With the (still standard) BP system, Bob would have to spend 315BP on attributes only (45BP to much on physical and mental btw):

new Karma System: 69.3% of the total amount on attributs
BP System: 78.75% of the total amount on attributs

just for comparison:
old Karma System: 42% of the total amount on attributs

Bob should be lucky, that the GM is such a nice guy and let the players use the karma gen (in which is build his neither illegal nor more expansive than the standard chargen)

so much or balancing... the new attribute cost makes the karma gen much better balanced to the BP gen.

cya
Tycho

The thing that gets me, is why do people think a person must have an attribute of 4+ to be any good as a concept? Hell, when I made made Cleric, he had most of his Attributes at 2 or 3 (with two mental traits at 4), because from what I could tell, 2 is normal. When you're pushing into the 3's and 4's, you're almost superhuman.

Maybe people should have more realistic expectations of what a person should be like.

The karma deficit introduced by SR4.5 will break character concepts and slow character development significally.


That wouldn't be the official table, then. By RAW, 3 is normal - Joe Average normal.

But you might be a Troll, too, as someone noted before.

---


I see only one way: More Karma per run. Much more Karma! At least twice as much as in SR3.

The civilian model, even without upgrades.

On the contrary - the feats expected from runners to accomplish puts them into superhero territory.

Skills should be cheaper, then. When it comes to bang for the buck, attributes still are the way to go... just now there is even less karma for skills.

Our games are a bit more...pro-level. More along the lines of...''gritty manga'' as I like to put it. We have people with 4's and 5's and we don't have a problem with it. (3-5 seems to be our common natural attribute ranges. We don't have very many at all with natural attributes above that, and we do have some 2's that show up as well. But I wouldn't call our people supermen.)

As for ''being lucky'', we switched to Karmagen pretty fast when we saw it was up our alley, so to speak. I know several people who use it as well.

Hell, even in the SR4 basic guide, those ''not so hot'' sample characters had plenty of 5's to be found in the masses.

Honestly, really, all this change does now is:

-Favor buying up attributes to high levels via ware so you don't need to raise them naturally anymore
-Favor even MORE pumping of attributes with BP to as high as they will go since they are even HARDER to raise now
-Totally hoses the higher-stat metas under Karma-I mean, I'll say it again...65 Karma for a 'weak body' troll to become 'average' for his race is ridiculous(and you likely won't see many of them anymore anyway due to this-in Karmagen, you likely won't see orks and trolls unless they are casters...since god knows they'll need the karma for that)
-Technomancers. Like they needed any more problems at chargen. Ouch. They better like what they can get, because they ain't gettin' much more in game until months and months go by.

Sorry to say, but I just see far too many drawbacks to this system as it is.

Again, if it were, say, 4x Karma, and the metas added/subtracted them afterward at karmagen, it would be a bit better(though I still didn't have a problem with 3.) Right now, straight 3's-just average-in Karmagen(not counting Edge/Magic/etc), is 120 Karma. For a person that's maybe slightly on the higher end of average(but not really above average.) Under this? it's 200 Karma. To be average. That's an awful lot, IMO. At least 4x would make it 160. More than the original, but a little more reasonable, IMO.

If people don't start getting more karma per game, their characters will stay stagnant, sometimes popping a skill or two up once and awhile. I, personally, am one that likes the see the character grow...both in personality/roleplay AND mechanically.

EDIT: I mean, I know it's always pretty much an unwritten rule that you don't have to use all of the rules, but would it have hurt to put a sidebar in that said ''If you wish for slightly faster advancement, just use the rules from the original SR4 and charge 3x the new Rating of Attributes.'' This way, new players might like that option, too.

The suggestion is still 4-5, max 10.

Amen!



Fortunately that's only a suggestion and no rule. I think I'll switch to at about 8 to 14 per run as GM. Maybe even more.

I adding Capacity limits to things like contact lenses new to SR4A?

Sure, but like rated sensors, that was an announced errata.

I must say, the +2 limitation rule was something of a shocker to me, too. Might I suggest, though, that all is not lost? Have you thought to build drones around the chips? It's not like you're hurting for parts, if you're willing to disassemble your current drones. I imagine you could probably offer a compelling argument to your GM.

on the upgrades thing, a quick fix is this:

of the shelf upgrades, max +2.

upgrades built from the ground up, go for it.

unless thats how its already set up in the book, as i have yet to see the new text.

