What is it about 3rd Edition? Options

[Cochise]

Hm. That's still only 18 dice in most circumstances, going to 24 when defending and disarming. That is a lot, but I still don't see how you get 27 without combat pool, let alone 33 when defending. With combat pool, those numbers look more plausible, but not without it.

~erm~ I can't do more than providing the numbers ... and they clearly state: 27 dice for attacks prior to combat pool at bare minimum for the Mk I version. Disarming and/or being defender just adds more dice. You might want to re-read the Mk I section and potentially the advanced melee Cannon Companion rules on calculating dice pools - in particular for ambidexterous characters.

[Cain]

~erm~ I can't do more than providing the numbers ... and they clearly state: 27 dice for attacks prior to combat pool at bare minimum for the Mk I version. Disarming and/or being defender just adds more dice. You might want to re-read the Mk I section and potentially the advanced melee Cannon Companion rules on calculating dice pools - in particular for ambidexterous characters.

Still not seeing it. Two weapon fighting adds half off-hand skill, which with Ambidexterity III equals base skill. So, we add three dice. The wording is confusing as to rather or not you get adept powers, but if we allow that, you get three more. 18 + 6 = 24. The weapon focus doesn't apply twice-- in fact, it doesn't even seem to apply to off hand weapons at all. You can make a case to allow it, but even then, that would only apply if the off hand weapon was also a weapon focus. So yeah: twin weapon foci would be devastating, but I'm not at all sure you can get two Force 6 weapon foci at start.

Also, with Ambidexterity III, you're taking a +1 TN penalty every time you use them. Which is arguably offset by the increase in dice, but still needs to be considered.

[Cochise]

Still not seeing it. Two weapon fighting adds half off-hand skill, which with Ambidexterity III equals base skill. So, we add three dice. The wording is confusing as to rather or not you get adept powers, but if we allow that, you get three more. 18 + 6 = 24.

The rules actually are pretty clear on adept powers:

p96, CC: "Only half of any bonus dice applied to the off-hand skill (from adept skills and so on)

While you could try - in vain - to argue that adept skills are not identical to adept powers (albeit there is nothing like "adept skills" in RAW, thus indicating a mere misnomer there) the "any" as well as "and so on" provides legitimacy for any source of bonus dice ... up and including to

The weapon focus doesn't apply twice--

... the weapon focus. And no, there's no ...

in fact, it doesn't even seem to apply to off hand weapons at all.

... question that the focus is actually applied to the off-hand, because either the weapon focus is considered as bonus to the weapon skill (thus providing the bonus as per p. 96) or the weapon focus adds its force to the base skill (here clubs)... which gives us the same overall numbers: 12 skill for main hand + halved skill off-hand = 18 vs. 6 skill + halved skill + 6 bonus main hand + halved bonus off-hand = 18.

In both cases we'd have to add 9 dice from adept power => We're back to 27 dice.

The fun part there being: A weapon focus does grant its power when wielded in active state. The rules nowhere make any demands in which hand the focus has to be held.
So:

You can make a case to allow it, but even then, that would only apply if the off hand weapon was also a weapon focus. So yeah: twin weapon foci would be devastating, but I'm not at all sure you can get two Force 6 weapon foci at start.

Rule wise there simply is no need for secondary weapon focus. A second focus would however push those numbers even further. You are however correct that it's not possible to get two force 6 weapon foci ... unless ofc. the Mr. Johnson's litte Black Book rules for creating "high power" characters are used.

Also, with Ambidexterity III, you're taking a +1 TN penalty every time you use them. Which is arguably offset by the increase in dice, but still needs to be considered.

I suggest that you re-read those rules yet again. Because that +1 TN modifier would - by RAW- affect ranged attacks only.

Edit: We are however entering the "beat the dead horse" territory here, so I won't discuss this any further ... since it's highly unlikely that you'll stop trying to make incorrect claims about SR3 RAW in order to invalidate those numbers I gave

[sk8bcn]

Something confuse me. I've thought that people had 0 in driving because they were much more assisted through auto-pilots which lessened they're ability to drive

[Cain]

... question that the focus is actually applied to the off-hand, because either the weapon focus is considered as bonus to the weapon skill (thus providing the bonus as per p. 96) or the weapon focus adds its force to the base skill (here clubs)... which gives us the same overall numbers: 12 skill for main hand + halved skill off-hand = 18 vs. 6 skill + halved skill + 6 bonus main hand + halved bonus off-hand = 18.

