Chummer Character Generator, Thread #2 Options

[ShadowWalker]

Aaaand here's another little thing I just recognized about drones in chummer that doesn't sound right with me:

When I buy a drone (let's say a Doberman) the stat block reads System: 3 ... Pilot 3 etc.
Looks like chumer thinks these are two different entities. I can also increase the System rating of a drone indepent from it's pilot, which is also not correct.

For reference, here's the entry from SR4a:

So the pilot essentially is the drone's system. Drones do not have a separate system rating.

-CJ

Page 102 of Arsenal has the following, that changes what's in sr4, sadly sr4a that came out after Arsenal did not change what's in Arsenal.

DEVICE/SOFTWARE RATINGS
As wireless-enabled devices, every vehicle/drone is considered
to have a Device rating (see p. 213, SR4) that determines
its standard Matrix attributes (Response, System, Firewall, and
Signal). As noted on the Sample Devices table, p. 214, SR4,
standard vehicles have Device ratings of 3, security vehicles have
Device ratings of 4, and military vehicles have Device ratings of 5.
Th e individual Response, System, Firewall, and Signal ratings may
be upgraded as normal (see p. 240, SR4).
Note that Pilot rating is listed separately, and is not considered
part of the Device rating.

So according to Arsenal all vehicles have a System rating, as well as a Pilot rating. I don't agree with Arsenal, I think the Pilot should be the System as stated in SR4A.

[CeeJay]

So according to Arsenal all vehicles have a System rating, as well as a Pilot rating. I don't agree with Arsenal, I think the Pilot should be the System as stated in SR4A.

Sometimes.... sometimes I really... Okay, so drone have a system rating that they will never use. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

Since I just have this discussion in my group at the moment, I might ask you this as well:

My Runners Companion says the following to purchasing attributes in Karma generation mode:

Next, purchase the character’s attributes (including special attributes) using the costs given in the Karma Character Generation Table. Characters begin with the minimum attribute ratings defined by their race/metatype. The maximum Karma a character can spend on their attributes at character generation is half their starting Karma (rounding up) plus twice the listed BP cost for their metatype or alternate racial concept.

Chummer enforces the second part concerning the Karma cap, but happily ignores the bolded part in the brackets. So for a human mage I can purchase attributes for 375 karma and additionally purchase 6 magic and 6 edge...
I'm currently unaware of an errata that changed the bolded part above, so if anyone could give me a link or something that would be appreciated.

-CJ

[bannockburn]

Chummer enforces the second part concerning the Karma cap, but happily ignores the bolded part in the brackets. So for a human mage I can purchase attributes for 375 karma and additionally purchase 6 magic and 6 edge...
I'm currently unaware of an errata that changed the bolded part above, so if anyone could give me a link or something that would be appreciated.

In my understanding this means that you purchase attributes and special attributes for the same costs.
In the standard creation system, special attributes do not count against the limit on Build or Karma points (emphasis mine)

Players may not spend more than half their total BP on Physical and Mental attributes

However, the RC states what you quoted. I'm not sure, if that's a mistake there or poorly worded. For my part I never enforced it, but it does make an interesting point.

[SpellBinder]

Regarding System/Pilot & the entry in SR4a 245, the catch word is "basically". It's not exactly worded well, but also doesn't state that a Pilot program IS a System program. I'd probably suggest ignoring the first "System" in that second paragraph, might make more sense.

Now drones do use System. Their nodes can be attacked just like any commlink, and System sets how much cyber damage it can take. Also, drones and vehicles can run other Common/Hacking programs as well, and System limits the rating of those programs in a vehicle just as it does in a commlink. Best to think of a vehicle's Pilot rating as it's four mental attributes, particularly Logic.

Regarding the FAQs, I've seen several posts suggesting to shy away from those. As for a reduced response, actually, it can be killer for a drone because it is used for many tests when it's running autonomously or if a rigger's jumped in (see SR4a, top of page 247), especially if that drone's also got an active IC (with proper armed software) as well as a running Encrypt and ECCM software (which paranoid riggers would be foolish not to run all of these). Thankfully databombs don't require a running program anymore. Now if you really wanted to be mean about the Response of vehicles and drones, the way things are worded on SR4a 245 about a drone's Pilot program does suggest you can count it as one of your running programs (meaning your Pilot 3, ECCM 3, and Encrypt 3 reduces your Response to 2); this isn't exactly something I'd enforce.

[EpicUnknown]

Could you make it so that the metamagics that adepts get from their way show up in the metamagic table?

