Is there an errata somewheres? The brawling adept has 2 levels in critical strike for 1 pp, but the power description doesn't list the fact that is can be purchased in levels.

I was hoping it could still be in levels, but I am okay if it is not, since you can apply it to toher stuff now.

Thanks guys.

I do believe that it was one of those powers that was changed at the last minute, after the Archetypes were in stone. Essentially, it's as the power reads-you can take it one time per skill and get a +1 to the damage value. The archetypes were not changed to reflect that.

Yeah someone decided that unarmed adepts shouldn't be a valid concept and the power was changed but the sample one wasn't updated.

I'm going to have to disagree here. I have an Unarmed Adept that does 11P Damage between his Strength, Strength Increase powers, Knucks, and Critical Strike. And no, he's not a troll, he's an elf, so he gets more dice to roll for the skill thanks to Agility. And he's made 100% by the book rules with none of our Availability-nixing house rules in effect.

Unarmed Adepts advantage over Weapon are that Killing hands can cover Weapon Foci-so they don't need to spend nuyen and Karma to bond one to hit stuff with Immunity to Normal Weapons, and they don't need to actually have an active Focus to do it(yes, they can activate or not activate the power.) They take a .5 PP power and get their Physical damage/ability to hit stuff with immunities and also Astral stuff.

Weapon Adepts have the advantage in sheer damage. As well they should, IMO-since before, it was *weapon adepts* that became obsolete, since Unarmed Adepts could out-damage them in every conceivable way(especially when Martial Arts hit, where it was easier to get the +3 DV with unarmed than it was with a weapon on TOP of that.) However, to really make total use, they need a Bonded Weapon Focus. Now a low-level one isn't that bad to get at least. (Let me add I am not necessarily biased toward weapon adepts, either-I always have, and probably always will, prefer unarmed.)

(THAT being said, I do hope Penetrating Strike makes an appearance again. I kinda think that should have been in the base book. Limit it to 3 levels even, and I think that could have helped out a *little* more.)

<chanting> make distance strike stack with elemental strike...make distance strike stack with elemental strike...

I can live without in my games, so I really do not mind, but why remove it?

Sure, weapons where s/2, but they also got a =1-+4 on top of that. I understand you could get bone lacing and density on top of unamred, but that hurts the magic.

11p unarmed is not very good in shadowrun. The armor is all better now, and that will get laughed off, a lot.

Swords could also add the weapon focus on top of that. This nerf makes makes weapon adpets, far and away the better choice in this edition, expecially since you can get everything the previous poster posted, on top of the weapon, plus the weapon focus bonuses, plus the reach bonus.

There's no reason, in SR5, that you can't just use weapon focus Knucks and have that stack with Critical Strike.

11P unarmed isn't good? Let's see here. Knowing full well that every opposition is NOT equal to a fully built character...

Decent Security Guard: Reaction 4, Intuition 3. 7 dice to try to actually avoid the attack. Average successes: 2(he could go on a block for 3 more dice, giving him an extra success on average, but he'll lose Initiative, allowing my dude with reflexes to go again later on.) I decided to actually roll this out on some dice, and he actually only got 1 hit, so oops.

My dude: 15 dice to attack. Average Successes: 5. (For fun, I rolled. I got 6.)

So 5--2=3 net successes. It's going to connect. Since the base damage is now up to 14, it's above his Armor Jacket(12), meaning that the damage will be Physical. He then gets to throw 16 dice(average successes: 5, body of 4 and Armor Jacket. For fun rolling: I threw 5.). Assuming average successes, he manages to bring the damage code down to 9, marking off 9 boxes and being one box til death. The dude is literally standing there barely with his ribcage shattered and is probably spewing up blood. If he had gotten even 1 less success or my character 1 more, he'd have had his head caved in. Now if he had gotten 'lucky', he might have only taken 7 boxes of Stun damage, which would still put him at a severe disadvantage. (In the rolled attempt, he was killed in a single hit.)

