Ok, so I cannot find it in the melee combat rules but I assume if you are wielding two melee weapons you can make two attacks. (due to martial arts allowing for multiple strikes, now are you splitting your dice pool between the two if you attack the same target? I can kinda see arguments both ways just curious if anyone knows RAW from this or their own rule for it.

Basically, you can attack a target once with a single weapon - so, twice with two weapons. You can, however, attack any number of targets with a weapon by splitting your dice pool. See SR4A 158 and Arsenal 163.

Important bits bolded.

~Umi

this makes me wonder :
Is it possible for an unarmed fighter to attack 2 targets in the same action ?

SR4A, 158

Of course, that being in the corebook, it is talking about using a single melee weapon.

Presumably, if you're willing to split your dice pool yet again, you could use two weapons to make 2 attacks against 2 targets in melee for a total of 4 attacks, but by then you're running low on dice.

Oh, and don't try to use two stun weapons at once and Incapacitate, or attack to Knockdown, or even just knock out/kill an opponent with the first attack, etc. There technically aren't actually any rules on how to handle the second attack with the second weapon if the first does any of those things or similar.

~Umi

Not sure if you can actually count yourself as using two weapons while unarmed.

But splits like that work best for armed adepts, as a Weapon Focus is a pool modifier, and thus applied after the split.

Personally, I've yet to see a practical argument for disallowing unarmed to follow the same rules as melee. The only reason people even contest it is because the rules are worded such that they talk about "weapons", and that invites some parties to become needlessly pedantic.

~Umi

Yeah, not like fists haven't been used as weapons before Shadowrun was dreamed up....

And remember: the split of the dice pool has not to be even! You can split the pool any way you like.

And don't forget all dice pool modifiers are added after the split. Yes, that includes Specializations, regardless of what the FAQ says.

In terms of things like weapon foci? There's the fact that there's powers specifically designed to compensate unarmed adepts for not having that benefit - it would, for example, be completely unbalanced to let an unarmed adept combine the benefits of Critical Strike, Elemental Strike, and a Weapon Focus.

Except that that is not what he is saying...

From a rules standpoint, the main thing getting in the way is that you only have ONE weapon that meets the criteria for two weaponing. One I've solved, with my most recent character.
Unarmed combat has an entry on the weapons table that qualifies it.
My second weapon is my Natural Weapon. Being wielded by a free spirit with mutable form, its shape often changes into actual weapons, though the mechanics of using it don't.

And that's how I ended up two-weaponing unarmed.

However, I agree with umidori here. You can force the issue by two-weaponing shock gloves, or two-weaponing unarmed and a single shock glove, or even a cyber shock hand.
This is legal, as they are seperate Weapons with reach 0.
It just drives the point home that its super dumb you can two-weapon by putting on a glove, yet some people disallow it when you take the glove off.

Things also get weird with non-arm appendages. Not just kicks and headbutts, but also things like the Thagomizer tail for Changelings (had some "fun" arguments over that one) and Fangs (there are three entirely different kinds, with different damage codes and linked combat skills - Cyberware Fangs, Changeling Fangs, and Vampire Fangs).

~Umi

It's actually connected, because in general you're either using a weapon or you're not. There is also the oddity that comes up in terms of gaining additional attack methods. For that matter, how many weapons would you want to count a normal metahuman as having?

TJ was quite right, I wasn't talking about weapon foci at all, and to be honest, that is almost entirely unconnected to what I was talking about. That said...

Every single physical method of attacking an enemy in Shadowrun counts as using weapons, except for Unarmed. From a game mechanics standpoint, that's bizarre. It should be unified unless there is some rational reason to treat unarmed attacks radically differently than any other attacks. (And there isn't.)

But putting aside game mechanics, it doesn't even make plain old common sense, because it complete fails to account for some pretty normal sorts of situations that it ought to be able to cleanly resolve without discrepancies. For example, I can stab twice with a knife in each, but I can't punch twice with just my hands? I can somehow use cyberspurs implanted in my ankles to make two attacks at once, but I can't just kick someone twice?

So long as the pool is split, what does it matter whether you make the attack with a held (or implanted) physical object, or with the limb that would hold (or house) that object to begin with? I honestly don't get why people are so against it.

Want to make two attacks, one with your head and one with your left leg? Go nuts! They of course should be modified logically - for example, the headbutt should probably be at -1 Reach, akin to Fang or Horn attacks, and shouldn't gain any bonuses from most Martial Arts, as headbutts are usually not part of that training. The kick, of course, would still benefit from most martial arts training, and would also benefit from the Kick Attack maneuver for +1 Reach. But it makes just as much sense and is no more overpowered than doing the exact same thing with weaponry.

~Umi

I find it strange enough that you can't stab a guy twice with the same knife, really.

Well, it's not like you can shoot someone twice with one gun with the same action.

Likewise, making two melee attacks with one weapon with one action doesn't work.

~Umi

I'm just saying, there's more weirdness in the melee multiple attacks rules than just that.

Like trying to reconcile attacking with two weapons AND with a Thagomizer tail all at once.

And that doesn't even get into the question of since a Thagomizer counts as Prehensile, can you use it to wield a weapon? Would be a lot nicer to just have three swords and split the dicepool between them than to have to also have Exotic Melee Weapon: Thagomizer, forcing you to diversify your skills, denying you a specialization, and making you use the lower of the two pools. (Considering the costs associated with this Surged Quality, this seems reasonable.)

