Personal Flight, Would you allow it? Options

[Kyuhan]

I'm talkin' Superman style flight; jetpacks, flight spells, anti gravity belts, whatever. A couple friends of mine think it's overpowered and I wanted to hear some opinions from the dumpshockers to get a more well rounded view. Fire away.

[JaronK]

Well, it already exists (levitate, eagle shapeshifters, various flying drones, various flying craft) so I fail to see the problem. Sure, riggers themselves don't fly like superman, but they can jump into drones that do. Why would it be so powerful?

JaronK

[Kyuhan]

I have no idea, other than "it just seems to make them too mobile" which is the only real answer I could get other than "it just does". My personal guess is that these fellas have no imagination when it comes to setting counter measures so flying just adds another thing for them to fuss over.

[Kagetenshi]

Levitate and either a sustaining focus or just being willing to pay attention for a very long time will, as pointed out, already do this with ease.

~J

[Sandoval Smith]

Flight spells already exist(get levitate at a decent force, and you're already going pretty fast), and a jetpack can be made out of a flying drone with enough load to carry a metahuman passenger

[Kyuhan]

Yeah, but I was asking if anyone else thought it was over powered or just didn't belong. It seems to fit just fine with me personally, I was just curious as to the opinions of others. Heh, although by citing ways of flying that pretty much lets me know your opinions. :P

[fistandantilus4....]

IMO, doesn't really go with the feel of SR in most situations, but that's up to you and your players. But there's no reason you couldn't do it. After all, the biggest problem in most other RPG's w/ flying is that they're hard to hit. In SR, everyone has ranged weapons (aka guns)

[JaronK]

Seriously. Unless all your runs are outdoors, dealing with threats that don't look up or have guns, I fail to see a significant problem here.

JaronK

[Sandoval Smith]

Not to mention, in most places where'd you expect to find runners hanging around, Joe random suddenly alighting and soaring through the sky would probably find himself on the wrong side of a 2064 round of skeet shooting.

[Crusher Bob]

And people haning around in the air like Superman have no cover. In addition you make your self more of a target in both that you are most likely a mage (shoot the flying guy first); also, you are 'unmased' in that guys who couldn't draw a line of sight to you when you were down on the ground now have a clear line of fire (assuming you are flying at any altitude).

[Sandoval Smith]

We finally have a contender for beating, 'Geek the mage!' as the first rule of SR combat.

'Shoot the flying guy first.' He cannot be up to anything good.

[Kaosaur]

why else would there be a Low-Altitude Jump parachuting specialization in SR?

You're supposed to do fun shit like that!

[Nikoli]

How funny would that be? Mage who is over confident in his sorcery decides he won't need a parachute for the up comming run that the entire team (minus the rigger, who should never ever jump out of a perfectly good airplane) is parachuting down onto the target decides to use his levitate spell, and botches the casting on the way down.

[hyzmarca]

Of course, if you are going to build a jetpack drone you might as well put a mounting point for a minigun along without enough recoil compensation to make it accurate. The jetpack rigger and/or sammie actually has an advantage over the mage.

[Nikoli]

That's evil, besides, if you have a drone that maneuverable, why waste it moving meat around. just tack ona second gun more ammo and use that by remote?

[toturi]

Because the enemy might have a smart rigger who knows how to MIJI well?

[Nikoli]

Even more reason not to strap someone into one of those things

[RangerJoe]

Nikoli--It's customary to cast the levitate spell inside the airplane. :-)

I can see a whole slew of "personal flight" technologies being popular for moving the wealthy around downtown Seattle. Most buildings in my version of downtown have helipads on the roof or sticking off the side (like that nifty hotel in Dubai--only not a tennis court) for choppers and derigible air taxis. I'm sure there is a market for a personal flying drone (with datajack interface) vehicle. Think of it as the Segway of the future. Actually, I might design that vehicle for my game and market it as the "Segway65."

[hyzmarca]

[mmu1]

[Cray74]

[Nikoli]

I think the latter is more likely than the former. If Lonestar won't handle traffic stops and tickets than I doubt they handle air traffic control violations. that and with the advent of the new super traffic control systems such as grid link, and besides, air taxies don't file them and operate at all sorts of crazy altitudes by today's standards. If anything they'd bust him for a bogus transponder code, nothing else. which is bad enough.

And, concerning the casting lev before jumping out, I've seen dumber moves from PC's than that. It's cast when they say it's cast and roll the dice. If they jump and then cast, than it's during freefall as far as I'm concerned. This isn't like putting your shoes on, you have to state when you cast a spell because of the mechanics involved.

And I love the mobile drone-shield. Hell, you should have the player for the rigger write that up, I could see lone-star using it or any tactical team, and submit it for SR4.
And all you need is the cyber remote deck, not the VCR, as you aren't planning on rigging, as far as I know. shoot, you could probably get the armor up higher with some tweaking, and add storage for clips, etc.

[BitBasher]

[BitBasher]

[Nikoli]

Yes, but the system is automated.
We're talking about a police department that has abandoned any neighborhood under a certain rating to the gangs that prowl at night. that doesn't strike me as a police force interested in air traffic violations