...Unless a character is going against fully built characters 24/7, I am REALLY failing to see how 11P is 'not good.' I mean I'm speaking from the PoV of a table who plays a little more on the cinematic end and we even think that's good, so it's baffling me how something with a damage code of 11 is considered bad. Are Ares Predators considered bad because their Damage Code is only 8P? They only get -1 AP on that. (APDS will take it to -5 total, but the base code is already 3 lower than 11, so without APDS, the average gunshot is actually Stun most likely.) Is anything below a 14+ Damage Code bad now? Honestly I think I got lost somewhere here.(Remember, filling the Stun Meter is JUST as useful, if you need 'em dead you can kill them when they're out.)

That is pretty damm bad damage, my SR4 adept build has higher damage then that
Gun damage went up, defences went up, but unarmed adepts got their damage nerfed.

Well, in SR4 I had an adept that hit for much more, yes. It was easier to stack. Which is why it was changed. It got too easy to oneshot everything. SR4 isn't SR5. Damage codes are different. Ares Predators only did 5P in 4. Now they're 8P. 11P is lower compared to SR4. Compare it to SR5, not SR4, since damage codes are different.

Maybe people aren't supposed to one-shot every single enemy they come across? 11P is enough to oneshot a lot of security guards and gangers. Do you NEED to be able to oneshot Elites as well?

(Note: I am not actually upset or anything about this, I am just...confused. Since when did it become necessary to one-shot *everything?* )

Combaring to SR5 doesn't change the fact that guns got big boost and unarmed adept got nerfed hard core as a concept.
Really being an adept is pretty much useless for unarmed combat, all you can get is +1 damage, ware can give you +3.

Oh, I won't argue that it got nerfed....but IMO, it was a necessary one. It was FAR too easy to stack the damage high with them. I mean there was no challenge to it, and honestly, in SR4 it was the *other* way around-it became un-necessary to ever play a *weapon* adept. I mean, as someone who played MMOs, I understand the idea of 'Oh, go ahead and nerf Warlocks, but I play a mage, so don't nerf them.'

IMO, bringing back Penetrating Strike will go a long way; 3 levels of that will essentially equal the AP of a few weapons, which will cut Armor down more. Weapon Adepts will still do more base damage(again, as well they should), but Unarmed will have a little more oomph at that point.

That +3 won't help against spirits and other things with immunity to normal weapons, either. (Also, only +2 at chargen by RAW.) Also, cyber can only get +1 to the die pool. Adepts can get +3, which is another success on average, with Improved Ability. Also, Adepts get cheaper Reflexes.

Oh well, I suppose it's different opinions-I tend to think being able to oneshot anything up to a good security guard is pretty damn good, others might not.

11P is not good dude. Sorry. I guess if you are fighting security guards, then you are fine. I do not throw an endless stream of security guards after my runners.

It's funny, the S/2 runners in 4th hit harder than the s+ runners in 5th, when all armor went up, all guns went up, all melee went up, yet the premeire build for unarmed adpets went down.

This is perplexing.

Critical strike having levels like it should, would actually buff weapon adept just as much, but even if it didn't IMO unarmed adept is much more important to have as a valid concept then melee weapon adept.

Actually used Titanium bone lacing and muscle augmentation 3 give the ware puncher a whopping +6 damage in chargen.

Have to houserule that in Chargen, though-Used ware is not available for chargen by RAW. If you houserule that, you could just houserule Critical Strike getting levels.



If 11P isn't good-then what ARE your runners facing constant streams of-Tir Ghosts? I'm looking at Professional Rating 4 things and I see this:

Dodge Pools of 8 base(average: 2.5 successes, round up to 3 if you want.) They can block for extra of course, if they sacrifice Initiative.
Lined Coats for 9 Armor.

I see Elite Corporate Security with base dodge pools that average 4 successes. Better, but this also asks the question: Do you believe that every Elite force should be able to be one-shot? If yes, then okay, I can understand why you'd think 11 damage is 'bad.' Yes, if you expect an unarmed person to be able to one-shot everything up to and including characters who are *better* than starting characters, then I could agree 11 damage is not good for that.

(Also, Professional Rating 6 Lieutenant unarmed damage is 8. With a weapon, 11.)

