No.. that's one way to play. Not the only way. If I'm playing Rifts, and someone wants to play a dragon. It doesn't take away from my joy of playing a Dogboy. If I want to play a merc, it doesn't affect the next person over from playing a Dimi-god. Some races/things/people/classes are just better. Trying to make everyone be balanced is ONE way to play. Not the only way to play.

For example, if the guy to my right is making a fire dragon and My little rogue scientist isn't as good in a fight, I can roll a dragon too if I want, or a godling, or some powerful DBee.



Yes. I know. I'm pointing out that even in a balanced game.... you will have some people that will do those things, to destroy your balance. So while 'Game balance' is something that some strive for, it's never really quite actualized, due to those sorts.

I've never had that problem. I'm playing HU game right now. My lil Alien is argueably the weakest in a group of an Alien, a Mutant and a Mystically bestowed hero, but I have just as much fun, as I like playing my Alien. He's the 'weakest' by the stats, but he's also the military guy and comes up with group tactics and contributes to the group. I don't have to have a blast like the Mysticaly bestowed. Nor turn into living lightning like the mutant. I have a ball and am in the spotlight just as much. Being weaker than others means I have to be more creative. It's awesome. I ----purposefully---- made my char to be the weakest.


And I'm pointing out, that doesn't have to come from 'game balance'. It's the players that make it awesome. Not the numbers or dots on a sheet. If you WANT to play a 'stronger' (Be it physical, mental, social) Character/character type, then simply play one suited for your wants/needs. You don't need to make everything equal to achieve that.



Enter GM: GM thinks and creates an encounter where all the players can shine in their own respects. Ignore arbitrary numbers.

Done! I'm not trying to be flip or smart assed. This is how we've ----always---- played, in the groups where I've played. Sure, some encounters are difficult for some people. Some are easier for others. But when I GM I look at who's at the table and I make sure the adventure has something for everyone. Works out great. Again, back to the HU game I'm in. The adventure we ran this weekend had something for each character in the group. The Electric mutant got to hack some computers and use his EMP to take out cameras and stuff. The Mystically Bestowed got to use her shink and flight powers to scout and prowl around. My Alien got to use his abilities to form tactics and fight some tough fights. It was fine.



Again, you have the GM moderate with in some guidelines so you don't have someone with 2,000 karma and awakened and emerged etc, but being quite honest, what you play, wouldn't affect what I play, unless the GM made it 'The Pax show'. I've played Rifts for 20 years. lol I've been 'The little guy' in countless groups with dimi gods, monsters, dragons, etc. Most games I've had a blast. If nothing else. My char will use your 2,000 karma drake as Cover while I do my own thing.



The guy CHOSE to play the gnome. Noone made him. If one chooses to play someone the size of an 8 year old, he should do so with out blinders, and with out wanting everyone else penalised due to his choice of an exotic (and smaller, weaker, etc) Character type.



But currently that's not how it really ends up. The Trolls are scraping and having to make choices others don't have to, for nothing else than the fact he's a troll. So he ends up being a rather non exceptional troll. Just so the Gnome can be a super amazing wonderful awesome gnome. lol.

That's why I don't like artificially enforced "balancing'.


And that, I have no problem with. But that's not totally how it is now. And thus inversely Gnomes end up Ok, or even exceptional and amazing, while trolls (Exceptional in their own way) "Cost more" and thusly end up 'weaker' over all.



Fun doesn't come from artificial equality for me. Fun comes with hanging out and playing with my friends or family. I can be the weakestt, or the stronges. I play with friends and we work TOGETHER to make sure everyone has fun. Other wise.. why play? Right?


Right, and when it comes time to sneak through that small airvent and get into the building and do your thing. My Troll will stand by the vent, waving his "Go Gnome Go" Pennant.

My strength and Durability doesn't harm your utility and stealth and infiltration. They augment and compliment.



Which is fine, untill, like you point out, the costs make it not quite so. Due to the costs for BEING a troll, it's harder to be used in your 'spotlight', and much easier for a human to do so.



