Unnatural selection, Forcing players to smarten up. Options

[FuelDrop]

We've run into a bit of a problem in our game.

Useless characters.

Now I want to be clear, I have no problem with minmaxing. I have no problem with character specialization. I have no problem with building around a theme.

However, when you minmax around the most useless weapon you can find (EG the combat knife) plus stealth, then expect to be able to take on armies? That doesn't work, and even if it doesn't get everyone else killed it leaves you hopelessly gimped outside of situations where slitting throats is the answer. It leaves you with no less lethal option for, say, taking down a civilian who's just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Even with a couple of dots in the Firearms group you're unlikely to be better than "above average" at any range outside of arms reach.

Similarly, I have a problem with people who minmax badly. Himori, our group gunbunny, is outclassed in most guns by the knife guy above. Both of these characters are combat specialists who are either really mediocre at their jobs or else are good at a near-useless job.

In fact, with the exception of the combat characters' initiative enhancers the Face and B&E expert outclass them in a fight both offensively (even with the shotgun the face only just learned to use) and defensively (B&E has better dodge, Face has better soak). In both cases the characters also shine in their designated roles.

Now our GM has decided that he's sick of pampering these special snowflake characters (I don't blame him) and wants to force them to become effective through using circumstances to encourage them to spend their karma well and improve, you know, useful skills.

I'm asking if anyone can suggest scenarios that make sense in-game which force such adaption without allowing the characters to get through by relying on the better rounded characters to get them through in their own specialty. I don't need stuff to force them to branch out, just to encourage them to stop being crap at what their specialty is or to specialize in something that isn't almost completely worthless.

I will say one thing for the group: They have universally good stealth (Except for whichever troll we've got that week, but that's understandable as one's a rigger and the other is too big to go through most doors). Lowest stealth DP with chameleon suit on is 15 and limit 7 on Hollywood (the face).

Please provide suggestions to help these players grow their characters.

[psychophipps]

The knife guy just needs Thrown Weapons skill and he can be a contender with the right gear selection. Add Automatics skill and specialize in something like Machine Pistol or SMG and with minimal karma he becomes a real asset.

The Gun Bunny just has to up her skills a bit. A few specializations for her preferred weapon types and she should be a contender relatively shortly.

[FuelDrop]

so how do we encourage that without outright telling them?

[psychophipps]

Ummm...I'm a pretty blunt kind of person. I'd just tell them straight up, to be honest. Be cool about it, but point out that they're supposed to be the hardcases and, well...it's kind of sad when they get schooled by the second-story girl in putting bitches in the hurt locker.

[Lobo0705]

You might also want to consider telling them in character.

If your character feels they are worthless, why the hell is he going on a job where their uselessness is going to get him hurt/killed?

[FuelDrop]

Ummm...I'm a pretty blunt kind of person. I'd just tell them straight up, to be honest. Be cool about it, but point out that they're supposed to be the hardcases and, well...it's kind of sad when they get schooled by the second-story girl in putting bitches in the hurt locker.

Well to be fair the second story girl is supposed to be very agile so her being good with guns is kind of understandable.
When the Face is both better with his weapon of choice (Pistols, because he's a face and the only weapons he's likely to be able to have on him are highly concealable) and is a better tank (only by a few dice, but still...) then you may wish to rethink your career choice.

Now to be entirely fair Himori has 5 skill in the firearm group, which is easily professional level. Her problem is that she's an elf gunslinger with a total agility of 5. That means with a smartgun she's getting 12 dice, compared to Zero's agility 9 skill 6 specialization (sports rifles) 2 smartlink 2 total 19 dice, a bit more than 50% more.

Himori has better damage output, but that's due to the fact that a 10 grand battle rifle SHOULD be outperforming the 2 grand sports rifle. Even then, she needs to use burst fire to beat me.

Also, Himori refuses to carry any rounds other than APDS for any of her weapons. We've tried to convince her to carry gel. Hell, we've tried to convince her to pick up normal rounds for shooting out low resistance targets like sensors. Nope. APDS is her shtick.

A thought occurs to me: All the really badly designed characters our group attracts (Himori, Darkblade, Nitro) eschew nonlethal options either by the nature of their weapons (blades) or by conscious choice. I wonder if it's coincidence or if the two are related.

