Tailored Pheromones Clarification Options

[Seerow]

Prelude, I'm not actually a face, but our group's face is looking into picking these up soon, and there seems to be some disagreement as to how they work. From the book:

Tailored Pheromones: The subject’s body is altered to release specially designed pheromones to subtly influence others. Tailored pheromones add their rating as a dice pool modifier to Charisma and Social Skill Tests. This bonus has no effect on magical abilities and tests.

My interpretation of this: The bioware effectively gives you +3 charisma and +3 to social skills.
Other Interpretation of this: There is no benefit to charisma directly, the bioware simply gives +3 dice to any test where charisma comes up, or any test where social skills come up.

Arguments for my interpretation:
1) This is the only effect I can find outside of a Increase Attribute spell I can find that boosts charisma directly. This isn't necessarily an argument saying it must be boosting charisma, but it seems to me that it's a strong point in favor of it given most of the attributes have some way to boost them permanently.

2) The wording is frankly redundant. Why mention social skill tests and charisma back to back? There are no social tests that aren't charisma based. If the intent was to have just one, why would it not be worded as just +3 to all charisma tests? Or just a flat +3 charisma?

3) I know it's not a definitive source, but it's generally pretty reliable-The excel character sheet from the community projects section of this site has tailored pheromones granting +3 charisma on the main sheet.


Arguments For the other interpretation:
1) Charisma test != Social skill tests. There's attribute only tests, Charisma test, and there's skill + attribute tests. The description mentions both simply to be complete.





Anyone know of a clear accepted ruling one way or the other on this?

[Epicedion]

Since it's listed as a dice pool modifier, it doesn't add directly to Charisma or to any Skills.

I think what they mean is any Charisma + (Social Skill) tests. There are social tests where you might roll Intuition + Con, or Willpower + Intimidation, instead of using Charisma. These are primarily for defense against whatever sort of manipulation is being tried.

[Seerow]

Since it's listed as a dice pool modifier, it doesn't add directly to Charisma or to any Skills.

I think what they mean is any Charisma + (Social Skill) tests. There are social tests where you might roll Intuition + Con, or Willpower + Intimidation, instead of using Charisma. These are primarily for defense against whatever sort of manipulation is being tried.

But wouldn't that have again been covered just by saying apply the bonus to non-magical charisma tests? It still isn't explaining the redundancy in any real way.

Then again... bad/unclear writing in a shadowrun book. Who woulda thunk it.

[Xahn Borealis]

It occurs to me that maybe Reduced Sense (Smell) isn't that bad after all...

[Epicedion]

But wouldn't that have again been covered just by saying apply the bonus to non-magical charisma tests? It still isn't explaining the redundancy in any real way.

Then again... bad/unclear writing in a shadowrun book. Who woulda thunk it.

There are tests involving Charisma that have nothing to do with smell. Composure tests, Drain tests depending on your tradition, etc.

[Glyph]

Seerow, your interpretation has absolutely no basis in the rule that you quoted. "dice pool modifier to Charisma and Social Skill Tests" can mean one of two things. It can mean "dice pool modifier to Charisma Tests and Social Skill Tests" (the most likely, and logical, interpretation), or it can mean "dice pool modifier to (Charisma and Social Skill) Tests", which would be more limiting. There is no way you can interpret it to mean "+3 to Charisma, and +3 to Social Skill Tests", mainly because of the phrase "dice pool modifier", which can describe an Attribute test, but not an Attribute.

[Machiavelli]

I agree that the description of this bioware is that clear, that your question shouldn´t come up. There is e.g. only one bioware implant i know (symphat....something gland) that directly boosts body permantently, this doesn´t mean that anything else should do this too. Not even bone lacing / bone density ware does it. There is a difference between the raise of attributes and dice pool modifiers, they have nothing in common with each other.

[eyeBliss]

It occurs to me that maybe Reduced Sense (Smell) isn't that bad after all...

Until you have an itchy trigger finger in a room that is rapidly filling with natural gas (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)



(yes I'm aware that mercaptan is what you actually smell or in this case, don't smell...)

[Whipstitch]

In fairness to the OP, this is a bit of a case of the left hand not knowing what the right has done given that Tailored Pheromones as written is clearly a dice pool modifier and yet some writers have seen fit to present the bonus as an Augmented Attribute in NPC stat blocks in books like Ghost Cartels. I would argue that the rule itself is actually pretty clear but that the rest of the books inconsistently reflect that. The three reasons he explicitly mentioned are admittedly pretty irrelevant though, given that two of the statements are false and the other is a reference to fan projects.

[Stahlseele]

Under SR3 Rules, it actually DID raise the Charisma Attribute AND gave extra Dice for Social Tests.

[SpellBinder]

It occurs to me that maybe Reduced Sense (Smell) isn't that bad after all...

