Or you just have your operatives in the GOD. Access, on a silver plater.



No, I didn't, and I follow the current excuse for a metaplot. Have you seen a company switch from Linux to Windows, or back again? That's an immense undertaking that's taking a massive amount of time and resources, often taking more than a year, and leading to all kinds of emergency stops throughout the system. At the same time, even Fastjack, Smiling Bandit and Slamm-O! knew jack shit about the new Matrix, which'd cost billions and thousands if not millions of human years to develop and implement.

Shadowrun 2050, p.149.
And grounding certainly gave Astral more reason for existence, other than as a scouting and messaging medium.

Its an abstraction. You can't expect the game to perfectly simulate reality. If you want that, then house rule it. But to me, it makes sense. Making the hand sign for love with your AR gloves while reaching for your cyberholder or baton makes sense to activate it and would be quicker than reaching for it and then pressing a button and then to have it deploy in your hand.



Then why are you arguing that they were taking out, if you understand why they were taken out?



Its both. One in the same. In order to have your devices communicating with one another, they have to be on the Matrix. Wireless on, is on the Matrix. The core rulebook is designed to give you enough information to play with. I'm sure the Matrix book will add a number of layers to make this more complicated. Just like Unwired. You don't like it, house rule it.



Common sense does help. So how would you repair internal cyberware? Because you seem to lack imagination, I'll tell you. The internals can be accessed with panels. A head commlink/deck would probably look something like Mr. Data from Star Trek. Something more invasive, like an internal air tank probably has a hollowed out chest cavity with a panel on the breast to access and even replace the air tank, along with the internals. I'd imagine wired reflexes have a small computer placed at the base of the neck or spine to regulate it. Is this an assumption? Yes, but I think its a pretty damn safe assumption.



Really? Is that why the rules for burning out wireless exist in SR4?



Jeez, almost like how the music industry pretty much gave up a lot of rights to Apple to try and stop music piracy? Totally unheard of to ever happen. If the wireless Matrix of SR4 for security was so inadequate, what makes you think the corps wouldn't have a knee jerk reaction to solve the problem when a division of the Corporate Court says that they've got an answer?



And as soon as an agent of GOD is found to be undermining a member of the Corporate Court, we get another Corporation War, or the Corporate Court sends a thor shot on the HQ of the offending corporation and their AAA status is revoked. Yeah, that sounds great. Very worth it, as opposed to hiring Shadowrunners.



Oh no, we have to suspend our disbelief a bit more in a world of Dragon CEOs, banks in space, and a working wireless mesh network. How can a fictional setting about corporations with near limitless resources possibly be able to upgrade all the wireless devices over the course of days or weeks, when everything is already connected to the wireless mesh network, and are receiving wireless updates over the Matrix to keep programs up to date, as has already been established in the canon. There is definitely no way that a commlink can be updated over the wireless.



I don't own it, so I'll take your word for it. But did we really have to wait until 4th ed to get a reason why it was removed?

I don't agree on either point.
Character creation now forces all 5 priorities into a tier, which means you have to spend what you have at that tier.
There is no flexibility anymore - take a tier 1 mage, you MUST have 6 magic, 2 rating 5 skills, 10 spells...even if you don't want em.
Since there's no negative for maxing out a stat, more players are min-maxing their characters more than they ever did in 4th Ed.

I don't see the combat as "deadlier" either.
- Now, instead of one attribute used for dodging, EVERYONE gets two.
- Where there used to be encumbrance rules, now a body/strength 1 character can wear any armor they want.
- With no ballistic/impact difference - melee does even less potential damage.
- Gun modes just take away defense now, they don't increase damage, so extra damage from FA or BF is basically gone.
- Hell, you can't even fire two shots anymore without cutting your dice pool in half.
- The accuracy system caps hits on the attack, but does nothing on defense. So you might get 7 hits on your attack roll, but that troll is still rolling 30 dice on defense and has no cap on hits.
- Even spells do less damage now that they've nerfed direct spells and doubled target defense dice.

Why do you need a Matrix uplink for flipping a peace sign to open your cyberholster? In the world of nano-sized computers?

They're taken up to support a particular mechanic. My argument is that the mechanic is ridiculous if basic physics (like, you know, transmitting wireless commands directly between devices, or transmitting signals over wires) have to be taken out for it to work.

Because no two devices can communicate directly now? Despite the WMI Matrix being p2p mesh?

Good luck replacing burned internals (and that's what bricking does, before you ask, p.228) through a comm jack; or good luck making an access panel on an implanted device that lets you access the entirety of its internals.

No, it isn't.

I am sure music industry has A LOT of trade secrets from Apple *fp*

Because in that division, nine of ten employees come from your bitter rivals' ranks, that's why. Because the basic principle of any security, network or not, is keeping strangers out.

Of course, the only known reaction to finding an employee of another corporation working directly against you is a Thor shot. *fp*

Settings work on internally consistent logic, if suspension of disbelief is to be maintained. When one failed project sends a megacorp into a downward spiral, replacing the entirety of the world's network infrastructure flies in the face of any kind of logic.

Last time massive renovations had to be done to Matrix infrastructure was after a global Crush, and it still took a few years to bring the new matrix to full speed - despite it being a p2p mash, that is, incredibly scalable even without supporting infrastructure.
Do you have your OS updates enabled? Try updating to another OS, with a complete overhaul of underlying network protocols to boot.

Maybe we didn't, I wasn't around at the time.

Also, for your oft-repeated "if you don't like it, houserule it". It's blatantly obvious that the less subsystems that have to be hand-patched to be workable a gamesystem has, the better it is. SR5 by that estimation is currently much worse than SR4AE.
I frankly tried compiling a list of houserules for SR5, but minding that the book contradicts itself regularly, I just couldn't be bothered to finish that job.

