What it boiled down to was you were an idiot if all your shit wasn't dikoted. If you dikoted a Base L damage weapon (a knife or some hand razors), you tripled the base damage by bumping it up from Light (1 box) to Moderate (3 boxes), just by magically coating it in diamondy stuff. If a Moderate weapon (like a sword, already mentioned, or cyberspurs), you stil doubled the base damage by bumping it up to Serious (6 boxes). On top of that came the Power bonus (that set the difficulty/target number for the damage resistance test, back before everything was a flat diff. 5).

It was just a little silly. If you didn't have dikoted armor plating in your armor, you just plain had less armor than the other guy. If you were any sort of melee guy (particularly with blades), you were just plain dumb if you didn't have fancy diamond coating on your stuff.

And I'd say, yes, it will still be a "must have" item even at a moderate +1/-1 or what-have-you, were it to pop up in SR4. It would still be less of a must have, sure, but the fact would remain that every little die helps, and most of those little dice stack with one another. Adding dikote to trollbows, for instance. Dikoting armor being worn on top of Form Fit (for yet more stacking).

It just seems unnecessary to me, I guess, to start the whole "he who has the most dikote has the edge" arms race again. Why not simply consider dikote standard issue on most goods, or consider it a part of the process used for some customization option we've already got available (like electrical insulation)? Call your Fineblade long knife a dikoted survival knife, if it floats your boat, or your monosword a regular sword that's been dikoted (that just coincidentally costs the same).

it made weapons coated with dikote use the regular barrier-rating instead of the doubled rating when attacking a barrier in close combat

And it killed a dude and made fun of his widow at the funeral.

Dikote's tears cure cancer, too bad Dikote never cries...

What would happen if you Dikoted Chuck Norris?

dikote would have become even better

I always wanted to dikote a mono-filament whip... but I couldn't make it make sense to me.

Mono filament whips getting their damage from being a single molecule wide.... adding diamond would make it into a yo-yo I'd think.

True, but it would be a yo-yo with damage staged up a step.

so instead of 7S it would do 8D damage and still fit into your pinky and still would be able to slice through most barriers . . ugly . . unlogical, rules-wise possible . . and ugly O.o

True, but it wouldn't make sense...

Monofilament Whips get their damage from the wire being so narrow. Coating it with diamond would make it thicker and do less damage.. IMHO.

Dude, its magic. I mean tech. I mean diamonds make everything better.

yeah, but the rules allow magic, and that makes even less sense, so rules-wise you're fine ^^

Gah! much more logic getting throw out of the window will make my head explode...

*BOOM*

too late.

aaww . . *loots crypto*

As are most mods in SR4. Since there is no SOTA cost or implant upkeep, when I lay down 32k for 4 levels of Muscle Toner, I get a hard to detect, always active +4 to Agility, which gives me (on average) 1.33 more DV to all my weapons. How is this any worse than Dikote, which would have a flat cost for each weapon it mods? And how on earth can dikote affect armor? Most armor in the sixth world is non kevlar plate based (as far as I know) and instead weaves some kind of fiber into the clothes. Aside from hardened military grade armor, where do you find a metal armor to bond the dikote to? Either way, Dikote is far from being too powerful.


You misunderstand, I am not saying you should have put it in. The choice of what material to include is up to the writers, and I am not complaining (too loudly at least). I am merely calling AH's excuse, since he has already stated that it was a decision they made to remove it because of its flavor and purpose. No point in making excuses now.

Maybe if it gave +0DV, -1AP, no effect on armor, and was extremely expensive it would be okay. But that is the absolute upper limit, IMO. Any better than that and it's a must-have, which is bad for reasons already mentioned.

Because Dikote doesn't cost essence: an absolutely limited and amazingly precious resource for every character.

True, but how important are blades anyways? They already suck compared to what adepts (and now martial artists) can do with their bare hands. I think they need some pump, pump, pumpin up! Seriously though, I'm sticking with 0DV/-4AP in my games, +1 structure rating (must be used on ferrous alloys).

blades are important if the target is bulletproof . . if you are strong enough you're more likely to get through the armor and actually make that fucker bleed . . and if he's wearing too much armor, you will probably still do one hell of stun damage

I am sorry but melee is a waste in this game simply because attacking with a non ranged weapon is a complex action not a simple one.
Everything would be great otherwise.

