That would mean multiple kitlists per grunt. No, I mean archetype characters with role-specific kitlists.

Like a "Sniper", or "Pathfinder", or "Medic", or "Gunner", each with "his" primary and secondary weapon, special kit like a ghillie or medic pack, armor, ammo, field kit, misc barracks/travel kit.

ATM, I am writing on the Ares unit. I decided to split the text into an inplay part and offplay gamemaster information. I think this is the best way to cater to different gaming styles Frank mentioned in Den, e.g. power-projection macrocorps with big armies and smaller units for the profit-making fans.

Ok then. I'll think of something and write it when I get back from class.

I'm having some problems issuing the kit for a grunt.
This is what I got so far:

survival kit
medkit RTG 3
trauma patch
SWAT Armor w/ Helmet
Colt M23

The cost is 10,850 . Is too much or not?

My reasoning anyway: the only reason I don't see milspec armor being issued to every grunt is because the armor is almost custom-made, i.e, you have to adapt the armor for each soldier's body, while the SWAT armor is the second best thing; it is not sealed and does not come with an integrated commlink but doesn't need to be customized, built-in biomonitor and comes with a helmet with integrated vision enhancements and gasmask.

Next, how many clips would be normally issued to a grunt. I believe it depends on the kind of mission, sure, but on average? 10 clips?
Of which ammo? I would vote for APDS, but APDS is three and a half times more expensive than regular ammo, but on the other hand, regular ammo would rarely hurt someone wearing a SWAT armor...

...OK I came into this late and haven't yet made it through all nineteen pages.

So, what of the Balkans? Last I know, the region was pretty much ignored in SoE save for passing mention that it was considered a "merc playground". As there was no information, I did an extensive writeup of the region for a campaign I ran (unfortunately pre-crash 2.0), that was based on the fallout from the Euro War and long history of ethnic friction in the region.

Nothing set in stone so far, but we're taking (for a later issue, though). Nothing's saying you can't work on it though.

For the Balkans setting, the Crash shouldn't be a world shaking event anyway, crappy as it already was. Adapting it should be relatively easy. The only mention of the area after SoE has been in Feral Cities, which did a somewhat meh writeup of Sarajevo.

And here's a little something I wrote: Metahumans in the Army. Thoughts welcome.

I'd see full armor more as a special item issued when there's need for it. A simple armored jacket should be okay, and solves the ammo type problem. I'd give him at least 8 mags, maybe a small backpack with another 4. And two smoke and 4 frag grenades. Don't forget a knife!

@Brasilian_shinobi: Secondary firearm, communications equipment might be added (radio/commlink). Possibly add armor mods to the armor and vision mods to the helmet.

What about rations and stuff?

I'll do a small text on field cuisine.

Another thing: SR4 doesn't have weight stats for the equipment. We should have some sort of encumberance rules, I think.

Yeah, they ditched weight ... so either we make an encumberance chart, or we do this by (number) items per point of strength, or ... we just do it very abstract and leave it to the GM, in good SR4 tradition.

I like it, but I don't share the author's opinion Something I'd mention is the age problem with orks and trolls - there's an international agreement not to deploy underaged soldiers, this would heavily affect their use/recruitment. On the other side, they would be huge assets in civil wars, where some sides may lack funding and compensate this with their superior fighting powers.

Good thinking, though I do think orks will see use at least in non-SOTA state armies too (and I kind of doubt Aztlan gives a shit about underage soldiering anyway).

The author also clearly is biased. It's a pro-meta think tank. Trolls (IMHO) mostly have the problem of their significant silouette and size issues with using any but tailor made equipment, but could work well as specialised guards or heavy infantry (what with the massive, massive armor they can bring to bear) - say, in critter or spirit warfare. Specialised roles though. Could see them in the NAN forces, though, and some others for more political than practical reasons ('The NEEC is an equal opportunity union and we WILL have troll subramine crew!').

