so I love the concept of martial arts masters and unarmed users in SR. and It seems that unarmed is all around better then using melee weapons.
reasons for saying this are
1. detectability, someone is not going to just assume you are a complete badass with the punching power of a mitltech grade sniper rifle, (or higher..)
2, base damage, as an adept there are so many ways to boost your unarmed damage, (adding martial arts into it as well) that you can easily do more damage with your fists then with a katana or combat axe.
3. armor bypass. by taking an elemental strike to use with your fists you can easily bypass most armor at -halfAP, or if you want to do stun damage you can COMPLETELY bypass their armor, and do so very quietly, (smoke as an example)
4. you are NEVER without this weapon, short of cutting off your hands, (or perhaps using some very powerful handcuffs) people cannot really take away your hitting power.
the only thing I really see that may give melee weps a slight edge is the reach, but.. -1 die? maybe 2. if I am wrong on this let me know.

it seems to me that other then for aesthetic reasons or the like their is not really a point in using melee weapons. unless of course, your not an adept. then its more comparable.

On number 4, don't forget that an unarmed attack isn't necessarily just fists. You can kick them too, which means you still have your unarmed attacks if you're literally "disarmed".

ah that is right, though, if your handcuffed behind your back, you would be at a slight, (if ever so slight) negative modifier haha. they basically have to tie you up like a cafe lol.

I prefer unarmed myself for thematic reasons, but weapons have a lot to appeal: most of them give you a bonus to your base (from Strength) damage, and a lot of them give you a reach bonus and/or an AP modifier as well. You can use weapon foci for more dice to attack with. Adepts who go the weapon route don't need to spend points on killing hands or critical strike, points that can go towards buying a lot of combat sense.

Of course, the main attraction of using weapons is the two weapon style maneuver, which becomes cheesier when combined with the aforementioned combat sense and the Arnis De Mano ability to do damage on a disarm. With a level of counterstrike added to that mix, you can hurt an attacker, then use those successes as a bonus to your dice pool to do an attack of your own.

Generally, someone built around two-weapon style is a viable choice for a weapons adept. If you want to be more well-rounded, then a monofilament whip weapon focus (or even a completely mundane monofilament whip) is a relatively cheap way to be deadly in combat.

I have always debated with myself, (and others) wether or not the two weapon style should be allowed to count for unarmed it makes sense in most ways, (he tries to swing a sword at you, you step up block the hilt with your left or right arm/wrist then proceed to punch him , or some form thereof inhis face lol) and you can easily get what I mentioned in about 2 PP without dropping geases or adept ways. one of my characters is a troll face in a suit,, that punches down walls. has a 13 base damage with his fists haha :3. took .5 for a +4 critical strike. then another 1 for elemental strike (blast) and killing hands we were using karma gen and allowed (after GM approved back stories) one initiation at start so had slightly more to work with than on average 400bp build but meh.

but I see what your saying with the weapons, makes it easier to make my assassin char with that extra 2PP going into wall run and gliding.

For unarmed adepts, the ultimate munchkin technique (usually purchased later, because you need essentials such as killing hands and critical strike to start out with) is distance strike. Because you can use it at point blank range. It is essentially saying "Hey, you know all of that melee skill that you've invested so much in? It's useless - all you get against me is your Reaction."

For armed adepts, it is two-weapon style, along with the ability to do damage on a disarm, a level of counterstrike, and lots of combat sense. It is saying "Hey, I get to double my base skill for defending, and lookie here, it's like SR3 combat rules (where the defender can wound the attacker) came back, just for me!"

Pitted against each other, it mainly comes down to who wins initiative.

I think, by the rules, you'd have to use one of the "unarmed weapons" like shock gloves or hardliner gloves (still not sure where the second one is book-wise) in order to make use of the two weapon stuff. Doesn't quite make sense, but that's the rules.

