I was wanting to run a small heist and thought about having an armored car robbery.

But in the wireless world of 2072, is there even a reason for armored cars?

... Yes, its called 'shadowrunners'

Amored cars can transport things like convicts, really expensive components, really expensive equipment, magical artifacts, really expensive people.. really anything someone is likely to want to attempt to steal from an unarmored car.

just think of armored cars as a well insured truck/train/suborbital. anything you need to move, material-wise, that you want there to be less of a chance of being screwed with, put it in one of those bad boys

Double-post above, by the way.

An armored car/truck/train/gazebo or whatever would still be incredibly useful, as stated, for moving things you don't want lost. Additionally, with the great concealed armor, a car could also look normal. This would lead to a lot of need for legwork, I'd think...

Not everything valuable is cash: bonds, bearer bonds, stock, precious metals, gems and jewelry, artifacts, art, persons or creatures of interest. Magical artifacts or items. Spell formula. DNA or biosamples. The list is endless shot.

Pretty much every car in SR is as well armored as the Brinks truck.

For as long as expensive/rare junk needs to move from A to B there will be armored transports. Essentially you'll be looking at a Citymaster for stats...

Well, the roadmaster as described in Arsenal (vs. the earlier SR2 descriptions) is pretty much a straight up armored car, the citymaster a beefed up version thereof (and better for the money).

Obviously armored cars are useful for trying to deter heists (don't screw with me, I'm threatening); concealed armored vehicles are good for trying to actually prevent or evade heists.

So, if you don't want to get robbed, drive around in big armored vehicles and try to communicate that trying to rob this is a bad idea. If you know that someone is trying to rob you, specifically and directly, take measures that make it difficult to rob you (concealed trucks).

I disagree with KZT, since most of the cars in shadowrun will get ripped apart by a medium machinegun. I would suggest armored vehicles as 'survivable against MMGs' as a rule of thumb that jives well enough with civilian life.

I'm not sure I get what you're saying here. Could you clarify?

I was also wondering... because obviously this is not the case...

What, you've never noticed that thick layer of armor on your Harley?

I don't know about "as well armored as the Brinks truck," but if you do the math, taking hardened armor and average successes into account, it's pretty clear that something interesting is going on with the Armor values for SR4 vehicles.

Vehicles have hardened armor? Weird, I don't remember that... then again I've never really had to deal much with vehicles being under attack, so never looked into it much.

Vehicles just do not take stun... any damage not above the armor rating is ignored for all intents and purposes, it is not tracked...

So will a brinks truck. They are rated to stop pistol rounds. A MMG firing AP will go right through them.

I don't know what to call it in SR4. The relevant passage is the one Tymeaus Jalynsfein was referring to:

And reading it that way, I realize I've been thinking it through the wrong way: you roll Body + Armor, and then if the DV thus modified isn't greater than the armor value, no damage is applied. That's rather worse than I realized.

Ok. A real world car won't stop pistol bullets. You can shoot at someone in a car with a common pistol (like a .38, or a .380, or a .45) and the bullet will, most of the time, go through the glass, or the door, or the trunk and mess up the day of whoever is in the car. Occasionally you'll hit a structural member or it will deflect off something, but most of the time being in a car when someone is shooting at you with a pistol isn't gong to work out well.

In the real world if you are shot at by a guy with an AR or an AK when in a car you are just screwed. The bullets will typically go completely though the car and kill you on the other side, they have no problem killing you inside the car.

In the real world most Brinks trucks (or generically, most armored transport trucks) are rated to stop pistol bullets. The glass crazes when it's shot and you can eventually shoot through it with enough shots. If you shoot at it with an assault rifle or larger you will go through the metal armor on the body.


In SR, if a couple are in a Honda Spirit subcompact the guy can just make funny faces at the thug shooting at him with a light pistol and keep making out with his girlfriend. Since the average subcompact in SR gets 14 dice and hence will get 5 successes PLUS 6 hardened armor, the thug needs an adjusted DV of 12 to hurt anyone inside. Essentially you can completely ignore him, as he's unlikely even be able to get 8 success.

Now, once he gets pissed off and comes back an hour later with his 4 drunk gang-banger friends with AK-97s, the driver can likely just ignore them to as they each empty a magazine with full bursts into his rocking and steamed up subcompact, as they need to get 6 successes to do anything to the car. Which means they need essentially all success on their rolls. So they, unlike the driver, will probably go away unsatisfied.

