Runners Companion, Karma system vs BP system Options

[the-medic-cross]

I'm having an issue with character creation within my team at the mo. Half the team wish to use BP where as the other half wish to use karma can any body tell me how many karma it is to 400bp I cant seem to find it in the book

[Ancient History]

If using SR4 (New Attribute x 3), 600 Karma.

If using SR4A (New Attribute x 5), 750 Karma.

[Maelstrome]

we had a group with half using bp and half using karma. we had no problems with that.

[Larsine]

Characters for a typical Shadowrun campaign should be built to a 750 Karma total.

And that was before SR4A was published (with new attribute x3).

Lars

[McAllister]

If you believe the Runner's Companion, karmagen results in more well-rounded characters whereas it's easier to specialize with BP. Imho, karmagen is just better. Getting a skill up to level 6 and giving it a specialization costs 30 BP (7*4+2) or 46 karma (2+4+4+6+8+10+12). Getting a human's Logic (or anything else) up to 6 costs 65 BP (4*10+25) or 100 (10+15+20+25+30) karma. Given that A. you get almost twice as much karma and B. those are examples of maxxing out (anything under that will make karmagen look even better) the only situation where I see BP winning is if you have a troll, shapeshifter, Infected or something else capable of getting attributes up to around 10; that's killer expensive in karmagen.

And Larsine... I like your signature, guilty thought I may be.

[Ancient History]

And that was before SR4A was published (with new attribute x3).

Lars

Yeah. There is an explanation for that. I stand by my suggestion, though.

[DuctShuiTengu]

I actually got bored and calculated how much it would take to make each of the sample characters in the 4a core using Karma Gen and the 4A experience costs. While I forget the exact numbers, they ranged from roughly 425 to 625. And different sorts of character builds will see an even larger range in costs.

So, if you and your players are that concerned about having the characters all start out balanced, I'd suggest having the entire team use one set of rules or the other.

[Freejack]

I whipped up a quick Javascript page to help and posted a link and my findings over on the Community Projects forum:

http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=26249

Carl

[the-medic-cross]

My main issue is that I dont know how many karma is equivelent to 400 bp

[Ancient History]

Because the costs for improving attributes, skills, etc. in BP and Karma are so different, there's not an exact correspondence. If you consider the nominal 1 BP = 2 Karma conversion, you'll find that attributes under 6 are much cheaper under Karmagen; attributes over 6 are effectively cheaper under BP.

Consider this simple comparison for attributes <6:

BP-generation:
1 (free!)
2 (10 BP)
3 (10 BP) -> 20 BP total
4 (10 BP) -> 30 BP total
5 (10 BP) -> 40 BP total

Karmagen:
1 (free!)
2 (x5) = 10 Karma
3 (x5) = 15 Karma -> 25 Karma total
4 (x5) = 20 Karma -> 45 Karma total
5 (x5) = 25 Karma -> 70 Karma total

[Daedelus]

Race and many other factors effect this amount as well. We just calculated three characters built with 400 BP. Thier exact twins cost 581 karma, 676 karma, and 624 karma. The builds were a macial adept face, a technomancer (both elves), and a Street Sam (Human). As you can see the totals are all well short of the suggested 750. These were all built using the x5 cost for attributes.

[Glyph]

750 Karma is the default level for karmagen, just as 400 BP is the default level for BP, but karmagen is definitely more powerful in all but a handful of cases. You are better off using one system or another, or flat out telling the people who want to use BP that their characters will be weaker if they go that route.


I hope that when they do an overdue errata on Runner's Companion, they keep it at the equivalent of that 750 Karma, and don't try to retroactively "fix" it. That was created such a furor over SR4A in the first place.

[Ancient History]

I probably shouldn't say this but...the reason the original values for 750 Karma seemed so far over the top is that the initial calculations were done for (New attribute x 5) instead of (New attribute x 3) - there'd been a fair bit of discussion at that point about what the Karma improvement costs should be yadda yadda but by the time RC was due for playtesting the fix wasn't "in" yet so RC was printed with (New attribute x 3) - in their defense, our playtesters did note that this made the amount of Karma for starting characters a trifle ludicrous, but on the bright side it should make SR4A characters much more balanced without doing anything except tweaking costs to match SR4A.

