I think there are good innovations in Shadowrun 5 (the magic and perhaps the Matrix (not tested)) and bad (the limits) but my main complaint is that the system is heavy, or even heavier than previous (complexity of fireshots and adding limits).
Good innovations make me want to play to SR5, but my players and me have had enough of this system crawls.

So I worked on a new system with the following objectives:
- Prune Shadowrun 5: less rolls, less dices, fewer attributes, fewer skills, etc. order to have a faster, easier and more fluid game.
- Obtain a relatively compatible system with conventional rules and equipment (scale attributes and skills, d6, damage, equipment, etc.) or at least adaptable without much difficulty.
- Keep the richness of the system and the world of Shadowrun.

Other considerations taken into account:
- There must be a difference between a professional (skill 3) and amateur (skill 1).
- Facing a troll melee should be scary.
- The conjuration is too strong in SR5 and SR4 where mages are doing everything with their spirits.
- Different versions of Shadowrun have the Qualities to integrate the characters in the Sixth World. Provide historical bases would help design a character really related to this universe.

I think I managed to do all this. The documents can be found on the SRA page of my web site (SRA = Shadowrun Alternative).

The basic principle of the system is that the skills set the threshold of the dice (2 in a skill that only the 1 and 2 on the dice are succes). That's less than we throw dice (only the attribute and bonuses) and that skills have real importance. One action = one roll. All dice rolls 'secondary' (drain, defense, etc.) are replaced by constants or removed to speed up the game. Firearmes use and Matrix are simplified.
Small drawback: it's in French (not very complicated French). Sorry for my poor English.

You should really test the Matrix before calling it a good innovation. In play, it really isn't.

Most of the rules never even saw use in the game I was in, even with a decker in the party, because brute force handled essentially everything.

I saw the post you made elsewhere. I still can't read your page (apologies. but I haven't studied French for 30-some years) but there are a few thoughts:

First of all, every edition of Shadowrun from 4e-onward is basically a buckets-of-dice system. Your effectiveness is directly tied into how many dice you get to roll, and it's easy to get tons of dice. They also rely heavily on opposed rolls, which slows things down considerably. While changing things to a threshold looks good on paper, with inflated dice pools, you're just making every challenge too easy to pass. Limits don't work, either-- system masters will find ways to finesse or bypass them, while players who don't min/max as successfully with just get frustrated.

The only fix here is a total overhaul. You need to eliminate most of the modifiers, changing things so that there's fewer dice rolled. I still think going to a SR3, skill-only model would work-- attributes only factor in indirectly. It'd also make skills meaningful again.

Funny, I am at the moment working on the same project, except I try to modify third edition rules, not fifth.

At which point we're playing skills vs variable target number and might as well be using SR3 to begin with because it is more mechanically sound in the first place.

Problem is, while you're absolutely right, the OP wants to keep this as close to SR5 as possible. Unfortunately, that means we're going to be stuck with a buckets-o-dice game; because without a variable TN, the only way to be more effective is to roll tons of dice.

In theory, you could get away with a much smaller amount of dice with a fixed TN, but in practice you'd still have people trying to squeeze more dice every chance they get.

The theory does work... Only if you make the DP the goal.

Make Limits limit the amount of dice, instead of the amount of successes.

Because they limit successes, they enter the equation extremely late when you roll,
thus you probably have to look up your limit in the middle of the test,
which leads to it taking extra time to work out the roll.
Making them limit the maximum amount of dice would make them a central part in every test,
which means knowing ones Limits is more integral to the game, which means people have less trouble remembering them.

Also they seem to add something to the game which attributes were in 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition,
an element that limits skills in a way.
In 3rd we had two elements, skills, and the attributes that limit them.
In 4th we had two elements, skills and attributes that boost them.
In 5th we have three elements, skills, attributes that boost them, and Limits that limit them, which are themselves boosted again by attributes.
I liked Limits at first, but now I feel they are adding another layer of complexity to a game which is already way too complex.
Compared to the skill system in 3rd they seem redundant to me now,
at least the way they were implemented.

SR4/4A has a Dice cap of 20 (Optional Rule - It was something like that anyway, and I really liked it), and I was always of the opinion that that was more than enough.
SR3 was okay in that your skill imposed that limit on you, but I saw some really stupid high DP's, even in SR3, and with the Karma Pool, well, many rolls were not really all that difficult to hit.

