From the Cannon Companion, P11
Damage: (Str+2)M, (Str+3)M once Dikoted ((Str+3)S if your GM counts a spiked version as 'edged')
Reach: 2
Advantages: Can be used to entangle opponents as a whip (takes opponent complex action and strength test to get free)

Okay, they have a lower power, but that's offset somewhat by the extra reach and the fun that you can have by holding them stationary and smacking them with whatever's in your other hand.

I personally prefer a dikoted Manriki-Gusari. Concealability 10, (STR+3)L Stun dikoted, Reach 2, and the ability to not only entangle, but do damage while you have them entangled. Sure, the Damage Level is Light, but I've always found Power to be more important anyway. So it's equal to the above in that department, you'll rarely be spotted carrying it, and you can both entangle (with a high Barrier rating to boot) while doing damage. The best part is that it's Stun damage, so you won't have to leave a pile of corpses in your wake.

The Manriki-Gusari is nice, but it's 2-handed. With the morningstar you can use it in one hand (with another non-lethal weapon in your other hand) or in both hands (gaining +1 power). The ability to damage and entangle simultaniously is nice though, I'm not sure about repeatedly damaging someone with it if you've already entangled them though. The concealability is a great advantage, but compared to the katana's concealability of 3, 4 ia already ahead.

Thankfully; they're both whips. You can use them with the same skill.

I don't think that a diamond-coated ball of steel (even with spikey bits) would be that much more threatening than a normal ball of steel. Thus, while the technicalities of the rules would allow it (?), I would say that you can't dikote clubs, baseball bats, batons, hammers, maces, or morning stars. Well, you CAN, but you just won't get the increased damage code that you wanted. (In other words, this would be either a house rule, or my interpretation of canon rules. Much as I'd rule that an untrained average person CAN suicide while defaulting to quickness to shoot themself with a light pistol. )

IIRC, the dikote increases a bladed weapon's damage code because it lowers the resistance for it to slice through things -- easier slicing means deeper wounds. A mace doesn't slice, it bashes -- sure it might have spikes, but those won't go any deeper just because they're diamond covered, since the big ball fo steel behind them limits their depth. Maces and other mass weapons were all about crushing underlying bones, anyways.

In my opionin, like the FirePower™ ammo of 1st Edition, Dikote is really just a rules addition to "fix" the Damage Codes of melee weapons to make them as dangerous as they should be and to give certain types of items a Barrier Rating. You shouldn't put too much thought into the exact reasons for it, just accept it for what it is.

Good 'ol FirePower ammo. My group thought that, and the reactive trigger, was the coolest thing.

As for dikoting, get dual cyber spurs and dikote them. Concealablity is moot when there housed in your forearms and if your strength is high enough you will be a ginsu machine.

Yes, the suggestion was that the spikes on a spikey ball could be made sharper thus deserving the +1 Damage Level. The spiked ball would also probably cause a nastier wound as sthe spikes could penetrate further or other spikes, spikes that would not normally penetrate due to resistane, could penetrate the skin and cut them up.

Anyhow: Yes, by canon they do not get the +1DL as they are not edged weapons, but they do get the +1 power.

I fully respect the Dikote and all the whips in general, but nothing can ever replace the good ol' Dikoted katana (or no-dachi). Old tricks are the best tricks, i always say.

As previously mentioned, a pair of dikoted spurs will trump a dikoted katana any day of the week. [(STR+50%)+1]S Damage. And if both are used with an Off-Hand Weapons Skill or Ambidexterity 3, they both gain bonus dice.

Except that the katana has reach, which is key.

How bout dikoated traditional materials tomohawk . (Str)S, +1 reach, 7 concealability, no metal!

Far as I could tell from the rules all the whips weapons have the power reduction that regular whips have... whatever it is... half damage against anything with armor maybe?

Who cares about Reach with Close Combat? The katana weilder will get his ass handed to him by anyone with a Reach 2 weapon. At least with Close Combat and the spurs, you're leveling the playing field while getting a superior Damage Code to boot.

Plus, you can coat those spurs with glow-in-the-dark paint and pretend you're a Protoss Zealot! The enemy's command cent.. I mean research facility doesnt stand a chance! Hit it into destruction!.

Where are the cyberspur rules? I can't seem to lay my hands on them right now.

If you use the maneuver rules maybe, I don't so I don't know.

If you don't the katana is still a lot better against the reach 2 weapon than the spurs, even if it still looses.

I'd dikote my gun for the hell of it and shoot you all from out of melee range.

Entaro adun, Mr. Johnson....

Why not just go one step further and make the cyberspurs weapon foci, with the character being an adept.

