Ah well, that would have made it easier
Guess you gotta use the old fashioned method then ^^

500 BP sniper I keep referencing in the sniper thread

Yes I took gliding just because it's cool.

...have my babies?

Runner's Companion, page 98.

That 500 BP sniper is cute.

Yeah didn't spend to much time on it, had 4 other characters to make aswell.

Yes, BP is worse for a generalist, but even Karmagen won't make a very great one. I still think it has more to do with the nature of the setting, and just HOW MANY roles there are to be filled by a would-be generalist, and with player expectations and system demands (wanting 10-12 dice on every roll instead of 6-7 being good enough)...BP makes it worse, but those are all issues that would still be problematic under karmagen system, with someone trying to fill a lot of roles and be good/great at a lot of things.

Well, generalists aren't supposed to be great
They're supposed to be able to fill different roles in a pinch and you can do that better, IMHO, with the lower end costs of skills up to 3 in karmagen.

One of my friends build a fairly decent generalist, and he capitalized on the fact that Humans have a lot of Edge. He made a Lucky Human with 8 Edge who had most of the skills in the 2-3 range, but when he needed to he could toss in his Edge and get dicepools in the mid-teens with exploding 6s. With 8 Edge you can't do that all day, but you can do it fairly often.

Okay, file this one under , "I still can't do my math right." I did some retooling, and came out over the 500 BP limit. That's fine... I'm just doing math right now. But I calculated the karma that would be equivalent to 500 BP, and it turns into 937.5 karma. My spreadsheet says I spent only 596 karma on this. I can't believe that it's so generous! I could build a competent MacGyver on 750, it seems, and actually start Richard Dean Anderson on 938 karma!

Tell me I did something wrong? Here's my new build. (938 would definitely let me buy into some serious bioware and sniper gear, considering I could almost be happy with my numbers and turn the rest to cash...)


Item/Rating/BP/Karma


Metatype: Human 0 n/a

Quality: Blandness n/a 10 20
Quality: Addiction (Mild) n/a -5 -10

Bod 1 0 0
Agi 1 0 0
Rea 1 0 0
Str 1 0 0
Cha 1 0 0
Int 1 0 0
Log 1 0 0
Wil 1 0 0

Edge 2 0 0

Bod 3 20 15
Agi 4 30 27
Rea 4 30 27
Str 3 20 15
Cha 4 30 27
Int 3 20 15
Log 3 20 15
Wil 5 40 42

Edge 5 30 42

Athletics Group 2 20 20
First Aid 2 8 8
Close Combat Group 3 30 35
Computers 3 12 14
Data Search 3 12 14
Automatics 2 8 8
Longarms 5 20 32
Longarms Specialization (Sniper Rifles) (+2) 2 2
Pistols 4 16 22
Influence Group 4 40 55
Forgery 2 8 8
Locksmith 3 12 14
Pilot Aircraft 1 4 4
Pilot Groundcraft 3 12 14
Pilot Watercraft 1 4 4
Infiltration 2 8 8
Perception 4 16 22
Shadowing 3 12 14

(18 Free Knowledge)
International Travel Procedures 2 0 0
Vory Heirarchy 3 0 0
Russian Intelligence Heirarchy 3 0 0
Counter-Intel Procedures 4 0 0
Money Laundering and Bank Fraud Procedures 2 0 0
Narcotics Distribution Channels and Methods 2 0 0
Agent Evaluation and Review Requirements 2 0 0
Language: English 3 6 7
Language: German 2 4 4
Language: Czech 1 2 2
Language: Polish 1 2 2



Gear 25000 5 10

CONTACTS
Senior Intelligence Officer 2/3 5 10
Vory Boss 3/2 5 10
Black Market Vendor 2/1 3 6
Money Launderer 4/2 6 12


527 596

Karma Generation normally does not give free knowledge skills, and you seem to use the old attribute prices. Since SR4A they are x5, not x3. If you calculate using SR4A ratings, your build equals 765 Karma (+112 for Attributes, +57 for knowledge skills).

Not to mention that the authors arrived at 750 points under the assumption that it would be with SR4A prices, but it got changed in editing, IIRC.

What's the Runner's Companion look like? The one I was loaned has a woman sitting on some stairs. Did I get the pre-anniv version?