Here are a list of SR5 house rules we actively use. We are trying to keep house rules to a minimum as we all play/run Missions:
- +1dp initiative for everyone (ergo: base 2dp for initiative). Gives more people opportunity for interrupts and provides a slight leveling of reflex/initiative enhancements.
- Combat Defender rolls reaction +/- modifiers: This is opposed to Reaction + Intuition +/– modifiers (SR5 pg 173).
- Restore individual karma awards: Dump the 'one size fits all' Karma awards (SR5 pg376). 1-2 Survival, 1 Per Objective Completed, 1-2 Good Role-playing, 1-2 Guts/Bravery, 1-2 Player pushing the storyline, 1 Right Place/Right Time, 1-2 Smarts, 1-2 Humor/Drama

Both our campaigns currently run based on SR4 with a number of SR5 changes back ported. Given the mess the SR5 matrix is, we are currently keeping SR4 matrix in our transitional campaigns. We have back ported SR5 combat (modified as above) including armor, damage, weapons, interrupts, initiative, and surprise.

The dice pool cap was actually my idea, I posted it here on Dumpshock a long time ago. It was popular enough that it was picked up by Bull and added to Missions.

Unfortunately, when Missions got a hold of it, they left in a loophole. Edge did not count against the cap, so you could break it that way. That led to some problems in my second Missions game, where one guy was rolling a lot more dice than everyone else, which made them feel inferior.

As far as SR3 goes: it was really hard to get a huge dice pool, since the biggest source of bonus dice was limited to your Skill. So, if you had Pistols 4, you could only add 4 Combat pool dice. So, even if you had a huge Combat Pool, you couldn't always use it.

There were ways to get more, of course. My personal record was 20 dice, but that came from abusing fetish foci. The biggest one recorded was 28 dice. Unfortunately, the CLUE files are long gone, but the tale lives on:

I've toyed with a bunch of SR5 houserules, but the only one I recommend to other is this: decks cost 10x less than listed price, hacking programs cost 10x more than listed price. It lets more people get into the hacking aspect of the game without them becoming one trick ponies.

Most of my other patch house rules are ideas about how to get the matrix to work: but I haven't found a silver bullet because the rules are a mess. A gentleman's agreement with the hacker seems to work best.

I think I finished up with 18 Dice for my Troll Ganger using Counterstrikes. Which in SR3 was a pretty large DP. My Combat Pool was never large enough to really add all that much, and I generally used it for defense. Karma Pool, on the other hand was pretty nice, and it came in very handy.

My 1st Edition/2nd Edition Wolf Shaman borked himself pretty bad with a Hellblast during a Berserk... It was bad. Fortunately, the character did not obliterate... that would have been Really Bad.

Since Skills now go up to 12, professional level is now 6.

Take an excerpt from Bullets and Bandages on the Biotech Group, for example. The same could be applied to other skills with similar flavor text.

0 Untrained: Has some basic knowledge of anatomy, but nothing more
1 Beginner: Person who took a CPR course or learned some first aid as a Boy Scout or something
2 Novice: Med student, new hospital orderly
3 Competent: Good student, but not up to advanced coursework yet
4 Proficient: Intern, certified nurse’s assistant
5 Skilled: Resident, licensed practical nurse
6 Professional: Doctor or registered nurse in practice for less than five years
7 Veteran: Doctor or registered nurse in practice for five years or more
8 Expert: Leader and/or supervisor in a practice or hospital
9 Exceptional: Award-winning practitioner, recognized in trade magazines as one of the best in their field
10 Elite: Top-flight practitioner at elite facility or university, sought after by wealthy clientele
11 Legendary: Pioneer of new, cutting-edge medical techniques
12–13 Apex: The absolute tops—CEOs of the megacorps fight each other to see these people

As for the other bullet point, facing a Troll in Melee IS scary. I had to face another PC, who was a troll, in melee after he got mind controlled. The only difference between me and anyone else in the party facing him is that my character has Unarmed 10 and had martial arts to negate any advantage the troll player had.

This is a side note, but why is a skill cap even necessary?

Capping starting skills at 6 is a good idea, because it slows down extreme builds. But because skills come at an escalating cost, you'll hit the point where the practical limit is better than a theoretical one.

By not capping skills, you leave the top tier wide open, and those who exceed it are genuinely impressive. Fastjack has a computer skill of 15? That just proves what a badass he is. But if there's a cap, then he's not impressive, he's using special NPC rules.