In both cases we'd have to add 9 dice from adept power => We're back to 27 dice.

This is what I don't get. You already added it once, why does it count a second time? Even halved, it shouldn't apply twice. I think you're saying that weapon foci increase the base skill, which they don't actually do-- they're just a bonus to the base skill, which technically isn't the same as the off-hand skill. While the main-hand skill and the off-hand skill are equal with Ambidexterity 3+, that doesn't apply to bonuses to each skill, which is where I get confused.

Anyway, I'm just arguing for arguing sake. It doesn't really matter, since I won't be running a SR3 game anytime soon, curse the dark.

Something confuse me. I've thought that people had 0 in driving because they were much more assisted through auto-pilots which lessened they're ability to drive.

I'm sure that helps, but truth be told, people having 0 in driving has been common since the early days of Shadowrun. According to SR1, vehicle skills were only for driving under difficult conditions; ordinary driving didn't require any tests, or any skill, whatsoever.

[Cochise]

This is what I don't get. You already added it once, why does it count a second time?

And that should actually be the most obvious part:

Base condition for ambidextrous fighting according to Cannon Companion is:

(base skill + whatever bonus applies to base skill) for main hand + (halved off-hand skill + half of whatever bonus applies to the off-hand skill) for off-hand.

Ambidexterity edges of levels 3 and 4 remove the necessity of having a dedicated off-hand skill => The aforementioned dice pool calculation becomes:

(base skill + whatever bonus applies to the base skill) for main hand + (halved base skill + half of any bonus that is applied to the base skill) for off-hand

A weapon focus - just like adept powers like improved ability - is a bonus towards the base skill => Since the off-hand skill is now the base skill, any bonus applied to that base skill automatically also turns into a bonus that is applied to the skill when used as "off-hand" skill.

I think you're saying that weapon foci increase the base skill, which they don't actually do-- they're just a bonus to the base skill, which technically isn't the same as the off-hand skill.

But "technically" it actually is the same. That's what the edge does.

While the main-hand skill and the off-hand skill are equal with Ambidexterity 3+,

Not just "equal" but "identical". The edge at levels 3 and 4 removes the necessity of having a separate off-hand skill in the first place ... and thus the totally valid interpretation that a weapon focus' bonus applies to the base skill and subsequently to both the main and off-hand since either use the base skill.

As I said: a weapon focus' bonus is only reliant upon the focus being in active state and not upon which hand it is held in. One could even try to argue that an active weapon focus in form of a knife would provide its bonus to the edged weapon skill while its owner leaves the focus in its sheath and wields a katana instead ... That however is a totally different debate and one with a less certain outcome.

[sk8bcn]

If I was the gamemaster, you could argue as much as you want, I would say that the weapon focus bonus isn't applied to the off-hand unless you had a magical weapon in the off hand.

e.g.
GM: ok you just found a sacrificial dagger
Mage: Is it magical?
(rolls dices)
GM,: it's a weapon focus lvl 3
Troll adept: me, me, need!!!
GM: ??? it looks like a butter knife in your hands?
Troll adept: who cares? it will give me +3 dices to use my troll axe! Ha ah!
GM: ...you're just dreaming...

[Stahlseele]

As per RAW, he'd be 100% correct in that.

[Cochise]

If I was the gamemaster, you could argue as much as you want, I would say that the weapon focus bonus isn't applied to the off-hand unless you had a magical weapon in the off hand.

And "you" making such decisions would be something that "I" would have agreed upon when accepting "you" as current GM. However, that neither changes the fact that per RAW "I" would get the focus' bonus regardless of which hand it's wielded in nor the fact that I personally would opt not to play with you (note the distinct lack of quotation marks here) as GM if you were to make such decisions "just because".

e.g.
GM: ok you just found a sacrificial dagger
Mage: Is it magical?
(rolls dices)
GM,: it's a weapon focus lvl 3
Troll adept: me, me, need!!!
GM: ??? it looks like a butter knife in your hands?
Troll adept: who cares? it will give me +3 dices to use my troll axe! Ha ah!
GM: ...you're just dreaming...

There was a good reason for me mentioning that a discussion about an active, yet sheathed weapon focus granting its bonus for a different weapon would be a different beast than the scenario where the weapon focus is actually used in a dual-wield combat situation (where the hand in which the focus is held is still of no importance rule wise).

