Sadly in computers the example is even worse since its Skill+gear, so a guy with 1 skill who stole fast jacks crap is only 2-3 successes worse than fastjack. And sure its the whole dicepool that matters so the best in the worlds attributes will be better, his gear will be better etc. The point is the fluff in skills says 1 is a beginner in the skill 7 is the best in the world. So lets say you have a Physical Adpet master of unarmed combat and you've got the stats to back up your skills. Well after a few fights you realize far too often fights happen at range and you really need a gun. You spend 4 karma and attain a pistols skill of 1, now you are stupidly close to being as good at shooting as the street sam who is the master of the gun. That does not meet the fluff in the slightest.

The point is the fluff never should of been about skill rating but about dice pool size. And if you cap dice pool at 20 dice you have for me the odd benefit of not needing to cap skills for any reason. Game Balance wise does it matter if the old grandmaster got his 20 dice from 16dice in unarmed combat and 4 in agility, while the promising upstart has a 9 agility, 5 skill, and whatever else modifiers.

The problem here is that the SR4.5 rules don't bear out as having an attribute of 1 as crippling. The rules make it clear that rolling dice is only for difficult tests, so no ability to make a default roll = no problem. This is pretty much true for most every RPG out there: you don't need to roll dice to tie your shoes. Check page 63 for an example. Even the fluff doesn't go so far as to list an attribute of 1 as crippling, just "weak".

I know a woman with severe cerebral palsy. She can dress herself in the morning, even though it takes her an hour. She's probably have a Quickness of 0 by Shadowrun standards, although since the base book doesn't go that far down, she'd probably have an attribute of 1. That means e she can function, if slowly; she is anything but helpless.

As far as the skill dice go, your skill is just a source of dice. While significant, it's not the only source of dice you can have. As pointed out with the pornomancer, you could theoretically reduce the Seduction skill to 1 and only lose 6 dice, barely making a dent in his pile.

Heck, reduce it to 0, lose what. 10 dice?

But what you are missing in these comparisons between the Skill 1 Character and the Skill 7 Character is that most of the rolls you describe are OPPOSED rolls, at which point the Skill 7 Character Wins, every time... as for the difference in the Att 6 Skill 1 Character and the Att 1 Skill 6 Character is that one has a great deal of Innate ability but little real applicable knowledge/experience in the skill and the other has a great deal more experience using the skill while having a low innate ability to apply that knowledge...

And for comparison, that Skill 7 Pornomancer is throwing 6 Dice more vs. the character with a 1... and yes, that may only be a statistical difference of 2 dice, that is okay. As for your argument that the dice pool difference is not enough for a critical success over the lesser skilled character, I say Good... that is not how it is supposed to work... if Critical Success was the standard by which the game was written, I might concede you a point or two, but since Critical Successes are not the Norm (they are there for the rare instance when you have exceede all bounds, which should not be the case on every roll, it should be rare), then I think you are looking at it from the wrong perspective...

Your argument that the dice pool rules (as in is King) only really applies if you let the Dice Pools become inflated beyond reason... that is not the normal assumption of the game (I know, you hate that word, but it was the best one I could think of in the moment), nor should it be. If it were, however, there would be examples of such characters located somewhere in the myriad number of published books... but as you can see, there are no such examples... Fact is, A skilled character like Fastjack is going to have top of the line gear/equipment that the newb will not have access to, combined with a superior skill (and a superior breadth of skills that support his specialty) and probably superior attributes, and he will Routinely run circles over even a professional Hacker in the Business... and that is pretty evident within the system from what I am seeing...

The big disconnect is that the game is transhumanist in nature, and at that point, you can go beyond what would be natural in the real world... So Michael Jordan with his Skill of 7 and Attribute at 6, with a Specialization would be throwiong 15 dice, and yet, you could have some schlub off the street sponsored by the local corp with a Stat of 9 and Gengineering to augment ability, along with a mediocre skill of Professional Level (Say 3) and have a specialty and still throw the same number of dice... I say, So What, that does not mean that we should all of a sudden grant Michael Jordan a mysterious level of benefit because he is the best there is...

Augmentations (Whether magical or technological) allow one to transcend the boundries of what is humanly possible; as such, being on par with the best is accepted... and athletes that want to compete are going to seek such augmentation themselves, at which point, Jordan will get the genetweak for the +1 Dice, possibly some Muscle Toner and Muscle Augmentation +3 each, and a tacsoft with image link retinal modification so that he will be throwing a possible +7 additional dice for a total of 22 (kind of extreme but there you go) Dice... that does not affect whether he is still the best in the world due to his skill rating... He will be able to apply more effort (and thus a higher dice pool) across the board, regardless of negative modifiers, while the less skilled character will not be as capable, ever...

Anyways... This is about where we hit an impasse, I am pretty sure the above will not sway you to my point of view, but there it is...

(I am ranting aren't I?)

Keep the Faith

Also Michael Jordan is good at basketball because he has high strength, quickness, intuition, he has a high knowledge of the game. He has a high running, acrobatics, he's tall, etc.

