to make him less melee, drones and smoke to make him less bum-rushy (is that a word?), and AOE fireballs for effect.

With this guy, just have everyone use Ultrasound. That takes away his invisibility. Have them start packing RFID specific APDS ammo (only their RFIDs will make it work). That takes away his armor. And then have the security mage pop out an elemental on the counterspelling mage. That takes away his anti-magic shield. Then just start beating down.

Also, 2 drones with Ares Alphas would tear his ass open with full-auto long bursts. It's not overpowered, it's "standard" ;)

[Cabral]

Ideas.
First, tactics:
Don't have the mage attack him directly at first, instead have him use dispelling to nix the Invisibility.

If the rest of the team is giving him covering fire, they're great targets for the security team's fire ... especially if the Troll's invisible.

If they've mad a habit of this, security teams/patrols will take note and adjust. Have the every team accompanied by one or two spirits. When they hit, have Spirit/astral reinforcements show up in a few turns and physical reinforcements in a minute or two.

Weapons:
A Monofilament whip's 8P -4 AP is nasty but might just give him ideas.
Instead, try a Defiance EX shocker (8S electrical damage) resisted by half impact.

A Supersquirt with Gamma-Scopolamine can take him right out. he can resist with his many body dice plus any toxin resistance gear, but if he doesn't get 8 hits on the resistance test, he's paralyzed (and at -3 willpower) for an hour. Other toxins (Narcojet is also popular) can be fun too. (see page 245-246)

A Fichetti Pain Inducer is also fairly unpleasant. If the modified power is over his Willpower he has to run away.

Spells:
An Astral perceiving mage can ignore his invisibility and cast:
Acid spells which will leave a noxious cloud around the troll.

Decrease Attribute (Intelligence, Logic, or Charisma) which is resisted by the attribute decreases (+counterspelling dice). A 0 Mental attribute means he stands there confused as long as the mage sustains the spell.

Use Phantasm or Trid Phantasm to create Illusionary allies.

Ice Sheet will make it hard for him to stand on his feet and counterspelling won't help.

Use levitate (and sustain it with a sustaining focus) the attack from the air! Fireballs for everyone!

Throw up an Physical Barrier around him to keep him contained until everyone else deals with his friends ...

My suggestion is to step things up for a few games; beef up armor and weapons (maybe have one LMG equipped officer in each citymaster squad), as well as adding the spirit/astral support. Maybe bump the iniation of your security mages one grade.

If that doesn't slow them down, have them tagged by a "hit squad". Some Prime Runners equiped with nice gear, including gamma-scopolamine loaded squirt guns. They hit the team between runs or while doing legwork. Have the players taken down and paralyzed then hauled off. Repeat dossage if necessary. Have these Prime Runners explain that it's great that they can do be so bold, but they shouldn't. Tell them that it's raising security accross the board and that if they don't cool off, security will keep escalating and the corps will start sending hit teams after your players.

Then perhaps they say they've got great potential if the can manage to be more subtle. All the while being annonymous. (If the PCs try to get revenge, go ahead, say they're Azzies ... Nobody cares if you kill an Azzie anyway)

If you think they've learned from the esxperience, give them an extra two or three karma points at the end of the adventure.

Of course, I may be too nice as a GM ...

[Charon]

He stopped a Citymaster with a Warhawk?

Armor 20, Body 16? That Citymaster?

How the hell did you let that fly? It's basically an APC. First of all there is no way the DV exceeded the armor so the bullet should have glanced harmlessly. And even if you did make the roll, how can 36 dice possibly not be enough to resist a single bullet?!

If you let him get away with that kind of crap, then my first advice is... Stop letting him get away with that kind of crap!

---

Soldiers aren't stupidly going to charge a tough invisble enemy. first order of business is staying alive, taking cover and spotting the enemy. If the force in presence can't do it, they'll call for backup while withdrawing to a safe location as best they can.

Backup can come in the form of an astrally projecting mage in seconds and that will means spirit.

But remember that invisibility work on the visual spectrum. So unless the Troll also has hush active, you can get him with Ultrasound. No matter what, there is at least that and they'll only get -3 to shoot instead of -6.

