 Do adepts suck right now?, Yes, they do. |
  |
 Jan 22 2007, 06:53 PM
Post
#31
|
|
|
Running Target  Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534  |
Baseline for SAMs:
Attribute 4-5, Attributeware 3, Skill 4-5, Specialisation 2, Skillware 1, Smart 2 = 16-18 dice. 15 dice is the least I expect from a SAM using his primary weapon. |
 |
 
|
|
Jan 22 2007, 07:16 PM
Post
#32
|
|||||
|
Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,333 Joined: 19-August 06 From: Austin Member No.: 9,168 |
Only in their primary skill. It is about the cap, yes. To be fair, it's not in line with what the book suggests as a normal level. But for a serious survivor, I think it's pretty well required. SR really requires competency to survive, I feel. With the ease of death, an average runner will be dead in a week. But that's a matter of preference, I know. I guess more to the point, there's not that much difference between an adept and a sammie in those regards. Both primarily rely on their skills and attributes. They then have the option to boost their skills by a couple points with ware/adept powers, and then to boost their attributes by the same. In my defense, I'm on at least 3 different OTC meds for allergies today. I'm...uh...not sure how that plays in, but I think it does. Somewhere. |
||||
|
|
|
||||
|
Jan 22 2007, 07:18 PM
Post
#33
|
|
|
Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,549 Joined: 31-December 06 Member No.: 10,502 |
Why hasn't anyone mentioned the healing bit. I'm away from my book but I'm pretty sure they didn't take that out of magic and I know it's in regular first aid.
While the hit limites and starting threshhold of two on healing means you won't get the SR3 effect where when a Sammie goes down he stays down and when an adept goes down he's back at full health in a few combat turns (first aid, then magical healing). But it's still a difference that favors an adept along with their concealability. Which means that they SHOULD be worse at straight up combat. (Though I do think some things are now overpriced.) Also part of what made an adept go from good to great before were some of their super stealth abilities. But I don't have the new books. Can they still walk without noise on top of leaves or balance on the tiniest of branches? |
|
|
|
|
Jan 22 2007, 07:24 PM
Post
#34
|
|
|
Genuine Artificial Intelligence Group: Members Posts: 4,019 Joined: 12-June 03 Member No.: 4,715 |
Yes, adepts still have Traceless Walk.
And I think the adepts' healing advantage is lessened in this edition since by many people's interpretation of the healing rules 10 boxes of damage takes all of a day or two to heal. (note that there are more than one interpretation, several of which make a good deal more sense to me, but there is still some ambiguity and confusion) |
|
|
|
|
Jan 22 2007, 07:28 PM
Post
#35
|
|
|
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 749 Joined: 28-July 05 Member No.: 7,526 |
lol . . . adepts underpowered. I guess you also forgot with how much ease they can dispatch spirits.
|
|
|
|
 Jan 22 2007, 09:49 PM
Post
#36
|
|
|
jacked in Group: Admin Posts: 9,737 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 463 |
Not Force 20 spirits...
Bye Thanee |
|
|
|
 Jan 22 2007, 09:51 PM
Post
#37
|
|||
|
jacked in Group: Admin Posts: 9,737 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 463 |
You mean apart from the very first reply (and the re-reply)? ;) Bye Thanee |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 22 2007, 10:24 PM
Post
#38
|
|
|
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 433 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Somewhere in Iraq Member No.: 1,789 |
How are Adepts more concealable when every important place that they would be sneaking into would have someone with astral sight assense them for talent? In order for you to tell if someone has wired reflexes and other cyber that is inside the body you have to use tech or you can't tell anyway. Besides, if I was a security guard in 2070 I would be wary of anyone who was 40 years or younger who didn't have either cybereyes or a datajack or both. I would then call up the mage and have them assense the person. Wireless just came out about 5 years ago so datajacks aren't completely useless yet and cybereyes are still considered "cool" and "fashionable".
Oh yeah, not to nitpick but with the sample uber-adept his addictions aren't legal. Nicotine and Caffeine aren't considered "harmful" enough to warrant BP. I think without a Magic hardcap Adepts are always going to outpace Street Sammies anyday. They always have and always will as long as that hardcap isn't there. |
|
|
|
|
Jan 22 2007, 10:31 PM
Post
#39
|
|||
|
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 777 Joined: 22-November 06 Member No.: 9,934 |
wireless came out 5 years ago? yeah but everything is wireless. cool/fashionable is dependant upon your social circle so anyone who could have afforded a datajack can also afford to have it removed. what about induction pads? I have never seen an adept outpace any streetsam. and all we see in this thread is people "talking" adepts are fine, adepts are uber powered, adepts are underpowered... Sammies are better, sammies are worse... why not show the examples of why adepts are better or sammies are better. |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 22 2007, 10:54 PM
Post
#40
|
|||
|
Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,498 Joined: 4-August 05 From: ADL Member No.: 7,534 |
Not in SR4. I give you 150 Karma and 450k (thats a ratio of 1 to 3k) on top of the 400 BP Try to make an adept without cyberware (note face adept though, kinesics are broken) that is better than its cybered version. Adepts start to outpace SAMs only at incredibly unrealistic karma amounts of 300 or so. |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 22 2007, 11:12 PM
Post
#41
|
|
|
Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 325 Joined: 9-December 06 From: the Maaatlock-Expressway! Member No.: 10,326 |
With only 1 or 2 in 100 people magically active, I wonder where you are going to get all those astrally percieving watchdogs?
