If it is important enough to hire a Magic 8 Mage to penetrate, it is important enough to protect the site with a Mage of similar caliber onsite. Pretty obvious, I would have thought. *shrug*

No, they are not. *shrug*

So, what, because they have to see you to be able to do it it's just fine that they can one shot you pretty much any time they can lay eyes on you?



This is not debatable - this is a simple flat fact. While you can reduce the damage, and if you're very, very lucky it's down to nil, any time you're a valid target for a direct spell you CANNOT avoid it. In contrast, indirect spells can both be avoided and have their damage reduced.

I was more talking about most runners able to add more dice, most runners can expect to have 6-8 dice against most elemental spells, direct or indirect.

As of SR4, and I'd expect this to be true of SR5's spell creation rules, you can't have a direct elemental spell. And elemental protections are why you take multiple elemental spells as a combat focused mage - they have non-conductivity, so you toss Acid Stream instead.

You seem to be correct, I was mixing up what made up a direct or indirect spell, but it is still a considerable boosts to most pools.

Um no, its only a defense test its not a soak test at all so yes cover does apply.

When your direct combat spell is successfully
cast, it inflicts a number of boxes of damage equal
to your net hits on the opposed test. The opposed test
generally pits your Spellcasting + Magic [Force] against
either Body (for physical spells) or Willpower (for mana
spells). The target does not get to resist the damage,
only the Spellcasting test.

The last line shows that it is not a soak test but in fact a defense test. Unless they have an errata about this, cover helps against direct damage spells just like it always has.

Uh, if you could point out where it implies that in anything but your own interpretation, I'd appreciate it. And I don't recall cover applying for 2nd or 3Rd Edition, either.

well, since cover only applies to defense against direct combat spells then I agree that this is an issue. After all, it's not like street sams ever have to contend with cover against their guns.

Also, it's a good thing they added that rule that mages can only attack with spells, it keeps them separate from the mere mundanes who need, you know, more than one skill to be the best at everything and have no way to completely ignore all armour and dodge with an attack with unlimited free ammunition that involves the strenuous task of looking at the enemy.

Ok I am being harsh, but even so I'm getting sick of the entitled mage-lovers who're weeping over not being able to win any fight in a single round outright. Let mundanes do one thing better than magic, it's not like you can't use the same weapons as them.

You recall wrong. Cover applied in SR2-3 as well.

Fact is, magic can't one-shot people anymore. This is not a bad thing. In SR4.5, combats only lasted until the mage got off a combat spell. To a lesser degree, this was also true in SR2-3, unless the other side had Shielding. Just because mages can't one-shot as easily doesn't make them unbalanced.

Lets see it is a combat spell there are 2 tests for combat the attack/defense test and the soak test, it expressly says you don't get the soak test how much more spelled out does it have to be. Is it an interpretation since like dozens upon dozens of parts in SR5 it is poorly written, sure. But by far it is the most reasonable one. Uses the same rules as every other combat action except where it expressly says no soak part of it, or uses some made up new no name test that doe snot follow the normal rules of combat on top of the expressly noted no soak part.(which you would not need to say if it was a new fangled non standard test)

And fueldrop I can't speak for others but I have no issue with mages being worse in a straight up fight, I expect it even. In 1-2e as powerful as magic was claimed to be mages rarely had multiple passes since grounding was a bitch to contend with and sustaining penalties were harsher as well. So I was well used to the street sam mopping up the fight before the mage had a chance to even move. That was fine, killing things was his niche. I do think direct spells got nerfed to the point that they are a mages worst combat option in most cases, I'd like them to be balanced with indirect spells but I don't see a fix for it. And on a side note in my experience in 5e mundanes do a crap ton of things better than magic does, mages usually have more ticks at their fingertips but the mundane way usually is better. Which I think is a pretty good balance, they are a swiss army knife able to help in almost any situation but the specialists are much better than them.

Do I have issues with mages, sure. Mental manipulation spells should always allow a resistance check every round, sure reduce the pool but the resistance pool sould have a minimum of 1 die at least. Spirits, x2 force on damage powers is too much, concealment is still too good, and there should be a hard limit on spirit force instead of soft GM calls on using edge.(flat all spirits over force X use edge to resist summoning and binding, and give them force edge, not 1/2 force), improved initiative spells on a mage should not have a higher cap than mundane options in fact it should be a lower cap. Since I enforce a over force 4 spirts use edge, force 5 with affinity rule all the spirit issues are fine at my table, but that requires too much GM intervention to balance IMO.

