[X] My Assistant

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

I have a much simpler option than the above: numbers

I find a gang of (say) 15 people with 1 or 2 options armed, and about 8 die on their attack with heavy pistols, or worse smgs, can take down almost any PC, as long as they are not stupid.

...

You don't have to use a 15 group gang...even a 10 member gang is good. A 5 member gang however will probably all die before they get a go.

Hell... in a recent game, the 5 Gangers ended up against 5 Runners. In the end, the Gangers lost out, but not before throwing a pretty good beat down on the runners. The Runner's heavy hitter (Fomori Mage Killer) was down and out (though unfortunately not quite dead) at the hands of the Troll ganger. It was quite funny indeed.

[James McMurray]

What rules did I break? I'm really confused as to where I broke any rules?
13/9, 13/11 are both very cose, and I could make it 13/11 if I used the PPP system items that give 0/1 as well (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) so that's not really much difference.

5 body = 10 points of uncompensated armor

The Steam Punk outfit has 7. The FFFBA has 6 div2=3 3+7=10

Sorry, I miscounted. Your total would also be 13/11 if you added two bits of Securetech.

Yes, but Trolls can have both High Dodge and High Soak totals.

No, they can't. At least not for long. See again the ganger example. It is incredibly easy to drop any dodge pool to 0. Even a great Dragon with a 45 reaction could be dropped to 0 if you have enough guys shooting at him with big enough guns that he has to try to avoid the hits.

High defense numbers are meaningless in SR's combat system unless the GM is not willing to do what it takes to overcome them. The only important thing is making sure that the PCs are built in a way that the GM can overcome them and is willing to do so, and the only way something can be unbalanced is if the players and GM allow it to be. Usually this means that the PC in question is vastly superior to the rest of the team, since there's no way he can be superior to the rest of the world. From the opening post it looks like the GM is having problems with all of the PCs, not just one. That means he can either drop some draconian restrictions on them all or step up his game. The latter lets them play the characters they want without waffle-stomping through every run.

[Seth]

My favourite tactic actually is to adopt an idea from many other games: mooks and bosses. Mooks are like the gangers I described above. They have 3 (or 4 or 5 if they are veteran / elite) in attributes and skills and provide numbers, while the bosses are stated a bit more like PCs. Don't forget the value of tacnets though...they add 2..4 die in most circumstances to all the bad guys.

Bosses on their own are toast: the samurais and mage all focus on them, and the boss goes down. With the numbers though, the boss is much more effective.

[sabs]

Yeah:

Defender has defended against
previous attacks since last action | –1 per additional defense
Attacker firing long wide burst | –5

Means that After 3 or 4 gangers shooting at the same guy, he's sucking -9 dice to his dicepool, worse is those gangers have FA weapons, then he's sucking -13. That will hurt even the most dedicated gun bunny.

Another nice thing for taking out groups of people. If you have 5 guys all lay down suppression fire: They don't take any penalty to their to hit, and it's a cumulative -1 to defense for every player in the area. It won't kill the players, unless they try to charge in, but it will cause them serious issues. Suppressive fire + grenades = fun.

Especially if you start using Flash Bangs with an Airburst. 6 guards, 4 doing suppression fire, 2 throwing flash bang grenades. that's 6S -3 AP x 2 you're soaking.

[Yerameyahu]

It depends on who you're fighting, of course.

[KCKitsune]

You know, IKerensky, you could always sit your player down and say to them: "Hey guys, I know you love be uber curbstomping bad asses who have more guns than any third world nation and enough magic to make Dragons notice, but could you guys... I don't know... make real people." I made a character who is a combat medic mage, and here was one comment about the character:

What happened to my dumpshock... these don't feel like min maxed characters at all... it's runners companion so they should... but... it almost feels like their rp characters... I think I'm going to go back to one of the troll bow threads, they feel safer.

SO you can have a fun character to play, but not so superhuman that they curbstomp everybody.

[cndblank]

Great thread all (as I take notes for the gunslinger adept in my campaign),


On spirits using edge, I'd say say don't do unless you want the Players to be asking for their spirits to do so too.

Certainly a summoner can not order a spirit to spend edge.

Personally I like the suggestion that a summoned spirit will only spend edge to save itself some serious pain or if it really likes the summoner (or if doing so will really screw over the summoner if it hates the summoner).

Spirits have edge, use it. Also be aware of all the spirits powers and have a general plan for how the spirit will use them.

