When you delay you have to declare your action during the Declare Actions step, but you can do this after your opposition has declared theirs, and you automatically go before them on that turn. It also has no effect on your initiative count in future turns.

Delaying allows the guy whose intiative was higher to always react to an opponent's action.

Is there ever a reason not to delay until your highest initative enemy has declared his action (or other enemies depending on the situation)?

If you already know what you're going to do regardless of the enemy action…

Also, does no good that you can break in in front of Goon A when Sniper C has an action you don't know about. A pity you didn't close to melee with Goon A when you had the chance…

~J

Because they might be dead or incapacitated by the time thier turn comes around?

There is a reason not to delay. Surprise. If you use any dice pool at all before you get a chance to take your held action, then you use it. While you are delaying you can only move half your quickness while delaying, and you cannot observe in detail, which is really necessary to have a solid graps of everything that is going on.

Delaying helps balance the loss of advantage posed by SR3's initiative scheme. It still requires a free action (right?), thus you can't call a shot or similar when you take the action (without the adept power anyway).

Resuming is not an action, but you've used the free so you only have two simples or a complex left in that pass.

You can take free actions on any intiative count as long as you would be eligible for an action at that time (i.e. your initiative has aready passed for the first phase of the turn).

But only after the person acts.

I'm not sure what you mean.

On the first pass for the turn you sit around and do nothing until your turn comes up. At that point you spend a free action to begin delaying. Every pass after that you can spend your free action dropping items, speaking, or whatever other free actions you want. Then when it comes time to act you stop delaying, take your turn (including a free action if you want), and then go back to your original intiative count -10.

I don't think you've got the terms right.

Guy got a 21 on his INI. In the first pass and on his phase, Guy chooses to Delay, using his free action.
Mage got a 15 and chooses to cast a spell. Guy interupts Mage and shoots twice with his simples. However, because of an armor spell, Mage resists the damage and finishes casting the spell. After which Guy can use the free he got on Mage's phase to say "shit".
Guy will go next on phase 11 in the second pass.

Maybe this is another instance of my book being wrong (I really need to invest in a newer printing). My page 105, under the Free Actions header, says that a character can take a free action on any combat phase as long as their intiative fo the first pass has already come and gone.

I think that's correct, but the free action occurs after the person who's phase it actually is acts. Otherwise everyone could drop prone behind cover before being shot.

Oh, and I'd hold off on a newer printing; if it's not in the Erratta, it likely isn't in the newer printings... And I sense a new edition coming.

Any particular reason for that? As of about a year ago it was still "absolutely no plans", so another edition would probably be at floor minimum a year off.

~J

I'm thinking two, three more years, but that's still no reason to throw 30 bucks at an old book when the SotAs are so good. The reasoning is that they'll have covered the whole planet with the Shadows of... books and be relying only on modules and SotA for cash flow (and even with SotAs all the old stuff has been redone). But then again, one can keep playing third edition for a long time (as most of us did with second).

It's never going to happen, but I'd love to see them abandon the Shadows of… format. I'm also becoming disenchanted with the SotA books; by their very nature they demand a power climb, and if done yearly they make that climb much faster than it previously was. Much as I like SotA:2064, I quite dislike the precedent it sets.

Ah well, so it goes. Certainly coherent reasoning on your part.

~J

I have to agree abpout the SOTA books, they have seriously thrown off the power curve in some areas, and by the very nature of the books this will continue. I really liked the fact that shadowrun had a nice gradual power curve and wasn;t about one upmanship of technology and magic which is what those books stand for.

I think they went a little over on the adept powers, but otherwise they're simply leveling all the facets of the Sixth World. I expect Media and Medical in the next one (with an obligatory Culture Shock). I think they've done a good job of keeping the SotAs to world updates and not just tech/magic powers (flavor first, IMO).

HIJACK NINJA!

As much as SR in previous editions were a reflection of the 80s, I see the SOTA series as a reflection of the 2000s. With new innovations nowadays, technology which might be top of the line 5 years ago is becoming obsolete now. I see the SOTA format being a reflection of this, and a good way of enforcing SOTA on older PCs. You want that cool new gun/spell/metamagic/adept power? You didn't keep up with the SOTA... tsk tsk...

My held action says nothing about not being able to move that pass. You just have to wait until you stop delaying. Likewise you can't observe until you stop delaying. What am I missing?

Re new book: Well, it'll bea while before I have any money to get one with, but I'll pick one up. If for nothing else than the one I've got now is falling apart. It was one of those lovely FASA printings that disintigrate momentes after you open it. That and I don't plan on buying any of the SOTA books. We're currently playing at year 2052, so it'll be a long time before I have to worry about the techonology available in 2064.

Most of the SotAs just update the rules to third edition. Besides, like I said, it's the world stuff that's so cool, Like the mage duels in UCLA and the bit on Carnival!...

I think we're both saying the same thing and thinking we aren't. From what I can gather, he is saying that you can't move or observe until you stop delaying. That's what I'm saying too.

Yeah, but I think you can move during a delay (are the rules about 1/2 movement under Take Aim?) pretty much without restriction.