Is War! Really that Bad?, Fatum: I moved it here. Let's continue. Options

[Fatum]

Visibility modifiers do not break LOS, they just modify the spellcasting pool when casting through an area with poor visibility.

[longbowrocks]

The hell, if you use edge and you have a good pool you might survive a freaking thorshot. (right you would need 12 hits, but hey. Surviving a thor shot in the face is worth throwing 40 dices. Well, as a matter of fact you do not need this amount of hits. since the thor shot would enter the area and would be slowed down. Then he would slowly continue to fall, untill enough mass entered the area to break the spell. By this time most of the kinetic energy of the thorshot would be used up for deformation(or absorbed by the field) of the pole itself. So the depris will fall down from maybe 50 meters. A physical barrier should offer enough protection from that...

Now THAT is pretty gay. I'm starting to understand people's dislike of WAR!. It can only be countered with WAR!. i.e. lasers vs. slow vs. THOR.

[Fatum]

Now THAT is pretty gay. I'm starting to understand people's dislike of WAR!. It can only be countered with WAR!. i.e. lasers vs. slow vs. THOR.

There are lasers in Arsenal, so not just War!

Oh, and while we're on spells, let's discuss Designate, which is the universal code cracker the spell (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[longbowrocks]

Smoke does not. That's why there's FAB.

Well, RAW-wise, but I like the way he's thinking. Might be even more effective than FAB if your GM allows it.

[Irion]

@longbowrocks
I am not saying that this in particular is bad. For my taste it is hilerious.
GM:Thorshot, everyone is dead!
P1: Wait a second I...
Great situation.

[Irion]

@Fatum

Oh, and while we're on spells, let's discuss Designate, which is the universal code cracker the spell

I do not get it, sorry.

[Faelan]

Visibility modifiers do not break LOS, they just modify the spellcasting pool when casting through an area with poor visibility.

Could you please show me where it says this. I just went through the entire book and could not find this. While I understand using the modifiers to get off a quick spell, because no concealment is perfect, your vision would be completely obscured often enough to disrupt a sustained spell, at least in my opinion based on my personal experiences with smoke grenades. A page number would be helpful, I would like to know if I am handling something incorrectly. Thanks.

[longbowrocks]

@Fatum

I do not get it, sorry.

Ditto.

[Faelan]

Smoke does not. That's why there's FAB.

There is no reason smoke would not provide concealment. FAB exists to not only provide concealment, but it acts as low level cover being solid in astral unlike the walls of building.

[redwulf25]

The GM has no obligation to design all the encounters around your team; you're not playing D&D 4E.

Speaking as a GM they sure as hell do. What fun is it if the GM's encounters are either too weak to offer a challenge or too hard to survive*?


*Yes I'm including running away as an option on the survival front.

[Fatum]

@Fatum

I do not get it, sorry.

As the author stated, it can be used to fool the target designation systems everywhere on the battlefield. So, when there are shells or missiles in the air that are being directed by active target designation, casting the spell redirects all those at the spell's target instead.
Minding that target designators use coded sequences, obviously that means that the spell is capable of cracking all of their codes at once.

Could you please show me where it says this. I just went through the entire book and could not find this. While I understand using the modifiers to get off a quick spell, because no concealment is perfect, your vision would be completely obscured often enough to disrupt a sustained spell, at least in my opinion based on my personal experiences with smoke grenades. A page number would be helpful, I would like to know if I am handling something incorrectly. Thanks.

Sure.

Other sources of power (foci, spirit spellcasting aid) and Visibility modifiers (p. 136) may affect the dice pool.

Speaking as a GM they sure as hell do. What fun is it if the GM's encounters are either too weak to offer a challenge or too hard to survive*?
*Yes I'm including running away as an option on the survival front.

Runners choose the targets, GM makes the opposition realistic. If your runners want to assassinate the president of the UCAS, you are under no obligation to make the encounter "level-appropriate". If they want to steal candy from kids, the same line of reasoning applies.