I'll work it over and emphathise their roles in sub-SOTA and guerilla armies, and the age issue.

You think that there's an international agreement not to deploy underaged soldiers in 2073?

Also, I completely disagree. Soldiers found on the battlefield would be wearing SWAT Armor (for high tech forces).
Senior NCOs and Junior Officers would have Light Milspec, Senior Officers would have Heavy Milspec.

The only time you're going to run into a grunt wearing an armored jacket is on base, or when he's on R&R

I don't know. If there is one thing I think armies wouldn't want to be cheap would be issuing armor. Paying 10 times more and you have a suit of armor that can take a blast explosion from a grenade at ground zero and still survive...



I was getting there. Commlink I was thinking a rtg 3 commlink (better for officers and riggers/hackers, of course). The SWAT Helmet already comes with low-light, flare compensation, image link and smartlink. Rations and water, are magically inserted into survival kit (no kidding, read the book and see it for yourself).

[ramble mode on]
You know, I'm all about abstraction and simple rules, but if there is ONE THING that I think it's better be completely described and let each GM decide if they will use or not is the encumbrance rules of a game system. Which means that everything should have a weight.
[ramble mode off]



Also, define 'underaged'. A 10 years old Ork can have children already. And reach peak performance on his early teens, right? I can see pro-metahumans countries reducing the legal age for Orks and Trolls with no problem.
I mentioned that Amazonia Army uses Humans and Orks like everybody else, but would extend on that when talking about the Army, that the governement reduced the legal age for Orks (and Shapeshifters).

We're not going through every book and putting weight on everything

Just assume that Military types are +1 average body/str than the rest of their civilian fellows, and call it a day.

-- Why not? They already have a whole passle of agreements that ban various weapons and tactics.

-- It's extremely unlikely any officer would agree to such a thing. Wearing different armor would mark them to even the most vision-impaired sniper. Milspec armor in Shadowrun is military in name only, it requires individual tailoring, which is a ridiculous logistics burden and Full Body Armor/SWAT Armor with gelpacks is comparable/better for a fraction of the price and trouble. Most of the military-grade armor enhancements are gimmicks, with only hydralic jacks and strength upgrade striking me as particularly useful (especially if you give it a troll).

-- On base or R&R he's probably just going to wear his uniform, without any armor (unless the uniform has some limited protection, like Armor Clothing).

I know, I know. Like I said, it was just rambling...

So, PEACH:

backpack
survival kit
medkit RTG 3
trauma patch

SWAT Armor w/ Helmet
Chemical Protection 2, Fire Resistance 2, Insulation 2

Colt M23
8 clips of APDS ammo
Colt Government 2066
5 clips of APDS ammo
2 Flare grenades
4 High Explosive Grenades
2 Thermal Smoke Grenades

Novatech Airware with Iris Orb OS
Tacsoft 3
Analyze 3
Browse 3
Edit 3
Encrypt 3
ECCM 3

It costs 30,000 (actually 29,995, but let's round it)

Civilians wear armored clothing in 2073..

Milspec armor also provides much more armor before encumbrance (body x3 vs body x2)

You're basically proposing that in 2073.. High Tech Militaries have /worse/ armor than they do today?

-- These look fine. I do find it amusing how expensive and crappy the trauma patch is in SR (they are often worse than a medkit and are not even faster to use). Might be something to address.


-- I can see Fire Resistant. The other two seem a bit more unlikely, usually being the sort of thing offloaded to specialist gear.

-- Just a thought, but armor for technicians, aircrew, and the like is probably very similar to the urban explorer jumpsuit (arguably the most cost effective pieces of armor in the game).

-- Why the stripped down M23 and not the M22A3 or better? What gun options does it have? The following come to mind:
* Advanced Safety (not cost effective at all in its current form though)
* Safe Target System (maybe, it's very expensive)
* External smartgun system
* Imaging scope (comes with the M22A3, but it has no options standard)
* Sling
* Foregrip
* Laser Designator (at least a rating 1 seems like a no-brainer).