Fastjack will not only have high cracking skills. He knows more people, he is smart. He knows more about Average Joe, than Average Joe knows about him.

MJ may be the best basketball player ever, doesn't mean he is the best at horse.

Sorry, TJ, but you're simply wrong on all points.

First of all, saying that inflated dice pools for modifiers such as gear is part of my point. Skill really doesn't matter as much as a huge dice pool. It really doesn't matter where all those dice come from. While skill can be an important part of it, the fact is that a scriptkiddie with the right equipment can own a guy with skill 7 and a lesser pool.

Even with opposed tests, two successes isn't enough to showcase the supposedly huge gap between a skill of 1 and 7. That means Joe Average will still have about the same odds of dropping an enemy in one shot as the highly skilled street samurai. If Fastjack attacks a scriptkiddie in cybercombat, he also isn't likely to blast them out of the matrix in one shot, something he did to experienced otaku in R:AS. Four+ successes is a success with style, and that's exactly what people like Michael Jordan and Wyatt Earp should do to Joe Average. Unfortunately, the rules don't reflect that. The fluff does, which is why there's a serious disconnect going on.

Even at lower levels, the dice pool is king. Mr. Lucky can add 8 dice to his pool anytime he likes, which means he can suddenly outperform a dedicated programmer for short bursts. Assuming a decker with Software 3 and Logic 3, versus Mr, Lucky's Logic of 2 and Edge, we're going to see Joe Programmer lose out every time. You don't need to go to hyperinflated levels to see the effect; they're just easier to demonstrate when the differences are larger.

Finally, as far as augmentations go, they're part of the problem. Someone with huge augmentations, huge attributes, and zero skill is supposed to be nearly incompetent at a given skill. Yet he will consistently outperform those with a much higher skill. That's because the augmented guy has piled on the modifiers. Heck, most of what overloads the pornmancer's dice pool are conditional modifiers. It really doesn't matter if he has skill 1 or 7, he's still throwing around a huge hyperinflated pile of dice. If you pit two such builds against each other, the guy with skill 7 will only come out slightly ahead of the guy with skill 1, despite the fact that one's a beginner, and one is the "best in the world". That's not reflected in the fluff, doesn't represent reality, and is a serious problem with SR4.5.

So, skill should (like force for spells) limit the hits?

Bye
Thanee

Micheal Jordan, if alive, is probably sitting in some danky pub, drinking beer and scotch and rambling about back in the day, he was the best there was now everyone are just cybered up wannabees... grumble grumble...

Point is that Jordan isn't the best there is if he doesen't keep up with the young 'uns. And if he does, yes then it's his dice pool of 20+ that makes him the best, not just a skill of 7 or some such.

This has been addressed by the optional rules for your number of hits based on skill. It makes skills worth a lot more and diminishes the exceptional successes for the unskilled.

Edge has an optional rule for reducing the effective dice pool each time you use it. Even Mr. Lucky will run out of luck depending on the situation where skills will count for more than luck.

The difference between 2 successes does not seem like much until you are looking at extended tests. Then we are talking doing something 2-3 times faster than Joe Average. I think you are exaggerating the effect without looking at the optional rules in SR4 and SR4A to address your complaints. The developers addressed your issue by putting those rules in the black box.

Well, that's really a comment on the post human condition.

Once you've got a smartlink showing you where your bullets will go, a TacNet telling you how your opponent will move and where to place a bullet in order to intercept him, and a tweaked out musculature making sure that your fine motor control is nanometer perfect, then skill is really just an afterthought. Sure, not everything can be simulated and instructed to near perfection on the fly, but just about any mechanical process can. The skill is just a holdover from a previous time when you were younger and hungrier and had to live off your own personal resources. Once you're sufficiently set up, any rating over 4 is just a matter of personal idiosyncrasy.

On the technical side it's even easier. You've got automagic, handwave processes built into your high level software. You've got machines and brainmatter and nanobots and genetic reconstruction all breaking down any mental activity into a simple matter of decision making. Why do you need to know how to do something when familiarity can be fed to you in a direct data pipeline, and in such a manner as you can instantly grasp? You may not be the man most familiar in the world with the subject at hand, but you've got the raw power of scorching synapses and bottomless databases at your disposal.

Transhumanism shouldn't be the foregone conclusion in the game though. You should be able to compete with natural skill. I mean its awesome when the game designer forces his religion on you and all but they could have easily "fixed" it by having a dice pool cap of X and dropping the skill cap. You could get your natural skill to 18 and have an agility of 2 and be the grandmaster old dude kung-fu guy, or you could take a short cut and have decent skill, X cyber and bioware and still get to 20 dice. The conflict of man vs nature vs machine etc is a good story to tell. They are going more and more towards removing that story in each edition.

Actually, we should put the skill cap at 12. So even with no mods the "best human ever" can get up to 18 dice. There is a point where you simply can't improve yourself farther.

