I don't have my PDF yet. So I am working only from what has appeared on these boards. But I do have to give in to the temptation to say this.

Armor, generally, reduces damage to stun. If I recall correctly, a lined coat has a ballistic of 6, and a Predator a damage code of 5P (-1AP). So let's say the shooter shoots and inflicts four boxes of damage. Because the DV does not exceed the modified armor value, the damage done is stun.

This totally disregards the fact that armor does not cover the entire body. The SR3 system accounted for this lack of total coverage by making it possible to kill a person wearing a lined coat with a heavy pistol. SR4, apparently, does not.

If combat magic still ignores armor and still does killing damage, then magic has gained a big jump-up in killpower over firearms.

It also seems to me that this will create an arms race, where everybody will be forced to carry SMGs and autoshotguns just to overcome common armors.

I understand that the stun condition monitor probably still overflows into the physical condition monitor, but the chances of inflicting 20 or so boxes of damage with anything less than a sustained barrage of pistol fire are, at best, vanishingly small.

Again, I only have the SR4 information I have seen on these boards.

There may still be called shots for bypassing armor.

If I remember right from Tisoz's posting, Armor converts damage to stun if Net Hits plus damage is less than the armor rating. Thus, if you score some nice extra hits with that Predator you will do physical damage - representing shooting into an unarmored area or something. On the other hand, if you have a weak shot with only one net hit, then it's pretty fair to say you hit him where it doesn't count as much.

Good point, Ellery.

With any luck, it will be a bit better balanced than in the previous edition. I.E, on one hand, a called shot w/ an SL-2 was a +2 TN, w/ no armor against power, and on the other, it was a +4 to TN, merely for a wound level.

-RM
"I haven't figured out how to say 'FUCK YOU' politely."

No, chances are it will be even less balanced, though it may be imbalanced for everyone rather than biasedly imbalanced towards smartlink-users. If anyone else is interested in why, I'll explain. If not, just consider what happens to combat as described by Bull when you try to pick a penalty for calling a shot.

I've generally found that called shots in increase damage are senseless. In combat you're trying to do the most damage possible. Taking a called shot means that you're sacrificing the best shot for something else. Wether a shot happens to hit a sensitive area is best modeled by the amount of damage done. I think that called shots should be used only for effect, bypassing armor, knockdown, etc.

Stun damage is still damage. Get 10 boxes (or whatever), and you're pretty much just as dead as if that was physical. Differance is if you still win, you don't have a huge hospital bill to pay. Now, I don't know how much sense it makes for people to pass out from bruises rather than bleed out and trauma and stuff, but in game terms, getting shot is still no good.

Actually, taking a Called Shot is used primarily to give up the best area to hit for a better shot that can potentially do more damage. A called shot to the head is the best, and most frequent, example. In other cases, it has other effects you consider more desireable, such as disarming someone you intend to take hostage or keeping a vow of not killing people by shooting them in the limbs.

eh. i've never viewed "unconsciousness" to necessarily mean actual lights-out. if you get hurt bad enough, shock can keep you from doing much more than lying on the floor and groaning--same effect as unconsciousness in game terms. that's plenty realistic.

Statistically, the best place to shoot someone is in the torso. However, that's also the place most likely to have armor. A shot to the head is preferred, but you have to take time to aim and in most cases people don't have the time necessary. In the long run, it's often more worthwhile to shoot for the bigger area than the smaller because you simply hit more often.

Pretty much, a case of ease over lethality.

Right, and the way in which to balance the difficulty and the lethality is a problem which I am sure has plagued the mind of many a game developer. In my experiences called shots for extra damage always tend to be unbalanced.

That's why you use modifiers. Attach a positive one to the TN or a negative one to the attacker's roll. In this case, I would say a mod of -2 dice.

Obviously you use modifiers. But how much modifier is enough? What specific benefit do you get for the modifier?

The benefit with a modifier is that it becomes harder to hit. However, as weapon skill goes up, modifiers get fewer and fewer returns. You need a mod that makes a large difference to low gun skill. I think SR3 used +4 to TN or something like that. However, you don't want one too big to represent the fact that skilled gunshooters can hit specific targets with greater ease.

Also, what about a couple of EX rounds? You'll exceed a lined coat in no time.

