I am new to Dumpshock but you guys seem like you've collectively been around the block...a lot! I probably don't need to make the case to any of you why SnS ammo is so incredibly powerful. (These facts are based on SR4 so if any of them have changed in SR4A then I stand corrected.)

* Stick'n'Shock rounds change any weapon's base damage to 6S(e). For all weapons with a damage under six, that means more damage.
* Stick'n'Shock rounds are soaked with Body + Half Impact (rounded down) which means significantly more damage
* Every time you take electricity damage you have to make a Body + Willpower + 1/2 Impact (round down) roll and get three hits. If you fail, you are effectively dead (paralyzed for 2+ Combat Turns). At my game table we call it the flop and twitch roll.
* Even if you succeed the above test, you still take a hefty -2 Penalty on top of the wounds you have already incurred for the same duration (2+ full turns).
* Stick'n'Shock is available at character creation.
* Stick'n'Shock costs less than Flechettes which are worse in every way.
* Stick'n'Shock has an Availability of 5R and a cost of 80 Nuyen. Nothing stops every runner from starting game with a boatload of it.

In other words, Stick'n'Shock ammo effectively turns a standard pistol (light or heavy) into a Force 6 Lightning Bolt spell with no drain that you can cast twice per turn. What a mage can do once per turn for 6DV Drain, anyone can do twice per turn without risking stun. But it's not just magicians that SnS make look bad. Every ammo in the game is irrelevant compared to SnS.

* Regular Ammo: LOL.
* Gel rounds? Don't make me frigging laugh.
* Flechettes' extra damage won't necessarily exceed that of SnS, and it is soaked with IMPACT + 5 as opposed to Impact/2.
* Explosive ammo is better than the above but not as good.
* 'Novelty'/Specialty Ammo we can discount.
* That leaves APDS....which is the only ammo even close to as effective as SnS, and even it is nto as good. It is also Availability 16F.

But what does Stick'n'Shock ammo really, really, really make look bad? Almost every other form of electricity damage. Why would anyone ever, ever, ever buy a four shot Yamaha Pulsar when they can get a 30 shot Fichetti Security 600 "taser" for pennies more with Recoil Comp and a folding stock. Even a generally crappy gun like a Colt American L36 becomes a dangerous threat when combined with Stick'n'Shock.

So, then, how to fix it? I see basically three issues...

* Availability/Price
* Armor penetration.
* Flop and twitch effect.

Now my players aren't abusing it. They're really good about that! But just as an exercise, how would you fix it? Assuming of course you agree that it's a problem.

Just off the top of my head, I am thinking of increasing the availability to 13F and the price to 200. That in-and-of itself does a LOT because it means you need to invest at least 6BP (Restricted Gear) to start with 250 Rounds of the stuff as opposed to less than one BP. Next is the armor penetration. Impact - 2 sounds like a good compromise. With those two fixes, we can leave the secondary effects of electrical damage as is. Of course, I'm not married to this.

I'd love to hear alternatives. : )

Have you run a search on this topic. It seems to pop up at least once every 2 -3 months.

The consensus if there really was one was to change the availability or to just flood the market with it and give everyone non conductivity on everything.

No, I haven't run a search.

Mea culpa, I guess?

Well the first thing you always have to consider with Shadowrun.... It's a deadly game PERIOD. If your not prepared, anything can kill you quite easily. Let's say the average character has 3 body and willpower as well as some decent armor, it's not that hard to get 3 hits and even not, you still have edge.

The Drawbacks to Stick'n'Shock rounds (especially with my favorite types of Gun Characters I play...) You can't target vital areas as per the combat rules. 6S to your torso is still gonna do 6S to your head. You can't take a -4 penalty to your shooting like any other round and get +4 NON STUN damage to what ever gun your using. Sure, Stick'n'Shock is great against unarmored opponents that are average at best, but if that's what your up against in the first place, you've gotta ask yourself if using your gun is even a necessity at this point since there's such mediocre security/opposition.

