hehehe.

I think the skillwires are even greater as your the only technical character in the group, so you can backfill for any random situation that comes up with a bit of notice and a bit of money.

If you go skillwires, just remember to get Demolitions at rating 1 instead of 4 for no good reason, because it's awesome to watch the other players sweat when you go to defuse something and "happen" to mention that out loud. ;D

Yeah, the skillwires are attractive from a gaming standpoint, but I'm having a hard time coming to grips with the character that would be willing to rely on them so much. I dunno.


Very basic background because I don't want to bore you, he was originally going to come from a relatively wealthy family in Miami. However, his father was being extracted and caught a stray bullet or three, he was basically abandoned because the corp had no real use for him, so he hit the streets only to find out that at 16 his skill with mechanics really didn't cut it out in the "real" world. So he hired on to a pirate boat that was headed out as a junior mechanic/jammer/gunner/anything else they could make him do. After awhile the main gunner and main jammer(electronic warfare specialist) had gotten killed and he found out that with some practice he rapidly improved to the point where he was better than the old specialists. However, his boat bit off more than it could chew and got ambushed by some minisubs while trying to ambush and rip-off what they had been TOLD was a routine shipment of weapons to the Weapons Worlds in Haiti. Apparently... they were wrong. Everyone on the ship was killed except for him and the doctor they had aboard. The ship was dead in the water. It looked like they were screwed until the doc came up with an idea. Jackson thought he could fix the ship, but neither of them knew how to pilot it at all. However, while they were tallying the dead and inventorying the ship they found a skillwire system in their previous first mate. After some diagnostics, they found out they had luckily been undamaged by the bullet that had destroyed his heart and lungs and also had Pilot Activesoft, among others, in his commlink(or wherever activesofts are stored). So, they risked it. The doc ripped the system as carefully as he could, and using what little medical supplies they had left implanted them into Jackson(which is where his implant suppressed immune system comes from). After he recovered from the surgery he used the Navigation and Pilot activesofts he found to find them a way to Santo Domingo, the nearest port. Once there, they sold the boat for scrap and parted ways friends. Jackson set up a machine shop on the beach where he does repairs and upgrades for alot of the pirates that come through the area. When business is slow he spends most of his time tinkering with his boat, van, or drones and occasionally takes shadow jobs thrown his way by the doctor or some of his other pirate contacts.

So... I guess it could work, his original background was going to be something along the same lines except that he learned most of his skills the hard way while trying to find the way home in the boat and his Wired 1 system was going to be the one suppressing his immune system.

I dunno. I need to decide soon though, before Fisty kills me.

Chris

If Skillwires were real and as reliable as depicted, they'd be one of the first things most people with disposable income would pick up. It would be incredibly popular in the military as well as several other areas. There's nothing remotely hard about seeing someone use and abuse them from a believability stand-point. Nothing at all.

People are lazy. Skillwires lets you act as if you weren't lazy, and not only that, but you can switch to vital skills and abilities with the click of a mental switch. Total dream come true.

Here's what i'm looking at, with 1 point of karma and 38 BP floating and 130k cash floating

Race: Dwarf

Stats:

Body: 2
Agility 5
Reaction: 4 + 2
Str: 3
Chr: 1 (I hate leaving this low, and it is a strong contenter for some spending)
initution: 6
Logic: 6
willpower: 6
Edge: 5

skills

7 Gunnery (Ballistics)
4 Perception
4 Athletics (Group)
4 Unarmed Combat
6 Pilot Watercraft (whatever it is that you use)

Negative qualities: 35 points of weak immune system, allergies, whatever it is that you like (I set him up with allergies, buggy ware on the expert system, weak immune and a criminal sin, which explains while he legged it.) (buggy ware and weak immune system probably would cover most of your issues. Make sure the buggy ware is the expert system though not the skillwires )

Cyberweare:

Eyes with stuff
Ears with other stuff
control rig
Datajack
Synaptic booster 2
Skillwire 4
Expert system.

Gear:

18 x Rating 4 active softs covering

Elec. War.
Hacking
Cybercombat
Mechanic
First Aid
Driving anthropomorphic
Driving Ground
Driving Air
Equiette
Pistols
Longarms
Hardware
Software
Computer
Data search
negotiation
Medicine
infiltration

all rating 6 progs -minus reality filter and a 5/5/6/6 commlink
Rating 4 Agent

no drones yet, but I imagine you could spend the 138k cash floating and get some okay ones!

