OK, so i was musing to myself earlier today. I said, "Self, why on earth didn't you get a little ambidexterity at character creation?" Then it occurred to me that i could learn off-hand weapons and all would not be lost. Then it FURTHER occurred to me that maybe the Adept's Handybook (not CANON, i know, but handy all the same) had something about ambidexterity as an adept power. No dice. So i was forced to muse to myself again. "Self, how would this work? What would be fair?"
So myself decided to get some feedback. What does Dumpshock think?
Also, ambidexterity and off-hand weapons rules would be helpful.

Hmmm...I personally think it's workable.

Improved Coordination
Cost: 0.25 points per leve, max of 4 levels

Each level of Enhanced Coordination is equivalent to one level of the Ambidexterity edge.

Yes, this does make it cheaper for an adept to acquire the abilities of the edge, but that's how it should be in my opinion. This is something specifically within the focus of even the original "physical" adept concept, and one level of the power is roughly equivalent to a single Improved Sense (several of which are also far more expensive for a non-adept to acquire).

I was thinking along the same lines but didn't want to say anything to avoid any min/maxing, munchkinism accusations. Anybody else have a take on this?

I'd go with something like ACL's interpretation, but I'd make it .5/level.

[rationalization] At 2 pts per level, the edge is roughly equivalent to a stat point per level. As stat points are .5/level for adepts, .5/level seems somewhat more balanced. [/rationalization]

The power makes complete conceptual sense -- however, given the flaming debate over paired weapons and game balance, I'd run it past your GM to be sure.

-Siege

I don't use firearms anyway, so it won't be too bad.
My GM frequents this site so we'll all get to see him tell me to go f*** off together.

well you can get high pain tolerance at .25 (or is it .5?) per level which is equal to a 2 point edge. so why not .25 per level all the way up to level 8? 2 pp for complete ambidexterity ain't unbalancing at all.

High Pain Tolerance is a 2-point edge with an Adept Power Point cost of 0.5 for its equivalence. On the other hand, Low Light Vision is also a 2-point edge that only costs 0.25 Power Points. On yet another hand, Bonus Attribute Point is equivalent to as much as 1.00 Power Points. So using any of those as a basis for determining the cost is pretty much futile since it runs the gamut.

A full Power Point for the ability to weild two firearms without a penalty (yet still suffering the no-targeting devices limitation amongst others) or use melee weapons effectively is hardly overbalanced.

I was thinking of ambidexterity as a physical skill, not unlike stealth or athletics. Since stealth and athletics cost .25pp to improve, it was my reasoning that ambidexterity should cost .25pp/level as well.

But that's just me.

The melee benefit is significant enough for it to cost .5 per level, IMO. Getting this at level 3 (1.5 Power Points) provides three extra dice when you have skill 6 and two weapons, identical in cost and bonus dice to three levels of improved ability. If the adept has a higher skill than 6 and/or already has some improved ability, then the bonus is even greater and this becomes quite an efficient use of points.

And that's only limited to the two-weapon melee scenario. There are plenty of other benefits to ambidexterity which make it worthwhile.

I to think this makes perfect sense as an adept power. one of the few suggestions I have heard in a long time that make sense.

As far as to cost I would say .5 per level. It is pretty powerful. I don't think you can go vary far comparing power point cost edge cost, I think they compare more to the cost of cyberware as far as game balance gos.

that sounds like a good idea. maybe 1/2 the cost of KH? .25/.5/1/2?

Personally, I'd suggest something along the lines of 0.2/0.5/1.5/2.0 or, alternatively, 0.2/0.5/1.2/1.5, if you'd like it to be cheaper than 2 points for full ambidexterity. Personally, seem paying a full third of one's starting magic points for ambidexterity is a bit much, but I'm als unfamiliar with magic and even less familiar with adepts. Any opinions?

Well: power point costs don't tend to come less than 0.25, Arethusa, but the numbers suggested by mfb seem fair.