As to weapons, there is something to be said about the Troll Adept wielding a combat axe. It's gonna hurt like a biotch. (With the unarmed, you can actually hit 12P -3 AP with an Ork rather than a Troll--the Troll would probably be able to hit around 14 or 15).

the damage on disarm is well. pointless vs an unarmed adept :3 haha

As to weapons, there is something to be said about the Troll Adept wielding a combat axe. It's gonna hurt like a biotch. (With the unarmed, you can actually hit 12P -3 AP with an Ork rather than a Troll--the Troll would probably be able to hit around 14 or 15).
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yeah the troll right know hits only 13 coulda got him to 15 if I wanted to haha but wanted to stick more to the char concept and theme :3. my ork hits for 12, though one gets -allAP and the other gets -half haha.
the -all is the ork with sound, (HE HAS HIS OWN ASS-KICKING MUSIC!! YES!!!!!) lol

Actually you missed a major point Raiden.

Unarmed with a LOT of investment can do better damage... but by the time you've put all that investment into improving your unarmed the weapon adept could have put those points into other things like combat sense, etc. You need to consider the oppurtunity cost of all that investment and what else it could be invested in.

Weapon based is a lot easier to get more dice with. Reach & weapon focus to be precise. And a +5 or 6 dice advantage is big... why?...

Since melee is based on opposed tests... the guy with more dice has a big advantage even if he does less base damage per strike. Also more net hits stage up damage... and if I'm tossing +5 or 6 extra dice... I can always drop 4 of those dice on a called shot for damage bringing the damage level up.

You can get a weapon focus pair of hardliner gloves for unarmed, and if you're a troll you have reach even with your fists.

The main advantage of Unarmed is that people can't take your weapons away.

And if they have, you have more pressing concerns than trying to beat people up.

this is an old discussion, but my opinion on the matter is:
If you're using hardliner gloves, you're not unarmed, while still using the Unarmed Combat skill to deliver your attacks. For me it is either hardliner weapon focus or critical strike/elemental strike/etc

the advantage of armed combat is, that you can use you power points for other things, while Unarmed eats up almost all magic.

Makki hit the nail on the head.

Hardliner gloves are a weapon with it's own unique damage code which use the unarmed skill (but are not unarmed attacks). If you use it you use the weapon focus stats... you don't put critical strike and all those other adept powers on top of it.


The only way to get a weapon focus and unarmed is to put yourself at risk and install it as cyber. A weapon focus cyberlimb you pay essence for. Weapon focus bone lacing you pay essence for. Even then it's not perfect because you activate the focus the focus becomes dual natured, and any damage done to the focus automatically goes to you as well. So at that point I hope you have astral perception and a reasonably good astral combat ability. Because anything astral can pwn you when you activate the weapon focus with impunity if you don't.

Pretty important caveat.

Why would astral attacks against your weapon focus damage you?

Also, is there a thread for the hardliners focus issues? I would like to make my own decision based on more than a few summaries that keep popping up of why it won't work.

Because its a part of you. If you make your bones/cyberarms into weapon focuses then attacks against them hurt! And being dual natured (as active foci) allows them to be attacked from astral. That is a big dangerous opening.

Regarding hardliners. There probably is a thread, but this is the summary of all the rules issues regarding hardliners in general.

They are not a piece of equipment that gives +1 unarmed damage. Nor does it say (like bone lacing or density does) that it changes your base unarmed damage to (str/2 +1)P. Instead, they are an exotic weapon unto themselves, that happens to use the unarmed skill in combat, with a damage code of (str/2 +1)P. The same way as shock gloves. Thus they are Melee weapons that use the unarmed skill in combat.

Because they are melee weapons they can be used as foci. Because they are weapons, they can be dual wielded (and thus qualifying for two weapon style).

Because they are melee weapons you CANNOT apply martial arts +DV qualities to damage. Because they are weapons, you CANNOT add critical strike/elemental strike/killing hands/distance strike.

In regards to these two, the big advantage to a weapon vs. unarmed is that you're not sinking 2+ Magic points worth of powers into getting fists and feet up to the hitting power of a no-dachi.