In sensitive areas, yes. But definitely not as commonplace as ware-scanners. My personal playing experience with adepts is limited to SR2 (yes, I am quite old, me), and I always felt even were chickenshit compared to even the standard out-of-the-box BBB-sams. With SR4, I feel the playing-field has been a bit evened, at least on paper. Unless you're min-maxing. Then, a well-cybered char can wipe the floor with a pure adept. Attribute-powers are, and have always been, too damn expensive. Seriously though, my approach would probably be to gimp bio a bit. Make toner and aug a wittle more expesive, essence-wise. But then, I tend to like my SR low- to mid-powered, where a rating 5 is actually good and a 6 something you can aspire to... |
|
|
|
|
Jan 22 2007, 11:23 PM
Post
#42
|
|||
|
Hoppelhäschen 5000 Group: Members Posts: 5,807 Joined: 3-January 04 Member No.: 5,951 |
You forgot a zero there. |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:03 AM
Post
#43
|
|||
|
Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,598 Joined: 24-May 03 Member No.: 4,629 |
I look at your stats, tho, and go, "That's just crazy huge out there. Seriously? *Crazy!*" Here, it's 4 (6) Agility with Firearms 4 and a Smartlink giving the Sammy 12 dice, making him a *monster*, while everyone else is in the 8-12 range. The mage, for example, is Conjuring Group 4 and Magic 5, the Face is Charisma 5 and Influence Group 4, the Hacker is Skill Groups of 4 and rating 4 programs, etc. 8-10 is standard issue, with 12 being just crazy good. |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:16 AM
Post
#44
|
|||
|
Target Group: Members Posts: 17 Joined: 22-January 07 From: Wellington, KS Member No.: 10,734 |
There you go, talking about my character again. Don't forget my bouncyball ownage on the last run though. [edit] Don't forget to mention that we only started out with 450 karma for our characters, using a slightly modified version of SeCKsy. |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:17 AM
Post
#45
|
|
|
Prime Runner Group: Banned Posts: 3,732 Joined: 1-September 05 From: Prague, Czech Republic Member No.: 7,665 |
I think that the idea of charging Adepts extra for Increased Combat abilities is dumb. Adepts are supposed to punch people in the nuts, that's their iconic fucking job. Increase Attributes also shouldn't cost extra when the attribute is very large, since the only god damned point is that it is an attribute augmentation that exceeds your normal attribute limits.
And if you want to have Distance Shot and Elemental Strike at the same time to throw fireballs like Ryu, why the hell not? And people certainly shouldn't be paying more than a single Magic Point for either power when both are objectively inferior to just being a Mage and knowing a single spell. So I'm willing to say that Adepts are overcharged for a lot of things. But autohits are bullshit. That was tried in SR1, and it was broken as fuck. With real broken and real broken sauce. -Frank |
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:28 AM
Post
#46
|
|
|
Target Group: Members Posts: 17 Joined: 22-January 07 From: Wellington, KS Member No.: 10,734 |
I don't like the idea of auto-hits...That just means that phys adepts automatically own everybody else. I don't see that Adepts are gimped anyway. Maybe some people out there just can't really get the numbers to work right for them.
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:34 AM
Post
#47
|
|||||
|
Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670 |
no, it doesn't. that's the neat thing. because the TN is fixed and everything is threshold-based, auto-successes don't mean auto-winning--they just mean that the effective threshold for their tests are lowered.
auto-successes would be horribly unbalanced in a variable-TN system, because they would allow you to succeed against any difficulty level. TN 100? no problem! however, when every TN is 5, auto-successes don't unbalance anything (unless they're handed out too liberally, which is true of any mechanic). of course, SR4 doesn't actually use auto-successes... |
||||
|
|
|
||||
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:35 AM
Post
#48
|
|
|
Dragon Group: Members Posts: 4,589 Joined: 28-November 05 Member No.: 8,019 |
Well, there are threshold modifiers for jumping in VR into a drone; -1 to each threshold.
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:37 AM
Post
#49
|
|
|
Immortal Elf Group: Members Posts: 11,410 Joined: 1-October 03 From: Pittsburgh Member No.: 5,670 |
exactly. -1 threshold is, basically, an auto-success. you just can't use that success unless you roll at least one success on the dice.
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:41 AM
Post
#50
|
|
|
Canon Companion Group: Members Posts: 8,021 Joined: 2-March 03 From: The Morgue, Singapore LTG Member No.: 4,187 |
There is always an evolution from edition to edition. There are somethings that mundanes were good at that adepts are better (for) now, like hacking. There are somethings that adepts are going to be flat better at, like Social and "Brain" skills. The adept niche has changed. I do not presume to know what role the developers wanted the adepts to fill, but if I wanted to hazard a guess, I would think that they wanted people to move more towards a non-Combat skill oriented adept. Adepts are weakened in Combat Skills, but they are better now in other things.