APDS has always been the round of choice for the players in games I've run since no one ever worries about unarmored targets unless their Mages or Phys Adepts... And at that point your probably gonna need more then just Firepower

No worries, but this title as well as Direct Spells/Indirect spell tend to ignite quickly. A few of them have been shut down by the mods. They do have a lot of good ideas. And as I said there are a lot of them.

S&S isn't really that good, it really only raises the weapons damage for pistols and SMG:s, after that its just even(AR:S and L/MG:S) or less and you start to need really absurd armor values for it to be better then EX-EX and APDS or even Fletchette(as it actually gives more damage).

If your going for light pistol or hold-out with S&S, you could just as well get Defiance EX Shocker that is a much better electrical weapon(get 2 to get around the SS firerate)
For Heavy pistols Warhawk with EX-EX or APDS is pretty much just as good and actualy does physical damage
That leaves pretty much only Machine pistols and SMG:s as the only categories in which S&S rules supreme and even then a burst of EX-EX does enought stun damage that the difference doesn't really matter.

Only think you really need S&S is if your against nasty force 5-7 spirits.



WTF, nothink in the rules stop you from taking called shots with S&S rounds or any other electric damage weapons.

I'll admit that we don't use called shots often at my table...generally we figure it's six in one, half a dozen in the other, since the more dice you roll the more net hits you can rack. We'll leave soft targets out of this for now.

Jonny, imagine you're shooting at a Red Samurai with Body 6 and 12/10 Armor. You've got your trusty Ares Predator.

If you load APDS and aim a -4 Dice Pool Called Shot to the FACE, if you hit he's soaking a base of 9P with 13 Dice.

If you load Stick'n'Shock and fire a regular, non-called shot, he's soaking a base of six damage with 11 Dice. And remember you get to roll FOUR MORE DICE on the attack. If he takes even ONE BOX of damage, he has to resist being immediately incapacitated, and he is subject to an additional -2 penalty.

Starting to see my point at all?



EX-EX has less AP and is resisted with ballistic and you don't have "Heads you're incapacitated, Tails you get -2 to Everything".

Yepp... everyone who has money for real armor nearly ALWAYS has nonconductivity at high level. At least in my games. Electricity attacks are nasty and very common. Only chemical attacks are even in the same league.

But there are other factors:
SNS cannot penetrate barriers (Would be REALLY weird), cannot harm someone imune to electricity (drones for example) AND... and this is of course just my opinion and against the rules as written: They shouldn't stack damage like the other ammo types - of course more is better... but you can't get more tasered than tasered *g* and alos they should cut down on the range a bit.

(Also i prefer to have them shot just in high caliber... i find it stupid to allow them in light pistols and MP's and such. Shotgun should be the tool of the trade here.

Best fix for stick and shock, just pretend it doesn't exist.

I dislike the idea of everyone having nonconductivity but that is one fix.

Stick'n'Shock in shotguns only is an option I do like (makes sense) although it seems a touch extreme.

Warhawk with EX-EX also has 1 higher base damage(on avarage worth 3 points of AP) so it has technically -6AP compared to S&S, meaning the target has to have more then 12 points of armor for S&S to get better AP.

Drones definitely aren't immune to electricity, but your right that S&S rounds cant harm then(except the side effect) as drones dont take stun damage

Too bad S&S isn't really worth it in shotguns, except in very specific situations.

Where did you get that? Called shots can always be used unless the GM says there are no vulnerable spots.
Actually SnS shines against armored targets. No other round (except for those fired from rail guns) have that much armor negation.

True, but unfortunately APDS is not available at CharGen.

My fix to SnS is to have the gameworld react to the effectivness of the ammunition. Most professional guards will have rating 6 electricity protection.

Well... everyone having nonconductivity is just logical. I mean: People run around with SNS-Ammo and stuff *g*.

