Well I would say that if you have Bone Lacing (Cyberware) or Bond Density Augmentation (Bioware) of a rating 2 that gives you a damage value of (STR/2+1)P. If you increase that to a rating of 3 then it becomes (STR/2+2)P. All you did there is make your fist harder so why wouldn't adding Hardliner Gloves add the same additional +1 to the damage value? With that being said Bone Lacing Rating 2 + Hardliner Gloves + Critical Strike Lvl 4 + Killing Hands Lvl 1 would equal (STR/2+6)P according to my calculations.

I'm not sure where I stand on the Hardliner glove, but my initial thought is that Force = Mass * Acceleration. So, if you are indeed increasing the Mass without it reducing the Acceleration then it would actually work. To be honest I've not gone too far into this to have a solid opinion though.

I do have a question though: If there are Hardliner Gloves, how would you stat something like "Combat Boots" (or some other name) for a more kicking oriented character? Just use the same price and such? Would you just not allow something like that in general?

Also, just to chime in on the above build, Killing Hands becomes moot since you already have the Bone Lacing or even the Hardliner Gloves giving you Physical Damage (yes you'd still need it to hurt things that were immune to normal weapons). If you are just going for raw hand-to-hand damage I'd instead add in Piercing Strike 3 for an AP -3 value. I'm sure you could get all sorts of creative and add in things like Martial Arts qualities as well to up that even more. Just food for thought.

The Killing Hands is useful against Spirits however, as they would bypass the ITNW of the Spirit...

Keep the Faith

I mentioned that. I was just saying for pure DV it was a wasted power point. However, it is also a gateway to Elemental Strike adding in some extra damage or side affects.

Sorry, missed that reference... and yes, it is a gateway to Elemental Strike... which could be a useful ability, depending upon the element...

Judging by some viewpoints expressed in this topic, I am a terrible GM because today, before I read this topic, I told the guy playing the physad in my game that he could make a weapon focus out of custom-made Hardliner gloves. Balance, you say? What balance? I don't have a melee specialist physad in my group, so who is he outclassing? He's a parkour mobility adept that happens to have put a couple points into Killing Hands and Crit Strike. No Distance Strike or Elemental Strike, nor does he plan on getting either, being more concerned at upping his infiltration abilities. By my judgment it does not hurt the balance of my game to let him use some custom-made "Hardliner style" gloves as a weapon focus that he can use with his Unarmed Combat skill. OTOH, if this same adept had instead min/maxed his adept powers for maximum damage in Unarmed Combat, then I wouldn't let him use the Hardliner gloves as a weapon focus because it would upset the balance in my game compared to the guy playing the street sam. It's all situational.

I don't understand the emphasis some people are placing on universal game balance in a tabletop roleplaying game. This isn't an MMO like WoW where every game mechanic has to be balanced to micron tolerances lest tens of thousands gnash their teeth and tear their hair. Where millions weep over the slightest perceived imbalance between classes. If a given rule or item doesn't unbalance play at *your* table, then what's the problem? Why say no if the rule change, while not RAW, will make the game more fun for the player in question while not affecting the fun of any of your other players?

It's a good point. There does however need to be some semblance of balance (unlike Runner's Companion where it looks like they came up with costs by rolling some dice--clearly equal choices have a 20 point spread of costs, 20 points in a game where 3* lets you control everyone you meet like puppets or 12 and you become the Flash on heroine).

But yes, a GM does have the final say.

*An obviously "this should not be allowed"** spell, and the 3 points assumes that you're already a mage.

**Then there's Bear Who Digs Through Walls, who stacked every "I destroy objects" adept power onto a bear/troll shifter and can dig through walls at least as fast as he can walk (depending on barrier rating--concrete is a mere 0.5 miles an hour--for reference, most humans can't dig through loose soil that quickly with a shovel). But the game he's in this doesn't really pose a problem, as the primary barrier keeping us from the objective isn't material.

there is a Hardliner Glove. Hardliner Gloves on page 39 in Arsenal gives a damage value of (STR/2+1)P and use the Unarmed Combat Skill to use. And as far as Killing Hands being moot The way I explain it is that Killing Hands is needed to turn the damage from Critical Strike from Stun to Physical. Also it sets you up to get Elemental Strike later on as Killing Hands is a pre-requisite for Elemental Strike. So here is the example...

Troll Adept with augmented strength of 15 with bone density augmentation rating 2 + Hardliner Gloves + Martial Arts - Boxing Level 2 Quality (p.157 in Arsenal) + Critical Strike Level 4 + Killing Hands would hit for a total of (STR/2+8)P or 16P of damage per punch. Then you upgrade the bone density to rating 4 for 2 more points of damage and get Elemental Strike through Initiation grades to add elemental damage on top. So the final total would be (STR/2+10)P + lets say Blast Elemental Damage from page 164 in Street Magic for a total of 18P + Blast damage effect. You would be like Brick from Borderlands when he uses the Berserk power with an explosive elemental effect.