This is a correct observation. But it does not say anything negative.



Not entirely true. Because they still can't wear a helmet or shield without taking encumbrance. And if you think someone rolling 12 armor + 1 body for a soak test with 9 condition boxes, how long is that person going to last against a Ares Predator V with -5 ap with APDS doing 8p? So lets play the average game. 13 - 5 = a soak dp of 8, average of 3 hits. Lets assume our shooter gets only 1 net hit after our body 1 guy dodges, so that Predator is doing 9p. 9p - 3 soak = 6p. Our 1 body runner now had only 3 boxes left and is taking -2 to all actions. That body 1 runner sure did break the system by wearing an armor jacket without penalty.



You do realize that melee damage is now strength + weapon, right? Not strength/2 + weapon, right? So you understand that melee does more base damage, right? You do understand, you can't look at rules without context to how other rules affect them, right?




You do realize that a narrow burst gave you a whopping +1 dv. While wide burst is the way normal burst fire is in SR5. What a game changer. If only there was an easy way to house rule the old narrow BF mode or something.



Oh no. If only there was a new rule on something like a semi-auto burst, that makes firing a SA gun into a complex action and fired 3 bullets on one turn. But I understand, you'd rather be able to kill someone so quick that they have no chance for an action of their own.



By defense, I assume you're talking about soaking, not about dodging. In which case, it sure would be nice if a mage knew a spell that ignores armor and is resisted with only one stat, but everyone thinks its totally useless. Or if there was armor piercing ammo. Or if only you could stealth by that troll and just totally avoid the fight. But nope, there is definitely no way to counter a troll rolling 30+ soak dice.



Yep, direct spells are totally gimped and unusable now because you can't one shot everyone with no drain, because that was balanced. Oh, and of course, even though direct spells are only resisted with one stat, lets pretend like its two, to help illustrate how bad SR5 is. And its not at all like indirect spells have been buffed and made to actually be useable by reducing their drain and giving them ap = to force. Yep, magic is totally useless now, lets all roll street sams, so we can be hacked by our own decker who we can't trust.

A narrow burst in SR4 gives +2 DV (which in nonmathematical average is something like 6 additional dices).

SYL

For every person who likes point-buy systems, you'll find a person who hates them. At the core, however, build points and karmagen are simply too expert to be used as the basic, unadorned character generation system. They're fiddly, calculationally intensive, and prone to error. For people who aren't super-knowledgeable about the game, build points can be a huge turn-off to character generation.



Combat is deadlier on average, but prone to "miss or big hit." In SR4, you were much more likely to take 1 or 2 points of damage from any given attack. In SR5, you're more likely to take 5 or 6 points of damage from an attack that hits, but generally more likely to be missed (and thus take 0). What this means is that a gun that delivers a big wallop, like an assault or sniper rifle, is far more likely to severely injure, cripple, or incapacitate a target with a single hit. It makes getting shot a bigger event.

Note that base melee damage was increased by a sizable amount, putting it on par with heavier weaponry. An average dude with a combat axe is putting out better damage than he can with a heavy pistol.

Note also that burst fire decreases defense -- this has the double effect of increasing damage (increasing net hits) and reducing the chance of dealing 0 damage. To say that automatic and burst fire don't increase damage is simply wrong.

Dice-pool splitting for multiple attacks puts things more on par with SR3, where in order to put multiple effective shots downrange you'd have to burn through your combat pool. This is a break from SR4's aberrant "everyone hits all the time but does crap damage" mentality.

The troll isn't rolling 30 dice on defense. He might roll 30 dice on soak (which would itself be amazing). The soft-ish cap on defense is 20 dice, which is maxed out augmented everything and behind cover, whereas the soft-ish cap on attack is 24 dice, which is maxed out augmented everything and a smartlink. The attack limit (with no defense limit) gives the defender the occasional break, but it's certainly not heavily stacked in his favor.

Direct damage spells deal consistent damage versus one defense stat, for what likely amounts to "free" Drain cost. They could probably use some options (hopefully in the forthcoming magic book) to make them a little more clearly useful. That said, indirect damage spells are far and away awesome, since they can do big damage with huge AP and set you on fire.

With the exception of direct damage spells, this puts SR5 back in the ballpark with SR2-3 with respect to combat. SR4 is such a huge deviation at this point that these sorts of arguments you're making are just more fuel to my opinion that people who think SR4 is the bee's knees just don't like Shadowrun that much.

DeathStrobe, you should really just post everything in italics, it is the sarcastic font.

-In 4th ed, a low strength/body character couldn't wear anything above a vest, which changed how people played and encouraged people to diversify their stats.
- Is your argument in defense of unlimited armor really **NOT HELMETS!!!**? Without an impact armor stat, defenders basically get double their old armor dice on melee soak.
So, double the defense dice, double the armor dice and defenders don't have any limits. I'm not convinced that's deadlier.

"Automatic and burst fire don't increase damage" that is a fact. They just decrease defense dice. We could previously add as much as +9 to the DV on one hit or +5 on two attacks.
That's nice if your opponent is rolling 10 dice on their defense, but if they're below that for some reason, it's just net hits only - which is the minimum anyway.

The gun argument is just silly, we've gone from something like 10 possible firing mode choices to 1 that increases damage.
All this "one shot" talk is really just proving my point.
Since you (and consequently, your opponents) can't 1-shot people anymore...the system has become less deadly.

Feel free to disagree, but in my opinion, the new system favors the defender and punishes the attacker.

This really falls into the category of "who gives a shit?" The SR4 Matrix was tedious, bland, and relatively nonexistent (since there was no apparent "backbone" to ride along, making each node an island only accessible by proximity, and no one ever had their wireless turned on to support the peer-to-peer aspects anyway). Now it's gone. They could've said it happened by infectious computer space monkey viruses and that would've been just fine.

