Just went through the rules again, and all I found was "some damagy types are resisted with willpower instead of body" (paraphrased) and the Body+Willpower special test for electrical incapacitation, so you are correct. No clue why I had it stuck in my head that S&S was resisted with Willpower. Weird. My apologies.

I gotta agree with Rotbart here. SnS is probably the best ammunition in the game, at least for pistols. It increases damage, reduces armor by half, is resisted by the lower (usually, unless you're a biker) armor, adds a -2 penalty to all actions in addition to wound penalties, has a chance of incapacitating the target on contact, ignores metal armor (eat that chainmail !), and does stun damage. Not to mention that most targets who matter will have a higher physical damage track than stun. The only real reasons not to use SnS are when you're fighting drones, Pain Editored cyber sams, and walls, but really a gun bunny who wants to be the most effective should be carrying an automatic pistol full of SnS and carrying around a spare clip of APDS, not the other way around.

Even when fighting drones, you got a decent chance of removing them from combat with S&S long enough to either get away, have them crash or simply change to the AV weapon to finish them off.

Only Your Opinion



True, but that is not damage, which is what you are arguing...



Actually it is not... SnS is stun damage, and is easily removed... not so for Physical Damage, but as I said, I never said SnS was not a viable ammunition, just not as useful as you stated... it is just as much a niche ammunition as others out there...



Very Relevant... just because you disagree, does not make it so...



I fully understand exactly what the rules are for Toxins... I never said tht the onset was the second you hit them with the round now did I... You just assumed that I was unaware of the rules... that is your mistake, not mine... And for the reference, IT IS a combat ammunition... just one that takes a second or two to have an effect.

And when your opponent only has one ss or two (or maybe even three), passes, then it is really a moot point... If he is shot in the second pass.. that means, for all intents and purposes, he is either down, or has a single pass to capitalize upon my mistake... you are making a mountain out of molehills here...



Irrelevant, as the actual capsule round applies additional damage with net hits... so if I have 4 net hits, the capsule inflicts 8s which must be soaked down, in addition to the Toxin damage of 10s...soemtimes this results in the victim taking physical damage. My character has accidentally killed opponents with this ammunition because they did not soak any damage from either soak roll... sucks, but htere you go...



You are so caught up in your own perceved superiority that you cannot even see the forest for the trees... it is understandable, though, you so desperately need to be right that you cannot even concede that your opinion is not the majority, even here on Dumpshock...



The same could be said for yours as well... keep the in mind why don't you...

Keep the Faith

Wow this is becoming an annoying quote war. A person writes a paragraph and every three words is broken out as a separate quote. Uhgg.

And way I agree with RVD...

Awesome his initials are RVD.

Anyway his math is on and yes it does not matter how fast someone heals from the damage, all that matters is how fast they drop in the fight. If I take another burst because they dropped slower I am not in a happy place, if they heal up quicker I don't give a crap because chances are I wont be bumping into them again, and if I do either way it will almost always be after they are healed.

Indeed...

Well, as I have stated my opinion... I guess that I do not have to argue it any further...

Keep the Faith

Yeah it is just going back and forth at this point. And really things like the importance of heal rates is completely a game by game thing. In your game apparently how fast the people you shoot heals is important, I don't think it has ever come up in any of our games. But then again we don't really leave many living people behind us.

Body counts do tend to eliminate the healing factor, no doubt about that...
It was not really the speed of healing, but the descriptive of the damage that is really the point I was trying to differentiate...

3 Points of Stun has the same game effect as 3 Points of Physical, and yet, the physical is far more incapacitating than the stun is all other things considered... when a table only aporaches it from the penalty aspect, then the actual damage is rendered inconsequential... I prefer my damage to have consequences in play, that is all... and from that point, SnS is definitely not the uber ammunition that some people paint it to be...

It is a perspective thing, I guess, and not merely a Math thing...

Anyways, no worries...

Keep the Faith

Actually, drones have a better-than-even chance of not shutting down due to the shock. According to the rules they get their full armor value to the check. Only metahumans get no benefit from metal armor.

Ah I think I get what you are talking about. Stun damage is an boo-boo but physical damage is you bleeding out. People will react differently to bleeding out.

Precisely.

I could say the same thing about you. So far your only argument is "my opinion is that S&S is not so good" without anything to back it up.