EDIT: IF someone came up to me and asked for a 'compromise', I'd say allow Critical Strike to stack, but at a maximum of +3 DV.

Actually it is as per the gear section(the chargen section fails to even mention it existing, so i go with the list that does)

Oh, the 'word of god' had said it was not(it's in an Errata thread discussion), so I guess until it gets said errata, you can run with that(and again, for your home table), but Missions stuff follows the RAW as far as I know.

(And again, nothing stopping someone from houseruling Critical Strike at their own table.)

And Jasons answer on some random board isn't in any way RAW, it really doesn't even qualify as RAI.

I suppose this entire discussion shows that no edition is immune to one thing.

The Cyber people arguing that Adepts are too strong(I've seen a *lot* of this.)

The Adept people arguing that Cyber is better.

Yep, still Shadowrun.

For unarmed combat cyber is better, cybered adept is best.
For anything else, cybers new ridiculous prices are quite a problem.

SR4 had the other issue-'Bio Adept' was probably best for any sort of combat type of character, let alone an unarmed adept or pure cyber. Essentially, if you wanted to totally optimize a combat character, Bio-Adept was the way to go.

Weapons? Sure. Reflex Recorder, Improved Ability, then add Weapon Based martial arts for DV. Extra Attributes gave a bigger die pool for Agility as well as Improved Ability.

Unarmed? Definitely, Cyber Adept was the best.

Gunslinger? Same here, Improved Ability got more bonus dice than a Cyber gunbunny could get with Reflex Recorder, and they both got stat bonuses, which pushed the bioadept ahead.

Now, in SR4, plain Cyber vs. 'pure' Adept-Cyber, IMO, they were more even for unarmed. Adepts could get a bigger damage code(3 Martial Arts, 6 Critical Strike) unarmed. Their die pools ended up probably about the same, once you factored in the Cyber person getting better stats+Reflex Recorder, the Adept with Improved Ability. Cyber unarmed wasn't a slouch though-they could get +6 bonus damage instead of +9. So your Regular Adept might have Unarmed 6, + Spec, + Agility 5, + Improved Ability for 16. Your Cyber probably had Unarmed 6, + Spec, Agility 7, + Reflex Recorder. 16 dice.

Damage was probably-let's say Adept with Str 5, plus Level 6 Crit Strike, + 3 Martial Arts, did 12P. Cyber had the 5(7) Strength, +3 Bone Lacing, +3 MA, for 10P. A little less on the damage side, but at that point they probably had a bit better Reflexes(Level 2 vs. Level 1 on the adept, due to the cost of everything else.) All in all, *pretty* even, once you factored everything together. (Adept of course had the Killing Hands bonus for the stuff with immunities.) Now, the Adept could probably squeeze out a couple of Armor Piercing points(after getting Reflexes 1) to help a bit more.

Weapon-wise, the two were very close-equal die pools(again, factoring in the different bonuses of the two), the Cyber would instead do a *little' more weapon damage than the pure Adept. Essentially, it was the reverse of the Unarmed. In this case, since Critical Strike didn't work with this, but they'd have been able to probably squeeze up to Reflexes 2 with those points, equaling the initiative of the pure cyber.

But then, yeah, Bio-Adept came along regardless and knocked them both out of the water.

(I did, however, forget something. One can get Qi Foci, if you put in the money, which can add to stats with Improved Ability, without spending all the PP on it. So an Adept could, say, get +2 Strength(2 PP), and a Qi Focus Improved Strength to get another 2, for a 6(10). Now if the rules for Used ware end up errata-and given they were stated by the head developer, I don't doubt they are-suddenly the Unarmed Adept becomes potentially harder-hitting than the cyber, or even if the Used rules are in affect, more equal.)

I guess with all of my opinions, I don't judge 'Good' or 'Not Good' on the basis of 'Being able to oneshot any and every enemy, regardless of enemy level, not on a surprise.' As it stands, an unarmed adept can potentially oneshot anything up to and including Professional Rating 5 enemies, so I REALLY, really, have a hard time seeing that as bad in ANY way, shape, or form. I think the only thing that exists at the moment that can potentially one-shot a Pro Rating 6 is a Sniper, and they snipe you with 50 cal rounds on a surprise from a kilometer away with AP-8 monstrosities.