Besides, the easiest way to ramp up your damage without sinking the points is to have a friendly mage sustain Elemental Aura on you. And that works for weapons just as well as unarmed. No precious Magic points needed from your adept.

Who said anything about a cyberweapon focus? A sword or axe would work just as well, better even as no cyberweapon has reach and cyberweapond have no more than STR/2+3 AP 0 damage. Bonded and activated foci are dual-natured but do not make the wielder dual-natured. Cyberweapon foci are an edge case. There are no rules whether a) they are part of the wielder or b) make the wielder dual-natured. Heck, there aren't even explicit rules whether cyberweapon foci are allowed at all.

Falconer.

yes, as Yerameyahu stated, my comment was in answer to Cabral, who was in turn responding to Falconer. Falconer stated that the only way to get a weapon focus to apply to unarmed attacks was to use a cyberarm/bone lacing weapon focus.

Personally, I wouldn't allow either, because they're not 'weapons' (unlike Hardliner Gloves, per ZeroPoint's argument). Cyberarm/bonelacing really do modify your 'unarmed damage'… but/because they're not weapons. So Dakka Dakka's question about cyber-*weapons* is relevant… but ironically he's the first person to bring up cyber-implant weapons as opposed to a cyberlimb/bonelacing focus.

This underlines my own misgivings about allowing cyberarms/bone lacings as weapon foci.

I'm away from my book, but I thought that damaging or destroying the focus, does not damage the enchanted item, but destroying the item destroys the enchantment.

@Zeropoint
Would you allow the natural bones as foci?
virgin awakened metahuman telesma.

Do you have to take them out of the body to enchant them?

no idea, actually.
you would, on the other hand, have to open up the bones to the air to carve/etch runes into them . .

As per the FAQ clarification they need to be enchanted before they can be implanted. Once they're part of you they're part of your 'living' body and can no longer be enchanted.


As for the second part... we're dealing with astral so any combat or spells will be of the mana type. Street magic... "Mana spells work against cyber-modified living beings because the cyberware was paid for with Essence and so is considered to be integral to the being's organic system."

Augmentation: p108... "If the implant was targetted with a called shot, ..." meaning it is possible to target implants.
p127 goes further into this.

There's a blurb somewhere in one of the books about damage to installed implants is registered against the character's damage track, but it's been a while and I'm not finding it. Anyone else remember it? Or am I way off in left field.


And I didn't bring them up except as a counterpoint to someone claiming Brass Knuckles (aka hardliner gloves by any other name) aren't a weapon so would grant full benefit of both weapon focus and unarmed adept powers. Which I disagree with since they're a weapon... no different than a club, or a sword... just because you use the same skill doesn't stop that.

That's a wholly different animal from someone buying a set of cyberspurs then having them eat up capacity in their cyberarm or just installed in their own natural arms essence.

The problem is also the rules are quite vague in here and grey. The focus has it's own magical aura... and damage done to it can shut it down. (IIRC they put somewhere that attacking a focus will deactivate it but not destroy it... but details of this are again vague. There's that one spell in the web supplement to Street Magic that attacks focuses to deactivate them.


At the end of the day... with all that I take the preliminary view that damage done to the focus is stun... the cyberware and it's magic is integral to the characters own aura. So character is stunned... unconscious... focus is still in contact iwth his body (since it is his body)... so people continue to overflow stun until they're dead. So implanting a weapon focus is a very very dangerous action with some potential huge payoffs... but very dangerous.

Brass knuckles I would not allow, no, but a pair of hardened gloves not being allowed? Come on, if that isn't being an asshole rules lawyer GM, I don't know what is...

All4Big... hardliner gloves ARE brass knuckles. All brass knuckles are is some kind of hard striking surface worn on the face of the knockles... whether it's brass or some new high tech densiplast in a much more socially acceptable and less noticable glove form. It's the same thing. It's a weapon worn on the hand which isn't an unarmed attack though it uses the same skill.


