[Shamie]

Hello to all

Well i had my second game of SR4 a few hours ago and it was a dissaster thing was the first one was so good but after that game i found out i got some rules wrong, reading again i tried to implement the rules correctly and the game colapse.

First thing: Damage resistant test
At first i miss that rule so resolving combat was different lets say for example that Lu attacked Isao with a gun. 6p with AP-2

Lu rolls pistols + agility and got a 2 hits

ISao roll Rection and got a 1

So Lu got 1 Net hits that add to the weapon DV for a total of 7P so now we compare wether or not those 8P of DV surpass or not the Balistic armor of isao as he has 8 it doesn’t so isao receives 7 points of stun damage.

However for what I understood in the rules isao had to rolls a body + armor (isao, being an orc he has a +3, so lets said he had 8 in body) so that would mean isao would roll 16 dices to reduce damage. And this really mess our game as a enemies were no one would really get any damage done.  And ork with armor was near unstoppable.
The second thing were wired reflex.
Are combat phases a turn inside the turn?
The problem with that was that the entire party had wired reflex rating 2 except the technomancer, wich was boring for him because it felt like he lost 2 turns in every turn.

I wanted to ask more experience DMs how do they handle this things, I felt wired reflex force everysingle enemy to either get it or its equivalents or be killed in the first turn as a character could fire 6 shots from a pistol in one turn with wired while he could only shot 2 shots.
And at the same time I felts like damage resistance test made any fight against the ork with body 8 useless. I put him against an NPC with unarmed combat of 15 and when the thought the NPC made a pretty good gapple she couldn’t do anything as the ork had 15 dices to reduce any net hits that had come from the attack every turn.

I was thinking of using my missinterpretation of the rules and remove wired reflex from the game because I don’t like how it force every PC and NPC to have it or be useless in combat but maybe im seing this in a wrong way.

[SwampFox]

Okay, let's address these one at a time.

First off, yes it's body+armor to soak damage from a weapon.  You roll whatever the armor type that's applicable to the attack (ballistic for projectile weapons, impact for melee) adjusted for any special effects of the weapon and/or ammo.  So let's say that Isao has a Body of 8 and is wearing an armored jacket.  He rolls 16 dice minus the number of -AP applied to the weapon.  In this case, -1 AP, so he rolls 15 dice to soak 7 boxes of stun damage.  If the damage of a weapon is greater than the armor of the target, it's physical damage.

Second, yes and no.  Basically extra combat phases are sort of like extra turns, however you can't move more than your standard movement rate for the entire collection of combat phases.  So say a human has three combat phases.  He can move 30 meters total.  it's up to the player how they chop up that movement.  And the Technomancer should have been doing something in VR or AR, which owuld have brought htem "up to speed" with the rest of the party.

[All4BigGuns]

Actually, it isn't up to the player under RAW how to divide movement. Without house rules you divide movement rates by the highest number of passes, so if a bunch of 1 IP people are fighting a 4 IP badass, everyone gets their movement cut to peanuts (which is why I house rule movement rates to per pass rather than per turn).

[foolofsound]

It's not hard to kill anyone is shadowrun. Give that ork some Long/Full Bursts; he'll soon learn to not stand out in the open.

Honestly, the first thing guards should be doing when they see enemies who are obviously using Wired Reflexes or similar is call in backup. Give your 1 IP enemies a dose of cram or jazz, so they can keep up with the PCs. Basically, every character that expects combat should have access to 2 Initiative Passes (and your technomancer should be doing his own thing in the Matrix at 3 IPs, anyway). Even if your players all have 3 passes, that should only give them a moderate edge over their enemies (don't forget to give security guards the Home Ground quality, to get them more on par with your players).

Besides, the guards shooting at the characters shouldn't generally be their primary threat. The bigger threat is that they can put the facility on alert; activating turrets, drones, ect.

[Orvich]

Running over to slap the big "Call the po-po(-equivalent)" button.

[Noble Drake]

On the fist matter, I recommend considering the alternate rule explained on page 75 of the Shadowrun 20th Anniversary core rulebook - instead of rolling the Damage Resistance test, you simply subtract the armor value from the damage done. It keeps things moving pretty fast by cutting down on rolls, but it does make it a little harder to cause damage to heavily armored characters.