Of course the costs in time, effort, and cold hard cash are extremely prohibitive, assuming you could even make the blades from your spurs into foci...that and dikoting would conceivably give you double the dice to roll (assumedly if you're going to all that effort you'll invest in high force) and the bonuses for dikoting.

But yes, this is a ridiculous idea so don't take it seriously. (please? I can't bear the thought of the ensuing min/max discussion)

Just a thought, but if you were going to turn retractable cyberspurs into a weapon focus, would you not have to magicify the actual cyberware itself, the stuff they implant into your brain. How much is orachalcum circitry, I wonder?

Well, none of it thankfully. It's all optical quantum computing, otherwise EMPs would fry sammies in a fraction of a second.

Should I advertise the THE WALLHACKER!!!1112?

What's the armor rating on a Leopard III again? (I haven't got SOTA.)

40

Damn. There's no way in hell you can pump up the Power on those dual Dikoted handblades up to 82. I guess I got to stick to Light Armored Vehicles.

Yes there is. You just gotta make it on a vehicle that has mechanical arms. Hell: A single mechanical arm mounted on a Leopard III (body 12) has strength 144! Stick a pair of them on (with cyberspurs) and you're looking at a power of 216!

So the leopard may be armored sufficiently to survive a heavy railgun hit from another leopard, unfortunately it's shafted if it's ever punched by one

well if the heavy rail gun doesn't work what you need is a good old ranger-X bow.
min strength 144 damage code of 148 M
it would work as an anti troll weapon as well i think...

Of course it can only be used by the leopard III with arms

Eh, you only need something with a Body 8, two arms, and spurs to do the job. A medium caterpillar can easily do the job, infinitely cheaper, and infinitely easier to get your hands on, too.

Let's see, a used medium caterpillar with jet turbine plant and maxed out Speed and Load will set you back 56,000 nuyen. That gives you 10,000kg and 60 mps to work with. Get your engine customized four times for Load (28,000 nuyen), load it up with 40 points of armor (50,000), snag your two Mechanical Arms (160,000) and get some dikoted Spurs for them (24,000ish), and you have your very own nigh-invulernable tank-buster of your very own.

Actually, after reading the rules for Mechanical Arms more closely, you can do this with a Body 6 vehicle.

Let's go with a used Heavy Transport with Electric Fuel Cell (19,200 nuyen). Crank the Load and Speed to their max (23,600 nuyen) to get Load 10,000kg, Speed 100, and Signature 4. Load that up with 40 points of armor (50,000 nuyen and -7,200kg), two Mechanical Arms with Strength 60 (912,000 nuyen), dikoted spurs (24,000 nuyen), Improved Signature 1 and Radar Absorbent Materials 3 (62,000 nuyen), then add ECD 6 (120,000) and you wind up with a vehicle capable of traveling at Speed 100 with a Signature 8, ECD 6, arms capable of dishing out 91S damage, and 40 points of vehiciular armor.

Since the Handling sucks, crank that up with Drive-By-Wire 3, Improved Off-Road Suspension 2, and Handling Improvement 1/4 for a relative song. Then give it a Rating 5 Robotic-Drone with the works and a Prime Directive: Kill Tanks (487,000 nuyen), an Autosoft Interpretation System with Performance Profile 5 and Sharpshooter 5, and you're pretty much set. All for a fraction of the price of a single tank, too. Might as well throw some Ruthenium Polymers on complete with 12 scanners, too.

Sure, the Handling is still up there (but only 8/6), but your new Tank Killer is throwing tons of dice and it's difficult to spot and lock weapons onto. Get a mage with Vehicle Mask 6 and you can pump the Signature up that much more before you send it out (Line of Sight isn't required for sustaining a spell). A competent mage (Magic 6, Vehicle Mask 6, Sorcery 6, and Spell Pool 6) will average 6 successes, cranking the Signature up to 11. With the Ruthenium on, I believe that cranks it up by another +6, but I'm not sure on that one.

You could do much the same with a more maneuverable vehicle, too, like a Twin-Engine plane or a Cargo Helicopter. The latter can even handle the same amout of cargo, and if you get it with Smart Materials, it'll be even stealthier.

Here is your version. There were a few errors in your numbers, but this should be about right:

Punkbuster

Body: 6
Armor: 40 + 6 Ablative
Cargo: 174
Handling: 7/6
AutoNav: -
Sensor: 8
Seating: 2
Entry: 2d+1x
Load: 3,880
Speed: 100
Accel.: 5
Sig.: 8
Fuel: 400PF EFC
Econ.: 1.5km/PF
Chassis: Transport, Heavy

S.I.: 4.5?