However, the limit on how big the pool is after mods should be at about 25 at that point. 13 skill (exceptional) + 2 spec + 7 attribute (exceptional) + 3 (tools/situational) = 25. You're looking at having a little wiggle room once you get up to the highest learned potential so that having the right tools still helps (such as smart link or tacnet)

Your transhumans however would be more reliant on modifiers and cyber augmentations than inherit attribute or skill, making it easier for them to reach that "best you can be" (25 dice). So you'd have your 6 skill, 5(9) attribute, +2 spec, +2 tools, +3 reflex recorder (or similar cyber) and +3 (other mod) for 25.

An adept could have 6 skill, 5(9) attribute (boosted), +2 spec, +2 tools, +3 (adept skill boost) and +3 (other mod) for 25 that way.

Another advantage of capping skills at 12 is that you have a degree of professionalism between otherwise equal (N)PCs, effectively just doubling the chart we already have, which means that the difference between a novice (2 dice) and a master (12 dice) is now 10 full dice or about 3 successes instead of 5 dice (a little under 2 successes).

Three additional successes on shooting a larger weapon (6P base) is the difference between seriously wounding someone and killing them with a single shot. Your upper tier gun bunnies are actually just that much better than the novices. The novice can get the same dice pool too, if they scramble for modifiers (take aim, use smart link, lie prone, etc), but is difficult.

First of all, that's an optional rule. If you used all the optional rules at once, you'd have a mess of a game, because many of them contradict each other.

Second, even on Extended tests, limiting successes to Skill level means that Joe Average simply cannot do everyday tasks. A Computer skill of 0 simply means "untrained", you can still function in the Sixth World. Nowadays, I probaly have a Computer skill of 0, and yet I can check my email, surf the web, and even (legally) hack a wireless network for security leaks. Someone with skill 0 in Shadowrun would have a max of 0 successes, even with Edge spent. Meaning that a scriptkiddie with Fastjack's own deck and Dodger's own programs could no nothing in the matrix-- which the rules clearly did not intend.

For example, writing a webpage is an Extended action. Joe Average, with Programming zero, cannot design even a simple page according to those rules. I've got no applicable programming skills anymore-- Commodore 64 BASIC doesn't count-- and I can build fairly complicated HTML pages from scratch.

First of all, that's an optional rule. If you used all the optional rules at once, you'd have a mess of a game, because many of them contradict each other.
A )can you name some that contradict each other ?
B ) thats why they're optional you can choose wether you want to use them


Someone with skill 0 in Shadowrun would have a max of 0 successes, even with Edge spent.
Thats Wrong (Plain & Simple) Edgedice Successes always count,they even break the Limits of maximum Successes (like in Spells ) !

I've got no applicable programming skills anymore-- Commodore 64 BASIC doesn't count-- and I can build fairly complicated HTML pages from scratch.
Wrong again
If you can Build a HTML Page than you've got Programming Skills (maybe only 1,but thats Enough)

HougH!
Medicineman

Page 75, SR4.5. Cinematic vs "Grittier" gameplay.



Not under some of the optional rules I just listed. Which are the rules currently under debate.


Not really. I can use compilers, and I know how to use some sophisticated tools, but really all I can handle is the Skill 0 stuff. Heck, I can't even play most MMO's, they're too complicated for me. They didn't really have computers when I went to high school, so I definitely fall below the standards according to the book. Which is rather part of the point: the SR4.5 rules have a disconnect between fluff, rules, and reality. Two wouldn't have been bad, but all three? That's bad.

Cain, you complain about the rules then willingly ignore optional rules in the core book that address the majority of your issues. Don't throw red herrings about playing with all the optional rules when you can pick and choose the ones to play depending on the type of game you want. Your issue has been skills don't mean as much as technology and attributes. The optional rule clearly makes skills worth getting if you want to do more than daily tasks. You also mentioned edge for Mr. Lucky. Ok there are optional rules for that so Mr. Lucky doesn't just use edge all day and still remain more effective than the skilled guy.

Second the optional rule clearly states: The total hits are scored on any tests are limited to no more than the character's skill rating x2... Defaulting tests are limited to 1 hit. Edge would however allow you to bypass these limits . I look at it as Joe average is limited to 1 success per roll not totally limited on successes in an extended roll. This allows even experts to take on extreme tasks. I also use the suggested rule as you lose 1 die per roll on an extended test. Once you run out of dice you then you can start over again or get bumped up to the next interval level. This is why corporations want people at the highest skill levels. They increase the number of successes per roll and do not require the next time interval.

So, yes your unskilled guy can create a webpage. If the threshold is 5 then it may take him several days or weeks to complete what even a basic skilled character could do in less than a day due to the time intervals, glitches and limits on success per test.

Double post

As I have said in the past, you and I do not agree on this topic. I am okay with that... I am not WRONG, I just have a different Interpretation than you do, while still adhering to the RAW... You and I differ... so What.

Regardless, the SKill 7 Character is still MORE SKILLED than the Skill 1 Character... Point Blank and End of Discussion, you CANNOT refute that at all... +6 SKILL RANKS makes it so... (Dice Pools and Dice Rolling (Successes), by the way, is a Metagame Function, not an In Game one, so the Characters have a very large in game comparison between their skill levels... Just reference the Skill Level Descriptive Fluff, you should see it immediately).

