Heh... WHAT makes no sense? Rather than saying I am full of it (I know, you're not), can you explain to me what you think is nonsensical about my position.

Armor Impacts (= to Armor or less) cause Stun.
Armore Penetrations (> Armor) cause Phsyical.

Sometimes you will get some hits that penetrate and sometimes you will not. This has the potential to still leave someone standing that would otherwise have fallen due to accumulated Stun or Physical, had it remained on a single track, because it is now split between 2 tracks.

I see this as okay. And Intended, due to how the system actually works in play.
Others disagree.

Does this help?

@Tymeaus Jalynsfein
Are you making some sort of fairness argument?
You have only stun, so you can be passed out. You have only physical and nearly dead, because you had no armor.
You had an armor so you have stun and some physical, and to make up for your physical damage you may stay active?


I for my part, do actually not understand.

I understand what you say, I understand the words and sentances but I can't get the reasoning behind it. (And I guess it is the same with Mäx and Yerameyahu)

For my part I normally grasp quite fast, why somebody argues for or against a certain point. Be it to safe his character, or be it because he has in his real life a lot to do with stuff like that and does not like it, if it breaks his "suspension of disbelief", or he is just a "noble" Powergaming, locking to make his "job" harder.

For example: I dislike the ruling (and I guess it is for most this way) because it sometimes breaks the suspension of disbelief, when physical damage is just equally to stun damage.

Alright then:



Problem: doing better (more net hits) is actually a negative result (opponent stays on his feet).
Converse: opponent does worse (fewer net hits) is actually a negative result (you fall unconscious).



Less armor -> stay up longer



More armor -> stay up longer (except the rules don't reflect that, except no one would actually DO it, so it's irrelevant)



Less armor -> stay up longer (this is OK because that's the rules and the rules are OK)

Often in real-life combat, the goal - even when using lethal ammo - isn't to kill, but to incapacitate. If you kill or not is usually irrelevant, as long as your opponent can't keep attacking you. It doesn't matter if he gave up, ran out of bullets, got knocked unconscious, or died. You 'won' if you are left standing and can chose what to do next.



Yet by using basic logic, the armored guy should - all things being equal - be able to withstand MORE punishment.

Are claiming that the discrepancy between damage types in very specific situations is intentional to introduce a 'chaos factor'? If so, why? The roll of the dice is the chaos factor that mimics the fact that things don't always work out as expected.



No I am not - I'm arguing that the discrepancy and disconnect between the two types of damage can create the 'worse' result. The armor does what it's supposed to do. It's the body of the target that fails to do what it's supposed to under certain rare circumstances.



Like I said, the issue exists independent of the shooter knowing what damage the target has. However, the scienctists of the SR world will during countless ballistic tests and armor tests etc etc have found out that the best way to keep soldiers on their feet is to have every third bullet or so penetrate armor, and that there will be a point in a shooters training where he suddenly becomes statistically worse at taking down opponents. It's an undisputable fact of the way the mechanics of the world work - observable in-game by people having no clue that there actions are determined by the roll of a dice.



Yet in the real world, people will go down faster the more shots penetrate armor, because all damage affects the body against the same limit. In Shadowrun, it doesn't. Within the game world, it is completely irrelevant what happens somewhere else.



You just admitted that it is inherently BETTER for the defender to split the damage. If it's better for the defender, how can it also be BETTER for the attacker? Since both aim to win, what is good for one side is necessarily bad for the other side. Hence, splitting the damage is WORSE for the attacker if it's BETTER for the defender.



Incapacitate does not equal 'make unconscious' - incapacitate simply mean 'make uncapable', HOW that happenas is irrelevent. See above.



But if the mechanic fails in certain circumstances, it isn't 'perfectly functional'.



Yes, the infectous part adds a complication.



I don't take it as aimed at me personally, and my players don't bitch about it. We've accepted that the game mechanics fail in certain circumstances and don't dwell on it - this thread being the exception

The PROBLEM: is not a NEGATIVE result. It is a result that did not lead top YOUR expectations as a Shooter. Not the same thing. It is EXACTLY the result I expect to see if you continue to hit stun, and then, in one instance get Lucky and penetrate. However, THE TARGET STILL TOOK MORE SERIOUS DAMAGE than he would otherwise have taken.

The CONVERSE: is not a NEGATIVE result, but a logical conlcusion to taking more stun. It is the EXPECTED RESULT for taking more Stun.

See, I think that the issued is still one of perspective. For the shooter, it sucks that his opposition may not go down based upon how the target takes damage. FOr the defender, he is, hopefully, relying upon his armor tot ake the brunt of the abuse, but knows that occasionally, it will be penetrated. for the Defender, it does not get any better than that. He is accepting that, on occasion, he will possibly take REAL damage from someone who can actually shoot, but that against most opposition his armor will take the hits. (Guy B in examples Above)



Actually, No. Less armor does not equate to staying up longer, as most shots will likely do actual physical damage, and then he is Dead (Guy C in the Examples above). Not sure how you get thast interpretation. Look at it this way. Shooter gets some good shots in, and some bad shots in. The good ones will penetrate the armor, the bad ones will not.



