On page 105 of Arsenal it states that if a character that increases the rating of all his sensors for a vehicle/drone the overall sensor rating should also be increased. The question I pose to you all is: what is a good rule of thumb for this increase? For every 3 sensor upgrades/sensor types beyond the norm, a +1 to the Sensor rating is applied? Or is some other guideline a good choice?

Thank you in advance.

2 days later.... Bump.

The new rating is equal to the average rating of all installed sensors
example:
2xCamera [6]
Radar[4]
motion sensor [no rating]

would give you a rating of 5, a house rule I've seen used is that when a sensor only has ratings 1-3 to double its rating when calculating the average.

Actually, that would be Rating 6 total, as one rounds up.

In SR4A it explains how to upgrade as well.

Basically any sensor without a rating is treated as if its not there till the average is calculated. A sensor with a max rating lower then 6 is treated normally till it gets to its max then treated the same as sensor without rating. (Though doubling not bad house rule.)

So....

Camera [6]
Atmosphere sensor [2]
Radar[4]
motion sensor [no rating]

Would be a sensor rating of (6+4+2)/3 = [4], divide by 3 since the fourth sensor has no rating.

Another case:

Camera [6]
Atmosphere sensor [3] (max rating)
Radar[4]
motion sensor [no rating]

Would be a sensor rating of (6+4)/2 = [5], divide by 2 since the fourth sensor has no rating and 2nd sensor is maxed....

now if the camera was 3 and radar 1 and Atmosphere sensor was 2 would be (3+2+1)/3 = 2 ,Atmosphere still counts since the average of the other two was equal to or lower than it.

Thank you. I don't have SR4A yet, so I did not know about this rule.

That is a little wierd though:
You have 2 rating 6 cameras, and a rating 4 radar, and rating 2 atmospheric sensor:

Avg rating of senors: 4

If you remove the rating 2 atmospheric sensor you sensor rating goes up by 1 point.


Wouldn't make sense to base it off the highest rating sensor?

Remember the sensor rating is the average rating of the entire system...technically you need a full system to do the average. So if you remove the sensor without replacing it...I would count it as a zero...to avoid what you just described. But you could replace it with a motion sensor and get the 1 higher rating..which makes sense since you lose the atmosphere monitor portion for a local sensor but gain a movement.

Though now the DM can tell you that you can notice the room is being evacuated of air and your roto-drone is about to hit the ground...since the air is leaving the room. That's just a reminder in case you thought atmosphere sensor is useless hehe.

Repeat after me:

The average is rounded up.

No.

And if only using some sensors in the package, the highest rating is used.

That's not the case by RAW. Nor does it really matter, as the average is rounded up.

So, if my drone has the following sensors:



... Then my sensor rating is now a 4.142857.. (on and on), rounding up to a 5? And if I upgrade the R2 Camera and R2 Microphone to R6 (even if I have them without max capacity additions) then my sensor rating becomes 5.28...(blah blah), rounding up to a 6?

Well after rereading RAW...he is right. Sensors are ratings Average regardless of their max. Though a unrated sensor is considered to have the packages rating.

From Arsenal Errata



So.... upgrading all the sensors to 6 from 3 results in this:

Camera [6]
Atmosphere sensor [3]
Radar[6]
motion sensor [no rating] (Considered Rating 6 since all sensors where upgraded to 6)

Is equal to Sensor rating of (6+3+6+6)/4 = 5.25 = 6 (Rounding up)

Alternatively you could get this:

Camera [6]
Atmosphere sensor [3]
Radar[5]
motion sensor [no rating] (Considered rating 5 since Radar was not improved to 6)

Is equal to Sensor rating of (6+3+5+5)/4 = 4.75 = 5 (Rounding up)

I think I got it...now.

Correct and Correct.

Confusing a little, but I think I get the hang of it. Thank you.

Ditto-one of my soft points ruleswise!! Now the onlything you have to worry about is the capacity!!!