As far as dikote beign the "Essential" item and thus making it bad is total bullshit.

EVERY gun guy will have a smartlink: Essential
EVERY mage will have at least 1 sustaining foci: Essential

Nobody complains about that, so the idea that Dikote should not be in the game because it makes it too essential is worthless.

I think that Dikote should surely be in but how about this time someone actually take the 10 minutes it would take to write logical rules for it such as:

1. The dikoting process may only be applied to edged melee weapons and costs x amount per rating in reach. Giving it +1 P and -1 AP
2. The dikoting process may be added to military grade armor or better cost (some astronomical ammount due to surface size) giving it hardened armor but doubles its incumberance rating.

There problem solved.

ONE FOCUS! TWO OR MORE FOCI!

PILLS!
And don't choose, just take the red and the blue one...

ROTFL!

BIG IMPACT TEXT!

say that again, once you've been on the recieving end of 20+S+ Damage in one Attack . . from some troll who seemed to be unarmed at the time the fighting started . .

Hey best of both worlds: I'm right both times! Because, see, we couldn't fit in everything we wanted (I'll tell you about the ouija deck and spirit gyre some day) so we took a hard look and decided Dikote™ wasn't apropos.

Because EX has an alternative, the Dikote would not. Keep Dikote at a balanced level, and add other non-compatable options, and we are good. Dikote alone, however, is to much. As for stats, although I would love more damage, I do not think it fits - my vote goes for -2AP, or similar.

Add other options, so it is not a 'must have', and make it take capacity with the Arsenal modification rules, and I will be very happy. Melee weapons need more options, considering what was given to firearms.

On a side note, melee in shadowrun does not suck. The majority of my characters focus on melee, and can easily slaughter a room of gun-happy guards - although I do admit it could use a little boost.

Dikoted monowhip = normal whip damage (which cannot be dikoted) + dikote bonus.
If I was really feeling generous I would have added +1 (up to a whopping (STR+1)L, woohoo!) to the whip damage, but no more.
So you just wasted a perfect good and awesome monofilament whip for some third rate exotic weapons and at for high cost too!

Ho man, I would so have loved one of my player to try that...

yes, i agree that it is unlogical and physically impossible . . but so is magic and the rules allow it . . and everything that is a cutting weapon gets the benefits of dikote . . and the monowhip does nothing BUT cutting . . now remember about those failure rules . . you really wanna have to defend against your very own whip of doom with the probably not too high body?

Dammit AH! i want that not published material <.< . .

If they brought back Dikote as an AP only modifier, honestly i'd be completely cool with it. I recall another thread discussing something about the AP to DV ratio...i think it was roughly 1 DV was worth -3 AP or something? So giving something an additional -2 AV would not quite be 1 DV. Almost. Of course Impact armor tends to be lower than Ballistic, but still, it seems about right. There was a whole writeup on it in a thread on this page, too, i think comparing APDS and ExEx.

To be honest(on a side note) even though DV seems to be worth 'more' than AP, i find it interesting that the Adept power Critical Strike is only capped by Magic rating and Penetrating Strike is capped at 3. I suppose they might have been worried that both powers are so cheap, stocking 6 levels of CS and 6 levels of PS(essentially negating all but the heavier armors) would have been too easy. So negating armor isn't all THAT bad. I have no plans to change this, as it's worked fine in our games, but it does come to mind. In a way, Dikote with a -2 AP would be much more of a boon to the blade-wielder specialists than anyone else. And it will still be used less than a smartlink(which is SO easy to get even a face or hacker can and do usually have them.)

And agreed about melee characters. They can be awesome. You just need to change your tactics a bit when playing one. They have that nice advantage, that unless every gun-wielding person in SR has 'Firefight', IE, are all Grammaton clerics, you start taking DP modifiers when firing too close to someone(-3 i believe it was, so it wasn't a joke if the people firing only have DPs of 7-9.) And it takes 3 levels of Firefight(realistically only had by more special opponents) to totally negate this.