Actually they do. The more armor you have, the less likely you are to take Physical Damage, aAND the less likely you are to take Stun Damage becuase you soaked ALL the damage, thus there is no stun to take. Optimal, but hard to do and remain plausible in the game world. Most characters I see in play run with about 8-10 Ballistic. This is pretty good. Any Troll I have seen in play rarely takes any damage at all, due to high Armor and Soak pools.



Again, I am not sure where you get that, as I never said that. Good armor will tend to soak most hits, though Some will likely get through. I have never said that LESS armor is better for you. The sweet spot is to have armor good enough to take most hits, and yet not be an issue for mobility or other concerns, and acceptance of the fact that some hits will penetrate. If you are running with less, it is likely for a reason, but you run the risk of Penetration from weapons. If you are running with MORE, then good for you. Most of my characters are comfortable with the Ballistic 8-10 Range. It is the sweet spot for my characters. Tough enough for most hits, and yet wearable enough that I do not get encumbered. Because it is not high-end, I expect some of those hits to actuallyu penetrate the armor and cause physical damage. I am not surprised when they do.

Again... this continues to look like a perspective problem, rather than a ruiles issue.

Another suggestion for a rules tweak, totally untested:

1. Attacks with a Physical DV that penetrate armor also do half DV in "secondary" Stun (rounded up)
2. Attacks with a Physical DV that do not penetrate armor do ONLY half DV in Stun (rounded up)
3. If an attack with a Physical DV penetrates armor, any secondary Stun does NOT overflow to Physical.

If the expected result is not the mechanical result, there is a disconnect, thus problem with the rules.



I'm talking about the difference of 1 armor or 1 net hit. Or in extreme cases where 1 more stun means unconsciousness, but that the physical track is empty (i.e. 10 whole boxes) and that the loss of a lot of armor does make a difference.

In any case, the odds of soaking ALL damage are extremely tiny, even at 18 (!!!) armor. A holdout piston does a minimum of 5, and it just goes up from there.



You've stated that less armor means sometimes you take physical damage.
You've stated that sometimes taking physical damage means that you stay "up/conscious/active" longer.
Staying up longer is "better" as it (more easily) results in a "win."
Less armor -> Better.
Q.E.F.D.
(Quod Erat Fucking Demonstrandum)



Except that that isn't true. It's very easy to end up with High Body for High Armor and HUGE Physical track, and constantly, constantly get knocked out from stun overflow. This is losing. 3 points less armor might in fact be the difference between falling unconscious every fight and "taking a bleeding wound" to stay up, stay fighting, and win the fight.



Again you admit that this is the "winning" number because some hits penetrate.



No, it isn't.

1) Rules: having your armor penetrated (sometimes) is good.
2) Perspective: having your armor penetrated (EVER) is BAD.

1 && 2 is never True,* thus there is an issue: there is a disconnect between the rules and the perception.

*That is, the boolean logic of statement1 AND statement2 is false: they are not both true. You cannot reach a state where the rules agree with the perception without changing the rules. The two statements are self-contradictory at current, thus the entire issue of this thread.

I don't know about your training in the Military, SnowRaven, but I was not taught to maim or incapacitate, I was taught to kill. In the most expedient fashion possible. Even had special classes for just that purpose. So no, when I am in a lethal encounter, I am not trying to incapacitate, I am trying to kill (This generallycarriesd over into myPOV for characters, too). Fortunately for me, I do not see those situations all that much. And I am grateful for that. Does not change the training, though.



The Armored Guy CAN take more damage, and often does, because he often splits that damage between the two tracks dependant upon how successful his opponent is in harming him, anbbd how successful he is in soaking. Why? Because he is more armored. The less armored guy loses outright, by comparison.



Absolutely not. The dice are capricious enough. I am saying the mechanic was crafted to perform just as it does, with some hits penetrating and some not, DEPENDANT UPON THE SUCCESS OF THE SHOOTER. Complaining about the defenders damage track because the shooter cannot be consistent is not the defender's issue, it is the shooter's (and it is not even a game world concern, hence the Metagaming I keep complaining about). Ironically, the defender will throw a roll or two as well, so it does all work out in the end.



Except I see the body doing exactly what it is supposed to be doing when it receives damage. I see no Discrepency. It only exzists if you equate the damage as equal, which I do not do. Yes, teh Modifiers are the same, but the damage is entirely different in nature.

Continued...



Again, in experimentation, it has absolutely nothing to do with "every third round should penetrate." The best way to keep soldiers on the ir feet is to have teh round impact the armor, and have all the energy stay in the armor and none of it transferred to the body (A complete soak roll). You are comparing apples to oranges, I think. Instead, what happens, in fact, after those experiments is that the researchers come to the determination that the vest will stop "MOST" rounds, and some will get through, and that is deemed the acceptable limit for surviveability. In the end, teh search for more viable armor continues as ammunition cpabilities are increased. In some instances, ther armor stops all teh energy, and the wearer ius unhurt; but eventually, ammunition catches up and that is no longer the case, and the cycle continues.



