Question for the devs: under SR3, as has been lamented and bitched about more than enough around here, mundanes move at a fairly glacial pace, can't throw out more than two (at best, four) shouts in three seconds, and in general, are ridiculously slow in comparison to their real counterparts. Have the dynamics of combat shifted to realistically represent normal humanity in any capacity under SR4? Is any of this answerable without violating NDAs?

I actually like the way the combat speeds work out. It makes complete sense that an unaugmented mundane would be moving in slo-mo compared to Twitchy the MBW4 super-Sammy. If you increased the ability of mundanes to react at high speeds, you'd need to increase the ability of augmented characters as well, meaning it's basically back where you began, only with more passes per turn (as far as the current combat system goes. I'm very interested in what it'll be like in SR4)

I'm with Sharlaoth on this one. Changing one would necessarily mean changing the others. And such a high speed would not be very playable...

Bump. I know you devs are out there. You can't hide from me.

This has the beginnings of one of those "I don't understand why they don't make the normal, unspecial people special" dogfights that erupt from time to time. If mundane people where highly effective combat machines, why would people get wired? Why would Corps sink money into combat drugs?

now, okay, normally? when anyone says something like "uncybered mundanes are too weak", i call them stupid in a variety of ways.

however. in this case, i think there are improvements that can be made. i think that, all things being equal, a cybered char should beat the everliving pants off of a non-cybered mundane every single time. but, i think that a non-cybered mundane in an advantageous situation should be able to get the drop on a cybered character.

the way to achieve this happy medium is, take away the ability of characters to roll for surprise tests if they are completely unaware of their attacker. i think that whenever a surprise situation comes into play where there's a chance of a character not noticing another character, a perception roll should be made first. anybody who fails the perception roll automatically gets 0 successes against the opponents that they cannot percieve.

edit: and, yes. even a non-cybered mundane can talk a whole helluva lot in a three-second combat pass. he gets one free action during every other character's action in the combat, plus his own, plus he can use his own simple actions to conduct free actions. even if he's the only one acting and he rolled a 1, he can say nine words in that three seconds. (why he can say more words if there are more people around is a mystery to me--the power of groupthink, maybe. who knows.)

I, on the other hand, want Melee Combat revised so that mundanes don't automatically match the speed and number of attacks of their super-fast opponents. I've had this conversation many times, and understand the give and take of Melee, but I'm not convinced, and still think that slower combattants should be limited to their actual number of actions when attacking, and only be able to defend over and above that number.

No argument from me there. That's more an issue with the melee rules than it is an issue with speed augmentation.

Been done, baby.

Ummm, great minds think alike?

I think that the penalties of being Twitchy should be better explored. Cyberware is easy to damage with electricity, and mages tend to pack a lot of it. (This is why lightning-focused elementalists are so darned common in my setting). In addition, the character could not get through security checkpoints, and even with a reaction switch (or whatever it's called) he/she would still be prone to acting kinda scary. Plus, things that involve your nervous system (like a massage) would become a lot less fun.
In Shadowrun, you're either quick or you're smart or you're dead. A PhysAd with enhanced reflexes II, a high natural reaction, and 10 dice for pistols tests can drop quite a few people with an easily concealed Glock model 40s Smartlink-integrated pistol. Cybermunchies can do the same thing, but they lack the uber-amazing skills of the PhysAd to send bullets into vital organs, so they simply spray with SMG's. Normal characters (like Deckers) tend to be backup support, throwing grenades (which you don't want to throw too many of at one time anyway) or making the enemy's life difficult in ways that don't involve spraying hot lead at them. In noncombat situations, the mundies can wreak havoc on security systems, making combat avoidable, or simply reducing enimies to a state I call "Pancaked" in an Ares Roadmaster. Combat-optimized characters such as minotuarl street samurai tend to be common in combat-heavy campaigns; in those involving less wetwork, the less beefy can do all sorts of things while the streeet sammys twitch away in their overstuffed armchairs.
In short, all characters can end combat. Some do it by preventing it in the first place.

Quite honestly, I think that wires should give more of a quickness bonus that can result in a higher reaction instead of a flat reaction bonus.

It doesn't make since to say they are quicker when all they did was react faster. Nowhere does it actually make you move faster. Just react quicker. A person with a quickness of 3 without cyber and a person with wires and quickness of 3 still move the same speed. One just really reacts faster.

I understand that the quicker reaction might make you do more responses in the same given time, but I would see that more as a multiple target scenario because after all...your mind is reacting...but you still only have a quickness of 3.

