|
Yeah, while it IS a little dumb from a realism point of view that your robot arms need wifi, the alternative is basically having the hacker have to cower in the corner while his player sits on his rear end whenever a fight breaks out, as it often does. Giving them something to do that's not shooting fools which can meaningfully add to combat is only a good thing.
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 09:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 03:55 |
|
|
And hopefully let them do it in a single turn instead of the current "find signal, find signal, hack, hack, hack" system where the combat's over by the time they've got a user-account to one dude's arm. Considering that in one turn other characters can fire two grenades, launch an unstoppable stunball, unleash an undodgeable long burst, or mind control a half-dozen enemies, I wouldn't think it overpowered for a hacker to turn someone's eyes off in one turn. Or, if they're really good, take control of someone's cyberarm and make them shoot themselves in the head (again, considering you could just spend a turn to shoot someone in the head twice yourself). This'd at least make hackers a bit different instead of "another guy with a gun" when combat breaks out. Right now mages and physical combat characters have a nice bit of differentiation going on, but when it comes to combat the hacker might as well just get out his gun and start shooting with everyone else because hacking takes too drat long (unless you're taking control of a heavily armed drone or combat vehicle that your weapon couldn't damage, then it can be worth it sometimes).
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 09:47
|
|
|
Baby Babbeh posted:Yeah, while it IS a little dumb from a realism point of view that your robot arms need wifi, the alternative is basically having the hacker have to cower in the corner while his player sits on his rear end whenever a fight breaks out, as it often does. Giving them something to do that's not shooting fools which can meaningfully add to combat is only a good thing. Does it need wifi? No. Would the corps want it to have wifi? Yes and there are so many fantastic big brother plot-hooks you can do with it for both the corps and the runners, just thinking of the people with cyber-eyes alone. Plant a hacked program inside some corporate wageslave cybereyes, have it record the inside of his corporate building, upload the video back, use it to get security info for the run. Toplowtech fucked around with this message at 14:17 on May 5, 2013 |
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 14:10
|
|
|
Yea it totally works that a corp would want everyone who buys Robo-Arms 2000 to be connected totally just for innocent updates on the software, no other purposes at all, we swear. Also it'll let me force a dude to smack himself with robot arms and cackle 'stop hitting yourself', so, ya know, I'm in.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 15:44
|
|
|
children overboard posted:And hopefully let them do it in a single turn instead of the current "find signal, find signal, hack, hack, hack" system where the combat's over by the time they've got a user-account to one dude's arm. Considering that in one turn other characters can fire two grenades, launch an unstoppable stunball, unleash an undodgeable long burst, or mind control a half-dozen enemies, I wouldn't think it overpowered for a hacker to turn someone's eyes off in one turn. Or, if they're really good, take control of someone's cyberarm and make them shoot themselves in the head (again, considering you could just spend a turn to shoot someone in the head twice yourself). Well, in the main rulebook it does say you can spoof commands to weapons and the like. SR4 pg 236 posted:Clockwork’s team would be okay if it weren’t for the gal with the heavy machine gun. She has them pinned down in the jungle, unable to move. He needs to do something, and quick! He already has the soldier’s access ID, so all he needs to do is spoof an appropriate command to her weapon. Clockwork signals his team to get ready and sends the machine gun a spoofed command. Clockwork rolls his Hacking 4 plus his Spoof 5 program. The weapon has a Device Rating of 4, and rolls 8 dice in the Opposed Test. Clockwork gets 4 hits, while the machine gun gets 3. It obeys his command to eject its ammo box and the soldier is left with an empty weapon as the hacker’s teammates charge. I guess it'd still be a minimum of two turns since you have to get the enemy's access ID first.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 15:58
|
|
|
Martello posted:Well, in the main rulebook it does say you can spoof commands to weapons and the like. Cyberlimbs are all Rating 0 though so unless you are literally hugging the other guy you can't hack his eyes or arms.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 16:32
|
|
|
Piell posted:Cyberlimbs are all Rating 0 though so unless you are literally hugging the other guy you can't hack his eyes or arms.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 16:39
|
|
|
Couldn't you use some form of gun or crossbow thing to launch a tiny hacking drone thing with a wireless connection you can use to take over their stuff? Might be slightly hard to aim with and not particularly practical in any way.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 17:35
|
|
|
Poil posted:Couldn't you use some form of gun or crossbow thing to launch a tiny hacking drone thing with a wireless connection you can use to take over their stuff? Might be slightly hard to aim with and not particularly practical in any way. That's why you get smoke grenades packed full of RFID tags 
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 18:08
|
|
|
Poil posted:Couldn't you use some form of gun or crossbow thing to launch a tiny hacking drone thing with a wireless connection you can use to take over their stuff? Might be slightly hard to aim with and not particularly practical in any way. I'm trying to figure out if Sixth World Almanac is worth getting. Or 3rd Ed Shadows of Asia. I'm looking for more info on China in the Sixth world; I've been listening to the China History Podcast, so it's been on my mind lately. Or maybe I should put all this on hold till 5th Edition comes out?
