Will it be possible to create surged Characters in Shadowrun 4th Edition?
I think it would be quite suitable for a new companian (if there will be one), and it would help that more groups include SURGE in their Gaming Rounds.
Full Version: Surge for Shadowrun 4th?
I'm sure it will be possible. eventually. you just kinda have to wait. or convert it to SR4 yourself. take your pick.
I'm not sure you'll be able to count on SR4 SURGE. At least offical and in print. It was the blacksheep of the family. Even though some people had fun with it, it was a bit wacky. Sort of like the old Castle Greyhawk WG7 module, with it's magical eggbeaters and other parody shtick.
Besides, who wants continuity in their game worlds and storylines?
Just convert? it takes like 1 second to see the equivalents and use the same random table! yay !! 
You know what I like most about forums? The search buttons no one seems to be able to find. This Question was asked like a million times this week alone. 
Well, I like the WotC Boards. They removed the search funktion completly (it never worked anyway, so no real loss there)
Disclaimer: No trolling intended. Just needed to say this before it could hurt me
Well, I like the WotC Boards. They removed the search funktion completly (it never worked anyway, so no real loss there)
Disclaimer: No trolling intended. Just needed to say this before it could hurt me
| QUOTE (Brahm) |
| I'm not sure you'll be able to count on SR4 SURGE. At least offical and in print. It was the blacksheep of the family. |
You can count on SR4 SURGE. It's still around, even though the rules for PC SURGies haven't been published yet. It's mentioned (albeit briefly) in the "History Lesson for the Reality Impaired" section of SR4.
| QUOTE (winterhawk11 @ Feb 26 2006, 05:20 PM) | ||
You can count on SR4 SURGE. It's still around, even though the rules for PC SURGies haven't been published yet. It's mentioned (albeit briefly) in the "History Lesson for the Reality Impaired" section of SR4. |
I envisioned Holostreets as the kind of place where we'd see a release of a semi-offical conversion forward to SR4 of the Surge alterations from SR3. Not that most won't be extremely simple and straightforward updates.
Post Script I hope we can count on the lack of random PC generation tables.
Sure, a lot of 'em are on the retarded side and would kill your love life. But, seriously. Kangaroo pouch? How awesome is that. You could smuggle things! Like, uh. Babies.
The astral hazing one still needs background count rules to work. That and the bird person one are the only ones I've personally seen played in a PC. The Astral hazing guy took a long dump in the bathroom once and the GM played it up some and said the toilet became like Cristine, only without out wheels. Him and his roommate ended up moving out of the apartment.
| QUOTE (Dissonance) |
| Kangaroo pouch? How awesome is that. You could smuggle things! Like, uh. Babies. |
That'd only be useful if dingos had money.
Another one that needs a good look at is the one that is like... "LOL BONE SPIKES"
Seriously. For a ten point flaw, it gave you a lot of stuff. As for the bird person one? You could totally do that one lady from Static Shock as a (possibly aspected-flavored) mage with sonic elemental spells and levitate.
God, I'm shameless.
Seriously. For a ten point flaw, it gave you a lot of stuff. As for the bird person one? You could totally do that one lady from Static Shock as a (possibly aspected-flavored) mage with sonic elemental spells and levitate.
God, I'm shameless.
| QUOTE (Dissonance) |
| Kangaroo pouch? How awesome is that. You could smuggle things! |
Guess what - now that's available as bioware.
| QUOTE (Dissonance) |
| Sure, a lot of 'em are on the retarded side and would kill your love life. But, seriously. Kangaroo pouch? How awesome is that. You could smuggle things! Like, uh. Babies. |
Skin pouch is bioware. Skin Pouch + Adept Leaping + Unarmed Combat: Jump Kick = ninja kangaroo.
| QUOTE |
| Another one that needs a good look at is the one that is like... "LOL BONE SPIKES" |
Osteocuspis, one of the SURGE effects I really liked because it linked back to Earthdawn. The return of the Blood Elves.
It's neat, I'll give you that. It's just that for a ten point FLAW, it gave you a lot of stuff. I think a few levels of adept pain resistance, natural armor, and extra unarmed damage.
Sure, it came at the cost of agonizing pain every couple of weeks or months, but that's why they invented industrial-grade painkillers. Seriously. Ten points.
Sure, it came at the cost of agonizing pain every couple of weeks or months, but that's why they invented industrial-grade painkillers. Seriously. Ten points.
| QUOTE (ThreeGee) |
| Osteocuspis, one of the SURGE effects I really liked because it linked back to Earthdawn. The return of the Blood Elves. |
Yes, and our new flavours: Blood-Orks, Blood-Norms, Blood-Trolls and Blood-Dwarfs.