That's a fair question, and one that Stephen and I will be discussing at our weekly meeting this Sunday.

As to SR4A being the same as D&D 3.5, I understand that there may be some similarities. However, 3.5 required the purchase of new books, had new mechanics, and required the rebuild of all characters and monsters. You don't really need to do that with any of the latest tweaks/errata/whatever. Unless, I suppose, you've got an un-fun rules lawyer for a GM who forces you to re-purchase everything you've ever spent Karma for.

Nope, you can still download the changes as PDF for free.

You seem to be implying that the SRD is the equivalent of the full set of books.

EDIT: Wait, do you mean the list that was compiled by a fan?

I'm not entirely sure what you are getting at, but take a look here.

That document starts with "The purpose of this booklet is not to provide a comprehensive list of everything that has changed with the 3.5 revision." It then follows up with some detail-less lists of spell names and a few other hints as to the new stuff. I'm not sure that's equivalent to a full-blown errata/change log.

I have noticed that cyberlimbs info have been placed in one spot, with standard limbs (off the rack no upgrading without a cybertorso), and the custom limbs, one you can upgrade above 3 without worrying about getting a cyber torso

the devs have added a few more vehicles, too

now i can see how limiting devices to +2 on upgrades is simulating you can only upgrade so far before the tech can't take it anymore

as i get time to pick through each section, i'll post changes I have noticed if no one else does


please remember 2 golden rules, though, as i read the positive & negative remarks
grandfather the old stuff that works for your game (like upgraded drones..)
its your game, use the rules you want, and forget the rest.

they have been making PRGs for over 30 years, shadowrun 20 of that
there has not been a perfect game system, yet, as players always seem to find something wrong

for a moment, please, thank the devs for their time and effort for a well designed 20 anniversity book

The threshold changes bother me a bit. So now to be have a basic level of competence I have to min max whore my character like a mad man. Hey some people are abusing the rules, lets punish the majority for there sins. I mean seriously 6 threshold OR test for computers, drones etc. I need on average 18 dice in a spellcasting test to beat that. It was more than bad enough beofre now it is absurd. I have never seen and I never want to see a character rolling 18 dice on there spellcasting tests, in my games. And yet I do want the player to have the option to powerbolt a drone.

I like most of the changes, but the thresholds are crap. You are not bringing difficulties inline with an augmented world, you are making ordinarily achievable tasks impossible without cheesing the augmented world to the extreme.


Uhg, just thought how hard it will be to use physical illusions now. Hitting a OR threshold of 6 is fun.

How about this then? The only things not included in the SRD are a few monsters, the names of deities, and the "how to generate a character" rules, which didn't change. And no, the SRD isn't fan-made. It's published by WotC. There's a hyperlink version online that's fan-run but unofficial.

Hear here!

Yes, but how many people do you know are actually 'average' across the board? As in, 'baseline human'? As far as I can tell, most people are under the baseline in a number of areas, and are 'good' perhaps in one or two areas.

From my perspective, and this just may be my style of play, I like characters to be realistic, start close to baseline, and then work up. So, expecting people to be floating at 4-5 out-of-chargen, for me, is unrealistic... it essentially means most PCs are starting off as Olympic caliber individuals, and then hitting 'human maximum' (6) in no time, flat.

As for other metahumans, trolls and such.... they already start pretty damn high, and just go up from there. A 'baseline troll' to a troll should be what a baseline human is to a human... troll characters should start close to the baseline, and progress slowly. You don't go from 'Joe Average' to 'Olympic God' in a month or six of Shadowrunning (well, you shouldn't, anyway).

It is just as bad.

The changes aren't quite as sweeping, but they are just as profound. If you've built up gear past +2, you may have to go back and undo all of that, especially if the gear is powerful. So, it could potentially affect everything you're ever bought, with karma or with cash.

This also matters dramatically if you're playing in multiple games. I'm in multiple games on RPOL.net; what happens if I have one game running 4.0, and the other running 4.5? The same character would come out radically different.

I would like to inform you all that the sky is falling, the sky is falling.

Seriously. Cutting edge military technology will get beat out by a normal civilian model?

"Cutting edge military laptops" aren't. Their overall tech? Sure. Their personnel laptops? No.