Buy an Armor Vest (6/4) for 600 bucks and go down from an old grandma with her taser or buy a Armor Vest with 6 Levels of nonconductivity (6) for 1800 and laugh at the puny thunderbolts of a mighty spirit.

9 points of armor isn't really that awesome versus thunderbolts of even relativly weak spirits(force 4-7)

It's just 8... but it is maybe enough to just get knocked out instead of being fried... Also maybe enough to take 2-3 of that with good body.

But of course there is no ULTIMATE armor which makes you perfectly safe from everything. SR rewards aggressive behavior, you shouldn't "wait it out". Armor just helps giving you more actions to murder someone.

Most of the Groups I know or read of in german forums use either of these Houserules
A) S&S ammo only in Shotguns or Rifles
B) additional hits don't raise the damage .Its capped at 6S (+burst or aimed fire damage)
C) drastic raise of Avail and Price
in my own Groups we use B )

with a Housedance
Medicineman

A makes S&S pretty useless most of the time, unless they rule it to have a higher base damage.

Ok, if your using an Ares Predator without Burst Fire, your either not using the Arsenal Book modifications or your an ammo-whore That's an extra +2 to your 9P.

11 Automatic Damage vs 14 (not 13, your math was off ) soak dice that won't turn up all successes... And keep in mind this isn't factoring in EXTRA damage with the successes that carry over from hitting your target when he fails at dodging. I mean when I hit a target, I usually get at least 5 successes over and that's with a starting character following all the limitations on equipment of 12R or less and money wise... I dunno, it still sounds like your taking a long shot with the Stick'n'Shock and hoping they fail their Body + Willpower + Half Impact Armor test.

At least with Damage, if you don't kill them in one shot, your building up a wound penalty snow ball to keep blasting at them and giving them more negatives to all their dice pools until they drop.

Have to agree. It's possibly one of the sillier ideas that Shadowrun has come up with.

Here, for example is a projectile from an 5.56mm M855 ball round for the M16 assault rifle. Pardon the blurry pic. Took it with my camera phone in mediocre lighting.

http://i56.tinypic.com/9fthd5.jpg

As you can see, it's slightly shorter than the diameter of a quarter and narrow enough to fit inside Washington's neck. Now, instead of being a somewhat balanced and aerodynamic slug, it's going to be an encased miniature capacitor with a non-aerodynamic conductor face and some kind of miracle adhesive on the tiny space between conductor prongs that allows for it to "stick" to an opponent?

Mind you, there couldn't be adhesive on the sides of the projectile, and the prongs have to be thick enough to penetrate the surface being "stuck" and also sturdy enough not to bend or break under the impact, or even from the simple wear and tear from being handled, loaded and carried.

Now, anybody who has ever seen a ballistics test or wandered around the impact area for a range will tell you that there's often not much left of even a pistol round that has struck a target. Shadowrun has developed a round that can be fired at absurdly high muzzle velocities and is still sturdy enough not to be completely deformed/destroyed at the point of impact.

I've figured out what they're made out of.

http://cdn.fd.uproxx.com/wp-content/upload...-Unobtanium.jpg

No, it just balances the 1/2armor and the sideeffect of Electricity

If he takes even ONE BOX of damage, he has to resist being immediately incapacitated, and he is subject to an additional -2 penalty.
It's even worse than that.You don't even need one Box of Damage.A gracing Hit (in German Streifschuß ----no Netto Hits) is all you need for the Victim to make his CON&WIL (3) roll

with a gracing Dance
Medicineman

Some interesting "real tech".

The TASER eXtended Range Electronic Projectile (XREP)

http://www.apbweb.com/images/XREP.pdf

http://www.technovelgy.com/graphics/conten...taser-xrep2.jpg

Has a muzzle velocity of approximately 260fps (less than 1/6 of common slug rounds) and an effective range of approximately 30m.


S&S would be believable as a round for shotguns using Taser ranges. Maybe even a heavy revolver like the Ruger Super Warhawk if you're feeling sassy. But remember, the shotgun would be limited to SS mode because the propellant in the round won't be enough to cycle a semi-automatic action (meaning pump action or a manual bolt manipulation).

