[brombur]

I have had a recurring issue with one of my group who is convinced that based on what is written in the core rule book that Glitches, of any level are these life ending errors and this player actual gets all bent out of shape when I rule on a minor glitch and the effect is minimal. Due to his extremist views on crit glitches I've never actual had one because he has the other players terrified of them happening and insists they save an edge point just in case.

So the question is did I miss something? the few no crit glitches I've ran into were dealt with as follows

1 -  A gang member on look out and stationed on a rooftop that the team was sneaking up rolled a glitch on his perception check to notice their approach. I decided that, in character with the gang mentality, the thug would completely choose to ignore being on watch and turn his back to the team (funny moment he went to the edge overlooking an alley and started to relieve himself into the street below). A few moments later when turned back and they shot him he fell backward into the alley. This player was in an uproar that I had used the gang member glitch to screw the party because him falling might raise an alarm.

2 - While working on to access a maglock a glitch occurred and I ruled that one of the bolts holding the panel had gotten ruined and that raised the time needed to remove the panel and put it at risk of becoming stuck and preventing a quite removal. No complaint on this one.

3 - There were a couple in last nights session which came up while taking a few medium range shots at some approaching enemies. All came on called shot attempts. Two glitches were regulars that were also hits I removed the +2dv for vitals the players were going for. the 3rd shot was a miss so a crit, edged to a regular glitch. Since the character wasn't in any real pressure at that time it seemed pointless to have a gun jam or anything that would create extra dice rolls so I ruled the shot a miss and moved on figuring anything else would have just been a time drag.  This player had a mini meltdown over how nothing happened on this glitch.

I frankly don't understand. Maybe I'm missing something
thoughts?

[Marcus]

Glitch should be a complications, a complication shouldn't be life threatening but should disruptive to a given plan. A Critical Glitch, should reasonably serious, but keep in mind the skill being rolled. Something things are more obvious then others. A Critical Glitch while researching send you down a dangerous wrong track, it shouldn't guaranteed death or anything. But it should be a reasonably dangerous situation that's not going to advance the plot, or at least trigger some background issue for a character.

1 I think that's fine, plan disrupted no big deal.

2 Again plan disrupted, increased the tension but no huge deal.

3 I agree the easy out would have been jamming the gun. But this could still be a more fun alternative the shot might have accidentally trigger something else. And there's still time, player don't get see the full picture that missed bullet is found by the cops and now they are on the hunt for that character's Gun. It's not the end of the world, but the Cops have ballistics on file. Disruptive but not super dangerous. Mostly likely the character will just have to replace the weapon.

[SpellBinder]

1:  The ganger turning to take a piss for the glitched Perception check is actually pretty good.  I think they have no real right to complain about the ganger falling after getting shot.  I've got the feeling that shooting him wasn't necessary, so the consequences may have been well warranted by the actions.

2:  Seems perfectly alright for the situation.  Steel screws can rust, all screws can get over torqued, etc.

3:  In doing my story writing I do track skills and do dice rolls, and in ranged combat have had a few glitches come up.  One that I can recall off hand I wrote in as a bad shell.  Nothing difficult in that one, just a little spent time to manually work the slide and clear the chamber.  Of course, in the middle of a firefight a little time to do this can be a big issue.  IIRC, back in SR3 a glitch with Ex-Ex ammo actually meant the shell exploded in the gun and the shooter took its damage instead.  I'm with Marcus here that something should happen to that third shot, that it will be somehow discovered and reported to the LEOs.

[Sphinx]

I've always treated a glitch as something embarrassing or inconvenient, and a critical glitch as something damaging or disruptive. When explaining the difference to new players, I use a basic attack test as an example: On a glitch, your gun jams. On a critical glitch, it explodes. Obviously, you want to change things up so you don't get the same result for every glitch, but that's my guideline. Looking at your examples ...

1: The gang member's glitch shouldn't hurt the players. If falling off the roof HAD triggered an alarm, your player might have had a valid complaint. But it didn't, so the point is moot.

2: Seems perfectly fine to me.

3: Remember that a glitch doesn't cancel the success. A glitch on an otherwise successful attack test shouldn't make the shot miss, just introduce an unfortunate unintended consequence. Having law enforcement recover the bullet is good. Maybe the shot goes through the target and wounds a civilian in the background. Maybe the optics get knocked out of line and the weapon can't make any called shots until it's recalibrated. If you're stumped, ask the players for suggestions.

[Kiirnodel]

First off, your player is being disruptive, and is flat-out wrong. The book is very explicit that glitches are not supposed to be "life-ending" by any measure. Even a critical glitch only "puts the character's life at risk" and doesn't immediately end it... Tell them to re-read the second paragraph under the Glitches header on page 45.

Second, there are actually three possible ways to get a glitch. Successful glitch, a failed gltch, and a critical glitch. Many people overlook the fact that failing a test while glitching is not the same thing as a critical glitch. Critical glitches only occur when you get enough 1's to glitch while also not getting any successes. Glitching on an attack where you simply don't get more hits than the defender (but still got a hit or two) is just a regular glitch, not a critical one.

1. The argument that the glitch penalized the players (even potentially) is fallacious. You made a ruling about what the glitch meant (ganger blew off watch duty and turned his back to take a leak). The players then chose to shoot him while he was still next to the edge of the building. At that point it is on them, they could have chosen to sneak past him entirely, or waited until he was away from the edge, or evendors moved in for a melee attack. The player is being sore, and trying to blame you for the group's failure at foresight. Bullets cause knockdown, true story.

2. This is a great example of a glitch, and is reflected in the specific rules for glitching on an extended test. Make sure to check out those rules if you haven't already.

3. Personally, I would suggest doing different things with glitches each time (not every glitch is the same), but saying that a glitch negates the effect of the called shot is good. It gives a bit of a penalty without negating the entire attack. The missed attack has a couple aspects to it, though. I mention above that it is possible to miss, glitch, and not critical. If I read your situation right, I think this might be what happened.  In which case, spending the edge negated the glitch entirely.

[Marcus]

I do agree that variety is important, always keep'em guessing.