Final note: Darkblade has Agility 8 and 2 ranks in Firearms group, meaning that he's lagging only one die behind the gun bunny (no internal smartlink). This is a bad sign. Hollywood has been training with Zero for about a week with his shotgun and a hunting rifle and is putting down 10 dice (rank 3, 5 agility, internal smartlink), putting him 2 dice behind the gun bunny with some weapons he's only just learning to use. I'm thinking that Himori needs to get augmented hard if she wants to become viable (Boost agility and either bone lacing or dermal plating would be very good.)

[FuelDrop]

You might also want to consider telling them in character.

If your character feels they are worthless, why the hell is he going on a job where their uselessness is going to get him hurt/killed?

They tend to run headlong into traps and take the hits for me, without prompting. Also good for tripping ambushes, drawing gunfire and being a distraction.

[psychophipps]

They tend to run headlong into traps and take the hits for me, without prompting. Also good for tripping ambushes, drawing gunfire and being a distraction.

Well, it sounds like they're being handy after all... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

A lot of it is build style. If you're going for Agility build then yes, you're going to skool anyone that is going for a generalist build, even with lower skill totals.

[Moirdryd]

I'm curious... What's Zero like if he's not using a Long Arm?
APDS can be pricey, but it's always nice to have and I don't see any real issues with the Firearms at 5. Sure some Smartlink contacts are a worthy investment along with smart guns for the weaponry, or laser sights. But currently she's 10 dice with any gun straight up. Advancing the skill group is a good way to go and getting some initiative boosting stuff certainly never hurts. It depends all on how you play things (granted we do get to see the results of the games you're in) but I've seen very dedicated specialised skillet become worthless and a more rounded combat grouping prove invaluable.
It's hard to assess because we can't see the rest of the character (granted, playing like your a maxed out specialist when you're not will go bad places.)

[FuelDrop]

Here's how I'm currently thinking they may want to progress. You guys correct me if you think I'm making a horrible mistake.

Himori: Karma: Focus on a single area, probably either that battle rifle of hers or assault rifles (They have the rate of fire to compensate for her middling dicepool [it'd be fine if it wasn't for the fact that this is supposed to be her specialty]) Nuyen: First focus on getting bone lacing/orthoskin/dermal plating to increase survivability, then save up for muscle toner at rating 2+

Darkblade: Karma: Boost automatics and focus on either SMGs or Machine pistols, both of which have high rates of fire and can be 1-handed when necessary. I'd lean towards SMGs personally, but I like being able to hit targets beyond arms reach so I'm weird. As for 'ware, survivability boosters are once again the order of the day as his combat style requires him getting up in the enemy's faces so he is going to get shot.

Thoughts?

[FuelDrop]

I'm curious... What's Zero like if he's not using a Long Arm?
APDS can be pricey, but it's always nice to have and I don't see any real issues with the Firearms at 5. Sure some Smartlink contacts are a worthy investment along with smart guns for the weaponry, or laser sights. But currently she's 10 dice with any gun straight up. Advancing the skill group is a good way to go and getting some initiative boosting stuff certainly never hurts. It depends all on how you play things (granted we do get to see the results of the games you're in) but I've seen very dedicated specialised skillet become worthless and a more rounded combat grouping prove invaluable.
It's hard to assess because we can't see the rest of the character (granted, playing like your a maxed out specialist when you're not will go bad places.)

Zero has longarms (Sports rifles) 6/8 (Sports rifles are a lot easier to get and less suspicious than sniper rifles, plus you can take one down to the range and practice with them without anyone commenting unless you forget to take the silencer off), Pistols (semi-automatics) 6/8 (Again they're easy to get and practice with, and semi-autos can be silenced unlike revolvers), automatics 3 (proficient, but spray and pray is both not her style and risks a stray shot hitting civilians), an unarmed (cyberweapons) 3/5 (She doesn't do close combat if she can possibly avoid it but has at least basic competence if left with no choice). She's got up to 19 dice in her specialties, but she's not the combat monkey so tries to avoid a fight if possible.