As for the idea of an indestructable Orc with 16 dice for damage resistance... a shot from a heavy pistol, an Ares Predator IV for example, has a minimum 6 damage value for a successful attack, meaning that a target would need around 18 dice to regularly shrug off the damage or have some seriously good luck with his dice. Wounds add up, even the little ones, as every 3 damage results in a wound penalty that drives their dice pools to avoid getting shot towards zero - and with multiple shots against them the defense drops as well, and burst fire or full-auto can reduce that defense even further.

Your "indestructable" Orc could end up having a character shooting and SMG at him in two short burst per Initiative Phase, which would mean his first Reaction roll would be at -2 (because of the wide burst rules) and his Reaction roll to avoid the second burst would be at -3 (2 penalty from wide burst + 1 penalty from being attacked more than once). If you have more than one shooter, you quickly have an Orc with no defense at all against incoming damage other than to roll Damage resistance.

For Initiative Passes, it seems like you are saying that you think a guy with 3 Initiative passes gets all 3 of them at the same time, and that is incorrect - everyone gets to take their turn once no matter how many initiative passes, then those that have 2 passes take another turn, then those with 3 passes take another turn, and so on all in order of their Initiative rolls.

If you had that right and still don't really like what it does (which I personally don't like it either), here is a house-rule I use that is basically lifted from Shadowrun 2nd Edition:
-Leave all the augmentations as they are in the book, and change nothing about the character sheet.
-When rolling initiative, instead of rolling dice equal to the initiative score of the character, roll a number of dice equal to the character's Initiative Passes and total the result (pip or number total, not number of hits).
-Add the character's Initiative Attribute to the total rolled. That is when the character takes their first action.
-Subtract 10 from each character's initiative roll, if they number is 1 or greater that character also acts on that initiative.
-Subtract 10 from each of those results, characters that still have a 1 or greater number act again on that initiative, repeat that process until no one has a number 1 or greater remaining or the character has a total of 4 times that they act.
-Re-roll each round.

To put that example in practice, let's say you have a wired guy with 3 Initiative Passes and an 11 Initiative score, a completely average guy with 1 Pass and a 6 Initiative Score, and 3 goons with 2 Passes and 8 for their Initiative score.

Their Rolls would be 3d6+11, 1d6+6, and 2d6+8 respectively. Let's say those rolls come out as 19 (2+2+4+11), 12 (6+6), and the 3 goons get 10 (1+1+8), 20 (6+6+8) and 15 (3+4+8), you would then have an initiative list that looks like this

20 - Goon 2
19 - Wired Guy
15 - Goon 3
12 - average Guy
10 - Goon 1 and Goon 2 for the 2nd time
9 - Wired Guy for the 2nd time
5 - Goon 3 for the 2nd time
2 - Average guy for the 2nd time
Then re-roll.

The rule makes it so that people without reflex boosters have a chance to act more often, and so that characters with maxed-out reflex boosters are not as likely to get as many actions - evening the playing field and making reflex boosting magic or augmentation less important overall.

[Shamie]

It's not hard to kill anyone is shadowrun. Give that ork some Long/Full Bursts; he'll soon learn to not stand out in the open.

Honestly, the first thing guards should be doing when they see enemies who are obviously using Wired Reflexes or similar is call in backup. Give your 1 IP enemies a dose of cram or jazz, so they can keep up with the PCs. Basically, every character that expects combat should have access to 2 Initiative Passes (and your technomancer should be doing his own thing in the Matrix at 3 IPs, anyway). Even if your players all have 3 passes, that should only give them a moderate edge over their enemies (don't forget to give security guards the Home Ground quality, to get them more on par with your players).

Besides, the guards shooting at the characters shouldn't generally be their primary threat. The bigger threat is that they can put the facility on alert; activating turrets, drones, ect.

actually it was the free taiwan mission they were on a boat againts the other runners in the mission. So it was a fight between shadowrunners.

Thing is it gave me the impresion that any combat build without wired reflex is useless, for example the bounty hunter in the Core doesnt have it and it seems to me that is a nice build but in a game where every character (ecxept technomancers and hackers, maybe) have wired reflex hes useless.

But that raises another question if everyone has wired reflex wouldnt be more simple if noone has them? If its something that gave such an inmense advantage to the point as you said that "any combat oriented character should have it" wouldnt be more simple if noone has it? or that wire reflex one gave you ONE more passes with no more rating?

