Can someone point me to a thread or discussion, detailing the reasons as to why the the attribute costs were raised and the real life effects on the game? It seems to be a serious nerf on the non-mundane. One that at least Technomancers hardly seem to deserve. I did use the Search Engine, but it doesn't seem to like me.

I always admired the thoughtfulness of the devs for not letting themselves be fooled into applying the BP math on attributes and skills, as the average raise cost of an attribute is automatically higher, since the attributes tend to be higher then skills. I mean 5 is a really high skill value already, often your best skill, while you probably have more than one 5er attribute (even more so after the change). Attributes, on the other hand, can easily go as high as 8 or 9 on metahumans, something completely unachievable for skills. So, attribute raising is already more costly than the multiplier would suggest.

Also, this change up-values all attribute-raising cyberware, downvalues skillwires (that have been seriously nerfed anyway), makes Hacker-progression even less Karma-dependant (like they needed that) and non-mundane progression even more karma-costly. It rewards attribute min-maxxing at character creation. Etc.

But maybe I am missing an important point of two, as I haven't factored in the increase in Karma reward and resulting change of the expected Karma/Nuyen ratio. Which I found hard to balance anyway.

I currently setting up a new group with new characters encorporating the newer rules (I don't like to change rules in the middle of a game) and some house rules, so I am kind of careful about this. We did have some problems with varying progression pace in our last group, to the point where the Adept was pressured to "borrow" her money to the Sam to even out. I didn't like that at all, not that she needed the money, it just doesn't seem fair and pretty meta-gamy. Also, I didn't want to simply dish out the money myself, especially as their lack of money was mostly due to a string of botched runs. (Yes, I do believe that failure is a possible outcome for a run, even for "heroes". ) So, any changes in progression pace of different character "classes" is of special interest to me.

Maybe I should use one of the alternative advancement schemes from the Arsenal(?). Has anyone any hands-on experience with the BP-system?

Thanks for your comments.

You have 50% more karma gain, and a 66% increase in attribute cost.

It would be harder to handle, but they could instead have increased the attribute cost by 11% and decreased all other cost (including initiation, submersion, foci, complex forms) by 33% . So if you used to spend more than 3/4th of your karma on attributes, you pay more now. All who didn´t do that get a boost.

It does follow that technomancers and mages benefit from the change, much. TMs were widely considered too expensive before, and mages have to deal with a threshold modification and (optionally) changed direct combat spell drain rules.

As a possibility, you could leave Magic/Resonance increase-cost at the old x3 value.

80%+ Karma gain, actually. Suggested values went from 4 - 5 to 8 - 9. That is a 100% - 80% increase.

Sorry Ryu, I didn't quite get how mages and Technomancers benefit? Complex forms become comparitively cheaper, ok. But everything else?

Did Nuyen also get 80% inflation or is the Karma/Nuyen ratio further shifted towards Karma? More Karma on less Nuyen, however, would be a big boost to everyone non-mundane even with the increase in attribute costs.

I think, I will switch to the BP system. I find beginning characters quite balanced and since we have new players, they will probably not build min-maxed characters, for kick-started progress. That should be easier fixable with BP than with Karma.

Very true.

Did the text actually change to state as such? Last I had a chance to look at it, the chart had changed, but the descriptive text still suggested 4-5 as an average.

It's the solution I choose to.

Yes. The chart in the pre-release PDF was wrong.

Hmm. You gain more karma, and everything but attributes costs the same as before. Mages and TM´s spend little karma on attributes (Initiation/Submersion, CFs/spells, ally spirits, foci, skills...), while quite a few mundanes used to spend most (if not all) karma on attributes.

As for the karma/nuyen change, look at the table. You can add 1 karma for survival, and 1-3 for the challenge level. Effectivly +1-4 for dangerous missions. More complex missions tend to have more objectives - more karma. Dangerous and complex missions should also pay more money. Nuyen/karma rules of thumb should work better now.

I am definitely looking forward to the Karma Gains....

I dunno about that. Initiations and attributes tend to be the focus of an otaku and/or a mage. Everything they do is tied to their key attribute, so it got raised frequently. In fact, I can't think of a game that went long enough where the mage *didn't* raise his/her Magic as soon as possible.

Very True...
In some cses, I ONLY Initiated/Raised the Magic Rating... Gonna be a little harder now, but that is okay by me...

1. Even if you went low on the initiations and high on the magic, you will not have managed to spend less than 25% of your karma on initiations.

