The 5th Pass, So time to change our Initiative mechanics... Options

[Nightwalker450]

So each combat turn has 5 IPs now, due to Technomancers and Hackers. So we need to divide all movement by 5 to figure out movement per pass, grenades that go off in 1 IP, now have a detonation time of .6 seconds from .75 seconds, or rather another IP they could explode during

I'm looking at shuffling the IP's to handle the different speeds of people better.
I'm going to do this based on how many seconds have passed before the pass would start
1 IP = 0
2 IP = 0, 1.5
3 IP = 0, 1, 2
4 IP = 0, 0.75, 1.5, 2.25
5 IP = 0, 0.6, 1.2, 1.8, 2.4

Since everyone acts at 0, we will of course say people with at least 1 IP start.
Now we'll look at each individual second...
From 0 to 1, nobody with less than 3 IPs acts.
From 1 to 2, everybody acts who has more than 1 IP (someone with 5 IPs acts twice in this range)
From 2 to 3, nobody with less than 4 IPs acts.

So my turn order would be (These are noted as people who have at least X IP's, if you have more than the number you act during that pass)
1, 3, 5, 2, 4

So being faster will make you faster, not just continue to act after the others are done. This will also make people (who have more than 1 IP) pay attention through the entire combat turn, instead of only acting in the first couple and then just watching the action around them.

Grenade issues are the largest problem though with the "same Initiative, next IP" time frame. They now explode quicker since passes are divided in to .6 second increments... I'm going to change this slightly into "same Initiative, next IP someone is able to act during" So Grenades will never be instant kills, but will always have someone acting during the turn they explode. So using my turn order, if someone with at least 3 IPs throws the grenade, if nobody has 5 IP's it will explode during the at least 2 IP's round. Whether or not their Initiative is good enough to actually do anything is up to chance and circumstance.

EDIT: The realization of drones being controlled during a 5th pass, has led to wanting to add more to this set.
Drones are limited to only 3 passes in the physical world, unless modified to handle a 4th pass.
(I'll have to think on availability/pricing for this modification, but this is my current thinking for a fix)

[Ryu]

I thought you could only get 5 VR actions, and that the limit of 4 IPs for the physical and astral planes stayed in effect?

[FrankTrollman]

I have nothing nice to say about this development. The mechanic of allowing people in VR to perform specific actions in less time already existed. There was absolutely no reason to go to 5 Initiative Passes. This part of the rules in Unwired is something that really stands out as an incredibly shitty idea. haven't fully plotted out the ramifications of the entire book yet so there is a lot I'm unwilling to commit to, but this is stand alone.

And it's stand alone offensively retarded. There was no reason for this change and it fucks a lot of things right in their fuck holes.

-Frank

[Nightwalker450]

I have nothing nice to say about this development. The mechanic of allowing people in VR to perform specific actions in less time already existed. There was absolutely no reason to go to 5 Initiative Passes. This part of the rules in Unwired is something that really stands out as an incredibly shitty idea. haven't fully plotted out the ramifications of the entire book yet so there is a lot I'm unwilling to commit to, but this is stand alone.

And it's stand alone offensively retarded. There was no reason for this change and it fucks a lot of things right in their fuck holes.

-Frank

I think the reason it was added was so that VR had a bonus over AR without having to take the "Optional Rules". It is a large step from the core though to get beyond the 4th pass when it was absolutely prohibited.

I thought you could only get 5 VR actions, and that the limit of 4 IPs for the physical and astral planes stayed in effect?

The only one that will truly show us how broken this is, is a rigger. As long as what happens in the matrix stays in the matrix its fine, but once your rigger is gunning down people 5 passes per combat turn something is wrong. I think that drones should be limited to 3 passes in the physical world period. Maybe a modification to get them up to 4 IPs, but that would be the limit. There's a reason drones don't get 4 IPs, and its not because they think Hot-Sim will damage them. Running a drone at 5 IPs I think would start causing some serious wear and tear on the drone.

[deek]

Yeah, a 5th pass royally screws the stability most of us have tried to maintain when it comes to IPs. I for one will not be allowing a 5th pass...it just screws over way too much stuff that already existed.

[dionysus]

Could you guys give specific examples of mechanics you think it screws up? I can't see anything from where I'm sitting (ok, drones are an issue)but I defer to your greater experience.

[Eryk the Red]

My game is not so delicately balanced as to see this as a problem. It changes so little about my game that I'll be surprised if it ever comes up. That said, I don't see a reason it should affect how you do movement. Just assume that only matrix actions take place in the 5th pass. Don't split physical movement into it. If you want, allow character to hold movement for the 5th pass. But for the most part, it probably won't be necessary.

[Nightwalker450]

Drones are the only place I forsee it becoming an issue.