And to me it's about keeping a balance. Unarmed damage can be obscenely higher than weapon based damage. The downside to it is it's not as reliably accurate because it gets less dice (no weapon reach bonus, no weapon focus bonus dice). So it's the old hit like a sledgehammer but not as often or hit more often but do less damage.


The only way by RAW to get both I know is extremely invasive in terms of tech/essence/and vulnerability... making the character essentially a glass hammer.

Yeah, on what basis would gloves and knuckles be different?

If we're talking RAW, I'm still pretty dubious that limb/lacing focus is a valid option. It's not 'a weapon'.

Right. Allowing weapon focus bone lacing or non-weapon gloves, but not allowing weapon focus hardliners (for unarmed attacks) is a bit questionable.

Cabral... I'd allow a weapon focus hardliner glove... just an adept wouldn't be able to use his critical strike and other adept powers to boost the damage since he's using a weapon. Just like I wouldn't allow him to boost the damage of a weapon focus sword with his elemental fist.


Cyberware is paid for with essence and becomes part of him... it literally changes his base unarmed damage. It's not a weapon... enchanting it before installation is also a royal pain!!

A glove that enhances your punches is not a weapon. It's an unarmed attack, just like bone lacing. The principle is the same. The paid for with essence rule, as far as I remember, only applies to spell tar getting and no other aspect of whether tech assists in magic.

I've not decided whether I would allow hardliner weapon foci, but I do not agree with the arguments I've seen thus far.

You can foci anything you like. If you can make your gloves into a sustaining foci, you can make them into a weapon foci.

A weapon foci doesn't necessarily have to be a weapon; the effect is seperate from the name.


Also, I could totally have a weapon foci Fork if I really wanted to. After all, it has an entry on a weapons table. An improvised weapons table, but a weapon none the less.
And if you can have a spirit stabbing fork, you can totally have brass knuckles, weighted gloves, pool ques, and other objects of simliar mass/size/shape enchanted the same way.

Hell, there are plenty of reasons to enchant an item that isn't a weapon as a weapon focus - to make use of its specific Astral Travel properties. Even something as simple as a "weapon" foci pencil and paper that a projecting mage can take with them on the astral is worth considering. What if your day job is interviewing spirits and you need something to write with on the metaplanes? Weapon foci can do that.

mechanically, weapon foci hardliners are basically the same as magical gloves of killing hands +1.

I call it stacking the deck in your favor, as it is a truly munchkinned out Troll pugilist Adept can outdamage even sniper rifles in terms of damage potential, then add in negating most defensive maneuvers by making it a ranged attack with Distance Strike, & then adding in the extra 7 dice from a Hardliner Force 6 Weapon Focus...you're pushing 20 dice to hit with & 18p+nets for total damage & aside from the Force 6 Focus, thats all at character creation, add a few Karma into the build...& you're pushing a lot more.

Well, except that Killing hands is only .5 power points and leads to elemental strike. If you want to munchkin out, sonic elemental strike is where you want to go. I don't consider the dice from the weapon focus rating a large bonus, but it is also an issue of what happens if you allow unenchanted hardliners to combine with adept powers.

About the same thing that happens as an adept with unenchanted cyberware, or a normal person with hardliners.

as far as I can tell from the book, the killing hands/CS/elemental strike are described as "auras" I COULD understand where you wouldn't allow the critical strike DV bonus to apply with hardliner gloves, but the elemental and martial arts Bonuses I believe should be allowed as with martial arts its more of HOW you punch then anything (also note if they kick or do something other then punching the gloves are poof)

There is no one punch or kick. A melee attack in SR is abstract. It could be a series of punches or kicks or any combination of those. Except for the Kick Attack maneuver there is no need to use anything but the fists, and even the maneuver's description does not explicitly require the use of the legs.

Regardless whether the adept power is described as an aura or not, using hardliner gloves (or any other weapon) is nor a nunarmed attack even though it uses the Unarmed Combat skill.