I agree with the first part. And in a 'perfect world' it'd work out that way. Im' pointing out that due to 'balance' in SR right now, the Trolls tend to not fit into their spotlight, while humans are alll up in theirs and what not. the Awesome isn't dependant in equality. Just play ability. If My troll can't be awesome because I spent all my points being a troll. That's the problem.



Right. I'm pointing out that "Equal strength' doesn't mean 'equal fun' and the gnome shouldn't be so super awesome amazing, to make up for the fact that someone chose to play the 8 year old kid dude. lol



Well it doesn't work out quite like that does it? If you PURPOSEFULLY Pick something 'weaker than average' that was your choice. Why should you get benefits for purposefully choosing something weaker?

If you had to do it. If someone had to be the "Tank" and someone the "DPS and someone the 'Healer" ok. I can see giving bonus to the healer for being weaker, because they were forced into or regulated into that role.

But nothing's stoppin' The Gnome player from choosing something stronger. He purposefully chose the gnome. Gnomes are weaker and smaller. If you want bigger and stronger, play a bigger and stronger race.
Play the Drake. Play the Troll. Etc. If you WANT to play a gnome, know that you've chosen to play someone smaller and weaker. Make it yours. Capitalize on your deal. Plenty of games put out classes that are balanced and then races that are really not. Pick race, add class, go. Shadowrun makes you pay more for your races and thus you're penalized when doing your class.

*shrugs* It's not a perfect world. The answer is "Well go play one of those games" lol. I do! But I'd like for it not to effect my shadowrun game either. Sadly it does. I don't like it. So I say so. Does that mean I won't play SR? Nooooo. I just suck up the hit, shrug, and play my heart out.

Why does the gnome 'have' to have equal benefits for bein' 2.5 feet tall? lol



OH!! Yell at me. They're not two and a half feet tall!!

*Opens Runner Companion. Flips to page 48. Looks at the Height and Weight tables....... Gnome...... 0.80 meters..... Does some conversion.... two feet, seven and a half inches. So.... An inch and a half off two and a half feet.

Would you like to revise your posts?

Edit: Instead of 2.5 feet like I've been saying, it's 2.624 feet. So... 2.6 feet tall if being very precise. Not 4 or 5. You're basically doubling their height.

Why does the troll 'have' to be more more cost-efficient than playing another race?

Because the Troll will never be able to do some of the things the other Races do, like crawling through air vents, sneaking past stuff, fitting in with a crowd and hiding in there, being a chameleon and so on.
Like it is, under SR4 rules, as far as i understand, he does not even get his niche protection of being strong and tough, because Body can't be raised as it could under SR3 rules anymore and close combat is not linked to STR but to Agi, which elves get more in and the Troll LOSES out on! Same with Heavy Weapons, if i remember correctly, not sure though.
So, basically, you pay your points to be strong and big . . and it does less than what the attribute-points the elf gets do for less points spent in character creation . .


In the Size/Str/Bod Function, Trolls lose out more than anything else too.
Humans get a size of about 1.8 to 2m and get 6's as maximum.
Orks get a size of 1.9 to 2.1m and get 9 and 8 as the maximum.
Dorf get a size of 1.0 to 1.5m and get 7 and 8 as the maximum.
Both orks and dorfs don't lose anything in agi if i remember correctly.
So in terms of points/size/str/bod they are both superior to a troll.
Nothing gets less niche protection than the troll, as of right now.

The only things a troll can be really superior in are running, jumping and climbing.
Which are among the most useless things to be good in.
Running fast is good for making an escape. Oh no wait, Magic and bullets are faster.
So it's only good for getting into close combat range faster . . only trolls are not good at that anymore compared to elves . .
Jumping is usefull for . . i have no idea, really. same for climbing. With things like hook/anchor-cannons and geck-tape that is nothing protected anymore either.
Anybody can do it.

I understand what you are saying. It is simpler when each character has his own area of expertise and own time to shine. I think the concern about "game balance" is that when it is time for your character to shine, there is another character whose primary area isn't your area but can still shine as well or better in your area of expertise.