[groduick]

It would be great to have an option to show the BP/karma cost or nuyen cost when you print a character in creation mode; so that you can show it to your GM (those little beasts can be suspicious sometimes); perhaps just a quick text-only summary, without dice pools and everything else...

[Neko Asakami]

So, I just finished building a character and when determining my starting money, Chummer says that I get 4D6 x $1000, meaning a luxury lifestyle. Thing is, I have no idea how it got this number. I used the advanced lifestyles and the total came up to 18 points, which is only a high lifestyle. The entertainment level is at luxury, would that do it?

[BouncingCactus]

Making a character with Type O system.
Adding normal grade bioware in the Cyberware and Bioware tab works just like I didn't have Type-O. Just as suspected.
However.
When I manually increase the grade of the Bioware (Muscle Toner in this case) to Deltagrade, I would think that the price would stay the same but the essence cost would be lower, right?

That's actually not what happens. What happens is that the price goes up as if I had bought a Deltagrade bioware out-of-the-box but it costs no essence. So it looks like this:

Type O system. positive quality.
Deltagrade Muscle Toner rank 4: 320000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) and 0.0 essence cost.
Remaining Essence: 6.0


+++EDIT+++

Actually, upon further inspection, this is the essence costs of Muscle Toner rank 4 without Type O System:
basic 0.8
second-hand 0.96
alpha 0.64
betaware 0.56
deltaware 0.40

Essence cost with Type O System:
basic 0.40
second-hand 0.56
alphaware 0.24
betaware 0.16
deltaware 0.00

The only thing Type O ought to do is to upgrade basic bioware to deltaware grade for Essence cost purposes but keep the price tag at basic level, correct?

Just thought I would point that one out ^_ ^

[redwulf25]

Made an Elf with a natural agility of 4 and natural strength of 2 and then bought a level 2 Muscle replacement. For some reason my enhanced Agility is only 5 instead of the 6 it should be. My strength is being increased correctly.

Edit: My charisma is hard capped. Could that be effecting it somehow?

[CeeJay]

The only thing Type O ought to do is to upgrade basic bioware to deltaware grade for Essence cost purposes but keep the price tag at basic level, correct?

And that's exactly what is happening. Looking at your list, the basic musle toner with Type 0 cost the same amount of essence as the delta muscle toner without Type 0.
So it looks alright, doesn't it?
Keep in mind that Type 0 only changes the essence cost. It doesn't turn normal bioware into deltagrade bioware in terms of product quality etc.

-CJ

[bannockburn]

Made an Elf with a natural agility of 4 and natural strength of 2 and then bought a level 2 Muscle replacement. For some reason my enhanced Agility is only 5 instead of the 6 it should be. My strength is being increased correctly.

Edit: My charisma is hard capped. Could that be effecting it somehow?

How much body does your elf have and how much armor does he wear? Maybe the encumbrance is factored in

[redwulf25]

How much body does your elf have and how much armor does he wear? Maybe the encumbrance is factored in

Ah yes. It's been a while since I played I may have forgotten to factor in that rule. He's wearing an Auctioneers Business Suit 6 ballistic 3 Impact and only has a body of 2.

[bannockburn]

If he's only wearing one piece of armour, you can check the optional rule fur encumbrance in the options to avoid this.
Other than that, only YNT SoftWeave or more body will help (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[BouncingCactus]

And that's exactly what is happening. Looking at your list, the basic musle toner with Type 0 cost the same amount of essence as the delta muscle toner without Type 0.
So it looks alright, doesn't it?
Keep in mind that Type 0 only changes the essence cost. It doesn't turn normal bioware into deltagrade bioware in terms of product quality etc.

-CJ

I thought the only real difference between a standard Muscle Toner and a deltagrade Muscle Toner is in the essence cost and probably other specific things that affects different grades differently, but I haven't found any such thing yet. So yeah, just entering Type O system does work just as intended with standard bioware.
I ought to simply have kept it at standard rating for 0 amount of confusion. But since I did muck around, here's a follow-up question though:

The question is, how does Type O system manage to reduce the essence cost of actual deltaware to 0?
Oooooh!
I see it now. Type O system cuts the standard price in half and then reduce the costs of all other grades by that amount.
.8 to .4 is a .4 adjustment, .96 to .56, .64 to .24, .56 to .16, .4 to .0

Is that just how it is programed, or is there somewhere in the rules that allows for this?
*curious complete newbie*
I don't think so, but no essence cost bioware does look pretty powerful, if expensive.