2. If you forego spells and foci you are missing out on style AND power. I can "get" an initiate degree of 3-5, but raising magic beyond 5 never seemed worth it for me.

Really? An extra die is an extra die. Plus being able to cast more damaging spells without physical drain is pretty nifty. But I must mention the Mystic Adept. While previously there was always the problem of power points vs. magic points (useful powers vs. casting & summoning), which is just a part of the flexibility they have, this new change hits them even harder than it does the Adept. Raising magic for the Adept & Mystic Adept (not to mention Technomancer) is very important. If you don't, what is the point of playing such a character? (The whole stik of playing them is those powers.)

I have not made an argument regarding adepts. The optional "power point instead of metamagic" rule makes sure that our adepts will have more power points than before.

If you wanted to know what options I consider superior to having magic 6 (old-new) as a magician: magical group/Initiation 1-2 with ordeal/ 1-2 spell(s), 3-6 spells, power focus 2-4, spellcasting focus 4-7, ally spirit force (0-)3...

My experience is also, that Mages and TMs focus their Karma spending on their Magic/Resonance.

Say, roughly 20 % go for flavour (eg. flavour skills that are independant from being a Mage or TM),
30 % synergy stuff (foci, complex forms, useful skills, specialization),
50 % for initiation and Magic (or the equivalent).

I would have to check the logs for my old group, but I can distinctly remember one mage and one adept writing up half their Karma separately for that exact reason.

Mundanes however, seem to go
40 % flavour
60 % synergy

and our Hacker started complaining about not being able to spend any more meaningful Karma on his craft at about 100 Karma. At that point he had all the relevant skills on 6 or 7 and a couple of advantages.

So my question remains:
What did the devs try to fix with the change?

Hey, that's better than SR3 when the Decker had ONE skill to improve in their specialty area.

"I think I'll improve..... Computer?"

In my last campaign, SR4, I disassociated karma from objectives. This is more "real-world" coming into effect. Our group met twice a month and we figured that the campaign would last about 2 years before we'd want to retire the characters, they'd all be dead or we wanted to just break from SR4. So karma was awarded based on that, and came out to about 10-13 karma per session.

The only problem we ran into was training times. Most didn't want a heck of a lot of downtime between missions, so everyone had a ton of karma unspent and was just waiting for time to pass so they could train up.

In SR3 I would often award a 2 Karma "being a Mage" bonus since the Awakened characters were so obviously Karma sink-holes.

And computer B/R...and after the matrix splatbook hit, about 20 knowledge skills that hadn't previously existed, but were now included in TN calculations.

Enter one of the reasons why I'd like to see skill caps after char gen raised to 12.

Got a Grade 8 Initiate Adept with a Magic Rating of 11... That is a LOT of Karma my Friend...

Honestly, i think that if I ever run an SR campaign again, I would probably tweak the caps a bit myself. I dunno about 12's for skill, but I'd at least do 9. I'd also probably change the post-chargen Attribute caps to 1.5 base max/2.0 Boosted Max. So humans could hit 9's naturally, and 12's with Cyber/Bio/Magic.

With the increased attribute costs, I don't see that really being a huge issue, and once a games gone long enough for characters to raise their attributes and skills to those levels, theyt're likely running with the big dogs of the SR world anyways, so power levels become much less of a factor.

But that's another topic... Back to the one at hand!

Err... I don;t really have anything to add, other than the only net effect I see is that players will likely focus on skills moreso than attributes, and Mages/TMs are still a Karma sinkhole.

Has anyone considered a house rule for initiation costs that combine Initiate Level with a Magic rating boost, ala SR1-3? Maybe base the whole thing on your magic rating, and make it 6x instead of the standard 5x? Hrmm... Not sure how well that would work, espeically when you got into the higher magic ratings...

I have to agree with some of the others, Ryu. Foci are expensive, and only give you a limited boost. Ally spirits are a major investment in terms of time and karma. Raising magic was a cheap and fast boost to your power. And that's ignoring otaku, for whom raising Resonance is pretty much the only way they have to boost their powers.

Bottom line: most of the time, players focus on raising their magic/resonance pretty heavily. These new rules gimp that soemwhat.

Right now, in the game we play, we have no skill hardcaps. No one has even hit a 7 yet, but knowing this certainly makes skill increases prettier. We still use the older rules, though. I myself allow natural attribute increases beyond the maxes, but I put a slowly increasing cost on them.