Say for example, you have a plain human Rogue Scientist. Another guy rolls up a Rogue Scientist too but his PC also has Natural Combat Ability and Invulnerability as Super Powers. Not only does this PC match yours in the Science department, he can fight well and can take a lot more punishment than yours. In this case, there's nothing your character can do that the other cannot, while the opposite isn't true. Do you think that you'd still have fun? And no, you can't use the other PC as cover, he Auto-Dodges, leaving you without cover.

I think the costing out of the different races is a good idea, but you bring up a good point: in SR, not all attributes are created equal. Some are just plain better (Agi,Int) while some are just plain...worthless (Str).

So while I would like to see continued effort put into balancing out the racial costs, it seems like this must go hand-in-hand with some kind of re-balancing of the Attribute costs or uses. Either make it cheaper to raise "worthless" stats like Str, or make it more useful (link it to CC, armor worn is Str*Bod, etc).

@Pepsi Jedi:

I find your point of view somewhat narrowsided. It's like you argue against gamebalance because you don't care about gamebalance. Then why argue?

I mean, a min-maxer is more ok in an balanced game than an unbalanced one.
A roleplayer non-optimizer is ok in both kind of games.

As a player, sometimes I max my character, but more often, I play with fun a character which can even be the worst guy possible. I don't mind beeing underpowered or weak.


However, as a player, I had a really bad experience with a french game named Agone (med-fan). I created an ogre mercenary that won by the sword his own baronny. Pretty enthusiastic about the concept. My friend plays a Minotor. No additional race cost. His effect: twice as many Hit Points than me, but same skill, more damage.

Fighter-wise, he was the brute force, me just a side-kick. And as said, I had nothing more than he couldn't have.

Spellcasters? Yes, you could be one with no drawback. Just had to say I'm one. I was pretty idiotic. For roleplaying, I didn't wanted one. Just to discover afterwards that they could launch attackspells like a rocketlauncher, casted as fast as I swing my sword, dealing 2 or 3 times the damage I can deal. They could even set a shield absorbing with ease the damage I could do, while still toasting me with offensive spells.


Fun was dead from the start for me. And this even if I'm able to pick a football college star, slightly dumb in Buffy and have great amount of fun of it.


I don't like chargen to be unbalanced.


Up to this point Pepsi, why charging adepts or mages with BP?

You get Magic 1 and some extra stuff (like 1 PP of Adept Powers for Adepts, Astral Perception/Projection for Mages) for it.

Should that be free?

Bye
Thanee

One of things I think that can rebalance Attributes at least with respect to Strength is to put back the weight lists and Encumbrance will take care of the rest. I usually see characters with one of 2 types of gear lists - the conservative gear list with minimal gear or the cram everything in because the GM will make me drop some anyway list.

First, there's nothing stopping you from putting BP or Karma into Body.

Second, melee trolls do just fine. Reach is actually more valuable for melee, because it acts as a dice pool modifier and thus applies after splitting your dice pool when making multiple attacks. Start out with Strength 11 (nat. 9, Muscle Aug 2) and you get base melee damage of 6. Take a claymore and a couple martial arts, and you've got weapon damage of 12P. Use Restricted Gear to make that a Weapon Focus 4, snag Improved Blades 3, add in Personalized Grip, Agility of 4 (6), and a Swords speciality. Base pool is 15 (Skill 9, Attribute 6), and you've got modifiers totaling to 10 (Focus 4 + Reach 3 + Spec 2 + Personalized Grip 1). Want to attack one guy? 25 dice against Reaction + Defense Skill (Unarmed, Weapon Skill, or Dodge), for (let's say) 9 dice; expected net hits of 5.33, expected damage 17.33. Want to attack 3 guys? Take that 15 base pool, split it to 5/5/5, add your modifiers to get 14/14/14 (you lose 2 for being outnumbered, but that is reduced by a certain martial art benefit). Expected net hits of 1.67, expected damage of 13.67 to each of them. Give them all impact armour 6, Body 4, and they can expect to soak 3 of that (claymore has AP of -1) and have 10 damage boxes. So all three are probably in overflow.

That same troll also gets 2 points of Recoil Compensation from his Strength, and only suffers a -1 modifier for using a 2 handed weapon in one hand. He's got a massive soak pool, tons of armour, is going to be much better at sprinting, climbing, and swimming...