YotC didnīt restrict it to elves or did it?
Just donīt let anyone know that your Osteocuspis-SURGEling is a mage, somebody might misunderstand and try to collect a bounty from the Draco Foundation
We need SURGE because we need Lesbian Amazon Pirate Ninja Catgirls with Chronic Osteocuspis who have their spikes filed down with a full-body laser treatment every week to avoid the social stigma and clothing customization while retaining all of the bonuses.
"I'm not playing a lesbian female because I'm an immature pervert. I'm playing a female for a free smuggling compartment. She's a lesbian because I'm not into dudes." - You might be a munchkin if....
"I'm not playing a lesbian female because I'm an immature pervert. I'm playing a female for a free smuggling compartment. She's a lesbian because I'm not into dudes." - You might be a munchkin if....
I feal sick
| QUOTE |
| YotC didnīt restrict it to elves or did it? |
It didn't restrict it but as a GM I was always inclined to choose SURGE effects for characters rather than allow them to occur randomly. Then again, as I've said before, the advent of the sixth world involves a fair amount of random mixing of patterns from the fourth (and even the second) so there's no reason why you shouldn't have "Blood-Orks, Blood-Norms, Blood-Trolls and Blood-Dwarfs".
Yea, itīs not like scales are restricted to TīSkrang, soo.
Surge is something that I tried to pretend didn't happen (kinda like Highlander 2). If it rears it's ugly head in SR4, I'll have to deal with it, I guess, but I really hope it doesn't.
I believe changelings have been mentioned before. At least there's now a cyber option that only costs .2 essence if you want to get your freak on without calling it Magical Woogie Juice.
| QUOTE (Shrike30) |
| Surge is something that I tried to pretend didn't happen (kinda like Highlander 2). If it rears it's ugly head in SR4, I'll have to deal with it, I guess, but I really hope it doesn't. |
I do that with the metahuman variants in SRComp. I've never had to deal with a player wanting SURGE stuff, but I'm doing a YotC campaign, so I might have it hit them since it goes with the theme.
| QUOTE (Shrike30) |
| Surge is something that I tried to pretend didn't happen (kinda like Highlander 2). If it rears it's ugly head in SR4, I'll have to deal with it, I guess, but I really hope it doesn't. |
Sigh. Yeah. The whole thing could have been cool, and probably sounded that way when first described as a plot proposal. I mean let's look at the abstract:
"The awakening continues to produce new effects as mana spikes produce results previously unencountered. Characters will have the opportunity to have a number of strange cosmetic alterations made to them by the fickle flow of mana - allowing players to play through the kinds of early fear and backlashes of the original goblinization periods without retconning anything or turning back the clock."
When said like that, it sounds pretty cool. Unfortunately the actual implementation was more reminiscent of old Rune Quest - you rolled dice on a totally crack-smoking chart and sometimes your character turned blue and sometimes he got heaps of raw power raining down on him for no good reason.
I really don't blame anyone for being completely turned off by the implementation of SURGE, or anything else from YotC. I found the whole heavy handedness of the affair really off-putting. Everything from the return of Icewing to the partitioning of California was something that could have been cool but instead came off as a tirade by a power-mad GM.
-Frank
To me, Surge said "Oh god, running out of ideas... QUICK, TURN EVERY SHADOWRUNNER INTO AN X-MAN!" 
SURGE doesn't effect every shadowrunner and it almost certainly isn't about turning people into X-Men. No, SURGE is about making some Shadowrunners superficially look like anime characters. Take, for example, the catgirl pornstar. I'm sure that only pure decorum prevented them from implimenting a futa SURGE effect.
With the exception of Chronic Osteocpus most SURGE effects aren't that powerful and can be replicated with cyber, bio, edges, or flaws. The real advantage is that some, like the perhensile tail, allow you to save some resources and some essence.
With the exception of Chronic Osteocpus most SURGE effects aren't that powerful and can be replicated with cyber, bio, edges, or flaws. The real advantage is that some, like the perhensile tail, allow you to save some resources and some essence.
Eh, I like YotC overall. SURGE has some silly aspects, but really, so do cyber and bio.
I didn't mean in the x-men "let's all shoot fire from our eyes or stick to walls" sense, much more just the stylistic thing. Your read on it was that it made some people look like anime characters, mine is that it made some people look like comicbook mutants. Same thing, really, I should have just been more clear.
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