So i decided to see how high dice pools i could get for a character, would appreciate some comments to make sure i made no mistakes and didn't miss any possible extra dice sources(except the ones for raising intuition), also it would be nicce if some one could bother to sheck my math to make sure i didn't misscalcuale

you got the core. furthermore:
-the obvious is increasing Intuition (surge, gentech, magic...)
-drugs: Betel, eX,...
-genetic infusion Sideways, but might be the same ingredient as Synch
-TacNet situationally

Dammit, how could i forget Betel, well its added in now.

Yeah, it's a bit silly how much Perception bonuses are out there... and then you make opposed rolls with Perception against Disguise, Stealth and such.

It's no fair!

Bye
Thanee

Nitro (SR4, core) raises Perception by 2.

Pyche and Betameth also boost intuition.

aptitude, specialization

I see you're not worrying about magic reduction from 'ware. In that case, all the Infected, shapeshifters, etc. with Enhanced (regular) Senses get an extra +2 dice to specific-enhanced-sense-based perception tests (Enhanced Hearing gets +2 to hearing-based perception, for example). It forces deltaware, yeah, but you don't seem to be worrying about that here.

You can get that from SURGE instead, AFAIK?

Enhanced Pheromone Receptors III

As far as i understand, that doesn't stack with Olfactory Boosters

The rules are unclear on whether or not olfactory boosters are a complete replacement for the natural sense of smell, or not. If they are not, I would say they stack, since the fluff specifically states that they work in different ways (one more intuitively).

I think it's likelier to be a full replacement, though, because you can turn your sense of smell off completely with it (plus terms such as "cybersnout" make me think full replacement).

I think it's just an implanted sensor, actually. If it's not, just *use* the external version.

I think, except for cybereyes, pretty much all of the four non-touch sense cyberware items (cyberears, olfactory booster, taste booster) offer the option of either augmentation or full replacement. Like, you can just get the inner ear bits altered with cyberears, or you can get artificial exterior ears too, whether obviously artificial or natural-looking. I'd assume that if you got your nose cut off by some mafia type, you could get an olfactory booster which included a synthetic replacement nose to go with it. Likewise with a cut-out tongue. Or, if you hadn't lost them, and didn't feel like going the full 'cut it off and have it replaced with figurative chrome' approach, you could just have your natural bits augmented just like the inner ear mods that make up the basis of cyberears.

Least, that's how I'd interpret it.

See, I feel like none of them are replacements. It's a 'booster', not a cybernose (snout nickname notwithstanding). The olfactory and taste boosters both say 'enhance'. It *is* annoying how neither really mentions their physical form.

Most sane GMs should be using the optional "Max DIce Pool" rules. Which 20 or double your Skill+Attribute, whichever is higher.

You can still reach 40+ dice with that rule if you do it right .

It is important to note however Perception DP is also a dice pool that can have a lot of negative modifiers. For example, Concealment, Invisibility and Rutherium all impose negative modifiers to Perception (vision) tests.

Not much of an argument. 'Turning off' -or in medical terms, inhibiting- the sense of smell is a natural function of the body.
Ever notice how you only percieve smells in an area for a short time, until some quality of the smell changes? Prevailing theory says that's not due to your conscious attention shifting away, it's your central nervous system preventing the neural impulses from even getting to the cerebrum at all (from getting past the olfactory bulb, IIRC). Cyberware could easily subject this function to direct control without replacing anything.

In fact, pretty much any consciously percieved sensation can be blocked, or in a lot of cases enhanced by careful manipulation of proper areas of the brain. See the functioning of VR full sensory and motor control override. Being able to directly apply chemicals to both bloodstream and neural pathways just makes it a whole lot easier.

Hrmm, just had a whole post written up, then reread things, and the rule got even tighter, so had to erase it.



The Italics are not mine, they're in the book.

The absolute highest natural, unaugmented attribute is 11 (Troll Body or Strength with Exceptional Attribute applied) and a skill of 7 (With Aptitude applied). This means the dice pool cap is effectively at 36, since no other metahuman can get a higher attribute.

Ork Body caps at 34 dice. Dwarf & Ork Body, and Elf Charisma caps at 32 dice. Dwarf Bod and Elf Agility caps at 30. All other racial tests cap at 28 or lower.

