[Stepping Razor]

This is probably a dumb question, but here goes:

By assigning C to Skills you get 28/2 points in Skills. Is the 2 part of the 28 (ie 26/2) that must be used on Group Skills or is it an additional 2 points
added to the 28 (28+ 2 SG Points)?

Thanks in advance!

[Shinobi Killfist]

additional.  So you get 28 skill points and 2 additional points for groups.

[Stepping Razor]

Niiiiice! One last question because it's connected:

Say I have a base Skill in Automatics of 6, can I get a Specialization in Assault Rifle that adds a +2, then add a Reflex Recorder for Automatics? 6(7) +2 = 9D6

Thanks!

[Michael Chandra]

There's nothing forbidding bonuses letting you go above 6 at chargen, only the base skill is capped at 6. Adepts will often start with 6 base in an offensive skill of choice and add 3 more levels with an Adept power for 6(9).

[Stepping Razor]

Awesome! Thanks for the help!

[Lusis]

There's nothing forbidding bonuses letting you go above 6 at chargen, only the base skill is capped at 6. Adepts will often start with 6 base in an offensive skill of choice and add 3 more levels with an Adept power for 6(9).

How does that work with specializations? Say if I made a Bow Adept, with an Archery Skill of 6, an Improved Skill of +2, and a specialization in Bows; would that make her overall skill:
Archery (Bow) 8(10)?

[ZeConster]

Pretty much, although the book says (suggests, really) you use "(+2)" instead of "(10)"; and since Improved Ability only increases the effective skill Rating, the skill is still level 6 for the sake of determining how much Karma it costs to increase it and for determining the maximum rating - so you could theoretically eventually have a base rating of 12, an Improved Ability level of 6, and multiple specializations, to get Archery (Bow, Crossbow) 18(+2), for example.

[RHat]

Actually, it's very important to note that a Specialization does not increase your skill - it acts as a dice pool modifier.  This is an important distinction for a number of reasons, and perhaps the best demonstration is with attacking multiple targets.  Say we take a street sam with a weapon skill of 6, a wireless smartlink, a relevant specialization, and an augmented Agility of 8.  When determining how she splits her dice pool, she would take her skill rating (as modified by anything that directly modifies the skill, such as Reflex Recorder or Improved Ability) and add her augmented Agility, for a base bool of 14 (6+8).  Then she decides to attack as many targets as she can - because her skill is 6, the maximum number of attacks she can make is 3.  So, splitting as evenly as possible, she has three pools of 5, 5, and 4, to which she then adds any modifiers - including the +2 from her smartlink and the +2 from her specialization.  Assuming no negative modifiers, her pools would then be 9, 9, and 8.

[SoulGambit]

Wait, I thought all modifiers were added before splitting the dicepool when making multiple attacks? Bah. -goes to reread that section-

[faket15]

You are right, SoulGambit. RHat is confusing SR4 and SR5 rules.

[RHat]

Just checked - could have sworn it had said that they added separately.  Man, they really screwed multiple targeting then...

Of course, the worst part is that it's extraordinarily easy to find situations where that completely breaks down (as you cannot assume that the same modifiers apply to each attack).

Regardless of the error in the example, however, it remains the case that a Specialization does not directly add to your skill - it is a dice pool modifier, and thus not a factor in anything that keys directly off of your Skill rating (like the maximum number of Improved Ability ranks).

[Michael Chandra]

This matters for Multiple Attacks because it lets you target Skill/2 enemies. So 6(+2) means that even with the +2 in play, you can only target 3.

Multiple Attacks is, by the way, really nice when you catch them by surprise... Especially once we get the Burst Fire version errata'd in.

[Elektrycerze3]

Just checked - could have sworn it had said that they added separately.  Man, they really screwed multiple targeting then...

Maybe you confused it with this bit:

Casting Multiple Spells: Some magicians have the mental discipline to weave multiple threads of mana into various spells at once. You can attempt to cast multiple spells simultaneously in the same action, even at different targets. To do this, you have to split your Spellcasting + Magic dice pool between the spells you want to cast (see Step 4), with a minimum of 1 die per spell. Since the modifiers per spell may be different, they are applied after you split the dice pool. The number of spells you can cast simultaneously is limited to your Magic attribute.

Emphasis mine.

Somewhat inconsistent.