Avail.: N/A

Cost: 4,087,000

MunchWheels Punkbuster Mk 0

Other features: Ablative Armor-3, CMC-3, DBW-3, ED-6, Electronic Ports, Mechanical Arms (2 @ STR 60, both with Dikoted Cyberspurs), Power Amplifiers-10, RAM-3 (figured in), Remote Control Interface, Rigger Adaptation, Robotic Drone-5 (Autosoft Interp: PP-5, SS-5), Smart Armor System, Smart Materials (figured in).

It isn't cheap, not by a long shot. I don't know what the Leopard III costs, but this is only 3.5 times as expensive, far more versatile, and can kill an almost unlimited number of Punkbusters. Of course the Pb has much space for improvement, and could fit lots of ranged weaponry and other gear if neccessary. Dropping the Cargo space or the extra Load will not significantly lower the price.

You could probably get the Punkbuster cheaper by using a larger vehicle to begin with, because over half of the price comes from the STR Enhancement of the Mechanical Arms. Slapping such arms on a Leopard III would cost ~240,000, which most armies would do if these kinds of tank hunters were common.

A helicopter might work with the same principles, but a fixed-wing aircraft would be a lot more difficult. Do the SR vehicle combat rules allow an aircraft to fly so that it's just on top of a ground vehicle to hit with the Mechanical Arms, and then continue to fly away? Or would you have to ram the ground vehicle or something?

The Used Model quality factor makes it significantly cheaper (roughly 60% so, assuming mostly salvaged parts jury-rigged together), and I'd say it pretty much counts as one. Sure, that means it has 1 point of permanent stress to start, but that's a minor hassel.

The above will the biggest, baddest non-naval vehicle in the actual game, though (the Leopard III, with Armor 40 and Signature 4). None of the missiles it carries will scratch the paintjob, though its railgun would. It has to get around that ECD 6, Signature 8, and Ruthenium 12 though, not to mention the Robotic Pilot's crazy-insane dodging skillz.

But regardless, I know it's not a practical vehicle. I was just bullshitting around. I think it's a pretty stupid idea, honestly. The last thing I'd want to see on a battlefield is a caterpillar running around with its B-9-Robot-from-Lost-in-Space-style arms flailing while the robotic drone is chanting "Crush, Kill, Destroy!" or whatever.

Don't forget to dikote the whole vehicle! That adds 1 body and 1 armor

Yeah, but it cranks the cost (even with Used Vehicle) waaaaaay above the Leopard. Of course you could use a Body 5 vehicle at that point.

Anyway, here's the original build above I was talking about. Sat down and calculated everything out and added a few things.

TANK-THRASHER 2000

Chassis: Medium Caterpillar
Power Plant: Diesel

Body: 8
CF: 0.5
Hand: 4/0
Load: 2,635kg
Speed: 120
Accel: 9
Sig: 5(7)
Armor: 20
Sensors 6

Quality Factor: Complex Chassis, Used/Prototype Model

Acceleration Increase 3
Handling Improvement 2/2
Increased Cargo Space 15.0
Load Increase 5,000
Speed Increase 55

Armor 20
Autosoft Interpretation System
Drive-By-Wire 3
ED 6
Engine Customization (Acceleration 2, Speed 2)
Improved Off-Road Suspension 2
Mechanical Arms (x2) (Strength 64)
Medium Remote Turret
Nitrous Oxide Injectors 6
Radar-Absorbant Materials 3
Sensors 6
Thermal Baffles 2

Fuzzy Logic Augmentation 5
Improved Neural Network Algorithms 5
Robotic-Pilot Advanced Programming 5 (Tank-Killing Prime Directive)
Robotic Reflexes 3

Clearsight 5 and Sharpshooter 5 Autosofts (350 Mp total)

Design Points: 30,417 (0.10 Mark-Up)
Design Cost: 304,170 nuyen + 87,500 for Autosofts + 135,000 for Xicohtencatl Railgun + 24,000 for Dikoted Spurs + Ruthenium costs (if desired; considering the benefits, the costs could easily be rationalized)

The Robot Pilot has a Reaction of 16, Initiative 4D6, Adaptation Pool 10, 20 Comprehension Dice, and 10 dice whenever it attacks. Assuming the use of the autosofts.

If it's compared to dedicated military vehicles, considering it "used" and the others not isn't really fair.

Read through the ED rules, and it seems the Pike doesn't really have to worry about such things in the least. It can just blow ground vehicles into kingdom come with impunity from beyond the target's ED range. The sensors on the Pike have a modified Flux of 32 in most cases, for a range of 74km. The ED on Punkbuster cannot hope for more than a Flux of 19, for a range of 48km.

Within the ED range, things do get a bit tricky. Seems high-level ED is insanely powerful when used together with a 6+ Signature. Since there's no way to get more dice on the Active Sensor Test than 16 (Sensors-10, ECD-6), it's almost impossible to ever spot a vehicle with ED-6 and Sig-6.