Here are the applicable quotes (p190):

Good Cover


Partial Cover


So an argument that can be made here is that Good Cover applies to any spellcasting, while Partial Cover only applies to indirect combat spells that allow a Defense Test. In other words, if a dude is hiding behind a potted plant, Flamethrower would grant him a +2 defense bonus, but Stunbolt would ignore the cover. If the dude is behind a concrete wall, however, both Flamethrower and Stunbolt would grant him a +4 bonus.

That jives pretty well with the fluff of direct spells, armor, clothes don't break the line of sight the question is do you get to see most of the aura, partial cover does not block enough to disrupt tat, but good cover does. IMX, good cover is more common than partial, people use corners, cars, and dumpsters before they use potted plants. I don't think anyone has ever said, hey I stand behind that 2 foot tall thing for cover.

double post of justice

If you don´t like magic, there is also the Cyperpunk RPG. ^^

Tell that to Shadowrun Missions Designers... F12 and F16 stunballs in 4a are the norm. The very last few missions finally trot out Shedim and Insect Spirits to challenge PCs, but most of the fights are Mundanes vs whatever shows up.

Besides... F12 stunball means 1 net hit and it's over. And that's the problem.

They are NOT the norm at our table (F7 and F8 Manaballs/Stunballs/Powerballs for our current 350+ Karma Combat Mage, on the other hand, see a lot of usage). *shrug*
I do understand the bias against Direct Spells, but they could have easily been adjusted without going to the extremes they went, in my opinion.

TJ Fallacy

Why? Because we don't game the system to eek out every erg of efficiency? Boring...

TJ Fallacy. Just because you don't use the stupidly overpowered option doesn't mean that the option isn't stupidly overpowered.

If they made an error, it was in trying to stick to the Direct spells getting no defense roll and only resisting with one attribute. An elegant solution could've worked. Here's an example:

Direct spells still offer no defense test. They do Force + net hits in damage, and are resisted with the Drain attributes of the caster for Mana spells (eg, Willpower+Logic if the source is Hermetic, Willpower+Charisma if the source is Shamanic), or Willpower+Body for Physical spells. Drain for direct spells is adjusted to: Touch (F-5), LOS (F-2), LOS(a) (F+1).

So Mr Mage (Spellcasting+Magic 10) can cast a Stunbolt at Joe Average (Willpower+Logic 6) at Force 6, producing about 1 net hit for about 7S and having to soak 4 Drain.

Mr Mage then tries to drop another Joe Average in one hit, casting at F9 to guarantee a drop, for 7 Drain.

Mr Mage suddenly runs into a suspiciously cover-free room full of a dozen Joe Averages, and throws a Manaball at F12, frying the lot of them but taking 13 Drain in the process.

This seems equitable.

EDIT:

Willpower+Logic and Willpower+Charisma (almost) guarantees that the maximum defense pool would be 12 (a real soft cap is 14, and a real hard cap might be something like 18 but is really hard to get).

Willpower+Body is a harder target -- Trolls, Dwarves, and Orks do well here.

Assuming that everyone uses the Stupidly Overpowered option is just as much a fallacy, though.
Just because it is there does not mean everyone uses it, or is stupid not to.



Looks good on first examination.

I would actually suggest:

Touch (F-4), LOS (F-2), LOS(a) (F).

It's one Drain worse than the equivalent indirect category. Minus special elemental effects, but plus no dodging.

But that still comes under the definition of the TJ Fallacy, Not having a problem or issue with the situation by not having that situation arise in the first place.

Your gaming table is an elegant 7 course long campaign meal of adventure and daring-do, spiced with refined roleplaying and light banter over desserts.

I say Mortimer, that was a deucedly wicked shot there.

Quite.*puffs on his pipe* And most excellent hacking of that that spider Hughbert, I dare say he shall be reeling for some time.

Indeed, more of the brandy?

Please...

However most gamers sadly have to settle for the MacHugh's greasy diet of short order adventures most often ending with a quick grope and rough tumble with the surly troll waitress (if lucky) or a back alley brawl with her kin (if not so lucky or smooth, or sometimes if just too much of either) due to a constant rotation of players and GM's as well as a load of ambiguity in the rules with a wide range of interpretations.

Here game balance can swing a bit more wildly both for and against the players.