Plus as it states on page 164 in Street Magic... "Blast damage is treated as physical damage and is resisted with half impact armor (rounded up)." So not only is the troll doing 18P of damage to you but he is also cutting your impact armor value for the attack in half! I just hope for your sake you have a doc wagon contract.

Meanwhile over at the ranch a guy with a SMG is dropping 3 people per combat phase. Or getting up to 14P with normal Ammo. As twinked as people make a unarmed combat adept he still looks like suck compared to a guy with a gun.

They both definitely have their place though...

Keep the Faith

This is why I don't stress about these sorts of rules changes. The physad in my group has, by a min/maxer perspective, already significantly gimped himself in service to his concept. The heavily augmented Street Sam with the customized full-auto SMG with APDS is significantly more deadly. Letting the physad get a few more dice in his Unarmed DP from Hardliner glove weapon focus isn't going to change that. He still attacks one target, once per Action Phase. The physad player is fine with that because he gets to shine through his amazing ability to vault around the battlefield with Great Leap, Wall Running, Freefall, etc.

I think SR4 does a better job at overall balance than any previous edition. That said, the game still requires some tweaking and a strong social contract at the table to keep things from getting out of hand. This is just one of the reasons why I don't bother with Con games anymore*.


*Exemption granted for the series of truly phenomenal Call of Cthulhu games I was in at GenCon from 1998-2001.

He does know that he can attack multiple targets in range by splitting his dice pool, I assume?

Yes, indeed. On the occasions when it works out that way. My firearm-toting antagonists tend not to bunch up, so he doesn't get that many opportunities to hit multiple targets. Now if he was a Sarissa-Adept, that would open up the range a bit.

Sarissa?
Found it. Polearms don't however get most bonuses Unarmed can receive.

Sorry, bad attempt at a Classical Era warfare reference joke.

Yeah that is how I look at it so I am fine with a hardliner glove weapon focus and letting critical strike stack.

On the other poin I think 4e is worse at balancing melee combat with ranged than previous editions. And yes I am aware of all the that is how it should be arguments. Maybe my math-fu sucks but I got a lot more functional multi attacks in 1-3e(especially-1-2e) than I can in 4e. I am sure I can build a dice pool monstrosity that can somewhat successfully do it in 4e but splitting a dice pool hits really hard. Now unarmed adepts come out better in this edition IMO, previously my melee guy was a troll with a combat axe unarmed did not cut it except for trolls. Now being a troll, reach and all the powerhouse melee stuff form 1-3e helps a lot less. Heck I might take an elf over a troll in melee combat in 4e and a ork is dang close to strong as a troll and the 1 reach lost is more than made up for by not getting an agility penalty. And even within melee its not really balanced all the good stuff goes to the unarmed guy, they really need some armed combat phys add abilities.

You might want to read the rules again. Remember that you split the DP BEFORE you apply bonuses to your DP. In other words you basically only split your skill itself. Then you get to add to each individual DP the bonuses (Such as spec and personalized grip and weapon focus and whatever else). This is exceedingly important, as with something like a F4 weapon focus, you get +4 to each of your split pools, and thus with enough stacked bonuses you could split a base DP of 6 (from skill) into say 3 separate 2 dice pools (Or heck, 6 separate 1 die pools) and then add 2 from spec, 1 from personalized grip, and 4 from the focus and get 3(6) attacks all at a DP of 9(. Not exactly an amazing DP, but throw it all at one target and that is 6 attacks, each one of which the enemy is going to get 1 fewer die to dodge/block with. Can also be great for clearing an area of grunts (Running with a free action should allow you to hit multiple people)

Karoline, just to clarify your note, what you split is your base stat + skill pool. You then add any modifiers to each of the resulting pools.
So with an Agility of 9, and a skill of 6, you could split those 15 dice 5 ways, having 3 dice each. And then add the weapons focus, personalized grip, etc, to have 8 dice on each of five opponents. of course, they each avoid the melee attack with reaction + skill, so 8 dice is not great unless you are trying to plow through mooks.

Yours,
Joel

Sure with a good weapon focus and specialization and I guess personalized grip(I guess i don't mod weapons enough) you might have a good pool when split. I just find that in melee since its both reaction and melee skill in the defense pool the split dice thing hits it a lot harder than two weapon style with guns. Though yes an adepts can compensate for it more with a weapon focus.

At the start I'll assume a 9 agility+6 skill split into a 7/8 pool with a specialization and a force 4 weapon focus. So 13 and 14 dice for a 2 way split. Sure I can attack 2 people, but I think I just fell into dice pool monstrosity range.(this of course varies from game to game)

The phys add I had was a Troll with exceptional agility so he could potentially hit a 9 agility. At the time though he had 7 his unarmed skill was 5 specialized in boxing. That is 8/8 dice for the attack, It would be a gamble to use against any slightly competent foes. If the GM at the time let hardliner gloves be a weapon focus, and if I had the money and karma to get one I might get that up to 11/11 eventually which would be really solid mook clearing power. And not too much into dice pool monstrosity range. Now I cleared tons of people in melee combat as is, it just took a long time. Good skills+good reaction+combat sense level 5+counterstrike and even when you are surrounded they better be bad ass if they want to lay a finger on you. Didn't help me much at long range vs a drone with a panther assault cannon but oh well.