Ahem. With an extra 60-some years of refining, I don't see a problem with it at all.

EDIT: This is an old site for the round, but there are shotgun rounds on the market now for it.

EDIT EDIT: Kruger-ninja.

A regular round costs 25% of a Stick and Shock round and has better Availability. S&S should be always 400% more effective.

But it is not. Use the right round in the right weapon for the best results.

Don't confuse SA mode (Two shots per action phase) with a semi automatic trigger group. They are not necessarily the same. The Remington 900 at least looks like a regular pump action shot gun (especially in SR4) and is SA whereas the Panther looks like having at least a semi automatic mechanism but fires only in SS.
SR4 simply does not go into the details enough to decide whether a certain round produces enough force to chamber the next round.

One thing to consider is that it takes a pretty steady hand to use Stick and Shock effectively vs. drones and light vehicles as well. On the bright side, with enough net hits you can theoretically force a drone out of action for a few combat turns even with a holdout. On the downside, you need a fair number of net hits to win the test against any Steel Lynx equivalent drone and even then it will not be permanently harmed unless you switch to something that threatens sufficient Physical damage. That means depending on JUST a light pistol for all your self-defense needs can become a bit of a problem if you're not a Gunslinger Adept who tosses entire bricks of dice at their opponents. So heavier weapons may seem like a bit of a niche item at first blush, but my group's samurai has never really had any reason to regret his habit of stowing a Defiance T-250 and a handful of tungsten AV slugs in the back of the van. Dirt cheap and effective.

Ahem, physics. Familiarize yourself with them. They aren't going to be defeated in 60 years, lol. For an assault rifle round to travel the 550 meters that its extreme range allows, it leaves the barrel at 3100 fps. The round would have to withstand the impact in order to deliver its shock.

http://posterous.com/getfile/files.postero...tion_bullet.gif

And you probably shouldn't hop on the bandwagon for theoretech so quickly. They apparently only successfully tested the round in 37mm (yeah, that's a grenade launcher sized round), and there's been no news from the company in like five years, lol. That. and their website is defunct. Come on son, linking a press release from 2004 as a source?

I offered the link to the XREP. That's what a plausible Stick & Shock round would be like. The 100m range they claimed for ShockRounds? Not in a pistol caliber, that's for sure. Problem is, when you're trying to propel a round that far, the velocity it has to travel at increases, which sorta defeats the purpose of a less-lethal round if it is going to kill somebody with kinetic energy at close range. Assuming we suspend disbelief and believe a company would develop a round with LtL capability but not care that it had to travel at lethal velocities, the round still has to be constructed of Unobtainium so that it isn't completely flattened/fragmented upon impact with its target and destroyed. That ShockRound assumed the projectile would deliver a one time charge, not the pulsing charge of S&S. So, barring the discovery of Unobtainium, the round has to travel at greatly reduced muzzle velocities. And you still have the problem, even if the miniaturization of the tech becomes plausible, of the action not cycling in a semi-automatic weapon due to an understrength propellant charge.

Don't see the problem? LOL. There's no way it could even theoretically work. It's pure, unadulterated fantasy, and it doesn't even get the "It's magic" hand wave. You're more likely to express into a troll in a few years than for Stick & Shock to ever become a viable technology as written in the rules.

No it doesn't. But then again, SR4 has weapons designed by people who don't know anything about weapons. I'm not debating 4e rules. I'm telling you the tech wouldn't work. This isn't about game application, it is about theory. The reason why I denoted that a round like the XREP would force a shotgun to be SS instead of SA is that the description of the round explicitly states that it won't cycle a semi-automatic shotgun. Thus, for a "plausible" re-write of the S&S to represent a shotgun utilizing taser rounds, it should include that the weapon is restricted to SS.