That would require a force 8 qi focus so no can do.
Really i would say best use for Qi foci is boosting improved initiative up one level, so you get level 2 for 1,5PP or level 3 for 2,5PP.

Iirc it's 1.5, 2.5 and 3.5.
So boosting it with a Qi Focus actually costs more (in terms of PP).

You pay 1,5 for the first level, after that its 1PP per level or rating 4 Qi focus(or both for level 3)

Ah, ok forgot about the part of it only needing the difference in PP.

Melee is worse now that we have no more Ballistic/Impact split. Usually Impact would be less but now that it's not the case anymore, why close to melee range when you can shoot from a distance with an 11P -6AP (Ares Alpha, APDS) attack in a full burst? I suppose it's always been this way, but the new nerfing of melee adept powers in particular is a very strange decision.

I'm still wondering, btw-what IS a 'proper damage code' in this game?

Is it honestly 'Being able to oneshot everything?' is it 'Being able to at the very least 2 shot everything?' Since 11P CAN two-shot higher end stuff. If I put the dude I made on a mirror-match with himself, this would happen(assuming average hits):

Mirror 1: Rolls 15 dice, gets 5 hits.
Mirror 2: Doesn't want to lose initiative, rolls 9 dice, 3 hits. Will take Physical damage from the hit(13P).
Rolls resistance, 5 hits. Takes 8 damage. 3 condition boxes left.


Mirror 2 goes. 7/11 boxes filled, so gets -3 to everything but soak. Rolls 12 dice, 4 hits.
Mirror 1 throws 3 successes. Brings damage down to 12P. He'll be taking stun.
Rolls resistance. 5 hits, takes 7 stun.

Mirror 1 now has -3 dice to hit, rolls 4 successes.
Mirror 2 now only gets 6 dice to soak, gets 2 hits. 15-2=13P...taking Physical again.
Rolls Soak...5 hits, and gets dropped on the spot.

Those are 2 actually generated characters. It's the same guy mirrored.


The 'Elite Pro Rating 6' in the book? That guy is supposed to provide a challenge *to more than one starting Shadowrunner head to head.* Not just one guy. It makes sense that, unless the single runner gets surprise-that you can't just walk up and casually knock his block off.(EDIT: If this is the type of game you dig, a simple houserule or two will fix that, anyway. Hell, I like a Fist of the North Star game now and then. For that, I'd *totally* make Crit Strike the SR4 version.)


I'll put my dude up against a mirror in Full Body armor here, just for giggles. Assume the same playout at the top: Mirror 2 gets a few more dice to roll for defense, which averages a couple more successes, but manages to drag the damage down to Stun. Instead of 8P, he takes 6S, is still at a disadvantage next round, and will *still* be knocked out at the end of the second round, typically.

Here, he'll fight a Troll with Body 10 and an Armor Jacket. (4 Reaction, 3 Intuition.)

5 hits average on the attack
2 hits average on the defense. Physical damage(11+3=14, 2 more than the armor.)
7 hits average on the defense. 7P.

Second Round: Let's say 13 dice on the attack now. Hits average: 4.
Only 4 dice for defense, just 1 success. Total Damage: 14P.
7 hits on the defense: 7P.

Condition Monitor of the Troll is 13. Equal Prio system troll is flattened out.

Again, while I don't disagree that 'unarmed adepts lost damage', I'm waiting for an actual logical explanation on why 11P is 'bad.' 'Bad' for one-shotting people in full body armor, maybe, but I never knew that elite people in full body armor were supposed to be taken out like dominoes. I just played out two scenarios of equal powered characters and in both cases, the other side were flattened out with this damage code. Even the 10 Body troll in the Armored Jacket.

I have no idea what you just posted here. That'sa lot of numbers with no real anything to back them up, that may or may not apply to any situation in this game.

I see no 5 hits on anyone's average. 2 Hits on anyone's defense is pathetically low. That's a measly 3 reaction and 3 intuition. I guess your bad ass shadowrunner is glorified human mook security guard killer. Good for you bro. Apply that to a simple F6 spirit, and your example really starts to fall apart.