Now, the biggest difference between the two will come in their Extended Rolls... Even if all things are equal otherwise, the Skill 7 Character will get +6 MORE ROLLS than the Skill 1 Character... this makes a great deal of difference. Fluff indicates a difference, and rules indicates a diference... If you wanted to go even more stringent, use the Following to highlight the differences even more...

1. Reducing dice pool rule for extended tests. This will produce Huge Differences in Extended Test Results
2. Re-Introduce Attributes into the Mix to create a distinct differentiation between those who can and those who can't.
3. Limit AR Passes

These three optional rules will even further highlight the difference between Fastjack and the Scriptkiddie... just because you do not like the difference of +6 Dice (2 Average Hits) does not mean that it is equal... it is not equal if there is a difference between skill ratings (as in your example), no matter whether other bonuses are added or not...

Arguing "reality" for a fictional game is full of Fail... so arguments that appeal to such will fall on deaf ears with me. The system was created with FUN in mind. The designers have decided that the system will work in a given form, and have provided multiple (I would say Excessive) examples of their intent in the system (Average Dice Pools somewhere between 9-13 Dice in Dice Pools, which occassionally climb as high as 15-17 in some cases). Within those parameters, Skill differences between a Skill 1 Character and a Skill 7 Character are IMMENSE... now, if your dice pools climb above 20, tehn this system will begin to break down... But taking to the cap limits, with all other things being equal, the Skill 1 Character will have 14 Dice compared to Fastjack's 20 Dice (Arbitrary comparison, CHaracter's have accumulated 13 Dice of Modifications with Fastjack having +6 SKill Levels Difference. Ands actually, scaling this back makes my point even stronger)... Now, if you cannot see that Fastjack is Vastly Superior in that contest, well, then I submit that the problem is not with the Game...

Anyways...

Keep the Faith

Which if you look at it are a result of the High Level Software providing dice bonuses to your roll (Really, most web design software I have used is fairly intuitive and helps a GREAT Deal with the setup of webpages)... Though I think that you limit yourself a bit... If you have ever programmed, you would still understand the fundamentals, and would thus have a higher skill than 0... If what you say is true, I would place you at a 1 (or maybe a 2) myself, based upon your descriptions of yourself and the perceived technical savvy that you tend to portray online.

Keep the Faith

I think that your issue is that you continually feel compelled to link Reality with the Game... don't do that and you will probably be much happier. at that point, it is only 2 of the 3, which in your words above "wouldn't have been bad."

Keep the Faith

Again, that's an optional rule, and considered one because it alters gameplay in a way that many people may not like. What's more, we're on Dumpshock, where we discuss RAW; house rules and optional rules are discussed on a case-by-case basis, so we all know where each other is coming from. If we discussed everyone running with optional rules is if they were RAW, we'd have a mess. Fact is, by RAW, your skill doesn't matter as much as total dice pool size.


Only in fluff. In rules and reality, the higher effectiveness is what's measured. Which also firmly means that there *is* a serious disconnect between fluff and rules. Thank you for conceding that point, it means we agree but you don't like the rules. Which is fine, you cannot be expected to like everything in a system as thick as SR4.5.

I'm reminded of the double-amputee who was banned from the Olympics because his prosthetic legs made him too fast. He would have a low natural attribute but a high augmented one, enough so that he was faster than many other athletes. His skill could also be lower, or at least altered.


I have programmed, although my last formal training was indeed for Commodore 64 BASIC. And even then, I never got much past the simple stuff, such as RNGs for dice rolling programs and text adventures. I never learned much about graphics. I've built several webpages, with the aid of a book like "HTML for Dummies", which I wouldn't count as anything past a skill level of 0. The impressive feat is legally hacking a wireless network. Dumpshock rules forbid me from going into detail, but I basically used a tool program. It did all the work, all I really did was push a button. You might be able to assign me a Data Search skill of higher than 1, which meant that I knew how to look for such a tool, but not an actual Computer or Programming skill.

Remember, Joe 6th World and even some professionals have a skill of 0 in many technical areas, which makes them untrained, but not unaware. Just because I can change my own oil doesn't mean I have the skills to repair a car; just because I used to drive a bus for a living doesn't mean I have a Ground Vehicles skill at anything other than 0. And my insurance premiums would tend to agree on that last count. Restricting next successes to 0 or 1 for untrained skill checks means that Joe Average cannot succeed on any Crash Test, which obviously doesn't happen.


Everybody likes to play Shadowrun differently. Some people like it more realistic, which is fine. It's their game, my job isn't to criticize them or tell them they're playing it wrong. My job on Dumpshock is to help them get the most out of their Shadowrun experience. Additionally, I like a more high-flying game than many others; I like just enough reality so the 4th wall isn't broken and we're left shaking our heads. SR4.5, by RAW, doesn't even do that. So yes, it is "that bad".

You are apparently reading my posts Incorrectly... I see no Disconnect in the rules as compared to the Fluff as you imply (The DIsconnect comes when you try to compare them to the Dice Pools that character's possess)... I do concede that the difference between the lowest actual skill rating and the highest (unaugmented) skill rating is a mere average of 2 successes. However, I also see that it could be as big a difference as a Single Success or 6 Successes in Difference... a difference that the lower skilled character cannot ever make up via any means assuming that all other modifiers are possessed by both characters, UNLESS he improves his Skill Rating.