If you needed to mix it with the ambidexterous edge itself then you could simply buy the power point difference IE: buying 3 to 4 costs 1 power point, regardless of wether the first 3 levels are edge-bought or power-point bought.

consider that, in order buy level 4 ambidexterity, you have to pay 8 character creation points. that's a lot. that's more than the maximum you can invest in a skill (assuming a linked attribute of 6). that's enough to buy you an above-average stat. 2pp for the same benefit? that's cheap. that's a sweet deal, or my name's not Heywood Jablowme.

Why not just pay the karma cost of the edge?
10x BP cost

Well I know it's more expensive than to initiate with the point cost supplied in this tread, but well tought luck it's allready posible for you to get ambidex with canon (optional) rules.....

On second thought, maybe i'll just get off-hand weapons.

Ok maybe im seeing ambidex to be a little more deadly then some of you, but i was thinking it costing the same as killing hands (.5,1,2,4)

Because assuming a skill of 6, a starting character can roll 18 in a weapons attack without combat pool, and im wanting a character to pay for that ability wether it be a 6 point edge or a third of your magic. Note also the cost could end up being (.5,.75,1.5,3) by taking the geas "melee weapons only"

The off-hand weapons skill is good, but I don't think any Improved (Main-hand Weapon skill) dice would carry-over to it.

I'm If you're a 6 skill/6 improved skill monkey (as I suspect you are, no offence meant) then to buy the off-hand skill to 6+6 dice will cost you more, even if you compare it to the 60 karma to buy the edge, plus you can't use it to fire two firearms at once effectively.

@Shockwave_IIc: I was replying to smiley's post, yours just snuck in there first.
I'll talk for a bit anyway:
On 2-pistol shooting:
How exactly is 2 pistol shooting not worth it? It's even more worth it to adepts than it is to sammies as adepts get their improved ability with both hands (2*12 dice shots before combat pool? Yowch). I see no need for house-rules there.

On 2-melee weapons:
Edged weapons is a separate skill from Off-Hand Edged weapons. I am talking about a character that does not have ambidexterity and is using the off-hand weapons skill instead. Unless the GM ruled that Improved Edged Weapons: 6 also gave you Improved Off-Hand Edged Weapons: 6 then the char with the off-hand weapons skill is still a bit lacking.

On the killing hands price equivalence:
The fact that a character can roll 18 dice before combat pool is noted, but I see no real reason to make the costs escalate exponentially. The very last point dosen't give that tremeandous a bonus when compared to the 1st and 2nd levels. Also: If it is available as a straight 2bp/level, then why should the costs increase exponentially for the adept? I could agree in a step in the costs between levels 2 and 3 (due to the enhanced ability to use normal weapons skills for the off-hand) but otherwise strongly doubt the gap between levels 3 and 4 would really be worth 2 power points.

I'm still of my original mindset on this one.

Ambidexterity is an ability that should be nearly inherent in any adept that chose to go that route. It's the very core concept of what even the original physical adept was; a master of his body. Ambidexterity should be more difficult for characters other than adepts to acquire, and that would be reflected in it being a 2-point/level edge vs. a 0.25 Power Point power.

At 0.5 Power Points, it puts it at the exact same relative level as a non-adept, along the same lines as Pain Resistance/High Pain Tolerance (2 points/level vs. 0.5 points/level). Making it equal to that is the highest it should go, and I firmly believe it should actually be easier than that.

Yes, a player can munch it to high heaven if they really wanted to by throwing 18 dice. Big fucking whoop; he'd still be throwing 12 before Combat Pool without the power, and at that point it already doesn't really matter unless he's up against a similiar-powered adept in the first place. That same player can abuse any other rules in the game, too.

On a side note, I find it interesting how people tend to argue the higher end of things when it suits their purposes, but prefer to go with "average" characters every other time. In this case, your "average" adept will only have a Melee Combat Skill of 3 and would only gain a single extra die in a fight. But no one wants to hear that.