3 is average, not normal. By what I have seen & what makes sense, Joe Average has six to seven 2s, and one or two 3s. Increase two or three by one each of he is Joe Above-Average.

In other words, while 3 may be average, 2 is the height of the bell curve for the Human norm.

Better than I put it, but yes, my point exactly.

I have a question. Has the books gone to the printer? If not I hope that they hold off until the pdfs that are out get some play testing. Then they can update the books and re release the pfds giving free new ones to those that just bought these.

I don't think they've gone to press yet, since they don't have an ISBN. So, any errata being done now will be in the print run (I think).

My character's average is 3.6667, so I'm "above average" and not by far (raise 2 2s to 2 4s).

BTW, "six 2s and two 3s" averages to 2.25, not 3.

I do not believe it has been sent to the printers yet, as they have said corrections from our proof-reading will be included. This is an exception to the norm, where they are usually sent to printers when the PDF is released or before. I am unsure how long this will last.

Regardless, they should give it at least until Monday, so people can point out errors. As there is still no street date set, I am hoping they wait at least a week.


Also, as they are already changing the cost of Attribute increases in a way that will require significant reworking of characters, they will hopefully be willing to adjust it again before print to what I guarantee will work better, taken from my personal Karma Generation System.

I hope not. Play testing is always tough. Giving fans a chance to tear at the pdf for a few weeks before printing it will save everyone the depression caused by all the undetected errata in a first printing.

It might also go a long way to letting everyone feel part of the process and even provide some very good feedback that could be incorporated.

I am absolutely not discussing the average attribute value of a person (8 attribute average). I am discussing the average attribute value of a species (single attribute, billions of samples). There is a huge difference.

The most common Human Body is 2. The average Human Body is 3. Repeat for remaining 7 attributes.

You can smash all the 2s together that you want, and toss in a few threes, and say that most of the rest are statistically insignificant and never get a 3 average. That's HOW AVERAGES WORK.

In all seriousness, the gear limit means I have to go back and redo every single character I've ever made. Every last one has a custom commlink, jacked to a 5/5/5/5, with programs to match. Now, I have to go back and reduce those numbers, refund the program costs, recalculate the dice pools, and so on and so forth. And that's for the non-deckers; the deckers are going to have it even worse.

Every character I've made has a vehicle of some sort. One of the first things I do, rigger or otherwise, is to jack up the Pilot rating. Now, I have to go back and undo that, and figure what to to with the refund. Riggers have it worse, with tons of vehicles to redesign. (It's better now to buy a drone without autosofts, since those without have unlimited advancement potential now.)

Basically, every piece of gear you've ever upgraded may now be illegal, and need to be ret-conned. Everything you've bought with karma may need to be recalculated and ret-conned. So, possibly *everything* you've done to improve your character may need to be reworked.

It is very much possible to have an average of 3 on a 1-6 scale, with 2 being the most common; that is how averages work. To reasonably fit it on a bell-curve, you must do a little rounding, as it will probably come out to anywhere between 2.5 to 3, depending on the exact values. We can also reasonably assume the "human norm" is ~2.2, round to the nearest integer because the system only supports integers, which makes it even easier to reach 3 average.

It's a game system not an exercise in the bell curve. When I hear 3 is average I expect 3 means, give your stock NPC's all 3's except for one 4 and one 2.

Regardless of the mathematical "average" concerning attributes, why not take a look at some published stats for various NPCs and see where their "average" tends to fall? Or the pre-genned PCs, for that matter? I think you'll find that average isn't.

Good idea; Forgotten, take a look at the BBB p.275.

Corporate Security forces fall under your definition of average. Joe Average should absolutely not have attribute levels equivalent to trained security professionals (remember, these are not rent-a-cops).

Where do you get 2.2 from? Your arbitrary decision that average people only have 1 or 2 stats at a 3 or better?

And if you want an average between 2.5 and 3, that means stats of 2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3 or better.

Once again, I am not discussing the B-A-R-S-C-L-I-W average of an individual, but the Body average of a species. Separately, the Agility average of a species, and the Reaction average of a species, and so on.

So, Body averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Strength averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Reaction averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Agility averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Charisma averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Intuition averages to 3, with a median of 2.
Logic averages to 3, with a median of 2.
And Willpower averages to 3, with a median of 2.

