New players need some help!, We have no idea what we are doing. Options

[Mr.Jibaku]

Hello everyone, I am new to this forum and new to Shadowrun. My friends and I were playing Exalted and we found ourselves trying to make it more technology based and after talking about it we put that game on pause.

None of us in our group has ever played Shadowrun after 2nd Ed. We are always stuck with questions and I searched but I couldn't find the answers already posted.

In the core book it states that Implants have a starting attribute rating of 3. When using that implant, your dice pool is based on it's rating not your own. We think :please:

Scenario
Sal has a Agility rating of 6 and an right arm implant straight out the box with a rating of 3 and a Pistol skill of 4.

Questions
Sal using his right arm to fire a pistol would have a dice pool of 7 (Implant Agility 3 + Pistols 4). We ignore his stats when using implants, even though they are higher?

Sal decides to upgrade that arm because 3 is too low. So here is another thing thats confusing. Do you add the upgrade rating to the existing one? He buys a 4 Agility implant upgrade so now he would have 7? Does the 4 Agility upgrade simply replace the 3 that comes with it? If 3 is what all implants start out with why do they bother selling 1's and 2's?

Yea, um I know those are obvious but we just want to make sure because there is no playing this game half way right?

Thanks!

[Jaid]

the upgrades are added to the cyberlimb's stats.

that being said, your best bet with cyberlimbs is probably to either ignore them completely, or to wait until augmentation comes out and hope there will be some good "optional rules" that we can replace the real rules with :P (possibly including the rumoured "full cyborg rules")

[Demon_Bob]

Although, I like the idea of having a character with cyberlimbs, if your physical attributes are 3 or more they just don't seem cost effective in Essense or money.

I would reccomend the Muscle Toner bioware over cyberlimbs.

and yes the upgrades are added to the cyberlimb's stats.

[Dizzman]

As said earlier, if you want a more powerful street sam, your best bet is buying some muscle augmentation. If you want a street sam with a little chrome, the answers to your questions are below:

-You use the attributes of the cyberlimb in most cases that involve it. For example, Sal would use the 7 dice (3 from the cyberlimb plus 4 for the pistol skill) when using his right arm. He would use his regular agility when firing with his left hand. If punching someone with his right hand, he would use the agility of his cyberlimb as well.

-For any other test you use the average of the natural and cyberlimbs.

-You add the upgrade rating directly to the agility of the cyberlimb. Sal, after upgrading his cyberlimb, would now have an agility of 7 in his right arm. With the benefit of a little nuyen, he now has 14 dice for pistols when using his right hand. However, Sal would need a cyberlimb to enhance his cyberlimb past 6.

The advantage of cyberlimbs, which is relatively small, are two. The first is to upgrade your attributes to the maximum using just nuyen rather than karma. The other is to cram it full of useful junk like cyberarm gyromounts and guns. I like taking cyberlimbs for technical character like hackers and riggers. A cyberarm with maxed agility and strength with a cyberspur and a gyromount makes them pretty effective combatant with needing them to have maxed out physical stats.

However, the rules are particularly bad for metahumans since they usually have a higher natural strength and body then the cyberlimb. Until they come out with the augmentation book, you can use the following house rules, which *mostly* follow the old rules from 3rd edition. These are the house rules I use in my game, and I used to use back in 3rd edition. These rules make more sense then the house rules, and provide a little more power to street sams that want to take cyberlimbs:

-Metahumans with higher agility, body and strength attributes have cyberlimbs with better than average attributes. You can use the following:
*Ork: Bod 5, Str 4
*Dwarf: Bod 4, Str 4
*Elf: Agi 4
*Troll: Bod 5, Str 5

You can raise the attribute of a cyberlimb to the natural maximum +1 without having a cybertorso. In other words, a troll can raise their cyberlimb strength to 11 without needing a cybertorso. With a cybertorso, a character can upgrade their cyberlimb to to the maximum modified limit. For a troll this would be mean they can upgrade to a strength of 15.

Of course, metahumans need more capacity units to upgrade their cyberlimbs. Thankfully they have larger bodies that translate into larger cyberlimbs and cybertorsos. The following metahumans add the following capacity values to full cyberlimbs and cybertorsos.
*Ork: +3 to cyberlimbs and +1.5 to cybertorso
*Dwarf: +1 to cyberlimbs and +.5 to cybertorso
*Troll: +4 to cyberlimbs and +2 to cybertorso

That should tide you over till the Augmentation book comes out.

[Mr.Jibaku]

Guys thanks, I checked out Bioware and yea.. no wonder it's so pricey it's really good. We might start playing tomorrow but I am not sure how well we understand the rules. Thanks for the quick response!

[Aaron]

A number of new players have found some of the cheat sheets on my Shadowrun Resources page to be useful. You might, too.