As such, the Skill Fluff works just fine for me... I do IN FACT enjoy the rules connection to the Fluff, and have not had any issues looking at a character and immediately classifying who is the more skilled character, dice pools not with standing (Something that you apparently have an issue with... in my case, I do not care about the modifiers). And also, the vast majority of the rules in the Anniversary Edition I have absolutely no issue with. The few that I do have an issue with deal with the relation between Reality (Real World Weapons, combat etc.) and the game world... and I choose the Game World over Reality, because that is why I play the game. Reality gets boring from time to time, I play the game to have fun and be someone that I am not...

Please don't make the assumption that you actually understand why I like the Skill FLuff, because it makes you look a bit condescending, as you onviously do not undestand my reasoning... I get that you don't like the skill definition fluff, it does not mean that I do not.

Keep the Faith

I think I'm reading your posts correctly. You agree that there is a disconnect between actual effectiveness, skill levels, and reality. The difference is that you seem to like this, while others here disagree. Again, this is fine-- I'm not going to call the gaming police on you! But that doesn't mean the disconnect does not exist, nor that it isn't a real problem for those of us who play slightly differently than you do. Here on Dumpshock, we try to help other players, who will likely have a different play style than we ourselves do. This also is fine. If you're here to help other people, then one shouldn't act superior about one's own likes and dislikes.

As far as the mild advantage of 6 dice goes, that depends on how large the skill pools in question actually are. The larger the pool, the smaller the differences become. What's more, the higher they get, the more variability occurs; so it becomes increasingly more likely that the unskilled/low-skilled person can exceed the more skilled individual. Some optional rules actually make this problem worse: a pornomancer both with and without the relevant social skill will still have the same 20 dice, for example.

Yep, No gaming Police knocking at the door...

The game delves into the ideas of Transhumanism. As such, it is perfectly allowable for the characters of low skills to augment themselves to challenge the higher skilled individuals, as otherwise they could not actually compete. In this regard, why would you want to stifle that approach? Yes, it may suck for the guy who spent 20 years developing his skill to the epitome of human endeavor for the shlub off the street to circumvent that with judicious applications of augmentation. But, that is the way it is in this dystopian future. Now, the Corps will be somewhat to blame for this, as it takews a great deal of effort and money to acquire those abilities legitimately. So, they provide the augmentations for their workforce so that they do not have to expend ludicrous amounts of money to take the requisite time to train their workforce enmass. It is so much easier to install a skillwire system and chip their skills.

Now... there are those individuals that truly need that level of innate skill, as only with the true skill can you innovate, and for those special cases, they will dedicate the time and resources to ensure that they remain competitive. But here is where the issue becomes a problem for the gaming group. Joe Blow Average has the same effective dice pool as Mr. University... I do not see an issue with this, however, as Mr. University is pulling down their 6-7 Digit wage while Joe Blow is lucky to be making 75,000 Nuyen a Year (and probably much less)... and Joe Blow's creative contributions in his chipped skills will likely be ignored in place of Mr. University's. Why? Becasue it is hard to be creative with a rote skill.

In game, this may not have any consequences, unles they are enforced by the GM. Honestly, that is an issue for each table. In my opinion, I believe that it is not truly an issue if the fully augmented character can approach, or even surpass, the abilities of the character that purely relies upon skill. The disconnect that we have been talking about only occurs when a table thinks that that is an issue. I guess my question would be.... Why is that an actual Issue?

The contention (as I see it) is that because the character's have identical dice pools, even though they do not have identical skill levels creates a situation that allows the lesser skilled to compete with the greaeter skilled. Sure, they can acquire as many successes, or potentially more, depending upon size of dice pools. But what is the real problem? all things being equal, eventually the character that relies upon his skill ability WILL surpass the dice pools of the one with lesser skill, at which point, he will obtain greater success. Additionally, the individual with the higher Skill Level will consistently create more robust "whatevers" than the one without... And then we get into Extended rolls, where the one with higher skills will produce more output, of higher quality, in a quicker time than the one without. As a result, the group (Company, shop, whatever) who has the guy with higher skill will continually stay on a higher level of "cutting edge" than the one without, due to the ability to more quickly adjust and tweak output.

Now, this may not actually matter at your table, where you do not measure such things... But I think that you maybe should consider it. Higher Quality, More Robust, and More Timely "whatevers" tend to make one more successful (whether you are a shadowrunning team, a criminal organization, or a AAA Megacorporate Entity). This is the baseline of the world that we are gaming in. It is so, because that is the way that they set it up. Now, you're right, not everyone looks at it that way; and a lot of people think that it is unfair for the Skill 1 individual to even have a chance to challenge the Skill 7 Monkey out there. But, with the cheap availability of Knowledge and Data, as well as the relative inexpense of Augmentations, that is the reality of the world.