We don't really use augmented maxes either; it's pretty rough to reach them as it is, and it doesn't come up often. The only times it does, due to diminishing returns and the like of actually overtwinking a stat, is for total flavor. But your method actually sounds really nice.

I am not a big fan of giving experienced characters options that starting characters do not have. I feels kind of D&D-ish. (You high-trained archer can't use Uber-Shot as it is level 4 Prerequisite...)

The other games we play a lot are WoD (o and n) and GURPS and you kind of get used to not having that artificial distinction of beginning character and played character. Skill caps aren't that bad otherwise the game becomes a who-guesses-the-higher-number and you constantly have to tweak the numbers for world class, eg. how many points of unarmed combat does Muhammed Ali have (used to have)?

The underlying problem with the Hacker seems to me that char progression runs on two different ressources: Karma and Nuyen for different character "classes". That is pretty unique in the roleplaying world. The Hacker wouldn't have problems spending more Nuyen on his char. On the other hand our Adept basically didn't know how to spent her Nuyen effectively after session two.

All that is well enough as long as the two ressources are equally available. Some archetypes however benefit from both, eg. Mages (who can buy those uber-expensive foci), Rigger (who can always raise just another skill) and Faces (who strictly speaking run on a third ressource called connection). So, if you want to avoid the problem, cash-for-Karma is the more elegant solution, which does not nerf or tweak anyone else. In our case, the Hacker started to take on other jobs in off-time, which secured him a good income, but cost him Karma instead of gaining him.

On a sidenote: I am currently working for a very large company and it actually feels like losing Karma for money, so that is not even unrealistic

Since there is a bit of convincing me going on, let me agree that many players raised magic as much as they could.


Or you could tweak Aptitude (now named "Expert"): Can be had for 5 BP / 10 karma, and raises your skillcap by 2 or 3.


Rolling initiation into magic is difficult, as you have magic increases that don´t require initiation, and generous 40% rebates are available via the initiation mechanics. So you do it the other way round. Old cost is (10+3*(grade))*modifier+(new magic)*5. Let´s assume that (new magic) is (grade+6), and we end at 40 + (grade)*8, which can be had with 40% rebate for 24+(grade)*4.8. Slight kick in the nuts for augmented initiates, as they implicitly pay for more magic than they actually get.

On the other hand, it means that after char gen there is very little opportunity for character growth.

Yup, this is my issue as well.

Starting characters are, well, starting characters. They can be good, very very good (WHich puts them head and shoulders above a 1st level D&D character), but they shouldn't be able to start off maxed out in their primary traits and attributes. Granted, a character that does that is pretty much a one trick pony and will likely need to burn karma just to make himself competent in other areas, but still... You should be able to grow and improve, even in your best areas. Otherwise, why have Karma and character advancement at all?

That is a much bigger question.

My biggest problem with the hard caps was what I liked to call ''Fastjack Syndrome.''

Fastjack, as most know is, well, Fastjack. When it comes to computers and electronics, IMO, very, very few should be able to match the old coot. Yes, there are outside modifiers, but anyone can get them. Sure, someone super-duper-smart(8 starting logic, cerebral boost 3, etc), can get damn good, but those skills. Under the normal, regular, rules, Fastjack can probably tweak his Logic up to...12 with mods? But this would require that he SURGED(metagenic improvement), and I don't think he did. So we'll say PuShed and Exceptional Attribute: Logic with 3 level of Cerebral Boosters. Okies, the man himself has an 11. But so can a starting character.

On top of this, there is the skill cap. 1 6 and the rest 4 or less, sure, at the start, but the hacker can stick a 6(7 with Aptitude) into, say, Hacking or Cybercombat, and boom, he's equal to Fastjack. Probably the greatest decker alive. And this is a starting character. (Yes, the other skills are likely lower-and I'm sure Fastjack somehow gets around that ''one aptitude'' clause somehow and has several 7's. But even then...the other guy can still load up on 4's for the rest of those skills(and for a hacker, it's not difficult-they don't need many BPs for other things), and specialize, and eventually pay his 22 karma for each skill to bring them from 4 to 6. But that wouldn't take terribly long.

Now, without Karma pool(one thing that could also separate runners, this same runner can have Edge rather equivalent to Fastjack, as well. Now, granted, a starting character probably lacks the ol' Fasty's programs and decks(that's probably some stuff he's built up over his 55 or so years of hacking, if not more...he's 70, is he not?), but the fact is, by the numbers, [i]he is as good as the greatest decker in the world, out of the box[i], at a skill, thanks to hard skill caps. Now, of course, Fast probably has max skill in ALL of those comp and electronic things, something the starting character can't have...but he can turn those 4's to 6's rather quickly.