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 22:01
|
|
|
Rockopolis posted:I'm trying to figure out if Sixth World Almanac is worth getting. Or 3rd Ed Shadows of Asia. I'm looking for more info on China in the Sixth world; I've been listening to the China History Podcast, so it's been on my mind lately. Sixth World Alemanac is only worth it if you're into collecting SR books for the sake of it. It's a horrible mess of editing and language errors, with text copy-pasted from all over the place; text copy-pasted into the wrong section; and text copy-pasted to create duplicate entries. If you want a timeline of the game, there are ones done by 9-year-olds on cached geocities websites that will provide a more coherent, complete, and structured package. Shadows of Asia is a good old world book. The section on China isn't particularly long, but it's decent enough.
|
|
#
?
May 5, 2013 22:37
|
|
|
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but what is the most common way in the newest 4EA rules for fixers and other covert contacts to get in touch with runners? Everyone needs to be off the grid and encrypted, right? So are there encrypted phone/commlink channels or encrypted email accounts? Private message boards? How am I going to get the team's contacts in touch with them safely and securely? Back in 2nd edition we had people do short phone calls to set up face-to-face meetings but that was back in high school before the internet existed IRL. These days (in-game) with everything being wireless and more easily traceable things like phone calls seem less secure. Also I'm glad I didn't allow any hackers in my current campaign. Holy crap there is so much confusion and variance in personal preferences for how powerful hackers should be. My team's hackers will all be NPCs assigned to the by the fixer for each mission and they're going to do legwork and carry a gun and that's it. I understand that veteran players who like to play hackers want to be more than legworkers with guns, but as a GM with new players that would just be nightmarish. Elephant Ambush fucked around with this message at 14:36 on May 6, 2013 |
|
#
?
May 6, 2013 14:34
|
|
|
Elephant Ambush, I usually either have throw-away commcodes and fake SINs that you can give out to contacts. Now, honestly, if my mage was in the middle of a run, I'd have most of that poo poo off or dialed down so as not to be disturbed - but outside, it's probably pretty easy to get in contact with a runner if you have his commcode.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2013 16:39
|
|
|
I'm currently running an SR game where my runners are entering a police academy. One of the interactive bits I want to run them through is a "kill-house" with pop-up enemies that they have to decide whether or not to shoot. I'm trying to figure out a creative way to do this at the table - even though I know their characters will be better equipped than the players would be... I could always have them roll a perception test (or a reaction test) to decide whether or not to fire, but I would prefer to figure out something I can use at the table. Maybe have cards printed with friend/foe images and have them roll their dice in under 1 second if they see something they want to shoot? (Have to be quick or be dead, etc.) Anyone have any suggestions for an interactive component to this?
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2013 17:55
|
|
|
Kenderama posted:I'm currently running an SR game where my runners are entering a police academy. One of the interactive bits I want to run them through is a "kill-house" with pop-up enemies that they have to decide whether or not to shoot. I have had a lot of luck using an out of game timer to rush the players actions. You could have a timer set to 30 seconds and hold up sheets of paper with three innocent/hostile icons, labeled A B & C. The players would have to yell out what letters they shoot and at the end you tally the score. There wouldn't be any rolling though and is more of an ooc test then ic, but fun is fun.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2013 19:22
|
|
|
Alternatively, have make a list of details about each cutout. Perception+Reaction test, each hit/2 hits/whatever gets them another detail about the cutout, then they have to decide.
|
|
#
?
May 6, 2013 21:08
|
|
|
Quick rules question since I can't seem to figure it out from the core book. I'm trying to plan ahead for a possible scenario in an upcoming game: The runners are supposed to hijack a truck full of supplies like food and medicine and stuff. One of the party members is a mage with Stunball. The trailer of the truck has 2 security guards inside. Once the trailer door is open, can the mage throw an indirect Stunball in there to knock the guards out without LOS? Like, could she target one of the inner walls and let the stunblast go out from there? Also, will Stunball damage crates of food and medical supplies?
