Quick Vehicle Converter
AKA: How to stick a classic car in your game
*EDIT: ARG! Freaking thing deleted my title, added above*

These are just a few things that I have been working and hobbling on that allow me to stick nearly any 'real' vehicle into SR4. Their still rough since I'm in the process of shifting them from SR3 rules, but with the simplification of vehicle rules it should be fairly easy. Mostly I use them for ether sticking in a really really old classic car (say a Ferrari F50) or building a modern version of a car (say a C13 Corvette Z06). I didn't include the complex math, but if anyone wants it then I'll post it up.

First off, we have to figure out an actual top speed for your vehicles, since they can accelerate paste their listed 'Speed' rating. I use Speed x 1.25 as the top speed, with Acceleration cut in half paste the Speed rating.

Now that we have that out of the way, we can move on to the numbers.

Handling: Pretty much a “Use Examples from the BBB�. Bikes for example, a small bike or off-road bike will have +1, while a crotch rocket or chopper will have +2. Cars, a sports car will be around +3, a “Sporty� car will be around +2, a “Normal� car will be +1, and a bigger or heavier +0 or less. This can be bumped up or down by one depending on if that vehicle is known to be a good or bad handling vehicle. Limit is +3/-3 for production vehicles, more than that requires after market work. If the vehicle is a classic (and thous without Drive by Wire), subtract 1 from its handling.

Accel: Walking rate is pretty straight forward. 5 = slow, 10 = average, 15 = sporty, 20 = sport car/bike. Bump it up or down by 5 if the vehicle is exceptionally quick or slow accelerating.

Running rate however, is where the math first starts. Divide 242 by the time it takes the vehicle to reach 60mph. The result is the vehicles running Accel + the test drivers average roll. I round down to the nearest number divisible by 5 and then knock 10 off of it.

(Option: Multiple the vehicles ¼ mile speed 4 and divide by the ¼ mile time. Average the result with the 0-60mph result before subtractions. I would use this for classic vehicles only.)

The website www.0-60times.com is a good place to go to find a vehicles 0-60mph time.

Speed: Quick and dirty, just take the vehicles top speed x 1.07 and round to the nearest number divisible by 5. For modern versions of classic vehicles, consider bumping it by 5 or 10.

Pilot: If a classic, then 0. If not a classic, the use 1 (price 10k or less), 2 (price over 10 k to 20k), or 3 (price over 20k) for ground vehicles.

Body: For bikes, 4 for scooter, 6 for rocket, 8 for chopper. For cars, 8 for subcompact, 9 for compact, 10 for midsize car, 11 for full size car/small SUV, 12 for boats of a car/midsize SUV, 13 for large SUVs. For trucks, 14 for truck, 16 for van, 18 for tractor, 20 for bus. Bump it up or down by 1 or 2 for slight variations in vehicle size.

Armor: Bikes are normally 4, cars are normally 6, heavier vehicles are normally 8. Bump it up or down from there as you see fit, remembering that armor often is more related to how tough a vehicle is rather then actual armor. A jeep wrangler for example would be Body 9, but most like have armor 8. Half armor for classics.

Sensor: If a classic, then 0. Otherwise, a 1. Military/security vehicles can go up to a 3.

Price: Roughly equal to ($ * 0.8 ) for the first 50k, ($ * 0.6 ) for the next 50k, and ($ * 0.5 ) for everything above 100k in Nuyen. For Classics, it is what ever the GM wants.

Examples

1995 Ferrari F50
Handling: +2 (Sports car: +3, Classic: -1)
Accel: 20/45 (Used Optional since this is a classic. 242/3.7 = ~65.4, minus ~10 and 124.5mph * 4, divided by 12.1s, averaged with 65.4, minus ~10 for average test driver roll )
Speed: 215 (202mph * 1.07, rounded to nearest divisible by 5)
Pilot: 0 (Classic)
Body: 8 (Midsize: 10, Classic: -2)
Armor: 3 (Car: 6, Classic: /2)
Sensor: 0 (Classic)
Price: a LOT! (Come on, it is a near mint 75 year old super car.)

2070 C13 Corvette Z06
Handling: +3 (Sports car)
Accel: 20/55 (242 / 3.7s, minus 10)
Speed: 220 (198mph * 1.07 = ~210, adding 10 for updated performance)
Pilot: 3 (calculated from price)
Body: 10 (Midsize: 10)
Armor: 6 (Car: 6)
Sensor: 1 (not military/security vehicle)
Price: 60,000 Nuyen (~$75,000 * 0.8 )

Old cars won't have ANY armor unless modified to have any. I don't know about you, but my Subaru didn't come with armor plating.

You know what would happen if a Street Sammy looked at my Focus funny... one VERY dead Focus. I'm talking dead as in they are finding pieces of it on the Moon and everywhere in between.