Take away skill caps, and this goes away. I just don't even see the reason for keeping them there. Taking the caps away certainly makes skills look very pretty.

I agree ElfFenrir. When I first read SR4 I spotted the problem right away, and I call it "compression of scale." With most things in the universe being graded on a scale of 1-6 or possibly up to 7, there just aren't enough levels to accurately depict how much better someone/something can be than another. When you run the probability numbers, (assuming they have the same attribute value) a character with a skill 7 just isn't that much better than one with a skill 4. The person with a skill 7 should be much better, given the fluff description.

The other place I saw the problem was in the Matrix (however it has now been fixed with Unwired). A starting PC Hacker should really have Rating 5 everything. So, what's the rating of a top-secret corporate research host? Umm.. 6. What about Lofwyr's personal diary on world domination? That's... a 6. What about the Zurich-Orbital Banking System. That has to be.... 6? Now, Unwired removed the 6 "cap" on Matrix gear, so its quite conceivable that FastJack would have some pretty unbelievable gear, but the problem persists in other areas.

Zurich I believe has rating 11 software/hardware. It's in Unwired somewhere, the sample systems.

Right. As I said, Unwired fixed the problem by removing the Rating 6 cap, but the problem remains in other areas.

I'm aware of that, and even made note that it had been changed (or was slated to be changed) in the corrected version. The question I asked did not pertain to the chart, it pertained to the descriptive text near the chart which, last I saw it, still suggested 4-5 Karma per run.

Remember, even in the original SR4 hardbook... Rating 6 gear was what was available to purchase... it never said that higher rated gear did not exist; in fact, it said completely the opposite, you just COULD NOT PURCHASE SUCH GEAR...

So, the cap fpr technology was a character ceiling for chargen, not a technological ceiling for the tech...

That being said, Let me ask another question...

Do you REALLY need 20+ Dice to be world class? I think that the levels of skills are okay, if you take into account the actual ratings and what they mean... you are right that rating 4 skills are not FUNCTIONALLY much different, but in the verisimilitude of the Ficitonal World, they are MILES apart... Remember, the PC's are supposed to tbe the best of the best BECAUSE THEY ARE PC's...

Having played in many games (using many systems) where that scale must be continuously adjusted to keep the Opposition (or Cannon NPC's) somehow superior to the PC's, I am happy with the fact that Shadowrun has solid skill caps... it is an easy way to immediately evaluate a character in relation to the rest of the world...

If your campaign continuously runs up agains the skill caps, and it is considered Bad form because you are now equivalent to "Fast Jack" or (pardon the useage) "James Bond," well you might want to consider that maybe you are looking at it the wrong way...

Sure, Player Characters can reach exceptional skill in a relatively short amount af time if all you care about is the mechanics... On the other hand, if you remember that a Skill rating of 3 is Professional and a 4 is Veteran capabilities, then you should have YEARS of playtime ahead of you before you hit the skill caps... For an exapmle, I have a highly competant Physical Adept (Grade 8 Initiate) who has an impressive 386 Karma and 28 Skills (both Active and Knowledge) of which only 2 are above a 3 (both are 4). Yes he has a fairly robust Initiate Grade and Magic Rating, and 3 stats are augmented above a 6 (all 7's)... I played this character for years and he is barely a veteran by Skill Fluff... Is he highly competant.. You Betcha, does he complain that he generally only has an upper range dice pool of 14 (for 2 Skills, with many of the rest falling into average ranges of 6-8 Dice) ... NO!

Now I know not everyone likes to play that way, but I would say that that is how Shadowrun is intended to be played, where you might have a single skill above a 4 (if you are lucky)... Now, I know that a LOT of (Player) characters take advantage of the one 6 or two 5's in skills at chargen, but when you do so, you should not complain that you are in the elite with the best in the world... There are so many things that you can use your Karma for now that I am not even sure why skill caps are a problem...

Any Way, Just wanted to point that out... Take it for what it is worth, which is exactly Two Cents

Sure, if playing deliberately-gimped characters is your style, then go for it! Fun is where you find it.