So you can still get some pretty high DPs, but they're a bit more sane than some people trot out. Granted, it's listed as a Gamemaster Option, but it's a good one, and one of the hadnful of Optional Rules we do allow (and enforce) in Missions.

of course, the single best way to handle things is for GMs to simply talk with your players and discuss where they want their game to be set at. If your expectations are Dice Pools of 20 or less for top end skills, and 10-14 for moderate skills, let players know that so they know what to expect from the opposition, and they know what to shoot for when building their characters. And tehy know what to avoid. Shadowrun is a game of very different potential power levels, and much like a SUpers Game, it can be no fun if someone brings Superman to a street level game. And few systems that can handle both ends of the power scale balance it well. You have to trust that GMs and players will work together to build characters balanced with each other.

Bull

Gentech, Infection and Surge push the natural maximum

True. But those rules are not well balanced or tested, and are better off ignored and not used, IMNSHO. And even then, they don't generally push it up all that much. Again this also comes down to Gamemasters and PLayers working together to create a balanced group. And, keep in mind that Infected and CHangelings comes with a host of penalties that aren't dice pool related. The Infected especially, since most countries have active bounties on them.

I was just being smart-ass *g*

I was thinking of changing the rule to: max dice pool = Skill x4
that'll greatly encourage raising skills. on a marginal note, this although favors "unpopular" qualities like Catlike, Natural Athlete and Outdoorsman (with aptitude and reflex recorder one can reach lvl 9 skills without being an Adept)

Actually no, Fomori Ghoul with exceptional attribute body has a natural max of 16 for Body.
For other attributes the maximum possible natural max is 9 + racial modifiers (for example elfs natural charisma max is 11)

I think its kinda stupid rule and makes lots of equipment in the game totally pointless.

Reflex Recorder for Perception.

It's criteria only require the skill to be a combat or physical skill of which Perception is in the Physical Active Skill section. There is no requirement that the skill be linked to a physical attribute.

As its an actual skill increase, it doesn't stack with the level 3 increased ability power.

That's the point. It's meant to stop Joe 1+1 from boosting his DP to 40, I assume.

Makki, I've wanted a nice rule like that, too, but none of the simple rules seem to satisfy. I think we *do* want people to be able to boost their DP a fair bit (Shadowrun is about how good gear matters a lot), but we also want them to not rely on gear 100%. The simple rules don't accomplish these goals nicely enough. :/

No, it's 6+racial mod. Anything above that is Augmented, i.e. non-natural. And see my second post... I'm not a big fan of the Runners Companion stuff, as it was, IMO, poorly thought out, porly tested, and poorly implemented in a lot of cases.



Eh, it puts an emphasis back on skill and your natural ability. You can still get quite a hefty bonus from equipment (Even if you have minimal skill and attribute, you can still get up to a 20 DP), and extra dice are still useful to offset penalties, as the DP Cap is after penalties are applied.

Really, the only thing this rule does is shut down the uber-cheesemonkey players who are absolutely trying to maximize their Dice Pools to get 40+ dice. That's not a bad thing, IMO. UNless of course you WANT to play a game like that, in which case all the players should be building toward that, and you simply don't use the optional rule.

Simple and elegant, no?

Bull

I think I gonna try my Skill x4 idea in my new group. Skill is supposed to represent the knowledge of how to use the gear as well. maybe...It only really hinders ranks 0-2 (i'll handle defaulting as lvl1)

that should equal a dp of 4 very well

That's an interesting idea. Let us know how it works.

Skillx4 makes an effective cap of 28 with Aptitude, 24 without the quality, generally 20 for most of the folks?

No, it 9+racial mod.
Exceptional attribute,Metagenetic improvement and Genetic Optimization all raise the natural attribute maximum.


Well ruling it like that does make it a little better rule, as atleast you can use the extra equipments to offset penalties, meaning that whole lot of gear doesn't become totally pointless to have in the game.

Makki, I think you're right about Skill 0-2, and I certainly agree with the 'know how to use gear effectively' point. If you protect Defaulting, that goes a long way toward fixing things. How does this affect Attributes? Does skill 1, attribute 6 still get capped at 4? If so, (and it's not necessarily a bad thing) that really alters the whole augmentation equation.

There's very little gear that's 'totally pointless'. Hehe.

Yup. But theoretical math and Actual Play are two different things.

Bull

[quote name='Mäx' date='Jan 31 2011, 11:21 AM' post='1038280']
No, it 9+racial mod.
Exceptional attribute,Metagenetic improvement and Genetic Optimization all raise the natural attribute maximum.[quote]

Ahh, yeah, good point. I'm just dealing with the basics here. Of course, all of that is expensive amounts of cheese-monkery.