Eh? One-shots may be unlikely based on normal distribution peaks, but dice don't always land on the peaks.

Joe Security (body 3) in an armor vest (armor 9) gets shot at (defense 6) by a guy with an ares alpha (attack 14, damage 11 AP-2).

The attack gets 6 hits on a burst. Joe gets 1 hit back. Joe needs to soak 16 damage on 10 dice. Joe soaks an amazing 5 points and still dies.

Yup, one-shots are definitely impossible.

Then use a voice command, or DNI. You don't have to use a hand sign, it is merely an example of a free action that can be used to represent how to make a cyberholster to deploy. If you don't like it, adapt something else to work.



I'm not clear what you are trying to argue. Are you saying that wireless shouldn't exist because it makes everything too easy to hack, or that everything should be wireless because its unrealistic to have everything wired?



They are communicating directly, but it just so happens that its also being transmitted to the wireless Matrix as well. If you want some logical fluff behind it, the Matrix protocols are probably designed this way to make sure GOD can home in on illegal Matrix activity.



Because we all know that computers are totally not modular, so it'll be impossible to simply replace or repair a burned out fuse or other burned out system.



I thought the rules for burning out your wireless was in Augmentation, but I can't seem to find it. But it honestly doesn't sound like you can turn off your cyber's wireless in SR4 at all. Its just something people house ruled because they fear hackers.




Not all the Megas need to agree, just enough to make the new protocol happen.



The idea is that they are undermining the Corporate Court. Unless you would prefer a world without Shadowrunners, and at that point, it makes me wonder why do you play this game? The CC is the reason for Shadowrunners to exist as deniable assets. If Corporations could have their own guys working against other corporations directly, without fear of CC reprisal, then Shadowrunners wouldn't exist. The Thor Shot is merely the extreme form of CC reprisal.



Wait, so the Ares Excalibur makes sense, but new Wireless Matrix doesn't? How?



Have you never upgraded a computer or mobile device's OS before? Its normally pretty easy and painless, other than having to learn the new features of the OS. You make it sound like upgrading requires a PhD or something. A lot of updates are now completely automated. Take for example my iPhone. It now downloads App updates in the background, so I don't have to manually do it all the time. Do you think the future would not make almost all this upgrading near seamless?



All systems require house ruling. Because either rules can be ambiguous or just unclear. Do you have your hacker edit the Access Log before they jack out every time they hack something in SR4? Or how about doing a Matrix search, do you have them use their Analyze program + computer or their Browser program + computer to find files? Or do you allow a hacker to do an hacking search and replace the skill with hacking instead of computer and make the computer skill totally useless? Do you make it so that if they need admin access, but only have user, that they have to start all over hacking the firewall but with a much higher threshold with the firewall already having hits to detect them, or do they get to start their current access and only need to get the difference in threshold to get admin? Its not like SR4a is perfect and doesn't have weird ass rules that can be interpreted differently.

That is simply not true. Good rules, good explanation, nothing more is necessary. If you want a 5 minute quick start (something you will not achieve with either point or priority without an extreme good knowledge of the system) you can use archetype or point arrays. There are many other RPGs out there (both rule light and heavy) which use point buy and who are not really recognized as (SLA, Eclipse Phase, CP2020, in some regards Feng Shui, DnD just as some examples)



FA 10 bursts say hi (to the one-shot-stun bolt which seems to be such a big evil for the SR5 crowd). To generalize the attack/soak/defend SR4 system as "1 or 2 damage" is simply wrong. Even when not talking about extremes live 40 dice soaking trolls or 15 shot miniguns you take damage fairly fast fairly easy (look at the usual values even for very good equipped people vs some shots from a shotgun).



Which is simply a lie as well. depending on values, armor, used weapon and situation you can take only a few points of damage ... or you are dead ... or you are something between. What is true that it is indeed fairly simply to damage people (attack is stronger in SR4 than defense).

SYL

In SR4 you can reach each node in the world from the other side of the world (if the node is connected to the matrix and if you are authorized of course).



Just like the NPCs in SR5, yes? Way to go to introduce the nifty wireless boni to make deckers useful again.

In that regard SR4 hat a way better system to make a hacker combat useful (except for the extended test of course which were really a negative point in SR4).

SYL

Ummmmm...
Not sure how you completely missed a Section called "Turning it Off" in the "Wireless Connectivity" section of the SR4A Book.
See Page 314.

I am afraid that the writers of SR5 see it differently if I remember the discussion correctly on Jackpoint. There is no device => device communication anymore in SR5 - because when asked they confirmed that wireless boni do not work in the desert or in wifi inhibiting buildings, even when standing next to each other.



There are no rules for burning out wifi in SR4. You can of course crash the system so it has to reboot, change permissions etc, depending on the specific device.



Perhaps you should check again your basic SR4 book. There is an entire chapter for wifi security => .



No, official rules in the basic book are usually not considered house rules.



Thats a very bold statement. I would rather say that runners exisits, because it´s a very non-perfect world which failing societies, high crime rate, lots of poor people, weak states and insufficient law power.



Have you ever upgraded a network system in a small company? Its normally not pretty easy, as it required long preparation, backup plans and usual on the spot problem solving, especially in older heterogeneous grown networks.

SYL

Your examples are an unpopular game, a version of the SR4 rules with a different setting, and an unpopular game (in part due to its overt complexity). Want to fit Rolemaster in there somehow?



Yes, the one example of an attack that does massive damage but at a huge penalty to hit is the lynchpin of the system's balance. Back in the quasi-normal realm of pistols and SMGs, however, you tend to nickel-and-dime your enemies. Big damage hits are pretty far out on the curve.