Apply it to a REAL NPC, and your toon gets carved up and laughed at. Apply ANY defensive option, and your hits fall even less. Add a helmet to the person, and ANY cyberware for body, armor, or any points spent in body, ANY points in body, and your 11 damage with no AP is a joke.

No they really did not, since Unarmed Adepts had their Base Damage doubled before mods. Seems pretty bad-ass to me. If I were to convert my Ex-Ganger Adept, he would be punching with a Base Damage of Strength (10) + Unarmed MA Bonus (+3DV, Assuming they still go to +3DV), +1 Critical Strike - That is 14DV Base. Looks good to me.

So, with the additional Kiling Hands, teh Adept I have (Troll) is hitting with the damage of a Sniper Rifle. If Penetrating Strike comes back, then the character hits at 14p -3AP.

Not bad for simple hand to hand combat.

While the lack of Critical Strike stacking and the current absence of MA rules did affect Unarmed Adept damage, they can now utilize weapon focus knucks without getting wierd looks from the other players/DM at the table. With some splatbook support, I'm sure their damage will be able to compete with high-caliber longarms again.

Then again, I do like it that weapons aren't so inferior anymore.

Did you completely miss the part where i said my SR4 adept did more then the 11P he posted.
In fact she did 14P, mostly cos i didn't bother upping it higher.

In SR5 adept at chargen needs to have 5(8 if we account for martial arts) points more strength to match the SR4 adepts damage code, witch is pretty much impossible unless the SR4 adept has strenght as a dumpstat.

Tries again, applying to a Real NPC, In the book, Statted out, Professional Rating 4. Rolling out everything as said(as I did before, but it wasn't believed, apparently, since 11P was proven to be actually useful):

Professional Rating 4(over halfway up, better than Standard Security guards) Dodge pools are Eight(8 ) dice. Those average just about 3 successes. Now, I'll roll it out, for the hell of it. It might be more, or it might be less. Professional Rating 4 Lieutenants are NOT meant to be fought 'In Bulk.' These are actually meant to be somewhat of a decent threat to RAW Shadowrunners, which is why I'm using one, since I already rolled out that he pastes everything lower than that. (This character is located on Page 383 of the book, for what it's worth. I don't think he's as powerful as the mirror match I played out, but sure, I'll use a book NPC.)

Professional Rating 4 examples have:

8 Avoidance Dice(remember, full or extra defense cost Initiative to do it, and they roll 1d6+8
Lined Coats(9 Armor)

So, Initiative is rolled. Unsurprisingly, my dude wins, since he rolls 9+2d6(for the record, they rolled 10 total and 19 total.)

Okay, round 1. I have 15 dice here, and I'm rolling them. They come up: 6,2,6,4,5,2,4,3,1,6,3,1,6,4,6. Six hits.

Now, the other guy rolls his eight(8 ) Defense Dice in the book. 5,1,2,2,5,4,4,4. Two hits. So my dude gets the hit. Total Damage Code the guy must resist: 15P.

Professional Rating 4 guys have a Body of Four(4). He rolls his 13 resistance dice, and gets 4,1,4,5,4,3,5,4,1,6,5,2,1. 4 hits.

He took 11P and died.

(If you say count Edge, then I can do that too, and I'd have possibly exploded all those 6's.)

Now, again, that is considered 'Well above average' by RAW. These guys are better than corporate security guards(who have a mix of 2's, 3's and 4's), who are only Professional Rating 2 and really don't have that much.

Pro Rating 5 and 6 are not typically meant to be 'easily Solo'd' by One single starting shadowrunner. They are MEANT to be a challenging fight if you face them one to one. I can say this; even if a Sword Adept faces a Security Guard with Body 6, Full Armor, and Helmet like in the book one on one, they're going to be running into problems and not just plowing through him. Again, they are not meant to be easily one-shot soloed. Hell-even a runner using a Ranger Arms Sniper Rifle and getting surprise won't be guaranteed a one-shot kill of a rating 5 or 6 NPC in the book with that armor. They CAN probably get them(again, assuming surprise and APDS ammo), but that's a sniper rifle from 500m, not 'stabbing him with a sword.'

