Vampire: The M/R vs Shadowrun 4 Options

[Shadow]

[Ellery]

What is the definition of a "simple action" in nWoD? This could be a good point, if a simple action can include things like shooting people who are behind a plexiglass window (or other things that may well increase the threshold).

Also, if your dice explode 1/10 of the time, then you should multiply the number of expected successes by 10/9. (3/10)*(10/9) = 1/3. Exactly the same as SR4.

(For reference, an exploding die in SR has a probability of (2/6)*(6/5) = 40%.)

[Critias]

[Nerbert]

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes and yes. And yes.

If a person's health bar is full of lethal damage, one success with a gunshot will kill them. If a person's health bar is full of bashing damage, a single success will knock them unconcious. If your opponent gets no successes, a single one will keep the door from being bashed in. If your opponents get no successes, a single one will win the tug of war, if the person gets no successes then a single one will convince them you speak the truth.

And yes, you have a different WoD book then I do.

Now, I've answered all of your questions literally, without answering the spirit of the questions.

What you're saying is that it is possible that Shadowrun's threshold system will match nWoD's resistance system. This is possible. I don't deny it. I also do not deny that when you describe the dice system of Shadowrun 4 to someone who is familiar with nWoD, they will express the similarities. It is true, they are very similar. The rerolling of 10s and 6s is different but not necessarily significant.

Now, and I hope this will lay this all to rest, when the person expreses the similarity, which they will, they may ask next "So do they play exactly the same? Will I just be playing nWoD with cyber arms?" I believe the answer will be no.

Thats all I'm saying. Thats all I ever intended to say.

[frostPDP]

Nerbert man, you're taking this way too personally.

I haven't been here for, I dare say, 3 months. In another forum, Eyeless Blond -slammed- me. Like Hulk Hogan slamming Elian Gonzalez. The point of the matter is, we make mistakes and say dumb things. Sometimes sarcasm gets overlooked (I.E. with what I say a lot of the time.)

I see comparisons that you can't possibly deny. I see the entire core mechanic of a game shift from 3eSR to WoD (A + S +/- M) You wonder why someone might say "wow. Sounds blood-suckerish."

As for the NWN comparison, of course it was different than D&D. You could still get -something- of a D&D feel, but considering NWN was realtime and D&D isn't, there are limits and revisions necessary to make the game playable both as singleplayer and multiplayer.

Personally, I loved Baldur's Gate. If it wasn't for BG, I'd never have picked up that D&D starter set. Then tried to use BG's rules to co-opt the game and not have to buy a player's manual for level 4.

But if such a huge difference in play feel can be found simply by changing a few things in NWN, imagine the difference of a complete system overhaul to SR, both in mechanic and setting (No more Matrix, etc etc). No longer the same game, at all.

Which is SOMEWHAT acceptable. Sci-Fi has to catch up to reality in some ways, as has already been said, thus a wireless matrix...Makes sense. But I -liked- the old matrix. I liked being able to plug into the matrix and be all Keanu Reeves and whatnot. Now, from what little I've possibly-erroneously peiced together, you're basically dual-natured: Physical and Computer.

Which has some potential but could honestly, completely suck if done incorrectly.

And judging by most of what I've seen, at least in terms of completely changing mechanics and doing silly things to a longstanding, powerful game, the track record for SR4 isn't looking good enough to support this new matrix.

Which is a damn shame. I would personally have preferred (and still might use, cuz I'm a GM so HAH) a combination: Some things can be done semi-conscious, others you must be fully jacked into.

And considering offline storage is huge, you just might need that cyberdeck afterall.

But I'm 6:30 AM rambling. :talker: Night. [edit] and I just have to say this: Why NOT get a vampire with a cyber-arm? That'd be cool! ....Or maybe not, but its new and might have interesting plot twists.

[Cochise]

[Nerbert]

Thanks a lot, fixed.

[nick012000]

Something interesting? If SR4 and V:tR are so similar, it makes crossovers much easier.

And with the mana storms in Australia, there's a decent (ingame) way to send SR PC's to the nWoD.

I wouldn't mind seeing some shadowrunners blasting the holy heck out of some elitist vampires, for reasonable pay, of course.