But to get back on track, in ranged combat Ambidexterity isn't really powerful at all. At best he's applying a +0/+0 modifier to his tests whereas the sammy with a Smartlink-2 is getting his choice of a Called Shot at the same target number for +1 Damage Level or a -2 TN modifier in its place. Hardly worth even a full power point considering it's basically self-balancing (unless you break the balance by creating a house rule to allow smartlinks to work with it). The only benefit is that the adept is getting twice as many shots off, albeit at a higher target number (and thus less successes, and thus less Damage Level staging than he would otherwise). If he tries to go with multiple targets, the number just keeps going up and up.

Enhanced Coordination. 0.25/level. It's been working in our home games since not long after Cannon Companion was released, and there hasn't been a single "balance" problem with it. It's nice and gives an adept with the power the ability to hold his own against someone with the natural-born edge, while giving him style otherwise.

I have used .5/level in the past.
It is rather powerful, so I think it would become too popular if it were cheaper than that (I could be wrong), but this seems to me like it is exactly the sort of thing that PhysAds do.

"Average" is highly relative. Given the dearth of skill points, if a character doesn't plan on utilizing unarmed combat extensively, odds are (s)he won't burn points for a minimum skill that may (or may not) prove particularly useful.

-Siege

Uhm, High Pain Tolerance *is* effectively the non-magical form of natural Pain Resistance. Read the description.

Which is my point in other conversations. Everyone always assumes "average" characters when it suits their point regardless of how inane it is, but prefer to go with maxed-out munchkins at other times. Standard operating procedures.

An adept with Improved Ability: Melee Weapon 6 is already unbeatable by just about anyone other than another adept. There's not much of a difference between 12 dice as there is 18 dice before combat pool in those situations... at least no more than there is between 6 and 9 or 4 and 2 or 2 and 1. It's still only +50% more.

I mean, why stop at 18? Assume a 6th Grade Initiate with Edged Weapons 12(24), Pentjack Silat 4 (Multi-Strike and Multi-Strike: Edged Weapons), and a pair of Dikoted Katana Weapon Foci 12 and etc, too. This sucker's hurling 54 dice and only suffering a +1 target number modifier everytime he throws another 54 dice at additional targets as part of the same Complex Action. It just keeps going and going.

The problem isn't with the power cost of such a power, it's with Ambidexterity itself. An adept can get it one way or the other, but in my (obvious) opinion, I think it should be easier for them to do it via magic than having to develop it naturally -- that's the point in somantic magic. At 0.25 points per level, that's what it is. At 0.5 points per level, there's basically no difference between them aside from flipping a coin to see if you want to spend Build Points or Power Points on 'em. Anything higher than that is pretty much asinine unless you also adjust the cost for Ambidexterity as an edge.

Duly noted. However, that's what the gunbunnies are for. I'm more of a sneaky git. Up close and personal, if you will.

Wait... ambitwinkerous?

Well, if they only had the off hand version, that's easy, just remove the words "off-hand" and they're good to go, at whatever rating they have it.
It's when they have edged weapons and off-hand edged weapons that it gets tricky.
I say give them a +1 to their skill and be damn grateful!
Honestly, I'm not exactly sure how I'd want to handle that.

Shockwave: I stand corrected! I had never noticed the "or" in there before. Thanks. Unfortunately, it just goes to prove my value for the power that much more rather than not. If Pain Resistance 1 takes up the equivalence of 4 build points (High Pain Tolerance 2), that means 1 Build Point is equivalent to 0.125 Power Points. I doubt if anyone can argue that High Pain Tolerance and Pain Resistance aren't worthy of being a good base to work off of, either.

So in that case, the 0.25 Points/Level works out exactly the same. You need High Pain Tolerance 4 (8 build points) to equal a single Power Point in Pain Resistance 2, so those same 8 build points that Ambidexterity 4 equates to just a single Power Point.

Sadly, about the only other power that can be used as a direct reference to an adept power (Night Version vs. Improved Sense: Low-Light Vision) is also a 2-point Edge... and a 0.25 Point adept power.