Deucedly Clever Ol' Chap...
But... Hughbert?



I do get the point... I really do...

Another slightly more elegant option involving Reagents:

Reagents don't modify the Limit, but instead can be burned to add to the Spellcasting and/or Drain dice pools, with (Force) as a limit to the number of reagents you can spend at one time (that is, the number of Spellcasting Reagents + Drain Reagents can't be greater than Force).

This solves the "Cast at F1, spend Reagents" loophole and fixes the "Direct spells suck and don't get benefits from overcasting" problem (at relatively high cost per added effectiveness) -- the latter by making it easier to throw very large dice pools in conjunction with the higher Limit.

It doesn't address the "what about F1 spirits" issue, though that could be solved by other means.

EDIT:

This would also solve the nonexpert player "Reagents can do what to the Limit with the who now?" problem. "Burn reagents get dice" is easier to comprehend and doesn't require too much statistical analysis.

THIS

Adding my 0.03 nuyen (infaltion! ) regarading the OP:

From my 4.5 perspective the magic issues were:

Spell Drain was to light to be an issue for anything but an overcasted spell. Even then, you could design a PC around it (like throw in a apha or beta ware pain editor.

Sprit summoning: Same issues, drain was too light.

Direct combat spells were an all or none proposition due to drain. Either you resisted all of it or none of it and died/unconcious.

Indirect were not balanced against direct spells as they required a to hit roll and were impacted by armor.

Banishing: Pointless since a manabolt/stunbolt did the same thing quicker and with less drain.

Astral Combat: Dittos well.


After reading through 5th ed what I liked:

Drain codes better designed: F + or - X. No halving of of force.
Indirect spells do force+hits damage with AP=force. AP at half was a bit excessive for a low force spell.

Haven't looked at reagents yet, but sounds like they replace expendable and reusable fetishes from previous editions.
Illusions requiring two stats to use, they were too easy.

OR is now a roll and not an automatic success thing.


Do I think they better balanced spellcasting. Yes, SR4.5 was too much becoming magic run. Direct combat spells might have been nerfed too much to the point of being almost useless. But that gets to my other point, mages are better balanced against street sams now.

I agree wholeheartedly. Drain codes are so much better in 5th edition.

And you are spot-on about direct combat spells. You could pretty much solve every problem with a good stunbolt (which typically lead to minimal drain, i.e. fully soaked drain) at our table in 4.5. Astral combat? pointless (use stunbolt). Banishing? not really worth it (just use stunbolt!). Combat with a mage on the team? Pretty boring (stunbolt, stunbolt, stunbolt, maybe a spirit or 3, forget shooting). And indirect spells? utterly, discouragingly pointless (stun-fudging-bolt).

So yeah, I like what they did with direct combat spells in 5th. Not really a big reagent fan, but that's a separate discussion.

An interesting idea, but it doesn't feel right to me to to be using Willpower here. The single-stat Body/Will split allowed for targets that were weak against one category and strong against another, which is something I personally would like to try to keep. With that in mind, how would Strength+Body work for resisting Physical spells?

Strength would probably work well, though Trolls would get a double awesome advantage.

On the other hand, you're hitting a TROLL with elemental spells. Seriously, break out the manabolt.

Jesus, all they did was add a bit tactical depts with spells.

Of course thats even more obvious in a team example:
If you have two mages trying to kill bunny hopper the dodger they can either try to throw lightning bolts at him, miss all the time and get killed or use indirect spells and take that guy down together.

I see no reason to take that away and go back to SR4. You will end up with either indirect or direkt spells beeing obsolete because the one would outclass the other. At the moment they are different tools altogether. It would be like comparing a hammer to a screwdriver.


Sorry, but no, it does not work. You will end up with the same old problem, again.
If you say you have to roll down the force, too it will get impossible at higher "levels" to really resist.

And as much as I like getting a lot out of using the right "tool", this can go much too far, depending on the attributes you use and your interpretation of cover.
Sure a Troll might be able to resist it if you take strength and body (willpower and body is a bit harder). But he will have no chance against mana spells.
You have to keep in mind, that you are using ONE SKILL and ONE ATTRIBUTE for all that fun. You only need to buy another spell for a few points of Karma!
If you can now freely choose the defence attributes your enemy must use and you can add Force to the damage.....
Attributes must be bought too, and a gunbunny will not spend a lot of points for body, strength, charisma, logic and willpower. (He will need first of all reaction and agility!)