[Stahlseele]

i don't see why the sheathed yet active focus should not give the bonus dice, even if not held in hand . .
it's the same with all other kinds of focus too right? so if the adept has to hold it in his hand to get the bonus, a mage has to hold his spellcasting or power focus or whatever in his hand too, to actually use it, not just have it close by in a pocket or something . . focus is focus after all.

and yeah, i would not play with a GM that goes against raw like that just to fuck over an intelligent player without that having been made clear prior to the start of the game.

[Cochise]

i don't see why the sheathed yet active focus should not give the bonus dice, even if not held in hand . .

When making a comparison with other focus types such an interpretation certainly would be fitting, since none of them seem to have requirements beyond activation and being "in touch" with either the owner or the target of a spell. However:

p. 191, SR3: An active focus adds its Force to its owner's appropriate combat skill when wielded in combat.

Actually wielding the focus is thus made an requirement for getting the skill bonus, but - and I already tried to hint at this earlier: A weapon focus adds to the skill itself and is not just a bonus, thus making weapon focus bonuses for off-hand 100% certain.

[Stahlseele]

Ah, right, that makes a clear difference then.
So, Troll Size Laser Combat Axe with Dikote in one Hand.
Knife Weapon Focus in the off hand, PROFIT! ^^

[Sendaz]

What if they have Kali arms?

[Cochise]

Ah, right, that makes a clear difference then.
So, Troll Size Laser Combat Axe with Dikote in one Hand.
Knife Weapon Focus in the off hand, PROFIT! ^^

Provided that you resort to dual-wield combat and have a high enough ambidexterity edge ... Otherwise you wouldn't strictly "wield" the knife in combat and/or get your off-hand[edged weapons] skill boosted (by half of the focus' force) but not the skill for your main hand weapon.

[Cochise]

What if they have Kali arms?

Kali arms were no part of SR3 and there simply weren't rules on how to treat more than two arms in melee => No RAW-based answer possible.

[Stahlseele]

Provided that you resort to dual-wield combat and have a high enough ambidexterity edge ... Otherwise you wouldn't strictly "wield" the knife in combat and/or get your off-hand[edged weapons] skill boosted (by half of the focus' force) but not the skill for your main hand weapon.

But of course, i am still going mostly by your idea here, i just prefer to play trolls is all ^^

[Cain]

Not just "equal" but "identical". The edge at levels 3 and 4 removes the necessity of having a separate off-hand skill in the first place ... and thus the totally valid interpretation that a weapon focus' bonus applies to the base skill and subsequently to both the main and off-hand since either use the base skill.

The catch is that while the skills are identical, the bonuses aren't. So, Improved Ability and weapon focus dice would not apply.

Then again, you know it's questionable-- it's just a fun exercise with the rules. So I applaud your effort, I think you know it wouldn't really fly, for perfectly valid reasons. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Nath]

Cain mentioned 28 dice in a CLUE file, so that might be 2nd edition, in which case Fields of Fire rules would apply for a second weapon.

IIRC, there was then a mostly non-functional setup with a Human Physical Adept, requiring 3 power points, 24 skill points and 1,000,000¥/50 Force points.

Armed Combat: Dagger 4( 8 )
Special Skill Ambidexterity 5 (cost: 15 Skill Points)
Special Skill Dagger and dagger 3
Enhanced Physical Skill (Armed Combat) 4 (cost: 2 Power Points)
Dagger Weapon Focus, rating 6 (550,000¥ and 6 Force Points to bound)
Dagger Weapon Focus, rating 4 (400,000¥ and 4 Force Points to bound)

Dice pool is 8+4+6 in one hand and 8+4+4 in the other, for a grand total of 34 dice, because that's how it worked with Fields of Fire. You can add only 3 dice from the Dice pool, the limit being the Dagger and dagger Special Skill.

What makes the build non-functional (besides the fact it has no other skill...) is that the Ambidexterity skill increased your Target Number by +3 for being 3 points lower than the skill used. So unless the card were heavily stacked in your favor (which will be far from commonly occurring with Reach 0...), you wouldn't roll a lot more success than you would have with only your main hand.

EDIT : Wrong calculation for the second focus. You can only buy rating 4 (but have 50,000¥ remaining). Also, I took concentration while I could take specialization, but in both case the Adept power cannot go past the General Skill level (using Specialization however allows to spend the 4 remaining points on getting +2D6 to Initiative).