As a side, Yes we are definitely here to help those that are in search of it. And I do try to do so when it is requested. However, I often see posts that pursue a question to a problem that one has, and yet it is apparent from the post that someone is either Misreading (and is therefore asking for clarification) or Misunderstanding (in which case they are asking for clarification). Now, both are easy to correct, and often times the RAW will suffice to correct the situation, one way or the other. In Fact, I prefer the RAW solutions to ones that tend to make a situation even more convuluted. I tend to take a lot of heat for adhering to the RAW over something that seems so obvious. However, it has been my experience that once you transcend RAW for Houserules, the Houserules become more and more prevalent. and as someone else said here a weak or so ago, that is a very slippery slope. Minor changes tend to lead to major changes...

The fact of the matter is that a 9 point spread for Skill Level Proficiency (Unaware to Skill 7) is perfectly adequate for the system. I trhink that it becomes an issue when you start to experience those characters that can become entirely ludicrous in Dice Pools (Pornomancer, Assault Climber, Pramedic from Hell characters, I am looking at you). The easiest fix is to not let those types of characters become that ludicrous (Typically the purview of the GM in most games). In my opinion, the reason individuals create those types of characters (I will say this in general, you may differ), is because they are afraid of "Losing" the game. No body likes to be unsuccessful in what they do. I get that. But you are trying to create a story between the GM and the Players, and that takes collaboration. It is difficult to do. It is even harder to do when characters never fail.

Now, Characters that never fail are, to me at least, somewhat boring. Read any good novel, or watch any good movie, and you will see triumphs and failures. the most interesting characters are those that get hurt (Physically or Emotionally) and are imperfect. they have flaws and hangups. They do not always succeed at the things that they attempt. You have to admit, why else would you want to have a Dice Pool of 45+ for the Pornomancer than to always crush your opponents in social discourse.

Sorry for the wall of text answer, but I am somewhat passionate about this particular subject. you can play a character with "relevant" skill levels and still compete in the system. it is only when you start down the road of excessive dice pools that it truly becomes an issue. yes, it is very easy to create a character that has Dice pools of 20+ in a skill, let alone a couple of skills. Perhaps you should take more control and start showing that that is not truly necessary to be effective. When Dice Pools becomes an Arms Race, everybody loses...

Keep the Faith

Cain,

You are very good at pointing out where a problem exists, but I have not seen where you really add anything to fixing it. You seem more to point to the developers as having a flawed system and then throw up your hands and push the fix back to them.

As I have said is the developers have included a fix in the system if you deem it a problem. It is actually one reason I was so impressed with SR4 compared to SR1 and SR2. They give optional rules to address problem cases or give a different feel. Per RAW transhumanism dominates. Per RAW optional rules you can shift it back very easily to where skills dominate. Even the text for extended tests has a suggested rule, which to me is optional.

Even with transhumanism higher skills still have benefits. Whether this is making extended tests or just adding a little extra to a task it does pay off, but at diminishing returns. I think we can see this in olympic athletes where they are competing for hundredths of second rather than several seconds difference.

We however do see a very different outlook for attributes and skills.
As per RAW 0 skill means someone can perform daily duties, has basic knowledge and can function without any kind of expertise. This is your basic high school education where you learned something despite yourself and the teachers and retained it. You will makes mistakes and you won't be much more than the very basics. Most people have between 0 and 2 depending on their daily lives. Modern society ground vehicle skill is 1 or 2 not 0 unless just learning.

Now 1 attributes to me represent a crippling deficiency. The idea of a pleastant conversation with a charisma 1 does not exists. It doesn't mean there is malice, but it is anything but pleasant when you talk to a person with said charisma and 0 skill. It is just like talking to a phone menu or worse that charisma 1 is condescending, etc. You know the stereotypical comic book guy from the Simpsons.

Such people exist just not as main characters in my games. 1 attributes I leave with children, the handicapped and the elderly. Typical encounters defaulting on a skill are 0 dice and as such are at best long shots if allowed in the game without same bonuses.

Quit getting personal. If I'm paying $50 for a single book, I expect more from it. I'm not getting paid to fix the system; the developers are. My goal here is to commiserate and highlight problem areas, so people like TJ can fix them to their leisure.

I've made many suggestions, but every time I start, it degenerates into a flamewar of SR3 vs SR4, even though I go out of my way to avoid comparisons. Some people cannot handle criticism of holy canon. Since I've been threatened with banning because of those arguments, even when I don't start them, I won't go there.


As I said, I currently work with developmentally disabled individuals. Many of them are perfectly capable of holding onto a pleasant conversation. However, in SR4 terms, they'd have a Charisma of 1, and would get taken advantage of in a negotiation (A Charisma-based Opposed test). Even with low attributes, you can have your peak moments; an attribute is an overall average, not a uniform limit in all areas.

As for modern vehicle ground skill, it is 0 for most people and even some professional bus drivers. Most people couldn't handle themselves in a crisis; they rely on the car's abilities and their reflexes for a lot of things. They can drive to work and back without crashing; but put them behind the wheel of a stock car and you'll see the difference right away.