So the couple can likely drive some over the mounds of empty steel cartridge cases covering the road next to his undamaged car.

If a real world brinks truck faces 5 guys with who AKs empty their magazines on full auto into it they will blow out the windows at the very least and probably put dozens of 5.45 or 7.62mm holes in the doors and walls.

So you are safer transporting your money in a Honda Sprint than in a Brinks truck.

I'm not sure it works this way. My reading of the rules is a bit different. The Body of the car does not enter into the DV reduction, it comes AFTER, to soak the damages if the armor is overcome.

With the light pistol you need three net hits to overcome the 6 armor of the car. But there is nothing to eat your sucess, as the car is not evading. That is not very likely (this asks for 9 dices, a bit much for a ganger even adding bonuses for immobile and large target) and it sound a bit excessive., but if you manage to score them, the car now has to soak 7 damage boxes using 14 dices - chances are two will go through.

With the AK it becomes more brutal. With a 6 base damage value, if you manage to hit the car you sucessfully overcome it's armor of 6 and it has to soak the 7+ damage boxes. Also the extra dices to hit for a narrow burst are likely to add a few more extra hits, pushing up the damages to be soaked. Statistically 1 extra "to-hit" dice requires an extra dice of (Body+Armor) to soak.

Considering this the poor wheeled love palace is not as impervious as you made it, even if it's a bit over the top when using the lightest weapons.

Sadly, that isn't what the rules actually say:

"VEHICLE DAMAGE
Whenever a vehicle is hit by an attack, it resists damage as
normal, rolling Body + Armor. If the attack’s modified DV does
not exceed the vehicle’s modified Armor, no damage is applied."

Doing the calculations, a reasonably competant ganger with a Light Pistol can damage people inside the Subcompact, though it's far smaller quantities than I'd like. If you have the dice, though, taking a -6 in order to negate the car's armour is generally a good expenditure.

I don't particularly think it's all that ridiculous for even cheap cars to be reasonably well armoured in 2070. Wasn't it meant to be a big thing that street violence was a lot more common? So a car that is practically bullet proof would sell better than one that isn't.

The extra few tons of armor tends to provide some negative effects on things like fuel efficiency, which they make a big deal about in Arsenal, and vehicle performance. A 6000 lb subcompact would be, um, interesting?

It works even better when Mr Lucky spends a point of edge to shoot the driver of the citymaster in the head....

KZT - Two things, I think you're reading the vehicle rules differently. I read the same sentence as "vehicles resist damage in the same way as people or spirits with hardened armor," Not, "Vehicles resist damage first then compare this with the armor rating." That's my interpretation. If you use my example, it changes the dynamic a bit. A Honda Spirit, then, would be in danger of damage from any assault rifle (which will get through the hardened armor) and any light pistol firing EXplosive rounds.

Just like Dakhran said.

Note, also, that if you're shooting at the people in a car, according to the rules, they have good cover but only the armor from the vehicle applies, not the vehicle's body (SR4A, p. 171). In the case of the Honda spirit, that means the door of the vehicle counts for a lined coat. Which is fine by me.

No, the rules are:

VEHICLE DAMAGE
Whenever a vehicle is hit by an attack, it resists damage as
normal, rolling Body + Armor. If the attack’s modified DV does
not exceed the vehicle’s modified Armor, no damage is applied.

It nowhere says, under the subordinate heading of damage and passengers, that the general rules on vehicle damage don't apply to attacking passengers. Why wouldn't they? You are shooting through the vehicle structure, so the defense provided by armor and chassis (ie body) of the vehicle still gets applied to protect the passengers. As a matter of fact it says "Additionally, the passengers gain protection from the vehicle’s chassis, adding the Armor of the vehicle to any personal armor the characters are wearing."

Otherwise, according to your version, you can just shoot the cops in the Citymaster with your pistol loaded with neurostun capsule rounds.....

Did you really read what Rob just posted ? He said "you add the armor of the vehicule", and it is exactly what is said in your quote : "Adding the armor", not "Adding (Armor+Body)" ! Good luck puching through the citymaster's 10 Armor points with capsule rounds (Stun only damage, which armor vehicules is immune to).

IIRC Armor is never modified by Body rolls ! The "Modified Armor" that you compare to the modified Attack DV is the value after acounting for things like APDS or AV rounds. The (Body+Armor) roll to soak damages comes only after this step.