As far as Off-Hand Skills go, they're already largely a "waste" mechanically. The only time they're worthwhile is if you never plan to raise either of your Melee Skills or Off-Hand Melee Skills beyond 5. Ever. Otherwise, Ambidexterity 3 trumps it in all cases.

Firing twice per gun isn't an interpretation -- that's the entire point of the penalty Ambidexterity reduces.

ACL: You're doing almost exactly what you were complaining about earlier, selecting specific examples that suit you. As it happens: High Pain Tolerance isn't exactly equivalent to 1/2 of a level of pain resistance due to the fact that high pain tolerance 2 can resist 2 boxes on a single condition monitor.

Night Vision is reasonably equivalent, but it only costs 1 point for some characters. There is also a fair case that enhanced senses is somewhat extreme for a natural enhancement, thus more expencive. IE: how many people do you know who can walk-around in coimplete darkness with vision equivalent to that provided by low-light goggles? I'd suggest that low-light vision is somewhat more in-tune with the physical adept abilities than natural variation, thus cheaper.

These two examples go against the skill-point and attribute point comparissons, both showing that 2 build points equate roughly to 0.5pp. We could also go into how combat skills equate 1bp to 0.5pp and, as the rules for ambidexterity are largely combat-skill oriented, why should that conversion rate not be the one used?

I personally find 0.5pp/level to be balanced and fair. It is still a useful expenditure as skill 6 gets 3 extra dice for 1.5pp (more if they buy improved ability too), while 3 extra dice for 0.75pp (again, more if they have improved ability) makes it a cheaper way to obtain similar, superior if you also consider the ranged combat implications, benefits to the established power of improved ability (which by some people's definitions makes it broken).

Yeah, I know. I've never been accused of not being a hypocrite. I was just pointing it out, is all.

In any case, Edges and Build Points are two different things entirely. Since we're talking about a power that's based on an Edge, we should stick to using Edges as the basis of how to determine a cost. Edges, even though they do cost Build Points, do things that Build Points can't do on their own. Things like giving you an extra Attribute Point (which costs 2 Build Points) to raise a single Attribute above your Racial Modified Limit, yet it only costs 2 Build Points despite doing the same thing plus more. Improved Physical Attribute is far closer to that than a basic Attribute Point, too... especially since its costs varies depending on whether or not you're at your RML or not.

Yes, you can do things like High Pain Tolerance that you can't do with Pain Resistance. But that just proves that High Pain Tolerance is capable of doing more than the same investment in Pain Tolerance... thus those 2 Build Points you just spent give you more options than a 0.5 Power Point adept power. Just like Bonus Attribute Point vs. a standard Attribute Point.

So sticking with Edges as the comparison to adept powers, two of the standard Edges that come close to comparing on an equal level are High Pain Tolerance and Night Vision. Sure, Night Vision is cheaper if you're a rigger or decker (a strange distinction to make since you could always snag a VCR or Cyberdeck and not be a rigger or a decker), but for most characters -- and more specifically, just about every adept -- it's a 2-point Edge.

High Pain Tolerance 2 (4-point Edge) is equivalent to the 0.5 Power Point adept power of Pain Resistance 1. Night Vision (2-point Edge) is equivalent to the 0.25 Power Point adept power of Improved Sense. Resistance to Pathogens + Resistance to Toxins (two 1-point Edges) is equal to the 0.25 Power Point adept power of Body Control 1.

All of those examples suggest that 0.25 Power Points is roughly equivalent to 2 Edge points. There's no real reason in my mind that Ambidexterity should be more difficult for an adept to develop than any of those other powers, especially since it fits their theme even better than Night Vision does.

And again, I'm talking from personal experience with this power. It's never, ever been a problem. The only time it would be a problem is if a player designed some uber-killing machine, and in those cases, that's the problem itself -- not the power.

DF has already said that using .5/level makes the costs about equal, and that .25/level makes it easier to use power points which is what he feels is best. Many, myself included, want to make it roughly equal rather than easier, which is just as valid an opinion.

Frankly I think that's where the discussion should end. Lets just drop the whole Build Point to Power Point conversion thing