[Faelan]

I am sorry the quoted portion doe snot say that it cannot disrupt LOS. It simply says that when initially casting a spell to use Visibility modifiers to the dice pool.

[suoq]

Having read this thread, I'm forced to consider that WAR! isn't particularly bad, but at this point the constant lack of game balance, the inconsistencies, and the backlog of rules that people still can't come to a clear consensus on mean that any book is just going to cause all that pent up frustration to burst.

The system itself has been broken since the main rulebook. The rigger and hacker don't actually need any stats. The cost to buying skills via BP and buying them via Karma is completely off. The cost for an extra die in any particular skill or action through ware/tools/whatever appears to be completely random, as is the availability of that extra die.

This isn't a problem as long as the system itself is simple. People can work with a limited broken system. However, with every additional complexity, the brokenness of the system makes it more frustrating. A limited broken system is playable. An unlimited broken system is frustrating.

What Shadowrun is becoming is an unlimited broken system with broken attempts to fix broken sections. (SR4A software vs. unwired software leaps to mind). The issue with WAR! isn't that the book is badly named. The issue is that Shadowrun has no foundation to support all of these things each new rulebook brings. It's a great world, and a great game, but the core rules are horribly broken and can't support the complexity being added. War! is just taking the blame for it.

[redwulf25]

Runners choose the targets, GM makes the opposition realistic. If your runners want to assassinate the president of the UCAS, you are under no obligation to make the encounter "level-appropriate". If they want to steal candy from kids, the same line of reasoning applies.

Runners get offered jobs by Johnson's most of the time. If the team decides to do something stupid on their own that's their problem (and running or surrendering is usually still an option unless they fuck up horribly). But in the normal course of play only a total dick of a GM would have Mr. J offer the team a job they stand no chance of surviving. (A job Mr. J thinks they have no chance of surviving if he's screwing them over, but unlike Mr. J the GM should give the team a fair, if difficult, chance of survival.)

[Fatum]

I am sorry the quoted portion doe snot say that it cannot disrupt LOS. It simply says that when initially casting a spell to use Visibility modifiers to the dice pool.

If you can cast a spell through an area with Visibility modifiers (as per the rules in the quote), that means that Visibility modifiers do not break LOS.

What Shadowrun is becoming is an unlimited broken system with broken attempts to fix broken sections. (SR4A software vs. unwired software leaps to mind). The issue with WAR! isn't that the book is badly named. The issue is that Shadowrun has no foundation to support all of these things each new rulebook brings. It's a great world, and a great game, but the core rules are horribly broken and can't support the complexity being added. War! is just taking the blame for it.

There are numerous examples of the contrary. For example, The Way of the Adept adds some solid crunch without ruining anything. Actually, even most of War! is salvageable if you use a lot of houserules and run with RAI.
So it's not a problem with the system (although there is one, there's no arguing that), it's a problem with the particular book.

Runners get offered jobs by Johnson's most of the time. If the team decides to do something stupid on their own that's their problem (and running or surrendering is usually still an option unless they fuck up horribly). But in the normal course of play only a total dick of a GM would have Mr. J offer the team a job they stand no chance of surviving. (A job Mr. J thinks they have no chance of surviving if he's screwing them over, but unlike Mr. J the GM should give the team a fair, if difficult, chance of survival.)

Of course, the Johnsons should mostly offer beatable runs, and if not, the runners should get a chance to learn they're being set up.
That does not in any way mean that the runners should be unable to paint themselves into a corner, or that they must have a chance to get out of any encounter at all alive.

[Faelan]

If you can cast a spell through an area with Visibility modifiers (as per the rules in the quote), that means that Visibility modifiers do not break LOS.

I argue that it does not. Visibility modifiers are used when something is obscured. It is difficult to see, the fact that you successfully perceive something long enough to cast a spell or shoot it is what the Visibility modifiers and the quoted text, along with every other reference to Visibility modifiers in the book imply. The fact that you have a chance of getting the spell off does not insure that the spell will continue. Maintaining LOS requires a constant ability to perceive the targeted area if it is disrupted even for a moment LOS is lost. At least that is how I run it, and will continue to run until I see it presented as you stated. As it stands nothing in the quoted material suggests to me that LOS is guaranteed after the initial casting.