Hmm... heavy pistol is 5P -1. Body 8, armor 6. At least 1 hit to hit the vehicle, so modified damage of at least 6P/-1 That adjusts the subcompact's armor to 5. So it resists with 13 dice, buys three hits against 6P damage an thus takes 3 damage. I think the dude in the subcompact is going to be zipping it up and hitting the gas if he is getting shot at with anything bigger than a holdout.

Also kzt, it says it adds the vehicles -armor- not the vehicle's armor + body (As Dahrken already said).

The reason body doesn't get included at all when attacking the passengers is fairly simple, you aren't aiming to damage the vehicle at all in that case (Except to put a single hole through it). When you are attacking the vehicle you are aiming to damage and disable it, thus aiming for things like the engine and tires and other.. umm... important vehicle things (Gas tank? Not that it'll explode, but having no gas would suck)

That aiming for critical spots is where the body of the vehicle comes in. Remember that under the damage to passengers, it also never says anything about having to completely demolish the vehicle in order to get at the passengers.

Oh, and as for modern cars, yeah, pistol rounds will go right through the door. Cops are trained that if a gun gets pulled on them by a person in a car (Like when they walk up to give a ticket or whatever) they drop down to their knees and shoot the guy through the door. The guy in the car will generally try to aim out and over the window while he is plugged full of bullets flying through the door.

KZT - I looked over the stuff this morning. In my copy of SR4A, the vehicle damage rules read exactly as you write, and I'll admit the confusion by the chronological ordering of those statements.

However, if you look at the vehicle attributes on p. 167, it states (italicized emphasis mine):


I have read your take on the rules, so don't quote it back a third time, that's annoying. I understand where you're coming from, if you look at that one paragraph in isolation. However, I think that the take Drakhen, Karoline, and myself present makes a lot more sense, and is more consistent with similar rules, such as the Immunity from Normal Weapons powers for spirits and every other thing with hardened armor.

Plus, I really fail to understand why you want to disagree, since we're giving you an easy, logical, rules based way to avoid the ridiculous scenario of people making out in a subcompact being fired on by assault rifles.

I have fairly extensive personal experience getting shot at by and shooting at people in cars, courtesy of the government. Nothing in these rules strikes me as over the top; all seems quite reasonable.

Legs - sorry we co-opted your scenario based thread for a rules argument. Hope that some of it is useful to you. I think an armored car heist sounds fun, and I think roadmasters make good armored cars (I have a character that uses a Citymaster for it, and has a fake armored car service company that he uses as a cover, so I've thought about this before).

No. Vehicles get to roll their armor + body and subtract hits from the attackers DV. If the adjusted DV doesn't exceed the armor the attack bounces. So in your example the DV has to exceed at least 9 to do ANY damage, and hence takes the subcompact no damage.

You seem to be jumping to the conclusion that either the "vehicle's modified Armor" or the "attacker's modified DV" in the second sentence somehow incorporates the results of the resistance test from the first test. Soaking damage reduces the damage taken, it affects neither the actual (modified) DV of the attack nor the actual armor of the defender. They are two independent rules to follow: Resist the attack as normal with Body + Armor. If the attacker's modified DV doesn't exceed the modified armor of the vehicle, no damage is applied. (It's a trivial optimisation to skip the resist roll if no damage is applied....)



It does, in fact:


Unless you're specifically targeting the vehicle, the vehicle damage resistance rules never come into play. If you're targeting the passengers, the subsection has further rules for what part the vehicle does play (-2 to dodge, partial/full cover, add vehicle's armor to passenger's armor).

The damage resistance roll is what produces the modified DV.

Looking at the Combat Sequence text (BBB p139-140) clarifies things a little bit, but not as much as I'd like. Step 4 is the "Compare Armor" test, which explicitly states that net hits + base DV = modified Damage Value (emphasis in the book). If the modified DV does not exceed the modified armor, damage is stun rather than physical. Step 5 ("Damage Resistance Test") does in fact say "each hit scored [on the damage resistance test] reduces the modified Damage Value by 1."

So basically it boils down to this: The section on vehicle damage (p161) is not clear how those rules break down into steps in the Combat Sequence. The choice of wording of "modified armor value" and "modified DV" (as well as the various bits of text that state that vehicle armor functions just like character armor), to me, indicate that the armor comparison goes in Step 4 (which explicitly defines those terms), before the damage resistance is applied, and proceeds as normal from there ("it resists damage as normal," first sentence). I could see how a literal reading could interpret it to replace Steps 4 and 5 entirely, but to me it doesn't make sense to disregard the larger context of the combat rules when trying to read this one paragraph. I don't think there's a definitive answer to be found by examining the letter of the rules further, but my own feeling is that the results of doing the comparison in Step 4 are much more reasonable.