Because the concept of completely unlimited growth is pretty ludicrous because you must then push the envelope (for those who are the Shadow Legends, Like Fastjack or Harlequin, etc.) as your players progress.

You need no special rules to implement people like Fastjack. You could add them if you felt the need to do so (and I believe that SR4 did so in the Street Legends book), but it is not really necessary.

I don't think that a top tier NPC should always be [PC ability]+X.

The system should allow a PC to reach Fastjack's level, but given a very high amount of experience.

I don't like it (personnally).

With a limit on success, having a higher skill still impacts your average successes upward.
With a limit on a dice pool, there's no reason (execpt edge) to go over the limit, and actually, no difference.

I find option A way more subtle.

Only if you assume that there is no negative modifier that apply. It takes a base dice pool of 30 or more to guarantee that you will still roll 20 dice in harsh situations, with wound modifiers and every modifier the system can throw at you.

I agree... But I imagine that My idea of Fastjack is a far cry from Your idea of Fastjack.

First, you don't need to push the envelope if you don't have a skill cap. It means the players can eventually reach the level of street legends. Otherwise, it becomes one rule for the PC's, and another for the NPC's.

And the point is to make it so you don't need special rules for characters like Fastjack. He's simply got so much Matrix experience, he's earned a skill of 15. And the players know that if they live that long, they might someday stand just beneath him.

Thing is, I don't need to represent Fastjack with a Computer skill of 15. There are other ways to represent a Street Legend without separating PC from NPC. The way SR3 does it is just ONE way of doing so, and not my favorite, because it DOES allow for unlimited advancement, which I have some issue with. I prefer a cap (of some sort) on Skill Level. SR4 was decent with 9 Discrete Skill Levels before Adept Magic. SR5 goes a bit further. But they are both capped, which I far prefer over uncapped skills. To be fair, I was not happy with SR4's way of representing the Street Legend either (Hits on 4+).

Well, while unlimited advancement looks game-breaking in theory, in practice the escalating costs keep it from getting out of hand. Granted, the Sr4.5 skill costs are really low, but you could scale it further as you go up. That way, even though there's no theoretical cap, the practical one will help.

Out of curiosity, where are you getting 9 skill levels from? They're rated from 1-6, with 7 a distant possibility.

Skill

Practical caps will definitely exist, to be sure (and those slide depending upon the table, I think), but the powergamers do come out occasionally. See the Topic that details that very subject (28 DP in SR3, Right?). Not in many peoples nature to just keep pounding a Skill, but it does happen, regardless of good reasons (diminishing returns) to the contrary.

Where I see it really having an impact is with the game world itself (NPC"s have no concept of Karma/Experience expenditure). If the GM's desire is to keep the Legends above the Players, then the world scales out of whack after a bit. I have seen this most in DnD, but it does happen in SR as well.

SR4/4A Skills...
Unaware (No Roll Allowed at all)
Unskilled (Skill 0, Attribute -1 Skill Roll))
Skill 1
Skill 2
Skill 3 (Professional)
Skill 4 (Veteran)
Skill 5 (Elite)
Skill 6 (Best in World)
Skill 7 (Legendary - Best of the Best in World)

9 Discrete representable intervals of Skill. Adept adds an additional 3 Levels based on the Adept Power, for a Total of 12 Discrete Levels (Max Skill 10 with Magic). This is about right to me, but I could go to Skill 9 if I had to... the arguments for such don't bother me all that much...

SR5 Goes to 13, so that would be 15 Discrete Levels, + potential Adept Levels if you go with that (Max Skill 19 if Adept Stacks). I think SR5 goes too far.

I thought you meant 9 as in Aptitude+Specialization.

To me, it makes sense that the "best in the world" actually are only in a subset of the fairly broad domain a single SR skill represent. There is the best car racer in the world and then there is the best bike racer, the best sword-fighter and the best spear-fighter, the best salesman and the best diplomat... The only skills for which it doesn't work are the firearms skills (the best sniper in the world probably ought to do just as well with a hunting rifle, or even an assault rifle, which is actually even supposed to be a different skill). I guess a lot of people would say the same about Hacking, because of the way most people picture this activity and the rules themselves: they don't expect a world-class hacker like Fastjack to attain top-level only for one single use of the skill among Exploit, Stealth, Spoof or Decrypt and be just on-par with PC on everything else.

Personally, I don't find buckets of dice the issue (get smaller dice?)

To me what kills 5th Ed (and 4th Ed wasn't really any better) is the modifiers. There's just too many and they need to be rationalised and I've yet to play in a game where 90% of them weren't just ignored anyway.