-- Note that a pedant will object to you using "clip" when it should be magazine

-- A return to heavy pistols as a sidearm makes sense given the armor ratings of even armor clothing. Five magazines seems like a lot for what is an emergency weapon. Most would just carry more rifle ammo instead.

-- Needs a knife or survival knife. It's a combination utility tool, "peace of mind" backup, and something to use in a pinch against spirits (see Attack of Will, p. 94, Street Magic).

-- To both: So?

-- I'm proposing that they would buy armor that's just as good but doesn't have the tailoring requirement, which shuts down military-grade armor as an option for extensive organizational deployment. That, and it's stupidly expensive for what amounts to having a cool name and a few decent perks.

I don't think cost is a serious issue in this case. They're going to be buying 30,000 of these from Ares. And remember the costs in arsenal are for after market modifications. We routinely have weapons with built in mods that are /much/ cheaper than doing it yourself (I'm looking at you White Knight)



Sling yes, foregrip? No. Yes it helps with recoil, but it hurts your targeting. You can't realistically fire prone with a weapon that has a foregrip. If the foregrip can be detachable, or foldable.. then maybe.
The smartgun system would be internal most likely.


Can you have this and smartgun on the same gun?

I agree, but I think it is the last resource stuff that you use to prevent a soldier from dying.



I agree with Insulation, it was more fore completion sake. About chemical protection, are we to assume that the Geneve Convention is somehow still agreed upon? If so, the gas mask of the helmet should be enough.



That's an idea.



I think it's better to work with a clean weapon and add stuff as necessary. But I agree, I should have listed the mods and add-ons this weapon would have.



Ok, I'll reduce the amount of magazines.


It's already listed in 'survival gear'

I'd push the programs and the link a bit- say, give it Iris Orb Military edition (System 3, Firewall 6) and have ECCM, Encrypt and Analys have the option "optimised 3". Still keep it at 30K because it's a package deal.

And make it all be produced by Ares subsidiaries. Since Sr is a corp controlled world, everything needs to be branded. Call that my little quirk, but I like this.

Kinda like:

backpack (Victory M12 Packrat)
survival kit (Victory M9 outroods pack)
medkit RTG 3 (Cross Biomed Therèse M3)
trauma patch (Cross Biomed ReVivre)

SWAT Armor w/ Helmet (Victory Specialist Mk. 2)
Chemical Protection 2, Fire Resistance 2, Insulation 2

Colt M23
8 clips of APDS ammo
Colt Government 2066
5 clips of APDS ammo
2 Flare grenades
4 High Explosive Grenades
2 Thermal Smoke Grenades

SV/Apple Bishop Commlink (like Novatech Airware) with Eotech/AppleOS Military (3/6)
Eotech Global Warrior Suite (counts as one program, cumulative program cost*0,9)
* Tacsoft 3
* Analyze 6 (optimised 3)
* Encrypt 6 (optimised 3)
* ECCM 6 (optimised 3)
SV/Apple Daktari (Browse 3)
SV/Apple iXpress Suite (Edit 3)

I'll recalculate once i'm at home. And yes, Ares owns Apple (CFS Sourcebook), and Apple still produces software (Burning Bright).

-- True enough. In which case the Safe Target System might be more likely. I'm ambivalent about the Advanced Safety as it just looks like another dangerous point of failure with how hacking works (and can you trust that the manufacturer didn't put in a million back-doors?).

-- I've fired prone with a foregrip with no problem. I'm not sure how it would even come up as an issue (the magazine is more of an impediment). Hell, I wish I had a Grip-pod (ah, that's a new piece of SR gear for ya)

-- Agreed, if you're going with the stripped-down base gun (but that goes back to the daft way they charge for the smartgun mod).

-- Are you confusing it with the laser sight? I'm speaking about a target designator (p. 34, Arsenal).