[Moirdryd]

Well, for 19 karma she can get either long arms or automatics up to 6 and a specialisation which is a 13dice pool upto 15 if SmartLinked which means she'll be close to hitting Acc often. A few thousand Nuyen could go into Dermal and Lacing but I'd say to go for boosting initiative and reaction is probably a good idea.

[FuelDrop]

Actually the only thing that the two combat characters did right is get initiative boosters out of chargen.

[Moirdryd]

Well... Sadly with that load out (Near max Agl and Max starting stats in Two weapon skills) means Zero kind of IS a combat monkey. I count 20 skill points in combat stats alone.

[Lobo0705]

How is Zero NOT the combat monkey?

[FuelDrop]

Well... Sadly with that load out (Near max Agl and Max starting stats in Two weapon skills) means Zero kind of IS a combat monkey. I count 20 skill points in combat stats alone.

Vicious cycle. Most of the players rock up with combat only characters, runs focus on combat, all new characters need to be good at combat to survive.

Actually I did intentionally make Zero very good at combat BUT I only did it after I'd filled out my primary role and got a smattering of other utility skills. Priority A skills gives you a lot to play with. I also did some intentional gimping (Sports rifles instead of sniper rifles, low automatics, light pistol instead of heavy pistol, Razor hands instead of spurs, that sort of thing). I wanted to be able to contribute, but I also wanted to leave the combat guys with the chance to shine in their role so intentionally underpowered myself with a civilian instead of milspec loadout. I also lack any form of initiative booster beyond a reaction enhancer (It was looking like I'd be our wheelman at the time) or any form of durability booster, so I made sure I wouldn't outshine the combat specialists in their niche.

Didn't work, but I tried.

[thorya]

Well to be fair the second story girl is supposed to be very agile so her being good with guns is kind of understandable.
When the Face is both better with his weapon of choice (Pistols, because he's a face and the only weapons he's likely to be able to have on him are highly concealable) and is a better tank (only by a few dice, but still...) then you may wish to rethink your career choice.

Now to be entirely fair Himori has 5 skill in the firearm group, which is easily professional level. Her problem is that she's an elf gunslinger with a total agility of 5. That means with a smartgun she's getting 12 dice, compared to Zero's agility 9 skill 6 specialization (sports rifles) 2 smartlink 2 total 19 dice, a bit more than 50% more.

Himori has better damage output, but that's due to the fact that a 10 grand battle rifle SHOULD be outperforming the 2 grand sports rifle. Even then, she needs to use burst fire to beat me.

Also, Himori refuses to carry any rounds other than APDS for any of her weapons. We've tried to convince her to carry gel. Hell, we've tried to convince her to pick up normal rounds for shooting out low resistance targets like sensors. Nope. APDS is her shtick.

A thought occurs to me: All the really badly designed characters our group attracts (Himori, Darkblade, Nitro) eschew nonlethal options either by the nature of their weapons (blades) or by conscious choice. I wonder if it's coincidence or if the two are related.

Final note: Darkblade has Agility 8 and 2 ranks in Firearms group, meaning that he's lagging only one die behind the gun bunny (no internal smartlink). This is a bad sign. Hollywood has been training with Zero for about a week with his shotgun and a hunting rifle and is putting down 10 dice (rank 3, 5 agility, internal smartlink), putting him 2 dice behind the gun bunny with some weapons he's only just learning to use. I'm thinking that Himori needs to get augmented hard if she wants to become viable (Boost agility and either bone lacing or dermal plating would be very good.)

It sorta sounds like Himori might not be the problem. If I'm understanding this right, zero is not a combat specialist, but took 6 ranks with a specialization in a weapon on top of all the agility augments Zero could get a hold of. It really sounds like whoever's playing Zero is intentionally cutting in on the combat role and the GM is having to up things to compensate. I mean, 12 is low in your specialty, but 19 is really high for a secondary skill.

Himori would be well served by a specialization, which sounds like it would probably still fit with her concept of the character. And if the GM were to make augments available, maybe through a street doc connection to give her a little boost in agi. If she's throwing 12 dice now, she not very far from being a real heavy hitter. I think once she's in the 14+ range, she should be kicking ass, but it's your table maybe you expect everyone to be throwing big dice. What dice pool do you think is necessary for her to stop being "useless".