This isn't surprising. A lot of less than lethal rounds won't cycle semi-autos. The M1014 for example, was rejected by every branch of the US armed forces except the Marine Corps in part because it wouldn't cycle non-lethal ammunition and the charging handle is on the right side of the weapon, making for an awkward motion to have to manually pull it back for every shot.

Along what Kruger says, I thought some time ago about this houserule :

-Increase the price and availability of the stick and shock
-Give it the regular round damage, and the 6S(e) come as a bonus and is resisted separately

The only problem being, it will most likely make it even more overpowered

I think you are making an assumption that may not hold true. You are assuming that real world physics (or at least your projection of real world technology 60 years forward) operate the same manner in the Shadowrun world.

Indeed. When playing Shadowrun, familiarise yourself therefore with Shadowrun physics where SnS works. Free your mind.

Your failed attempts to be clever are noted. Try and contribute something valid or useful, or just say to yourself "I don't care that it couldn't work, I'll use it anyway."

Besides, the "60 years from now" excuse is garbage anyway. Bad science fiction writers sixty years ago said we'd all have flying cars and practical jetpack technology by now. No reason bad science fiction writers can't predict something impossible in Shadowrun 4e. For every technology we can point at and show how it has advanced in leaps and bounds in the last half century, we can show another that hasn't. Weapons technology, if anything, should be pretty much the kicker. The basic design and function of the modern projectile weapon hasn't changed in the last hundred years, and the physics behind it hasn't changed in the last ever. Shadowrun is still grounded in the same basic reality we are, as evidenced by the way the sourcebooks have always tried to offer explanations for how all the various cyber and bio technologies work. Some things are magic. Everything that isn't magic in Shadowrun has conformed with real world laws, or at least tried to offer reasonable explanations of the tech that allows for the bending of them. That doesn't suggest in any way that Shadowrun is trying to present some kind of gonzo bizarro world.

Free my mind. What a joke. If you're willing to completely shut yours off, go ahead. Some of us enjoy higher cognitive function. I never said you had to stop using Stick & Shock. I just said that it cannot work and that the suggestion of pretending it didn't exist was the one I agreed with.

Physics in the Shadowrun universe does not necessarily function the same way in the real world. Your failed attempts to be clever are noted as well. Try and contribute something valid or useful, or just say to yourself "I don't care that it could work, I want to change it anyway."

Indeed, free your mind. Not a joke. But if you're willing to completely shut yours off, go ahead. Some of us enjoy higher cognitive function. I never said you had to use Stick & Shock as it is printed. I just said that it can work and that the way certain technologies work in Shadowrun may not be the same in real life.

Every time I think I've already met the worst posters on this forum, someone new pops up and with even less capability for coherent argument construction or mature discussion.

Fair enough. You win. Your rock solid argument grounded in "because I said so" has taken me completely by surprise and left me toothly unarmed for further discourse. You really showed me. Damn son, the "Your demonstrated superior knowledge of general physics and ballistics is no match for my six year old child style mimicry and absolute obstinacy" tactic is impressive and overwhelming...

So, this guy discarded, is there anyone who would like to discuss this topic intelligently? I'm willing to field questions from people who won't immediately resort to childish "Nuh uhs" if you don't understand all or part of why Stick & Shock technology isn't feasible with modern tech, or even documented and accepted Shadowrun tech that isn't Stick & Shock ammo itself (as in, the proof cannot be the existence of the item in the rulebook alone, lol).

Or, perhaps, someone with far greater working knowledge of metallurgy and physics than myself who can offer up a reasonable hypothetical model for it?

Seriously? Can we get back to examples or ideas that stay on topic

All I'm saying is that I'm imparting useful and practical knowledge for players and GMs who would find it useful to run campaigns that are more realistic and believe Shadowrun is grounded in the same basic reality we are, just with some added supernatural elements. The players and GMs who don't have any use for that information as it pertains to their game can simply set aside that knowledge but at least emerge from this thread a little more knowledgeable.

toturi. you are imparting douchebaggery just for the sake of being a douchebag. And that's really not very constructive or helpful.