Calling something a lie just because it disagrees with your sensibilities is dickish.

SR4 was balanced attack-forward but damage-weak (ie, you hit more often but do less damage per hit). SR5 was balanced defense-forward but damage-heavy (ie, you hit less often but do more damage per hit).

Now, combined with the "need to do more damage than armor or it's Stun" rules, this means that in SR4 you're more likely to deal stun damage, love-taps, and grazes, to the absurd extent that gearing for stun damage is more often than not the most effective mode of operation (the risk of splitting damage is high, and the penalties for damage are low). In SR5, when you hit you're more likely to deal major hits more consistently on the physical track.

The system is objectively more deadly because you're more likely to max out someone's physical track with fewer connecting shots.

You can totally one shot people though. Take for example, a strength 10 troll with a combat ax which will do 15p with -4 AP. I don't think very many people will be able to soak that to live and tell the tale of that one time they got cleaved in half by a troll with a combat ax.

Now if we use that same troll in SR4, he'll do 9p and -1 AP. Now call me crazy, but I can't help but think to myself, that taking 60% more damage and getting 4 times that AP, does make SR5 just a bit more deadly. I could be wrong though.


Or lets even go with the low end. Say we got Joe Average who has 3 stats and 3 skills to whatever we need him to have. He's got himself a nice holdout pistol to keep himself safe when he goes out of the Arcology for a night on the town.

In SR4; he's got a Streetline Special, doing 4p. Single shot, so he can only fire once a turn.

But in SR5, Joe has the new Streetline Special that does 6p and is now semi auto.

Both games he's only rolling 6 dice. But oh no, looks like an orc in an armor jacket is harassing poor Joe. The Orc is pretty tough, 4 body. In SR4 armor jacket is 8 balistic. In SR5 the armor jacket has 12 armor.

Playing the averages, because they're quick to calculate. Also the ork is either surprised by Joe's gun or things he can take it on the chin and laugh it off later.

SR4, Joe fires and gets 2 hits. It does 6p. The Ork gets 4 hits on the soak and takes 2s.

SR5, Joe fires, get 2 hits, and does 8p. The Ork soaks and gets 5 hits and takes 3s.

While it is only a 1 box difference. I think it does help illustrate that SR5 is in fact more deadly than SR4, because this is the low end. It gets worse with better gear.

How? There was no "the Matrix" to be "in" so that you could traverse the expanse of linked nodes. SR3 had the telecom grids, SR5 has its grids. What did SR4 have?



It's bonuses.

Which NPCs in SR5 are you talking about? All the NPCs in my games have on or offline gear as necessary, as do the PCs, yet no one has fallen into an apoplectic fit over it.



The system that would see you finding your first target about 5 combat turns after he's dead?

No. But it´s interesting to see that you try to disapprove the argument by saying "they are unpopular systems". DnD in all it´s incarnations is unpopular? Where are you living? Bottrop-Kirchhallen? Perhaps you can have a better argument on why exactly a, lets say 20 point system is prone to failure?



So you are talking about the normal realm. Very well. Lets take the classic setup of body 4 and 8 armor (armor jacket / helm), so 12 dices to resist. Lets assume for the sake of the argument only 1 net hit: 12 dices vs 2x 8P damage (5P base damage, 2 for narrow burst, 1 net hit), average roll. which is 4 net damage per burst and 8 damage for two bursts after damage reduction (and yes, the 5 points recoil can be compensated).

In one complex action.

You claimed "1 or 2 damage", now using your own setup we are at 8 damage. Even with 20 dices to resist two bursts can be dangerous, and that is not even counting multiple net hits (attack is stronger than defense in SR4), used up actions for full defense, special ammuniation or stacking negative modifier for multiple defense rolls.

As long as you are not playing an armor stacked orc or troll even a heavy pistol is something to consider, especially in the normal realm (your words). It may not the most dangerous thing in the world (especially considering FFBA, synthweave, platelet factories and trauma damper) but you cannot simply reduce it to "1 or 2 damage all the time".

Just as a side note: I am running a high powered campaign with a 36 dice soak troll. He can take hideous amount of damage, especially from weak enemys (pistols, short burst MPis etc). The moment however where competent, professional enemys show up (with corresponding weapons, assault rifle, MG, long bursts etc) he usually receives a little bit more than 1 or 2 damage.



Using wrong statements to make a system bad is what exactly? Either a lie or a mistake. And I think even using your statements that your statement is ... wrong. As it seems I assumed that you know the SR4 system. In that regard I may be wrong and I would then redact the statement that you are a liar. You simply do not know the SR4 system.



Yes, but that does not mean that you only take 1 or 2 damage as you claimed. Go ahead, take the SR4 street samurai (or make a streetsamurai of your own) in the normal realm (no 40 dice soaking troll tank, no 25 dices supernsiper) and lets see what some shots or bursts from a shotgun, hunting rifle, MPi, low level assault rifle etc do with the samurai.



That may be the case but that is not something I have commented. I have just commented some of your mistakes or lies (your choice).

SYL

...

Really?

Just from the beginning of the matrix chapter in the SR4 basic book:



Please: at least read the basic SR4 book and the basic rules before even thinking about commenting them. You have now commented several times on the SR4 basic rules and made extreme mistakes. No one is expecting a walking encyclopedia, but basic rules like "you can turn of wifi" or "nodes are linked" should really be known before you comment on SR4 and how bad or good it was. Otherwise you should perhaps reduce your statements to "I like SR5 and I don´t know SR4 that well", which is perfectly fine of course.



Please correct me but didnt SR5 Mission stated that all NPCs have turned off their wifi?



