Laced Question, Friends, extend me your spurs Options

[Swing Kid]

If a sam were to get, say, Titanium Bone Lacing and Retractable Spurs, then he would do more base damage with the spurs retracted (albeit only Stun) than with them exposed. Strength [M] Physical for Spurs, and Strength +4 [M] Stun retracted. So, if he has, say, a Strength of 5 then he would do 5M Physical with the Spurs extended and 9M Stun with them retracted. According to SR3, with bone lacing, the character with Bone Lacing can opt to have his attacks do physical damage at half of the power (rounded up), so this example character could opt to do 5M Physical without the spurs. So essentially, he would do the same damage with or without his spurs. Is this correct? Or would the bone lacing bonus (or part of it) extend, so to speak, to the spurs? I think the rules make my above example accurate, so my real question is should there be a house rule for this? Or better yet, have I missed a printed rule somewhere that already covers this?

[A Clockwork Lime]

That is correct.

But apply some Dikote and the situation changes [(STR+1)S], especially since a pair of Spurs also gives you a +50% Strength bonus to Power on top of that. No house rule required.

It's even more abundant which is the better choice when you consider how much Essence you lose with the Bone Lacing. Irk!

[Swing Kid]

Daddy like

[FXcalibur]

I'm not able to visualize what a spur is, and the SR3 description isn't helping much. Okay, attached to a bone? Set of three attached to a hand? Are they like wolverine's claws, then? I'm confused.

[A Clockwork Lime]

That's exactly what they are. They don't have to come in three's, though. They could be just like the spike Robocop had (albeit without the induction datajack thing or whatever he used it as).

[Blaze]

Does that +50% Strength count with hand razors too, or is it just spurs?
The 'three spurs attached to the hand' would probably look like Wolverine, though bear in mind that they can't be retracted in that format. The single retractable spur would be akin to Wolverine just using the central blade, though perhaps slightly longer (say, about the length of your forearm). Also, the blades come from the back of the hand (fixed version) or back of the wrist (retractable) rather than from between the knuckles.

-JH.

[A Clockwork Lime]

Razors and Spurs. For some strange reason, Handblades are exempt.

[Swing Kid]

[A Clockwork Lime]

SR3 p. 121, Hand Razors and Spurs. Actually after reading it, it only specifies spurs and razors at the beginning. The actual rule is a blanket rule for all cybernetic-implant weapons used in pairs.

[Blaze]

*Succumbs to temptation, breaks out BBB*
p121- a matched pair of spurs or razors allow the player to add +50% of his/her strength on top of base damage.
So a pair of dikoted improved razors on a S5 character would do 11M?! God help us if he/she gets more than one net success...

-JH.

[Swing Kid]

Thanks fella's...owe ya one

[kevyn668]

Once again, don't forget that you can also gain extra dice if you A) take "Off Hand: Cyber Combat (Spurs)" or B) the "Abidexterity Edge" AND get the strength bonus if you have a dual set.

[Side note: what happens if you take both (Ambi and Off Hand)? Was there a rule in the CC that only the highest rating counts? I can't remember but I would assume so.]

That said, I personaly would allow the spurs to look like pretty much anything the player wanted as long as the damage code stayed the same.

This post has been edited by kevyn668: May 10 2004, 03:53 AM

[Nikoli]

My personal fav was hatchet man's set. one going forward, the other backward, same arm.

[Lilt]

[Bearclaw]

Is that right?
If you use a pair, then take the off hand weapon skill, do you get both the bonus damage and the extra dice?

[A Clockwork Lime]

Yep. The damage hike is a characteristic of the weapon, like Reach or the special abilities of a whip. The bonus dice Off-Hand Weapon Skill or Ambidexterity provides is a characteristic of skill. The weapon continues to have the same stats regardless of whether you're using Ambidexterity or not, just like every other weapon in the game.

[Nikoli]

Personally I like the idea of the +%Str as a bonus for any occaision when you wield two mellee weapons (whips not included)
matched weapons= +50%
off-hand lower code=+25%
off-hand higher=Use off-hand as base and treat on hand as off for determining the power increase.

[Apathy]

[A Clockwork Lime]

<points to the "improved razors" part> The character would have 11M with those. :)

[Apathy]

[Swing Kid]

I really appreciate the feedback fella's. So, let's do the math for the actual character at hand. I will only post the required stats.

Character Name: Meat
Troll Street Sam
Strength [9]
Ambidexterity [2] edge (4 points)
Wushu Kung Fu [6]
Cyber-Implant Combat [5] / Specialization-Spurs [7]
Off-Handed Cyber-Implant Combat [5] / Specialization-Spurs [7]
Titanium Bone Lacing
Retractable Spurs - Dikoted

So, if I understand you fella's correctly, when using the spurs, I should be rolling a base 10 dice with a damage code of 14S. When using standard hand to hand combat (spurs retracted), I would be rolling 6 dice base damage 13M Stun/6M Physical. Is there any flaw in this math?

[A Clockwork Lime]

Honestly? Unless you plan on attacking unarmed quite a bit, I'd drop Kung Fu to 4 and just get the Close Combat and Close Combat: Cyber-Implant Weapons maneuvers with it. Actually I'd recommend Pentjak-Silat since it has cooler abilities, but stick with Kung Fu if it fits your story better.

If you want or need to acquire another maneuver (like Whirling), just select another variant of the art at a rating of 4 and snag the two maneuvers that way. Continue until you have all the maneuvers you like.

The Titanium Bone Lacing is wasted in this build, at least as it relates to the use of his spurs. You'd be better off with a Dermal Sheath and a few other implants. If you want to be able to stun an opponent, just get some Shock Hands and talk to your GM about "routing" them to your spurs instead of your fists.

But yeah, if you want to fight unarmed as well as armed, you might as well keep one of your Martial Arts at 6. At least you won't totally be wasting the required maneuvers you need to get the ones for Cyber-Implant that way. :) And, ideally, you could just get Close Combat, Close Combat: Cyber, and Whirling and be done with it; use Whirling and unarmed combat when fighting a swam of opponents and use your spurs in one-on-one combat. Best of both worlds that way.

[TinkerGnome]

The problem with dermal enhancements of most sorts is that they are easy to spot and illegal. Personally, I prefer to have characters which don't get stopped by every cop who sees them (though the troll will probably be stopped by several cops, after the first one sees him and waits for backup before approaching him).

[A Clockwork Lime]

Dermal Sheathes are perfectly legal with a permit, and its going to get you pulled over about as much as carrying a pistol will. It can easily be written off as something a character got while serving in the military, too.

[TinkerGnome]

An ork or troll with obviously controlled cyber is still going to have to show permits quite a bit, and those fake IDs can't last forever. Not to mention that when it does fail, the sheath is Class A cyberware (3 year prison term in the UCAS).

If your character has a real SIN and really is ex-military, you should have any trouble with getting a permit for it. But using your real SIN has its own problems.