Let's take 1st aid for instance. Your buddy is wounded and needs healing. you've got 12 dice. do you just roll them? Nope! you've got to consider:

Their essence
Are they magical
Do you have the correct tools
The level of said tools
The amount of boxes damage they've already taken
Is the 1st aider wounded as well?
Environmental conditions
What caused the damage

Combat is 10x the clusterfuck that 1st aid is:

Are you wounded?
What's the range?
What weapon do you have? A pistol? light or heavy?
Light levels
Fog levels
Visibility countermeasures
Cover
Speed of attacker
aim assist? type of aim assist?
Windspeed (I think...)
What ammo are you using?
What firemode?

and that's just the attack roll.... You have to assess all this each time you roll the dice!! And for what? How much value does it add? I know they seem to want realism to play a big part (Lord! half of you can't suspend disbelief when it comes to hacking....) but seriously it just hampers the game so much.

Rationalise the modifiers and the game becomes playable.

I fell in love with the setting and have tolerated the rules since 3rd. I suspect others are in the same boat.

DrZ

Usually, when you see dice pools that big, the majority of it isn't skill. I'm not sure what went into that 28-die roll, but since it came up all 1's, we can say the whole thing was a wild improbability. This is true regardless of edition, although 4.5 is probably the most egregious example of this.


That does not follow.

Let's say that Legendary Level in D&D is level 21 or so. The players work long and hard, and they reach level 21. To keep the legends just above the players (which may not be an actual goal), the DM bumps the NPC's to level 22. They're still ahead of the players, but there's a good chance they can catch up.

In Shadowrun, if you remove skill caps, then every decker can dream of being Fastjack's equal someday. In practice, this might not happen, but it's kinda fun to dream about.

I get what you're saying. I disagree with your choice of words, but I see your point. Although, I don't think Improved Ability should count towards this, since it's not really an increase in the skill. It acts more like bonus dice, like a specialization. There's no scaling cost to it (well, sorta).


It's not the actual rolling that's a problem. It's more than the sheer volume of dice, and counting the successes, is a pain. Threshold 4 tests are supposed to be difficult, but when everyone is rolling 20+ dice, they're actually laughable. And if you change the difficulty scale, lower-shilled characters suddenly can't do them at all, and moderately skilled characters will start failing routine everyday tasks.

Not to mention that many tests in SR4.5-onward are opposed. So, having a ridiculously huge dice advantage over someone not only means you're going to beat them, but that you're going to utterly humiliate them-- Shadowrun is a degree of success system, so getting massive overkill on your roll rewards you more.

The SR4 skill table makes me think of oWoD attribute advancement.

When you describe a skill, the linked probabilities should scale accordingly.

For exemple, your "best in world" nets in average 1 success more than a Pro. The game experience doesn't fit to the description.

Like in WoD. Your strength is 5, you lift over 200kg. 2 or 3, it must be 80 or something. Now make an opposed test and the probabilities doesn't fit the description.

I am pretty sure he only nets one third of a success more on average,
but I have been wrong on that stuff before.

Generally I have a problem with high skills in most systems not being worth raising even higher.
If you go from a skill level of 1 to 2, you get 100% more dice.
If you go from a skill level of 10 to 11, you get 10% more dice,
yet the second raise is extremely expensive to do with karma.
WoD has the same problem, as have many other systems.

The only exceptions I can think of are Call of Cthulhu and AD&D,
where your progression is either automatic, or you do not progress at all.

This problem makes min-maxing the only valid option from a game-mastering standpoint,
where the XP-/Karma-system in-game is mixed with a character-generation-system, which gives flat points for skills and such,
since having three skills on 3, and raising one to six is more expensive than having one at 6,
one at 2, and one at 1, and then raising the lower skills to 3 each.
This especially annoys me in WoD.

I think that's a little unfair Smash, in SR3 you have Biotech and you want to help your buddy...
TN is based on
Their Wound Level
Your Wound Penalties
Are they Awakened
Do you have the Correct Tools
Environmental Conditions

There's only two variables difference and both typically only really care about 3 or 4 of them most of the time.

For Combat...
Wound Penalties
Range & Weapon
Targeting Accessories
Visibility Modifiers
Visibility Augments
Bodies in Motion
Recoil and Recoil Comp
Cover
Environmental Factors (Like High Winds)

So about the same...