I'm pretty sure you can only take that mod from Firefight twice.

Ah, i couldn't remember. Some powers seem stackable several times, some limited(the DV ones tended to be 2 if i recall).

Yup, only twice, but a -1 instead of a -3 is still quite nice...

It wasn't some critical error I was pointing out, or anything. I'd just happened to have read up on Firefight lately, and had it stuck in my head, and noticed, and blah blah blah.

For one I will assume that a 20+S+ damage attack must mean 20 power +stun. from critical strike, + elemental strike and a lot of strength.

to that I say so what, if someone wants to be able to throw that kind of damage around, such as with:
Strength 12 troll, with killing hands, critical strike 6, elemental strike electricity, maybe even with penetrating strike,probebly to with some improved skill for unarmed. and even 4 levels of martial arts to give it +4 to damage.

that would be 6 from strength
another + 6 from critical strike
another + 4 from martial arts
possibly -3 armor piercing

now the main point is though that with ALL the points you spent to be able to do that 16P 3AP with stun, you will have speen more than all of your build points. for which you will be stuck with a crummy initiative and at most maybe 2 iniative passes.

It is just not worth it to be a rather above average one trick pony, that can doo a good bit of damage once a pass if they live long enough to get within reach and get to live through the other people that will almost assuredly go first.

no, actually, i am talking about a troll with two dikote'd spurs using the 3rd core book rules for 2-weapon-fighting with cyber-implant weapons . . in those you get (STR+STR/2) Power and with dikote and a Strength of let's say 16(yeah maxed to the max) one Dikoted spur would deal 17S Damage . . two of those would deal 16+8=24S Damage . . add in reach bonus and just 2 successes make him even more deadly than a vindicator minigun, which starts off at 7S damage and has 15 bullets that bring it up to 22D damage . . but the spurs are much less noticeable if retractable and do not make your success in 3rd at somewhere above 15 in most cases . . and now compare the power of 24 to 3rd ed barrier ratings and tell me he can not just cut through that reinforced wall over there because instead of having to use barrier x 2 he is only using barrier rating . . and because of the non fixed success target number it was hellishly impossible to withstand such an attack if it hit . .
even if it were like this in 4th, with the fixed target number for successes it would probably still not be as bad as it is/was in 3rd . .

3rd edition and 4h edition are ao different they might as well be different games, the only thing that carried over was that if a mage want's you dead there is nothing you can do about it and Phys adepts still are horredously underpowered.

Yes in 3rd edition a melee person was at least understandable but now in 4th they are worthless.

I don't even know where to begin...
If by worthless you mean can kick ass and take names, then yes, they are worthless...
If several people are shooting a meleer at the same time he is in trouble, but so is everyone else...
Are guns better? Yes... Is kicking, punching and stabbing worthless? Hardly, flinging excrement at CorpSec, now that's worthless (from a combat point of view, from an entertainment point of view on the other hand)...

a good meele is worth his body in gold for getting into places where one can not take weapons and having to kill one persocon without causing too much of a ruckus . . or at least would be, if there were things like breaking necks for insta-death and stopping people from screaming/struggling *g*
but yes, close-combat-people were much better in SR3, because strength did more ouchies back then and agility wasn't used as the attribute for close combat either . .

Garrotte in Arsenal, and subduing combat

yes, yes, i know about those . . but nowhere does it say anything about being able to stop people from screaming for help . .
and on a side-note, i ain't playing SR4 but still playing SR3 . . well, if i ever get the chance to play again . .

A called shot and a GM that isn't retarded should be enough to take someone out fairly quietly. Certain martial arts advantage (Wildcat, for one) and/or some solid Adept Centering Versus Penalties should take care of the former, but I'm afraid there's not much that can be done to help with the latter.