I think that all Military commlinks should have an R3 or so Agent with a personality mod. Sort of a virtual assistant/Drill Sergeant. It handles the "anti-hacking" and it coordinates the electronic warfare parts so taht the average grunt just talks to his pilot, and gets it to do everything he needs.

Data searches in the military databases.
Modifications to the TacNet/Commlink.
etc..

This is cheap to accomplish, and immensely useful.

And give the agent the Home Ground software. It adds it's rating to everything the agent does in that 'link.

If the majority of soldiers would use such armor, we'd have much more deadlier weapon systems. If they would shed grenade blasts or bursts of automatic fire like it's nothing, it's not war but more like the most expensive version of a game of football.

I'll be offline until monday, btw. Have fun, guys!

hemit, would you be so kind and collect links to all Google Docs in the thread for #1?

Then maybe we need to rethink "Military Armor"

Perhaps it's got the same stats as Swat Armor, but with specialized mods?

While I don't think it should have a built in commlink, I think it should have a commlink carrier case.

Troops have an issued Commlink, and they are not allowed to wear/use their personal commlinks while on duty.

Grinder do you have a status for us?

I think I have (I just edit my post there so as to not drown that out).

Perhaps it is time to issue laser weapons to troops? And given the new rules for overlaping grenades blasts, you just need to throw two grenades together to kill anyone. At least, with a SWAT Armor, there is a chance to survive.

-- The Thunderstruck (p. 30, Arsenal) might be better for power armor Rambos as it does 10P, halves all armor that isn't smart, and has an AP -5 on top of all that. That reduces Heavy Military Armor to 3 ballistic armor (4 if wearing a helmet). Ouch.

Not invloved before. But from a logistics point of view you want military armor existing of two parts:

1) Affordable form-fitted inner mold module fitted to the individual user/soldier/merc.
2) Standard outer module with all the mods, accesoires, armor, the works etc.

...there is also a passing reference to peace talks between Serbia and Croatia under the entry for Sayid Mujtaba Musawi in the Culture Shock section of SOTA '64 as well as brief mention in the historical section of Shadows of Europe (see next).

According to SoE, the region had pretty much been the main staging area and battlefield for the clash between Danube Union/Met2000 and Muslim forces. Following the war, the nations who would eventually form the NEEC were more concerned about the recession and rebuilding. Meanwhile, the situation in the Balkans was pretty much left to fester as the region descended into ethnic and religious factionalism.

This left me pretty much a blank slate for a campaign I was writing up that involved the Balkans, most notably the nations of Croatia and Serbia which through history have been ethnic and religious rivals. Granted, this allowed me to take a little political liberty as I had Serbia become a dictatorship which annexed Montenegro and then (with a little outside help) invaded and occupied Croatia (giving a bit more precedent for the peace talks of '64)


What I would need to know is what the current political situation in Europe is.

The NEEC is growing stronger and just put France under sanctions for blowing up corp facilities in the SOX containment zone. Euroroutes are being built more and more, and the continent is slowly starting to look like it does IRL. Poland is reeling from a civil war and horribad writing, Germany about to turn into a subsidiary of the Frankfurter Bankenverein (Frankfurt, South) and Saeder-Krupp (everyhwere else), with the Berlin Anarchy mostly pcaified. Hamburg made a moderately half-assed attempt at secession. England stopped having a Lord Protector, but still is protofascist, Tir na nOg has a terrorist problem, and ... that's about it, everything else is probably like detailed in SoE.

So, has anyone else come with an alternate kit for grunts? Or are we stucking with the version I made and change accordingly?

I jsut realized why the army wouldn't issue SWAT armor to every trooper. I forgot the armor encumbrance rules. Meaning that you would need at least BOD 7 to wear such armor with no penalty. Of course, Trolls and Orks could have less problem reaching this rating of BOD, but I think it is best for morale and avoid inside racism issues if everyone receives the same kind of gear.
So, for reference, I'll use the stats given for the infantryman (War!, page 148). He has BOD 4 and STR 3, which means the highest value of Impact or Ballistic must be 8 (or 11 with Softweave). Given the fact that softweave just increases the price by 10% and increases the rating of the armor by 3 points with no encumbrance, I think that is the way to go.