Now, maybe in your games, the Average Joe Security have all 6's, Full Body Armor, Cyberware, and helmets. Then sure, I'll give it to you. 11P won't be as good. In that case, since you'd be houseruling the average guard, I imaging you'd houserule Critical Strike to compensate for the fact they're facing armies of elite guards, or doing something to up the PC's power against higher-level opposition.

As the game is balanced, in RAW, as the Standard Power Level NPCs are statted, 11P is MORE than enough to kill stuff quickly. I can sit here and roll it out all day and continue killing Non-Mook(by RAW Power Level) guards.

Now, by Raw power level, I still haven't seen proof that it's useless, I've been here rolling out actual, real examples. Again, there may be a power level discrepancy here, and that's where I'm not seeing it-if in your games, your average opposition are all high Body, high Attribute, Full Body armor enemies. In that case, again, I'll agree, sure, 11P no AP? Not that much at all and he'd be in trouble. Now let me ask-are your type of games that you run the type where Shadowrunners can kill everything they come across with no challenge? What type of opposition do you use? What is your 'Average' guard like? Do you boost the PC power to compensate? Like, what exact power level are you looking at here?

That being said, I could say that Critical Strike could either go up to level 3, Penetrating Strike could make a comeback(again, up to level 3), or perhaps the Martial Arts rules could make it back in. In fact, the MA rules would probably drop in perfectly fine, and that can be an extra 3DV to damage.

As for SR4, my adept did *18P*, -3 AP. SR4 isn't SR5. The unarmed power level dropped, but if you use opposition that is balanced along with the power level, then *it isn't a problem.*.(Edit: Sorry, I miscounted. He had 15 Strength, 3 levels of Martial Arts, Bone Density, Initiation, and 6 levels of Critical Strike. It came out to 21P with the hard gloves and boots that he wore, with -3 AP. That was how stupidly easy it was to stack stuff. IMO, that was just...silly. I more did it to be silly, of course, but yeah, it got stupid.)

EDIT: For some math purposes, it seems that the highest unarmed damage code a Pure Adept can reach is around 17, with no AP. But it requires a Troll, with Exceptional Attribute, max Strength(for 11), 4 levels of Improved Strength, Critical Strike and Knucks. You can't get a stat higher than 4 points above the maximum, so 15 is the max a Troll can cap at, and that troll's priorities has to be made with-at best-Troll A, Attributes B, and Magic C-since he needs a minimum of 5 Magic to pull this off with. With 20 points to spend on Attributes, he'd have to spend 6 of them on his Strength, leaving 14 for 7 stats, and with 22 Skill points he's essentially going to be a one-trick pony type.)

EDITx2: I will say that, sometimes I notice going from edition to edition, power level shifts aren't always taken the same way, but can't always be looked at the same way. Looking at SR4's 'Standard Corp Security', they aren't much special. In both books, I don't start finding Full Body Armor and Helmets on book NPCs until 'Elite Security'-stuff like the Red Samurai. Even Swat Teams aren't in the full hard body armor. That kinda stuff isn't the standard stuff at a corp. That's the high end stuff that gets called if stuff looks really bad. Even Knight Errant Security Lieutenants(Pro Rating 3, page 383) have Armored Jackets and not Full Armor.

(Actually, to one of the guys who run Missions-which I know are standard power games-how would and 11P, 15 dice unarmed character-with Body 5, an Armor Jacket, Mystic Armor, and isn't a one-trick pony fare against Standard Enemy Opposition?)

I actually don't mind 11dv. I do mind the narrow range of builds to get there. It's all about muscle head the muscle bound. Critical strike allowed non muscle head characters to have competitive damage. I also think the racial disparity is game breakingly large. Their fix solved nothing because you still get 20dv trolls of instant death and tank destroying, all it did was kick people building non optimized builds in the jimmy.