But if you want to play characters that feel effective at what they do, you're going to want to min/max. In fact, min/maxing is a good thing, since it means your character has interesting highs and lows. In SR4, the point of effectiveness is around 16-20 dice, or roughly the ability to buy a critical success without rolling. Not only can you pull off routine things easily, you do so with *flair*.

Fastjack, for example, most likely has maxed every attribute and skill related to hacking(possibly even a little above the game limits, not all NPCs have to follow player rules), but his real advantage is equiptment(I would expect 8+ on most things), rep, and resources. He may not be a huge amount better then you, but he has way more to work with.

Still, though, I personally(and our table does too, hence getting rid of hard caps) prefer the fact some folks just have higher skills than the norm can have...to a point. I mean, can a PC eventually get a 15 in Computers like Fastjack? Sure! It just takes awhile, as it well should.

I mean, my current character, who has some Karma under his belt, isn't some god. For his top 3 skills, he does throw(before modifiers like smartlinks) 12-16 dice for them(with some mods like Smartlinks, Reach for Kick attack and weapons etc), bringing his highest DP 17 for his unarmed attack. Otherwise? He's between 7-9 for most, 10-11 for a couple and even 5-6 for a few skills. it fits him. He's not maxed on all things I want him to be-I wanted to branch him out on a couple things before I maxed his Unarmed and Armorer skills.

But I'm glad we can go above 6 in our games. Eventually, I really would like to see him with some crazy scores in Unarmed, Blades, and Armorer(the three skills that probably define his speciality best.) In addition to qualities(martial arts, etc.) I'd like to see him, should he live, at that level of some of the classics have. But there are other skills I still want to buy. Also, planning how a character grows with Karma can be hard...you always end up with those skills that you didn't think of before(I plan on getting him a Locksmith of 1, for example, due to defaulting with his little multitool several times to pull the team out of some heat.)

In other words-no, you don't need ALL die pools at 20+ to be effective. BUT, I just personally have a bit of problem with the fact that a legendary decker who has been hacking for most of his 70 years reaches the pinnacle of one of his skills(or one under the pinnacle for 2 of them), right out of the gate.

As for NPCs breaking rules-I admit, I ain't a fan of this. I mean, this is one reason that while I don't mind stuff like IEs and GDs, I don't use them in my own campaigns. They seem above the rules, and I sorta get rubbed the wrong way from that.

So yes, while Fastjack probably has gear the PC's might never hear of, let alone see(Gear, yes, doesn't have such hard and fast rules), the stats and skills still abide by the rules. I mean, I doubt I'd ever end up putting Fastjack in the campaign, like, ever, and if I did I wouldn't make the PCs ''fight'' him, since his vast contacts would just have him disappear, anyway, but I like the idea of being able to break the skillcap like in SR3. It also gets around things like the classic old master who is a bit physically past his prime(Agility 2, Skill 7), being schooled by his skilled, but still less skilled student because he's souped up faster(Agility 10, skill 4.)

Apparently skill caps are a matter of personal taste.

If a character concept reads: I am the world champion in X. Then the question should be, do the points cover that?
If you don't agree, you should consider lowering BP at char gen (300 work surprisingly nice, you can't max anything, unless you really compromise)

BTW I never said that the Hacker complained at being world class. His problem was that he wasn't because he couldn't afford the equip.

That aside, just that you have the maxed skill in something, doesn't necessarily mean that you are actually successful in your field. I bet there are a lot of unemployed acting 7 actors, while the actors we get to see on TV are often astonishingly mediocre. Scientific Noble prize winners consistently have an IQ above 120, but that is far from having IQ maxed. Considering recent events, I am pretty sure that investment bankers aren't making career for their skill in banking. And I happen to know first-hand that IT specialists are not paid based on their skill level, although we are probably closer to that than most other careers.

Your career as a Shadowrunner isn't determined on how many dice you roll. It is how successful you are. Dice pool size is relatively unimportant for that. Fastjack probably doesn't even have maxed out skills. Why should he? He is Fastjack. Everyone already knows he is the best Hacker out there.

I had a SR3 character once, who was famous on Cons for solving problems fast and elegantly. That character had nothing maxed, she was a wannabe Trideo-actress that needed some money on the side and tried to avoid getting into too much trouble for that. I was always nervous that the GM would ask me to roll something, because I never read the SR3 rules, but was pretty sure that the character couldn't do anything. But, for some reason, every run she had ever been on went super smooth. Every person she asked a favour, miraculously did what she wanted. Whenever a group fractured, she happened to be on the right side. Whenever the shit hit the fan, she came out smelling like rose water (admittedly, she did have a spell for that). I never knew where the rep exactly came from, but at some point other people told me stories about my own character, other characters declared having a life debt to mine and Johnsons paid me double share, without my asking. My point is: even without a mechanic like Karma pool, reputation is more important for fame and success than actual skill.