So, corrected version:

Feel free to change/suggest.

Also, I think we could add a 'Tweaking the rules sidebar' suggesting other rules for armor encumbrance and encumbrance in general (suggesting using BOD + STR for instance, instead of BODx2)

...so whatever happened to the Pendragon? Did the writers just lose track of him?

At the time of his appearance, the UK seemed ripe for change.

-- Working off of Shinobi's list. I still need to finish this with a commlink and backup gun, but how does this look:

-- Equipment is going to vary a lot depending on mission and army, but a patrol load for a Fourth Wave grunt (UCAS Army/ TT Peace Force/ etc) might look something like:

Patrol/Fighting Load

Camouflage Suit (p. 327, SR4A) with fire resistance (Rating 2), gel-packs (p. 50, Arsenal), and SoftWeave (p. 160, War!) [3,020 :nuyen: ].
Helmet (p. 328, SR4A) [100 :nuyen: ]
Respirator (Rating 6) (p. 336, SR4A) [150 :nuyen: ]
Biomonitor (p. 337, SR4A) [300 :nuyen: ]
Light Stick (p. 336, SR4A) [5 :nuyen: ]
Military First-Aid Kit (contains Trauma Patch (p. 338, SR4A) and Medkit (Rating 3) (p. 337, SR4A)) [800 :nuyen: ]
Survival Kit (p. 337, SR4A) [100 :nuyen: ]

Colt M23 (p. 27, Arsenal) with internal smartgun system and gas-vent 2 (both p. 322, SR4A), safe target system and sling (both p. 33, Arsenal), grip pod (p. 00), and laser designator (Rating 3) (p. 34, Arsenal). [2,865 :nuyen: ]
8x clips APDS ammo (320 rounds) [291 :nuyen: ]
7x Flash Bang Grenade (p. 324, SR4A) [210 :nuyen: ]
2x Fragmentation Grenades (p. 324, SR4A) [70 :nuyen: ]
1x Smoke Grenade (p. 324, SR4A) [30 :nuyen: ]

NEW EQUIPMENT
Grip Pod: This is a retractable bipod (p. 322, SR4A) contained inside a foregrip (p. 34, Arsenal). Takes a Simple Action to extend or retract the bipod.

Name Mount Avail Cost
Grip Pod Under 5 250 :nuyen:
-- Gear list adapted from a thread on smallwarsjournal.com regarding infantry loads.
-- It's not clear if the SR Gas Mask includes a rated respirator (it doesn't say). If clarified in alt.War! go with that instead. Otherwise it's implied that it only works for 1 hour which isn't long enough.

He disappeared (it's in the Almanac). Because the current writers couldn't handle him. Well, that's better than writing up stats for eating Irish babies, I guess.

...bugger Was looking forward to a political donnybrook between him and Marchemont.

Without the LP anymore, having the UK continue as an "Orwellian" state doesn't seem to make much sense. One would think that with the tide of revolution in the early 60s (bolstered by the Pendragon's appearance), much of the power structure Marchemont and the NDM had would have crumbled. They (the editors) had built such an interesting scenario to simply dismiss with a handwave.

Reminds me of a certain comic book company in the 80s that made universe shattering changes only to turn around and say, "oh, it was all a dream".

...and a recent popular television series.

...sloppy, very sloppy.

*SO VERY DEEP SIGH*

Yes, sloppy.

I'd add a helmet light and an IR beacon to his kit.

I really like the GripPod - maybe we could do more weapon-mounted gear?

-- It would make sense to clarify what the point of having a Imaging Scope (p. 322, SR4A) is. At present it's a "why bother" accessory I never even see mentioned Off-hand it would seem that allowing it to function as a corner shot type system (poke weapon out and aim) would be quite useful (at the expense of proper bracing).

