I have no problem with the marital art cap since there is only so much you can do from training. But with magic/super science make the sky the limit. And really you have to close with the target and melee combat is a complex action vs more dice to defend for base crappy damage if you don't have absurd strength. Make a Troll with a 9 strength, 5 levels of critical strike and 3 levels from marital arts and your DV is only 12. A SMG can hit that with no problem. Even if you get a magic of 10 with a critical strike of 10 you are only looking at 17dv for a complex action attack in close combat. Absurd insta kill damage on a connect sure, but so is a lot of the damage form guns and guns can reliably hit multiple targets have range oh and can come with a underbarrel grenade launcher.

Now I think it may be a bit under priced at .25 but I don't see a need for a cap.

Now I never said that melee was better than guns. But in trying to not get shot while closing the distance to get close enough to do that instant kill complex action we've learned a good infiltration skill (boosted with adept improved ability) and a wonderfully modified chameleon suit do nice enough to not be seen on your way there.

While it's far easier to kill a man with a bullet at range, I find something romantic about doing with the bare hands.

Expanding on what Cain said, the mechanics already help make the gap between specialized areas of fighting even more noticeable and truer to life, because those quality bonuses help out too. That boxer can hit harder with bonus DV and block better with bonus dice. That bjj practitioner can takedown better with an extra die, subdue better with extra dice, and subdue more effectively for more damage (bonus DV)

When you look at dice pools, the boxer of skill 3 (boxing +2 spec) with those four quality bonuses, is rolling 7 dice to block, 5 dice to punch and potentially punching for a +2 DV more. The BJJ fighter at the same skill (3 (BJJ +2 spec)) with his bonuses is rolling 6 to take down, 7 to subdue, and doing extra +1DV when he does submission damage.

But, if you look at their respective pools to try and accomplish what the other does, we see the boxer sucks at take downs (3 dice vs. BJJ's 6), sucks at subdual (3 vs. 7) and when doing a submission damage move doesn't get his +2DV like he would when punching. On the flip side, the BJJ fighter isn't as good at blocking (5 dice vs. 7) and won't strike as hard.

I'd say the rules don't need anymore tweaking.

They definitely seem to work as intended in my opinion... we have not had any problems with the Martial Arts rules ourselves...

In that sentence lies my entire character concept in Alpha Omega. A little spellcasting here and there, but OMG my character can punch. He can punch hard, and a lot.

(Melee rules in AO are much better than SR, the number of times you can act every 6 seconds is governed by your Reaction score (PCs will act twice unless they can get 4 of 7 stats up to 22). Every weapon in the game has a 'maximum attacks per segment' attribute. The more unwieldy the item (or if it's single shot and not SA/BF/FA) the fewer attacks per segment (each segment is 1 second long) the weapon has.

A full auto pistol has: SA: 3 bullets per segment, FA: 6 bullets per segment

Unarmed Combat: 5

A chain sword: 2*

*A chain sword as have a ridiculously high "exertion" rating (18), which means if you decide to swing twice, that second swing won't hit very often (compared to unarmed's exertion 4, and guns are around exertion 5 to 7, basically acting as recoil (the "the first bullet in a FA should hit" side would like this)).

Still not sure what your aim is Draco18s...

There are many options available to the SR Character to reflect such things... splitting your dice pool to target multiple opponents comes immediately to mind...

Are you arguing that the Melee combat is not as damaging as guns? That will always be the case for the most part... but then you can have those characters that hit harder than the best hand held weapons available (I have seen Humans hitting with a Base DV9 and a Troll once who had a base DV15)...

Is it that the Melee attacks are not as prevalant as SA/BF/FA attacks by Guns... Well that is a no brainer anyway; you will generally not get "more" attacks thatn a gun wielder in most combats, that is why the gun was invented... to provide a more efficient way of killing over the man who wielded a sword, or went unarmed...

I am not sure exactly what your point really is... And comparing the relative mechanics of a seperate game to that of SR does not help me in any way as far as I can see... It might be more clear if I understood your premise...

My two cents...

Oh, mainly that SR treats melee attacks as a complex action that deals damage once, rather than a flurry of smaller blows, each successive attack (same target or otherwise) having a lower and lower chance of hitting.

Just different, 's all.

Gotcha...
Personal Preference I guess...

I still haven't formed an opinion of AO as a whole. It lacks rules for repairing items, for example (though it references said rule, such as a repair kit granting +3 to the check). And we've managed to already break the balance of combat using magic (SR equivalent: "How would everyone like +10 to their initiative score, +5 armor, and an extra pass? I can do that to everyone without taking any drain.").

Hmmm.. Interesting...
But then again, you can always break a game's balance if that is your intent... Look at a large amount of craziness discussed on Dumpshock for example... with concerted effort, you can always create some combination that will vastly overpower the norm...

Well, seeing as how they can't seem to figure out a way to make automatic fire work as a flurry of smaller attacks with a diminishing chance of each successive attack hitting, what on Earth makes you think they'd work out a way to make melee attacks work that way?

In the name of simplicity and ease of play, in both instance, they've gone for the "screw it, roll the dice once" route.

I always thought that the Complex Action of the Unarmed attack represented exchanges of blows and parries and such combat maneuvers. The damage inflicted is supposed to be the combined effectiveness of the 3 second exchange of blows.

Now give that Kung-Fu guy three iNit passes. Be fast like Bruce Lee.

A troll with marital arts? Sounds scary. Unless you're a lady troll I suppose... Then you're in for a fun time!

I think the martial arts specialisation with unarmed combat is retarded. It's way too broad.

I'd agree with the earlier suggestions for making a drunken style kung fu martial art, that is bonuses to dodge feint and the like.

Everybody has their opinions and choices... what is retarded for you makes perfect sense for others...

so, on a related note. How do the gm's out there treat alchohol in game? any stats for it? I wish they had it on the drug list.

Yep, thats my argument since the beginning.

I dont mind having it as the default, but the advanced fighting rules should just pulverize the Unarmed Combat skill just as they did with the "Firearms" of old editions. It would be simpler and more intuitive (than, say, using qualities to represent martial styles).

This reminds me of that topic about the hacking rules, in which someone said: the weird thing about it is that the more one knows about it in real life, the less sense the rules make. And then another guy replied... "Thats true for all sub-systems of Shadowrun". Well, here we are.

I'd agree in previous editions, but in 4e not so much. Almost all specializations are broad as heck. Back in the day when it was pistols(Ares Predator) yeah unarmed combat(kung fu) is too broad. Now its Pistols(semi automatics) so unarmed(kung fu) does not seem out of place.

If the martial art system had come out a few months earlier I would of used them on a troll, for my character Yos the boxer, "Stings like a butterfly, floats like a bee"

I consider semi-autos to be too broad, and require tighter specialisations than that. But of course that is drifting away from RAW.

You should still outfit your troll with 3 ranks of marital arts. Equip him with a chest wig and a Barry White CD for goo measure