Now that I can understand, and would really have liked to have not been a casualty. (For the record, to get to 20DV, you need to be a Melee Weapon Troll and pretty one-trick. It's possible, but you are, once again, one-trick). I do miss the 'Wise Old Wuxia Master' who might not be super-strong. Now, I understand there's a level of 'realism' (stronger hits are more dangerous), but IMO-realism doesn't always equal 'the most fun.' I'd like to see a fix for that that doesn't buff the muscleheads too much.

This discussion though-with 'What damage is good for the way the game is tuned?' kinda reminds me of something in WoW. I don't play anymore, but the developers were/are discussing something called the 'Item Squish.'

As the expansions went on, numbers got bigger and bigger. It's getting to the point where they are ridiculously big. At some point, players are guessing(I still read news on it from time to time, I played for a long time) that they're going to do this. So, say, a piece of gear with +3000 or whatnot to each stat will have +300 to each stat.

But the enemies are going to be 'squished' 'as well. Right now, the enemies are tuned to players having that big-number amount of gear. If/When they do the 'item squish', the enemies will be tuned appropriately. So even though the players would end up doing less damage, the enemies don't take as much either, equalizing stuff. (However, and this is a fair argument-the reason why they haven't done it yet was that they don't know how people will react to their characters having less HP and doing less damage and healing, *even if they're killing the enemies the exact same speed as they were before.* )

The book enemies in SR5, as it stands, are 'tuned' assuming a 'Standard, non Street, non Prime level group of Shadowrunners.' They have stats, skills, gear and equipment appropriate to that. The more high-end elites are more like 'Bosses.'

Now, to use the WoW analogy again, back in SR4, after the splatbooks came out and stuff like Unarmed damage could be pushed through the roof, and heavy FA guns could be customized to have almost zero recoil(allowing for massive damage, gods help if you loaded them with AV Ammo which rendered full hardened military armor near useless), those 'book NPCs', tuned for a standard game, would get utterly hosed. Even the higher level ones-the higher level ones were tuned likely for a group of Shadowrunners, and after it got to the point where *each* runner was nearly a group themselves, they would get hosed. It would be like a group of Level 80s in Wrath of the Lich King going back to Molten Core(tuned for level 60). Of course they destroy the place, it wasn't tuned for level 80s.

Now, there are no splats yet, and the stuff is more even. But the numbers that the PC's can do were somewhat pulled back, again, because they don't have all the bonuses they used to. Again, standard security-even Knight Errant lieutenants who are seen as 'pretty damn good'- aren't walking around in full body armor and helmets. They're in Armor Jackets and have reasonable stats. Thus, the sheer damage One Shadowrunner needs to do is *not* that excessive to take them out.

(For the record, I remember a similar issue after the Great Dikote Dissapearance of SR4-it was what had weapons people sad since that helped unarmed then pull ahead.)

Those Elites-the guys with Skills of 8-9, full armor, bigger stats than PCs can get at chargen(multiple 5's and 6's before ware), PLUS good cyberware or Initiation or whatnot, are more like 'minibosses.' They aren't meant to be fought one on one without gratuitous use of Edge, or perhaps Surprise, or perhaps said sniper rifle with APDS Ammo from 500 meters, or maybe excellent skill, Edge, and some full armor and a Helmet on the PC themselves(and even then they'll be really tough and you'd still probably want Surprise.)

In other words, they are not designed for a starting, 'normal' level runner to waltz up and take out with zero effort and one hit, no more than a Heroic Dungeon boss is designed to be soloed at level easily. But, if you notice yes-there are videos of Heroic dungeon bosses getting soloed at level, but it takes the use of a lot of skill and odd methods, all the tools of a certain class, and a little bit of luck(and it's often not a fast fight)-the player doesn't just waltz up and solo the boss toe to toe. They get slaughtered that way.