Of course, I rarely bother trying to max out this stuff. Most of my characters tend to hit about 16 dice in their core skills and I stop bothering to cheese out further there, as they tend to be scarily effective at that range already. <shrug>

Bull

Egh, don't remind me. I get more critical glitches on eight dice than I do on three.

Calling everything "cheese" is easy, but not very constructive. Cheese (AFAIK) refers to a cheap abusive option that's either absurd or detrimental to the game.

All aforementioned options are quite expensive to add up, and maxing out an attribute is not free either :

BP : 20 (metagenetic, comes with anactual increase) +25 (maxing an attribute) +20 (exceptionnal attribute) +20 (two points of attribute paid, for neither geneware or exceptionnal attr increase the score) + geneware that costs essence

94 points (counting nuyen but not essence) spent to go from 5 (soft-maxed) to 9 (hard-maxed). This is much more than twice the standard cost. Sure a high AGI score (for ex.) is mighty useful and synergistic, but you severely limited yourself from the get go by trying to max it out. The opportunity cost is too terribly high.

Player's that choose to focus on an attribute should be judged on end results (i.e. playable characters that enhances the in-game experience of everyone at the table), and not on components... especially for such a high cost.

Cheesy ? I don't really think so. I can easily imagine a prototype character that could feasibly have such a maxed attribute.

I think Bull noted that it was expensive in that very sentence, though. Per your suggested standard of judgment, it's probably *not* the case that one person who automatically beats all forms of stealth/etc. "enhances the in-game experience of everyone". It is a thread about theoretical optimization for the sake of playing with numbers, after all.

With the incredible DP for Perception we're seeing here, it certainly feels like Stealth is in need of help though.

Indeed. Look at the Perception thresholds and modifiers: max Threshold is only 4 (literally invisible/silent), and I guess the max penalty is Far Away, Interfering Sense, while Distracted, while using VR (!), and Blinded (for vision). That's -19. The most dice you'd need 'on average' to pull off this maximally-impossible Perception is 31, without Edge.

since infiltration vs perception is an opposed test, one should now start to max out Infiltration...

How many NPC's are going to have this kind of pool against the characters, though?

The mooks almost always have numerical superiority to even the odds, so they wouldn't have to sneak as often. Or at all.

Don't forget Concealment. And perceiver-side wound penalties, Disorientation, possibly even sustaining spells, and being in a spam zone.

I was trying to be serious, Mardrax.

As I have stated before, there can be a lot of negative modifiers for Perception, just as there are positive modifiers for it. In practice, with such a high dice pool, the player isn't really interested in having his character noticing every little detail a normal everyday situation; he is more interested in spotting that Concealed (as in Concealment), Invisible, Rutherium clothed sniper that has 16+ dice pool of his own.

Seen in this context, it isn't such a big deal that Perception dice can hit 40+. It becomes essential to have such a large dice pool.

It's never possible to see the GodsHammer coming. I mean, really, at that point wouldn't a Thor shot get the message across faster?




~R~

The point is that not every sniper is GodsHammer. If the GM is resorting to a Thor shot, it would be better to simply talk to the player instead.

My point was that if your GM is throwing an invisible, concealed, chameleon-coated sniper with 16 dice in infiltration at you, he doesn't want to negotiate and he doesn't want you to survive. He's either just killing you off, or he's knocking you out for some kind of forced scene.

::shrug:: Though I suppose this could just be a massive difference in play style/power level. I have yet to see a runner at my table who could survive more than one or two sniper rounds, but maybe the players at your table have the ability to take it and live. Either way, no offense intended.


~R~

It's a valid point: the GM would never send anything that required a 40 Perception unless the player *had* a 40 Perception, or it was a railroad. Either way, the player has stupidized the game.

Incidentally, I thought it was decided that you can just close your eyes and get rid of all the penalties from Visibility, Invisibility, Ruthenium, (not Concealment, cuz it's unexplained magic), etc.? In any case, the Perception bonuses do seem to go vastly higher than the opposed Infiltration from this theoretical sniper.

How did the player stupidized the game when it is the GM that wants to pull a railroad?

This also assumes that the GM somehow scales the opposition to meet the PCs' capabilities. If the GM simply stats out the opposition to what would be sent against the PCs according to the resources and motivations of the NPCs, the GM could send such a sniper even if the PCs have no chance of spotting him even if the GM wasn't railroading his players.