YES, of course, because they have penetrated, and are inflicting Physical Damage. However, put random exhaustion into the mix (or bruising, or whatever you want to mimic Stun), and the results do not always, or even generally, stack to the same outcome. In the end, the target will have both tracks with damage in them, he likely went down at the same speed (All rounds penetrated, so that does not change the speed dynamic), and he is MORE hurt thatn the first guy was. Gee Imagine that, just like in Shadowrun when that happens. Hmmmmmmm.



No, I parroted what you said. The fact that I happen to agree with it is notwithstanding. YOU Said that, not me. Go back and look, I highlighted it (I think). But you are right. I do not care whether the shooter's feeling are hurt because the target manages to survive longer, because his armor is mostly effective. That is my expectation from the start. No Armor is perfect, and no armor can stop everything. SInce I go into it with that expectation, I am not surprised when my opposition survives a bit longer due to the capriciousness of the dice when taking damage.



You are absolutely right. ANd you are right that it does not matter how it happens. WHat I take umbrage at is the complaining that it does not work out in the shooter's favor. Too Bad.



I do not see it failing, like some others do. I see it working EXACTLY as I expect it to work. Therefore, it works perfectly, as far as I am concerned.



Indeed it does. That aside, thoguh, I am always ready for a character to die. If it happens, I rarely even spend Edge to HOG it. WHy should I.



Awesome... I am not aiming anything at anyone in particular.
I am thoroughly enjoying the debate. Thanks

This never happens in the game world, short of a cybertank. 10 or 12 armor is the most any PC can have without being a complete armor whore and cheese the rules (as you, yourself have indicated).

12 armor stops (about) 4 damage.

A holdout pistol does 4 DV plus net hits (thus, minimum 5).

And I don't know about you, but my runners aren't ever shot with holdout pistols.

@Draco18s
You have still your body dice (In reality the whole kinetic energy is also not absorbed)

My expected result IS THE MECHANICAL RESULT...



And so am I , and it makes no difference to MY argument. Taht it does to yours implies, to me at least, that you are looking at it wrong.



Indeed, and yet I see it often in play. Especially for the trolls. Of course, I have also seen those same trolls fub a roll so bad that they soak nothing.



Less armor means you OFTEN take more physical damage.
Sometimes taking physical damage means you stay up longer, yes, regardless of the "Level" of armor, as long as sometimes it stops the round, and sometimes it does not.
Staying up longer does not more easily equate to a win, it just means that you stay up longer. Situations vary, and I am not going to make such a sweeping statement.

Again. I have never said that. Good armor (without going overboard) is generally better for you than either Less or More armor. THAT is what I said, Not that Less is better. Since it all hinges upon how proficient the shootgr is, that optimal level of armor is a bit fluid. For some shooters, you will never have enough, and for some, even a little is more than adeqate.



It is indeed easy to get to that point, which I have already addressed. I f you want to go for the gold, and try to soak it all down, and have a massive armor pool, you will generally ONLY fall to Stun. So What? It is a Choice that a character makes, knowing full well the ramifications of such choice. It is NOT losing, as you are STILL ALIVE, rather than the dead you would otherwise be if you went the other direction with your choice, and wore NO armor.

Yes, a measly point of two of armor can make or break you, dependant upon where you determine your sweet spot for armor to be. I do not care about that, as it floats, and is personal to each character. That is of absolutely no concern to me.



Never said it was "Winning," I said the optimal number is dependant upon several floating factors.



World states that having armor penetrated is Bad...
Rules state that having your armor penetrated is Bad...
Perspective: Having your armor penetrated is bad, but I do expect it to happen, becasue Armor is never perfect, and i am going to get hurt.

Notice How they all Match? There is no mismatch. Perception, Perspective and Rules all match.

The problem is in your perspecitve. You expect armor to be either 100% effective, or 100% non-effective. I do not have that issue. I expect that my armor will protect me to some degree, what that degree is, is totally dependant upon who is shooting at me at the time. It is a fluid thing. You cannot fix that.

There is no 'perspective' involved. There is only one point: the SR4 rules fail in this specific way to follow real life. While there are some cases where the rules aren't supposed to follow reality, in *this* case, that is bad; a failure. If you don't agree that the SR4 outcomes (mentioned earlier) clearly mismatch the typical real life outcomes, there's nothing that can be done. You're not entitled to your own facts.

It doesn't matter if this ever comes up in play, whether it can be abused by players or GM, whether it can be avoided/ignored/disallowed. All that matters is the fact that the RL interaction of armor mismatches the SR4 interaction of armor on 'blocked' and 'pierced' shots (or strikes).

This is a preposterous argument. Not only does it not actually rebut what came before, but it's uselessly vague; 'bad'?
I haven't seen anyone say anything like this. Why are you constantly introducing irrelevant and/or false side issues? And again, the randomness of armor is already fully modeled by Damage Resistance tests. The fact that half-and-half damage keeps you standing longer than pure P or pure S cannot be an intentional mechanic for the random function of armor.