Like I said just before, I believe something like SnS is possible in 60 years time, but I seriously doubt it could be non lethal. At best, it'll add some electrical shock to a lethal bullet, taking out the opponent quicker.

that could be something like

DV -1 AP +1, resist normaly, all net hit/called shot rules apply there, and a fixed 6S(e) with the same rules as current SnS

Personally, I don't consider SnS to be that big a game breaker as some people make it out to be. Sure, the fix damage value is nice, and -half impact armor is pretty sweet too. But let's see against who it really matters:

Low-level mook (e.g. Go-Ganger): those guys probably have 6/4 armor (lined coat). Assuming you're wielding a heavy pistol, SnS effectively offers +1DV and -3 AP. That's good, but not really a big deal; those mooks are going to loose anyway.
Mid-level mook (e.g. soldier): standard armor should be 9/8 (camoflage suit + helmet). This time, we're using assault rifles, since the opposition is heavily armed as well. SnS offers -5 AP. That's slightly better than APDS, but since we're talking about soldiers here, a +3 Nonconductivity would be in order, effectively reducing the AP to -2. That's balanced, and not entirely screwing the SnS player over.
High-level mook (e.g. Special forces): SWAT/Light Milspec results in 14/12. Again, assault rifles are used. Against armor of this magnitude, SnS really begins to shine, effectively offering -8 AP. Since these are top-of-the-line guys, nonconductivity 6 is reasonable.

Essentially, what I do to balance SnS is to give higher-tier opponents a scaling non-conductivity. The importance is scaling; a flat Nonconductivity 6 for all opponents is lame and passive-aggressive.

Kruger & Toturi: Tone it down guys. Kruger your knowledge of physics and real world military is useful (and i've enjoyed it in other threads) and you're spot on about the feasibility of stick and shock ammo in relation to our world in my opinion, based on your evidence and reasoning. I think Torturi does have a point though. SR may say it continues on from this world and mimic our physics but in a world where magic suddenly exists and elves and other races mutate from humans... well, physics may have subtely shifted too. Sure there is nothing that explicitly states it nor anything that states stick and shock ammo uses some special technology that ignores conventional physics or has magical properties or something but it could do. I am essentially saying you both have an argument therefore. I just wish you'd both be a little less... sarcastic about putting it across to each other.

I think the point that SR isn't this world is a useful one. It doesn't have to completely follow real world physics or anything really. It's up to the GM and his interpretation of the setting. SR doesn't have to explain itself - its fictional. It's like trying to make sense of Star Trek or Star Wars. Light sabres and teleporters... give it a rest. You have to have a little suspension of disbelief. However, I think Toturi you are missing Kurger's point entirely and his is a useful one. For the GM who wants to interpret the SR world as a continuation of this one and to assume physics are the same and things are consistent with this world unless through magic or some other anomaly... then yeah, stick and shock technology would not be practical as described. Nor implementable as ammo for most weapons that works near identically to normal ammo except shocking the victim and as a continuous effect.

It's up the GM how they view SR and its physics and weapons. You can always argue that everything in the books is fine even if it wouldn't ever work in this world. If you started to make a fictional sci fi game too realistic according to physics and conventional current understanding of technology then you'd probably be ruling most stuff out. Kruger is aware of this however and even states that at least SR attempts to explain away some of its more novel technology such as cyberware. So I have to agree with Kruger overall - please be more constructive and not just attack Kruger's point that SR in regards to stick and shock ammo doesn't follow real world physics. Your point about it not having to - that's up to the GM and doesn't refute Kruger's point at all.