The easiest "fix" that I've used in past games was changing the base Inititiatieve of all characters from 1D6 to 3D6. I then cut the prices for augmented reflexes in half to account for the change.

You'd be surprised at how well it worked to even things out while still giving the augmented characters the major advantage. Cuts down on stopping to roll dice, too.

How about something like this?
YACS (Yet Another Combat System)
Change initiative rolls to a standard Reaction (+ Init dice) success test vs. TN4. The result goes into the character's Action pool.
Cap max successes to 12.

Each 3 second turn is broken into 1 second rounds. When and how often you get to act depends on your Action pool:
- Round 1: 5-8 (lightning quick)
- Round 2: 1-4 (mundane)
- Round 3: 9-12 (inhuman)
- If you rolled no successes, you're SOL. Prepare to soak.
All actions in the same round take place simultaneously.

Every possible action takes 1 or more Action Points (AP). Free actions have an AP of 1 (speaking 3 words, changing ammo via smartlink). Most simple actions have an AP of 2 (firing a weapon, certain melee attacks). Complex actions have an AP of 4 (spellcasting, summoning, melee 'powerup' attacks) or greater (autofire, perhaps?).

Your initiative successes count as your AP pool. You can spend no more than 5 AP in any one round. Any unspent AP carry over to the next round, but are lost at the end of the turn.

At the end of the turn, any remaining combatants can buy initiative successes for the next turn at 2 AP each. This increases the likelyhood that they'll be able to act in the first round of the next turn (but doesn't guarantee it).

Surprise/ambush: If one of the parties is undetected at the beginning of combat (i.e, hidden or invisible), the unsuspecting party rolls a perception test. If the test fails, the ambushing party gets a bonus of 4 AP added to their pool for this turn only the ambushed party cannot take action against the ambushers in the 1st round. The ambushed party can still take action in the 1st round against any party that didn't surprise them (provided their AP is 5+).

Ah, well... just something I threw together in the last hour. Feel free to shoot holes through it.

[edit] Updated the Surprise entry. Like I said, this is all pretty much straight off the top of my head .

[edit again] Forgot to mention that Initiative test is just a Reaction success test, with Init dice added in.

Personally I've always been a little irritated by the inevitable how much init/reaction boosters can I fit into this character problem of SR in all variants. Inevitably it creates a power creep in which even regular joe security guards need significant levels of boosted reflexes in order to be anything other than target practice.

Yes I would like there to be more room in the game for non cybered non awakened characters to be something other than tech specialists and face characters. However the highly skilled mundane option almost always pales in comparison to the heavy cyber or adept pretty much relegating them to "real roleplayer" types.

For that matter I'd love more concrete rules about how inhuman low essence characters become so it's definitely more of a "for this edge what am I giving up?" style system but unfortunately that would merely shift people over to physical adepts (which happens more than enough already).

I can see one possible method for resolving it would be to create something like an edge like this.


3 point edge - Quick as a rattler! (or some other stupid name)

The character can sacrifice 2 combat pool dice for this combat turn in order to gain +d6 to thier initiative. This edge cannot be taken by any characters with reaction boosting adept powers or reaction enhancing cyberware.

6 point edge - Lame name mark II

The character can sacrifice 4 combat pool dice for this combat turn in order to gain +2d6 to thier initiative. This edge cannot be taken by any characters with adept powers or cyberware.

9 point edge - Super speed mark III

Same as above but 6 dice buys you +3d6.

That way you can replicate normals really busting ass to shot all the bad guys but definitely leaving thier ass hanging out in the wind to get it shot off. It's inferior to cyberware or adept powers that boost reflexes or initiative but it gives the normal the ability to try to hang with the samurai if they are willing to go it on base skill alone.

Note the edge costs are top of my head and might require upgrades or downgrades etc.

IMO if you look at the average human (all 3's for attributes) you get 1 action a turn. If you take that same human and plug a wired reflexes system 2 into him his initiative goes from 3 + 1d6 to 7 + 3d6.

In combat that seems like a lot, but it really shouldn't amount to that much. The cybered human gets to go first, and it makes since that he should because he's cybered.

The big problem is that in the same turn, the cybered character gets to act again after the uncybered character. So in the long run it becomes a game balance issue. The question to ask is then : "How do I present a situation to my players that is difficult and still fun to play?"

There are several options to handling cybered up characters, here are a few.

The easiest is to outnumber them. Sure, they get to act first and more often, but as soon as they start blasting away with automatic weapons they should become prime targets. Even standard NPC's (ie gangers) can have automatic weapons... use them.