Not quite Irion... actually you're better off using indirect AOE spells against bunny hopper the dodger. Why? they still get base force damage. The single scariest thing in any of the official events and boards I've seen posted is the force 12 toxic wave that killed half the runners in one event IIRC when they took 12 damage on body alone.

Quite frankly, anymore... now the fight ending spell tends to be either a mind control spell, or an overcast AOE... which those in it cannot dodge... with high base damage and wiping out nearly all the armor plus adding a secondary effect for anything left standing. Then use edge for the drain. Remember AOE spells now are success tests... 3 success puts it where you want it.. less and it merely scatters (and with high enough force still hits the target).

I'm of the opinion the two best foci for any kind of combat mage are now...
1. Screw foci... go mystic adept (tons of magical buffs on the cheap... and did you really need astral projection anyhow).
2. Power foci... adds dice to pretty much all your castings (and summonings, and bindings, and deactivating opposing foci, etc.)
3. Centering foci... since overcasting is going to tax you heavily... adding dice to drain tests will help a ton.



Overall, my impression now having played a bit with the SR5 system is that direct spells were overnerfed. 2 damage per net success would have been just about perfect... would mean the spells would typically do about 4-6 damage. Conservatively even a 50% boost in damage would probably get you there. You'd need two spells and two IP's to reliably knock anyone out. As it is now, in the official missions campaign you're hard pressed to get more than 2 or 3 points damage out of them per use.

@Falconer
Well, but AOE is another ballpark anyhow.... I hoped they would have made everything a bit more concrete there too....

And mind control again another book, too....

You have to start somewhere. I am not saying that they did not carry over tons of bugs from the 4. edition and called them features.

And yes, if they did not fix the "I spend one action and I get rid of any modifiers forever cheese"... Well, I have to check it might have been that wishful thinking took the better of me...

Of course doing that 3 damage might slow the opposition down enough that you can hit them with the gun-bunnies. I think the intent with the change to direct combat spells was to make the mage more of a team player rather than constantly being the main attraction. In fact from 1st through 4.5SR direct spells always outclassed indirect (indirect used to be manipulation spells back in 1st and 2nd iirc).

If any of those involved in playtesting/writing the rules can comment to that, I think it would add alot to this discussion.

Just having my pdf in front of me... well, they did not. You just need to spend a simple action BUT at least you woul still suffer the dice pool modifier for magical skills. So it ain't that bad. (Would still be silly if you would just sustain 5 spells and then just run around shooting people (I would arguee that they are seperated causes). BUT you only a limited amount of free actions so it might not be that bad. And if your player are abusing it, it is adept only so by the letter of the rules you can't use it as a mythic adept....

And honestly, focused concentration is not that bad.
You get to sustain ONE spell with Force max 6 for 24 Karma. Yes it is good. But just use the same houserule you would use for sustaining foci and say: Well, for sustained spells hits or Force counts, whatever is higher. And now you are done with it.

In my opinion it is a trick to make mages pay something extra for beeing a mage. You can't pass it up. And if you nerf them enought, they won't be stronger. So you get rid of those "I am a mage for the perks but actually I am not a mage". Beeing a mage was not expensive enough in 4 either.
(Sure if you could buy it multible times espacially during the game, it would break the game, true. But that is not an option as far as I read the rules.


@Falconer
Sorry, I reread the rules now several times, you can dodge AOE attacks as you dodge normal attacks. You only get a -2 Modifier, thats not that big.
So if a guy has 4 hits to fry you with a fireball and you got 5 hits do dodge it is 0 hurt for you. (All Shadowrun-characters get the evasion feet for free)

Only if you intentionally misread the grenade section Irion.

They completely changed grenades... there is no opposed test anymore when attacking a location with a success test (not an opposed test) as the indirect combat spell section directly invokes.

Specifically this extra -2 defense test only functions if using 'Motion Sensor' fused grenades. That sub-section of grenades specifically invokes "Make a ranged attack as normal" trying to directly bean someone with a contact fused grenade. For all other purposes that -2 defense is dead letter and non-operative. For this attack there is no success test at all, merely an opposed test which either hits for full effect (no net hits) or misses and scatters the full distance (not reduced for successes) and still goes off for damage... which can still catch the target inside it's blast radius. So just because you dodge the direct attack doesn't mean you dodge the explosion. If the attack misses and lands 1m away... you're still in for a world of hurt.