This is just another case of someone using the word "balance" to try to give their argument some validity. A +1 to damage and a few dice does not "broken" make, at least not in anything but an MMO.

While active,
the power wreathes the adept’s hands with a visible effect appropriate
to the chosen element.

from street magic on elemental strike. sounds like an aura but it can be called a littl vague

as for the combat I know that, but there is usually a specific body part that you HIT them with, whether you counter their punch to kick them or return a punch matters.

Yes, Elemental Strike is like that but the other powers you listed aren't. CS is counter strike, right?

Yes, but from the rules you cannot deduce which part it is, and the rules are pretty explicit, hardliner gloves give you a(n armed) melee attack with a damage of (STR/2+1)P AP 0, regardless how you describe the moves. Elemental Strike works similarly.

no sorry meant for critical strike, but yeah that is true about the gloves. but in theory couldnt you apply a weapon focus to a pair of normal gloves?

Hmm, I can't actually find a rule saying the item made into a weapon focus must be a weapon in the first place, but foci (including weapon foci) do not have any inherent damage resistance, so anything that is not designed to be used as a weapon may break after a couple of attacks. This could get expensive quickly. Additionally weapon foci deal damage equal to the weapon they are based on in astral combat. If the item is not a weapon, it should not deal any damage or at least a base damage of 0P AP0.

I threw a kombatmage with a Force 1 Weapon Focus katana at my group a few weeks ago. He kept using -4 called shots for +4 DV in astral combat with the group's magician, and kept missing spectacularly, thanks to some hilarious dice rolls (and a few Edge uses on my player's part.)

Then he decided to stop fucking around and throw a Force 10 Manabolt at my player's magician. That hurt like hell. Cue the Force 5 Spirit of Air clotheslining and astral engulfing him, delivering an astral TKO in one shot.

Ok, and now the Munchkin-Approach:
Get a cyber-fore-arm with a detacheable hand.
Use the capacity of the Fore-Arm for a Nanite-Breeder.
Have 2 detachable hands. use one, have the other enchanted.
Plug in the enchanted one when needed. Problem?

The system is abstract, but localized enhancements (elemental strike, hardliner gloves, Kick MA maneuver) provide generalized bonuses.

Due to the abstracted nature, you could even argue that you can use hardliner gloves or elemental strike with a kick- the bonus/effects represent the effect on swirling melee, the kicks, punches, and elbow strikes average out to a +1 damage code or the elemental effect. The main drawback to a localized enhancement is when you are restrained; you can't punch with your hands and you lose the bonus.

This is not D&D. There is no glossary of keywords. These matters are left to common sense and logic. We don't need special wording to determine whether Magic Fang or Magic Weapon can be used to provide a bonus to my fist. I don't want Catalyst to turn Shadowrun into that kind of game, in part because I think they would do a poor job of it.

Hardliners reinforce your punch. Your attack is still a punch. A punch is an unarmed attack.

No, hardliner gloves are weapons, more specifically exotic melee weapons that use the Unarmed Combat skill. An attack with a weapon cannot be an unarmed attack. That is plain English.

@Stahlseele: I see no rule forbidding this.

Udoshi, no one's saying you can't make a weapon focus out of anything. ('A weapon focus', btw.) When I said a limb/lacing focus isn't a weapon, I was pretty unclear. I meant that you're either unarmed or you're not; unarmed attacks with your limbs can't be using a weapon focus. Yes, the rule are quite gross at that conjunction.

When you use a weapon, you're not unarmed anymore, and you can't use all those fancy unarmed Adept powers. You're using a weapon with the Unarmed skill. Same as shock gloves, brass knuckles, Hardliners, anything.

So the question is really just 'do we want to declare that you can use a weapon focus unarmed… for the specific, unlikely case of limb/lacing foci?'. :/ If so, you kinda have to then allow the Hardliners and everything else, and no one will ever use melee again.

--
Hardliners do not enhance your punch. Bone lacing does. Hardliners replace it with a weapon damage code, same as a sword.