Yet you cannot smell pheromones to begin with, and they can influence your behavior.

[Manunancy]

Yet you cannot smell pheromones to begin with, and they can influence your behavior.

The peromon-detecting bits are still part of the olfactory system as a whole even if they don't register as odors to the brain. Which means that depending on why you have lost some olfaction may or not alter your sensitivity to pheromones.

If you've lost the olfactory cells odds are they'll work, but if it's nerve damage on the way to the brain odds are they won't.

[Machiavelli]

Under SR3 Rules, it actually DID raise the Charisma Attribute AND gave extra Dice for Social Tests.

Possible. But under SR4A the rules are quite clear. It already bothered me in previous editions because charisma is always a very vague attribute. Raising the attribute generally makes no sense because it covers more than pheromones and corresponding physical attractions.

[Glyph]

From Man & Machine:

"Each level adds one die to the recipient's Charisma and Social Skill Tests."

So very similar wording to SR4. It didn't add to the Attribute, since you get points to an Attribute, not dice (and yes, there were Charisma tests in SR3, such as rolling your Charisma to potentially mitigate an NPC's racism against your metatype).

While it is clear in context in both editions, it would have been much better if they had simply added the word "tests" after Charisma, so you don't have to figure out if they are using the word by itself or as an adjective.

[Jewish Children]

I agree that the description of this bioware is that clear, that your question shouldn´t come up. There is e.g. only one bioware implant i know (symphat....something gland) that directly boosts body permantently, this doesn´t mean that anything else should do this too. Not even bone lacing / bone density ware does it. There is a difference between the raise of attributes and dice pool modifiers, they have nothing in common with each other.

Suprathyroid Gland: +1 to the user's Body, Agility, Reaction, & Strength. But lifestyle increased by 10%,

[Jewish Children]

Don't forget Enhanced Pheromone Receptors from augmentaion, doubles the bonus from tailored pheromones. Most of the negative can be avoided by just getting a cyber nose, which are really awesome.

As a side note, once had a character who threw like 30 dice for perception.

[fazzamar]

Don't forget Enhanced Pheromone Receptors from augmentaion, doubles the bonus from tailored pheromones. Most of the negative can be avoided by just getting a cyber nose, which are really awesome.

As a side note, once had a character who threw like 30 dice for perception.

Ummm... someone that has Enhanced Pheromone Receptors and Tailored Pheromones doesn't get double the bonus. Someone who has Tailored Pheromones has double the effect when facing someone with Enhanced Pheromone Receptors.

[Stahlseele]

There is no cyber nose either.

[TheOOB]

The OP got it wrong, it's pretty clear cut what the meaning is, and several other things in the book use similar language.

Think of it like this:

((blank 1)) adds ((blank 2)) as a dice pool modifier to ((blank 3)) tests; where blank 1=the source of the bonus, blank 2=the amount of the bonus, and blank 3=the type of test the bonus applies too. Any bonus that follows this format adds a number of extra dice to a specific test, they do not augment any attributes, skills, or anything else, they just apply a dice pool modifier to a test. The only way this differs from any other such bonuses is that it applies to two types of tests: Charisma tests and social skill tests. The fact that these two types of tests overlap almost completely is irrelevant, this 'ware only provides ((rating)) bonus to any test that meets either of those two conditions.

Anyways, for logics sake, contracting the OPs arguments

1) This is actually an argument against you. Mental attributes(charisma especially) are virtually impossible to raise by any means(save the increase (attribute) spells), and it seems obvious that the designers intended it to be so. In any case, this argument has no relation to the rules text anyways.

2) Telling is someone is lying, intimidating someone with a feat of strength, occasional training someone, are all examples where a different stat that charisma may be used on a social skill, and there are plenty of chances for charisma to be used outside of social skills. The specific wording actually, once again, goes against your arguments, because if it boosted charisma, it would list is like muscle toner raises agility.

3) Ultimately that's just a sheet someone made, and has no relevance to the rules

[Glyph]

Ummm... someone that has Enhanced Pheromone Receptors and Tailored Pheromones doesn't get double the bonus. Someone who has Tailored Pheromones has double the effect when facing someone with Enhanced Pheromone Receptors.

Enhanced Pheromone Receptors give half their rating, rounded up, as a bonus to social skills, so at rating: 3 you can get a +2 bonus. But they give penalties in many situations - as you mentioned, tailored pheromones have double effect against the character, and strong smells and/or crowds can also give penalties.

Sure, a "cyber nose" (assuming the OP meant an olfactory booster, often called a cybersnout) can negate the penalties (although you wouldn't get the bonuses, either, if you had your sense of smell "turned off"), but that's assuming you can get both - the rules are unclear exactly how much of the natural sense of smell the olfactory booster replaces, so it is really a GM call.