I've played 3rd and 4th a good bit. My wife bought me SR 5th at Gencon but I don't get it until Christmas. I was able to sneak 30 minutes or so with it while waiting around at the con. I looked at the art work and skimmed the side panels for a "Returning to SR from 4th? Here's the main changes..." I didn't see one.

Does anyone have any resource that gives a 4E player a quick overview of the changes required to adapt to SR 5th?

I am not absolutely fluent in SR5 and very focused on magic, but i overflew it and the following changes bothered me most:

- armour ratings are increased (e.g. armoured jacket raised from 8 to 12)
- no difference between ballistic or impact armour anymore
- no armour stacking (at the moment)
- Immunity to normal weapons only work as auto-successes (rating), no “zero damage if you don´t overcome the rating” anymore
- Damage codes of weapons heavily increased
- Direct combat spells are near to useless. You only make damage according to your net-successes.
- Indirect combat spells work quite like before (at least targeting), but the elemental effect doesn´t cause ½ armor anymore but (armour – force).
- drain changed from (F/2) +/- something to F +/- something. Most of the time it doesn’t make a change, but this heavily depends on the power level of your campaign.
- there are caps for successes. These caps rely either on your attribute or the weapon itself (depends on the kind of test)
- wireless bonus for a lot of equipment (if you turn wireless on, you get e.g. higher caps, or additional dice)
- a lot of adept powers are better than before (e.g. critical strike now available for close-combat-weapons (blades, clubs, etc.)
- mentor spirits now also grant benefits to adepts (quite good)
- mystic adepts don´t have to split their magic attribute anymore, but have to buy the power points extra (not very expensive, even after the errata, so it is terribly broken)
- character creation works only acc. to the old category-version at the moment and some details have changed (e.g. you get free skills or magic attribute if you take magic at category A or B).
- *just rumors i heard, not my turf*: Hackers are now Deckers (again) and they seem to be nerfed somehow, but i have no details.

Sorry, all this is only out of my mind, don´t have the books at hand. Hope it helped.

I, personally, would find this to be quite a useful resource if we could all get together and contribute, and the first post could be kept updated with accurate information.

I haven't read as far as magic or matrix rules yet, but here are a couple I've come across that have been mentioned a lot

- Only one attack action per action phase (your other simple action has to be used elsewhere)
- Recoil is cumulative over multiple rounds unless other actions are taken (it's unclear if this works as intended currently)

Also in response to the above, I don't think hackers have been nerfed. Most of the complaints I've seen would suggest the opposite. Mutual signal range has changed, everything now has 100m range or something like that, so hackers have loads more options. Haven't read it myself yet though so don't take my word for it.

Nope, still has the *plink* effect for low-powered hits, but now it also adds half its (modified) rating as automatic hits for attacks exceeding the armor rating, in addition to any hits you normally roll to soak.

Really? Must have overread this, because everybody else was complaining about it and i read it the same way.

***EDIT: Mindfu**ed myself. The problem was that there IS no *bling* anymore because even heavy pistols now do so much damage and have so much AP, that you can shoot a force 6 spirit with it. THAT was the problem. ^^

It seems like everyone feels that their niche got nerfed unfairly and everyone else's got buffed, which probably means that things ended up about the same place they were before.

-Skills go to 12 (13 with Aptitude)
-The maximum bonus to an attribute from cyberware/magic is +4 and does not depend on the racial maximum. There is currently 1 exception, I think when using wireless. (possibly 2 with edge, but let's not start that debate here)
- Initiative now has the form of Base + Xd6 to give an initiative number. Each pass reduces this by 10, until you have none left and are done for the turn. Some interrupt actions use 5 initiative.
-Gear prices went up, especially cyber, on almost everything. Starting Nuyen did not go up at the same rate.
-Used 'ware is a separate quality of gear, so no used deltaware. (this is vague in the book, but is supposed to be in the errata)

Also, the character conversion guide outlines some of the changes, like skills that went away, etc.

http://www.shadowruntabletop.com/2013/07/s...-now-available/

I would probably just rebuild a character from scratch though.

Sadly, because of the changes, rebuilding does not always work for a character.

You're mixing up something here. Hackers now refers to deckers and technomancers collectively. Deckers are pretty awesome, and the general consensus is that technomancers have been horribly nerfed.

Also, it appears no-one has mentioned Limits thus far. Limits are a mechanic that caps how many hits you get to count on a test (like spell force in SR4, with the addition that now you can use Edge to get around it), and they come in two flavours: Inherent and Gear. Your Inherent (or PMS, standing for Physical, Mental, and Social in a mildly amusing fashion) are based on your attributes (Physical: (Str*2+Bod+Rea)/3; Mental: (Log*2+Int+Wil)/3; Social: (Cha*2+Wil+Ess)/3), and apply to a wide array of skills - meaning that you can't dump Strength and max Agility and expect to be an awesome gymnast, for example. Gear limits are set by the gear that you're using, such as Matrix Attributes (Data Processing, Firewall, Sleaze, and Attack, with the latter two being exclusive to decks, host, and technomancers) or Accuracy for weapons. Many items now modify Limits, and those that do still have the potential to offer a dice pool bonus often do so as a wireless bonus, requiring you to accept some risk of hacking to have it (this being part of a goal to reduce the number of dice pool bonuses that people would stack up, though you shouldn't confuse this with an aim to diminish the size of dice pools; the concern was with where the dice were coming from rather than the number of them).

Wireless bonuses also represent a shift towards trying to make the MAtrix more relevant for everyone, better integrating the hacker, and bringing things in line with the "everything has a cost" principle. The reception of these has been... Mixed

Remote decking is harder now due to "Noise".

Decks are worth a fortune.

You also resist magic spells with two status (so to resist Mana Illusion spells you use Logic + Will. For Physical Illusion spells you resist with Intuition plus Logic)

BTW, Logic is no longer a Dump stat.

Spending Edge removes the limit to successes.

You defend against ranged attacks with Reaction + Intuition now (instead of just Reaction). So combat is less deadly even with the increased damage unless the combatants are skilled.

The Dodge skill has been removed.
To dodge you use your Athletics (Gymnastics) + Reaction + Intuition with the physical limit.
This boost only deducts 5 from your Initiative Score, but it only lasts for a single Defense Test.

For Full Defense you deduct 10 from your Initiative score but can add your Will to All defense tests for the entire Combat turn.
You can also still attack if you have an action left.

Everyone gets a free action each pass even if their Initiative score is less than one.

If you roll five higher than what you need for a pass (like rolling 27 on an initiative score), means you can pull a defensive action and still get the same number of passes.
The fact that combat last longer now and that you can burn Initiative for defensive actions means those with reaction enhancements get a lot more use out of them.

Great post and I agree to everything except the last Sentence.
I'm afraid I have to give you a *snarl* for understatement

HokaHey
Medicineman