[foolofsound]

the bounty hunter in the Core doesnt have it and it seems to me that is a nice build

Most of the book sample characters are pretty terrible by the standards of most groups. Having additional IP is a major advantage in combat: that is why there is no excuse for for having less than 2 (remember how cheap cram/jazz are). A character with 3 IP is only slightly better than one with 2.

Also, remember that EVERYONE takes their first IP pass (meaning each character only gets one turn), then everyone with 2+ IP takes another pass, then everyone with 3+ IP takes another, and so on.

[Shamie]

On the fist matter, I recommend considering the alternate rule explained on page 75 of the Shadowrun 20th Anniversary core rulebook - instead of rolling the Damage Resistance test, you simply subtract the armor value from the damage done. It keeps things moving pretty fast by cutting down on rolls, but it does make it a little harder to cause damage to heavily armored characters.

As for the idea of an indestructable Orc with 16 dice for damage resistance... a shot from a heavy pistol, an Ares Predator IV for example, has a minimum 6 damage value for a successful attack, meaning that a target would need around 18 dice to regularly shrug off the damage or have some seriously good luck with his dice. Wounds add up, even the little ones, as every 3 damage results in a wound penalty that drives their dice pools to avoid getting shot towards zero - and with multiple shots against them the defense drops as well, and burst fire or full-auto can reduce that defense even further.

Your "indestructable" Orc could end up having a character shooting and SMG at him in two short burst per Initiative Phase, which would mean his first Reaction roll would be at -2 (because of the wide burst rules) and his Reaction roll to avoid the second burst would be at -3 (2 penalty from wide burst + 1 penalty from being attacked more than once). If you have more than one shooter, you quickly have an Orc with no defense at all against incoming damage other than to roll Damage resistance.

For Initiative Passes, it seems like you are saying that you think a guy with 3 Initiative passes gets all 3 of them at the same time, and that is incorrect - everyone gets to take their turn once no matter how many initiative passes, then those that have 2 passes take another turn, then those with 3 passes take another turn, and so on all in order of their Initiative rolls.

If you had that right and still don't really like what it does (which I personally don't like it either), here is a house-rule I use that is basically lifted from Shadowrun 2nd Edition:
-Leave all the augmentations as they are in the book, and change nothing about the character sheet.
-When rolling initiative, instead of rolling dice equal to the initiative score of the character, roll a number of dice equal to the character's Initiative Passes and total the result (pip or number total, not number of hits).
-Add the character's Initiative Attribute to the total rolled. That is when the character takes their first action.
-Subtract 10 from each character's initiative roll, if they number is 1 or greater that character also acts on that initiative.
-Subtract 10 from each of those results, characters that still have a 1 or greater number act again on that initiative, repeat that process until no one has a number 1 or greater remaining or the character has a total of 4 times that they act.
-Re-roll each round.

To put that example in practice, let's say you have a wired guy with 3 Initiative Passes and an 11 Initiative score, a completely average guy with 1 Pass and a 6 Initiative Score, and 3 goons with 2 Passes and 8 for their Initiative score.

Their Rolls would be 3d6+11, 1d6+6, and 2d6+8 respectively. Let's say those rolls come out as 19 (2+2+4+11), 12 (6+6), and the 3 goons get 10 (1+1+8), 20 (6+6+8) and 15 (3+4+8), you would then have an initiative list that looks like this

20 - Goon 2
19 - Wired Guy
15 - Goon 3
12 - average Guy
10 - Goon 1 and Goon 2 for the 2nd time
9 - Wired Guy for the 2nd time
5 - Goon 3 for the 2nd time
2 - Average guy for the 2nd time
Then re-roll.

The rule makes it so that people without reflex boosters have a chance to act more often, and so that characters with maxed-out reflex boosters are not as likely to get as many actions - evening the playing field and making reflex boosting magic or augmentation less important overall.

Oh i see, part of the problem was quantity. I think the Missions of SR have to be taken with a grain of salt. It should be at least 2 NPC enemies per character so in the case of the free taiwan it should have been 8 shadowrunners enemies instead of 4.