Hmm. While this is a common enough situation that my players have noticed it, I don't know that it's a big enough issue to require a houserule.

In my game, I'd just let them cry about it, then mention the trauma dampner/platelet factory they didn't take to reduce the stun damage... or maybe go straight to the "Don't you wish you had a pain editor?" crack. Since, y'know, a pain editor completely stops that whole unconscious from stun damage thing.

Now, if pressed for a houserule to help with the problem, I wouldn't be opposed to allowing the FIRST stimpatch applied actually heal (or at least roll dice to heal) any non drain-induced stun damage up to its rating. Subsequent stimpatches only providing non-stacking pain resist, as mentioned in the rules.

EDIT: Speaking of pain editors, I feel these things would be fairly common for heavy assault troops (the ones typically in the heavy milspec). They already have a biomonitor built into the suit to deal with the side effects, and they take mostly stun damage (again, from all the armor). Might make it hard to get permits to go off the reservation, but I can see some of the hardcore really not caring much about that if they can literally ignore the pain and get the job done. Or perhaps big brother just ships in the hookers and blow for these guys, I dunno.

Yeah, the Pain Editor has always been ridiculously good.

Love the pain editor. Don't see it in play all that much, though.

At least they kinda fixed it in SR4 (IIRC). Now, you still take Stun and it rolls over to Phys, right? And in SR3 it was just straight immunity to all Stun? I vaguely recall lots of mage trickery.

There is perspective. The World Perspective, anmd teh Player (Metagame) perspective. I say that the rules you say are inadequate in their application are in fact adequate because they work just fine. You have yet to point out a placve in teh game where it is inadequate. It is all theory to you, as you have said so many times, and the theory falls short of application, by a lot. They are not my own facts, they are borne out by players all over the world. None have yet to claim any IN_GAME issues. Thay have all indicated that it is theory. Theory loses to actual application.



But it DOES matter... If it never actually comes up in play, then the theory you are so proud of is invalid. You have to actually PROVE your theory, and you have yet to do so.



I was only rebutting was was originally posited. If the Reply is preposterous, then so is the original premise. Can't have it both ways Yerameyahu.

But, I will ask this? Are you saying that it is not BAD for your armor to be penetrated? IT IS BAD. Would a new term fit better for you? How about Possibly Fatal? The randomness of damage is EXACTLY what we are talking about. Sometiimes it is Stun, and other times it is Physical. It is random, based on several factors, one of which is the effectiveness of the shooter. And yes, Half and Half damage is Entirely Intentional, otherwise you would not have 2 damage tracks. It has always been that way in Shadowrun. it is not new to 4th Edition.

You take the damage (Stun), but you ignore all stun wound penalties, and you do not go unconscious.

Insanity- Doing the same thing and expecting a different result.

Oh well, guess I'm insane. I'll keep feeding the troll.

The rules as applied also leads to the fun result where you are more likely to go unconscious from a single bullet that is stopped in your armor than three bullets, some of which get through your armor and some of which don't. Is there ever a situation where that makes sense? Are you seriously going to say that it is a consistent world for someone that has taken three gun shots to the trauma plate to drop from another gun shot wound to the trauma plate, but not to drop from a gun shot wound to the trauma plate if he happens to have two other bullets that penetrate his vest from the same shot? Or even to still be standing when two bullets strike the trauma plate and one gets through, when a single one on the trauma plate would have dropped him. Yes, I realize I'm making an assumption about how a short burst is distributed in terms of hit, since it's a level of abstraction. But that is one of the situations covered by a short burst's damage modifier.

I believe this was mention earlier where people were taking single shots rather than burst so they would be more likely to do stun damage. Even if your players are not doing so to get around this problem in the rules, surely it breaks the reality for a player when someone is more likely to be incapacitated by a single bullet than by several bullets. If it doesn't break reality for you, fine. It does for me. Which is why I use a single wound track for NPC's.

No, TJ, theory is the whole point. I'm not talking about application, because it's not a contest of theory vs. application. It's a discussion wholly about theory. If you're not personally interested in such a discussion, if you don't care about anything that doesn't centrally affect gameplay, that's fine, but you don't get to dismiss it as unworthy.

You did not rebut the previous argument. You restated it in a wholly distorted and grossly oversimplified way, then smugly beat that straw man.

I didn't say anything about 'inadequate in application'. I said the mechanics don't follow reality. Why can't you ever respond to things I actually say? For another example, I didn't say two damage tracks wasn't intentional; I said *the fact that half-and-half damage keeps you standing longer than pure P or pure S* (in contrast to reality) can't be intentional… specifically that it can't be a method for modeling random armor performance.

Not trolling... Debate.

This is very true. If you take enough damage from a single bullet stopped in your trauma plates (ie. your armor is greater than 10, and you get minimal successes, such that your Damage is still 10+), then Yes, you will go unconscious. How do you explain someone who always stops all but 1 point of damage per shot, and some go to stun, and others go to Physical? Surely this is a problem for you.