Please read what I wrote. I confirmed that extended test were one of the negative things in SR4 (and it is one of the things SR5 did right by reducing them). The introduction of wifi bonuses would not have been necessary to make hackers "combat viable", only the removal of extended tests. Independent from that SR4 already had systems in place which could be manipulated in combat (especially without extended tests). The discussion if it is really a good game design that you want to make deckers combat viable by adding online battons would have not been neccessary.

SYL

Professional arms dealer would surely advise him to use a SA light pistol. And yes, if you want to compare values you should be so fair to inlcude SA weapons for SR4 because 2 shots/bursts can make a lot of difference when compared to one shot/burst combat system, where only one attack action is possible. Or make the comparison with a Cav Scout (4p SA in SR4).

Just for understanding: I am not claiming that SR5 is not deadly (it is pretty much obvious that it is).

SYL

I'm not going to take the time to try every possible combination. But I assume if you are interested, you can give it a shot and find out. Maybe a full augmented troll tank, vs a elf adept sniper. Or whatever really. Its just a simple bit of anecdotal evidence to quickly disprove that SR4 is not more deadly than SR5.

D&D isn't a point-buy game, or at least 3.5 wasn't. It flirted with point-buy attributes in 3.0, but those were casually misplaced later.



And that's all stun. In SR5, two short bursts would be folded into a long burst, providing several extra net hits from the defense reduction (even considering higher starting defense pools), and the damage (higher base damage + net hits > armor) would look more like 9P. Something about "more deadly."



Someone in another thread asked "so what's Dumpshock like these days?" Answer: people generally being shitty to each other. Bravo.




Last things first: I don't really care about Missions. Missions aren't the same thing as the core system.

Now, by your quotes, devices route to devices route to devices route to devices. Either:

1) You can hack someone's security level 5 Ares black-ops dildo in Japan from the comfort of your Seattle penthouse (ie, mutual signal range is ignorable), or
2) There's nothing on the Matrix and you're stuck working within mutual signal range.

Most people appear to hybridize the two uncomfortably for convenience, so that the nightclub is "on the Matrix" while the broadcasting security drone node is "not on the Matrix" even though they're both online.



The only thing SR5 did wrong was package wireless bonuses as "wireless bonuses." Instead, "offline penalties" could've been equivalent and less controversial. People are averse to risking to gain, but they'll risk to avoid loss.

Both of which explicitly don't work comparably in SR5. In fact, by the base book rules, given that much of the 'wireless bonuses' list is basic functionality, DNI technology has somehow apparently regressed by at least 50 years.


Either that, or physics broke somewhere, and now a wireless signal is faster than direct transmission over fiber optic cable. Over a shorter distance. With less impedance.

I said a long while back that the simple solution is "technology has gotten sophisticated enough such that you can remotely connect to data streams previously locked away in internal wires or skinlinks." Pair this with offline penalties ("you can place your gear into turtle mode to protect it at the cost of performance") and it's great.

Of course it's functionally equivalent to what exists now, just with taupe curtains instead of beige ones.

Its that way in SR4 too. Lag is a thing of the past in SR4, and you can hack a node on the other side of the planet without taking a hit to response, its only when you get off planet is when you start to notice lag.

The question, of course, then follows : Why the hell would any self-respecting shadowrunner -do- that.

I like your idea of offline penalties, however, it would need to come with a serious revision. Even the guy who wrote the current wireless bonuses as it stands said he was told that they were going to be bonuses for having stuff connected to any DNI, not the Matrix. Many of the bonuses as they stand right now don't make sense at all, because there is literally nothing the Matrix can do that a DNI connection couldn't for those features.

Overall, it's just another point of shoddy editing for SR5. Hopefully it gets cleaned up in the eventual cyber or matrix splatbooks, or at least errata'd.

The main problem most people have with the wireless bonuses is their implementation. They are senseless and illogical, and there is no reason that a DNI connection could not have the same functionality for a lot of things. Bricking is also poorly implemented, namely in how it can apparently cause permanent damage to cyberware and other electronic devices. This leaves archetypes such as street samurai in a precarious position, where they have to choose between basic functionality for things like wired reflexes + reaction enhancers, or smartlinks, vs. being vulnerable to attacks that can permanently damage their expensive augmentations, all but crippling them until they can get it repaired.

Things are less fun for deckers, too, because now they have to babysit the rest of the team, like the mage with counterspelling (although the latter is not as vital now, with spells being nerfed and spell resistance boosted). I am not a reflexive naysayer, I really wanted to like this edition, and had no problems with limits (even if the calculations were a bit wonky) or priority system character creation. But in some areas, they made serious missteps. I may still eventually pick it up, but it will definitely not be until they at least have some errata to fix the errors and contradictory rules.

It's all still part of the metaphor of the Matrix. Back in Real Life (well, Real Life video games), exploiting desynchronization is a thing. I remember a period in Star Wars: Galaxies (among other games) you could unplug your network to desynch, walk through a wall, and plug your network back in before the system realized you'd dropped connection, and the game would interpret your client's new reported location as your actual location in the game.



Hence what I said about "technology can remotely access data on wires." It's trivial to the game mechanics, but eases the anguish.

If you watched the new Battlestar Galactica, the humans had a ban on complex networks specifically because the Cylons could hack into anything more complicated than an isolated computer. In Shadowrun, it would be easy to say that the technology is so complex that once you start hooking systems together, even ostensibly over completely internal connections, there's no way to guarantee that all of the external access points are completely locked down. Remember that hacking is about exploiting the failures inherent to complex designs -- no system in the world (the real world or the fake world) has a port that says "hackers please illegally connect here."

If that was the case, how would you rationalize people still having the ability to turn it off? As far as the idea of "offline penalties" - to anyone coming in from SR4, they already are offline penalites, since getting a bonus to hit from a smartlink, or having your wired reflexes and reaction enhancers able to work together, is something they had in SR4.