But I agree with this part:

It's pretty delusional to say that Stick-n-Shock isn't overly powerful. Because it definitely is. The point is that people still choose other types of ammunition -- and do so regularly and consistently. The point is that other ammo types do offer something different, even if the 'total package' of SnS is superior in general. The point is that just because one type of ammo is broken, that doesn't mean the entire multiverse has to change in order to account for it.

One or more of those points seem to be flying over people's heads.

Point Taken...

Keep the Faith

I'm on of those people who never pick SnS. And every time, I hate the game for having so stupid stats for them (if the GM doesn't house rule it).

If I played some stupid gangbanger, having crap ammo for my gun and thinking it was cool would be fitting. But I like to play professionals, who pick the efficient way to fight.

The problem is I also want something interesting, and SnS doesn't fit that for me. It is so bad I just can't stomach it. Most GMs seem to be of the same opinion, because NPC pros rarely use SnS.

Someone please explain to me why pros, players and NPCs alike, are using inferior ammo? The "EX-EX is cooler" flies for gangers and wannabees, but for soldiers, cops, shadowrunners, who are out there putting their life on the line - no way.

The only people out there NOT suffering from a bad case of Stormwind Fallacy are in a) campaigns where SnS is used almost exclusively or b) campaigns where the GM houseruled SnS.

And yet they have to beat a Threshold of the Net Hits of the attack, which can get ugly pretty fast.

That or the players are actually treating SnS ammo the way it's intended (a specialty ammo only used in certain circumstances) rather than just waxing off to it because it has OMGAWSUM stats. Again, that's not a Stormwind Fallacy; that's just players respecting the nature and intent of the game rather than abusing the rules. Unless, of course, you completely avoid it because of its stats. Then you may be on to something. Carrying around a clip or two of SnS is just smart, even if the stats were completely castrated as an overcompensating reaction to its current state.

Here are some reasons:

Why does the military not use S&S?
-Physical traume take longer to heal and ties up more resources. A soldier suffering from physical trauma is more burden to the opponent than a soldier that's just knocked out for a few hours.
-Regular ammo is cheaper. Especially when it comes to the military, that can mean millions, if not billions of Nuyen in cost difference. The military needs to pay attention to their budget as well.
-Military armor with nonconductivity is incredibly effective against S&S.
-The blood spray of physical bullet wounds, have a much more direct psychological effect on bystanders. Regular bullets are a lot more effective as a weapon against enemy morale, than S&S would be.

Why do Cops not use S&S?
-Just like the military, Cops need to keep an eye on the budget. S&S is more expensive than regular ammo or gel rounds.
-In cases where a taser is needed, a Taser is available.
-Tasers are not considered weapons by most observers and thus do not increase the tendency towards aggressive behaviour due to visibility. This is especially important in risk environments, like sport events, rallys or peaceful protests.

Why do (some) Shadowrunners not use S&S?
-Personal preferences may vary.
-They want to cultivate an aura of death and destruction to help in their intimidation rolls.
-APDS is on sale this week.
-"Buy two, get one free" week for regular ammo at your local Guns'R'Us
-Holes in walls get the point across better than explaining why the S&S just rebounded from the wall but would be potentially bad for the target you are trying to intimidate
-They do less damage in Sniper Rifles.
-They are fighting storm elementals all the time
-They are fighting in a City that has a lot of annual precipitation
-Their momma always said "big holes are better than burn marks" and "electrocution is for sissies"

Especially on the runner category all the arguments are purely emotional ones, because there is no way to find a "true" answer to the question why not all professional runners use S&S. On the military and Cop cateogries there would still be a lot more reasons, but the ones I provided should serve as a viable guideline to get my point across.
You can argue rules and math and proclaim S&S to be the ultimate choice (and ruleswise you might even be right most of the time), but oce you transcend beyond the mere rules and include psychological ractions, roleplay and common sense S&S loses more and more ground. It's still a good choice. For some situations even the best choice. But there are plenty of reasons why not everyone uses S&S exclusively.

Even for ShadowRunners the budget matters. A regular round is 2, whereas a SnS round is, what, 50? (AFB)

Oh, I agree with you on that part. Some groups, however, play with absurd payouts for their Runs, sometimes even in the range of several million Nuyen. For such runners, ammunition prices are pretty much irrelevant. That's why I didn't list budgetary concerns for the Runners.