[The Wrestling Tr...]

Hi Nebular!

Got a quick question about cyberware and Chummer!

Is it possible to link the Stat-skill bonus of a limb directly to a skill?
For example having normal agility of 3 would result in pistol skill 3 +skilllevel. But my Char has 2 cyberarms with modified agility of 7 and would gain the full 7 agi for the dices in this skill.
Chummer somehow compares all the limbs and gives you only the average limbbonus of 4 agility to the skill. I know that would mean to split up all the skills into different body zones, but without that you ALWAYS have to calculate each individual skill after printing out the char and fix the numbers on the sheet. Only alternative to that is to fix the numbers via the "improvements" tab after char creation and fix all the skills yourself.

Wouldn't it also be possible to have a "body chart" (see attachement) integrated into Chummer that shows the individual Stats of the Cyberlimbs? Agility, Strenght and Body of each seperate Limb etc.

[ Spoiler ]

(IMG:http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/upload/yuiupload/1300021409.jpg)

As of now, it's kinda hard or better said a nuisance to keep track of all the different cyberware stats.

[Nebular]

So, I just finished building a character and when determining my starting money, Chummer says that I get 4D6 x $1000, meaning a luxury lifestyle. Thing is, I have no idea how it got this number. I used the advanced lifestyles and the total came up to 18 points, which is only a high lifestyle. The entertainment level is at luxury, would that do it?

EDIT: Ok, so I've poked around with this. There's one flaw where it attempts to determine the equivalent Lifestyle for cost by comparing LP. If it falls in a very small range, it accidentally places you in High instead of Middle. I'll have this fixed in the next update.

Qualities do not affect the effective Lifestyle category which determines the number of dice and the multiplier that are used to roll starting Nuyen. If the 5 aspects (Necessities, Security, Entertainment, Neighborhood, and Comforts) add up to 13 LP, it's treated as being a Medium Lifestyle, even if you have enough LP of Qualities to put it in the effective High or Low Lifestyle range. The total LP (5 aspects + Qualities) only determines the monthly cost.

[Nebular]

I thought the only real difference between a standard Muscle Toner and a deltagrade Muscle Toner is in the essence cost and probably other specific things that affects different grades differently, but I haven't found any such thing yet. So yeah, just entering Type O system does work just as intended with standard bioware.
I ought to simply have kept it at standard rating for 0 amount of confusion. But since I did muck around, here's a follow-up question though:

The question is, how does Type O system manage to reduce the essence cost of actual deltaware to 0?
Oooooh!
I see it now. Type O system cuts the standard price in half and then reduce the costs of all other grades by that amount.
.8 to .4 is a .4 adjustment, .96 to .56, .64 to .24, .56 to .16, .4 to .0

Is that just how it is programed, or is there somewhere in the rules that allows for this?
*curious complete newbie*
I don't think so, but no essence cost bioware does look pretty powerful, if expensive.

Keep in mind that Type O doesn't actually change the Bioware's Grade but instead lets you treat off-the-shelf (ie. Standard) Bioware as though it were Deltaware. That said, here's how Chummer actually calculates it in the background. The Type O Quality reduces the ESS cost of Basic Bioware by 50% (0.5). When calculating the Essence cost, the modifiers are first combined (Grade Ess modifier - additional modifiers) then applied to the item's Essence cost. This means that Standard (1.0) - Type O (0.5) = 0.5 or a 50% cost reduction and Deltaware (0.5) - Type O (0.5) = 0.0 or a 100% cost reduction for example. It's disgustingly pricey, but the rules certainly allow for it.

[Nebular]

Hi Nebular!

Got a quick question about cyberware and Chummer!

Is it possible to link the Stat-skill bonus of a limb directly to a skill?
For example having normal agility of 3 would result in pistol skill 3 +skilllevel. But my Char has 2 cyberarms with modified agility of 7 and would gain the full 7 agi for the dices in this skill.
Chummer somehow compares all the limbs and gives you only the average limbbonus of 4 agility to the skill. I know that would mean to split up all the skills into different body zones, but without that you ALWAYS have to calculate each individual skill after printing out the char and fix the numbers on the sheet. Only alternative to that is to fix the numbers via the "improvements" tab after char creation and fix all the skills yourself.

Wouldn't it also be possible to have a "body chart" (see attachement) integrated into Chummer that shows the individual Stats of the Cyberlimbs? Agility, Strenght and Body of each seperate Limb etc.