For purposes of argument, lets say this sub-section did apply to indirect spells (which it doesn't). The attack roll misses... the spell scatters 1d6m on a force 6 spell that guarantees the original target is still within the blast zone for full damage (no range degradation on spell AOE). Now how exactly do net hits over success test of 3 work to stage up damage. You don't have combined success test & opposed tests defined anywhere in the rules. At this point you're in make it (houserule) and not operating within the confines of the rulebook.


p181 - Grenades
"When throwing a grenade, choose A LOCATION AS A TARGET. Use a Throw Weapon Simple Action and make a Throwing Weapons + Agility [Physical](3) Test modified for range and all the usual conditions. Success means the grenade lands right where you wanted."

p283 - Indirect Spells
"Area indirect spells travel from the magician to the point of detonation and then go boom. The test is like that for grenades (p.181): a Spellcasting + Magic [Force](3) Test with a scatter of 2D6 meters. Unlike Grenades you get to add your net hits on this test to the DV of the spell, but only if you beat the threshold; otherwise the spell still detonates but the hits are used to reduce scatter by one meter per hit..."


So it's written plain as day... you pick a location. Make a success test, not an opposed test. Then kaboom, soak the damage. Only by misapplying the exact text of the general grenade rules and then ignoring the indirect spells specific text invoking the general grenade placement rules can you reach your desired outcome.

@Falconer

You pick a location and throw a granade at it. Everyone in the blast radius gets to make a defence test. RAW indicates that a simple hit would be enough to take NO damage. The example under Spellcasting indicats that you still need to beat ALL the hits the guy throwing the granade/Fireball managed to score.

Sorry, there is NOTHING about motion sensors in the text. Or do you know spells with motion sensors?


It is not an opposed test, but everyone caught in the blast gets an defence test. And since a successfull defence test means NO DAMAGE. Well...
Honestly, I admit that it is not totally clear how it is handled in the end. But to assume you don't get a defence roll is just a bit over the top. NOTHING of what you quoted said anything about not getting a defence roll. And it would be totally silly from design point of view...

Which is still blatantly incorrect. I cited verbatim the RULES. When there is a conflict between the rules and the example... the example is considered wrong. The point of the example is to illustrate a single situation... utilizing the rules which are supposed to cover every eventuality.

Look at the first paragraph of your 'example'... the caster uses Mana bolt and does *STUN* damage... according to the example. Obviously this is wrong. The second paragraph also being demonstrably wrong that whoever wrote it shouldn't be writing.

Had blast been a single target indirect spell, the example would have been correct... as those do opposed tests.

Think about it, how exactly do you get net hits over the 3 threshold as extra damage on an opposed test?


Please show me anywhere in the combat section that states that someone ALWAYS gets a defense test against an AOE attack? I can't find it, and I sincerely doubt you can either. Your only 'proof' is a single example which blatantly contradicts the rules written immediately to the left of it. And even more damning gets other things wrong at the same time.

A thrown grenade lands where it lands... it then goes off in the next IP (no defense tests allowed) or when wirelessly commanded to detonate (again no defense test). The only provision anywhere in the rules for a defense test is 'contact-fused' grenades which go off when thrown (and for those specifically successes don't reduce scatter... all the other attacks success reduce scatter if you don't meet the threshold of 3 to put it where you want it).

Back up your assertions with actual rules quotes and I'll believe you. Otherwise your argument is critically flawed as I've already cited the direct rules which contradict it.

@Falconer
Honestly, man. I quoted the rules above. If you are the victim of any AOE attack be it granade, spell or whatever said explicitly in the rule your dodge dicepool is reduce by 2. Mentioning this would be pointless, if you would not be allowed to dodge in the first place. Sorry, you are wrong.


Right. Thats why I said, according to the rules, escaping an AOE attack is a simple success test with -2 to the dicepool by RAW. But that would make granades and AOE spells kind of weak I guess. So without saying it you have to meet the hits of the "thrower, spellcaster" whatever.
Again, according to the rules, you would only need to meet the net-hits. Meaning Hits of the Caster/Thrower whatever-3, but I guess for the same reason this is ignored to and you roll against all hits, period. (And thats what we see in the example!)