See, in my world, it is not a problem to describe some people going down from single shots on a sinble track, while others are described as taking dozens of rounds before falling (multiple tracks). That is how the world works. That is how the mechanics work. Arguing otherwise is a bit disengenuous.

Now, you may not like it that way, And I get it, but that is how it is. Saying it is not fact is actually wrong.

I suggested a Single wound track for NPCs long ago (it is, after all, a suggestion in the book). However, Since you do not like that mechanic (Split Tracks) much, what do you do for Player Characters? Though I imagine they do not complain when it is in their favor, which it will always be if you use a single track for Mooks.

Theory is irrelevant if it is not a problem in actual application. You are trying to fix a problem that does not exist in application, so the resultant theory is flawed.



Actually, I just restated it, exactly like it was proposed, and added on more argument line, and removed a conclusion to support a different conclusion. So, Yes, it was simply a restatement.



And I have repeatedly said the mechanics DO follow reality. Why do you keep dismissing that so that you can talk about Theory? The fact that it is exactly how the rule is written is ENTIRELY intentional. Otherwise there would not be two parallel damage tracks, and a dice roll to see how much damage you take. Like there have been for the last 20 years in Shadowrun (Though IIRC, Previous editions was just a straight reduction in Damage power... been a long time since I played previous editions). Why now, all of a sudden, is it a problem? Half and Half Damage has ALWAYS kept you standing longer than Pure Stun or Pure Physical.

This is simply false. It is irrelevant to *you*.

I haven't dismissed it. I have *denied* it. It's not 'all of a sudden'. We just happen to be talking today. Again, I didn't say *having* two tracks was anything. I said the weird *consequence* of that setup creates a situation which does not follow reality. In reality, the man whose armor blocked all the shots does not go down *before* the man whose armor only blocked half of them. This *consequence* of the rules is not an intentional implementation of 'armor works randomly, deal with it', because the Damage Resistance test already does that.

Let me see if I'm understanding what you're saying... you don't have a problem with the existing mechanics because they generate statistically reasonable results over the span of multiple combats, regardless of whether any individual wound/effect is reasonable or not?

Hey! whatamI chopped liver? [just kidding]
In addition to those ideas; I proposed making physical damage more detrimental than stun damage. I realize that doesn't directly address the problem: that a character may Elect to take physical damage, (A worse result according to TJ and me), rather than stun in order to avoid unconsciousness. but I still think that physical damage from getting shot should be more scary than stun from getting punched. I'm opposed to a system where the character gets to choose what type of damage they take.

I feel that making physical damage more detrimental than stun might mitigate the problem of the system encouraging metagaming.
My ideas were:
1) Do allow a character to make a roll to remain conscious after the stun monitor is filled. But double the damage when the character takes physical damage at that point.

2) increase the modifiers for physical wounds when the stun condition monitor is full (Yerameyahu helped me realized later this was a bad idea.)

3)"A character that has received a physical wound may continue to loose boxes on the physical condition monitor. If a wound is left untreated further physical action, (like combat), or intense effort, (such as spellcasting), may cause more damage. A wounded character who rolls a test for strenuous action; Physical active skills, Combat active skills, manual piloting or Infiltration, or resists spell or conjuring drain must immediately make a Body(number of wounds) test. Failure means the character takes another box of physical damage." (It was pointed out that this is already an optional rule but I can't find it.)

Also Sponge suggested:
1. Attacks with a Physical DV that penetrate armor also do half DV in "secondary" Stun (rounded up)
2. Attacks with a Physical DV that do not penetrate armor do ONLY half DV in Stun (rounded up)
3. If an attack with a Physical DV penetrates armor, any secondary Stun does NOT overflow to Physical.

Interesting. Those last three together mean that Armor against 'lethal' attacks becomes much more important: it's the difference between (n Phys) + (n/2 Stun), and just (n/2 Stun); triple the damage. Does this also mean that 'non-lethal' attacks (S&S?) are now even better at efficiently taking people down? (Or does it just require numeric rejiggering to compensate?)

I can see how these fit with how we understand reality, if the 'secondary Stun' is the result of sheer sudden pain/etc. That 'shock' is much smaller without the wound (i.e., when blocked by armor), though still significant. And getting shot while you're already KOd (full Stun track) doesn't Stun you more.

On a tangent, exactly how important is the Stun-overflows-to-Physical rule to you guys? Personally, I don't see the logic. If someone's KOd, stunning attacks aren't magically going to start causing wounds (esp. for tasers!), while a KOd target is *easy* to attack with Physical methods anyway. So… what's the point of the rule? Especially in a 'cinematic' game.

You didn't actually address my question. You are talking about something else entirely. I am asking how you reconcile a short burst in the current rules. Since we have already established that a character with a lot of stun can be knocked unconscious by a single bullet caught in the armor. How in your world view does one or two of the bullets from a short burst getting through armor negate the character being knocked unconscious by the bullets caught in the armor? They've taken a serious wound (physical) alongside a less serious wound (stun) and in the abstraction of the rules this is modeled by an increase in physical damage, but it does not eliminate the disconnect where an additional injury allows a player to stay conscious. Do you also allow characters to restore consciousness to their fallen comrades by shooting or stabbing one of their bruises? Obviously, that's just a ridiculous notion, but what you have proposed and defended several times equates to that (and I know I'm crazy for pointing it out, because as you said at the beginning if something is a problem, you just ignore). But they've just taken a less serious wound (stun) and made it a more serious wound (physical) and for some reason that means a person stays conscious. I don't think that's how it works in the real world. Maybe someone with a medical background could correct me, but I think most of us are assuming that increasing pain and increasing injury means greater likelihood of blackout.

