Yeah, that x2 is pretty crazy there.

Stimulant patches don't keep you conscious when unconcious. It just lets you ignore negative modifiers from Stun.

Otherwise, rereading your house armor rule, it just seems like more bookkeeping and unneccessary rules. Whatever works at your table though. I was in the proccess of pointing out examples, but that isn't constructive.

There's probably plenty of systems that would work just fine if none of the players are trying to "break the game".

The real challenge in rules design is to find a system that works even IF the players are trying to break things.



-k

I'm sure the rule can be exploited, but the SR rules are eminently exploitable and all that stands between each of us and a totally dysfunctional game is the social contract between the people at the table.

I can see how my presentation of the armor-stacking house rule could be construed as recommending it as a universal rule. That was not my intent. It's probably best suited for high-threat games where additional armor is a matter of survival and not unbalancing. As for additional bookkeeping, a couple extra sums done once and written down for later reference hardly seems like much of a burden.

Difference of philosophy, I guess. I see what you're talking about as an unattainable goal and not worth the effort it would take a game designer to get close to that goal. I'm not coming out in favor of totally broken systems. I am saying that after you get to a certain level of rules clarity and usability, further effort suffers from diminishing returns.

I see your philosophy as the MMO philosophy of game design. When you're operating in the harsh world of math and statistics with no room for flexibility or interpretation and you've got millions of players whose only mission is to exploit your rules then yes, you do need an airtight set of rules.

Tabletop RPGs have the distinct and overwhelming advantage of taking place on a small scale with the guidance of an adjudicator who can interpret and change the rules to fit his/her particular group's style and tastes. Aiming for rules perfection, imo, diverts resources better allocated elsewhere.

I can see that.

My primary experience early on was convention-based campaign gaming, so it's similar to MMOs in that they need airtight rules to prevent exploiting.

I also have a habit when learning a new game system of booting up Excel and creating a character generator - even if I never finish it, it forces me to learn the game system pretty darn fast. And believe me, if a game has fuzzy or mechanically problematic rules, trying to adapt them to Excel formulas makes it real obvious.

It's not all that impossible, though. Mainly you have to be precise in your wording and watch for any multipliers.



-k

Still
How vastly different is it to have:

bodyX2 max armor (which ever is highest of B or I)
vs
(body+str)x2 max armor (adding B and I together to get the armor rating)

3 body can wear 6 armor. So A great Coat (6/5)
a 3 body 3 str guy can wear 12 points. That same Great coast is 11... He might be able to wear something
There is no armor that's 7/5 or 8/4 so.. it's not a big difference.
He would be able to wear A Camouflage Jumpsuit, with Vital and leg/Arm Casings for a total of 7/5

But if for example that character was 4 body 2 str (which is fairly common in gunbunnies) he would still only be able to wear 7/5 armor max, where as with the normal rules, he could have 8 up to 8/8 (or 16)

Now where it does start breaking apart?

My 9 Body 11 str Troll can wear 40 points of armor.
Which means that I can wear Heavy MilSpec armor for 18/16 and tack on a FormFitting Full suit for 6/2 more.
it counts as half. so that 21+17 = 38, I can still squeeze on vital protection for 22/18.

That's of course if you don't take into account milspec being x3 normally.
Still, 31 dice for soaking bullets. That's Pretty.

Absolutely the rule change punishes those with uneven Strength and Body attributes. Not everyone thinks that Strength being a dump-stat is a problem and those people are going to find this house rule pointless and harsh.

An edit for your edit:

I, personally, probably wouldn't allow the vitals protection to be stacked on to the milspec, but that still leaves you 24/18. It seems like a lot, and it is, but I run a pretty high threat game where it's not uncommon for antagonists to get a few net hits on full auto-fire with APDS. Your average of 10 Hits on 30 dice doesn't look quite so pretty when you're trying to reduce a DV in the range of 14-16.

Armor is heavy, encumbrance really should be a combined body/str number.

Strength should definitely be involved, more than Body. If you want to dump Strength, you can't carry heavy armor. Duh.

