Whilst browsing the various threads here, I've come across some interesting references to reflexes. Such as having boosted reflexes 3 plus a synaptic accelerator for +4d6 initiative; someone even made comment about adding an increase cybered reflexes spell for even more initiative.

Now, I wasn't aware that reflex mods could be stacked like this. If they can, there's certainly no reason in hell for anyone to ever take wired reflexes 3 - or, for that matter, pretty much any level of the improved reflexes adept power, since that "costs" 5 magic, whereas the boosted/synaptic combo can be had for less than 1.

Someone want to clarify this for me?

Well, IR doesn't cost Essence/Bio Index, which is a plus in healing tests.

Wired Reflexes can be turned off (or even stepped up and down), and aren't a permanent, unmodifiable, implant (though, the "permanent" part of Boosted has just been largely undone, with the Genetech stuff).

Largely, though, yes. You're right. Wired Reflexes aren't the be-all end-all that they were in SR1.

IIRC Boosted is rather expensive to undo.

~J

Synthcardium is a must in my group. Otherwise all the speed overdose makes you go pop.

50,000 , SI 2 to get Boosted Reflexes out. Oh and six months in a gene tank...

There have been lots of comparisons between Wired 3 and Boosted 3 + Synaptic 2. I think the end result is that the Wired 3 is just fractionally better for average initiative, and can have a reflex trigger, but costs more in total essence/bio index, as well as nuyen.

Both are compatible with other most other bio and cyber increases (reaction enhancers, adrenal pump, suprathyroid, enhanced articulation, etc).

MBW-4 isn't compabile with anything, but is pretty excellent on its own if you have the money and essence for it (at a decent grade) and don't mind dying a little earlier than expected.


For spells, try Increased Intelligence or Increased Quickness.

Other than that, just take a lot of drugs before/during combat, be a night one exceptional quickness, yadda yadda, *yawn*.


Improved Reflexes (the adept power) is good because, although it costs a lot of magic and doesn't offer as much benefit as cyber combos, it's doesn't make you all twitchy and you can walk through wards with it no problem.

Unless you where going to take wired 3 and all the other reaction enhancers then your better of taking the cerebral booster and boosted refs 3 (or 1) and some other reaction improvements. If I recall correctly there are 3 drugs that will give you +1d6 initiative, set a cocktail up with your preferred delivery system. 15+7d6 would not be unachievable. Naturally it will heart coming down.

Edward

IIRC, Boosted, Synaptic, and drugs are the only initiative supplements that stack. So the max initiative (after some minmaxing that would make any GM cringe) is something like... 8d6 + 21.
Boosted 3, Synaptic 2, Kamikaze, Psyche, Novacoke... and a couple others that I can't remember right off the top of my head... I think it ended up being 6 drugs total, all at once.
Of course, good luck lasting very long after taking all those drugs... not to mention the crash afterwards. Ew.

Drugs stack with anything, I'm pretty sure. Given that non-Troll addicts tend to live no more than a year with canon rules, often less, it's hardly unbalancing.

~J

Agreed.

Although this brings up a point I've been wondering about for some time...
So... if you get toxin filters, they reduce the power that you resist the drug with, right? But, don't they also reduce the effects of the drug?

It just doesn't sit right with me that you can filter out the drug enough to be able to resist it, but not enough that you don't get the positive effects from it... And that's how some people play it. I've never really know enough about it to argue, though.

it would depend to some degree on the mechanism of toxicity, and a bunch of other factors...

one of the most distured characters I ever had to burn when a player handed it over was a char who used a data filter to forget dosing up on drugs with solely mental addiction codes.... he justified it by saying that these were not biochemical dependancies and were in fact products of memory. Which in a fairly literal sense is accurate. The only thing you need to worry about is overdosing.

unless his plan is to brutally kill every single person in the room before they can finish twitching.

Presumably he'd also remember the sensation that generates the psychological addiction without being able to indentify its source - so he might become addicted to whatever he subconsciously viewed as a common thread in his drug experiences - say a room in the house, combat etc etc - which would be fun.