It was not changed in this particular book, but the cost of attributes was generally changed in SR4A. The german version also lists it as *5

To add to what NiL_FisK_Urd said, it was also changed in some of the later printings in English. The only two changes to karmagen from what's in the version you have available to you, is that stats cost New*5, and races cost karma equal to normal BP cost.

There was conversation with the head of the line and the company making the "official" generator which ended up saying that 1000 karma is the proper total for the SR4A costs. I trust someone still with the company (especially the line developer) a lot more than some guy who isn't with the company and probably has an axe to grind.

I don't trust an offhand comment on one board at all, no matter where it comes from. Other line developers have been wrong and will be wrong in the future. We're all human.
What would interest me though is whom you're insinuating to have an 'axe to grind'.

If there were errata, of course, that would be a different story. As there are not, you may play grossly inflated karma build characters, and other people may play characters build to the usual sum. No RPG police will come and kick anyone's door in for either option and as karma built characters aren't even mission legal, there is no problem at all.

Well 'an axe to grind' is always a possibility if someone is no longer with a company, so without absolute proof that there isn't one, I will assume there is and not trust what the person said. As to who, I know that people claim that it was someone who used to be an employee who said it, but I don't recall the post-name.

Nice assumption, but a) worthless without (an) actual name(s) and b) I'm sure you know what they say about that and equine animals with a stubborn streak
On the other hand, with a name you'd cross the line into ad hominem, which is surely not necessary.
Also, you undermine your own credibility if you disregard an overwhelming majority of people citing actual rules and actual events at the time the selfsame rules were created by saying across the board "All those people just hate JH."

Saw it in the Scope thread, but it belongs here:


Well, lowering your AGI to 3 gets you 20 Karma, that is 50.000 nY -> you could buy Muscle Toner 2 for 16.000nY / 0.4 Essence, Muscle Augmentation 2 for 14.000nY / 0.4 Essence and a used alphaware Reaction Enhancer 2 for 20.000 nY / 0,6 Essence. For the loss of 1.1 Essence, you gained 1 AGI, 2 STR and 2 REA.

I'd go with the word of the guy who wrote and tested it above JH's napkin math. I'm not particularly inclined to go digging for the thread, but karmagen and the errata for it came from Ancient History.

The "axe to grind" theory doesn't really hold water, since AH was saying that before he split ways with the company. I think AH doesn't always do as good with rules as he does with fluff text, and karmagen (as much as I like it) has its flaws, but I still accept that what he said is what he thinks the original intent behind the rules was.

I don't have a problem with JH, but being a line developer doesn't always give you good insight into the nuts and bolts of the game - and until it shows up on an errata (like the revised costs have done), it is still just someone's opinion.

It's not very nice to question someones credibility or motives when they're not here to answer to the accusation.

After thinking a bit about this topic, I believe that All4 is referencing a post from last year, well after AH left CGL. So his perception may be a bit skewed by that.

This thread was 11 pages long, though, and I hope the topic doesn't get rolled out again

On the topic of karmagen, how does metatype attribute bonuses interact with buying attributes?
Like a human raising body from 1 to 2 would spend 10 karma
But a troll raising body from 5 to 6 would he pay 30 karma or 10 karma? Essentially do you apply metatype modifiers before or after raising the attribute?

If the first case is true, isn't metas getting screwed over hard?

Raw is the first option, but you pay less for being a meta compared to BP. Playing a high STR and BOD Troll is one of the few things, where BP is cheaper than Karmagen.

How about for templates? (like ghoul or dracoform)

Attribute increases from races and qualities happen before raising them with karma. Often, it's still cheaper like that (compared to baseline human).

With something like a ghoul this gets weird, would you start at -1 cha and have to raise it to 1?

No, you can never go below 1.

I think I had a brain fart there, yeah it would lower the max obviously.

Templates do get screwed, because templates cost BPx2 in karma and metatypes cost BP. It's actually not bad with the metatypes; higher stats are less good but they also cost relatively less.

This (higher exponential costs for higher Attributes, for metatypes with Attribute bonuses) was the reason why in original karmagen, you didn't pay metatype cost. However, even with the changes, metatypes don't get shafted too badly. In fact, humans are still one of the numerically weaker options in karmagen (although they do better than they do in build points).