-- I'm not sure what kind of sidearm makes sense in Shadowrun. Many modern infantry don't carry a pistol, and when they do it's optional and often has nothing to do with SOP or meeting any kind of requirement - it's 'peace of mind' chunk of metal.

-- Shadowrun doesn't have IR reflective patches I don't think (not entirely clear what they would do in game terms either). Presumably IR beacon is replaced with an IFF beacon from their commlink, interfacing with the safe target system. Note that the Shadowrun safe target system is probably deactivated a lot of the time, as that 1m buffer pretty much cripples any sort of operation in urban terrain (like room entry), and you probably want the option to "go dark" with your emissions - so some sort of simple backup does make sense.

Helmet (p. 328, SR4A) with flashlight (p. 336, SR4A), trodes (p. 328, SR4A), and microtrideo camera (Rating 1) with image link. [300 ]
Goggles (Rating 3) (p. 332, SR4A) with low light, flare compensation, smartlink, and hardening (Rating 4) (p. 58, Arsenal). [900 ]
Headphones (Rating 1) (p. 333, SR4A) with spatial recognizer and hardening (Rating 2) [200 ]
Snake (consists of an Endoscope (p. 332, SR4A) coupled with a trideo camera (Rating 2) with low-light and flare compensation). [600 ]

-- There's no audio enhancement for protected hearing?!
-- Not clear if hardening takes a slot in the gear. If it does, then we bump goggles and headphones up one rating point.

Grip pod FTW!

Using IR patches on the target and an IR source for the shooter, you could make perception checks a free action. That would make it a huge benefit in combat. Same goes for IR beacons and ground force / air support interaction.
If it's not high tech enough, it still can be used as a low cost / legacy replacement for TacNets features.

-- I like that idea. I'm becoming less enamoured with the safe target system the more I think about it. It really doesn't seem like it would work all that well in the situations it would ideally be used for -- combat in complex environments where positive ID is essential.

-- Maybe something like:

ID Patch: Most Sixth World military forces use something similar to the UCAS Enhanced Identification Patch (EIP), which appears to be a rugged cloth patch embroidered with the national flag. The threading is IR-reflective, making it highly visible when viewed with low-light sensors (especially after Observe in Detail, p. 147, SR4A) and the patch itself contains a RFID tag for use with the safe target system. A simple flap can cover the patch and the RFID disabled when necessary. 25

I'd change the embroidered cloth type to a flexible plastic sheet, though. One on each upper arm, small IR patches on both sides of the helmet. Maybe one on the front side of the assault pack. What about IR beacons? Could be put in the equipment section as personal marker, part of the survival equipment.

I whipped up something like a map for Maracaimbo. Nowhere near complete and I consider expanding my Aztlaner base. It also has a downtown Teocalli. Enjoy.

-- Hmm. Perhaps:

Positive ID System: Most Sixth World military forces use something similar to the UCAS Enhanced Identification Panels (EIP) to reduce the risk of friendly fire. The EIP is available in various sizes that can be fitted to both vehicles and personnel; the latter of which usually mounts them on the sides of the helmet, shoulders, and back. Each panel is a rugged, flexible plastic material embedded with IR-reflective dye (usually depicting the national flag or unit markings) and a RFID tag for use with the safe target system. In addition, it is now common for the panels to incorporate small LED lights with programmable patterns to aid in identification. The markings and LEDs are designed to be visible using low-light sensors. Spotting a panel on a unit is a free action under most conditions (part of military training includes looking for them) but Observe in Detail (p. 147, SR4A) may be required to make out the exact panel markings. The RFID can be disabled, and the panel covered with a simple flap, when not in use. 25 per person, 100 for a vehicle.

Considering that Aztlan can bane spirits or simply blow them to ectoplasmic pieces quite easily (artillery), I don't think blowing up the bridge and summoning water spirits would be enough to halt them, just to slow them.