Attitude has the Iron Will exo-skeleton, a Body 6 Armor 4 suit that gives you 8 strength at the cost of 1 agility and can be upgraded like it was a vehicle. I can't find rules for exo-skeletons anywhere though. Are they treated as armor, a vehicle (anthroform?) or something else altogether?

If they're just a vehicle that you wear it seems they make it really easy to get hardened armor 12 and a huge strength boost.

Do you think it grants you the armor? It looks to me like the whole thing is just a skeleton, so its defensive stats should only apply when someone attacks it.

On the other hand, I can see you getting vehicle turrets to it. Or adding a rigger's cocoon to basically make you a metahuman sized engine of destruction.

On the cocoon, the only question is whether people consider that remote piloting.

Yeah, but can you fist-fight Xenomorphs with it?

Or Spirits that look like Xenomorphs (Toxic Beast Spirits? Insect Spirits? Toxic Insect Spirits? ... That last one scared me a lot.)

Its not any more abusing than making a budget battlesuit out of an up-armored Evo Orderly, now is it?

But still, powerloader. Two things come to mind: Passenger Protection seems to the the most useful, since it helps YOU soak damage. And a Mechanical Arm using the optional-rule for Cyberlimb Capacity should let you squeeze 3 more strength into the Iron Will with Enhancements, for a total of 11 strength.

Which isn't bad at ALL.

Or "The Horseman Of The Apocalypse".

Actaully, canray, i think the hardest part would be statting up the Xenomorphs to fight it.

I'm sure there's something in Running Wild that would do the trick. Chimeric critters, maybe.

Wow. But as far as I can tell, the Evo Orderly doesn't carry passengers. It looks like a sapient drone that cares for the elderly.

Until a Technomancer or Feral AI eats it's OS and suddenly you have a Bad Day.

...

Damn, I sound like Clockwork.

The orderly is a medi-bed. One person can lay on it.

Its kind of like how the book says drones can't have passengers, but they the crashcart is a drone, and the transys wheelchair is a drone... and any Standard Vehicle, which happens to be Small Drones and up can take a rigger cocoon, which carries a person.

Only because the rules are wrong.

Alright. I actually looked at the picture this time. It is indeed some kind of medi-bed.

The irony is that originally the Orderly was statted up as a humanoid drone and the text had no indication that it could carry any passengers at all.

I suspect that there was a disconnect between the author and the artist. The author had in mind a humanoid helper for the elderly, and the artist got the impression that it was some mobile Valkyrie unit.

Later they realized the conflict and the errata solved the problem in the simplest way possible, by deleting the word "humanoid" from the description.




-k

Wait... There's Errata for something?

The thing with toxic insect spirits is that insect spirits are so alien in the first place that we probably couldn't tell the difference between the toxic and normal varieties.
But they'd probably be the closest you can get to xenomorphs in SR. You would have to houserule the acidic blood, but that wouldn't be a problem if you follow the rules for Corrosive Spit/Corrosive Secretions.

If simply looking like a xenomorph is enough for you, though, that has been done already with custom-looking cyberware (even though it only happened in some German sourcebooks, namely the expanded Hamburg chapter in Runner Havens and the Munich sourcebook).
It's not that hard if you can afford full-body replacement with Raptor Legs, Balance Tail and a Cyberskull with maximum Increased Capacity.

Aye... we had one playing such a "dude" in out SR3 campaign a few year back. SCAAARY Motherfucker. (He also had cyberskates and once hunted hobos through some tunnels... just for the hell of it *g*)

Back to Exoskeletons: Convert the JIM-Exoskeleton from Arsenal 2060 to SR4. I think i have done so in one of my post a few months back... eh. Can't find it.
That thing is awesome (And Rigging it with your matrix speed/enhancements is totally powerful). It also was pretty cheap.

EDIT: Wait... i can just search for it:

http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?show...p;#entry1000459

Ah there it is:

Well... i think they never retconned anything from previous versions, right? So technically the JIM-Exoskeleton (Arsenal 2060) still exists, just isn't converted. Which i am going to do now. Hm, let's see:

Standart JIM
Body: 5
Armor: 9
System: 1
Sensor: -
Handling: -1
Accel/speed: Like pilot.
Standard Upgrades:
Sealed, Life Support 2 (20 Hour air supply) , Extreme Environment Mod (pressure safe to 600 meter), Mechanical full arms/legs
Avail: 12, 20000 NY

Upgrade JIM
Body: 8
Armor: 9
System: 1
Sensor: -
Handling: -1
Accel/speed: Like pilot.
Sealed, Life Support 2 (20 Hour air supply) , Extreme Environment Mod (pressure safe to 600 meter), Mechanical full arms/legs, Rigger Adaptation.
Avail: 14, 32000 NY

Done. At least that was the thing our rigger ran around with *g*. And it should be available since it DOES serve a purpose. (Underwater exploration and construction). Also... can't you just ask your gm to get you something, Why do you need to modify some existing vehicle.( I know it is just for comparisons in ratings/values) But can't you just make something up? The modification rules are too rigid. Just use your own creativity. (Or use the vehicle design rules from 3rd edition and then convert it to fourth).