Also, the elf gets a 1 point agility bonus. The Troll gets 4 points each to Body and Strength, 1 point penalties to Agility, Intuition, and Logic, and 2 points off Charisma. Even at augmax, the Elf is only 3 dice better at ranged and 2 dice better at melee, but doesn't have anything near the Troll's or melee damage.

.... the poster-child of all that is wrong with a system that lacks balance.


In D&D 3.X .... that literally cannot be done, with any but a very slim handfulof encounters - maybe 1% of what willhappen in a campaign.


Lack of balance = lack of fairness.

And absent fairness, I am constitutionally unable to have fun - whether I'm playing the weaker charactr or the stronger, it doesn't matter.


Trolls get direct mechanical advantages for feats of strength, durability/survial, and anything requiring size and/or Reach.

Gnomes do not get advantages to stealth and infiltration. RAW, a Troll can be every bit as good a "ninja sneaky type" as a Gnome.


For fucks sake, I AM NOT SUGGESTING GNOMES GET THE SAME STRENGTH AND BODY SCORES AS A TROLL.

If the trollis BETTER, overall, than the gnome? It should be MORE EXPENSIVE, too. THAT IS ALL.

Fuck, man. It's not rocket science; how are you not understanding this?

I also think it would be a good idea to have Armor Encumbrance work off Strength+Strength or Body+Strength instead of Body+Body.

Bye
Thanee

Personally I think that the apparent lack of balance is more of a feature than a bug and IMO it is much of what is right with such a system.

_Pax._, please, keep the tone friendly!

That also goes for everyone else, of course.

Bye
Thanee

Can be. But it also can be quite fun as long as players are responsable and your GM doesn't let you do stupid stuff.



Sure you can. CR numbers are just numbers. You don't have to look at them or use them if you don't want to.



Not at all. I play in games all the time with varying balance/power levels. I don't find it unfair. Sometimes it's challenging. Some PEOPLE will try and make it unfair. That's where the GM's responsibility comes in. And the player's too. As a player part of your responsibility is not making something stupidly more powerful than the rest of your group. ((Or something so crazy that it makes the group upset)) Like a crazy guy that always wears a hotdog costume and screams everything he says in the third person.

Can lack off balance open the possibility for abuse? YES. Does it automatically "Equal" lack of fairness? Nope.



Then maybe you should ask yourself why you have to be balanced with all of your friends to have fun? If you know out of character one of your friends has more or less points, why's that bother you? Does it hurt your ability to play YOUR character? If not... why's it matter?



As others have pointed out above. Not really. Just theoretically.



I understand. I just do not agree with your overall point. To me, not everthing has to be 'equal' to be 'fair'. Nor does 'fairness' or 'equality' with other people's charactes, affect my character or my having fun.

Now if say, in D&D or Pathfinder, everyone is level 14 and I'm level 1.. yeah that's a big deal. but if they're lvl 3 and I'm lvl 1.. No biggie. if they're 8 and I'm 5... No biggie. I just pitch in as I'm able and I have fun with the game.




By the way. I notice you ignored the post on the Gnome height that you were so up at arms about? Not going to comment there?

I just statted up this troll in Chummer. Looks like it uses something like 212 BP just to achieve this. That's without any (other) stat increases, money, skills, etc.

It's not that a melee troll can't be done, it's that for the investment, there's so little return. Investing so heavily in Str lets you hit really hard in CC (and CC is already vastly inferior to shooting), and that's about it. Whereas investing heavily in Agi, for an Elf, opens up tons of other possibilities. Great DP for shooting, plus Infiltration, Dodge, Gym, hell CC as well.


How about rolling Str and Bod into one stat? They overlap in many ways anyway, and together they still don't seem to overshadow things like Agi.

That could work. But then there would be the need to also do the same (reduce to three) for the mental Attributes, of course.

I also agree, that melee is a "weak choice" compared to ranged, from a pure "power level" point of view.

The biggest offender is the Complex Action cost to attack, I think.

Bye
Thanee

Well, they are also slightly better at taking damage...whether that is something you want to be good in is at best questionable, though.