Presumably the data filer would also have to edit out the decision to take the drug as well as the exposure to fool him for any length of time, or completely remove the period when he was under its effects, which would be another great (momento style) plot thread. I'd let it happen and then have some fun...

Nope, you get no memory what so ever of what the drug felt like, nor is there any addictive sensation. It just never "plugs in" to your memory at all. Certainly you'd remember the decision, but it'd be just another decision.

Thinking about it, I'd actually probably allow you to use a headware memory to store alterations to the plan of the run, etc. and just set it to automatically clear when the filter turns off. I think a simple checklist would allow him to keep track of where he is, and a battle tac computer would change the checklist automatically quite nicely.

*shudders* yes make the player watch memento, or watch it yourself and screw that runner up the a$$ with a chainsaw.

My assumption was the data filter was activated between taking the drug and its effect starting and would not be turned off until de drug had run its corse (safest to wait until withdrawal is finished) this is probably several hours. You would probably want an orienteering system linked to GPS, and a tactical computer and some custom software you can write yourself to track your activities. And if you make a mistake you will be in big trouble (watch memento).

Edward

I don't know, I think that data filtered individuals can still plan to some extent...
I was under the impression that it just prevented effective formation of long term memory, not temporary storage, otherwise anyone using it would be completely dysfunctional. Then again, looking at the canon text, I don't think my interpretation is supported. Still, I don't think people are totally confused while filtered.

They're not. The example in the text demonstrates a secretary using a data filter to prevent her from remembering what occurs in the meeting. If temporary storage weren't possible, there really would be no point in having the secretary present at all.


...actually, I think the book even gives an arbitrary time frame for temporary storage. I think I'll go check.


Yeah. It blocks the flow of information from short- to long-term memory. So aside from being slightly distracted (more of a roleplaying thing as opposed to an actual in-game effect) there shouldn't be any difference in a person's performance.

But the point is that there will be a sudden discontinuity (I would have thought) between the time when the filter is on and when it is off - so that you end up in a "where the hell am I, and who are all these dead people?" effect. You wouldn't be incapable during either phase, only between them.

If it's not a clear line but rather a "no long term memory" effect then you have straight momento, though maybe with a slightly longer timeline...

MM says a fiew minuts is all the memory you will get. If you ask your secretary to go and get a cup of coffy for the person your having a meeting with they will forget who it was for halfway threw making it and probably make it the way there employer usually has it and give it to him (actually there probably smart enough to writ the order down).

When your 45 minutes into your plan you have forgotten what you did at the beginning and what you where going to do latter. You hide in a broom closet for 2 minutes to treat an injured ally and you forget witch floor your on. You would need to be taking excessive notes and looking threw them every few minutes would be a pain.

Edward

Going back to the initial topic, wired reflexes is handy for the extra REA it provides, and at higher levels is can be a little sticky to get that bonus - it's doable but tough on Essence and Bio Index.

My current group has 1 WR'd character, and that was written by someone else as a spare and handed over in an emergency "oh crap a new player, but no PC.." moment.

Let's move on to magic, then. Although there is no Increase Cybered Reflexes spell in canon existence, you just KNOW some smartboy with too much time on his hands will develop it. Hell, give me 30 seconds with the Grimoire, I'll do it myself.

(30 seconds later)

Physical Spell (Target number Bod+target's reaction)
Sustained
Drain: Base S (+3d6), +2 Target (Affects Cybered Attribute), +1 Drain Target (Physical), +1 Target (Sustained), -1 Drain Level (Voluntary Target Required), +1 Level (Affects Initiative), +1 Level (affects attribute)

Final Drain Code: +4(D)

So. In theory, then, we are looking at a smartboy with Boosted 3, Synaptic Accelerator 2, and a mage with a death wish (because someone's gonna track that sustaining focus or quickened spell back to him) or a burnout job to cast Increase Cybered Reflexes 3 on him. This gives us a staggering +7d6 initiative, by God. Is this actually legal?

I know that I never allowed reflex modifiers to stack anyway, not even boosted and a synaptic - frankly, I didn't realise it was possible. So, next question, even if the above example was legal - would you allow it in your game?

ok so with 5 drugs you get hiper speed and hiper reflexes, but...

how would you feel going in a run with somebody heavily armed and under the effects of a cocktail of 5 or 6 heavily addictive drugs??