[sunnyside]

By the way if you're starting out new some light suggestions.

Avoid technomancers, use hackers, just easier and less likely to lead to rules debates IMHO.

Have the guy playing the mage/shaman (you really kinda need one) be a bookwormy sort, but preferably not a munchkin.

Have everyone be able to do something in different scenarios. For example everyone should be able to fight, everyone should be able to do a something when they aren't fighting but are on a run. And everyone should be able to do something when prepping for a run. Socials skills, hacking, craftingish skills and contacts help with the latter.

As for cyberlimbs. yeah the rules seem a bit, uh, thin. Especially for metahumans. I've always used some metahuman house rule based around the idea that a bigger thing can have a bigger cyberarm.

However while having all sorts of gizmos in your arm can be fun. (say your hand is attached to a line and grappling hook launcher). Another thing they let you do is not expend build points on certain stats at chargen.

For example if you want to use a spur effectivly you could drop a lot of BP on str. Or you could take a "2" in the stat and up your cyberarm to a respectable level. You also can up your body this way quickly with their weird averaging thing for calculating it. And so on.

This lets you have other stats that are higher.

Pity the starting availibilty thing gimps starting arms. Still it isn't too hard to get high availiblity stuff outside of chargen. So maybe start with cash and have a contact that can get you the level 7 upgrade you want(If you're going cybertorso).


Still on the balance cyberlimbs are a bit underwhelming.

[Mr.Jibaku]

Lots to take in and lots of good advice thanks to you all. Well my friend and I today were trying out sample monsters versus our characters to see what would happen. Holy crap, Ghouls, they aren't suck.

We couldn't figure out where in the book where it explained Critter's health levels? I hate to ask again for more answers but how do you figure that out. Ignite rules by the way, especially when ghouls are left burning in a cubicle of an office complex. Shadowrun is so much more fun in this sense than Exalted.

Thanks!

[Jaid]

critter health levels work the same as anything else.

stun is 8 + 1/2 will (round up)
physical is 8 + 1/2 body (round up)

[Nocturne]

If you want to keep combat streamlined, you can also use the grunt rules for critters. Appropriate for packs of hellhounds perhaps, but vampires and the like may qualify for prime runner status and have complete physical and stun tracks. The grunt rules are on p272.

[Mr.Jibaku]

Thanks guys I noted those rules, wow this game is so much better laid out that Exalted. We haven't started playing but we are trying out different scenarios and "VR Missions" just to see how the game is played.

Quick question, again thanks for all your answers. You guys are ace and I don't even know you.

Nova and Dose waltz into a off shore bio-laboratory that has been over run by Ghouls. Nova is a Mage and Dose is Arms Dealer with personal interests in what there is to find so he came along. As they are exploring the lab they run into some Ghouls. The Ghouls get the upper hand and attack first! One Ghoul casts Ignite (Force 4) at Dose! Dose screams out as the flames rip through him. Okay... this as where we sorta go, "I don't get it."

Initiative ranking is:

Ghoul A
Ghoul B
Nova
Ghoul C
Dose

Dose is my character so I roll Body when attacked by Ignite to resist, the Ghoul got 4 hits and lets say I only rolled 3 hits on body. So I take 4 P Damage.

First question, so if there are 3 ghouls and 2 players and 5 combat turns, I have to defend with Body + (1/2) Impact Armor every turn?

Second Question, on Ghoul B's turn I defend against 5 P damage, then on Nova's 6 P ? Am I reading the spell damage description correctly.

Last question, how do I put myself out before I burn to death? :(

[toturi]

You got 4 Combat Turns to gib the ghoul before you start to actually burn. In case I wasn't clear - 4 Combat Turns before you take damage.

Why? Because Ignite is a Duration P spell. Pray, what is a duration P spell? It means it need to be sustained in order to be made permanent. And "...once it has been made permanent, causing (Force) boxes of damage..." The defination of a Combat Turn can be found on P132 SR4. And a combat turn is a very long time.

You do not want to use Ignite in a combat situation unless you can cast the spell and hide in a corner sustaining the spell or you have so much dice the -2 from sustaining doesn't matter.

[Lorka]

Also read up on the rules for counterspelling, since you where there with a mage you ought to roll more than your body when resisting spells :)

[Mr.Jibaku]

Awww snap! That's awesome info, I will start reading.

[knasser]

The thing that I usually point out to new players (especially if they've come from certain other games) is that you can usually dish out a lot more damage than you can take. That's one of the reasons Shadowrun is so filled with back-stabbing, treachery and tactics.

Or to put it another way: "He who shoots first, shoots last." ;)

[WearzManySkins]

Another valid saying is those seen, get dealt with.

Mages using magic, and Trolls carrying Panther Assault Cannons get taken out first, so try not be one those types in combat, see the above about not being seen, or just look like a bystander. :)