I say get rid of Willpower. Only 2 linked skills, not much else going on with it other than magic-related stuff...


Reading this debate, I agree with your general premise, I really do. Have fun with your friends, don't worry about who's "better" than who, and so on. Rule zero and all that.

But in particular, I think your point is just...wrong You can't say "My friends and I have fun despite the rules" and then not agree that the rules need some fixing. Not every group is as awesome as yours (or TJ's ). Rules need to be balanced for the exact reason that not everyone is able to just go with the flow and have fun. Otherwise we could all just free-form it, no need for rules or rule books in the first place.

since damage that is smaller than armor goes to stun damage instead of vanishing, technically a dorf is better at taking damage because they can get a longer stun track than a troll because of their bonus willpower, right?

Heh. In fact, it is simple math.

Let's assume there are two groups of players. Those who do not care about balance (group A) and those who do (group B).

If you have unbalanced rules, group A is happy, and group B is not happy.

If you have balanced rules, group A is happy, and group B is happy.

Balanced rules are obviously better, if the goal is to make as many players happy as possible!

Bye
Thanee

Since bullets that are dodged cause no damage at all, decent Reaction is far better than a higher Body (most likely even more in 5th, due to the large defense pool).

And what's with all those Dörfer?

It's a deeply specialized character, yes (I've got it coming to 201BP, so with full negative qualities you've got 234 left, 130 of which you can still spend on attributes). However, that doesn't mean you can't generalize a little bit...

@Sengir
Potentially NSFW Link straight ahead!
http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Dwarf_Fortress

And yes, technically a fairy is the better tank because he can dodge and not take damage at all.
But that pool diminishes, which the dorfish stun track does not. And because he gets both Body and STR, he can also wear a reasonable ammount of Armor.

That's why Pain Editors exist.

Is it wrong of me to look through balance stuff, discussions, and the like-nod, agree that things need definitely be balanced...but have my one burning question be...

Will there be the rules for cosmetic modification so I can re-make Monster, the Handsomest Troll in the Neighborhood, in SR5?

I should have more important questions but I guess for me being able to play favorites from edition to edition is an important question.

Not true... I have run a DnD Campaign for many, many years, and stupid things like CR have gone right out the window (It is an artifical construct after all). I put the world together and let the characters explore that world. I expect the characters to evaluate their opposition. If they choose to attack something more powerful than they are, that is on them. If I set up an encounter I NEVER look at the CR; I look at the rationale of why the encounter is there, and build accordingly (Even my random encounters are built in much the same way). Sometimes it works out well for them, and other times not so well. I have had Low level characters playing with high level characters; I have had medium to high level multi-classed characters deathly afraid of what would be a low-CR encounter due to good planning on the opposition's part, and poor planning on the Character's part. It is a Story, with very richly detailed characters and background. It is not a number crunching exercise.

It can be done on a grand scale (and not the less than 1% that you indicated). I have done it.

So I've been somewhat paying attention to this whole ... "discussion" Pax and PJ been having the last few pages and I thought I'd chime in.
Pax the problem with using D&D systems to support your claim is that the systems you're refering to are broken and in fact prime examples of the handwaving you've been opposing.

Level Adjustment (or LA for short) doesn't work, that's the plain and simple truth.
This is why, first of all the values assigned are totally arbitrary and have no coherent method to it what so ever, there was an attempt at outlining hard and fast rules for LA (in Savage species I believe) but you ended up with these strange "gaps" where something was beyond say LA +1 but not quite LA +2, essentially creating ghost levels where you got extra benefits at no additional cost.

But that's not the main issue of it, because there is no set weights there's no coherent power level even within an LA, A simple example... Drows get +4 stat points, SR, some fairly weak spell-likes, darkvision and a flaw, Githzerai receive +6 statpoints, SR, spell-likes that improve with level, darkvision and no drawbacks... Both are LA +2 Races, see the issue there?

But it doesn't stop there, because the very design of LA instead of making a character more powerful, in some cases it presents a crippling drawback as the lower level will not leave him behind the curve on things like hitpoints, but as a caster he's flat out kicking himself in a teeth!
As such it cannot really be used as a measure of power to achieve balance within the group.