And the knife guy could be kicking ass if with his knife stealth combo if he's smart. Called shots to unsuspecting targets even with a combat knife are pretty vicious. Maybe encourage him to think about coating the knife in poison or get an injection stilleto for a quick non-lethal knock-out. Melee's usually a sub-optimal choice, but it he's got high blades skill already, maybe just give him a katana as a present so he hits harder in melee. Is the problem that he's trying to charge in the open towards opponents?

Edit: I see, didn't realize you were playing zero.

[FuelDrop]

It sorta sounds like Himori might not be the problem. If I'm understanding this right, zero is not a combat specialist, but took 6 ranks with a specialization in a weapon on top of all the agility augments Zero could get a hold of. It really sounds like whoever's playing Zero is intentionally cutting in on the combat role and the GM is having to up things to compensate. I mean, 12 is low in your specialty, but 19 is really high for a secondary skill.

Sadly our game is very combat oriented, and I put those skills on Zero in response to that. When given the choice I play a support role with Zero (on Saturday my role in the run was using my high stealth, climb and escape artist to get everyone else's weapons to them in a secure location via the air conditioning system and didn't fire a shot, which is how I prefer to run her).

Himori would be well served by a specialization, which sounds like it would probably still fit with her concept of the character. And if the GM were to make augments available, maybe through a street doc connection to give her a little boost in agi. If she's throwing 12 dice now, she not very far from being a real heavy hitter. I think once she's in the 14+ range, she should be kicking ass, but it's your table maybe you expect everyone to be throwing big dice. What dice pool do you think is necessary for her to stop being "useless".

I'd say that 15 dice in your focus is good for physical skills (mental based skills are a different beast as those are harder to boost in many cases). A sniper with a good rifle can ironically get away with a lot less because if you've got surprise your foe is unlikely to be dodging. Given how Himori plays her first priority should be to get up soak, and probably focus on assault rifles over sniping as she tends to Leeroy Jenkins into trouble where her sniper skills are fairly useless and her secondary combat setup (Sword and light pistol or dual swords) is making her a target.

And the knife guy could be kicking ass if with his knife stealth combo if he's smart. Called shots to unsuspecting targets even with a combat knife are pretty vicious. Maybe encourage him to think about coating the knife in poison or get an injection stilleto for a quick non-lethal knock-out. Melee's usually a sub-optimal choice, but it he's got high blades skill already, maybe just give him a katana as a present so he hits harder in melee. Is the problem that he's trying to charge in the open towards opponents?

He's being played like a rogue on WoW, which ironically fits with both his background in game and his player's gaming history. we're cutting him a bit of slack while he gets his head around the concept of TTRPGs but the fact is that no matter your dicepool you can't step out, slit a throat and hide again without attracting attention.

Edit: I see, didn't realize you were playing zero.

All good, fair and honest observation is always appreciated.

EDIT: I want to be clear: Himori's 12 dice would be a good pool in most circumstances. However, when you only have 12 dice in the area you are EXCLUSIVELY focused in (along with skills like gymnastics to climb up to sniper roosts, perception to spot targets and stealth to hide in ambush, all of which are basically facilitating skills for sniping) at the exclusion of all other areas (Low driving. No social. No technical. minimal knowledge. No magic. No outdoors. limited close combat. very low first aid. low second language) 12 dice isn't exactly awe inspiring for someone who sells themselves as a killing machine.

[Lobo0705]

Fueldrop,

To be honest, after hearing your explanation, it sounds like a combination of problems, none of which are actual skill driven issues.

1) If Himori is a character who goes bursting through doors and running around at people with 2 swords or a sword and a pistol, then Himori should be killed rather quickly. Doesn't matter what her stats/skills are, she is behaving incredibly recklessly/irresponsibly, and should be punished for that, not how many ranks she has in firearms.

2) Darkblade has a character concept which might sound cool, but if he has to kill more than one person, runs into problems. The fact that he is playing it like a computer game doesn't help - and again, this is nothing to do with skill ranks.

3) The place where the biggest portion of blame deserves to rest in on the GM.