Edit: I see you want natural mechanical skills, so I'd actually take mechanic from being a skillsoft to being a real skill. Throw down some drones and you'll be sweet.

I'd also try and pursade fisty to let you have some downtime to match what the initiates have so you can crack your programs/agent (especially the agent) Loading the agent onto your robots (even if you have to tape a commlink to them) armed with analyze would really help your network security.

I'm assuming you used the karma as well, because otherwise I have no idea how you crammed all that in.

Chris

Yeah, the 1 karma floating bit means I used 199 points of karma. Sorry. Tweaking it all a bit, 'cause I'm not actually sure what logic does for a rigger?

Edit: so he has 1 karma, 38 BP and a pile of cash to spend.

Well, since I plan on running an armory and B/R shop on the side so Logic really helps with the whole B/R aspect, but for someone who JUST works with drones and has someone else repair/upgrade them or whatever it doesn't really do much besides EW.

Chris

Yep. It just requires an action to load it up, just like any other program.

Okay so Check this one out

Race: Ork

Body: 4
Agility: 6
Reaction: 6 + 2 (
Strength: 3
Charisma: 4
Intuition: 5
Logic: 4
Willpower: 5

Skills:

Gunnery 7 (spec: Ballistics)
Perception 4
Athletics (Group) 4
Mechanic 4
Pilot Watercraft 6 (Spec, power boats?)

Cyberware:

Control Rig
Datajack
Synaptic Booster 2
Skillwire 4
Eyes and ears with smartlink, thermo, vision enhancement 3 manficiation, audio enhancer 3, damper, selected sound filter 2
Skillwire expert system
PuSHeD
Nanohive (2) supporting
Neocortical (3) nanites
Control Rig Boosters (3)

Active softs with
Elec. War.
Hacking
Cybercombat
Mechanic
First Aid
Driving anthromorphs
Driving Ground
Driving Air
Equitte
Pistols
Longarms
Hardware
Software
Computer
Datasearch
negoitation
Medieince
infiltration
Unarmed combat and Armourer.

A rating 5/5/6/6 commlink with a rating 4 agent and every program at rating 6

Sea Otter with weapon mount and LMG
GMC bulldog with weapon mount and LMG
5 Bug drones
5 Fly Spies
3 Dobermans with LMGs
2 Optic X stealth fliers
1 Stormclound blimp.

Ares Predator
Chamelon Suit
Armoured Jacket
Helmet

I can send you the excel spreadsheet that birthed it if you want, pm email address.

Cash remaining 9400
1 Karma remaining

What I have't done:

Upgraded the drones, this probably could do with doing. The easiest cuts are stats - 1 point of stats off gives you another 50k cash, though I've advanced charisma, agility and reaction with karma. The safest cut is probably willpower.

No ammo is included either. You'll need that and batteries.

Some sample dicepools:

All hacking tasks: 4 skill + 5 (program limited by commlink) + 2 (hot sim) = 11

Mechanical tasks: 4 skill + 3 neocortical nanites + 4 logic = 11

Driving boats: 6 skill + 6 stat + 5 (control rig and booster) = 17

Driving other stuff: 4 skill + 6 stat + 4 (control rig and booster) = 14 dice

Shooting things with the LMGs: 7 skill + 6 stat + 5 (control rig and booster) + 2 (spec) = 20 dice

Shooting things with the pistol: 4 skill + 6 stat + 2 smartlink = 12 (probably more)

Perception: 4 + 5 (stat) + 2/3 (boosters) = 11/12

So pretty reasonable all around. Ca probably do better that my go at it, maybe not enough focus on rigging and to much on hacking.

I might be mistaken (don't do the rigger/decker thing), but doesn't Dodge (not Gymnastics) really help when rigging?

I thought they used there vehicle skill for that.

I could be completely wrong though, this is not an unknown state of affairs.

You could, if you like, put more weapons on the truck and the boat, up to BOD/3.
I would allow a turret with a pair of co-axial guns. If GM won't let you fire them together, then get two turrets, you run one gun, Pilot runs the other gun. Also, is GM allowing automatic 360-degree field of fire, with elevation up to 90 degrees, for free?