My technomancer is going to love this though, taking VR meshing, and getting 5 passes. I'll be able to act once in the physical and then 4 times in the matrix. My GM might be of the same mind of just not allowing the 5th pass.. In which case I'll still be fine and happy. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[FrankTrollman]

Could you guys give specific examples of mechanics you think it screws up? I can't see anything from where I'm sitting (ok, drones are an issue)but I defer to your greater experience.

The existence of a 5th pass allows people to delay actions into a 5th pass. It doesn't just make people with full VR crap and a drone army own you in the face harder, it allows people in regular meat to rock on that much more.

We could have had a rule where characters with these gadgets were able to use specific matrix activities as Simple actions instead of Complex actions, effectively making them act faster while in VR. But instead they decided that they had to sacrifice a sacred cow to bad fucking planning and break the no 5th pass rule. What, can people with Wired 3 buy a pass for an Edge now? Why the fuck wouldn't they be able to?

-Frank

[Eryk the Red]

Everything you describe there is true, Frank. I guess I just don't see how it's all bad. I run a very different game than most, I'm sure, but a "5-pass limit" seems not so different from a "4-pass limit" from where I sit. Everyone's free to houserule to their heart's content if they wish (I certainly do that), but it seems a little strange to me that this gets such vitriol.

I guess every change gets vitriol from someone. It's just a matter of who, and why.

[Dr Funfrock]

Drones are the only place I forsee it becoming an issue.

My technomancer is going to love this though, taking VR meshing, and getting 5 passes. I'll be able to act once in the physical and then 4 times in the matrix. My GM might be of the same mind of just not allowing the 5th pass.. In which case I'll still be fine and happy. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

I'm already limiting drones to 3 passes.
Yes, the person operating the drone has 5 passes. The drone only has 3, because there's only so fast it can act to keep up with that wiz-hot rigger running it. The advantage for the drone is simply that they can micromanage much better; big deal. At present running drone armies is kinda tricky, this just means that drone riggers can now go full on Zerg rush with some development.

The existence of a 5th pass allows people to delay actions into a 5th pass. It doesn't just make people with full VR crap and a drone army own you in the face harder, it allows people in regular meat to rock on that much more.

So don't allow people to delay actions into the 5th pass.

It clearly wasn't intended for drones, or to in any way affect the real world. You don't need to recalculate your grenade times or any other silliness like that. It's just a good compromise between matrix being speed of thought and the previous problem we had where a Wired 3 sam could outhack a hacker by using AR passes.

[Abschalten]

Add me in the camp that says that 5 IPs isn't such a big deal.

From a gameplay perspective, it's just another pass you get before the end of a combat turn. Compared to the other methods of hacking, it really accentuates the idea that a riced out hacker w/ simsense booster or a sufficiently submersed techno would be scary.

Regular wageslave w/ an AR interface for the Matrix = 1 pass
Regular wageslave diving into VR with his legal coldsim = 2 passes
Hacker w/ hotsim or a technomancer = 3 passes
Hacker w/ the right 'ware or a technomancer w/ Overclocking = 4 passes
Hacker w/ the right 'ware and a simsense booster or a technomancer with all the requisite echoes = 5 passes

You really start to see the legit users fading into the background while the optimized hackers and dedicated technomancers really start to move ahead in terms of what they can accomplish.

The Shadowrun system of initiative passes and combat turns isn't perfect insofar as how it's represented in what's alleged to be a 3-second time period. Honestly though, that's been a problem since SR1. It's hard to represent people acting at different speeds in the same period of time, when it takes one person 3 seconds to do a complex action, whereas a faster person could do it in 3, or maybe even fractions of a second.

But let's say you get your average wageslave on the Matrix and have him do some arbitrary complex action. In the three seconds it takes for him to do that, the top-level techno or optimized hacker can do it FIVE TIMES!

If that doesn't represent a huge leap ahead in terms of what dedicated Matrix specialists can do, I don't know what does.

Maybe 5 IPs breaks some mechanics, and maybe it doesn't. I haven't seen sufficient proof for how evil and game-breaking it is. Until I've seen proof of it, I'll just assume that the fifth IP isn't the doom and gloom some people think and move on with my enjoyment of the game.

[deek]

My issue was really with the normalizing everything to be divisible by 4. Movement, time, etc. Even though no one in my game has 4 IPs, we allow everyone to move in the 4th pass and all held actions and the like to take place there. With a 5th pass being available, even if just in the matrix, then there is an additional unit of time to resolve, well, pretty much anything.

So, PCs may ask to defer to the last pass...it just opens up a can of worms from a table management perspective.

Frank brought up a very good point...why didn't the devs just lets a few matrix actions drop down to simple actions or whatever? That would have gotten VR folks some more actions and speed without moving the 4IP cap.

I suppose that some might not view it as a big deal, but when you have tuned your game to handle only 4IPs, breaking that is just not good.

[Ryu]

Quite a few people were not happy with hot VR before. As drones seem to be the single issue, let´s just limit the 5th IP (and exactly the 5th) to pure matrix actions.