If they wanted Ghost in the Shell-style 'ware hacking, they should have made it happen over ubiquitous tactical comms (which could give teams bonuses to perception and surprise checks, indirect fire, etc.) rather than having hackable internal hardware. And the concept works horribly with bricking (far too extreme, damage-wise; it should be able to take things temporarily offline, or feed false sensory data, but not permanently disable cyberware), and even more horribly with deckers as their own class. Hacking should be more like stealth - something every shadowrunner has (or should have) rather than the province of specialists. The wireless bonuses were very poorly implemented. I hope they revise and fix most of them, rather than giving a half-assed fluff explanation for them.

I feel that you should have at least some understanding of the rules, - maybe by hearsay, at least something! - when you decide to start arguing them.


It's like you aren't reading me at all. For the third time, is there any conceivable reason why your PAN would be unable to recognize your DNI impulse/hand sign/voice pattern without a Matrix uplink?

I'm saying that wireless should make sense.

They are not communicating directly: they can't communicate in a dead zone.

Computers are modular, people usually aren't, and implants typically reside in people, not computers.

Yeah, cause otherwise, evil hackers will hack your Signal 1 periphery devices.

All megas need to agree to invite strangers with admin access into their networks.

Do you remember what lead to Operation Reciprocation? That's the kind of stuff that prompts Corporate Court action, not normal sabotage work. CC does not even possess assets of its own, constituent corporations provide those. Runners are used to hide corp involvement from the target corp first of all - that's who is to be feared, not CC. And yeah, there are numerous types of action for which runners are simply not suited, such as long-term intelligence, for instance.

Excalibur plotline (SR5 canon, btw) makes (some) sense if the corps are not as omnipowerfully rich as you're trying to present.

How many foundational protocols changed for your automatic updates? Updating network protocols is not even changing an OS (good luck trying to autoupdate iOS into Android), it's changing hardware firmware on the fly.

DnD (from 3.0 over 3.5 to Pathfinder) had both roll generation systems and point buy system. Please, do yourself a favor and just read the PHB and the DMG. I quote directly from the DMG 3,5



You should really start with the habit of reading rules before commenting on them. You are not a German with the Nick Mercenario on the German SR Board, or? He has the same habit of commenting on rules he never read.

After we have cleared that up I am still waiting for an *argument* why a well made free distribution point buy system should be more problematic that a not so free distribution point buy system (did you know: the priority system is a point buy system as well, just with more categories, a little liike WoD). And please the argument why point is more error prone should have more substance then "the example game systems are unpopular".

They may be unpopular (for example DnD/Pathfinder is a very unpopular systems which is not played by anybody) but it was not a discussion aka "do point buy systems make a system popular". All these systems I mentioned use point buy systems and are known for simple and understandable character creation (even if it can take some time in the case of SLA or EP (which is not a Shadowrun in another setting as you claimed it). And really, if you claim that Feng Shui is a complicated system then we seem to have a very different understanding of the human mind.

Your claim was that inherently point buy stems are prone to error, miscalculation etc.

Please prove that.

With facts.



Yes? And?



Yes? And? I never commented on the deadliness of SR5 and I know that SR5 is deadly. Your claim was that in SR4 high damage is very rare ... with is simply wrong, as proven.



Answering someone who again commented on rules systems (now DnD) without knowing the rules can have these consequences, yes. It is this feeling about talking to a wall. Usually, there is some kind of Gentlemens Agreement of knowing the rules before evaluating them as good or bad. I now, strange concept.



Yes, if level 5 ares black ops dildo is connected to the matrix. If it is not connected than you need to be on sight. Your claim however was that there is no matrix and nodes are not connected and that you need to stand next to the node. Or did I misread/understood you?



No, it would have been the same shitstorm.

SYL

You're deflecting. Even if I'm mistaken about 3.5 ditching point buy in the PHB, it's not really an issue (though I seem to recall it not being in the PHB). You can't stand there either way and suggest that D&D is a point-buy game unless you diminish the meaning of "point-buy system" such that any game system in which you get points to put into things qualifies.

No, when we're talking about "point-buy" we're explicitly talking about a game where character generation is handled by purchasing stats/attributes/abilities/etc with linear or scaled relative costs out of a common pool.



This sort of thing is why this place isn't nice anymore.



Verification is harder. Exploiting expert knowledge of the relative value of things is grossly rewarded.



Then you're rudely misappropriating comments addressing the deadliness of SR5 as compared to SR4. You jumped in to attack comments I made directly at the assertion that SR5 wasn't more deadly than SR4. I'm not responsible for whose bandwagons you like to hop on.



Acting like a dick isn't a consequence. It's more of a lifestyle.

Funny, you were the one commenting the perceived popularity to dismiss the example that there are good point systems who, by there user, does not seems to have the below mentioned problems.



No. It depends on the quality of rules. 23 are not really more or less easier to check as 25 oder 32 to points. 1000 points may take longer, but it is still easy for a normal human being, if the rules are good and well explained (and the necessary information are well presented). There are of course bad point systems (DSA4 *shudder*)



Wells, lets make a recpa, shall we?



Well, yes, if you make an assumption or declare something as a fact and it is wrong I indeed have the habit on commenting that to correct it. If you see the correction of wrong things as a "dick move" or "attack on comments", well, you are always free to leave this board or put me on /ignore. Otherwise please live with the fact that I will correct you if I am interested in the subject and you state false things. You are of course encouraged to do the same (please after reading the rules). Usually it is called a discussion.

SYL

If you care, my initial comment was that for everyone who loves point-buy, there's someone who hates it. The fact that you have to bring out unpopular, dead, or niche games to bolster arguments for point-buy sort of indicates that my initial estimation of one to one might be overly generous toward point-buy.