First off, you guys are playing very pink Mohawk (read a couple of your reports, and Panther Cannons, and 25kg shaped charges qualify your games as that for me) - and while there is nothing wrong with that, there is something wrong with the GM who puts you in that type of game, requiring you to play combat monkeys to survive, and then complaining that your character isn't combat monkey enough.

How about instead of telling the players how to spend their karma so that they can raise their combat abilities (one can only assume so that he can throw more challenging combat tasks at you, which require more combat monkeyness to survive), he talks to them about tactics, or "Please don't charge through a door" or "Running around with just a knife when everyone else is carrying guns is a bad idea - sneak up, make the kill, and then drop a smoke grenade, or use flash-paks, or get out of the room and come back from a different direction" - or, and this may be a radical thought, don't require every run to be solved by getting into a firefight.

I've been running a campaign set in Denver for 2 years now (previously with SR3, converted to SR5) where there are 3 characters, a decker with Pistols 3 Agility 3, a PI with Pistols 5 Agility 5 (the combat monster of the group), and a Gecko Shaman Aspected Sorcerer with no combat spells and no control spells, specializing in Illusion/Manipulation spells (but again, no Control Thoughts/Actions, no Influence, no Mob Mind/Mob Mood). They manage to get the job done, and even get in a fight or two along the way.

Now, I will admit that I'm probably on the extreme end of the spectrum with role-play and detective-work style runs as opposed to "Break into a club, murder the proprietors and blow up the building" style of runs, but isn't there something in the middle?

Can't the GM make the game so that you as the infiltration expert doesn't feel like they have to have the maximum skill rank in two different weapons categories, along with a rating 3 in two additional ones?

And if he can't do that, if he can't change his game to allow non-combat optimized characters to thrive, then at the very least he should have the common courtesy not to complain about it, but rather shouldn't he have figured this out when they made their characters? Pulled them aside and said, "Listen, this is a cool idea, but my game tends on the more combat driven side, why don't you try..." and then give him suggestions in char gen, rather than afterward when it will take them much, much, longer to gain the necessary money/karma.

Basically the exact same method I would use if a new player came to my campaign and ran a character who had 19 dice in a combat skill. I would say, "Listen, I run my game on the less lethal side, and you are going to seriously unbalance the game. Let's see what else we can do with some of those points to round out/flesh out your character, and I promise you, you will still get to shine in combat."

In answer to your question about spending karma/money (since I assume the GM will not do any of the above, since he hasn't already)

1) I would say Muscle Replacement rather than Muscle Toner for Himori. In the first place it is cheaper, secondly it will increase her damage for when she pulls out her sword, and lastly, the essence cost won't matter, as I assume she will be dead before she gets near her essence limit. For karma, character concept aside, have her pick one weapon, specialize with it, (since the 7 karma get her two dice cheaper than raising her skill by 2), and then start raising the skill.

Depending on how much money she has, a Reflex Recorder wouldn't be a bad investment - if all you want is more dice.

2) For Darkblade, as mentioned above, a throwing skill might help, or a Pistols skill so that he can pull the pistol after dispatching the first guard silently.

[FuelDrop]

Yeah, our GM has kind of put himself in a corner. No mages (My fault. I kinda sorta broke the game last time I played a mage by turning the unarmed adept into a horse...), no deckers, no technomancers (Doesn't want to get the matrix rules involved), and riggers only after being coerced... which kind of gives us limited options. Our limited options are basically combat focus, B&E focus, or Face-type focus. Hence, combat becomes more common. Hence, every character needs high combat skills to deal with the high levels of combat. Hence, combat becomes harder to compensate. Hence, higher skills you get the picture.

The recent additions of Hollywood (our face) and Zero (our B&E expert) are an attempt to break out of this vicious cycle. It seems to be working somewhat but since every mission for the campaign has been either Kill X, Destroy Y, or Silence Z we're not there yet.

As a result of this I have no problem with 1-trick pony combat characters. All I want is for them to be, you know, good at that one trick.