No, the opposed Attack-Defense roll does.

See SR4A, p. 149, Step 4. First, the modified DV (and modified Armor!) is calculated, then there is damage resistance.

If things like the magic example that contradict the rules on what test to use and how it works didn't exist I'd be more willing to say "oh, it should just work like the rest of the combat rules". Given these exceptions I tend to believe that when they write rules that have a subsystem that works differently that the rest of the game that they mean it.

Dude, but why? The test you're arguing for makes every shadowrun car armored like the brinks car, makes one system work an entirely different way than another, and is only supported by one sentence in the rules, that you're the only person posting has read that way? That really doesn't make sense for me.

I disagree with it because 1. I don't read the rules that way, because of the other places I and others have pointed out, 2. I don't think they intended it that way, because it's a significant departure from the rest of the system on the basis of one vaguely worded line, and 3. The implications of that rule don't pan out with sense (subcompacts immune to assault rifles, riot control trucks immune to shipboard/MBT weapons).

I would understand that, if you think every shadowrun car is SUPPOSED to be armored like the brinks car.

But then that gets into other levels of ridiculousness, when you consider that by your interpretation a stock, unmodified Ares Citymaster will shrug off hits from a gauss rifle with less than 5 successes on the attack + defense test (Base damage 9P, -4 AP, half armor vs. Soak roll of 22 (16 body, 20 armor, halved to 10, minus 4, so average 7 successes, or just buying 5 would mean less than 3 successes.)), or the GM heavy cannon with less than 5 or 3 successes (Base damage 17P, -8 AP, so 16 body and 12 armor, average 9 successes or buying 7). Or, with 1 point of smart armor, completely resists the Aztechnology heavy gauss cannon with less than 2 net successes.


Is there some reason you think the game world should work this way?

Well I guess there's a simple solution to this, anyone who wrote the books want to weigh in? Anyone know anyone with authority who can weigh in?

kzt's interpretation is lacking one very very important key word to make these two sentences work for him. That key word? Then.

The lack of a joining word like then means that the order of the two rules can be switched. It can just as easily read "If the attack's modified DV does not exceed the vehicle's modified armor, no damage is applied. Whenever a vehicle is hit by an attack, it resists damage as normal, rolling Body + Armor."

Also please note the part that says "it resists damage as normal" which indicates that it deals with damage in the same way as every other thing in SR existence, which is that DV being compared to Armor is done -before- soaking occurs, not after, for the sake of P v S damage.

As for shooting through the door/window of a vehicle somehow including the body of the vehicle, let me ask you this... why does shooting through a -wall- not require you to take into account the 'body' of a wall? You don't have to completely destroy the wall to be able to shoot through it, you just have to be able to overcome its armor value.



Notice how it doesn't mention anything at all about the body of the vehicle being part of this in any way what-so-ever?

Also, the 'DV must be greater than vehicle armor to do damage' thing is also mentioned much much earlier on page 158, in no relation at all to there being a soak test.

(Sorry this kinda jumps around, was reading up on the section a bit more as I wrote)

Also read the section about Armor (for characters but still...) p 160 in SR4A. What is written ?
"Armor is used with Body to make damage resistance test" followed two sentences later by "If the modified DV does not exceed the modified armor rting, then the attack does Stun damage".

Sound familiar ? The beginning of the section on vehicule armor page 167 follows exactly the same pattern, without the precisions about what exactly is a "Damage resistance" test and modified Armor and Damage Value - IMHO because those concepts have been thoroughly explained before and it explicitely says vehicle armor function like charcter armor. Finally, the paragraph p. 170 about vehicle damage drops even more extras, and the two sentences are now one next to the other...

I think you infer far too much from a slightly ambiguously worded paragraph, particularly when your reading leads to blatantly ridiculous results like needing a Panther to go Jackrabbit hunting.

NO, NO, NO...

You are NOT reading the rules in their totality... Vehicles soak damage JUST LIKE PEOPLE DO...
Please refer to all of the above relevant posts...

Keep the Faith

NO... The modified DV is the result of the Attack Test... JUST LIKE in ALL other cases within the Rules

talk about cain 3.0...

Well, on reflection, now that I have some sleep, I'll admit that I was wrong. But the writing of the rules still sucks.

Not really, No... and it has obviously been resolved anyway, so no big deel...

Keep the Faith