But it does come up in play, although it rarely happens in a circumstance that is seriously deterimental to the player characters. I've provided several examples.

Also, you agreed with me that it can be better (you even emphasized with 'certainly') for the defender to divide the damage between different tracks so he or she can remain standing and get away or shoot back. If this result is somehow better for the defender, then it MUST be worse for the attacker.



No, but the mechanics involving when you take stun and when you take physical has changed over the years, and it is only in SR4 that my group has observed the scenario of 'more hits(performing better)'='less desirable result(opponent can keep shooting at you)'.

I don't understand how you can seriously argue that 'everything works as intended' when there are situations where increasing your skill or shooting more bullets give you LESS chance of staying upright and fighting in combat.

The 'random factor' is provided by the dice - if you take away the dice and trade dice for successes instead, giving 'fixed' results, you would expect a curve where higher skill always means better performance against the same circumstances.

You claim that Physical damage is objectively worse than Stun, yet there are clearly many situations where it can be better to take physical damage.
- If you have a skilled healing mage handy he can have you ready for another combat faster than you can heal the stun.
- If you are Bubba the heavy troll and fall unconscious due to stun damage during a retreat, it would've been better to take physical damage, because you would've had a greater chance of escape/survival/success.
- If you have Platelet Factories.
- If you have a medkit on hand but no friends.
- If you yourself know the Heal spell.
- If you are nearly passed out from fatigue, but in desperate need of summoning a spirit, and not likely to soak all drain (and don't go on about 'in-game, characters wouldn't know..' or 'in-game, characters wouldn't choose overcasting'. A mage with experience will know if he's too tired for another summoning, and he'll know that if he summons and passes out he won't get what he needs. He'll know that if he pushes himself he can stay awake, but get a bad nosebleed.')
...to name a few.

Regardless of the situation you are in, would you consider these situations 'good' or 'bad':
- Being captured by police.
- Escaping capture.
- Being unconscious in a fight.
- Being able to attack your assailant in a fight.

Which is worse:
- Being wounded and bleeding in a hospital.
- Being unconscious.


And as for your claim that inflicting Physical damage on someone is Always Objectively better than stun...why? Why would you care if your opponent stays in a hospital for 2 weeks, or wakes up with a headache after an hour? Why would that matter in the least to the attacker?

When the drek hits the fan and your character ends up in combat, do you honestly care how long it takes the security guards to recover from their wounds beyond 'long enough for me to not be here'?

Assuming you have decided to go in for lethal attacks (for whatever reason - maybe you're fighting off bounty hunters who have a mission to kill you), and your character shoots at two security guards: you hit the first and do not penetrate armor, but manage to knock him out in one hit. You hit the second and you can see blood from his gut, but he stands and shoots back at you. Is your immediate response:
- Yes, I knocked one of them out; too bad the other guy still stands. OR
- Yes, I did physical damage to one; pity the other one only got stun - I wanted to kill him...

Which result is objectively better? The unconscious non-injured opponent, or the bleeding opponent shooting at you?

Well, keep tasering the unconscious guy and he'll likely havve a heart attack or start smoking eventually...

Keep punching him and he'll die.

If you didn't have that rule, you could never kick or punch or bludgeon or even strangle someone to death without changing other rules. Nort could you die from ODing on drugs etc. You could cast ridiculously draining spells, knocking yourself out with no care in the world.

I'd say the rule is necessary.

If the taser would cause a heart attack, it would've caused it on the first hit with equal probability. It's not cumulative, AFAIK.

No, see that's my point. Once they're unconscious, it's pretty easy to choose a 'lethal' attack. Strangling is an issue (though one best handled by specific asphyxiation rules), but I'm not convinced that a 'stun punch' would ever reasonably become lethal (and certainly not instantly!). Instead, you'd just use something with a P DV, probably with Called Shots now that he can't resist. I guess what bothers me is the magic conversion from stun to physical; to me, a given attack would either break a rib, or *not*, and it shouldn't matter if the subject happens to have his eyes open.

I wouldn't call being KOd from a spell 'no care in the world'. The drug example is good, though; many nonlethal drugs get lethal.

However, most of these examples seem to be outside my question: I asked about attacks, not every possible source of Stun damage. I guess that's one answer, though! 'It's not for attacks, it's for all the non-attack things'.

Stun becoming physical damage is pretty important to me. (It just doesn't do a very good job of representing what i experience IRL.)
Example; Boxing, I'm an amateur boxer. Several months ago I took a pretty good liver shot. It didn't drop me but came damn close. It hurt me bad enough that when I got my blood tested (for another problem relating to a work accident), my liver enzymes were elevated enough that It looked like I had hepatitis. That's real physical damage from a stun attack that is taking me Months to recover.