Called Shots (for both Ranged and Melee attacks) do the following:
1) Bypass Armor - Variable dice pool penalty equal to the target's armor. If the target has 6 points of armor, then you get a -6 penalty to bypass it. It's all or nothing, but I'd probably house rule this somehow in my group (maybe allow a "half Armor bypass" called shot roll as well, to target a faceplate or codpiece or other less-armored area).
2) Target a vital area - -1 to -4 dice pool penalty. The number of dice you withhold becomes the the increase in DV of the attack. I don't see why anyone would NOT call a shot (except because of a lack of Free Action) using this option, since increasing the DV directly amounts to free automatic successes on the combat test. Then again, if you have a small dice pool to roll, then you would risk your opponent completely dodging your attack on the opponent's Reaction test.
3) Knock something out of a target's grasp - -4 dice pool penalty, and DV has to exceed the target's Strength.
4) Other effects (knock opponent over a ledge, shoot out a tire, temporarily blind opponent, etc.) - GM sets dice pool penalty for this one.

I actually saw this as the reverse problem. Imagine your troll is wandering through with an armor jacket. He gets hit with the predator and takes 2 boxes of stun. He's pretty tough though, so he can stage down damage reasonably easily.

Now, rather than risk taking another box of stun and getting a penalty, it would almost make more sense for him to take off his jacket and put on an armored vest, so hopefully the next shot will cause physical, not stun damage, since he can take another two boxes there without penalty.

That would be one hell of a meta-gaming offence.

I wont allow called shots, I never have. I will use the rules for when a player wants to accomplish something specific only, like shooting this and that for effect, not to bypass armor or increase damage. or... Actually the rules for bypassing armor seem fairly usable now, so I might use them. Good for darts and other things that need to hit were there´s no armor.

Bleh, I just read the part about having to take 3 boxes first before starting to get wound penalties. I think we're going to house-rule it so that either it's an incremental progression (1, 2, 3, 4, etc.) or that the wound penalties take effect on any damage (i.e. you round UP damage boxes/3 instead of down)

Hahnsoo: Christ, are you sure those are the called shot rules?

I simply shoot, rolling a dice pool of 9, where statistically I can expect 3 hits, inflicting 8 damage with my Predator. My target with armor 6, body 3, rolls 8 dice to resist (remember my Predator has -1AP). Statistically, he can expect about 2 hits, and so the math is on my side - I can expect to do 6 damage.

But if I call a shot to the face to bypass my opponent's armor and, I reason, kill the crap out of him by blowing his brains out, I take a -6 penalty, roll 3 dice, expect 1 hit, do 6 damage; my opponent rolls Body 3, can expect 1 hit, and takes 5 damage.

Mathmatically, the called shot is for suckers.

thing is that with a bypass armor called shot your not aiming for the head specificaly, but rather your aiming for any spot with no armor.

want to blow someones brains out. take -4 on the dice and get 4 DV up front. then your aiming specificaly for any spot that allows for more damage to be done.

thing is that even the called shot rules are abstract, your not aiming for a specific part of the body. rather you aim for any part that may allow the change that you try to get with the called shot.

still, the bypass armor called shot may be overkill...

I think the "target a vital area" rules are just Goddamn awful. As long as you have enough dice that you don't think your target will be able to dodge you (and they won't be able to, most of the time, just rolling Reaction - especially with the cumulative -1 penalty for dodging more than one attack), you can do it, and you give up one die for an effect that'll take the enemy three dice on the damage resistance test to negate.

I wonder whether you can use this in conjunction with burst fire or fire from a shotgun, because IIRC that gives penalties to dodge so massive, it's effectively not possible. Someone please tell me it specifically says you can't?

hobgoblin:

Targeting the face was just an example. I know that the rules are more abstract than that.

It doesn't change the fact that called shots are a bad choice.

Agreed. Looking at that, I can't help but shake my head and wonder what they were thinking. I'm not even sure how to logically implement it, and I sure as hell know it's not worth the effort to change.

I don't think many people are going to be making Called Shots in SR4.

I'd think that everyone would use the DV increasing option unless they ran up against a very good dodger.

Can somebody confirm that layering is effectively gone?

Are helmets separate from security armor? As I recall, in SR3 security armor was always assumed to include a helmet, and that annoyed me because it was an exception to the rule.

Thx... well, thats a sad solution, but a solution one can easily change.

My rule of thumb as a GM was, and I warned my players about this, if they start making called shots so would I. Only seems fair afterall. And with that warning I can not remember a single time my players tried a called shot. So no called shot rules or whatnot wouldn't bother me, or my players.

I interpreted it as standing for the entire row, and that it just had been placed there for better readability.

Indeed. So, what hahnsoo said is how it is written in the book then? It's not clear to me if he has one, or read it in a thread. I would appreciate a confirmation or a denial.

Thanks. And mea maxima culpa, that i didn't got it right, that you actually had a book. No offense meant.