You're sort of begging the question here by saying that good rules make a good point-buy. It's entirely possible that point-buy is bad rules. Since you're trying to disqualify popularity, what's your metric?



Whatever that is.

In order:

1) Not mine. If you're going to list someone's arguments, attribute them correctly.

2) Points-buy systems are fiddly, calculationally intensive, and prone to error. Fiddly, meaning you have to compare spending X points to buy either Y oranges or Z apples (or XX kiwis, YY lima beans, or ZZ ounces of dashboard cleaner). Calculationally intensive, meaning that instead of adding up a short list of integers you generally have to multiply-add-multiply-add-multiply-add -- the difference between wanting an Attribute to be 5 and spending 5-1=4 Attribute Points to get there, versus spending (5-1)x10 = 40 Build Points, versus spending 2x5 + 3x5 + 4x5 + 5x5 = 70 Karma . Prone to error, meaning that a procedural error or misplaced digit is harder to notice in process and harder to check later (which sort of follows from how intensive the calculations are).

3) Covered elsewhere.

4) D&D isn't a point-buy game. Move on.



There's a line between correcting something (or even just flatly disagreeing) and suggesting that it's a lie, and you crossed it in your very first response to my post. "Cow to insults or leave" is a great defense, though. Keep it up.

I thought build points were very well implemented in SR4. They had a lot of hard limits (no more than half of your build points for Attributes, only one Attribute at maximum, no more than 50 points in resources, a maximum of one skill of 6 or two at 5, etc.) and soft limits (maximizing an Attribute point cost 25, rather than 10 points, etc.), as well as not only a step-by-step run-down of creating a character, but two examples to go with it. There were some pitfalls, but honestly, someone using a priority system for character creation is just as likely to take the uncouth quality, or forget to take perception, or nearly any other newbie mistake.

Priority character creation doesn't even save that much time, since making a character background and buying gear are the two most time-intensive parts of character creation. It is only useful for absolute newbies, who might be paralyzed by the sheer number of choices you can make in an open build system. For anyone else, it is a step backwards, flexibility-wise; you have more than you need in one area, less than you need in another area. That said, the priority system was not a deal-breaker for me, especially with the post-creation karma to smooth the rough edges. It isn't as flexible as build points or karmagen, that's all.

To add to Glyphs comment, if you limit the creation of SR4 to the same number of books SR5 currently has, it probably evens out, one thing that does add time besides gear is looking through all of the options.Once SR5 has more options, it will likely take a bit longer as well.

Stop it right here please. I did not comment the fact that there are people who love or hate point buy or priority systems. I commented your claim, that by their very nature, point buy systems are fiddly, prone to error, calculation intensive. I am asking for proof. Again, its not a popularity contest, which system is more loved, but simply your claim, that point buy systems are inherently bad. And that is something I would like to be proven/better explained by your.

Instead you are commenting the (un)popularity of examples for quite easy point buy systems - which was not even the point.

Again: I would like to here your arguments (and a little more then "they are prone to errors because they take long") why exactly point buy systems are "fiddly, calculationally intensive, and prone to error." if they are usually reduced to add 10 + 15 +2. Answering that with "they are unpopular" ... well, they may be unpopular but then again thats not the point I am asking you to prove. I am asking you to prove your own statement.

..

Oh, finally, arguments and not "they are not popular". Hurray. Lets see ..



This is part of almost all systems. Even in the beloved SR5 Point buy system you need to compare your 21 attribute points or your 46/10 skill points to what you actually buy. It may be more specific, but honestly, to distribute 30 skill points in SR4 (120 BP) is the same as buying 46/10 skillpoints with the corresponding "prioritty currency" and distributing the points. It is just another kind of conversion. You dont pay in BP, you pay in priority.



I cannot confirm that. I have used BP systems in their many forms over many years in many different sytems (popular and unpopular). Even with a priority system, if you have 46/10 points to distribute you want some sort of paper/pen, calculator, excel sheet, char creator (like Heros lab) or whatever. Lets take a very simple system as example: SR3 120 point buy (and please, dont even start with SR3 is unpopular - the compendium point system was very well received). You simply add up small numbers. 2 here, 1 there. 400 points are of course more to add up (or 1000), but then again you usually work then with 20 point steps, not with 2.

Perhaps you need a trick to make them easy. My usual steps are:
=> give the char the attributes and skill as you have imagined ("I image the characters with body 4 and charisma 6").
=> Sum up the points in their specific area (like attributes, spells etc) "whoops, 30 points in attribute, -8 for the starting points, that means 220 points distributed.
=> do not add the single cost of every single item, but only the sum of each area (dont calculate 30 for agility and 2 for specialisation and 3 for a spell, simply add 220 for attribute, 30 for advantages etc together).
=> With that you only need to calculate 3-6 numbers (like a number for attribute, skill, race, edge, money) at one time (and not dozens).
=> If you have distributed too much points, reduce one of the areas (hm, 220 attribute points, lets see if I can reduce some attribute by 3).

That is something a normal human being can do in their head if they have a good memory, but usually a paper with pen is absolutely sufficient. The only thing I find prone to error and fiddly is buying equipment for equipment heavy archetypes (hackers, riggers, sams etc). But then again this was already in SR1 the case. To spend 250 000 or 1 000 000 or 450 000 "points" on something small as "50¥" or something as crude as "475¥" is not quite fun. But except for "packs" I have no better solution for that.



Can you really spot easily if someone has really distributed only 46/10 skill points, used 20 karma points for skills etc?

See, that wasn´t so hard. You have made a statement and explained your thinking. Highly appreciated, even if I do not agree.