Other posts in this thread have lumped Concussion in with stun damage. I wasn't going to say anything, but I disagree with that. TBE is physical damage. Getting KOed should over flow into physical damage. I've been knocked out at work and (once) knocked out in the ring, I can guarantee that is physical damage. I've also passed out working concrete and passed out after a set of squats I'd classify that as Stun. There's a very big difference and thats why I think physical damage should do some stun and Stun damage should overflow.

(it's not germane to this thread but probably lot's of hits on a stun attack, like a broken nose/jaw or liver shot, should transfer to physical instead of stun damage)

Yeah, I guess I'm just running up against the limits of an abstract system that has 'Stun' at all. Because to me, an attack that does physical damage is not a Stun attack in the first place. If it hurt your liver, that wasn't Stun. And if it was going to inflict that injury, it wouldn't matter if you were awake or not, see? So, I agree: ideally there'd be a simple way for powerful, but supposedly 'Stun', attacks to 'stage up' to Physical. Maybe something like 'more raw damage than Body'? You'd have to play with the numbers and see what made sense.

But basically, it's the fact that Stun attacks (identical to previous Stun attacks) suddenly start doing *lethal* damage based on whether the target is awake or not. :/

Maybe. In some situations this is how it would work.
On the other hand you smack a guy in the head enough and that damage builds up till instead of just minor bruising he pops an artery and has an anurism. A skater or snowboarder muffs a maneuver several times. At first it just hurts the last time he needs a new MCL in is knee.
A solder keeps taking shots to his rifle plate and eventually that rib is going to dislocate from his spine.
I'm not fighting or sparring right now cause I need this liver for at least another 60 years.

I think there is a case for damage that would be relatively easy to heal building till you've got something that's going to need surgery and might kill ya.

Stun overflowing into physical doen't happen because the target is unconscious. Going to sleep is just a common side effect of being hurt pretty bad. The problem mostly goes away if you give characters the option to stay awake with a serious effort. In that case mages who would take physical damage from drain might not waste their last 2 boxes of stun by choosing to overcast. And you might not worry about switching ammo when you're fighting that FRT trooper cause he might just be tough enough to keep going.

Yeah, the problem is definitely the abstractness of Stun. Because you could have stun from fatigue, a taser, a toxin or drug, Drain, and then the *first* smack is now Physical. In rules terms, it *is* because you're asleep. (Just to be clear, for TJ: when I say 'problem', I'm not saying it's a dire, gameplay issue. )

NO! It IS a Dire gameplay issue. It RUINS the game and MUST be modified to suit my world view. and Tymeaus Jalynsfe will NEVER change my mind No mater How LONG his posts become! :[
Haha just kidding.

IDK that stun overflows to physical because the target is unconscious. Seems it could be that happens because the defender is no longer capable of defending but that's covered by the fact that you can't make a dodge or parry to stage down damage when you're sleeping. I think stun overflow represents that after a certain point any damage is a serious injury because you're hurt so badly allready. In my mind, stun overflow and unconsciousness are simultaneous but not directly related.

I think you guys are missing part of the damage mechanic when it comes to "bad things" that happen because of stun damage. Keep in mind that most people today do not wear any form of armor but often withstand similar amounts of force as someone 70 years from now. A bullet is a bullet, a ladder falling on your head is still a ladder to the head, but most of the time, you've only got your BODY stat to resist that.

So what, you've got 2, 3, MAYBE 4 dice most of the time?

How often will you glitch on that dice pool, hm?

I don't follow you. I'm only looking at the way SR4 models accumulated Stun (which, I understand, is necessarily abstract).

For 'lethal' attacks being affected by armor, I kind of feel like the fact that a KOd target can no longer dodge is enough; the attacker's net hits would rise enough to ensure P damage (fine, and no overflow rule needed). For non-lethal attacks, I'm still not convinced.I think you're right, and I don't think *that* is right. Why should 'any damage' now be serious?

But, I feel like it would require a pretty major overhaul to deal with this, because of the many various things that all do Stun (in totally different ways). I just wanted to see what people thought. Honestly, it never comes up in games because 'dropped' already equals 'dead or worse'.

But Unconsciousness is not the same as Sleeping. If someone is sleepng, with an unmarked Stun track, and you hit them with a Stun based attack, they do not take Physical Damage, they take stun damage. Only when the Stun track is full does it overflow into Physical, so Stun Overflow to Physical Damage already represents something else entirely.

I was using it as a euphemism, but that is a point: stun overflow isn't because you can't move, as OneTrikPony also said. I'm not sure *what* it's representing, given that someone knocked out by anesthesia *does* have a full stun track and takes instant Phys damage from anything that touches them.

I almost think we need two types of stun. Physical and Emotio-chemical.*

Physical stun is someone punching you in the face, taking a bullet to your armor, gel rounds, tazers, etc. Things that inflict actual pain. The other track is filled by drugs, chemicals, poisons, or mental damage (Black Ice, some types of spells, etc.).

