[Mercy Merchant]

Yep.  Body of 2.  I need to improve that as well.  This is my very first character so there are several things not done well.

[Thvor]

It's not that it's not done well; it's just that you didn't min/max your character to within an inch of her life. Sam's got four stats at 2, which does limit what he can do (I'm not bothering to sprint around the building, for instance, since he'd have a dice pool of one for that). But he's really good at the things he's designed for.

Some characters are designed to excel at a small set of skills (witness Con's shooting & dodging). Others are more "realistic" and balanced. Both are valid approaches to character design, with different strengths and weaknesses.

One issue with min/max'ed characters is that a good GM will start throwing min/max'ed enemies at them to make the battles closer--such as this sniper, whose attack seems to be designed specifically so he has a chance of hitting Con. A "normal" enemy (such as you're likely to find in most pre-fab adventures) is designed for more balanced characters, and simply wouldn't have a chance against our gunman.

[Mercy Merchant]

Unfortunately, if the guy is designed to go after Con, then I am pretty well overmatched.  Having the coat mentioned would help, but I was saving to be able to upgrade some software.  I guess that will need to wait as I will probably need the armor protection more.

[Thvor]

One nice thing about Sam's build is that he doesn't require much nuyen for upkeep or upgrades (of course, the downside is that he needs karma for upgrades, which is harder to get). If you're scraping the bottom of the barrel and need more to be effective, you might consider having Snow approach Sam about it--it's not something he'd think of on his own. But he'd be open to sharing to help the team out, especially if he's compensated*.

* I'm sure Snow could help him with his Russian, if nothing else.

[Necrogigas]

One issue with min/max'ed characters is that a good GM will start throwing min/max'ed enemies at them to make the battles closer--such as this sniper, whose attack seems to be designed specifically so he has a chance of hitting Con. A "normal" enemy (such as you're likely to find in most pre-fab adventures) is designed for more balanced characters, and simply wouldn't have a chance against our gunman.

To give numbers to Thvor's example, O'Connor is a dodge tank, so he was able to weave through a couple dozen shots from the goons at the strip joint. On the other hand, the sniper hit (an injured) O'Connor on the third try.

The GM will also take advantage of the min part of a build. For example, O'Connor has a mediocre Body and Willpower, so he's not great at mitigating magical attacks like he is physical ones. Hence Crossbow knocked out O'Connor with Sammy's spirit in a single round at the start of this run, and then nearly succeeded in one shotting him with that fireball.

[farothel]

I can also loan you some nuyen (and we can make it a shopping trip  ), as a mage is also a karma-heavy character, whereas a hacker is nuyen-heavy.  It's one of those things that is often difficult as GM in Shadowrun, to find the correct balance between the two (give too much karma to a hacker and he buys all the skills that exist, give too much nuyen to a mage and after a couple of runs he buys a permanent high lifestyle and retires).  It's not easy, I know.

I only have 1 stat at 2 (edge), but as Ork, I begin with a body of 4 (which I have at that level).  The advantage is that in most situations, I can do something, but I won't shine in any of them.  And I've been building characters in a large number of systems (including some even worse than Shadowrun) for almost twenty years now, so I have experience in this.  I also like building characters (for our L5R campaign, I already have created about 10 back-up characters, which I hope I won't need all).

for me the most important things to buy as soon as we get extra karma is edge and counterspelling (and magic, but that costs quite a bit at this point).

[Necrogigas]

Speaking of O'Connor's weakness to Magic, farothel, how good are you at counterspelling?

[farothel]

I don't have that skill (I was a trid mage, counterspelling is not needed on stage).  It's top priority as soon as we get karma.

[Crossbow]

I think I am vaguely offended, but you guys are having a rough time with this, so I will forgive

[HydroRaven]

So I am guessing Clem is next? And if so, does she still have a shot or did the sniper clear the room completely?

[Crossbow]

She has no shot unless she wants to take a chance on blind fire through walls.  You can get most of the way to the window, but you won't reach it until the first pass next round.

[farothel]

@Hydro: how did you try to contact Sammy, since I still haven't got my commlink on (I was told to put it off, so it's still off, and I also haven't had much time to put it back on). 

I think my next action will to be to look for the rest of the team, but I'm not going to move for now.  And if I see the sniper, I'll try to take him out of course.

@Mercy: do you have a docwagon contract?  If so, I assume it will go off now.

[Mercy Merchant]

Nope.  I was not knowledgeable enough to get one of those, either.

[HydroRaven]

Clem thinks everyone has their link back on so she sent a message. Hopefully Torley can see the message and maybe relay? But in any case, I don't think Snow should be deteriorating since she's not into overflow.

[Necrogigas]

Clem could use Snow's medkit since it's rating replaces the First Aid skill if used untrained, so no default penalty.