On the other hand CR while not broken, is a giant pain to work out and make encounters with several different monsters (Quick tell me what's the CR of 1 cr 10, 3 cr 7 and a cr 6 mob?) There's variant rules that addresses this by associating monsters with an XP value rather then a CR, but beyond that the system simple do not work consistently! Using the rules a zombie, a single plain old human zombie should provide an adequate challenge for 4 lvl 1 PC's? While in some cases that might be true... 4 zombies are supposed to challenge 4 level 5 PC's!
The numbers are guidelines at best and laughable at worst... Fortunately it seem PF cleaned a lot of that up.

If you going to argue balance atleast use solid examples

Roleplaying for 29 years has taught me that game balance and rules have absolutely nothing to do with "spotlight".

Bull, doesn't this essentially mean that the questions are right back up in the air? If, by the rules, decks and servers have limited processing and memory availability (which is necessary in a game design sense), then it follows that the programs and systems opposing them also have to deal with finite amounts of both. GOD, as described, would make a half-dozen fully rampant AI's seem like slackers.

I'm holding out on reading the actual material, but on the face of it that doesn't pass the ten-foot rule of plausibility.

Indeed... Rifts can be insanely fun.

Mark has posted the following on the Fear the Boot forums:



"Previous editions chargen" What type of chargen did all three previous editions have in common? I think I'll like it.

And:

That seems like strength will be more important than it is in 4th ed.

I really, really like having Essence directly cap social successes. Heavily cybered people should be a little creepy, given that they've literally shaved out big chunks of their soul.

Is the question whether decks and other Matrix systems will have ratings? Or is the question whether given a set technological capability it's possible to perform operations beyond that capability with devices at the normal level of tech instead of super magic uber tech?

If the former, I'm under NDA, but it's probably all right for me to say that there will be ratings.

If the latter, check out some distributed computing projects.

If the next question is "then why can't the runners use similar distribution techniques to put one over on the corps?" then my answer would be "because you can't do distributed computing if you have no control over the network. On the other hand, if you do have control over the network, plus the ability to define networking protocols that give you spare cycles from nearly every device in the world, then you can make a half-dozen fully rampant AIs seem like slackers."

So vamps are the new pornomancer?

Then we're right back into the round-robin of 'why exactly is everyone in the world giving away free cycles again?' SETI@Home, or Folding@Home, or hell, even the absurdity that is Bitcoin all work on distributed computing principals, but once again, they do so because people are choosing to spend their power bill and lifetime of their devices on doing that.

I get it that the goal is a more oppressive corporate presence in the Matrix, but it should at least logically follow from previously established bits of setting. That's half of what people bitched about in the 4e Matrix 'reboot', doing it again may not go over as well as expected.

if i told you the web would be much more stable and faster if everybody was forced to share 10% of both their bandwidth and computing power with everybody else, would you be okay with doing that so your remaining 90% work much better than they are right now?

I don't know...I made a dwarf cyber face, who wanted to be taller so bought all custom ware. I like the idea even if she's not rolling a lot of dice compared to an adept pornomancer.

No, because the web isn't paying my power bill, bandwidth bill, or buying replacements for my hardware when it wears out marginally faster from additional load.



It's a neat idea, but at the same time, Essence loss as loss of underlying humanity is rather neat too. Very fitting to a cyberpunk setting.

Pornomancers are their own little ball of bad game mechanic problems.

Wouldn't that character be a perfect example of that though?
Slowly losing yourself in a vain pursuit of superficial beauty...
Why do I get the picture of an animate mannequin in my head?

Re: Limits


Okay-I have to say that I'm mixed on what I'm seeing. Let's say...Mostly positive, but a few concerns. I'll make bulletpoints.