If either of these tracks are full, you fall unconscious. This doesn't have the problem of the "take a bullet and bleed = stay conscious, take a bullet and don't bleed = unconscious" issue because they're different kinds of knock-out. The first is something is physically wrong, but it's not lethal (typically). E.g. concussion, massive bruising. The second is all chemical based. E.g. sleeping pills, emotional exhaustion, stayed-up-all-night-gaming/working/partying, etc. That is, taking a lot of sleeping pills, but not enough to knock you out, and then getting punched isn't going to knock you cold: you're going to be awake, have a lot of difficulty DOING anything. You might fall down as the effort of standing up is too great, but you'll still be awake.

The chemical-stun can overflow into physical stun and represents a severe overdose on whatever chemical cocktail happens to be coursing through your blood (and before anyone says that staying up too late can't kill you: actually, it can. It takes "not sleeping" for like 3 weeks (for humans)** but it is possible) and starts causing actual physical damage to your organs. I'd allow some kind of...Body + Willpower test (possibly with no penalties from the chemical-stun track) to stay conscious each round after overflow occurs as a "I can power through this, I can power through this..." kind of thing. Full physical stun though you can't, as you've got actual brain damage going on (bruising, etc.) and your body shuts down, whether you want it to or not.

*The "I feel beat" type of being emotionally, socially, or mentally drained. Their all forms of exhaustion that is related to a chemical imbalance in the brain.

**Bullshit value. I know it's about 7 days for rats, I'm pretty sure there haven't been any laboratory tests with human subjects to see how long until the body dies from a lack of sleep. That whole...ethics thing.

So, clinical depression and stress also count as Stun Damage.

...

I can see that.

Three bullets bounce off your helmet, ringing your bell, causing in SR terms stun damage. 1 Bullet goes through the armpit, bypassing any armor they have, it can happen. Problem with the detail you mention is basically a more realistic result where each bullet is tracked and if it bypasses armor. As it stands the 3 shot burst (or 6 shot long burst), are treated as hitting the same area.

You could of course bypass this and state that the extra damage from a burst counts towards if the shot causes stun or physical damage (this would make the game deadlier) or just assume P weapons cause P damage regardless of the armor rating. The problem with having an attack cause both stun and physical damage within the system is that is will quickly lead to a PC or NPC suffering a -4 DP mods for stun and physical damage. This would reduce the persons dodge pool at an above RAW rate, and result in PC's and NPC's dying quicker on the next shot. Worth the added complexity? IMHO-no the game is deadly enough.

*Ping, Bullet bounces off helmet* "You must be the luckiest SOB alive!" *Ping, bullet goes through helmet into brain* - Saving Private Ryan

Actually, didn't he take his helmet off to ogle in amazement that the helmet actually did it's job for once?



Technically speaking yes, although I'm not suggesting that the game model it.* I was looking for a way to differentiate between a drug crash and being punched in the face. The two do different things to the body.

*Although I could see a spell called Depression that adds to that emotio-chemical track.

Helmets were designed at the time (And today even) to protect against shrapnel, not actual bullet hits. Especially against rifle rounds. Thus the "Lucky" comment. I can't remember if he had it back on or not for the second shot. It's been a long time since I saw the movie."Um, why are all the security guards in corners crying?" "It's better than shooting them, and we'll cost the Corporation a fortune in benefits due to the psychological damage I just did to them. It was either that, or Orgasm." "Good choice."

Yeah, Draco18s. I'm not too willing to make the game more complicated, so I do understand why all those many things are still 'Stun'.

However, perhaps it would be possible to separate out (some) drug/toxin stun effects into something more like Disorientation, Agony, etc. (you know, the 'status conditions' used by various things already). Hmm.

Warlordtheft, I think you have to compare the 3-burst hitting the same spot as the 1-shot, though.

Anecdotal, I know, but I went just over 5 days, when I was in the Gulf, with no Sleep. Boy was that not fun. Would not want to do it again. Started having hallucinations there towards the end.

And you had a rifle. Fun.

Glad you're home safe!

Yeah. I know. But I'd merge it with the Matrix Condition Track, honestly.

I understand why the matrix has it's own track, but I'd do it for two reasons:

1) The hacker's "stress" level more than his progams' integrity (honestly, this never made much sense to me). The track getting filled would be more of a "panic logoff" ("oh god, oh god, oh god, log off! Log off!") than an "oops, your icon crashed" type deal. And again be subject to the same body roll for staying conscious after a drug overdose.
Heck, it'd actually lead to more realistic scenarios, rather than the hacker going "oh well" and logging back in for another try the next round, he has to spend 5 minutes or whatever cooling off and calming down before heading back in.

2) Technomancers. I dislike that technos don't have a matrix monitor, and use their stun track. It's like they're hacking when everything that they face off against is Black IC and they don't get their biofeedback filters against it (honestly, they might fare better against Black IC than against attack programs!).



Yeah, 5 days will do that to people. I've done 30 or so. My sister's done 63.