True. My group changed to STR. Now, if you really want to add another level of complexity, you could create a mechanic that tells for how long you can wear armor without taking any penalties using both STR and BOD on the equation, but unless you have a notebook by your side keeping records of this, I think it is unecessary.

Except by making armor BOD and STR dependent you end up penalizing nonmelee characters by effectively doubling the cost of BOD for those of us that think we should be able to wear a jacket. I could see eliminating STR entirely, merging BOD and STR into a single BOD attribute, making all STR checks BOD checks, and raising the cost to 1.5x normal.

Of course, that isn't theorycrafted to be balanced, that's just some stuff I made up right now.

Okay, right, but it would also attract less attention than a full person (Well, be less likely to be noticed, a floating head would likely attract alot of attention once noticed )

I'm not saying you should get the full -6 without a helmet, but you should certainly get at least a -4 or so since most of your bulk is missing. Actually, isn't it in the rules somewhere that if your weapons aren't covered, it drops the bonus to -4? Sounds fairly similar. Weapons floating at chest level, head floating at eye level (Provided of course the person doesn't do something crazy like crouch while trying to be sneaky).

Yes, Chameleon Coating in Arsenal says if the weapon doesn't have that mod then the Chameleon Suit bonus gets reduced to -2.

Edit: For weapons greater than pistol size.

Yeah, I'd say exposure of part of the body (hood/helmet off, suit unzipped, rip in fabric) would hit the same rule, drop the visibility penalty to 2 if the effect is compromised. The masking ability of Ruthenium isn't pure invisibility - you see the "floating head" and then you realize that there's a person-shaped area that's just *colored* like what's behind it. The effect is something like these: http://koikoikoi.com/2009/07/liu-bolin-the-invisible-man/ but updated in real time, with just a liiitle bit of lag. The discussions of "Opto-cam" in the Ghost in the Shell manga give a good idea of how it's done and how it's defeated.

More to the original topic - why is everyone so sure Milspec armor with strength enhancements and mobility upgrades would be utterly silent? There's a lot of whirring motors and hissing cylinders in there, even sound baffled I would say it'd make some sound. Not as much as clattering plate-and-mail, but even just the bulk of that stuff would make more noise, logically. But again, I get in trouble by straying from RAW... I forget how fortunate I am that my players look to me, every time, before the books.

It penalises those who use strenght as a dump-stat, oh cos it almost feels like it was desingned to do that.
Oh right it was.

STR should be a dump-stat for nonmelee characters though. Because BOD and STR should not be separate stats to begin with. To me, STR only makes sense for melee characters, it's the muscle mass that allows you to hit like a freight train, not the muscle resistance (BOD) that lets you routinely perform muscle-tiring activities. Yeah, you want to lift a car you're gonna need a STR test. You want to have a heavy backpack on for extended periods of time, that's a measure of your core's strength, which is, in my opinion, BOD.

Except Body is also the stat that resists toxins, etc.I guess it depends on what that extent is.

You cannot be a body 5 bad ass, and have a str of 1 or 2.
it's just not possible. In the act of getting to a 5 Body.. you'd have picked up at least a 3 or 4 str.. if not more.

And the opposite is true.

I'm still curious about this as well. Y'know, hence the topic.

Not quite sure what the 'except' refers to. Is that countering something specific?

While I certainly agree that anyone with a 5 Body would be able to perform the Athletics tasks of at least 4 Strength, a 5 Body doesn't say you're going to be able to slam a sledgehammer through a solid foot of concrete. You can be incredibly fit and not a bicep powerhouse (which I consider STR to be). I see STR as the additional "sheer physical strength" on top of fitness. I'd say a BOD 5 character with STR 2 would be someone that exercises heavily, is very fit, but hasn't focused on lifting/carrying anything beyond what his own body can support. A BOD 2 STR 5 character would be someone that lifts weights as their sole method of exercise.