If the troll is taking cover (bringing the penalties to -7) and shooting at the soldiers, they'll stay on the defensive, get great cover (or even stay out of sight as long as the team as a whole can keep a visual on the troll through a single spotter or a drone for example) and wait for even more backup to arrives. Drones. SWAT. The full monty. They aren't in a hurry ; your PCs are!

If the troll is moving in the open to flush them out, they'll fire at him repeatedly. Concentrated fire. You get -1 for every additional reaction test you makes since your last action so sooner or later the solider will connect solidly.

If three soldier shoot at the troll in the same phase, that's 6 burst. The last burst are at -4 and -5 to reaction for dodge. They'll hit him. With assault rifle that will be DV 6 + 3 + successes. Don't be affraid to use edge on that last shot, the one where he can't dodge anymore. Make it count. A Red Samurai using Edge, ultrasound and EX round against an invisible troll who is -5 to dodge with reaction 8 could easily end up with DV 16 on a narrow burst (13 dice -3 sight -1 2nd burst +5 edge = roughly 6 success) and -2 AP.

To eliminate that, your troll would need on average 50 dice of Body + Armor. I don't care how twinked out he is, he'll be hurt.

3-4 soldier fighting intelligently is enough to either holdoff your troll until more backup arrive or crush him if he singlehandedly try to flush out the opposition and thus put himself in a crossfire situation where he has little to no cover at close range.

And I haven't touched on what a mage could do

[Samaels Ghost]

gamma-scopolamine only paralyzes if the power reduces Reaction to 0. A cybered character probably has Reaction enhancements, so this may not be a great idea.

If the mage is hit, any spells he's sustaining may be dropped. He rolls Body+Willpower (2 or 3) to see if he drops his spells. Keep this in mind for trying to drop the Imp Invisibility.

[Samaels Ghost]

[hobgoblin]

hmm, where did that -1 pr reaction test come from?

[Charon]

[Samaels Ghost]

[hobgoblin]

ugh, i realy need to go over those modifier tables with a fine tooth comb...

and that citymaster is more of a APC/IFV but you would atleast expect it to be using run-flat tires ;)

[Charon]

[Samaels Ghost]

[Dissonance]

I think that SR3's R3R had a thumbnail sized picture in it. Regardless, I picture a Citymaster as looking like a cross between a garbage truck and an RV circa Mad Max.

Basically, a mobile bunker that is sure to spread warm fuzzies to all and sundry.

[Samaels Ghost]

Like this?
http://www.mojojets.com/images/trucks/APC-432-01.jpg

Or this?
http://www.badside.freeserve.co.uk/images/ifv-pic.jpg

Which one fits more closely to the Citymaster?

[Charon]

[hobgoblin]

that last one kinda fits my mental image of it atleast.
or maybe just a armored van equiped to carry police rather then cash...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWAT_van
http://www.swat-truck.com/

i keep getting surprised as to what one can find on wikipedia...

[Charon]

Oh no, it has nothing to do with these SWAT truck image.

It's like a military Armore Personnel Carrier, as I keep repeating.

The description says it has life support and a turret! The old images are pretty close to the second one Hobgoblin posted but as I said it's lower on the ground. It ain't for wilderness use.

[hobgoblin]

no problem taking a swat van, putting a turret on top and making the cabin have overpressure (and a air filter on the pump) so that nasty gasses and similar cant get in...

[Glyph]

Well, at least with his solo act, you don't have to worry about toning down the opposition for the sake of the rest of the team. Now, there are plenty of tactics to use against this character build, but you should also ask yourself how much your games revolve around combat.

If combat is the main thing, then he does have a really good build. But shadowrunning should also involve planning, legwork, and some degree of stealth (a gunfight on the way out or near the goal is one thing, but if you hit the gate shooting, it should usually end poorly). The other players should be doing matrix searches, talking to their contacts, negotiating payment, following leads, and so on.

Even in combat, there should be things for the others to do. The mage is already buffing the troll and providing counterspelling, but the hacker could be trying to shut down the sentry gun with ultrasound sensors, the rigger could be giving the team a bird's eye view of the guard forces from his airborne drone, the face should be getting them past the ferroconcrete guardhouse with fake ids and some fast-talking, etc.

You can challenge the troll more, but you also need to give the rest of the team something useful to do (giving them suggestions if they are relatively new to roleplaying - remember that their characters would have a professional's knowledge), so he doesn't get quite as much of a swollen ego.