This is a question that has puzzled me for awhile - How are Knowledges handled in Karmagen? I couldn't recall reading this in RC... I just assumed it was the same as BP. You get a certain pool of skill points to begin with that are free then pay karma for additional knowledge skills as required. Is that correct?

- J.

Nope, you get no free knowledge skills and have to pay for them with karma just like active skills. Given the exceedingly limited use of knowledge skills, this means that most people will get as few knowledge skills as they think they can get away with without being called out by their GM. Notable exceptions perhaps include logic based jack-of-all-trades who will get a ton of rating 1 logic based knowledge skills so they can (Fairly) justify knowing just about anything they want.

I would put that as a incompetent skill rather than a charisma of 1. Again we see attributes very differently. To me a charisma of 1 is someone unpleasant whether it is lack of personality or just plainly a witch. Strength 1 can barely move items and would not pass the must carry 20 lbs on job interviews. Unless I am trying to play shadowrunners as elderly or children I don't allow 1s for attributes.

People who have driven for a few years brake and accelerate instinctively, etc. This is because of training/repetition. Once a skill goes from conscious to reflexive I would put that into a skill point. Just like what the military does with skills. When something bad happens the training takes over and I think the majority of people do that when they drive. Less thought more by reflex.

I think the system does a fairly good job for what it represents , while still keeping the game moving forward. I do see flaws in the system and the majority for me are in the firearms, hardened armor, and skill groups. The high dice pools don't bother me nearly as much. The fact the developers have put in optional rules for those of us who favor more drawbacks or for a lighter game is a huge plus for SR4.

The optional rules I do like
Cost of augmentations being 1% per month for upkeep
Limits on hits based on skill
Reduction of edge pool as it is used.

Really? Do you have a direct quote from RC?

- J.

Sure, just a minute.

Edit: Okay, it isn't ever stated specifically that you don't get free knowledge skills, but it is never mentioned that you do get free knowledge skills. And since this is an entirely different generation system, you don't get to go 'well, BP gives it, so Karma must'.

There are also several things that lead to this conclusion:


Only thing it mentions that you get for free is your native language at native rating.

Then in the build a character example, you have this:

Which indicates fairly clearly that in the sample character, knowledge skills were paid for with karma

So yep, no free knowledge skills in karmagen creation.

The example of the sasquatch would indicate the knowledge skills must be paid with karma also.

I have always seen a 1 as being the lowest functional Attribute rating, and as being underdeveloped rather than handicapped (since you are only 10 Karma away from a 2, and 15 more Karma away from a 3). A Strength of 1, by the way, does let you carry 10 kg (which is slightly more than 20 lbs) without even needing a test. To truly approximate someone who is disabled, you need an Attribute of 1 and one or more negative qualities such as infirm, uncouth, etc. To my way of thinking, if Attributes of 1 were not considered valid choices, then PC Attributes would start at 2.

I still shy away from them, though, both because they disallow defaulting unless you have net positive modifiers, and because a lot of GMs do have a strong reaction against stats of 1, either seeing them as more glaring weaknesses than they are, or seeing them as symptoms of munchkinism.


On karmagen, yes, you do have to pay for knowledge skills, as the example makes clear. I usually will get points equal to what my "free" ones would be in BP, and pay for them, to keep me honest. For purposes of powergaming (the original topic), you don't have to spend any points on them. But for other games, knowledge skills actually can be useful at times.

Ahh ok. I was going by the SR4A where it states you always get a base level of Knowledge Skills for free. I assumed that rolled over into Karmagen - perhaps erroneously but I couldn't find an explicit ruling to the contrary.

- J.

I didn't read this whole post so maybe I'm actually getting off topic here but I have made characters with the BP system and then converted them to karmagen and I always end up with karma left over. I did this with a cyber guy and a summoner mage who neither of them bought attributes above 6 with karma, so while I'd guess that if you're making a troll or a shapeshifter who have extremely high stats karmagen is worse, if you're making a human or a dwarf or an elf or maybe an orc you're almost always better going with karmagen.

Buying a bunch of spells and binding lots of foci will eat up points too.

I have been putting together some builds with the new rules (x 5 multiplier for Attributes, racial cost in Karma), and they usually do turn out to be more than 400 Build Points if I cost that out (and that is with buying knowledge skills). The main disadvantage is that there are a few builds that you can't do because of the Attribute caps. Although this comes up less than I thought it would.

I believe games should have the players use the same character creation system, but if you used this and build points, there would not be a huge disparity. Most of the ones I did wound up a bit under 450, and that was playing to Karmagen's strengths usually. Builds such as high Strength/Body trolls will narrow that gap.

Also the 750 karma build is just a suggested amount. If you're set on keeping starting power lower, or you want players to be able to chose between bp and karma for builds, you could always limit it, or at the very least, necessitate a certain amount of karma over to knowledge/language skills. I doubt that the bp squad would get too pissy over karmabro having stupid amounts of interest and knowledge skills.

Yeah. In a game I played we got 600 karma (with attr. *5 cost) and bonus knowledge skills and I made a very powerful Street Samurai. Sure, I didn't max out his dice pool, but he was all round very useful and could stand toe-to-toe with Horrors (occasionally burning edge).