In both cases the rules exist because despite the Magic and the Fantasy Races and the cyberpunk tech and so forth it's considering things like this that add grit and depths to the system. Smoke, Fog, Winds, Cover, Sheets of heavy Seattle rain in a howling storm these are all things that get described in the Cyberpunk game that is Shadowrun, players want to hide their characters behind these things, buy fancy cyberwar, cast spells or gear to circumvent these things and so forth. So in a game that tries to have a solid degree of lethality and presents itself in a certain way (coherent with what is expect of a cyberpunk theme) so the game has these rules.

Ultimately you either have them or you don't, D&D5 has done away with a lot of the minutiae of rules detail from things like 4 and 3.5 and it does really good as a game of fantasy adventuring embracing slot of classic ideas, similarly L5R 4E left several things open in its combat rule set (while being detailed elsewhere) and it achieves the type if game it should be very well too. Both get criticised in these areas as "Lazy Design" because there isn't a long list of charts detailing a myriad of situational issues leaving much of it to sweeping modifier suggestions and GMs Judgement. SR in most editions has all of this because it's game style needs it. But then people complain that it's got it.

The difference is that in the 4th edition system you have to know the modifiers before rolling the dice,
which makes a huge difference in the amount of time it takes to make the roll.

on skill level chart:
Legend 6 dices
Pro: 3 dices.

Average success per dice = 0.33..
So 3 dices more * 0.33.. = 1

I wasn't taking about the "4+ on the die =success" for legendary NPC.



I find that great: a disminishing return for a higher price promotes all-arounders but keeps high specialisation open for character.




Agrees. That's why I like BECK's character creation for shadowrun 3.

Seems I was wrong again, I was off on the table.

I never got why the concept of diminishing returns has to be so drastic everywhere.
Maybe I am just crazy on that point, but I think that if the returns diminish too far,
they seize to be an option at all, and rather become a waste of karma.

The problem in my eyes is that they diminish in two aspects at once.
On one hand it gets more expensive with each level, to raise the skill,
additionally the relative gain you have from the new skill level drops.

This does not affect me much as a player, since I love playing all-rounders,
but I do not hink I will ever see a player raise his skill from 12 to 13.
There are exceptions to this of course, like the Disciplines in Vampire, that net you new abilities with every point.

I might house-rule this in my group, for example award a free specialization for every skill level above 9.

Actually, it depends on the skill.

Let's say you have to make a perception test. Such skills have diminishing returns in 2 aspects at once, because up a certain level, not only do they cost more, but usually don't have more effects.

For exemple, you roll 4 successes and player B rolls 6.
Well technically speaking, both of you get's maximal infos anyways.

But for some other skills, like combat-ones, it's a single aspect (experience cost) that has disminishing returns. Usually, your additionnal die gives you additionnal damages anyways.

That's why some min-maxer will max out a skill anyways, even if very costy. But I don't remember someone trying to max out a skill who's effects are somewhat capped.

Allow me to clarify a bit.

When I talk about the world, I'm not always referring to the Characters/NPC. In this particular instance, lets talk about the skill for that legendary character. I will use Open Locks (DnD) as a point of reference.

When you start your career, you face Locks in the DC 20-25 (Simple to Average) Range generally. And then they scale from there. However, when you are 21st Level, your Open Locks skill should be a non-rolled ability for the average everyday exploits that you pull of routinely, because AVERAGE LOCKS are DC 25. Yet, amazingly enough, now the Baker has a Superior Lock (DC 40) because the GM wants to still provide a challenge for the Lockpicking Thief. To me, that breaks suspension of Disbelief within the world, because all of a sudden, said Baker is spending multiple years worth of income (150 GP) for a single Superior Lock on his door, for no reason whatsoever, when he only generally makes about 36 GP/year. It is a specific example, but I have been in games where the GM treats the entire world this way, with every test increased simply because the Character's Level has increased. It makes no sense, in world. It is an easy trap to avoid, if one considers the Game World, but it takes thought, otherwise it is second nature to just pose a challenge to the Character. One of the things I like about Shadowrun is that there are standard difficulties, and these rarely ever increase just because my DP has increased.

Talking about this with a group can be a great way for a GM to counteract min-maxing in my experience.
Most people do not think about this meta aspect of gameplay and world-building,
and making them aware of it leads to them not taking extremely high values,
because it simply is not necessary in a realistically built world.