Where are you getting this "Point of Effectiveness" at 16-20 Dice?
As I have stated in previous posts, with average dice pools between 9-12, I generally succeed in the things that I do as a character... Sometimes it is with a single success, Occassionally, I get 7 or 8 successes... Seems like success to me... all you need is 1 Net success to hurt somoeone (maybe they soak it and maybe they don't, that is not the issue here)... What is, is that I have succeeded, and DON'T feel gimped in any way, shape or form...

Again, I will take you back to the current rating system in skills... a 3 is Professional Level... Most characters SHOULD have 3's or 4's for their relevant skills... if you are sticking to the Fluff... if you are not, don't complain that you have no where to advance your primary skills... it is your own doing...

There is always a little min/maxing inherent in Shadowrun, but when you are going over the top, you force your GM to go over the top, and therefore you are creating a self-fulfilling prohecy in that you MUST be high powered because your Opponents are High Powered... Can't you see that you are causing the paradox that you are arguing for?

Maybe another cent of information, but there you go...

Very much agreed here...

Show me a starting character with 8-10 skills (Active and Knowledge) in the 6 (or 7) range with 200+ points of contacts, maximized Mental Stats (and possible some high to max physical stats, but not necessary), and ALL Equipment/Programs in the 8+ Range... Can't be done, can't even be done with several hundred Karma...

Once you get there, well, then you are a contemporary... congratulations...

Like I said: it is where you can buy critical successes without rolling. You don't have to roll out winning the target shooting match at the range, you just buy your way through the preliminary rounds with your huge dice pool. It's hardwired into the system.

Let's look at programming. We have Mr. Incompetent versus Fastjack. Mr. Incompetent is, naturally, Incompetent in the Software skill, but has an impressive Longshot pool of 8. Fastjack has high skill, high attributes, an advanced programming suite, and all kinds of computer toys to help him out, giving him a dice pool of 25.

We cut them both loose writing an Edit 2 program for a friend. This takes them both the same amount of time, regardless of skill. When they're finished, both simply buy the successes they need. Mr. Incompetent's program, according to the rules, will function just as well as Fastjack's. In fact, the only difference is that Fastjack gets to add a bunch of flourishes to his program, making it cooler. That's the power of buying critical successes: you can't do anything better than anyone else, but you can be flashier about how you do it.

So, if you like playing characters that barely squeak by most of the time, more power to you! But if you want to play characters who do things with flair, you need the dice pool to back it up. And style, flair, and special detail add a lot to roleplay.

YOU DO NOT NEED A HIGH DICE POOL FOR FLAIR... FLAIR IS A ROLEPLAY THING, NOT MECHANICS

As for your example... both programs are rating 2... therefore, THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE IN THE PROGRAMS... they will both perform the functions of the Edit Program equally well, regardless of the "Flair" that you assign to it because of the "si-called" superior number of hits acquired for the higher dice pool...

Now, I will grant you that MR. Incompetant is only able to Auto success that rating 2, but he could roll and conceivable complete that Rating 8 Edit in the same time frame... By the same token, Fast Jack COULD take his 6 autosuccesses, or he could roll and completely critically fail to create the program, having to start over from scratch due to faulty coding... either is a valid conclusion ot the scenario as presented... My point is that you DO NOT NEED high dice pools (16+) to accomplish ANYTHING in Shadowrun, and in fact, the dice pool average, according to the Fluff of the Game World would be more in line with 10 Dice for a Veteran in his field (4 Skill, 4 Stat, and a specialty), technology aside...

SO Again, Success is success... those things that are everyday, mundane things, you should not be rolling dice for anyway, so the uncommonly high dice pools of 16+ are not truly necessary... Now, you may decide to have that dice pool of 24, but there is no functional reason to have such a high dice pool...especially when you can succeed with a pool half that size...

I will say it again, for those that might have missed it... when you design characters with common dice pools above 16, YOU FORCE THE GM TO DO THE SAME THING... this results in an Arms Race (for Dice Pools) that is generally not a lot of fun. When your characters are hyper-proficient, then so too is your opposition, which ultimately reinforces the condition upon itself... it becomes a sel-fulfilling prophecy... I NEED HIGH DICE POOLS because my OPPOSITION HAS HIGH DICE POOLS, and thus the cycle starts again...