Fine, fine, take away the Used/Prototype Model (even though the point was that it was originally scavaged together by countries too cheap to build something hardcore). The Tank-Thrasher 2000 would have a base cost of 2,129,190 nuyen then. Still significantly cheaper than the Leopard III, and more than capable of defeating multiple ones at that.

Note also that any enemy vehicles would still have to get past the Ruthenium with 12 scanners; that effectively adds +6 to its Signature for 11(13 with Thermal Baffles activated). When not active, it could easily switch to any camouflage patter the terrain calls for (even technological camo), which still gives it a +1 bonus at night.

Does ruthenium really have that much of an effect on vehicle sensors? I would give it far less than half considering that it doesn't affect radar, thermographic, or ultrasound. 1/4 of the bonus would seem appropriate rather than 1/2 (anti-sensor camo gives 1/4 of the camofluage bonus as a signature boost, so there is precedence for this)

Just because we seem to be posting broken vehicles...

Ares Boomer

Chassis: Medium Transport (Markup 1.00)

Power Plant: Diesel

DPV: 6232

Final Cost: ¥628,200

Hand. 1/10, Speed 180, Accel 9, Body 5, Armor 11, Sig 4, Auto 4, Pilot 3, Sensor 8, Cargo 71, Load 1,476, Seating 6, Entry 2+1x+1h, Fuel D (300 l), Econ 6 Km/l

Smart Materials, Drive-By-Wire 3, Contingency Maneuver Controls 6, Remote-Control Interface, Rigger Adaptation, Concealed Armor, Gas Enviroseal, Life Support (100 man-hours), Roll Bars, R2 Thermal Baffles, Pop-Up Remote Small Turret (RPK HMG, 480 rounds, Smartlink-II, L5 Gunnery Recoil Adjusters), Launch Control System (X2), Missile Mounts (X2), Missile Storage (20), R3 ED, L4 ECCM, Electronics Port (X16) (1.5 meter viewscreen (replacing windshield)) (.3 meter viewscreen (X3) (replacing windows, plus one misc.)) (.2 meter viewscreen (X8)) (Fixed-Base Satellite Dish) (Remote-Control Deck) (Cyberdeck) (Rating 6 Radio), Rating 12 Power Amplifiers, Rating 9 Maglocks, Drone Racks (125 CF), Ejection Bucket Seats (x6), Photovoltaic Chameleon Paint, Spotlight, Infrared Spotlight, L2 Engine Customization



Combined with a driver with a VCR-3 and 6 or above skill, you can start dealing out 18S on stationary targets without going over your Speed rating. Or being scratched.

~J

Also correct me if im wrong but doesnt each point of flux drop the sig by one? Arent these things giant bullseyes?

The closest rule to that I can find are the footptint rules on P83 of R3. The rules reduce a vehicle's signature versus sensor-enhanced gunnery by 1 for every 10 points of flux transmitted by the vehicle (Radios, RCDs, Sensors, ECM, ED, ETC.). You can use electronic warfare to reduce that number, and overall I'd be tempted to apply the rules to all sensor tests to encourage running vehicles in 'stelth' mode for coolness value.

Never saw Stripes, huh?

You could make the spikes edged and knife-shaped instead of round and pin-shaped.

[QUOTE][QUOTE=Panzergeist,Apr 11 2004, 11:03 PM] You could make the spikes edged and knife-shaped instead of round and pin-shaped. [/QUOTE]
True, the rationale behind the fact that a spiked mace should do more than +1 power once dikoted is that it should probably have a far larger effect on a sharp weapon than a blunt weapon like a baseball bat.[QUOTE]

The whole point of a bladed weapon is to go deep and get the vital organs. Dikoting helps this the same way that polishing and oiling the blade does, only better.
When the blade can only go so deep and is limited to impaling, the damage itself is limited. For example, a spiked mace.
This is why blades, both cutting and piercing, get the damage level increase and nothing else does. (a knife has a short blade but can cut along the body, not something that a mace does.)
Think of a standard sewing needle. Can you think of any enhancement that would allow it to do seriously more damage than normal as a melee weapon? There is none, because the point only goes in a few centimetres. It'll go through armour better, though, because it's nearly frictionless.

Paul

(who has just thought of a sammie girl with two dikoted maces, called Shampoo - and will go and immolate himself in apology as soon as he can)

Don't be dissing the +5 Vorpal Unholy Power Speed Sewing Needle of Human Slaying.

dikoted vibro sword, str+1D

Wonder if I could Dikote my Attack Program

only if it looks like a katana.

being blind doesnt hurt