SR4A missed the boat on...., What do you think they left out? Options

[Cardul]

OK, now, first, this is not about how you would have done things they put in differently. No talking about what you thought they should have done to the Matrix rules, just what you think, with the SR4A, they could have put in, but did not.

For me, BTW, it was reintroducing Grounding(you know: hurling a spell from the astral to the physical using someones fetishes and Foci as the conduit).

I also feel that they could have put a Mystic Adept into the sample characters.

Does anyone have anything like that they can think of?

[GreyBrother]

some more sample characters working with resonance.

I wouldn't mind grounding, but it isn't that important to me.

Some proper vehicle construction rules would be quite nice.

[Dakka Dakka]

No grounding for me ever! The planes must remain separate.

What I'd like to see is:

• Clarification how damage to projecting mages works. Is it possible to remain active if the body is dead?
• Alternate weapon names just like with vehicles.
• Clarification on Grenades/Area Effect Spells. What happens if the primary target scores more hits than the attacker?
• SIN verification rules that reflect the fluff.
• Better Encumberance rules

[paws2sky]

How about a sample character magician that could reliably cast their Improved Invisibility or similar OR threshold spell? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/twirl.gif)

I would have like to see a couple more Sample Characters, maybe something hearkening back to the SR1/SR2 era. Even just changing things up a bit with the existing characters would have been nice. (I saw that they went back to an SR3 version of the street samurai, obvious cyberarms and all.)

As far as rules that could have been reintroduced...

• Grounding, definitely.
• Inclusion of the optional rule from Street Magic that allows Adepts to take a power point instead of a metamagic ability when the initiate.
• Clarify the description of how Mystic Adepts split their Magic. As its stands, even in SR4A, the reading of the rule flatly contradicts the SR4 FAQ.

-paws

[pbangarth]

I think a huge step towards rebalancing Skills and Attributes could have been achieved simply by reintroducing the Defaulting mechanic from earlier SR editions... dice pool equals half the Attribute, rather than a mere modifier of -1.

[Malachi]

I think a huge step towards rebalancing Skills and Attributes could have been achieved simply by reintroducing the Defaulting mechanic from earlier SR editions... dice pool equals half the Attribute, rather than a mere modifier of -1.

Which edition was that? 3rd had a form of "skill group" mechanic where skills within the group could "cross-default" at a +2 TN, and going to the attribute was a +4 TN. Second (and I think First, but I never played it) had the (horrendous) "skill web" where each "little dot" was +2TN and each "big dot" was +4TN. I don't ever remember a "half Attribute" rule...

[pbangarth]

I only have SR4 and 4A with me right now. Your reference to the skill web, Malachi brings back memories I had suppressed. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

It must have been First, then. Help me out, folks, am I out to lunch on this? I can't think of any other game with a similar mechanic with which I might have confused SR.

[Matsci]

I only have SR4 and 4A with me right now. Your reference to the skill web, Malachi brings back memories I had suppressed. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

It must have been First, then. Help me out, folks, am I out to lunch on this? I can't think of any other game with a similar mechanic with which I might have confused SR.

The only game I know that defaults to half abilty scores is Alternity.

[pbangarth]

What about White Wolf's World of Darkness games? I played Changeling for a while. Maybe it was that.

In any case, it seems like a good way to circumvent the "High-Agility-can-do-anything" syndrome, without hurting people who do have skills.

[BlueMax]

What about White Wolf's World of Darkness games? I played Changeling for a while. Maybe it was that.

In any case, it seems like a good way to circumvent the "High-Agility-can-do-anything" syndrome, without hurting people who do have skills.

From my perspective, the issue is that Agility can be jacked up to 9/10 (12/15 if you really line up the stars) and skills are capped at 6. If 9 dice are coming from stats and only 6 from skill, the skill is the least important aspect :sad face:

SR4A missed the boat on removing skill caps. The game should encourage skill.

[cryptoknight]

SR4A missed the boat on removing skill caps. The game should encourage skill.

I completely agree... Enforce the skill caps on created characters, remove them afterward.

[Phylos Fett]

Alternate weapon names just like with vehicles.

I've been waiting for that since SR3 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/frown.gif)

[Ayeohx]

Does anyone use the vehicle rules? If not, check out ramming. For fun pit two Ares Roadmasters ramming into each other at 30mph, see what happens. Now try two buses (Vistas from Arsenal), loaded with passengers, one t-boning the other at 25 mph. In real life a few people may die; in Shadowrun it looks like 80 people fed through a Troy built chipper vac.

Oh, and while I think you're usually right Cardul, I'm glad that Grounding is gone. It totally screwed Phys Ads.

[Not of this Worl...]

Don't get me started....

[deek]

I completely agree... Enforce the skill caps on created characters, remove them afterward.

I've been capping skills to Skill + 1 since day one. Even added a positive quality to up the cap to Skill x 2. I don't see uncapping skill in games at my table.