Where exactly you get that "specialty" thing from? Please not just from "special adhesive projectile"…

Like most ammo, it is used for a very certain circumstance: Make living things drop to the ground and stay down. It's sometimes an added bonus if they are still alive… if not, you can easily fix that after they are on the ground. (Mass Murder, where the individual touch just would take too much time would be an exception, tough… but this is rather what I would class as a "certaince circumstance".)

As a matter of fact, that sums up the Stormwind Fallacy, just putting pretty (respect) and ugly (abuse) words on it:
"respecting the nature and intent of the game" = Roleplaying
"abusing the rules" = Optimization
(And of course, just using a piece of equipment directly & alone in it's primary function is far from "abuse" – it's rather like inteded, obviously… since they nerfed any ammo with errata, but S&S stayed the same.)



S&S is 8 (eight) ¥ per shot.

The sad thing is that it really isn't.
The heaviest military armor with maximum isolation offers 14 Points of effective armor against APDS and 14 points of effective armor against S&S.
When using heavy pistols or assault rifles or above, you get to 13 for APDS… but are likely just to get Stun damage as well, and even less for the heavy pistol.

Ah, thanks for that. Like I said, I am AFB.



While true in the general sense, I'm finding my current character to be rather interesting roleplay wise, due to the sever disadvantage due to the non-optimization of the build (Elf Drake. 95 BP. Eaten for breakfast). But I'm good at what I do, because what I'm good at is knowing which direction to run when shit hits the fan (and how to avoid large piles of shit in favor of smaller ones): go 42 free knowledge skill ranks and taking every single skill related to Renraku and Security.

'Course, it helps that I as a player know a little bit about ShadowRun megacorps.
Example:
We were traveling upwards in search of some girl on the 42nd floor, the elevator topped out on 24. The guy in the lead (the original extraction team was down to two--rest were NPCs--and had picked up the other four of us--PCs--in the process) knew where he wanted to go and just kinda mapped a route in that direction.
As he went to hit the 24 button in the elevator I stopped him and punched 23. When asked why I replied, "would you like to deal with automated defenses, or less automated defenses?"
While I didn't explicitly use my knowledge rolls, it was something my character would have known and could have asked for a roll anyway. But I was only doing that when I, as a player, was unsure of what the answer was (eg. "where's the nearest maintenance shaft from here?" which results in an arbitrary direction and I as the player can go "quick, this way!" provided my roll gave me an answer).

I totally agree with D2F on the observations concerning the military, but for law enforcement I disagree with some points. While tasers are generally available, they have distinct drawbacks compared to SnS. Less range and lower RoF make a surprise take downs more difficult. Regular ammo has the drawback of possibly killing the suspect and bystanders. While tasers may be carried by most beat cops, I assume with the stats SnS has the patrol car probably carries an assault rifle with magazines of SnS and APDS. The latter being almost as improbable as SnS in a rifle round. But no one seems to mind that.

The reasons against SnS for runners are purely emotional and you cannot argue with that. Just one question, what has the annual precipitation to do with SnS. Don't you think the cartridge is sealed well enough?

@Draco18s: It's 8¥/shot still 4 times as expensive as regular ammo.

The point I made was not about effectiveness of tasers vs. S&S, but about the fact that S&S needs to be used in weapons. The mere presence of weapons will increase the tendenc towards aggressive behaviour from all observers. Especially in sensitive environments that is a risk you can avoid using tasers. Most observers don't recognize a taser as a weapon and therefore won't react with an increased tendency towards aggressive behavior, if they see them. In other words: it's not about effectiveness, but about de-escalation.


I was more jokingly referring to the conductivity of rainwater =)
Obviously electrical resistance, peak discharge and capacity would prevent the electrical discharge from reaching anyone other than the target. I still liked the image of the attacker electrocuting himself in the process, though
And yes, the quality of the seal is something to consider from a roleplaying perspective, as well as the structural integrity of the projectile. How likely is it to malfunction under stressful environments? How well would it perform against arriers (like a car window)? Would the be a chance for the projectile to short circuit, duuring a heavy downpoor, if badly mainatined? Those aren't rule questions, though, those are fluff questions.