[Cain]

Cain mentioned 28 dice in a CLUE file, so that might be 2nd edition, in which case Fields of Fire rules would apply for a second weapon.

IIRC, that was for a casting roll, and included Spell pool. I'm still not sure how he got that much, although I do recall fetish foci abuse could cover a lot. I'm not sure if I can link to something in the Wayback machine, so I'll just quote the story:

"My group of six runners was in the process of breaking camp to continue on our journey through some flatland. From over the horizon came the silhouette of two GMC Banshees. Not prepared for a firefight, the team scrambled to break out the ordinance, the rigger sprints for the Bison, etc.
The troll mage, who has had an unfortunate experience with Banshees in the past, panics and tosses a fireball at the closest one, throwing in all the dice he can get his hands on. The result? He rolls 28 dice for the fireball.

The group was hushed as he shook the huge handful of dice and cast them onto the table.

They came up all ones.

So, as the Banshees bear down onto the camp, the troll mage erupted into a mushroom cloud of organic debris.

We stopped playing for the night. It was a baaadddd omen…"

That story was published in the CLUE files in November of 2000, so it would have been 3rd edition.

[Glyph]

SR5 is pretty weaksauce compared to SR3. I can only get up to 30 melee dice for a starting character. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Of course, my min-maxing tends to be straightforward, meat-and-potatoes going through and nabbing dice pool bonuses, rather than bending the rules into pretzel shapes. And that's with the main book - the other SR5 books might have more power creep. Actually, I could only get 20 dice for a starting melee character in SR3 using just the main book (no adepts of the magician's way or two-weapon fighting style), so maybe 30 dice isn't that bad.

[Stahlseele]

How?
Nothing in chargen gives that many bonus dice aside from magic.

[Glyph]

Magic is pretty much it, or at least a lot of it.

The build I did was A: Attributes, B: Magic (Adept), C: Resources, D: Metatype (elf), and E: skills. For Agility, start with 7, then add three points of used muscle toner, then 1 point of improved ability: Agility, for an Agility of 11. For skill, one of my starting qualities is aptitude in unarmed combat, so it starts at 7, then a specialization in cyber-implant weapons. Skills have changed fundamentally from SR4 in some key ways. First, the maximum improvement with improved ability is half the skill, rounded UP. So you can take four points of improved ability for the skill. Second, there is no longer such a thing as an augmented maximum for skills, so you can also add a reflex recorder (alphaware, because I need to fit one more augmentation in without going over 1 Essence loss), for another +1. Now for dice pool modifiers. First, my final augmentation is hand razors, also alphaware, and they are a force: 3 weapon focus, bound, for +3 dice. Secondly, my other positive quality is the Shark mentor spirit, which gives me +2 to unarmed attacks. So the final dice pool is Agility: 11 + skill: 12 + specialization: 2 + weapon focus: 3 + mentor spirit bonus: 2 = 30.

So you can have a character who regularly goes over their limit and has to throw away successes. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)

[Cain]

SR5 is pretty weaksauce compared to SR3. I can only get up to 30 melee dice for a starting character. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Of course, my min-maxing tends to be straightforward, meat-and-potatoes going through and nabbing dice pool bonuses, rather than bending the rules into pretzel shapes. And that's with the main book - the other SR5 books might have more power creep. Actually, I could only get 20 dice for a starting melee character in SR3 using just the main book (no adepts of the magician's way or two-weapon fighting style), so maybe 30 dice isn't that bad.

Of course, since the dice system was different, it was harder to get that many extra dice. And their benefit wasn't as direct.

[Cochise]

The catch is that while the skills are identical, the bonuses aren't. So, Improved Ability and weapon focus dice would not apply.

I certainly do know that both apply because they happen to be either direct increases of skill level or bonus towards the base skill and I even provided RAW proof on either case.

Actually, I could only get 20 dice for a starting melee character in SR3 using just the main book (no adepts of the magician's way or two-weapon fighting style)

I'd like to hear how you'd get to 20 dice in case of SR3 ...

[Glyph]

I'd like to hear how you'd get to 20 dice in case of SR3 ...

For 20 dice, 5/7 skill/specialization, 7 dice from Combat Pool, and 6 dice from a force: 6 weapon focus. Obviously, it needs to be an aspected magician with A: Resources. It is a bit counter-intuitive, because you would normally think adept, but adepts can only get to 19 dice, since their bonus dice from improved ability are capped at the base skill.