It's statted up like a vehicle. You operate it by getting inside. People inside a vehicle benefit from the vehicle's armor. I don't see how it can't grant you the armor.

Yup and only FA bursts damage the passenger as well as the vehicle.

Logically, though, only if the rounds penetrate the armor to start with. Technically Not RAW, but makes absolutely no sense any other way.

Funny old RAW.

Unless the exoskeleton is a complete shell, people can always elect to shoot the passenger *instead* of the vehicle, and they're at a -2 to dodge, naturally. It's probably a mistake to use any part of the existing vehicle rules for something like this.

But they get the armor of the vehicle added to their armor. The vehicle rules have issues.

This is why I was hoping there were rules for exo-skeletons.

Indeed. I wish I was surprised that they threw a new piece of technology into the game without bothering to integrate it or consider rules interactions.

Yeah, the exo-skeleton is the first instance in SR4 of such a piece of gear, and it doesn't quite fit in any specific category. Big blunder by the devs on not giving a clear indication on how it should be handled.

For starters, I can't think of a good reason to give this thing any vehicle upgrades. If anyone else *can* think of a good reason, then they should individually allow each upgrade on a case-by-case basis.

Honestly, I'd just use the existing mil-spec 'powered armor' rules… with appropriate modifications, of course.

Are there any rules for shooting through rolled down windows? Because The iron will is like one big rolled down window, without the glass.
In other words, realistically it shouldn't provide you with any cover. In fact, the rules only say it's treated as a vehicle for upgrades.

Aren't weapon mounts vehicle upgrades?

Yes. Like I said, no good reason.

No, open beds and open windows still count as normal vehicle cover and armor, unless the GM says otherwise. It's an abstract combat system: assume a spherical cow.

Isn't the ability to mount vehicle weapons on your character and use them indoors a good enough reason?

Even better. Mount two powerful SS mode guns on the Iron Will. Each one is a simple action to fire, so you get the same effect as a SA mode weapon.

It is the worst possible reason, right after wearing (upgraded) vehicle armor. Both of which make cheaply boosting Strength seem trivial. I can tell you're using a different definition of 'good' than I am. Oh well.

The Iron Will is pretty much for making Iron Man. Or at least the giant knockoff Iron Man at the end of the first movie.





-k

Apparently. What is your definition of "good" in this case?

You are mounting these weapons on a drone. Which negates ALL recoil penalties. Don't bother with SS, go FA. The good SS or SA weapons require a turret that's too large for the Iron Will anyway.

Technically, with a Body of 6, the Iron Will could mount a single Reinforced Turret, which allows any weapon to be installed.




-k

Full-autop modded Panther Assault Cannon.

2 of them, one for each arm.

Unfortunately you are still limited to either 2*15 (additional clip) or 19 (extended clip) shots. A beltfed heavy minigun sounds a lot more appealing, whether that weapon is available however is up to the GM.

And these are all great reasons why it can't be possible.

And equally great reasons to get those upgrades.

WTF, i thought we where talking about an exoskeleton, not a light battlemech?
It actually has BOD 6?
That is a light truck, not a medium-sized drone.

It is the Loader from "Aliens."

Which is much smaller than a truck. Stupid inconsistent vehicle rules.

If it's the Loader, you should have to use Pilot Exotic. And it maneuvers like a zombie pig.

For a troll, it's a straight up skeleton. I don't think a troll could fit into an Iron Will unmodified for oddly shaped metahumans.

Ok, i took a glance at Arsenal again and there already are medium drones with a Body >3, namely the Akiyama and the Otomo. The Tomino (a heavy drone) even has a Body of 10.

A Body of 6 is also appropriate for a PMV with cargo module, light trucks are a bit heavier than that.

I was kinda confused by the statement that a reinforced mount can hold any kind of weapon.
They actually can't, you're still restricted from using main guns. That would require a heavy turret, and a Body of at least 14.

Probably True, but that is how I see it personally (without having the book, of course). Might change my mindonce I have the actual stats in front of me, along with the fluff text.

Those are actual combat (and/or assassination) robots, though, custom-made for cyborg brainjars. You'd expect an anthroform to be much tougher (and heavier) than a skeleton. The Tomino *is* a small battlemech.

But, your examples do illustrate the point that the vehicle stats are inconsistent and crazy. Body is a weird combination of size and toughness.

to further illustrate - a suzuki mirage has a body of 6. A Steel Lynx is body 4. The lynx, per artwork at least, is quite larger than a sport bike.

@longbowrocks

Good, are things you may suggest at your table without waking up in the hospital and having a bunch of surgents discussion how to get the Core Book out of your ass and how it got there in the first place.

@Rasumichin

Yeah, I hate those two. I have no idea how they got those numbers.
Every drone of this size has a body of 4 or less. This drone is quite fragil and hard to modify, so lets give it a body of 6...

Body =/= Size in my books, but by RAW...

It's even worse the way Body is the determiner of weapon and other upgrades; these are each tenuously linked to both size (or maybe mass?) and toughness. No part of it makes sense.

Yeah, and the simplicity of the construction. It is easy to get to work at an old Ford(meaning you are able to change a lot), but try this with one of the new cars.