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 02:13
|
|
|
No, a stunball is an area direct spell, which means it targets multiple opponents that the caster can perceive in a tight radius. If you want to hit people grenade style, you need an indirect spell... like fireball, or blast, or toxic wave. Stunball or powerball, viewed targets only, no blast. Other stuff, wreck everything in the truck.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 02:17
|
|
|
Mystic Mongol posted:No, a stunball is an area direct spell, which means it targets multiple opponents that the caster can perceive in a tight radius. If you want to hit people grenade style, you need an indirect spell... like fireball, or blast, or toxic wave. Thanks! Looks like the rest of the party will have to try to draw fire or distract the guards while the mage tries to draw LOS. Teamwork! Glad to know that Stunball doesn't blow up food. That would defeat the whole purpose of the mission.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 04:03
|
|
|
I always just saw stunball as a kamehameha that knocks people out, how off was that?
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 07:54
|
|
|
Mordaedil posted:I always just saw stunball as a kamehameha that knocks people out, how off was that? I love elemental area spells. They are horrendously draining but so much fun. For example sand spells has a chance to wreck any weapon or equipment not suitable for desert environment.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 09:55
|
|
|
Supposedly SR5 may launch at Origins next month, and they've got a "learn the rules" game coming up at Gen Con. I wonder if I should bother going to Origins since I'm just going to get the pdf anyway.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 11:54
|
|
|
Elephant Ambush posted:Thanks! Looks like the rest of the party will have to try to draw fire or distract the guards while the mage tries to draw LOS. Teamwork! Glad to know that Stunball doesn't blow up food. That would defeat the whole purpose of the mission. We scrape together our money. We bleed our village try to hire the seven of you, we give you our best supplies and host you in our finest house. Horhez will die without the medicine we couldn't buy, all to pay your fees. And the rice you bring us is asleep? drat you all, and drat me to hell as well, for trusting miserable, stinking shadowrunners.
|
|
#
?
May 10, 2013 16:45
|
|
|
Bigass Moth posted:Supposedly SR5 may launch at Origins next month, and they've got a "learn the rules" game coming up at Gen Con. I wonder if I should bother going to Origins since I'm just going to get the pdf anyway. Probably not, they just posted this update on twitter 45 minutes ago: 16 hours on SR5 proofing...about half way through inputting p. XX/comments into the PDF...crashing for a few hours before starting again rnb
|
|
#
?
May 11, 2013 08:09
|
|
|
Mystic Mongol posted:We scrape together our money. We bleed our village try to hire the seven of you, we give you our best supplies and host you in our finest house. Horhez will die without the medicine we couldn't buy, all to pay your fees. And the rice you bring us is asleep? drat you all, and drat me to hell as well, for trusting miserable, stinking shadowrunners. I wanted corn, NOT POPCORN! 
|
|
#
?
May 11, 2013 11:03
|
|
|
SirFozzie posted:Probably not, they just posted this update on twitter 45 minutes ago: Haha proofreading, funny joke. It's going to be 90% cut and paste.
|
|
#
?
May 11, 2013 12:56
|
|
|
Proofreading: Selecting 'defiantly' from the spell checker instead of 'definitely'.
|
|
#
?
May 11, 2013 19:21
|
|
|
What's the consensus for Adepts using Mentor Spirits? There are a few Mentor bonuses that would work for Adepts, but only a very few. As a GM I'm sure I could figure out Adept equivalents for the bonuses, like this idea for Wolf with the Adept version in parentheses. Advantages: +2 dice for Combat spells (+2 dice pool for Close Combat Skill Group), +2 dice for beast spirits (+2 dice for Animal Handling). Disadvantages: A Wolf magician must succeed in a Willpower + Charisma (3) Test to retreat from a fight (same for Wolf Adept). I know the above is kinda already covered in Way of the Adept, but the Totemic Way is kinda a little weak and vague as I see it. I'd be interested to see ideas for other Adept conversions of Mentor Spirit advantage/disadvantages. I'm working on an Irish warrior adept who carries a sword, pistol, and rifle named after the three goddesses who make up the Morrigan - Badb, Macha, and Nemain. I want her to have the Morrigan herself as her mentor spirit, using the Dark Goddess mentor in Street Magic as a template. The Dark Goddess Advantages: +2 dice for Combat and Health spells (+2 dice for Close Combat Skill Group and Healing tests). Disadvantages: Ruled by extremes of both creation and destruction, followers of the Dark Goddess oft en relish in confrontation. They must make a Willpower + Charisma (3) Test to avoid escalating a conflict, no matter how small, into a major clash, whether physical, mental, or social.
|
|
#
?