Even in combat it is diminishing in both aspects,
because the percentage you improve with each new level, in the pistols skill for example, still diminishes.
Pistols 2 is far better than Pistols 1. Pistols 13 is just barely better than Pistols 12.
Of course you can have 13 successes with 13 dice, which is better than 12 with 12 dice,
but it is far less likely than getting 2 successes with 2 dice, opposed to the 1 success with 1 die on the other side.

Exactly... But in my experience, you do need to have that talk.

mmmm

How can I explain that?

Let's take the example of 2 dices rolles vs 3 dices rolled.

2 dices: Probability of having:
0 successes: 4/9 = 44,45%
1 success = 4/9 = 44,45%
2 successes = 1/9 = 11,1%

Average successes: 0x44,45% + 1x44,45% + 2x11,1% = 0,666

(so technically equal to nb of dices x average number of successes so 0,333 * 2)


3 dices: Probability of having:
0 successes: 8/27 = 29.6%
1 success = 12/27 = 44,45%
2 successes = 6/27 = 22,2%
3 successes = 1/27=3,7%
Average successes: 0x29.6% + 1x44,45% + 2x22,2% + 3*3.7% = 1

(so technically equal to nb of dices x average number of successes so 0,333 * 3)


Your probability chart changes but not the average number of successes who goes up arithmetically (+0.333 per die)

So when you have to beat an amount of successes, the return disminish.
If not, and if you always get something more (like more damage), the gain is the same even if it is 13th die.

Ok, I see what you're trying to describe. Thing is, that has nothing to do with open ended skills, and everything to do with the GM not knowing how to challenge their players.

First, advancement happens. That's one of the big draws of RPG's over, say, wargames. Players expect their characters will get better, and the challenge will increase.

Second, just making the world harder is a bad way to run a game. Not only does it stretch credibility, it turns into an arms race between the players and the GM. I know you've seen it in other games: Champion/HERO tends to devolve into competitive character building, Rifts is about who can do the most ludicrous damage in the shortest period of time, that sort of thing.

Even Shadowrun had this sort of problem. In 1e and 2e, starting mages were reasonably balanced, but the moment they initiated, they went through the roof. They gained every single metamagic, and the only way to counter that was to throw more initiates back at them. If you let things spiral out of control, suddeny you have guys who could cream a platoon of Red Samurai are now security guards and hamburger flippers at McHughs.

The secret to increasing the risk is to increase the reward. Becaue xp and nuyen costs scale as you advance, you actually need more to keep up. If your 21st level rogue insists on picking bakery locks for a career, just point out that the treasure is chump change, and he doesn't get any XP because there's no challenge.

Agreed...
Which is why that conversation is important. GM'ing is hard.

What we in our group did was move the cap of dice closer to world of darkness that's the missing key to there formula to be honest. If you scale it down to you can only roll 12 dice it fixes the problems we don't use 4th or 5th but a hodge of older rules with the dice mechanic of 4ed + or - dice. Depending on circumstances. To answer someone problem GM needs to know what modifiers before the roll its easy make a table and go from there. We have build our own screens with cardboard and copied tables. Once you get used to it you really don't have to look your x far away with a rifle, -dice, its raining hard - dice. The thing you have to remember is making sure that the player does what he says he's going to do before he knows the dice mods. Example PC "iam going to snipe that guy over there from my position here on the roof." GM "has you grab dice and says what your minuses are."

If the person has no chance in hell because he's at negative dice pool he still pulls the trigger and still misses it doesn't have to reflect hes way off, the mark just he's off the mark. Success are limited by actual skill level its believable got a 1 in 1st aid skill no problem your supposed to not know crap really, but the real primitive basics. You roll all success lets say with your limited dice pool.. good for you ,your still at 1 success that's counted.

Someone mentioned the strength and there are rules in 3rd Ed core on how much you can carry its under gear, even talks about if you pick someone or something up and throw it. So their really wasn't rolling for strength less you were doing something with it ei; picking up and chucking him off a roof lets say. As far as street legends that arn't immortal dragons or something truly extreme they should be following PC's rules. Take fastjack, hes supposed to be legendary m'k so hes got a max skilled which is capped. Great he can have up to x amount of success vrs skill. Granted his gear should be up there hes been at the shadowruning game for years so that's his edge over say the new guy. He would stomp them, unless of course for what ever reason fastjack glitches, could happen unlikely but could happen. Again sometimes people screw up even trained professional solders have friendly fire issues or what not it happens.

I make an automatic translation in English for my SR5 house rules.