Vamp: "No mere human can hurt me!"
Street Sam: "Wanna bet?"
*opens up with HVAR loaded w/ EX explosive ammo*
*vampire falls over on two pieces*

[Ol' Scratch]

[Critias]

[frostPDP]

Crossovers are interesting, the problem is picking a system to use as your medium. For different things, one side might be way ahead of the other.

Though it would really be interesting to watch that meeting...

And another small note - as GM, you can do ANYTHING. Wanna bring SR to the middle ages via some ancient portal? Done. Wanna make it a Vampire game? Easy - A group of vampires get shifted over to the SR world. The hardest part is which of the systems do you use?

[Cain]

All right, Nerbert. I just happened to chance across a copy of Adventure! today; I'd been looking for a pulp game, so I picked it up. It's a White Wolf game, and uses the same mechanic as nWoD-- it's the new Storyteller system.

Now, I haven't finished reading it yet, but I haven't encountered any "humanity" mechanic in the game. I've pretty much skimmed the entire character creation and rules section, and I haven't noticed anything of the sort. So, it's pretty clear that a "humanity mechanic" is *not* a part of the core nWoD rules. I did come across an entire page on GM flexibility, incidentally.

[Nerbert]

There's only three core rulebooks in the New World of Darkness line. World of Darkness, blue hardcover. Vampire: The Requiem, red hardcover. Werewolf: the Forsaken, tan hardcover.

This Adventure! game is not related to the New World of Darkness in any way.

[Cain]

Okay, I don't have a copy of any of those, but I took a look inside the cover of one. It says: "Storyteller system designed by Mark Rein-Hagen". By a startling coincidence, that's exactly what it says on the credits page of Adventure!

I also downloaded the V:tR demo on Drivethrurpg.com, and took a look at the credits page. It says that the "Storyteller system" is copyrighted by White Wolf, blah blah. So, it's clear that the core mechanic of nWod is the Storyteller system. Following on that, it's clear from Adventure! that a "humanity mechanic" is not part of the rules. Ergo, a humanity mechanic is not part of the core Storyteller rules. Thus, a humanity mechanic is not a part of the core nWoD rules, since nWoD is just a specific Storyteller system.

It's perfectly clear that nWoD and Adventure! are mechanically related, even if the settings are not. However, we're not discussing settings, we're discussing mechanics. You're confusing systems with settings-- a natural mistake, since systems can and do heavily influence settings. In fact, your difficulty shows exactly what's wrong with SR4: it will change the mechanic so radically, the feel of the setting will be altered.

So, by your own argument, the change to SR4 will cause Shadowrun to become Shadows: the Running. QED.

[SR4-WTF?]

[Eldritch]

[Cain]

Adventure! pretty much uses the nWoD mechanics: variable d10's against a fixed TN of 7, with a threshold varying based on difficulty.

[Shadow]

Which is pretty much what I keep saying. I wish they would call it Shadowrun: 2070. That way they could clearly seperate 'real' Shadowrun from the new stuff.

[SR4-WTF?]

[warrior_allanon]

[Cheops]

I think Cain hit the core of the argument on the head...Nerbert seems to be arguing about setting while everyone else is arguing about system. SR$ will not play the same as nWoD because the settings are different. However, the GAME aspect of it, deciding what actions to take, evaluating chances of success, conducting combat, will feel similar between the two because they have an incredibly close game mechanic.

As far as the much vaunted Threshold aspect goes I always found Thresholds in the WW games--it was the number of successes rolled by my opponent. One success wasn't good for anything really. Especially since my GMs had a very clear knowledge of what the word Marginal means (lots of programmers and mathematicians who are used to calculus).

[Nerbert]

So, what you're saying is that Monopoly and Backgammon play basically the same because they both use 2 six sided dice to determine how far you move your pieces?

[SR4-WTF?]

[Nerbert]

But my point is that when sitting down to play SR4, no one is going to say "Wow, I feel like I'm playing nWoD." anymore then if they sat down to play Backgammon and said "I'm going to buy Park Place."

Unless I'm very much misinterpreting what people mean by "Shadows: the Running" or "Shadowrun: 2070" or "Shadowsprint: the Running".

[SR4-WTF?]