[FuelDrop]

One final thing: you may have noticed that I mentioned our least stealthy character has 15 dice in Sneaking when wearing a chameleon suit? That's because every target has so many sensors on it that anything less than that is literally worthless. Everywhere has full 24 hour camera coverage including motion sensors, thermal, low light, and vision enhancement, all of which is watched like a hawk constantly. I'm not trying to complain here or anything but when we can't have deckers and every place is outfitted with more security than the Whitehouse minmaxing for stealth is more important than whatever your primary skill was supposed to be. Also, none of that pansy timing the camera's pan and running across while it's looking elsewhere around here! these guys ensure total coverage at all times by having dozens of cameras on every building, along with auto-turrets in pretty much every location. Dropping a sports bag from the air vent to a toilet stall will be spotted and trigger guys with guns charging in.

Of course the sports bag in question contained an assault cannon so draw your own conclusions...

[Shortstraw]

Are you still allowed adepts or is it mundanes only?

[FuelDrop]

Are you still allowed adepts or is it mundanes only?

I've so far been denied adepts, but some other people have used them. They are frowned upon.

EDIT: If you're curious as to how I managed to get magic outlawed here's the story. Back in 4A I had a mage, not a particularly powerful one all things considered, and I was flipping through Street Magic looking for a new spell when I came across Shapechange. Now the thing about Shapechange is that it modifies the subject's base attributes rather than their actual attributes, allowing you to effectively ignore normal augmented maximums. The catch of course is that the subject is now an animal, but originally I was looking into something like turning them into a Gorilla or something so they could benefit from this massive physical stat boost while still using gear.

Now we had an unarmed Adept named Jade with killing hands, maxed out damage and penetration powers, maxed out initiative enhancement and enough martial arts to give Bruce Lee pause. At the same time I was going over land animals and trying to work out what gave best bang for buck.

End result: our next fight involved a horse with physical stats somewhere in the range of B:17, A:14, R:14(17), S:17 and a high powered deflection spell running around kicking the crap out of everyone. Even on full auto the guards were having trouble so much as touching him and when he kicked with his high 20s dicepool it was hitting with something in the area of 14P -3AP base. He pretty much soloed the mission at that point.

So yeah, that's the story of how I broke the game and was forbidden from even looking at the magic section ever again.

[DMiller]

I've so far been denied adepts, but some other people have used them. They are frowned upon.

EDIT: If you're curious as to how I managed to get magic outlawed here's the story. Back in 4A I had a mage, not a particularly powerful one all things considered, and I was flipping through Street Magic looking for a new spell when I came across Shapechange. Now the thing about Shapechange is that it modifies the subject's base attributes rather than their actual attributes, allowing you to effectively ignore normal augmented maximums. The catch of course is that the subject is now an animal, but originally I was looking into something like turning them into a Gorilla or something so they could benefit from this massive physical stat boost while still using gear.

Now we had an unarmed Adept named Jade with killing hands, maxed out damage and penetration powers, maxed out initiative enhancement and enough martial arts to give Bruce Lee pause. At the same time I was going over land animals and trying to work out what gave best bang for buck.

End result: our next fight involved a horse with physical stats somewhere in the range of B:17, A:14, R:14(17), S:17 and a high powered deflection spell running around kicking the crap out of everyone. Even on full auto the guards were having trouble so much as touching him and when he kicked with his high 20s dicepool it was hitting with something in the area of 14P -3AP base. He pretty much soloed the mission at that point.

So yeah, that's the story of how I broke the game and was forbidden from even looking at the magic section ever again.

Awesome. The last game I was running (SR4a) was very pink mohawk. The offensive mystic adept used shape change and the mind control spells almost exclusively. The only thing I could do to provide adequate challenge was use drones. Lucky for me drones are cheap. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[FuelDrop]

Good news, everyone! I just spoke to our GM and he's said he's willing to let the group have a mage again (Though not me, for obvious reasons...) and has even said he's willing to let Zero learn basic decking so she can bypass security cameras and the like without the team having to blow their money on subcontracting every time anything remotely matrix-y comes up.

This will further expand our group's skill base and allow us to tackle jobs that we previously could not. Naturally I'm going to initially be a half-assed type AR Decker as I'm learning all my skills in play at about 6 karma or so per week but still, results!

Our mage is likely to replace our rigger who's really not doing much anyway. We're still going with a 'no spirits, VR or astral' gentleman's agreement while the new talent settles in but still, our game is getting better every day!