[Yerameyahu]

What are you talking about? 'After the initial casting?'

[Fatum]

You can't cast unless you have LOS.
You can cast through areas with Visibility modifiers.
Thus, you have LOS through areas with Visibility modifiers.
Nothing in the rules says otherwise.

[Faelan]

What are you talking about? 'After the initial casting?'

You cast a spell and choose to sustain it. While sustaining it your LOS is lost. You don't continue to affect targets you no longer see. Visibility as a modifier to spellcasting (the initial roll, the only roll), does not reflect your vision being obscured after it is cast. If you lose LOS on a target you no longer affect that target and in the case of Slow the area is the target. If you are in the middle of a smoke cloud you have likely lost LOS with the target.

[redwulf25]

Of course, the Johnsons should mostly offer beatable runs, and if not, the runners should get a chance to learn they're being set up.
That does not in any way mean that the runners should be unable to paint themselves into a corner, or that they must have a chance to get out of any encounter at all alive.

Yes they should be able to paint themselves into a corner (through player/character stupidity not through the GM intentionally setting up something unsurvivable) but they need to have a chance to get out of any encounter alive (not always a good chance, and only if they play their cards right) or it's game over, rocks fall everyone dies, and that is no fun for either the players or the GM.

Also you'll note I didn't say all the runs had to be beatable, only survivable.

[Yerameyahu]

I thought the premise was that you're standing still, so you have touch. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Faelan]

I thought the premise was that you're standing still, so you have touch. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

You don't lose LOS of yourself ever, however my understanding was that the spell was being cast in such a way as to protect the caster without affecting him, hence it would no longer be a case of Touch maintaining LOS but sight which is the case with most ranged or AOE spells.

[Yerameyahu]

Ah. No clue. Several people mentioned that the mage couldn't move, so I'd call that affecting him. As always, it's a weird spell that makes no sense, so that doesn't help.

[Irion]

@Fatum

As the author stated, it can be used to fool the target designation systems everywhere on the battlefield. So, when there are shells or missiles in the air that are being directed by active target designation, casting the spell redirects all those at the spell's target instead.

Well, you would need to know the frequenz. Nothing you could not do with a normal target designator too.

So it's not a problem with the system (although there is one, there's no arguing that), it's a problem with the particular book.

Similar problems have been around with the other books too. See emotoys etc.
@suoq
Well, partly. The problem is, in my opinion, not the core book.
The additional books focused on giving new possibilities and new gear instead of new rules.

It is simply not possible to play with basic rules on throw additional dicepool boni with every new book. (See pornomancer)

[Fatum]

Yes they should be able to paint themselves into a corner (through player/character stupidity not through the GM intentionally setting up something unsurvivable) but they need to have a chance to get out of any encounter alive (not always a good chance, and only if they play their cards right) or it's game over, rocks fall everyone dies, and that is no fun for either the players or the GM.

Also you'll note I didn't say all the runs had to be beatable, only survivable.

Again, a GM's job is making the world react realistically and reasonably to the runners' actions. That has little to do with "setting up level-appropriate encounters", not any more than admitting the Johnson's willingness to see them succeed, and giving them fitting missions.
And there's a bunch of cases where the chances to survive are slim enough to be discarded; again that has nothing to do with GM ill will. That's just how things work - you don't expect to try, say, killing Lofwyr and stay alive and well.

@Fatum
Well, you would need to know the frequenz. Nothing you could not do with a normal target designator too.

Target designators do not use a simple non-modulated signal to mark the target. It is, in fact, coded. Saying that you can emulate any target designator on the field means you can crack any of those codes, instantly.

Similar problems have been around with the other books too. See emotoys etc.

Just the fact that you run into problems from time to time doesn't mean you can't avoid them at all.
Yeah, Arsenal, Street Magic and Unwired all had weird rulings and more or less broken pieces, but nowhere as catastrophic as War!