I don't believe that the average car is made with armor in 2070 either. The armor stat is an abstract number used to help calculate a vehicle's resistance to damage. You can't solely use Body for this, since that number is used for several other calculations.

if I puch a car with my fist I wont stop it from working unless I have a cyberarm. I could fire 9 mil at it and make pretty holes and it will still be in working order.

even a 357 mag wont stop it in its track.

like wind said its just a stats to say that it takes a certain amout of force before taking more than cosmetic damage. Why make a new system and add some rules when you can just use a armor stats to keep it simple?

and by the way those quick rules looks good so far, will have to try it.

As stated, the armor isn't actually armor but relates to a vehicles innate toughness. Much of the drop in body and armor for Classic cars is to take into account the better materials and construction used on Modern vehicles in SR4.

The actual speed stat, if you use my limit of 25% over as the max, will give you the roughly the vehicles top speed in MPH if you do the conversion. If it helps anyone, if you ever wonder what the speed rating is of a certain mph, or the mph of a certain speed rating. Very quick and not exact but very close... MPH = (Speed * 3/4).

The long math is Speed * Rounds per minute (20) * Hour (60) / Meters in mile (1609.344).

Your guy's first cars didn't come with armor? Seriously? My first car was a 1978 Buick Electra, and it certainly did have "armor." (My two good friends in highschool drove a 68 Lincoln and a 70's Cadillac. They were the only 3 cars in high school the hicks with their jacked up trucks wouldn't mess with.)

Hell, my parents had an old Suburban (back when they were good). Those and old Land Rovers also had "armor." Pretty much any car build before the days of cars which are designed to crumple (pffff) should have an armor rating.

No, armor is armor. It's there cause in 2070 people make armored cars as the norm.

american cars, tank on the outside, womb on the inside...

http://www.gladwell.com/2004/2004_01_12_a_suv.html

No, armor is not armor. In SR3 there was a weird rule where hand-held weapons automatically did one less damage "level" than they were stated to do against vehicles. Although it did "make sense" it was difficult to remember, and very "out there" as far as rules go. In SR4 vehicles just have an "armor" rating even if they don't technically have "armor" per se. This is to reflect the fact that a vehicle innately is much less "squishy" than a human.

What Malachi said. Armor refers to a vehicle's innate ability to resist penetration from a round or explosion. A wheel-well or engine block will still resist a bullet without being stuffed full of kevlar. Body refers to how much of the car can be shot up before it is no longer drivable.

Upon consideration, I agree that you are right. Armor represents toughness as much as a willful effort to make a car bullet-resistant.

Completely and utterly off-topic, but I wonder, given how much I hear it, just how many people know just what per se actually means. For that matter I wonder how many people know what phrases such as quid pro quo, vis a vis, and et cetera mean. [/Andy Rooney]

Infinity you evil, demented, sweet bastard... now I can finally make a character I've itched to make for a while. That character being the poor schmuck who lost his job the same day his shitty Jackrabbit crushed by falling debris, only to spiral into depression and fall into a decade plus slump until a certain dragon leaves him a sweet ride in his will.

He of course goes on to re-build his life around the car, and becomes a Rigger...

...ok, so it's blasphemy, perhaps, but it's attainable blasphemy...

Ok, just got back from my Xmas visit with the family and old friends. Seeing as it is a 12 hour car drive there and another 12 hour car drive back, I had some time to do a lot of thinking and for some reason I thought a lot about this. I also had the pleasure of testing out and tweaking my thoughts with my old gaming buddies. Of course, it might have had something to do with me running a couple of one shot games that normally involved lots of driving, getting chased by attack copters, and blasting at everything with big honking cable guns.

Anyway, right now I am bush finishing up compiling all the data and will soon be creating a thread with all the info and optional rules add-ons. Little things like the top speed, braking, limits of acceleration and breaking, a slightly tweaked "modern to SR4/2070" vehicle conversion guide, and a whole ton of vehicles. One thing that always pissed me off was a lack of a large variety of vehicles, so I started building LOTS of them. Everything from your little put put cheap'o cars, to sports cars, to super cars/exotics, to track day race cars. Hopefully some people will jump in once I get going and we'll have a huge list to choose from.

Oh, and a little performance break down of some cars in the game, since I'm sure most of you haven't thought about it much. For example, the Eurocar Westwind 3000 with a decent driver (9 dice and assuming average rolls)...
0-60mph: 3 seconds
0-180mph: 9 seconds
0-top speed (225mph): 13.5 seconds
1/4 Mile: 8.1 seconds @ 162.3mph

Stuff following uses my braking rules
0-100-0mph: 8.3 seconds (3 second 0-60, 5 second 0-100mph, and 3.3 second 100-0)
0-top speed-0mph: 21 seconds, topping out at 225mph

Just to give you an idea of how crazy fast this car is, here is a quote listing the numbers on the current fastest road car and fastest car in the world for 0-100-0.