~Umi

You could look at it this way. If the attack roll generated an insane number of hits (like 8 hits on a DP of 10) without using Edge, and the victim didn't manage to roll as well, the extra damage you dealt from your extreme luck resulted from being able to stab the victim several times in rapid succession. Particularly if you happened to kill the person with this attack.

Just a thought.

And yet somehow, it probably deals less damage than stabbing him twice with two knives?

On its own it is not weird that you can't stab one guy twice with the same knife in one action. What makes it weird is that you can stab two or more different guys with the same knife in a single complex action.

Think less "stabbing" and more "sweeping" and it becomes easier to reconcile. Making a broad sweep with a blade and hitting two goons next to each other is doable, while stabbing is less so because, ya know, blades get stuck in people that way.

It's an abstracted system anyway, remember.

~Umi

3 seconds should be more than enough to attack someone twice for most attack forms. Going through two or more bodies with a single slash is a lot less believable. But since a melee attack is more than one punch/stab/slash etc. anyways, you do not need such a weird motion to justify attacking more than one target anyways.

Believeable or not, it happened historically with at least some regularity. Two handed weapons, especially blades, had a tendency to "overpenetrate".

Still, moot point because 1) as you said the complex action is an abtracted set of movements rather than just a single jab or kick, and 2) sheer Rule of Cool would make taking out two guys with a sledgehammer or a katana totally fine anyway.

~Umi

I think you are missing my point. The complex action fro melee combat always encompasses more than one motion, whether it is against one or more targets. Because of the abstract nature of combat we do not know if one or more motions are necessary to cause the result represented by the dice rolls. Strangely however the rules allow to use one such motion against each target but more than one effective motion against the same target twice. So it is possible by RAW to hit one target in front of you and one behind you with totally separate motions but not the same target twice. I call that silly.

How am I missing your point? We're saying the exact same thing about melee complex actions being more than one motion. I agreed with you entirely.

Additionally, unless they're literally hugging you, no, you can't hit a target behind you and one in front of you with the same action (with the same weapon). They have to be within 1m of each other.

~Umi

OK, I misunderstood you then. Just to make it clear, my point was that attacking the same target twice in one Complex Action should not be more difficult (and thus prohibited) than attacking two different targets.

I forgot about that restriction. But still unless the attacker is really obese they do not need to literally hug. 1m is close but still more than a yard. Even if the attacker is not between the two, switching targets can involve some turning (especially if we are talking about stabs or jabs) and thus necessitating two different motions for each attack.

another question about dual wielding. specs. and weapon foci give dice after the split. does the adept power imprved skill do so as well? or does it count as that skill already ?

Not any more since the first errata to SR4(without an A). they changed it from being a dice pool modifier to a skill modifier.

after a bit of tinkering I have a adept with 17 DP without situational mods for dual wielding katanas that's 17 for both pools. not bad if I say so. still not as good as drizzt but eh. >:3 yes I did that. was bored lol. and no rules have been broken in the making of this character

How do you have 17 before the split and 17 after the split? That does not add up unless the DP modifiers are different for both weapons. Show us the math please.

sorry I meant 17 dp AFTER the spilt for both. I had an elf boosted the agility to 10. blades 6 + 3 for adept improved skill blades. then a martial arts for the multi attack. 20. both weapons at R4 wep foci + personalized hand grips and specialization blades. if you don't split it its at 27

EDIT: this was just an attempt to see how much I could do with it out of chargen. he is good at fighting. that's about it. although he has some charisma 11 DP for social. and is pretty sneaky.

Edit: Bah, faulty data! Oh well, I leave my ramblings for posterity. That said, it's cheaper by far to rely on modifiers after the split than it is to invest in the pool before it gets split.

***

Those numbers are curious.

The base dice pool is Agility + Weapon skill, which I assume you must have maxed out and then augmented by Improved Attribute and Improved Skill adept powers to reach 17 dice.

Then you have to split that between the two weapons, and since 17 is odd, you end up with two attack pools that aren't equal, probably 9 and 8 dice each. Then you modify each of those attack pools, presumably using specialization, personalized grips, and high force weapon foci to get the 8 or 9 dice needed to bring you back up to. But for both attacks to end up at 17, one weapon focus must be one point higher force than the other, which seems odd to me for some reason.

That's a lot of min/maxing, to my mind. Of course, if that's how you like things, go for it, but I really think you don't need much more than a dozen dice on each attack. Dropping your base dice pool a bit could save you a lot of BP/Karma by not requiring you to max out Agility so badly, or by putting some of the Improved Ability power points elsewhere (it's really not cost effective past your natural maximums).

Agility 5 + Weapon Skill 9 [6+3] still gives you 14 dice, which splits to 7 and 7, which get modified with +2 specialization and +1 personalized grip to be 10 dice per attack. If you want to edge up a bit more, a pair of Force 2 Weapon Foci are a lot cheaper than a pair at Force 6, and still leave room for growing later in your career.

~Umi

the fact was to min/max his combat stats I just wanted to see how much I could get with my knowledge I would never play the character no matter how good he is at cutting people up. but agi 10 + skill 6+ improved skill+3= 19 dice +1 for making to attacks with multi attack martial arts maneuver=20. my normal combat oriented guy is about 18-20DP for the fighting (750 karmagen).