Further on topic and as an aside: I think Stick and shock is fine myself. It's juse a useful tool the GM can add to make an encounter more challenging for players and something for players to be aware of - and use themselves. If you pick up nonconductivity armour it's not too bad. If you really want to tone it down in games, why not offer an armour upgrade or item that completely nullifies stick and shock? I dunno exactly how it'd work. Maybe some minor EMP field function you could switch on that only barely emits from the fabric/item/armor and prevents stick and shock from triggering its effect? It wouldn't prevent against the impact damage though. And it'd be picked up on scanners and anything that detects EMP - you'd probably cause cameras and other items to go fuzzy if you get really, really close. Still, I think stick and shock is all up to the GM. If they want it and don't want to screw you over you just have to trust them. If they use it without knowing its potency and its overpowering in your game (perhaps because none of the players have nonconductivity or weak body) then they can just decide to use it less. If they want to use something overpowered to screw you over they are a bad GM and just be glad they aren't arming all the gangers with gauss rifles

Normally I wouldnt say S&S is to much of a issue particually in the game I'm in, but putting abit more thought into it there is one simple answer

Net hits do not increase damage (only confirm you have hit)
So if your firing a light pistol yes you get a power boost but a lucky roll with three net hits isnt takign you to 9S your still at 6S.
Granted it is a fairly major change but I think its a option that could be usable.

If we assume the round is mostly used to subdue someone safely without killing them then knowing that for most people one round will leave them dazed and possibly on the floor but two rounds will leave most people knocked out but mostly unharmed seems fair. It also would get rid of some of the silliness of a shot getting four or more net hits and suddenly a single shot does more damage then is possible to believe.

I like this solution. I also like the SS house rule. It's a special ammo, with some potential benefits and with these rules also a couple of drawbacks.

Although with tasers already in the game, I would almost be inclined not to allow SnS in my game (even if they exist in the real world today). So if PCs want to stun the bad guys, they need to bring a tazer or stun baton in addition to their guns. Bumping up the cost and availability would possibly be enough to limit their use or at least have the PCs consider carrying a secondary stun weapon.

Or using the gel rounds. Well, they've been pretty much nerfed a lot (-1 DV now isn't it ?) but still relevant if you want to knock the bad guys without killing them.

(-1 DV now isn't it ?)
Right
DV-1 /AP +2
(from the german erratta'ed Ed)

with a confirming Dance
Medicineman

The fact that you consider force 4-7 spirits "weak" is kind of disturbing.

Once upon a time, Ex-Ex used to be +2 DV -2 AP. No one complained about SnS back then.

After Ex-Ex got nerfed, everyone turned to flechette, which in turn got nerfed. I wonder what ammo type will be next after SnS. They should really start nerfing regular ammo; I mean, it's a steal for what it does!



Thing is, they are. Force 6 and below is pretty much fodder for any opposition above ganger level, and Force 7 is barely cutting it.

Maybe it shines on anything that lacks armor penetration on the gun. Remember, SnS overrides the AP value for the gun, so your assault rifle's base -1 AP is removed when you use SnS.

If you compare it to APDS, you need to have 11+ Impact armor for SnS to provide more AP than a weapon with -1 AP using APDS.

If you're seeing 11+ Impact armor, your target is probably sporting 14+ Ballistic Armor. As far as shadow runners are concerned this is functionally in the mil-spec/spec-op/prime runner category. 6/4 or 8/6 is going to be par the course for most opposition for runners.

So on an assault rifle....
APDS: 6P -5AP (Target 6/4: 1 Ballistic, Result: 5.66P -- Target 8/6: 3 Ballistic, Result: 5P)
EX-Ex: 7P -2AP (Target 6/4: 4 Ballistic, Result: 5.66P -- Target 8/6: 6 Ballistic, Result: 5P)
SnS: 6S -half impact (Target 6/4: 2 Impact, Result: 5.33S -- Target 8/6: 3 Impact, 5S)

So let's be a bit intellectually honest here. The average grunt is going to be dead or KOed from two single shot rounds and that's just off the raw armor vs. weapon. An average body of 3 would reduce damage by 1 again, but there's a good chance that there will be at -least- one extra damage from net hits. So if your goal is to incapacitate (of which both a kill and a KO count), then it doesn't matter which you go with, and against lesser armored individuals your better with EX-Ex or ADPS. The other effects of SnS are negligible since they only matter after your action phase (though the extra -2 from electric damage would make incapacitation easier).