*Essence taking away from social skills. A very cool idea, and it fits thematically as well. That part's positive. However, I'm a bit concerned it's going to push faces even more toward the Adept route than they already are(and they are already pretty much there). Not that I have anything AGAINST Adept Faces at all-but I feel that if the modifier is too large, or if Bioware counts toward it(tailored pheremones), it's going to dry the 'adept cement' the face is already sitting in. Also, it harms 'alternate faces' who aren't Adepts as well-like 'back up faces', and may discourage people who take cyber from wanting to do face-ing as some backup. (I had a samuface that was actually a lot of fun in 4e.) THAT being said-this would only I think become and issue if the penalty/Limit was too harsh. Disadvantages are fine, but I get a little bit worried when I see something that can potentially remove interesting combinations.


*Again-it's cool that the problem with the 'high attribute low skill' person can be addressed, but my concern here is, again, if the target number continues being a 5 or 6, it's going to discourage having those nice 1-2 point round-out skills and we end up seeing a bunch of people with a few skills and nothing below a 4.


*While I was one of the people whom poked a lot of fun at the Strength score for being so useless in 4e-at the same time, I don't want it to be THE Melee Skill again. I'd like for their to perhaps be a way to use Agility/Quickness And/Or Strength, so one could play an agile OR strong fighter, and still be competent. (I'm a fan of the Little Cool Old Master guy who may not be strong, but he's got skill out the ass and he can still move fast for his age.) (Strength helping Recoil better could also help the stat. If Agility is the gun-shooting stat, Strength can be the gun-stabilizing stat, and once again, you could have a fast two-gunslinger or the Big Gun Dude mobile artillery platform.) Now I may have read it wrong-if you're actually working ALL the physical attributes into skills, that could actually go a long way.


*Hopefully the gear isn't weighed too heavily. I think there's already a bit of problem with the gear-load, and I'd like there to be a balance of emphasis on gear. (In other words, I'm hoping the Expensive Super Gun doesn't give an enormous Limit benefit over your more garden variety gun, since sometimes you want to buy a piece of gear because it's cool.)


*Is Reaction going to be back to a Physical/Mental average? Nowadays it's counted as a physical attribute, but it's...not really(you can't increase a Cyberlimb's Reaction, for example, like you can the rest of the physical attributed.)


*With Limits, I'm hoping that there's an ability to get better natural attributes again, a la 3e. I actually liked the top priority giving a crapload there-it's nice to have the ability to play, say, a lightly-augmented ganger who has a lot in the way of natural attributes and skills, but doesn't have a lot of gear yet. I found it a lot more difficult to work with that in 4e until we started using Karmagen again-also keep in mind this is coming from a table that plays a game of 'above average' power, so there may be that talking as well.(Actually, this has less to do with Limits, but I'd love to see a couple of small optional areas that give suggested tips for 'below average' and 'above average' power in the games, for example, how many BPs or Karma or whatever is being used to build with to add or subtract.)

Hmm, so confirmation on "Limit Modifiers"? Awesome.



Real-life "Uncanny Valley" effect. Wouldn't YOU be creeped out at a walking, talking Barbie doll?

And what if permission to use your idle cycles was in the end user license agreement you have to click through to get your device to work, and if you don't then you can't use the Web at all? Or worse, if the devices you have didn't bother to ask and just did it?

I think that's the kind of thing that Bull was getting at.

I already am. Google her, she's apparently friends with a "real-life anime character". We humans are a weird lot.

Note to self: never, ever google anything ChromeZephyr tells me to google ever again.

*shudder*

Yeah, Aaron, she got a good running start before taking the leap into the Uncanny Valley. And now I have to sig that.

Must have missed something interesting... What/Who are we googling?

Sorry, Aaron got his first post in before mine and I hadn't quoted the post I was responding to. Human Barbie Doll is what he looked up.

Yeah, and then we're back in the discussion loop. Network and bandwidth piracy already exists, it has just previously been mostly Trid because the Matrix was more about node defenses than full-network lockdown. And there's all this shiny old hardware from a decade ago just lying around.


Clearly, after all, the populace got along just fine without the Matrix for a few years after crash 2.0...

I'm not sure if you're being Ironic or not, but the populace didn't get along just fine after the crash. Hundreds of thousands died ( I think millions but I"m not sure and if i type millions and I'm wrong someone will yell at me)), people starved to death when ALL of their money just dissapeared, and all of the records for their property etc etc etc ad infin.

But if you were trying to be ironic... ok.