[Rasumichin]

Mage sight goggles are an affront to shadowrun (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

No, they are a very convenient way to tell corp guards whom they have to shoot first.

[Dakka Dakka]

Another nice thing for taking out groups of people. If you have 5 guys all lay down suppression fire: They don't take any penalty to their to hit, and it's a cumulative -1 to defense for every player in the area. It won't kill the players, unless they try to charge in, but it will cause them serious issues. Suppressive fire + grenades = fun.

Remember suppressive fire is not an attack at targets, and the target does not get a defense roll but a REA+Edge roll. As such the character is not defending and does not get the cumulative -1 for multiple machine guns. Also dropping prone which is a free action can be used to avoid the fire altogether. There is no penalty for shooting from the prone position. 6P-1(Assault Rifle and LMG suppressive fire) can be soaked with 19 dice half of the time. I'm too lazy to calculate the probability of taking less than 3 boxes. If that is the case the PC will have no additional penalty from the "suppression". It will add up but fights rarely take very long anyway.

[Nath]

Remember suppressive fire is not an attack at targets, and the target does not get a defense roll but a REA+Edge roll. As such the character is not defending and does not get the cumulative -1 for multiple machine guns. Also dropping prone which is a free action can be used to avoid the fire altogether. There is no penalty for shooting from the prone position. 6P-1(Assault Rifle and LMG suppressive fire) can be soaked with 19 dice half of the time. I'm too lazy to calculate the probability of taking less than 3 boxes. If that is the case the PC will have no additional penalty from the "suppression". It will add up but fights rarely take very long anyway.

Unless you bought War!, in which case "suppressive fire counts as one attack for the purposes of calculating modifiers to defense tests" and "if a target finds itself in more than one suppressive fire zone at the same time, he makes only one Reaction+Edge Test for the entire Action Phase, with a -1 dice pool modifier per zone beyond the first". However, as you said "the penalty from the defending against multiple attacks does not apply in this case, because resisting a suppressive fire is not a defense test".

[Yerameyahu]

Interesting. I love when core mechanics are assembled through a patchwork of variable-quality splatbooks. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[redwulf25]

Likewise, Control Thoughts is scary. But a typical runner is controlling the thoughts of a security guard while a typical security mage is controlling the thoughts of the aforementioned troll. Which one is nastier?

Even worse. A possession tradition wage mage. Now the troll hasn't just switched sides he's gotten a hell of a buff.

[Manunancy]

In the opening post you mentioned the PCs being heavy user (and possibly abusers) of mind-altering magic. That's not going to do much good for their repute. If they're using it even during non-hostile interaction (say using an influence spell on the Johnson to bump up their payrate) and it gets notices, their repute will plummet really fast as nobody will want to deal with them - or at least not without some sort of defense (up to having the meeting's security fragging the mage the second he looks like he's casting).

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

In the opening post you mentioned the PCs being heavy user (and possibly abusers) of mind-altering magic. That's not going to do much good for their repute. If they're using it even during non-hostile interaction (say using an influence spell on the Johnson to bump up their payrate) and it gets notices, their repute will plummet really fast as nobody will want to deal with them - or at least not without some sort of defense (up to having the meeting's security fragging the mage the second he looks like he's casting).

Indeed. I have noticed that few people tend to enforce the Fluff of the Mental Manipulations in game. Either they forget it, ot they just don't apply it for some reason. Having a Reputaion for using Mind Altering Magics is BAD.

Mechanically, of course, you can only really gain a point of Notoriety for it once. But still, it should matter to those that you deal with.

[Cain]

You know, I'm surprised no one's mentioned the obvious....

Lighting modifiers. Defensive terrain. Cover. All these will be on the side of the mooks, unless the team gets creative. (And then, they deserve the advantage). You don't need to toughen up the stats and rolls to challenge the team.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

You know, I'm surprised no one's mentioned the obvious....

Lighting modifiers. Defensive terrain. Cover. All these will be on the side of the mooks, unless the team gets creative. (And then, they deserve the advantage). You don't need to toughen up the stats and rolls to challenge the team.

Also Very true. There are a lot of conditional modifiers that the opposition can use to great effect. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[James McMurray]

What sorts of situational modifiers can the opposition use that the PCs can't? I'm especially having trouble thinking of any lighting modifiers that won't either cut both ways or be easily negated by a pair of glasses.