[ Spoiler ]

(IMG:http://www.proprofs.com/quiz-school/upload/yuiupload/1300021409.jpg)

As of now, it's kinda hard or better said a nuisance to keep track of all the different cyberware stats.

The issue I see is that, as per the rules, the Attribute average is used in all Tests unless the GM decides that only the augmented limbs are involved. For example, climbing uses both arms and lets, as does swimming. You could argue that running is legs only, but what if the character is a primate that uses both arms and legs to run? While things like Pistols is usually performed with your arms, things like the eye guns and oral guns, and guns mounted in another limb like the torso, skull, or leg, wouldn't use the arm's AGI.

The same basic issue comes up with a limb/body diagram. Not all characters have 2 arms and 2 legs. Centaur and Naga player Metatypes immediately come to mind, along with most Critters.

[Hellfire]

I have detected a slight glitch:

- when buying/adding an armor you can add the "Attitude" improvements (Carbon boron, delta amyloid and kevlar weaving) to every type of armor, even though it should only be possible for clothing and armor clothing
- also the WAR YNT softweave seems not to function as intended: when adding it to an armor clothing (for example Vashion Island Steampunk Vest ensemble (7/7), which has been improved to 10/8 by delta amyloid) which is worn by a BOD 4 STR 1 character, this should reduce AGI/REA by 1, but it doesn't (I cannot reproduce this in create mode, only in career mode, even when readding the equipment)

also an error:
when trying to add weapon accessory with the "add&more" button the program shows an error:
Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
adding the accessory with the "OK" button works perfectly however.

best regards
Hellfire

[Nebular]

I have detected a slight glitch:

- when buying/adding an armor you can add the "Attitude" improvements (Carbon boron, delta amyloid and kevlar weaving) to every type of armor, even though it should only be possible for clothing and armor clothing
- also the WAR YNT softweave seems not to function as intended: when adding it to an armor clothing (for example Vashion Island Steampunk Vest ensemble (7/7), which has been improved to 10/8 by delta amyloid) which is worn by a BOD 4 STR 1 character, this should reduce AGI/REA by 1, but it doesn't (I cannot reproduce this in create mode, only in career mode, even when readding the equipment)

also an error:
when trying to add weapon accessory with the "add&more" button the program shows an error:
Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
adding the accessory with the "OK" button works perfectly however.

best regards
Hellfire

Saw the Weapon Accessory one from a few days ago - I'll have that fixed in the next update. If you posted the other ones before then I apparently missed 'em. I'll take a look and try to get those corrected soon. Sorry, I've been trying to keep up but the past week or so has been pretty nuts. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[Nebular]

So as some of you have probably noticed by now, I haven't been quite as responsive to some of the recent posts over the past week or so. Don't worry, development hasn't stopped! In what was supposed to be a week vacation of relaxation and writing code, I was instead dealing with a landslide of phone calls from various companies and recruiters in another city, hoping to get back to Calgary and building up a list of potential places to live which sucked up about 90% of my time. An insanely long and nerve-wracking week, but it has paid off as I'm headed back to Calgary by the end of the month!

I'll have another update ready for Thursday to address some of the issues that have come up recently. I'll try my best to be a little more responsive now that I have all of the phone call stuff out of the way, but I may still be a little slow until I finally make the move as there's all of that packing and logistic nonsense to still deal with. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[ChatNoir]

Congrats on your future new job and good luck on that life change. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Nebular]

- also the WAR YNT softweave seems not to function as intended: when adding it to an armor clothing (for example Vashion Island Steampunk Vest ensemble (7/7), which has been improved to 10/8 by delta amyloid) which is worn by a BOD 4 STR 1 character, this should reduce AGI/REA by 1, but it doesn't (I cannot reproduce this in create mode, only in career mode, even when readding the equipment)

This seems to be working properly using the current build in both Create and Career Modes. Does the character you're working with in Career Mode have any STR augmentations at all?

[Nebular]

Could you make it so that the metamagics that adepts get from their way show up in the metamagic table?

From what I can see, there isn't a need to actually add any other additional Metamagics for these. The Artisan's Way still uses the Adept Centering Metamagic, and the others just let you treat your Initiate Grade as being 1 higher for the purpose of determining the Metamagic's bonuses. Am I overlooking something?

[Nebular]

- when buying/adding an armor you can add the "Attitude" improvements (Carbon boron, delta amyloid and kevlar weaving) to every type of armor, even though it should only be possible for clothing and armor clothing

I've updated the Armor data file to correct this.