LMG is better than assault rifle only for range mods; damage is same, and LMG doubles uncompensated recoil. See threads on recoil mods for guns on drones and vehicles. Consider gas-vent, and ask GM if laser sight bonus applies when Pilot is firing the gun.

if you anticipate ship-to-ship combat, then invest in a rocket launcher, possibly turret-mounted. Or ship-to-air; cf. "Spy Hunter". Or just a single Striker.

Demolitions skill, many kilos of explosives, and GM permission allow you to improvise mines. Real handy for deterring pursuit if your route passes through a chokepoint. Antisubmarine depth charges are probably hard to improvise, but possible. Diving and sneakily attaching explosives to the hulls of other vessels is insurance against getting double-crossed, or otherwise having ace in the hole. Sensors on your own hull are insurance against enemy divers. Antipersonnel charges on hardpoints are supplementary insurance. (cf Car Wars "point defense grenades".)

A lifeboat is a long-standing tradition, with good reason. Hard-hulled takes lotsa storage, inflatable is easy to store but not as tough. I don't see fire extinguisher... and a fire on a boat can suck really badly, especially if you're carrying ammo as well as fuel.

DTFarstar: I'm kind of familiar with the campaign you are talking about. I really think you'd be better served ditching the van altogether and using the points in a more aqua or drone oriented manner. The van probably won't see a lot of use, and if it comes up that you do need land transportation, you can always acquire it then.

I just got finished reading the meet, and I think you are right. Hmm... maybe a minisub or a boat and a hovercraft instead of a boat and a van. Looks like I will definitely want pilot anthroform thought. Hmmm.... it's so hard to decide.

Chris

Talk your GM into giving you a small ferry or a fish trawler for this campaign. Hovercrafts might work, but have to be rather large (to accomodate all crew members).

If he says no, play a merc rigger and aquire some transport ingame. Spend the saved BP on needed mechanic skills.

As for demolitions, I will definitely have it, either as a natural skill or more likely skill-wired. I don't see why he wouldn't let me improvise mines of some sort if I wanted. Hell, I've never been formally trained, but give me C4, a detonator, and some sort of casing and a few hours and I could rig a half decent depth charge. Some nails, ball bearings, metal shaving basically anything, an explosive charge, and a coffee can(or some other relatively flimsy casing) makes a pretty damn good anti-personnel charge. Of course, home-made napalm in a container and wrapped in detcord(or some other trigger-able charge that will break the casing and ignite the napalm(magnesium or whatever)) probably makes the best anti-personnel defense. Not that many people take too well to being covered in sticky liquid chemical based flame and it just really doesn't bother most structures.

As far as what vehicles to have besides drones, I'm waiting for fistandantilus to get back online at some point so I can see what is available, how big it is, and what it costs as well as several drone related questions(can I go ahead and crack the programs do I need seperate pilots and targetting soft for every vehicle etc.)

Chris

There is a reason why Israel and the US target bomb makers as the most affective way to shut down terrorists bombings. It's a lot harder that it looks to make effective bombs and not blow yourself up. There are all sorts of ways to accidentally blow yourself up.

Look up Palestinian work accident on google and poke through the 1.6 million hits.

I didn't say it would be entirely SAFE, but given decent tools(home shop equipment) and a clear space(warehouse with room to store things the way they need to be stored) it is easier than you would think to make small devices. It is the big boy bombs that get truly dangerous. Unless you have access to plastique then you are generally going to be fine. It is making homemade C4 derivatives or homemade thermite that is truly dangerous.

Chris

Getting depth charges to explode at the right depth (assuming you know how deep the sub is) would take an adjustable timer; you could even mark the dial as "1 sec for x meters down, 2 sec for y meters down" etc. It might help if you prepared a sample and actually timed how fast it sunk.

A minisub is a sweet-ass secret escape craft: if your ship burns and sinks, and the enemy sees no lifeboat, they may assume that you're dead, and be vulnerable to a later sneak attack (for revenge, or just because you want a boat and theirs is the closest available). Sub under boat = extra drag; sub inside boat = takes up lotsa hull volume. Even if it's just a torpedo-sized drone with an air tank, you can grab onto the handholds, access the air supply hoses, and make your getaway.