Another option is to use area of effect weapons. Grenades, especially gas grenades, seem to be effective at slowing down groups of players. Magic can also come in handy here if your NPC's have a mage available.

Instead of using numbers or special weapons against your cybered PC's, use the envirnment. Ambushes are popular in shadowrun. Set your NPC's up in superior positions. Give them some cover and forces your PC into the open.

Weapons that cause large target number modifiers are also good solutions. Tasers and Drugs can come in handy here. Check out splash grenades for the drugs to.

Finially, use some tactics! If your samuri's blast away at the first sign of trouble, let them. Your NPC's can take cover and HOLD ACTION until the samuri has dumpped half his ammo and used up his combat pool. Then in the second or third pass they can pop up and return fire when your PC is out of combat pool. This should not be a tactic you use often, smart players will start hording combat pool dice. This seems to be a good tactic, so make sure your NPC's can actually exercise some tactics, perhaps a SWAT team, but not the clerk at the stuffer shack.

Sometimes it is enough to give your PC's a hard time. You don't have to find ways to kill the party, thats easy. Find ways to make combat difficult and exciting at the same time. Sure, your cybered up characters will get more actions then your NPC's, but so what! The PC's are the hero's of the game! They are the center of your story and should stand center stage! So let them act over and over again. You have a world of NPC's at your disposal... let them feel good and chew a few up.

Is it realistic? No... but so what... its a game with people augmented by futuristic cyberware... thats not realistic either.

It's pretty much a given that tactics can help reduce the wildly obscene advantages that init booster can give to shadowrunners. However that pretty much assumes that the opposition has the knowledge and time to coordinate an effective response. Factor in surprise and stealth and the shadowrunners go back to absolutely tearing through standard security forces (granted a certain amount of that makes for a fun game)

In the campaigns I've run I tend to assume the following.

Rent a Cops- No cyber, no combat drugs slightly up from innocent bystanders in terms of threat value. Pretty much target practice although shoot too many and the heavies will show up.

Gangers - No cyber init advancers, possibility of low end combat drugs that they are less reluctant to take.

Average Security Guards, Average Lone Star Street cop - No cyber init advancers, combat drugs available but very reluctant to risk them

Secondary Response Guards, Swat teams - ex military background tends to mean boosted reflexes in my games combat drugs if needed.

Elite Sec guards, HRT (cyberpsychos)- wired reflexes, IMC this is the first level in which awakened characters become routinely represented as I tend to follow 2e rarity numbers. Honestly this is where most runners play.

Corporate Assault Teams, high end counterterrorism teams, prime runners- move by wire comes into play but still rare wired reflexes level 3 is most common cyberbooster. Awakened characters often have initiate ranks at this level.

Experimental Soldiers - cyberzombies show up in small numbers supported by higher end awakened characters. this is the totally scary level of opposition

Vehicle and Drone support tend to jump each group up a notch or two. A couple of Wasp helicopters and some doberman drones make average security guards much tougher than most average runners want to deal with etc.

However if most newbie runners are automatically trying to fit in the highest level of wired reflexes they can buy at alphaware and 1,000,000 nuyen then the paradigm begins to fall down.

So unless there is greater incentive to not take init boosters of some form in SR4 (either through more concrete low essence penalties or increases in utility to other high cost cyberware) I fail to see why it won't remain largely about fitting the most init boosters they can in most peoples games.

Of course you can calculate what a mundane character can accomplish in a combat round and say "hey, I can easily do more than that myself", and come away with the conclusion that the rules are unrealistic. But what about the problem with every second being utilized with optimal efficiency by everyone in a combat situation? You need time to think and plan too, people. Does it sit well with you that a fire-fight almost never takes more than 10 to 15 seconds to complete in game-time? Would you really want to reduce that time? I for one would like to see an even more abstract system, were every "shoot" action could result in a few missed shots as well as a hit and every "dodge" action could mean sitting behind cover for a few seconds, cathing your breath. Make every roll account for more in-game action, so that you can resolve longer fights in a shorter time.

Wired reflexes could mean you can make more choices in a combat round, that is change your actions, instead of it meaning you are given more actions. A gun has a rate of fire depending on mode, period. The reason you want more actions is that you want to be able to change your target or throw yourself in cover when it´s called for. The skill roll could determine how many rounds have hit and how many are wasted. There could be an action called "planning" or "focus" in wich you take time to evaluate the combat situation when it´s in progress, and then get a few extra actions when you finaly take action.

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