I could probably make a much weaker character with 750 karma though - it depends on how much tweaking and min-maxing you do. For instance, 250k nuyen makes for powerful characters almost by themselves.

Each system can build characters that breaks the limit under the other. You can use 750 karma to build a character that would be in excess of 400 BP and vice versa.

The mage character had 7 spells, a force 4 power focus, and a force 3 sustaining focus, in addition to having the magic skills to be both a caster and a summoner. This was a rather powerful character who had 50 or so karma left over when using karmagen as compared to BPgen. The stats were min maxed for the most part but I did use the 5x stat increase system and still got Cha and Will soft maxed and hard maxed magic (which was brought down to 5 due to cyber). I would definetly say that for characters that aren't paying karma for attributes at 8 or 9 or higher, karmagen is the best power play system.

I can see it happening, but focuses is one area where BP actually shines for the player. A force 4 power focus purchased through the increased availability edge costs 4 BP to bind, it would cost I think 32 karma to bind. Karma is overall so much cheaper for the types of characters I build that I would still overall save points with Karma.

For Karmagen, you are capped at half the points (adjusted upwards by metatype cost) to spend on core and special Attributes. This makes it less scalable than BP at lower levels. Overall, I find that Karmagen tends to make slightly more powerful characters for most builds, but it is not as versatile.

Really? I find that karmagen creates roughly equally powerful characters, but they are far more versatile.

Individual characters will tend to be a bit more versatile, since they come out to slightly more, point-wise, but the system itself is less versatile for things like trolls, vampires, and some other things. BP lends itself to a wider variety of potential builds, and is more scalable.

I actually made better trolls as long as I did not need to cap both strength and body, if I soft capped one and had the other at 8ish I still usually made out though it was close. I have not tried vampires and other weirdenss in either system. At attribute x3 it wasn't even close karma always was better for me unless I went out of my way to try and make it more expensive. Now maybe a Troll adept with good magic and edge would totally break me, but when I remade my Troll adept I was under 750 points. Now I still think you should be purchasing your stats before the mods because as is Trolls pay a bunch of karma to be worse off than humans in point efficiency.

I always hated the BP system. IMO, it is only useful for creating Troll fighter dudes with soft maxed bod and str. it gimps anyone trying to be proficient in several areas instead of world class in one or two. Karmagen is the way to go for basically every character idea, except close combat troll guys.

I haven't really found that to be the case in BP. You can make someone great at one or two things, or someone good at several things. The only "penalty" is that the system as a whole is geared towards specialists being more effective than generalists. Karmagen only lets characters spread out a bit more because 750 Karma usually works out to a bit more than 400 BP does.

Concept: I prefer the Priority System.
Min-Maxing: I prefer the Karma System.
Best Overall: I prefer the Karma System. Despite the capability to min-max easily with it, it also happens to be the only official system that allows the creation of well-rounded, seasoned characters.

As for the Build Point System, it's utter shit. It's a perversion of the Priority System that gets around everything the Priority System represents; picking a focus for your character and 'forcing' tough decisions. Even the Sum-to-Ten Priority System is greatly preferred over the Build Point system for me. The problem is the execution of the Priority System. It forces too difficult a decision and leaves all characters crippled in one fashion or another. It also unduly punishes certain types of characters while rewarding the Mundane Human. Though, admittedly, the 4th Edition version took steps to avoid that to a certain degree. I think the biggest problem is that 4th Edition assumes everyone wants to play street-level thugs even though the system itself encourages seasoned professionals, right down to describing their own poorly-built archetypes. The fact that skills are grossly overpriced and attributes have no distinguishing characteristic from skills in the vast majority of situations simply compounds the problem.

My Preferred System is one closer to how White Wolf Games used to do things. Basically, each step of character creation had it's own priority system. In Shadowrun, for instance, you'd have to decide if you wanted your Physical, Mental, or Special Attributes to be your best set, your second best set, and your third best. The same thing happened with Skills and everything else. Then, at the very end, you'd essentially get bonus Karma to spend however you liked to round the character out and make them unique to everyone else. Their system also gave non-magicians something to spend the equivalence of "magic" on. Shadowrun doesn't really have anything like that; the closest you'll find is the Martial Arts system, but that's more of a variation of qualities. Earthdawn fixed it by simply making everyone an adept (which is what White Wolf did, too, really), and that worked out smashingly well.

Karma gen characters are MASSIVELY MASSIVELY more powerful than BP-gen characters. This is what all the Karma gen generates more well rounded characters rar rar rar crowd are experincing - a karma gen character is between 500 and 700 BP - if you build a BP character with 600+ BP you will have a very well rounded character because you will rapdily soft max all your attributes and be forced to add new capabilities, creating the same 'well rounded' effect.

Priority characters are shit by comparison.

To see this effect in action, create a character by the priority system in the character generation excel spreadsheet that also shows you karma totals. The priority characters come out at like 350 (or less!) BP, and are quite light on karma.

The only exception is trolls who get screwed under Karma gen if you try and make a thematic character.