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:53 AM
Post
#51
|
|||
|
Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,241 Joined: 10-August 02 Member No.: 3,083 |
wait, what? Weren't we all talking last year about how terrible Street Sams were in comparison to Adepts? Yes, those points are a little more expensive, but keep in mind that the supply is, in theory, infinite. Where as Essence is a very limited resource, and low essence has a distinct disadvantage (magical healing is harder). |
||
|
|
|
||
|
Jan 23 2007, 01:55 AM
Post
#52
|
|
|
Target Group: Members Posts: 17 Joined: 22-January 07 From: Wellington, KS Member No.: 10,734 |
That's what I was thinking. I never really could get a mundane street sammy to work right for me, but maybe I'm just an awakened kind of guy...
|
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 03:40 AM
Post
#53
|
|
|
Great Dragon Group: Members Posts: 7,116 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 1,449 |
Personally, I think some 'ware should be better, able to do things that adept abilities can't. And it should be a temptation for an adept. And if he gives in, so what? He's just being smart!
For a hit of one Magic point, you can get Muscle Toner: 2, Synthcardium: 3, an alphaware Ultrasound Sensor, alphaware Cyberears with audio enhancement: 3 and sound dampening, and an alphaware Internal Air Tank. You have 2 points to all Agility tests and related skill tests, 3 additional points to all skills in the Athletics group, you can detect invisible enemies and active ultrasound sensors, you have superior hearing, and you can hold your breath long enough to negate any purely-inhaled gasses. And that's only one example. But the poor sammie can't save a point of his Essense to buy adept powers with, so he is at a disadvantage compared to the adept, who can get the best of both worlds. Street samurai start out potentially more well-rounded, as adepts start out as potentially better specialists, but adepts have the higher growth potential. |
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 05:59 AM
Post
#54
|
|
|
Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,598 Joined: 15-March 03 From: Hong Kong Member No.: 4,253 |
Well, here's my contribution teh broken cyber-adept build:
Ork (bow before the master race) 20 BP B 4 A 5 (7) S 3 R 4 (8) I 5 L 3 C 2 W 3 Edge 3 Magic 5 (3) Init 13 (3 IP) Essence 4.0 skills: Athletics Skill Group 4 Pistols (revolvers) 6 (9) Unarmed Combat 4 Etiquette 4 Perception 3 Ambidexterity 5 Adept 5 whatever flaws float your boat (-25) Adept Powers Imp Pistols +3 Combat Sense 3 Contacts 15 pts Resources 50 pts (30K Y left over for gear) Ware: Synaptic booster-2 Muscle Toner -2 Reaction Booster -2 Skill wires -3 2 active skillsofts @ rating 3 (maybe pilot ground vehicle & first aid?) The skillwires allow the adept to compensate for its main weakness, lack of points left over for skills. On the other hand, you roll 13 dice of initiative, have 3 IP, shoot your warhawks with 20 dice, have a passive defense of 11 dice, can wear an armored jacket, can initiate... |
|
|
|
|
Jan 23 2007, 06:31 AM
Post
#55
|
|
|
Target Group: Members Posts: 30 Joined: 28-August 06 Member No.: 9,240 |
this is my 'pure' adept
Metatype : Troll Adept Attributes Body: 8 Agility: 5 Reaction: 6 (9) Strength: 8 Charisma: 2 Intuition: 2 Logic: 2 Willpower: 2 Edge: 2 Magic: 6 (12) Initiative: 11 Essence: 6 Knowledge Skills : N Active Skills Throwing Weapons : 5 Dodge : 6 Pistols : 4 Pilot Ground Craft : 4 Blades : 4 Positive Qualities Negative Qualities Sensitive System Weapons Katana Survival Knife Ares Viper Slivergun 10x Flechette Rounds (10 shots) Armors Chameleon Suit Lined Coat Clothing (Regular) Clothing (Regular) Actioneer Businnes Clothes Vehicles Suzuki Mirage (Racing Bike) Commlinks Commlink : Novatech Airware OS : Iris Orb Equipments 3x Fake Sin (Rating 6) Weapon Focus (Rating 6) Powers Combat Sense (Level 6) Improved Ability : Dodge (Level 6) Improved Reflexes (level 3) Mystic Armor (level 2) Contacts jo (L:3 C:2) bob (L:2 C:3) the combat sense and Improved Reflexes allow him to roll 15 dice to avoid getting shot and with Improved Ability : Dodge as well he rolls 27 dice to dodge attacks in close combat his mystic armor gives him 8/6 armor with a lined coat. this is just off the top of my head too |
|
|
|
|
|
Lo-Fi Version | Time is now: 16th May 2026 - 06:17 AM |
Topps, Inc has sole ownership of the names, logo, artwork, marks, photographs, sounds, audio, video and/or any proprietary material used in connection with the game Shadowrun. Topps, Inc has granted permission to the Dumpshock Forums to use such names, logos, artwork, marks and/or any proprietary materials for promotional and informational purposes on its website but does not endorse, and is not affiliated with the Dumpshock Forums in any official capacity whatsoever.