But that house rule is interesting, i may have to really memorize it before using it but sound interesting

Another house rule that got in my head was to put a -modifier for every IP for example: second IP you get a -2 then a -3  in your third IP then a -4 in your fourth IP for all actions

the bounty hunter in the Core doesnt have it and it seems to me that is a nice build

Most of the book sample characters are pretty terrible by the standards of most groups. Having additional IP is a major advantage in combat: that is why there is no excuse for for having less than 2 (remember how cheap cram/jazz are). A character with 3 IP is only slightly better than one with 2.

Also, remember that EVERYONE takes their first IP pass (meaning each character only gets one turn), then everyone with 2+ IP takes another pass, then everyone with 3+ IP takes another, and so on.

What is cram/jazz?

Is there a disadvantage to having 3 IPs? If having 3  IPs is only slightly better than one with 2 ips, then a character with 2 ips is slightly better than a character with 1 ip?

But my question remains, if wired reflex or its equivalents is a thing that only exist for it own sake. "you have to have it because every other character has it also" and every combat turn is 1 turn with at leas 2 ips would be more easy to just remove it from the game so every turn would have 1? or if you really want to have a quick character you could have a rating 1 wired reflex (and it equivalents) giving you 2 ips max and that would be the max IPs avaible in the world.

Because i read the argument that it was the "cool thing" about being a combat character or at least the edge that a non combatant loses for his choices but truth it, it isnt. A PC has wired Rating two or three and i can tell you every combative NPC that the DM puts out there is gonna have the same. So that character isnt a special flower with reflex.

[foolofsound]

What is cram/jazz?

Is there a disadvantage to having 3 IPs? If having 3  IPs is only slightly better than one with 2 ips, then a character with 2 ips is slightly better than a character with 1 ip?

But my question remains, if wired reflex or its equivalents is a thing that only exist for it own sake. "you have to have it because every other character has it also" and every combat turn is 1 turn with at leas 2 ips would be more easy to just remove it from the game so every turn would have 1? or if you really want to have a quick character you could have a rating 1 wired reflex (and it equivalents) giving you 2 ips max.

Cram and jazz are combat drugs. Look 'em up (both Core and Arsenal have them) they're great for giving to NPCs. As to IP passes: I tend to find that having 1 more than an opponent is a mild advantage, having 2 higher is a very large advantage (since you now can Full Defend against their attacks, while still returning fire, amongst other things). Generally, 4 IPs are pretty rare though, so long as you make sure your enemies have 2 (which they have no reason not to) they shouldn't be vastly overwhelmed.

IP disadvantages? You either have to spend a significant amount of resources to get them, or else risk drug addiction. Power has a price is Shadowrun. Characters should have to make sacrifices to be powerful (invasive surgery, a lot of spent money, using part of their magic potential, ect.).

I'm not sure how powerful your team is, but SR Missions are built around low-powered teams. You do need to mod them up for well-built characters.

[Zilfer]

I'm guessing your group hasn't tackled magic yet.... but yeah having mutliple IP's is very good to take out most enemies .

[Shamie]

What is cram/jazz?

Is there a disadvantage to having 3 IPs? If having 3  IPs is only slightly better than one with 2 ips, then a character with 2 ips is slightly better than a character with 1 ip?

But my question remains, if wired reflex or its equivalents is a thing that only exist for it own sake. "you have to have it because every other character has it also" and every combat turn is 1 turn with at leas 2 ips would be more easy to just remove it from the game so every turn would have 1? or if you really want to have a quick character you could have a rating 1 wired reflex (and it equivalents) giving you 2 ips max.

Cram and jazz are combat drugs. Look 'em up (both Core and Arsenal have them) they're great for giving to NPCs. As to IP passes: I tend to find that having 1 more than an opponent is a mild advantage, having 2 higher is a very large advantage (since you now can Full Defend against their attacks, while still returning fire, amongst other things). Generally, 4 IPs are pretty rare though, so long as you make sure your enemies have 2 (which they have no reason not to) they shouldn't be vastly overwhelmed.

IP disadvantages? You either have to spend a significant amount of resources to get them, or else risk drug addiction. Power has a price is Shadowrun. Characters should have to make sacrifices to be powerful (invasive surgery, a lot of spent money, using part of their magic potential, ect.).

I'm not sure how powerful your team is, but SR Missions are built around low-powered teams. You do need to mod them up for well-built characters.

True enough they were new pcs, the standar 400 BPs and they plunge throught them without breaking a sweat.