[psychophipps]

A 5th pass? WTF?!? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/eek.gif)

Since multiple IPs is already FTW, what makes them think that adding another pass isn't gonna bust the game wide open?

Have to agree with the above about swapping some commands to simples and the like. This is huge and can really screw stuff up.

*Heads to bed pondering this situation*

[Dr Funfrock]

Quite a few people were not happy with hot VR before. As drones seem to be the single issue, let´s just limit the 5th IP (and exactly the 5th) to pure matrix actions.

Which is basically how it works anyway, since it's purely for full VR. This is why I don't see an issue with 5 passes.
(EDIT - OK quick reread and I see your point about drones. I'm forgetting that, as I mentioned early, I limit drones to 3 passes anyway)

Yes, we could have a horribly complex rule whereby certain actions can be done as simple instead of complex, but when I'm already having to look up which action counts as complex or simple because I can't remember with half of them, then having to look up which actions the Hacker's piece of gear modifies to see if it's still a complex action sounds about as much fun as hitting myself in the foot repeatedly with a tack hammer.

5 passes is easy and simple. You run the full 4 passes, then you turn to the hacker and say "And for your 5th pass?" Then you start the new round.

[Sombranox]

Sorry, I love the 5th IP in VR. I've said before and I say again that I miss the days when deckers/hackers were faster than thought in hot sim on the trix and entire matrix runs could take only a few seconds in the meat.

Don't get me wrong, it was a cubic bitch to have to run all the matrix stuff in a completely different time scale than the meat combats, so I agree conceptually with lining up the matrix and meat initiative passes, but the result of that is that Hackers are pretty much superfluous when Joe Sammie with a skill or two from the Cracking and Electronics group can AR hack safely using his meat IPs. I don't like my favorite shadowrun "archetype" becoming superfluous, so I see this all as a benefit.

That all said, I agree that the effect on Drones can be a problem and for that I'll be leaving the 5th IP purely to virtual so a 5IP rigger can gun through a drone for 4IP, but the 5th IP is limited to doing something network-related. Or maybe being jumped in will just limit to 4IP. Dunno. I'll have to give it more thought I guess.

[Floyd]

people are going to hate me, but......

This just allows for company techs to bring meat up to speed. Fluff speaking here: Cyber makes meat compete with VR. If One were to look between the lines in the fluff history in the game, you can practically see it looking back at you. Magic also solves the same problem, via a different route.

And......If technomancers can bring forth a fifth pass, how long before some wizmage brings it to the sixth world.


And.... when tweedle beetles battle in a puddle in a bottle......

[deek]

Yeah, but you could have used the optional rule to limit AR hacking to 1IP per combat turn...which makes a lot bigger impact on separating the meat hacks from the matrix cowboys...

Honestly, its not a HUGE deal, just doesn't seem well thought out. There are certainly better ways to make hot simmers a little faster and none of them needed to give a bonus IP...

[Dr Funfrock]

Except that limiting AR hacking to 1 IP just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. With the advances in processing power, I don't believe that a computer couldn't keep up with the rate at which even an augmented person can operate it.

Is there any actual logic to the limit on AR hacking, other than "I don't like AR being worth a damn"?

[Adarael]

Oh no, the skty is falling!

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, I'd like someone to explain something to me. How is this horribly game breaking, as opposed to 'powerful'? How does this "royally screw all stability" as opposed to "make certain people more powerful in certain situations."

I mean, back in 3rd edition, it was possible to have dudes running around with 5d6 + 21 initative , and thereby could reliably be expected to hit 4 actions and would often hit 5, with an upper cap of 6. This was much, much faster than the average joe street sam with his 3d6+14 init, who could reliably get 3 actions and would occasionally hit 4, with 4 being the upper cap.

I'm not saying a 5th pass is the best idea, or even a good idea. I'm just saying cut the rhetoric - this isn't exactly the end of the world.

[Ryu]

The playing field would not be equal, as drones could Full Dodge four times if need be, and then kill on the 5th IP. True riggers don´t need to cry about their place on the food chain as it is.

[Sombranox]

Except that limiting AR hacking to 1 IP just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. With the advances in processing power, I don't believe that a computer couldn't keep up with the rate at which even an augmented person can operate it.

Is there any actual logic to the limit on AR hacking, other than "I don't like AR being worth a damn"?

Meat, even accelerated meat, isn't even close to as fast as pure thought? Though that could come a lot from "I don't like AR hacking particularly"

[Adarael]

Man, this is Shadowrun. I don't recall the playing field ever having been equal. That is the entire root of my point. Equality for all 'classes' is something for That Other Game. Shadowrun is more about role balance than everybody having the same feat options.

[Nightwalker450]

Anyone hacking from AR should be assaulted by a bot net. Because even Script kiddies look down on you. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

I think limiting AR to 1 or 2 passes would be good. But getting better than cold sim is ridiculous.