If you've got a grappler making a called shot to the neck of an enemy, drop someone with a knife or a hand-to-hand attack in a single pass (from surprise), et, etc, and your GM still has them hooting and hollering and calling for help, there's not much a rulebook can do to help you.

even if they don't holler or scream, there's biomonitors with dead-mans-switch or the pulling of a trigger on an unsilenced gun . .
the only real way of doing such things stealthyly are jammers and a silence spell . . and even then it ain't really sure if the biomonitor with the dead-guards-bitch doesn't start off some silent alarms or something like that . . one of the reasons why i don't really see the point in playing an uber-sneaky guy, even in an MI style run . . in the world of shadowrun with teir magicks and technicks there is no frigging way to not be noticed once you have to take care of somebody or something that is supposed to be where it is right then . . i let other people do their thing and as soon as some alarm is triggered i draw the biggest gun i have and do my thing . .

I mean, yeah. I never understood why people say 'melee is worthless', unless they have a GM deliberately hose them all the time.

Are there instances where it's less effective? Sure! But there are also instances where guns are less effective as well. Hell, there are instances where magic isn't hthe best bet(background count).

For example; in melee range-unless you have Firefight(probably reserverd only for best of the best), you're taking a -3 to hit anyone in melee range. That's a fair little bit, especially when mooks roll what....6-10 dice in a test?

Really, while melee has certain disadvantages, with the invention of these different manuvers and martial art abilities, i will forever be baffled from people calling it 'useless.'

The poor competitiveness of melee with ranged combat is part of the reason for the biggest nerf I've implemented. It just made no sense to me that a WR3 samurai should be able to fire 4 full auto bursts with an assault rifle, while Mr Unaugmented can only fire one full auto burst with the same damned gun!

Consequently, and after much debate with my players, we agreed that the number of times one could fire a gun was limited by the weapons cycle rate, represented in SR4 by the maximum number of bullets a weapon can conceivably fire in an action pass. Obviously the real-life cycle rate of a vast array of weapons is much higher, but this is a game. Of course, cycle rate makes no difference in melee combat, granting it obvious advantages.

Uhh, you're the one that brought up the whole concept of using melee to kill someone without them getting to scream, remember?

yes, yes, i know, i know . . and now, off to work i go

Reasons why unarmed and weapon combat is pointless.

1: EVERYONE defends a melee attack with a stat AND a skill where ranges is almost always just the stat.
2: Melee has no counterpart of a smartlink
3: Melee requires you to either have a: a ton of points put into strength to even get decent damage, B: just as many points if not more to be an adept, C Both
4. You have to close in the distance to even begin combat, which is not so bad if you are one on one AND have suprise, otherwise you are screwed
5. Maxed out troll 11 str (with advantages) Killing hands and +6 critical strike/w elemental and piercing strike +4 martial arts= 16 damage unarmed -2AP cost: 140BP (not counting skill)
Guy with gun 5 agility, ingram white knight hight velocity, exex ammo, full burst: 18P -2 AP 43 BP
6: Melee may only attack multiple people if major penalties are taken(spending followup action, 2 weapon penalties, ect.), and they are standing within legs reach of each other

Finally and this is the true nail in the coffin: Melee is a complex action not standard so when Mr. Melee gets to hit you once, Mr. Gun gets to fire from 2 normal shots to possible even up to 2 long bursts at you.

While i love melee in this game as a character plot and a role playing experience it is far to gimped in the rule book. I have always said that melee should be a simple action and that something should be done about people always getting to defend with a stat and skill.

I will admit that it does have its advantages although they are mpt wprth the disadvantages.

1: it is silent, hopefully they do not have biolinked alarms
2: it is impossible to detect a well trained martial artist unless they are an adept
3: cool factor is like 10x that of guy with a gun
4: makes better use out of mage support
5: is never gear dependent

I may sound anti-melee but actually i love it and wish it was balanced out where it could be competitive but sadly it is not.

P.S. I used to love my Troll stealth expert in 3rd edition with his axe. But it is just not reasonable anymore.

That's funny, because in almost 20 years of playing and GMing Shadowrun through all kinds of power levels, I have never had a problem with melee, and have never really considered it to be underpowered.

I'm thinking there's a disagreement in paradigm, here. While most people see ranged defense as Reaction, I see it as Reaction + Cover (sort of; you know what I mean). I was taught that rule #1 of infantry combat was C&C: Cover and Concealment (and no, Sgt. Bratz was not amused when I told him that was actually two rules).