A seasoned hiker, accustomed to carrying 30+ pounds of gear, would be a BOD 5 STR 2.
A teenage male that wants to "get huuuge, bruh" would be a BOD 2 STR 5. (Although the guy in the IGN video I'm referencing definitely does not have STR 5)

"that's a measure of your core's strength, which is, in my opinion, BOD"… "Except Body is also the stat that resists toxins, etc."

As the quote says, muscles are a minor part (1 of 5) of Body, and the only one qualified by 'to some extent'.

I still think that a house rule saying that str/bod have to be within 2 of each other is not unreasonable.

And I'm sorry that guy who runs 5 miles a day everyday? His legs are /killer/ strong, and he's not actually any better at dealing with toxins, than someone who doesn't run everyday.

Body is a combination core str, immune system, physical size thing.

I would expect someone with a 5 body to just be 'big' Big Viking, or a Big Irish boy.

I don't want to be the OT bully, but I really was interested in hearing what people had to say about the potential stealth-defeating aspects of Milspec armor with +4 STR and mobility enhancements. I just know my 3 BOD 3 STR 6 AGI covert ops-er is gonna want to get her hands on some of this stuff, and I want to have a fair response...

I mean, per RAW, it's not noisier or anything; you could house-rule this a little bit, but too noisy and they wouldn't use it in the first place. It's *maybe* got a higher radar Signature, depending on the materials? Maybe a higher thermal Signature, unless you got masking? That kind of thing. :/

It should have an actual vehicle signature in the first place.

But really I imagine Light Mil Spec Armor is what covert-ops guys use in situations where they need to be stealthy.

Heavy Armor is limited to Bully Boys in actual Combat Zones.

The Signature rules are kind of a mess in SR4 anyway. For one thing, there's one number for radar, sonic, thermal, (and possibly even visual) sensor detection, even though they're all different.

I think of it as like Device Ratings.
Most systems are listed as having 1 number for it all.
But in reality you could have variations. Same thing for Signature
How hard is it as a GM and come up with some signature numbers and then some signature mods for armor?

Different Coatings having different effects.
Etc.
Sure it's entirely in house rule territory. But it's actually an interesting aspect. It gives players ways to differentiate their armors.

It's not hard. It's just a huge pain. At least Device Rating is based on a set group of ratings, and we know exactly what they are. The Sensor Rating is also a pain, but again, we know exactly what it's based on.

The signature rules *appear* to be based on radar and/or heat (possibly in a sort of 70-30 split). And they don't really function properly for non-vehicles, I've seen it pointed out around here.

Are you sure about that? I've seen alot of distance runners who have somewhat scrawny looking legs, and who wouldn't actually (by looking at them) be able to kick any harder than an average person. And generally a high body means you are healthy, which means that toxins and poisons and so on are going to be fought off better by the body.

Yes, I'm sure.

those scrawny legs are all bone and muscle with very little fat.
Feel them sometime, they are /solid/ muscle. That guy has wire strength, instead of bulk. But he's still plenty strong.

You can be very "tough" as in "can take a lot of punishment and have huge endurance" without being very strong. Survivors of concentration camps typically had to be tough as hell to live through it, but generally were pretty damn feeble when they came out.

Similarly you can be a beefcake musclehead that can't take punishment and has no staying power - look at boxing, they have plenty of folks that wash out early on because they can't hang in there even if they are very strong.

I can see toughness and strength as OFTEN being linked, but they don't always HAVE to be linked.




-k

But, I think we can agree, taking punches isn't about carrying heavy armor. Presumably, the relevant aspect of Body is 'not getting tired carrying heavy things', which is fine. That's why I prefer a Str + Body approach, instead of simply replacing Body with Str.

Yeah, I might change my home games to Str+Body instead of Bodyx2 as the limiter. Wearing armor is affected by both strength and endurance.

I just don't see why Str and Bod necessarily NEED to be locked together.

I can think of plenty of examples where a person had only one or the other buffed up.


-k

By sucking up, and being a mystic adept with counterspelling. Also, the only available defense against ultrasound is a spell, so you may want to really consider a 5/1 split mystic adept.