[Mäx]

I hope that when they do an overdue errata on Runner's Companion, they keep it at the equivalent of that 750 Karma, and don't try to retroactively "fix" it. That was created such a furor over SR4A in the first place.

We can always hope, but that probaply won't be the case.

[Larsine]

And Larsine... I like your signature, guilty thought I may be.

Well I am a member of Dumpshock myself, so...

Lars

[Neraph]

I like how under the Karmagen system all characters start with 75 Street Cred...

[StealthSigma]

And Larsine... I like your signature, guilty thought I may be.

I see you haven't visited Slashdot.

I like how under the Karmagen system all characters start with 75 Street Cred...

Nah, because Street Cred is a function of earned karma, and that 750 karma isn't earned.

[crizh]

I probably shouldn't say this but...the reason the original values for 750 Karma seemed so far over the top is that the initial calculations were done for (New attribute x 5) instead of (New attribute x 3) - there'd been a fair bit of discussion at that point about what the Karma improvement costs should be yadda yadda but by the time RC was due for playtesting the fix wasn't "in" yet so RC was printed with (New attribute x 3) - in their defense, our playtesters did note that this made the amount of Karma for starting characters a trifle ludicrous, but on the bright side it should make SR4A characters much more balanced without doing anything except tweaking costs to match SR4A.

OMFG, that's the funniest thing I've heard in a long time.

So funny I nearly spat McNugget all over the inside of this nice S Class.....

[Medicineman]

I Think it's more of a *Facepalm* considering how lots and lots of Players complained about the "Imbaness" of the Karmasystem kompared to "old SR4" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/question.gif)
And now the Fans of the Karmasystem have to clean up the bad Reputation of said system

he wo dances with a Broom
Medicineman

[crizh]

The thing is that AH had to argue black was white when RC was published to say that karmagen was balanced and then when SR4A came out it was how it broke karmagen that caused the worst argument.

If they'd just said right at the beginning that they planned on changing stat costs, karmagen would never have had such a rough ride and the stat thing would have been out in the open before people had SR4A pdf's in their sticky electronic hands.

I was shocked and appalled at the time, not so much by the change, but by the sudden nature of the way it was slipped into something that was supposed to be a celebration of SR rather than an opportunity to back-door unexpected changes.

[StealthSigma]

The thing is that AH had to argue black was white when RC was published to say that karmagen was balanced and then when SR4A came out it was how it broke karmagen that caused the worst argument.

If they'd just said right at the beginning that they planned on changing stat costs, karmagen would never have had such a rough ride and the stat thing would have been out in the open before people had SR4A pdf's in their sticky electronic hands.

I was shocked and appalled at the time, not so much by the change, but by the sudden nature of the way it was slipped into something that was supposed to be a celebration of SR rather than an opportunity to back-door unexpected changes.

For my personal record...

It was Karma-gen using 750 Karma and attributes improved at (new attribute x 3) that was imbalanced, not 600 Karma at (new attribute x 3) or 750 Karma at (new attribute x 5), correct?

[CodeBreaker]

Decided to see what all the fuss about Karma-Gen was about and remade my Technomancer (From CC) to it. Managed to quite easily fitted everything in, got an extra point in Body and a few contacts I could not afford from my BP build. But other than that I found it about the same, same amount of juggling points about and fiddling with little things.

Complex Forms were still a bitch though (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) That was using the new SR4A costs.

[StealthSigma]

Decided to see what all the fuss about Karma-Gen was about and remade my Technomancer (From CC) to it. Managed to quite easily fitted everything in, got an extra point in Body and a few contacts I could not afford from my BP build. But other than that I found it about the same, same amount of juggling points about and fiddling with little things.

Complex Forms were still a bitch though (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif) That was using the new SR4A costs.

I did the same thing, but my character came out to 545 Karma. 205 Karma is a lot to improve, but I can already think up at least 2 contacts that I want to add (specifically a coyote contact to smuggle stuff for me, I carry around a lot of Forbidden guns). Mostly though it would be tweaks like a slight increase to some of the physical stats and picking up some more skills at rank 2 for added versatility and bumping some of my current 2s up to 3s.

[Cthulhudreams]

Do not let your players use both systems. Pick one or the other for groups - it is impossible to balance across concepts and build types.

In general eve with new costs, Karma is more powerful.

[Neraph]

Nah, because Street Cred is a function of earned karma, and that 750 karma isn't earned.

Excellent point.