Sorry, there is not even the slightest room for your interpretation. Nothing says you do not get defence test against granades, actually the rules state the opposite.
So honestly: I got one example + direct rule referance and you got pritty much nothing at all. The only thing is that in your paragraph there is no mentioning of evading the attack but suprise evading attacks is mentioned in an other chapter of the book. So I guess, that would explain it.
Yes, this book is written a bit differently from the 4-edition core book, true.

But lets get even more on my plate. Granades are a subset of rules for the ranged combat rules. And for range combat it is stated in general:

So honestly....

But it goes on

Some extra rules means all other rules apply there are just additional rules. Like scatter.

whoah, where?

I'm curious as to how the defense test applies to a grenade or an area indirect spell. The "attacker" isn't rolling hits to hit *you*, they're rolling to hit a location. If they miss the threshold, the effect scatters. If they beat the threshold, the grenade/spell lands at that location (Grenades under Thrown Weapon, pg 181, as the same rules apply to indirect area affect spells). After that, the effect detonates, causing automatic damage to anything in its blast radius. This is analogous to the grenade making an attack against the person getting blown up, but the grenade doesn't roll hits, it just throws out damage. You'd still get a damage soak check, but there's no opposed roll here by RAW.

@Draco18s
Well, thats because you get an defence test and nowhere is mentioned that it is opposed by the hits of the attacker. And a test is successful if you at least get on net-hit (or drawn if you get 0 net-hits but more than one hit).
A successful defence test means, that you take no damage from whatever you were defending against.

I am not saying that it is meant to be like this. As I have pointed out, it is pretty clear, at least if you take into consideration that the general rules for ranged combat always demand an opposed test. So at least RAI is quite straight forward. As I said, you get only in trouble if you are unwilling to accept that one roll can be part of an success test and an opposed test.
But if you do so, you still have the paragraph about doding AOE attacks, which means that you can dodge AOE attacks. If you can't use the roll for the granade, the dodge test is unopposed.

@AccessControl
The example in the spellcasting section makes this quite clear.

First you roll your attack.
If you have less than 2 hits, you apply scatter and change the position of the center of the explosion. (Some special rules may apply here depending on the "device")
Now you check who would be caught in the blast.
Everyone caught in the blast makes a defance test against all the hits the attacker scored.
If he succeds he takes no damage. If he fails, he takes damage according to the DV (for spells every hit on the defence test still reduced the Net-hits to increase damage against the single target).

The example I posted above is pretty clear. It would be even better if one of the guys had managed to doge the attack but I guess they did not want to go down another avenue of thought in one example...

There is no defense test, per RAW, because it is a simple success test to place the grenade/area spell - and if you are in the area you are subject to the damage. That bit about a -2? It IS pointless, and pretty clearly a mistaken inclusion, because it's referencing a penalty to a nonexistant test. It's not good that this is the rule, but that doesn't change the fact that it is.

Wow.

Just wow.

</my_involvement reason="this is plain dumb">

Sorry Irion, it appears to me, that you are wrong in this matter.

As has been pointed out ( by posters here and by the rules themself ), this modifier is void and relates to a non exsitant test.

I also happen to have the corrected version of the rules in front of me (yes, the german print got the errata). In said book, the -2 modifier, that you are leaning your argument on, got corrected, as in: it is no longer contained in the rules.

Which is a shame, as it seems a majority of people feel the correct errata should have been to include the defense test, or at least some kind of interrupt action to put some distance between oneself and an explosion.

If there is no defence test, why is your pool for this non existant defence test reduced by two die?
Honestly?
There is an example for this test in the books and you think they write stuff in the book for non existant tests and mention that you get a defence test against any range attack and then tell you that granades are a ranged attack because well, you do not get a defence test against a granade?
Show me where in the book it is said you do not get one...
I quotet several pieces from the book explicitly talking about getting one. They were just written in the book by accident?

@Isath
Right. Do you have anything to back up your claim?
I have: 3 rule paragraphs and one example.
So tell me where it says you do not get one!

Because in some previous version of the rules such a defense test existed. Now it does not - it's worth noting that the definition of a defense test from Aaron is the right hand side of an Opposed Test - and as no Opposed Test occurs, there is simply no defense test. The examples are in error due to changes during development, as is the line about a -2; placing the grenade is a Success Test, not an Opposed Test, and thus per definition there is no defense test.

You have not, at any stage, shown a rule that provides a defense test for grenades, nor one which explains how they work. This is because the actual rule for grenades is that they are a simple Success Test, which means no defense test.