--



-1 DV, +2 AP, uses Impact rather than Ballistic, 4R, 30 per 10.

I think the availability and price of gel rounds is too high. At +0 DV, +2 AP, uses Impact, the cost was perfect. You pay a small premium and your ammunition is -essentially- equal to regular ammunition (impact armor rates 2 points lower than ballistic on average). Given the drawback of -1 DV on gel round, I think the price should be kicked back to 20 per 10.

Maybe you should look up what the word relative means or if you know that, practise reading thinks in contects.
The post i quoted talked about mighty spirits, which is somethink like force 10+, so compared to those they are weak.
And really force 7 spirits elemental attack does less damage than Defiance EX Shocker, so it is pretty pathetic thunderbolt.

If it deformed properly under impact in order to deliver it's shock, that would work as well.

As an example, I'm thinking of the black talon, a bullet that is designed to deform in a very specific manner in order to do what it does.
If the contacts were on the inside of the talon, then deforming upon impact, either naturally or internally assisted, would allow the device to have it's payload on the inside, not the outside.

Increasing the availability to 13F looks ugly.. it's a mostly non-lethal weapon, why should it be Forbidden? One of the nice things about Shadowrun is that you can make a non-lethal fighter that's competitive with the lethal fighters.

That said, of course SnS is a bit nasty. I'm thinking more along these lines:
* SnS never increases the base damage of the weapon
* Take a long hard look at possible house rules for ItNW and AP
* Move price and availability up a bit, but not out of chargen reach
* Reduce the stunning effects of electrical attacks, and define clearly how nonconductivity works against that

Consider that AP -50% is only really insane against things with way too much armor; against Joe Schmuck with Body 3, Armor 6, Ex-Ex is actually more impressive. (+1 damage is equivalent with -3AP)

Finally, I'm a believer in Nonconductivity; it's one of the most common armor upgrades in my setting, because tasers are legal, available, affordable and effective.

The cost of the round isn't the same as the cost of DELIVERING THE ROUND ON TARGET- IE, the cost of training and equipping the user, providing care for them if injured in the fight, etc. That's what you should be using for comparison purposes. S&S is cheaper in that respect- because if you win the fight, your costs go down.

I would think that if you lost the fight, your costs would be zero.

Your next of kin, on the other hand...

Sure. The problem is, it requires not a suspension of disbelief but the entire discarding of it. For Stick & Shock to function, it either requires bullets made of some kind of super material that would not be deformed or destroyed upon impact with an immovable object, or you have to believe projectile technology has advanced to the point where the round would be able to detect a target and then almost instantaneously decelerate itself to avoid full strength impact. Using retro rockets I'm sure, lol.

I mean, one could try and argue that it uses gyrojet technology too, and therefore the velocity of the round is controlled by a miniature rocket to provide the continued thrust to move at relatively low velocity over a long distance. Just for the sake of argument, we'll explore that, lol. So now you have a projectile approaching at approximately 350 fps which is way faster than probable, but at least feasible. We're talking about a round traveling so slow that you can see it coming.

Like I said, even the slightest application of basic physics and rational thought processes defeats the concept of Stick & Shock. I was simply nice enough to give an expanded explanation for people.

I'm willing to allow Shadowrun science to bend reality a bit. But if the world still uses conventional firearms technology governed under the same laws of basic ballistic physics and this is evidenced by the fact that weapon ranges tend to be approximately the same as their real world equivalents and the descriptions of how the firearms work is the same. Stick & Shock wouldn't be a subtle shift in physics. It would be a complete refuting of it.

Use it or don't use it. But it is also okay to admit that it's probably just the result of it being thought up by a writer and approved by editors with no practical knowledge of weaponry and just thought it sounded cool. "Yeah, taser bullets! Sweet. It'll be like our own addition to the game and players like having new stuff to buy."