I know I wouldnt want a troll with a panther ac. high on novacoke covering my back.. would you?


I am curious as to the max initiative you can get without going into heavy mojo, and without the assumption that all the drugs are cumulative with each other..?
can you beat MBW4?
DS

MBW4 Has +8 +4d6 no?

Boosted 3 Synaptic 2 and Enhabcers 6 gives you the same, though you lose the +4 to Athletics and Stealth, Nor get the extra action of MBW 3/4 You don't get the illness's either, so some would say it's better.

There are combinations which yield a higher numerical initiative than MBW-IV. There is, however, nothing better.

~J

And at a lower Essense Cost, I might add.

Would I allow someone with +7d6 in my game? Yes. Would I then give Equal NPC's the same? Yes :o) My players have learnt a long time ago that I work on the axiom "what you do gets done back". They learnt that when it came to APDS rounds :o)

With Synaptic 2, Boosted 3, Max'd out REA Enhancers and Suprathyroid and Enhanced articulation you're getting +9 reaction and +4d6 - that's an average of 13+5d6 for initiative, and if you have high QUI and INT as well, you're sorted. I'd rate all that at better than Move by Wire 4 any day of the week and twice on sundays. Costs less and is more ESS/BIO friendly too.

Hehehe, yeah I know what you mean. I use a sliding scale for the various levels of NPC's. Equal guys, like FRT or SWAT would get those levels of mods, but your average Joe Schmo sec goon isn't - he may have Boosted 1 simply cos it's so cheap and low essence, and he might have Smartlink but other than that they're usually unaugmented.

I once decided to see how high I could crank the initiative on a starting human character.
Start with Base Q and I of 6 (we'll ignore the rest of the stats). Now add Muscle Toner 3 and Cerebral Booster 1. Then Enhanced Articulation, Boosted Reflexes 3, Synaptic Accelerator 2 and Reaction Enhancer 6 (I believe one can get away with Alpha'ing the BR3 for saving in Essence). You now have a character with an Initiative of 17+5D6, meaning they have a minimum Initiative of 22 (three passes), an average Initiative of 32 (four passes) and a maximum of 47 (five passes). This means if he rolls well, in a gunfight he can get off ten bursts from an SMG (we all know it's easy enough to crank six points of RC out of a Warrior-10 and still be able to use it one-handed). That's the whole clip. Now Smartlink-II it...
Side effects include twitchiness, tendency to kill team-mates who surprise him, requirement of buying ammo by bulk, and the gamesmaster restriction that he must take the Borrowed Time flaw as the GM will be throwing the book at him...

-JH.

Blaze: Add Exceptional QUI, upgrade both Muscle Toner and Cerebral Booster, and you've got REA one higher.

Add in a cocktail of drugs and you got yourself a party.
Averaging at 5 passes, max of 7.

One could make him a Night One for unmodded Q of 8, giving you 19+5D6, but that's just getting silly and asking the GM to hit him with well-triangulated sniper fire.

-JH.

Take what Blaze said in his initial post, add Exceptional Quickness and another point of Cerebral Booster. Then add in a Suprathyroid Gland, and you've got 19+5d6.

That's kinda freaky... and if you're an Elf and add in the Bonus Intelligence edge then you could get to 20+5d6.

I've always interpreted the twitching as from wired reflexes and move by wire. I definately don't apply it for synaptic accelerator since it's 'natural' :o)

The concept of the data filter reminds me of the thread where Johnson's could put the plan on a data-chip, thus giving the person full access tot he pertinent info, add a little spare memory for the changing details and voila, you have your momento style runner that never forgets, whilst on the job.

I believe boosted would include twitchiness. As would drugs (but there short duration).

So you have 2 points of twitchiness. You have an int of 8 (or 9) take the perceptive edge and it wont be much of an issue.

Edward

As far as I knew, Boosted has always been exempt from twichiness.

Twitchiness is only in Wired, and also in people that have had MBW for too long. At least, by canon. In your game, people with jumped reflexes can have twitchiness.