In the end, all you have is a page of crazy statistics and mathematical constructs... a piece of paper that has absolutely no personality, no drive to become any better (because he can't), no roleplay potential, and no "Character"...

Numbers or Character... I think that I am going to go with the Character...
Your declaration that characters with dice pools less than 16 are incapable of having flair, or of accomplishing anything of significance is a total fallacy... Try it sometime, you might actually enjoy roleplaying of someone who is just a mere mortal, rather than one step removed from divinity...

But hey, Just my Two Cents...

In terms of skill caps, it's possible that you could instead adjucate that Fastjack has numerous as-of-yet unpublished Qualities that boost his dice pool, if you did not want to discard skill caps or raise them to the double digits. Raising skill caps can get problematic in various ways because distinctions have to be shifted to account for it, or your scale gets wonky (i.e. it's easy to tell the difference between 3 (professional) and 4 (veteran), but what about 14 and 15?).




Well, sort of. You're operating in a system that measures degree of success by "degree by which the threshold was met or exceeded." I.e. meeting the threshold is "adequate success." Hits in excess of the threshold *do* matter, it's just that the system doesn't recognize that rules-wise in a number of scenarios. Fastjack's program is different (superior), in numerous non-game-mechanical-factors. He got more hits. That's what critical success *means*.
If you're having trouble with that, imagine it as an opposed test - "Who makes the better program?"

The talented amateur, in other words, meets the necessary specs. Fastjack blows the project out of the water. Fastjack could, in fact, match the talented amateur while undergoing a double-digit penalty. He could write the other guy's program while being swarmed by bees.



"High dice pools means bad roleplaying" is just as empty an argument as "low dice pools mean bad roleplaying." I don't think that a character needs a 16-20 dice pool to be "Competent," but I don't think having one makes the character *bad*.

Also, I am painfully aware of how a high dicepool does not provide godly powers. My poor adept!

Oh, I've seen high die pools succeed poorly, and low ones well...and I've also seen the opposite.

When my sam fights someone with 9 DP hand to hand, he severely beats them. Severely. They basically need to blow Edge to have a chance 9 times out of 10. His 17 dice are too much for them. But is he the best in the world? Oh, no. Hell, I made a starting build for fun(more or less playing with character builds), and this guy could probably smack him around pretty effectively. The guy I built in the 800 BP thread could probably turn him into a little crying mass. In any case, he'd force my sam to have to use up some Edge. Hell, my sam had already used up Edge in one battle to ensure his victory. (One to blow up 6's, one to reroll failures. It worked. It was versus a large, cybered, critter that could have mauled the party pretty bad had it had been left to it's devices.)

At the same time, my Sam's 6-9 social pools make him decent, but guess what...the Face out faces him with her 14. I don't think I've ever rolled more successess on a Negotations test with his 6 dice. On average, the person with more dice will succeed at their tests.

Due to the current die mechanic, anything under 6 becomes rather hairy I've found. Sure, I succeed sometimes, but it becomes rather difficult. In those cases, you really need to start bringing in the outside modifiers.

However, indeed, die pools do not determine how rich a characters background is, how much personality they have. I've seen low die pool characters who were just as cardboard as their high-pool counterparts. Likewise, it's hard to compare characters across games. My characters have run the gamut(and this is even just at the 750 Karmagen level, I've built characters at a lot of levels), highest die pools that ranged from 13 to 20. All types can be fun. My current guy just happens to have die pools that range from 6 to 17, ith a middleground of 7-10. But I've had from 5-16, 8-20, 4-12...whatever fits the mood, really.

But yeah, sometimes there are things that I like my characters to really succeed at, and thus kick those pools up a bit. Again, it depends on the character. For Kael, it's his unarmed combat and blades. Sometimes, though, there is nothing I really think I need to ''crazy succeed'' at and thus only boost the skills for what I feel they really need for what they do.

That being said, the no skill caps have worked fine for us...mainly because no one has quite gone there yet. But a few of us have plans to succeed the 7 when the time comes. Again, there is usually just too many other little things we end up buying(a lot of active and knowledge skills at 1-2 end up bought, for example.) It's just nice that we know that if we want, we can continue growing up...or out if we choose so instead. Options are nice to have.