Seriously? That's where I stopped reading – if you don't find play interesting, it's work…

Uh, because turning your firearm into a taser isn't the normal function of, you know, a firearm? SnS is very much a specialty ammo; it's used when you need to incapacitate an opponent rather than try to kill them, bypass their armor (despite the rules contradicting this), or kill shapeshifters. Just like APDS, Explosive, and Silver ammo are all specialty ammos, too. Regular ammo is the default, and ideally you should only be pulling out the other types of ammo as the need arises, though that can be up for debate depending on the character and the situation. If you can't grasp that painfully simple concept... well... whatever. <shrugs>




You do realize you're the one who's insisting that there's a difference between roleplaying and powergaming -- oh, I'm sorry, we can't hurt the little munchkin's feelings anymore -- I mean, "optimizing." One does not preclude the other. You can be roleplaying while powergaming, and that is what the Stormwind Fallacy is about despite your rabid clinging to it anytime someone mentions the word powergaming (or, in this case, even if they don't). But that has nothing to do with the conversation at hand. I guarantee you that if you looked at any of my characters, you'd label me as a min/maxer in a heartbeat. Yet I still make all my decisions based on their appropriateness not only to my concept, but the setting and the game itself. Running around with nothing but SnS just because (<-- keywords) it has overpowered stats is exactly the opposite of that. You may as well be ranting that everyone should only be driving murdercycles because they're ridiculously broken, too, and anyone who isn't is OMG STORMWIND FALLACY OMG OMG OMG!<brainexplode>

Actually, lighter armor with Nonconductivity is more effective against SnS than heavier armor is. The heavier you get, the more effective SnS becomes compared to APDS or AV.

Compare, for instance, Armored Clothing (Ballistic 4/Impact 0) vs. Heavy Milspec Armor w/ Helm (Ballistic 18/Impact 16), both with Nonconductivity 6. Against SnS, the Armored Clothing has 6 points of armor, whereas it has 0 against APDS. Against SnS, the Heavy Milspec Armor has 14 points of armor to contend with, while APDS also has 14. The heavier you get (you can easily get to the 20 range with a Body of 6 or 7 and normal, legal armor), the more it favors SnS.

Agreed, hence why I've had to make several before finding one I liked. This is the first (actually, second, but that was my first character ever, and was in 3E) character I've actually had remarkable amounts of fun with on a regular basis. He's not a combat monkey (in fact, lacks combat skills almost entirely), but isn't a social whore (which I'm terrible at, because I as a player am not a social whore).

The reasons behind the character concept weren't because I thought it'd be fun, but more of an experiment: how could I put all of a Drake's racial benefits to good use?

I wasn't arguing it's the best way to stop it, but it's the stuff actually USED by the military and it IS effective against S&S, especially since it counts as hardened armor.

yeah, it is hard to admit, but RvB is right (as almost always)...

cya
Tycho

If you say so.

I'll just have to amend reality and say that SnS, APDS, and Silver ammunition aren't specialty ammo types. They're to be used at all times in all weapons simultaneously. Because, you know, there's no such thing as specialty ammo. And a type of ammo that changes a lethal firearm into a non-lethal weapon is, like, totally the opposite of a specialty purpose. How could I possibly have made that mistake?

yes, if you look at all possible Situations and search for the best ammo, in most cases SnS is the way to go. Only slightly more expensive for much greater effect.

Sure you can just ignore this problem and not care about it, which is what I do, too. But that does not change that the rules are bad and in an realistic 6. world taser would be a niche product for idiots and all the security forces would use SnS as a default Ammo.

cya
Tycho

Find a single post where I ever said that SnS ammo wasn't broken or couldn't use a fix. (I'll save you the time by pointing out that I never have, and even offered a simple fix early in the thread.)

But that doesn't change the rest of the discussion. If you are choosing the ammo purely for their stats -- despite the described intent of that ammo -- you're very much powergaming and completely ignoring the world the character lives in. Broken rules are a fact of life in RPGs. That doesn't excuse them, or the people who abuse them. And if one's entire argument revolves around people not abusing the rules, then they damn well better be prepared to argue the same thing for every other broken rule the game has. Including the aforementioned 'murdercycles.'