May 13, 2013 03:57
|
|
|
The problem with giving adepts a five BP +2 to two useful skill advantage is that it's yet another reason to 'dip' into being an adept without doing as much as is needed to address the adept/samurai gulf. Two extra dice on their melee attacks is nice and all, but those are terrible anyway. All it does is incentivise street samurai dropping 5 BP on adept, 5 more on mentor spirit, and leaving their magic at garbage.
|
|
#
?
May 13, 2013 04:57
|
|
|
Catalyst just said 5E PDF Preview 2 should be out this week
|
|
#
?
May 14, 2013 17:53
|
|
|
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/114622/Shadowrun%2C-Fifth-Edition-Preview-%232 Preview is out. Ugh, the Limits thing is insidious. I know they're trying to limit the "uber-success" issue, but that was half the fun of rolling that many dice.
|
|
#
?
May 16, 2013 23:40
|
|
|
I enjoy the writing style in Preview 2, but I am disappointed: It doesn't include the actual formulae for calculating Limits. I wasn't sure the preview would include any of the actual character gen rules or not. (For those who haven't yet looked: It doesn't.) Removing the concept of 'Limits' from the game might be a reasonable Cinematic Rule.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 03:08
|
|
|
SirFozzie posted:Ugh, the Limits thing is insidious. I know they're trying to limit the "uber-success" issue, but that was half the fun of rolling that many dice. I'm worry about using attribute stat as limit factor for physical, mental, and social. It would put more emphasis on Attribute than or equal to skill, but attribute is expensive, so it could become a team balance issue like a team with a player having 3 (probably human) physical limit while the other have 7 physical limit (probably troll). It could be a problem for GM since I think physical include dodging, which mean the human gunner with 3 physical limit will have a harder time if GM set the balance at the troll player's level or just have troll enemy.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 03:54
|
|
|
In reading through this second preview, it seems like Accuracy is the end-all stat for weapons, so apparently there will still be SUPERGUNS that are no-brainer choices since guns within the same category can have different accuracy stats. Also the header picture on every other page is an upshot of some dude's nostrils. WTF? Bigass Moth fucked around with this message at 15:33 on May 17, 2013 |
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 15:26
|
|
|
It's that weird androgynous motherfucker from the cover of On the Run. Why he's a page header is anybody's guess.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 15:54
|
|
|
Nyaa posted:Agree. It's an issue but it sure is funny when it happens and this should be a decent fix for it, but ruin the fun. I mused (over on RPG.NET's 5e thread that it could be the average of the relevant attributes, and one of the guys under NDA said: You're closer than most guesses I've seen, but if the bosses want the exact formula to wait, we've gotta let it wait. Close, though!
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 16:44
|
|
|
One thing that I hate, and I don't know if it's true with other RPGs, is how smug the freelancers that work on Shadowrun are. I dare you to read any post by Bull on Dumpshock or SR.com and not want to reach through your computer and smack him.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 16:48
|
|
|
Actually, I don't get that vibe talking with Bull at all (either on RPG.net or in their Neverwinter Guild)
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 17:37
|
|
|
I'm legit happy he isn't like that in real life, but that is the vibe I've gotten from him and other SR freelancers over a decade+ at Dumpshock.
|
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 18:14
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 03:55 |
|
|
SirFozzie posted:Actually, I don't get that vibe talking with Bull at all (either on RPG.net or in their Neverwinter Guild) Yeah Bull's a chill guy as are most of the freelancers. I think you'd be kinda short too if you had 2500+ idiots all screaming at you for imagined slights.  Nyaa posted:Agree. It's an issue but it sure is funny when it happens and this should be a decent fix for it, but ruin the fun. Remember this, however. "Push the Limit" lets you spend an Edge to ignore limits on test AND you get rule of Six. So you can blow past your limits in a most amazing way - and makes edge even more awesome as a stat. Kenderama fucked around with this message at 19:00 on May 17, 2013 |
|
#
?
May 17, 2013 18:57
|
|