[Draco18s]

So if I don't start with a skill I can't raise it higher than 1?

[Malachi]

Does anyone use the vehicle rules? If not, check out ramming. For fun pit two Ares Roadmasters ramming into each other at 30mph, see what happens. Now try two buses (Vistas from Arsenal), loaded with passengers, one t-boning the other at 25 mph. In real life a few people may die; in Shadowrun it looks like 80 people fed through a Troy built chipper vac.

Oh, and while I think you're usually right Cardul, I'm glad that Grounding is gone. It totally screwed Phys Ads.

You know, I read your beef on Ramming and I realize that I had been playing with some rule tweaks that I didn't even realize. For determining ramming damage, I use the net speed difference between the two vehicles instead of just the total speed of the ramming vehicle. I believe SR3 had some rules to this effect: for rear end subtract target vehicle speed from ramming vehicle, for t-bone use ramming vehicle speed, for head on add both speeds together. I also apply the damage to passengers that the vehicle took after its resistance roll. Those things bring ramming back into the level of "reasonable."

[Ayeohx]

You know, I read your beef on Ramming and I realize that I had been playing with some rule tweaks that I didn't even realize. For determining ramming damage, I use the net speed difference between the two vehicles instead of just the total speed of the ramming vehicle. I believe SR3 had some rules to this effect: for rear end subtract target vehicle speed from ramming vehicle, for t-bone use ramming vehicle speed, for head on add both speeds together. I also apply the damage to passengers that the vehicle took after its resistance roll. Those things bring ramming back into the level of "reasonable."

I hear you Malachi, and many folks here seem to play it that way. It leads me to believe that none of the playtesters actually run RAW. If they did, this would have been fixed by now. SHAME ON YOU PLAYTESTERS!!! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[ElFenrir]

Re: Skill Importance

IMO, they really did miss the boat on this. Not trying to nitpick or compare, or bitch, but they said they raised Attributes because they wanted to make Skills more important. This is fine. In fact, had they took extra steps to actually make skills more important, it would have worked.

But nope. They left them exactly the same, so the problem still exists, and is even worse in a sense(since skills are the same price, and attributes more expensive, it REALLY makes upping those primary attributes at the start with BP more enticing.)

Yes, I agree, missed the boat on removing skill caps(NOT hit caps, but skill caps....allowing one to go past 6, 7, or even 8 in game), as well as not lowering skill costs.

[The Mack]

Re: Skill Importance

IMO, they really did miss the boat on this. Not trying to nitpick or compare, or bitch, but they said they raised Attributes because they wanted to make Skills more important. This is fine. In fact, had they took extra steps to actually make skills more important, it would have worked.

But nope. They left them exactly the same, so the problem still exists, and is even worse in a sense(since skills are the same price, and attributes more expensive, it REALLY makes upping those primary attributes at the start with BP more enticing.)

Yeah, I don't understand why they didn't work on making skills more attractive as opposed to making investing in attributes (which everyone still NEEDS to do anyway) more expensive.

And it does exactly what you've said it will, basically push everyone to take max 200 BPs when starting out as that's easily the most bang for your BP. Everyone except possibly Awakened and Emerged characters will want to use their max allowed BPs for attributes at CharGen.


There are so many ways they could have made skills more attractive to invest in, but just didn't.

[Shinobi Killfist]

Removal of skill caps and grounding. Though I would of changed grounding so the only people who could be targeted were those directly linked to the grounding vehicle. So you are bound to a focus, they can ground a spell through the focus to you if it is active. Try to ground a spell through your spirit and you only hit the spirit and yourself. It adds cool flavor to magic, and it puts a nice limit on magic items.

[darthmord]

All Grounding did in my old group was ensure Mages never used any foci. Also, allowing Grounding to go through the Spirit's link to the Summoner greatly reduces the worth of spirits.

Using Grounding was basically a major way of mage spankage and all but telling mage players to not bother. I'm not sorry to see it go away.

[Dragnar]

I agree that while grounding sounded useful in theory, it never worked in any group I played with. No mage ever took anything vulnerable to grounding, as it was just too damn easy to exploit for the opposition.
SR4 led to an explosion in focus numbers, but I prefer that to the days of old.
Wouldn't mind some other way of restricting focus usage, though. The current limit is a way too soft.

[Dakka Dakka]

Wouldn't mind some other way of restricting focus usage, though. The current limit is a way too soft.

Besides the hard cap the GM can always ask for an addiction test if a character runs around with active foci all the time. Also rival runners may be hired/inclined to pluck some of the candy from such an astral christmas tree. 5-25K¥*Force is not so bad loot

[Dragnar]

You're absolutely correct, I just happen to dislike "If the GM feels annoyed by it, he can screw the player"-type restrictions, because they just generate bad blood at the table if the GM and the player happen to disagree on what's reasonable.
A hard and fast rule is preferable, imho.