In 1-2e yeah he'd still be in trouble the native troll reach would drop the TN to 3 and the additional target would bump it back to 5 but there TN would be 5 as well so I was okay at doing it usually, not much better than 4e. But in 1-2e if I was going with the great Axe my TN for attacking 2 people would be 3, there TN would be 7(okay6) and I'd eff them up. I wouldn't need to specialize, I wouldn't need a weapon focus, I was just a giant troll with a really big axe and that was enough.

I'm not a statistician, so maybe I am wrong it just feels like unless you really work the dice pool 4e is overly hard on attacking more than 1 person in melee. Maybe it needs to be since you can easily get builds where the damage is 10+ with 1 net success. Maybe the 1-2e catered more to pink mohawk and that is where I am comfortable, I don't know.

From a melee standpoint, don't forget that in previous editions, the attacker could wind up taking damage if the target out-rolled them. This means that those uber-reach bonuses also came into affect if anyone was stupid enough to swing at you, thereby allowing you the opportunity to get them twice in once round.

I'm not advocating going back to that system. I'm just saying, for those that think that melee in SR4 is less useful than previous versions, this is also part of it. After all, there was a reason that a counter-strike phys-ad didn't need to up their initiatve; all they had to do was get in the middle of some baddies that were foolish enough to try to hit them.

True, but you have to think about the flip side of that. While you can no longer sit back and countstrike everything to oblivion, you can no make risky low dice attacks of your own without fear of repercussion. So basically melee combat got weaker on the defense (And really, how many goons with guns were (Should have been) stupid enough to attack the melee combat master in melee when they knew he'd just kill them instantly for it? Much better to take a few steps back and shoot) and stronger on the offense since you no longer have to worry about a bad attack being thrown back at you or anything. Also means you can afford to split your pool up for an attack because once again, a low roll doesn't mean you get killed.

So, they took out the 'kung-fu master kills you for trying to touch him' style of melee and matched it with ranged combat by making it 'attack without worry'. Should point out you can build your character to do the kung-fu master thing and kill anyone stupid enough to attack you in melee. It only costs like 9 BP. So really I have no idea where the whole 'melee combat is weaker than in older editions' is coming from.

Um, how? I'd like to know because I like melee masters. And 4e so far looks a lot weaker in comparison. The only thing similar I have seen to do the attack while defending thing is one of the martial art moves riposte or something. But that uses your next action so it isn't really helping you kill more just earlier in the combat turn.

Let me pull up my books... it is fairly easy though.

Arnis De Mano Martial Arts quality for 5 points to get the 'may inflict damage when making a called shot to disarm' advantage.
Disarm maneuver for 2 points to gain 'go on full parry with -4 DP, if you do and you get more hits than opponent, you disarm them'

So when you disarm them with the Disarm maneuver you get to do damage thanks to the Arnis De Mano advantage.

And if you want to still be able to attack you duel wield and get the Two Weapon style maneuver so that you can attack and do full defense on the same turn with no penalty (other than standard duel wielding which you can take care of with the ambidextrous quality or another 2 point maneuver).

So maybe ever so slightly less effective than the old SR1-3 in the 'hurt people while defending' area, but you get the added bonus of disarming them (perhaps literally).

Edit: Oh, and the Arnis De Mano specifically mentions that the disarm maneuver works with the damage dealing. No mention of if you can disarm an unarmed opponent, there are good arguments either way.

This gets even worse with an Adept with lots of Combat Sense and Counterstrike. Riposte and Sweep are a nice combination as well. Too bad that you can only get one Interrupt action beyond your Action Phases per turn.

Cool, thanks. I guess I never looked closely at two-weapon style stuff. I kind of got burned out of it with 1-2E D&D.

Yeah, though the image of an adept taking out a small army of goons in 1 second and then standing there for 10 seconds while he waited for his actions to catch up again is kinda funny.

"What are you still standing there for?"
"I can't move yet!"
"Why?"
"I burned up all my ability to move taking out those guys for a few seconds alright."



Null sweat. Like Dakka said, things that let you handle more attacks in a turn without penalty make this increasingly viable. Think there is also something out there that helps limit how much of a 'friends in melee' bonus the other guys can get, which once again helps this build alot.

The trick to any game is reading everything carefully and being able to spot links.

the Maximum of standing around is 3 seconds or one round:Emphasis mine.

Yes, I know that. I was saying that it would be funny if that rule wasn't there, and thus you could run out several combat turns of actions and be unable to do anything for several seconds after wiping the floor with a bunch of goons.

Also, don't forget that you can potentially dose up your melee weapons.
Poison reservoirs in scabbards holding a DMSO/ Slab combo or whtevr.
Doubles up your damage potential, like throwing grenades using missile mastery to peg your target in the eye.