Well the significant amount of resource im gonna guess you referr to having IP3 or 4 as 2 IP you can get in Character creation and all my players got money to throw to the roof, 250000 nuyens to spent and they didnt spend it all and buy enough guns, ammo and gadget to conquer a small nation guerrilla style. and their pc had nice stats.

Finally i decided against removing wired reflex as it could happen some players may want to be quick cutter/shooters.

However im against the "all combatant have to have it or they died" so im between
a) 2IP is maximun IPs that there are (instead of 4) and maybe i let IP3 for those legendarys commandos as NPC enemies

b) in the second IP gives you a -2 to all actions.
in the third IP gives you a -4 to all actions.
in the four IP gives you a -6 to all actions.

plus a permanent addiction to use it
mild 2IP
moderate 3IP
severe  4IP

I'm guessing your group hasn't tackled magic yet.... but yeah having mutliple IP's is very good to take out most enemies .

in the last game they tackled magic and it wasnt a problem, 1 spell per turn easy to manage. Ips doesnt apply to magic at least in my games. because for one i dislike the idea of a firehose of fireballs and as i told them "magic needs concentration wich is kind of difficult when you are a espaztic squirrel on red bull"

[foolofsound]

You can feel free to houserule it, but in my experience as a GM, houseruling something before you have gotten used to it is ill-advised (reactionary house-ruling more so). Honestly, most games work just fine without editing IP; the GM just has to learn how to deal with it (it isn't just new GMs that can get blindsided, believe me). Remember that character built under normal rules tend to be fairly powerful; if you want to give them a combat challenge, don't throw security guards/crappy runners at them. Let them have a taste of Red Samurai (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1inVewGSC55fWofK1ssF_aNHQHYX2TSBYqsAcqNF5j78/edit). That'll teach 'em how to fight with strategy (and will give your technomancer something important to do).

[Mara]

Honestly, I think you hit the nail on the head:

If you are a combat character(as in a PROFESSIONAL combat character), you are going to have Wired Reflexes, Synaptic booster,
or Move-by-wire. The reason is: you are someone who engages in combat for a LIVING.  Non-combat, support builds can get away with not having it, but if you are a professional killer, then you should have it in some form.

Security Guard Grunts should not have it, because...their job is to observe, seek cover, and report. They *SHOULD* have bio-monitors slaved to their commlinks so that when they are knocked out or die, it sends a report(if they die..it should AUTOMATICALLY trigger an Alert, or if more then one guard goes "to sleep" in close proximity, especially after an adrenaline
surge from entering into combat).  The High Threat Response Teams should be the ones with Init boosters and heavy ordinance.

Something to think on is that your team of runners are NOT a bunch of mooks off the street. The characters as generated are
supposed to have had about a year experience in the Shadows. This means they are veterans, and are, if not professionals,
then at least familiar with the concepts of "If you are drawing weapons, something has gone wrong" and "The best way to avoid getting shot is to shoot first and more."

[Shamie]

Honestly, I think you hit the nail on the head:

If you are a combat character(as in a PROFESSIONAL combat character), you are going to have Wired Reflexes, Synaptic booster,
or Move-by-wire. The reason is: you are someone who engages in combat for a LIVING.  Non-combat, support builds can get away with not having it, but if you are a professional killer, then you should have it in some form.

Security Guard Grunts should not have it, because...their job is to observe, seek cover, and report. They *SHOULD* have bio-monitors slaved to their commlinks so that when they are knocked out or die, it sends a report(if they die..it should AUTOMATICALLY trigger an Alert, or if more then one guard goes "to sleep" in close proximity, especially after an adrenaline
surge from entering into combat).  The High Threat Response Teams should be the ones with Init boosters and heavy ordinance.

Something to think on is that your team of runners are NOT a bunch of mooks off the street. The characters as generated are
supposed to have had about a year experience in the Shadows. This means they are veterans, and are, if not professionals,
then at least familiar with the concepts of "If you are drawing weapons, something has gone wrong" and "The best way to avoid getting shot is to shoot first and more."

Thing was in the game they werent professional hitman persay

They were a pair of russian mobsters with some contacts and a smuggler all with wired reflex.

But thats the thing, i dont want my game to be about veterans. I want it to be about professional or barely professional runners. How many bps would that take 300?