Even being the best ammo, it's still a specialty ammo. Any ammo other than the regular ammo is. Otherwise they would the regular ammo. Duh!

Yeah, But that actually makes sense...Which is why the argument exists of course...

Keep the Faith

As the "default" is dictated by "need" as well, indeed.
In security & police work, there is a need for reducing the chance of accidentally killing bystanders. Thus, the default ammunition would be one that's less-than-lethal, or at least one that does not over-penetrate.
In fact, the need to injure & kill is generally rather the exception. Even in modern warfare.

There is no description of intent in the book for S&S.

Y'all can stick with "not Regular" ammo if that makes more sense to you.

"Special purpose" is apparently too advanced of a concept for some people.

Sure it has an implied special purpose of being the non-lethal ammo. With its stats though it has the general purpose of being the ammo that brings down almost every foe quicker than your other ammo.

It's not the non-lethal ammo – Gel rounds still exist, after all. It's just that those were nerfed with pretty much every major errata, while S&S wasn't.

And of course, even today's tasers are truly "general purpose":

Epileptic seizure? Tase 'em.
Asking tricky questions? Tase 'em.
Kid refusing to do homework? Tase 'em.
Grandma cursing you? Tase 'em.

When in doubt – tase 'em.

Unless you're a cat, in which case: wash self.

So you're saying that SnS is specialty ammo because it's only supposed to be used for fights where you don't want to kill people... And yet it's almost always better not to kill the people you're fighting, 'cause you know, people tend to have family, friends, and debt colectors that get angry when you kill them. So wouldn't it make sense for SnS to be the standard ammunition for a lot of people? Even if SnS were horribly nerfed and inferior to regular ammuntion, it would still be the standard used ammo for police and security. "Standard" is an objective opinion, just because one type of ammunition is called normal rounds doesn't mean that it's going to be the standard which everybody uses. After all, if you fought a lot of werewolves, silver ammo would be your "standard" ammunition.

Also, @Funk, you mentioned contradictory rules about SnS bypassing armor? Which? I don't believe I've heard about it before.

'Regular ammo' doesn't mean 'the ammo you normally use'. It means bullets. This is not confusing.

Taser rounds are specialty ammo. That doesn't mean 'ammo you don't normally use'.

<bangs his head on the desk, and tries his damnedest to bow out of the conversation>

I have made Funk speechless, my work is done

No. Most people obey the "Leave" commands or whatever a security guard/police officer says. If force is required, then the person will probably have to be beat down. If the person has a weapon, though, even a super taser round isn't guaranteed to knock that person unconscious and when it's their life against yours it's better for them to die. Aim for the leg if they just have a knife and are away enough, but when lethal force becomes an object, then you need lethal force. If lethal force isn't part of the equation, then you should be able to beat them down.

Or you can just tase 'em, for a smaller risk to yourself. Which is done quite liberally today – after all, it's non-lethal, and you don't have to get your hands dirty.

No: In Shadowrun, the likelihood of bringing the target down is much greater for the super taser round than for anything else, even anti-personnel rounds.
And you can do so without any second thought at all.

If your phaser is just effective when set to stun, lethal force stops being a need. Here, it's more effective when set to stun.

It is usually pretty stupid to assume that "you should be able to beat down" someone you don't know very well.

Math is not an opinion. You don't argue with math. RvD is right - SnS is the ammo of choice thanks to its stats for anyone who actually wants to be most effective in most situations.

And he is also right about the Stormwind fallacy.

No, it isn't.



That is the Stormwind Fallacy. Saying that SnS shouldn't be the standard ammo in all weapons simply because of its stats is not part of the fallacy. Saying that you can't be a roleplayer if you choose SnS ammo is. The fact that some of you can't even get that right, let alone understand what "specialty ammo" means ("derr, r u sayin itz specialty cuz it uses special adhesive?!?! u r dum!!!!"), speaks volumes about your views on the subjects of this thread.

What's more, you are the ones invoking the Stormwind Fallacy by saying that anyone who doesn't choose SnS in their weapons isn't playing properly. You've apparently missed the "vice versa" at the end, apparently. Which I, for one, find absolutely hilarious.

It just doesn't mean what you think it means, like Yerameyahu pointed out.
Aside from you making up that term.

That doesn't mean what you think it means, either – it results in: