kinda ofspring of the discussion regarding high strength Trolls and their uses over in the how to punish a character thread . .
no matter SR3 or 4, everyone is welcome to me *g*
At least in SR3 it was possible to do some pretty horrible things with trolls, as Strength as an attribute was way more important than it seems to be in SR4 . .
just give a Troll a Strength of 15, buy a pole arm with reach of 2 and damage of STR+3S and slap on some Dikote and voila, you have a troll that does more damage in close combat than the usual, run of the mill panther cannon . .
hewck, give him some bone lace and he has the same power niveau in UNARMED combat . . or slap two dikoted spurs into him . . not much that can equal that which is not mounted onto something . . and don't forget about the Bow . . or Adeps with missile mastery . . or something like that . .

Troll Cyberzombie Archers for the win!

and i still don't know how one would get a Troll up to 18 STR . . aside from ghouling him or buying up with karma if the GM allows to go to racial modified limit and then still get more by means of tech . .

Troll with Exceptional Strength Edge and Genetically Optimized Strength, with Muscle Augmentation 4 and Superthyroid Gland is 17, but could go to 18 if I could find another point of augmentation.

Of course, that same troll, with the Improved Attribute Adept Power could do it.

natural maximum of base troll without meta variant is 10 . . and the adept power of improved attribute costs 1 point if over natural maximum . . so that'd be 6 pints of strength available from that power . . bringing him up to 16 . . or am i missing something?

hmm . . i will have to take gene-tech into consideration for the advancement of myx trolls in the future it seems . . but otherwise there is no way to reach that . . ok, yeah, sure, as an adept later on with improved attribute through new power points . . but only in SR3, in SR4 not anymore, if i understood that one correctly *g*

Take a troll with natural maximum strength. Throw on the most pimped out cyberarms you can get ... I'm not looking it up, so I will just say you up their Strength to 15 so he doesn't have real problems. Now he can red-line those cyberlimbs up to a Strength of 30.

ah yes, of course . . i forgot about redlining O.o
if he has a pain editor he won't even get problems too fast will he?
that one would actually be able to throw cars like that . . or at least motor cycles *g*

Tarantula has a good troll build somewhere on the forums and I think he had archer variants for it too.

EDIT: here it is http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...c=19390&hl=meet

i've been over that built, but i think he . . she? . . it! was building on a whole different premise . . namely being able to TAKE ungodly ammounts of Damage mainly while still being able to do some damage . . whereas i am mostly for dishing out tremendous ammounts of Damage while still being able to take some punishment without losing too much potential . .

One proposed nerf: change bow damage to (STR/2+K), probably K=3 so that STR 3 bow still does 5P damage. It's the same relationship between STR and damage as other muscle-powered weapons and it reduces the Trollbow > Panther Cannon effect.

Subdual grappling is still a good tactic for high-STR trolls.

Playing a Troll is kinda uphill if you don't actively use that high STR. A troll technomancer or mage pays 40 BP, and gets 4 extra BODY, which is about break-even.
Troll TM also gets option to buy a lot more BODY, gets 1 point of natural armor and +1 Reach, but also has severe limits on INT, LOG and CHA, may get Infiltration limits, cannot use unmodified gear in many cases (fingers don't fit in trigger guard of standard Predator, stock motorcycle is too small, etc.), and gets a race prejudice modifier on many social interactions.
If you DO have a use for that +4 STR (and option to buy uber STR), then troll is a good race for min-max purposes.
(Troll shaman might get less min-maxed DPs than elf variant build, but might also be fun for the player and the group, which is OK if the group has room for non-min-maxed play.)

From what I'm reading off others. To posit a theory, I believe the only reason this is popping up is because how many weapons haven't been hit with the STR/2 w/ the new edition?

Bows are the ONLY weapon in the game I can see which gets a straight 1P per str point.in SR4. You mention axes, which need more investment, questionable legality. I'd love to hear from the authors why bows specifically were exempted from the STR/2 that every other physical weapon got. Similarly I don't think you'd see a lot of this popping up if these things were +2R per point over 6str and unregulated under.


Of that list of other weapons capable of doing massive damage... with the exception of the grenade (which brings it's own bevy of problems and benefits). Almost all of them require massive skill investments or other offsets. Okay full auto on a SMG/AR is a complex action for 11-12P with a -9 dice pool penalty, -5 w/ gas3 and a stock, and you still only get 5P or 6P to compare to base armor meaning it'll only be stun probably! Throwing adept has a large number of points invested into both magic and abilities on top of the str investment (that far exceeds 5-20BP worth of equipment in cyber/bioware).

The only reason I think this pops up is because of the relatively light investment required to do this, the only thing you're paying for you wouldn't pay for anyhow w/ a troll is a few ranks in archery, the lack of legality issues, and the cheap cost of the bow and arrows.

SR4 was designed with all kinds of loopholes, all apparently under the delusional guise of "we designed it for average players, not munchkins."

In the hands of a normal character with a martial bent (STR 4-6), a bow is a fine alternative for standard firearms. It's only when you start cheesing it up and taking advantage of the one race that shouldn't even be a shadowrunner and is just an annoyance in the setting as a whole rather than a valuable contribution (read: trolls) that it starts to break down. And even then, in SR4, it's still nearly on par with other options available to you.

If they went STR/2, bows could conceivably be worse than a cheap hold-out pistol in the hands of a normal character. If they added a hefty bonus to it, it again favors the trolls and munchkins. STR/2 is also a phenomenon found primarily in melee weapons, of which a bow is not. Frankly, I don't care for the STR/2 idea at all anyway, but c'est la vie.

The modified attack is compared to armor, but when doing so, you don't include the damage modifier for narrow bursts. Your best bet for armor penetration is a wide burst, since the dice subtracted from your target's defensive pool will give you more net hits - and net hits do count against armor.

I had some free time tonight (more so than normal, anyway), and I came up with a house rule that might help make bows more balanced. Was wondering what some of you thought about it.

Cain:
Okay 10p for ares viper sure on a narrow burst. But it's most likely stun damage against anything with armor. Only 8P of that counts for armor (doesn't include the +2 burst fire DV). Plus net hits is correct (so 3 net hits against armor jacket, 5 if you include a helmet). Recoil on pistol BF is going to be severe as well reducing your attack dice.

Also, according to errata, flechette AP was changed from +2AP penalty to +5 AP penalty. So the damage increase of flechettes isn't as much of a wash as you'd think. 5 dice extra armor averages 1.667 hits remember (+6Ap would be a wash). So I contend your assertion that AP doesn't matter against the damage increase isn't quite as good as you claim. Though works great on ghouls and other non-armored targets.

If you're after lethal on a lightly armored target, you're better off firing slugs than +5AP penalized flechettes. Though resisting 10+ stun isn't fun either!

Funkenstein:
Looks good... I like it. The special arrows/bolts simply mirror the ammo types for guns nicely. Puts the trollbows damage on balance with the trollaxe at least.

Remember Ex-Ex rounds were errated to only be +1DV/-1AP, while Ex are only +1DV now. Though the arrow is bigger and you can only fire one per round... so +2/-2 is probably fine.....

It would be nifty to have a microgrenade arrow too, think Rambo. Basically it allows the use of the bow as a grenade launcher. (though I still think it's funny cause on a high ballistic arc... the flight time of an arrow at extreme range would be 2 or more combat rounds! The system doesn't do a good job of handling things with flight times longer than a round). Not the ful sized grenade but a slightly reduced one, say a 6P HE nade. (remember bow wouldn't be firing w/ the GL's automatic scatter rules... so direct hits and net hits compared to actual GL would be more common).

Also, if you consider normal arrow ammo to be broadheads... you could also create bodkin points with extra AP-2, but less base damage. Wouldn't be very popular except for those w/ lower str who probalby won't use it to begin with.
Conversely, If you consider normal arrows to be bodkin or target points, then you could create instead of barbed a broadhead arrow with +2DV/+2AP penalty. (probably better option).

now don't get all hung up over the bow stuff . . think of other such things!
even if it's stun(with bonelacing it's physical), it's still more than some guns do . . or thrown weapons that do the same as the bow . . improvised throwing weapon:Metahuman comes to mind *g*

THIS JUST IN: TROLLS ARE STRONG.

Exactly. I think the biggest problems with troll isn't that they're broken. It's that we keep thinking in a human scale.

The weakest troll is a strong human! Just look at what unbelievable things strong humans can do, and imagine that it's nothing compared to what a troll is able to do, which is nothing compared to what a cybered troll can do.

My problem with trolls is that they're too large, too strong, too stupid, too unsubtle, and too underutilized in the setting. They don't really add anything to the game. Wipe them off the face of the planet and the only real footnote you might notice is the lack of the troll kingdom in the Black Forest (which, as we all know, plays a huge part in the setting... err, right?). Hell, I don't think I've even ever seen them depicted correctly in the art even once because they're that ridiculous in size.

Dwarves fill the short guy schtick. Elves the pretty boys. Humans the everyday hero. Orks the monstrous brawlers. Trolls... the larger, less interesting orks.

Gimmicky.

- der menky

"Certainly there is no hunting like the hunting of man and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never really care for anything else thereafter."
~ Ernest Hemingway

wait for SR5 . . as we all know, mana will rise untill we get another scurge and before that, we get a new Earth-Dawn setting with cyber-tech *g*

You know, explosives are pretty henious too, and 2/3rds of them can be started with at chargen. I mean, even 1 kg of rating 15 foam is 15P you're looking at taking.

Funk, made you a thread for discussion of trolls in SR here

Helmets do stack, they add. You don't call a head shot, a call to bypass armor is all armor. Not just one piece.

My bad. I assumed helmets applied to the armor not stacking rule. And the only location specific called shots I've run with are leg to stop them from escaping, hand/weapon to keep them from attacking, and head shots for snipers.

Yeah, definitely house rules. I simply can't imagine a sniper taking 5 minutes setting up the shot and not aiming for the head. Now if reaction is rolled and there are a few hits, maybe he's not so precise, but I digress...

or the other way around: there's at least one net hit needed to actually hit the target so every weapon actually starts with a +1 to their ouchies factor . .

No Cain, now you're cutting me out of context of the post. It's not 1 net hit, it's 4 (I matched, didn't exceed in my fast math). You're not dealing w/ a normal pistol hitting ballistic armor.

Lets break this down. Basic automatic pistol is 5P, -1AP stock template.
The flechette only pistol in question is 8P, +5AP (flechette errata). So you net gain the ability to burst fire (heavy pistol unique!), +1DV over the template but lose the ability to fire anything except flechettes (fair trade). So all around a really nice weapon... the drawback again.. .you can only fire flechettes.

So on to the math.
Base: 8P, +5AP, flechettes (impact)
Armor: +8/+6 (+1/+2 helmet)
Burst: +2DV added after the armor check!!!, -2 to attack

Rules for Burst-fire Quote: "Note the DV modifier does not apply when comparing the DV to the armor rating".

So that's 6+5==11 armor, 13 w/ helmet.

You need 11-8==3 net hits to match the armor rating w/ 2 less dice on your attack. That still doesn't change that it's stil +2DV more damage to resist w/ those 11or13 plus body dice. (call it 18... average 6 resisted or roughly half the attack).

EDIT: I had this wrong... *4* net hits, 6 w/ helmet... "If the DV does not EXCEED the armor, then the attack inflicts stun rather than physical" Emphasis in italics in book.


Whoever was hit, still needs to resist a good bit of bruising and headache after this is all done. But it's not automatically lethal track just by winning the contested to-hit/reaction test.

Interestingly: I just noticed that the rules for short bursts are the only ones which include the snippet about not adding DV til after the armor check. Long and full bursts it would seem don't have that text. (oversight to be errated? or intentional?)

Just asking nicely, did I get the above example right?

Making sure I'm not missing something big w/ SR4 rules here.

Yeah, that's where you had me confused. I couldn't tell if you were factoring in the AP values or not, because if you had, the numbers were still off.