[CanRay]

What sorts of situational modifiers can the opposition use that the PCs can't?

Elevation and cover in the proper ambush situation.

Always beware of areas in the Barrens that *DON'T* have wrecked and burned out cars everywhere!

[Glyph]

Some things to remember about mental manipulations: they are continually resisted, with victims getting cumulative successes over (Force) rounds until they exceed the caster's successes. This may not matter in most combats, but any time you get out of combat time, it can be very quick - so it isn't that feasible to make someone a puppet for an extended period of time.

Also, control actions and control thoughts take simple actions to give commands, and the victim can act normally when not being commanded. Remember that they are sustained spells, so shooting the mage can disrupt the control by disrupting the spell.

Using these spells against security guards to sow confusion or get someone to open the gate won't get the group into too much hot water, reputation-wise, but using them during the course of things such as negotiations will get them a bad reputation, as well as cost them contacts and make them enemies.

And for the next-biggest gun, the social adept, remember that, unlike the spells mentioned above, social skills are not mind control.

Etiquette lets you fit in and look like you belong, or catch yourself when you are about to make a big social blunder. The best it can usually do is get people to like you, really.

Leadership seems the most powerful, since it involves you getting people to do what you tell them to do, but the big limiter is that you need to have some authority over the people you are using it on, or at least the potential for them to think of you as a leader. You might be able to take charge during a big quake, and get a bunch of people caught in a mall to exit in an orderly fashion. But outside of using Commanding Voice, you won't get a security guard to do what you say.

Negotiation lets you come out ahead in bargaining, but that's all. The Johnson can still only raise his price so much, and the used car salesman won't sell for a loss. So forget about PCs thinking a high negotiation roll can get them free stuff, or even stuff at below cost. If the face is too good, it can come back to bite him as "buyer's remorse" sets in.

Intimidation lets you scare people into doing something for you, or telling you what you want to know. It's only good when you're right there to back it up, and for a little while afterwards, and it breeds resentment or even hatred.

Con is the most versatile of all, both for manipulating people's emotions, and for getting things from them. But keep in mind that con is a hostile act - you are essentially deceiving people. Con artists generally avoid their former marks - you don't have a good chance to con someone more than once (depends on the severity, of course), since once they realize they have been taken advantage of, they will not be receptive to anything the character says.

And that is the key; any social skill needs a receptive target. You might be able to mollify a hostile stranger, but things like enemies, or guards with inflexible security procedures, can trip you up. Read novels about face types, and you will see that their social abilities are not a magic bullet that protects them from people ever reacting negatively to them, even people who would probably have mental Attributes of 1 or 2.

A social adept with 30 dice is like a street samurai with 30 dice - more likely to succeed, but still not able to break the hard limits of the skill itself. That street samurai will hit nearly every time, sure, but he can't shoot faster than his pistol's rate of fire. Similarly, the face can't simply magically make everything go his way - social skills are more subtle manipulations, and take a deft touch to be optimally effective.

[Yerameyahu]

I've never really understood Leadership; isn't it really just Persuasion, with a couple funny wrinkles?

[Cain]

What sorts of situational modifiers can the opposition use that the PCs can't? I'm especially having trouble thinking of any lighting modifiers that won't either cut both ways or be easily negated by a pair of glasses.

Trying to fight with the opponents heavily backlit changes the equation. Flare comp helps, but they can also have UV lamps and do the same trick in total darkness. Heavily dug in positions also makes a huge difference.

[CanRay]

I've never really understood Leadership; isn't it really just Persuasion, with a couple funny wrinkles?

Try to use Persuasion on soldiers that are under heavy fire and see how well that works out for you. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[longbowrocks]

"Buddy, can you hear me? Sorry about that illusion spell earlier. Do those bullets sound real? Good! I'm off to a good start then. How do the soldiers on the enemy lines look?"

Works every time with a dice pool of 30.
Except statistically. For some reason it just doesn't work that way with dice and stats. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rollin.gif)

[Yerameyahu]

It's not a war game, CanRay. It's crazy that there's a skill for leading soldiers, but not one for simple persuasion… and that the latter gets rolled up into the former.

[CanRay]

It's not a war game, CanRay. It's crazy that there's a skill for leading soldiers, but not one for simple persuasion… and that the latter gets rolled up into the former.

That's what happens when you read War! in a ER waiting room while worried out of your gourd.