Wrong! If you read the critical success rules, they're the only way a player gets to add flourishes to their actions. It is very much a mechanical thing.

Second, as 5 Eyes pointed out, SR4 is a threshold plus system. The further you go above the threshold, the better you do. It's not just enough to know that you hit the guard, you have to know how well you hit him. Successes above the threshold are very much a necessary part of the system; it is not enough that you scrape by, you must succeed by a wide margin.


I would say that depends on how skilled your GM is.

And now the roleplaying elitism reveals itself....

In the hands of a good player, you can take the most munched-out monster and have it become the best character of a session. Or, you can take the most gimped "real character" and have him turn out to be completely boring-- or worse, such a drama queen that he spoils the game far more than the combat munchkins. I'll take the combat monsters over the drama queens any day of the week.

Numbers and personality are not enemies. In fact, they go hand in hand. A character without high and low points is boring. A character with extremes, however, can be the most fun and interesting to play. You don't have to deliberately gimp a character to give it personality-- in fact, the opposite is usually true.

Try it sometime, you might enjoy playing a character who is actually a character.

I'm with Cain on this. The rules speak very clearly about the ability to buy successes over the target threshold. This pretty well defines how you can buy your way to a critical success.

RE: skill caps.

I'm undecided.

In ye old days, I had one player whose troll sammy had 10s in most of his combat skills and nothing under a 6. His attributes were maxed as well and was a borderline cyberzombie back in SR2 days. I also remember one character doing nothing but sinking karma into Unarmed Combat and when we stopped playing, it was listed at 22. These characters were played around 3-5 years actively at a minimum.

I like the idea of caps (in a way) because it forces players to become more well rounded. I have one PC who is playing a former company man/spy investing skill points into Biotech, Nanotech Knowledge skills and Biological Warfare skills because of an interest in using/abusing nanotech weaponry. I doubt I'd never get that player to do that if I allowed him to raise his Unarmed Combat and Firearms above 6 (he's a notorious minmaxer).

If I abolish skill caps first, I'm likely to turf them on magical spells/adept powers first and on attributes. The current limitations on adept powers like Improved Ability renders adepts almost redundant IMHO. I have to pay 10BP to get Adept, 40BP-65BP extra to get magic to a respectable level (cyberadepts will want to max it) and then overspecialise. A cybered equivalent might be a couple of dice less on the key roll but be much more well rounded. At least in older editions you could accept the fact you would be weaker than the cybered mundane early on, but would eventually outstrip him. There's no assurance of that now.

If I change skill caps, I'm thinking of a sliding scale on karma caps - e.g. x2 karma for skills 7-9, x3 karma for skills 9-11, x4 karma for 12...etc. This allows for progression but would at least make a player really think "Is it worth my sammy getting that extra dice on the Firearms Group when I could get another rating on Influence and Stealth?"

I don't know. My plan at this stage is to run through Ghost Cartels, let the players accumulate karma and re-evaluate how the PCs are enjoying it. I have 3 magicians in my group so I doubt they'll complain in a hurry. If anything I'm expecting my mundanes to complain.

- J.

Perhaps you can enlighten us what you mean by "flair". Usually a GM simply describes an action taken by your PC and maybe, he adds some little details if he is feeling nice. But you get to describe certain cool things your character does, instead of your GM doing the description, when you roll a critical success. You, not your GM. This is when "flair" comes in. You get as much "flair" as you like when you roll a Crit Success.

The way you are defining flair is quite different from many of us here.


You do not force your GM to do anything. He can force you to adhere to his house rules, his rulings, his campaign. But you do not get to force him to do jack. When you design characters with common pools above 16 (or any number you like, 20, 30, etc), your GM has a choice - to recognise that you are building a character that is able to accomplish things far above what a normal human can achieve or he can choose to "challenge" you by engaging you in an arms race. It is his choice.


Good stats imbues the character sheet with its own personality and makes it leap off the page and grab you by your balls and doesn't let go. Numbers can be character if only you allow it. A character is more capable of flair the more dice he has. 16 dice is a good guide. You can have less dice, but you got to be content with as much flair as your GM deems to grant your character. If you want to grab the "flair" and stand in the spotlight, you'd need more dice. Your implication that characters with dice pools less than 16 are as capable of "flair" as those with more is a total and absolute fallacy. Try it sometime, fly with the gods instead of plodding on the ground like a mere mortal. You might actually enjoy it, if you can stop shouting on the internets long enough.