But in SR4, due to things like the skill cap, hard attribute caps, and crazy mods you could do with your damage and guns and stuff, they stopped being minibosses and became 'Kinda decent mooks', where the 'Standard Security' literally became worse than redshirts. Now the Elites are back to being minibosses again-but the runners can still, if made well, paste up to Pro Rating 4 stuff solo. I mean, in SR4, a lot of those NPC's-even the elite Red Samurai types in their full armor-weren't compensated to deal with things like 18P, -3 AP unarmed attacks with 20 dice being thrown or things like FA fire with AV ammo and nearly no recoil(again, with a bucket of dice). For a BASE SR4 book character-before Martial Arts came about, before Augmentation, before Arsenal-yes, damage could push higher(Bio-Adepts, Bio-Mages, you could hook up a gun pretty well with APDS, etc), but they were much more formidable opponents that you probably didn't want to solo 1 on 1 without a good plan. (A human adept, if they took 2 essence worth of Bioware, could push around 12P out of the gate unarmed. 4 levels of Crit Strike(max levels were equal to Magic rating), Bone Density 4 and Hardliners made 11P. If they had Muscle Aug 2, they'd get up to 12P. This was before Restricted Gear, and Penetrating Strike didn't exist until Street Magic.) That was considered awesome when SR4 came out(again, Core Book Only) vs. a lot of the opposition, except, again, for maybe the most elite. Why it's not now-again, vs. Non 'Boss' Opposition to some, is what confuses me.

Now, saying 'But I LIKED when a Runner could solo a Red Samurai either with his fists or his AV loaded machine gun'...well, then houserule away. Change Critical Strike back to how it was. Add the MA rules. Allow used cyber/Beta ware cyber at Chargen. Add AV rounds back in, and more ways to customize guns again. If you're not playing Missions, you can *easily* houserule this stuff back, essentially taking your 'level 80s'/85's' or whatnot back to Molten Core and having them solo the bosses again.

I liked Killing Hands having levels back in SR3, where it made them capable of dealing L/M/S/D depending on how many points you sank in. Maybe leaving critical strike as is and removing unarmed from it's table while making Killing hands add +1 - 3 DV?

Wow, really? People are complaining that 11P fists are too weak?

You can throw out the same base damage as an assault rifle, shotgun, or sniper rifle, and yet that's not good enough, despite the fact that your fists have a concealability of -Infinity instead of +6 and and can't jam, break, run out of ammo, be hacked, be confiscated, or be knocked out of your grasp?

You're punching dudes. Even with obscene strength, magic, skeletal augmentation, and brass knuckles, you shouldn't be doing much more damage than a friggin' high powered rifle. If you want More Dakka™, use a weapon - that is why humanity invented the bloody things, isn't it? A weapon will give you more damage, at the cost of being harder to get through security.

Meanwhile, unarmed adepts can walk straight through metal detectors, get patted down, get run through chem-sniffers looking for ammunition, and even bypass cyberware scanners if they opt for bioware or pure adept powers, and they'll not raise a single red flag. They potentially could go through security at the White House, walk up to the President and shake her (assuming Colloton is still in power?) hand, then make a Vitals Called Shot surprise attack and blast their fist through her trachea and out the back of her neck.

Try doing the same thing with a Yamaha Raiden, PSJJ Model 55, or Ruger 101.

~Umi

I know, Right?

So the question is what sort of gun can my troll use that fires chopped off adept hands at people?

Well, if it's dwarf adepts(they're the smallest), the old gun from Arsenal-I forget it's name, but you could load anything into it and shoot it off.

You'd need to find some way to connect the handless dwarf adepts to their adept hands with a wireless method though, to get the ability.

Why not just make a Throwing adept troll, that throws unarmed specialty Dwarf adepts?

Actually for connecting handless adepts to their adept hands I belive you have to be using them with wizfi on.


That might be easier as I wouldn't want to get my wizfi astrally hacked. Although if they brick my dwarves, think they should still do some damage.

Judging from the expected sounds: a splatgun
You'll have to wait for the next gun-book though, if you want SR5-stats with that.

Edit: Whoa.. where did all those posts suddenly come from?

Now the question here would be: would Dwarf Adepts with Critical Strike and knucks stack with the Troll's Throwing Weapon critical strike when the Troll makes the dwarf adept attack roll?

well, for simplicity sake, i would just say it is a variation of an assisted test. The dwarf rolls an attack, and the net hits add to the DV of the toss

Cos its impossible to detect someone is an adept, right.

It's a lot harder than detecting a fuggin' assault rifle...

~Umi

Especially if the Adept has the Masking Metamagic.