Melee House Rule Critque, Going back to the old rules Options

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nm.

[Critias]

[Shinobi Killfist]

[Ryu]

Why should superstrong trolls NOT rule melee combat? How is that worse than agility-elves ruling melee and several other things, including nearly all kinds of firearms?

[Whipstitch]

I have to throw in with the melee trolls should rule crowd. An elf or a human getting into a fist fight with a troll better be a highly trained individual. Most combat sports have weight classes for a reason. A (naturally) large individual generally has an advantage over someone smaller. Sure, if someone is a truly muscle bound/overweight/unskilled whatever, they very well could end up losing a fight (former sumos haven't done so hot in the UFC, for example, since they're both overweight AND trained in an art that's largely ritualistic), but when talking about trolls we're not talking about guys who pursue strength to the exclusion of other goals. Trolls are only marginally clumsier than humans and can be twice as strong as humans. A toned and conditioned troll can weigh 300 kilos without being overweight or muscle bound. What we have here, gentlemen, is basically a fraggin' bear who can learn kung fu. As such, I find it reasonable that they could learn to be pretty damn dominant in hand to hand combat.


[EDIT]
Anyway though, I'm easily able to live with either agility or strength being used as melee's "to hit" stat. I just rather dislike how easy it is to almost totally disregard the strength part of the equation via shock weapons and monowhips. I find it kind of goofy that even your average 5-8 strength troll is better off using a monowhip or shock glove in many scenarios. I guess I'm saying I'd rather just play around with the damage values a bit (I'd love to see troll bows nerfed and strength based melee in general buffed) and leave the rest well enough alone. Including all attributes into melee combat is a fine idea, but it seems to get handwaved away in practice.

[Dender]

The problem with strength is that while it only applies to a narrow field, it makes you MONSTEROUS at that field. The aforementioned troll with 13 str could do 15P with a bow and some arrows, and not have to worry about carrying legality (unless you're going to start qualifying those "arrows" as javelins), and more if you switch over to custom arrows, like hollow shafts filled with... explosive foam. or something else in the realms of silly

It it not as widely useful, but properly applied can be deadly. The Hulk example, he waited until he could hit, and ended it in one shot.

If you're going to pull from movies/literature, i should point out that many martial arts films have a staple of "This bruiser killed my master in a fair fight, so now i must train and enter this tourney/track him down/fight the organization he (works for/runs)"

If, cinematically, a supertrained but elderly kungfu master can break a boulder with a punch, what do you think a reasonably trained but mighty mighty Troll can break? If your answer is "just about anything" then you might be paying attention.

Aikido is radically different from boxing, but specialization in either still yields a +2 dicepool. If you're looking for a place to make houserules, there would be the spot to start. Why not make each "style" provide something other than just a flat +2. Maybe Boxing allows you to use strength instead of agility (having boxed for 3 years, i can say this is not accurate. Boxing itself has a large number of styles and techniques, even if at its based level it is brawling. You can lose in boxing from a sheer technical standpoint, if the other guy is fast, uses lots of well aimed taps, and makes you look like an ameteur). Perhaps one martial arts form or another uses Intuition instead. Or it uses agility or reaction, and gives access to "counterthrows" similar to the adept power's first rank from street magic. Add spice and simmer for your own homebrew experience.

Lets look at those numbers. That Elf, who we'll call Quick Dick with 12 Agi and a 20 dicepool, lets pretend they have 4 str, for shits and giggles. Using a rapier (hey, if you're going stereo type, go all the freakin way) thats what, a +1? +2 to damage? They're doing, on average (buying successes) 4P with 5 hits, max of 9P. The Troll, who for Humor sake, will be named Captain Mc Angrypants.

So, QD is doing 9P (or 10 with that fireax) on average, given no successful dodge.

Captain McAngry pants might not be dead, but he'll be PISSED. so, 13 str to start with for him (to prove that COMPLETE MAX might not be needed here to prove my point) and a fireax. For arguements sake, lets say he has 9 dice from skill+stat. Then another 3 from reach. 12 dice, buys 3 successes (i know you can't buy successes on a combat test, but this is theory here). 13 str turns into 7P base, +3 base from the ax, +3 successes. 13P damage. Not bad, neh?

Or, change it up a bit. The Captain is really an adept. He throws down the ax, and whips out killing hands, and deadly strike 4, as well as bone density 2. Thats 7P +1(bone) +4(adept cheesemonkery) + 3(successes, hey, easier to buy skills, right?)

The Captain is doing 15P, on average, with his "bare fuggin' hands", enough to kill almost anyone in one hit before called shots, special ammo, or any other such silliness.

Yes, Quick Dick can pick up any gun and do more damage, but Captain Mc Angrypants can just as easily pick up a bow and out damage panther cannons.


Damn i ramble. My point though? As it is, average vs average across races, troll wins. Ultraspec vs ultraspec across races, troll still wins melee, and starts to do some rediculous things with bows. You know what? LET THEM. the poor troll's gone and paid 65+40+skills+magic+implants to do so. Dropping 100-200 points on melee/bows? Should be worth it.

BTW whipstitch, thanks for reminding me. I need to give my army of bears ninjitsu lessons.

for when they drop from the trees

[Critias]

[Whipstitch]

Yeah, that's why my dream scenario would be compressing the damage ranges a bit, and changing melee attacks to simple actions. Ain't happening though. I'm in no rush to make strength the "to hit" attribute but I'm tired of not even considering anything but monowhips and shockhands for anything under 10 strength. I mean, I like fluff as much as the next guy but being melee oriented comes with enough hurdles even when making "optimal" choices.

[odinson]

[Ol' Scratch]

The real problem is having trolls as a player race at all. They just don't fit in properly as one. They're entirely too large and too physically powerful conceptually to be "fair" next to the other available races. Shadowrun's system is simply too niched and specialized to allow generic rules that apply fairly to everyone.

Since there's not much you can do about removing them without having some handwaving going on ("a new VITAS plague sprouts up and targets only trolls the world over, eliminating nearly the entire population of them!"), you pretty much just have to deal with the fact that their stats are ridiculously overpowered in situations such as melee combat. You won't find a happy medium with any set of rules without either completely revamping who and what trolls are, or breaking said rules for everyone else.

[Critias]

Or you could always just say "No Troll PCs in my game," and call it a day.

Of course, the guys who want to play Trolls would have to then revert to just being "gigantic, even for an Orc!" instead, but the rest of their character concepts would be pretty much untouched.

[Whipstitch]

It should also be duly noted that 300kg would definitely be on the extremely large end of the black bear population. Trolls are generally BIGGER than black bears.