I.E. ever stat averages/medians the same.

Therefore, on one individual, their overall stats are an average of 3 with a median of 2.

QED my previous post.

I agree that an average individual should have below average stats overall. Say 1,2,2,2,2,3,3,4.

The reason is that extremely low individuals can have something like 1,1,1,2,2,2,2,3 and exceptionally high individuals can have something like 2,2,3,4,4,5,6,6.

The high stats individual can easily blow up the averages. Much more than the low stats individual reduce it, because the average is 3 and the spread is 1 to 6.

So I agree with the bell curves argument. This is an asymmetrical distribution, hence the median must be below the average. For one attribute it is true. And for a single individual global average it is true also.

I kept the math simple and example-based, but I could go deeper in the analysis. I just don't think it would be appropriate.

That being said, it makes sense to have regular guys below a 3 average overall. And it's good to consider 2 as the most common number to have, even though it is well below average.

Just would like to point out that your "average Joe" could never kill anyone with a gun.

Agility 2 (average, right?)
Pistols 2 (check the skill descriptions, Joe has some experience with firearms, he went to boot camp)

4 dice. He buys 1 success and fires a single shot.

Reaction 2 Average Jane likely fails the dodge.

Average Jane has to resist 5P damage, but we'll give her some armor because who in SR wouldn't own at least something? Cops and runners are more tricked out, but I'm sure everyone has a vest. Or at least, those who aren't wage slaves.

We'll give her 6/4, just to be on the low end (armor vest, or 6/2 for the armored clothing + leather jacket...). With her Body 2 she has 8 dice, pow, she buys 2 successes and takes 3 stun. Enough to leave her woozy, but uninjured.

Anyone who has a skill of 1 (shooting tin cans with a BB gun; or god forbid, defaulting: point the barrel, pull the trigger) would never hit a target. Their 3 dice vs. their opponent's 2, odds of glitching are HIGH.

Even if Jane wasn't wearing armor, she'd still be taking on average 4 Physical. It takes 3 shots to kill her outright. How many times do we hear of UNSKILLED people picking up guns, shooting someone, and killing them outright on accident? All the time. This apparently is impossible in ShadowRun.

how often was it instant death, and how often was it from blood loss before the paramedics could get there?

thats one thing that SR have never dealt with in its damage system, the long term loss of blood from anything that can classify as a physical wound...

if your one box under max, you can go for a infinite time in SR, but max out and you got maybe minutes to live...

as for it being a accident, could one say critical glitch?

3 to 4 boxes (of 10) in ShadowRun is the RL equivalent of a broken bone: You're not going to die, but it hurts like hell.

Even a compound fracture sticking through the skin won't kill someone from blood loss (unless they're stupid and aggravate the wound...repeatedly...for three hours).

well, falling of a ATV can kill you...

not far from where i live, a guy hitched a ride on one when going home from a party. he fell off, got back up, got home, went to bed, and died from internal bleeding while asleep.

yes, he was drunk, so he didnt feel the pain. but its still quite possible to bleed to death over a long period of time, if one do not react correctly to a wound.

then there are non-blood loss related stuff like gangrene.

so i guess one have to assume that in SR, everyone knows how to properly clean and dress a wound, and maybe even some other basic first aid, even tho they do not possess the specific skill...

Guys
all your "3" is Average,No "2.2",No My Bellcurve says" 2.3 "GnaGnaGna is way Offtopic !
If the BBB says 3 is average,than 3 is average, than Joe Normal and Bob "Nachtwächter" Con
both have "3"s maybe one 4 and one 2 to make a difference
And do you know why ? 'cause thats RAW. Nobody tells you to play it that way ,but don't say that 2.2 is Normal !
Could one of the Moderators separate the two Threads ?
Thanks in Advance

with an average Dance
Medicineman

Vancouver is in the middle of a gang war. Scores and scores of shootings, very few actual deaths in comparison. There's a number of dead people, but for the most part it is just injuries. So, yeah, I can see 'average joe' not actually killing anyone with a gun anytime soon.

And yes, 'average human' is 3... but how many people do you know RL actually fit 'average'? And by average, I mean 'someone who takes reasonable care of themselves, tries to be reasonably fit, and is reasonably educated'? Most people unfortunately, RL, fall under the bar of what a human being could be as 'average'.