SYL

The point being made, though, was that the DESIGNERS of the system said that Wireless was ubiquitous and omnipresent and no one would ever turn their wireless devices off because REASONS. And then THOSE SAME DESIGNERS produced Missions and then said that their NPC's had Wireless turned off (ostensibly because having them on was stupid, risky, and provided no real benefit at all). Seems to me they realized after the fact that their REASONS for the Wireless bonuses embedded in the system were crap and they knew it, so they took steps to resolve it in the only way they could (because they had touted it as the bee's knees and later realized that it really wasn't).

Well, to be fair Missions takes place in Chicago, which has a constant noise rating of 2 or so, so they're gear would be useless anyway; since the noise would have drowned out their device rating.

Like wise, its the first missions. Its an introduction to the setting. Its designed to be EZmode. I'd recommend waiting to see how it shapes up in later Missions before you claim that, "wireless has failed and is so unplayable that Bull doesn't even use it."

It is an indicator, no more, but it is a very obvious one. *shrug*
Fact is that it is a poor design choice, and no professional would ever choose to expose himself to that risk, for the ignorant rewards that are supposedly provided. Especially since they can completely secure their devices 100% from ANY hacking that matters. You don't need the Matrix for communications, for example.

Just assume that ALL wireless signals are used for the new Matrix. So you're PAN talking to your devices is broadcasting on the same channel, frequency, etc as every other Matrix device. Likewise it's probably to phone home to GOD so that they can attempt to track any illegal Matrix activity. Not that they give a rat's ass if you're doing real illegal activity, but that they care if you are subverting Matrix protocols in your PAN's wireless communication.




Its all made from mass produced parts. Even a custom tailored suit, car, computer, etc are all constructed from mass produced parts.



Corporate Court makes it so they don't need to all agree. There was some Shadowtalk about how some smaller corps were in violation of CC rulings and were dissolved with no idea why. Does this sound like a democracy? This is a dystopian world where the CC is law, and even the Big 10 have to listen to the CC's rulings.



Why do Shadowrunners exist? You say it "hide corp involvement from the target corp." So why would they hide it? Why not send your own guys, who are probably better trained, who have better health, are equipped, and more loyal to the corp, to extract a researcher or prototype MacGuffin or whatever from a rival? There has to be a reason. A layer of bureaucracy makes sense, because this is a dystopian world of Mega Corporations. The layer of bureaucracy comes from the Corporate Court.



But the CC is made up of all the corps, and infact controls all the money of the world too. So their resources might be a bit more far reaching than Ares.



The new Matrix protocols are only changing software though, and how hardware interacts with other hardware through software. So your comparison of changing and iPhone to an Android isn't a valid comparison. Its more like going from IPv4 to IPv6. While a lot of legacy products will stop working, they're obsolete anyway, so it happens.

Why would you play Shadowrun if you are just going to ignore one of the cornerstones of its setting; namely the Matrix. While you can ignore Magic and Matrix, it defeats the entire purpose of the game world, setting, and genre themes to leave out one of the three rule systems.

A Street Sam would be dumb to expose his cyber to matrix hacking, plain and simple. For him, ignoring that aspect does not hurt him. A HACKER works the matrix. And a HACKER has better things to do than protect his team from Bricking. It does not defeat the purpose of the game world to secure yourself from extraneous hacking attempts. In fact, it is good business to do so. The clusterf#@% of Wireless bonuses and weaponized hacking was just dumb from the get go, and was attempted in SR4. The design team recognized that fact and backed off on it. Unfortunately (and sadly), JH decided he was going to ram that concept down everyone's throat in SR5. So, when I play in SR5, I will ignore Wireless access almost completely, since I see no benefit from it. I will make sure that I have a ZERO Matrix Presence on a run to be sure.

So? Change channel division, or encoding, or any of the other signal parameters. You'll have noise from the Matrix, but you should be easily able to build a p2p wireless comm system.

Oh woe is me, I'm a hacker who can code his very own milspec exploit software, and throw together cyberdecks to take on any corp host, but I can't close a leak in my firewall!

Please try to keep track. Or are you internationally trying to redirect the discussion? The issue is not whether you can find parts to replace the burned out ones, it's whether you can actually get into the victim's anatomy to do so.

The Big Ten are the ones making those rulings.

Because it's much more expensive, and risks not only the expensive assets, but also PR losses. Oh, and it risks revealing your involvement to the target, prompting counter-moves.

No, it doesn't control anything near that. So, what, all the corps suddenly have the money to replace their network infrastructure overnight, plus the public networks, plus the backbone lines? Is the CC paying for that?

Except modern cards are built with IPv6 support. So it'd be more like switching from TCP/IP to LAT or NetWare on the fly on the cards that support neither - completely unthinkable.
And that's without tackling the issue of moving the actual applications over to a new system that is not backwards compatible.

I imagine tracking matrix health for each piece of gear can also be rather underwhelming for a few players.

To say the least.

You are not forced to use online bonuses just to justify the matrix. Right now, even without online bonuses or combat abilities, the hacker/decker is one of the most powerful and versatile archetypes in SR, as he is able manipulate the entire world, from information brokering/gathering to security system override to delay and spoof alerts and information when the alerts triggers.

If the devs would have wanted to make combat hacking making sense, they should have simply used the systems already working and accepted in SR34 (tacnet, drones, radio communication, online links - every thing was already in place, the devs needed just to add some addition rules or better description of possibilities) and not ditching the old system while introducing something stupid, saying that is stupid, not using it for their own adventures and then wondering why some people would have preferred other systems, because they want to combine matrix with rules making sense.

Enforcing people and the entire world to act stupid just to justify stupid rules which are not liked by the devs either is ... stupid.

If you really want to see how combat hacking while influencing the ingame physical world, check out CP2020. And that was 230 years ago.

SYL