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Does 4 I.P.s seem excessive?

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Dakka

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« Reply #30 on: <10-15-10/1958:43> »
Ok, but 4 is still one more action than the drone would normally get, even after spending the 5th IP on controlling the vehicle.  Also, what if the drone is stationary.  If its not moving it makes little sense to require a drive action to not crash.

Kontact

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« Reply #31 on: <10-15-10/2018:33> »
Hunh.  I thought vehicle tests were only a chase combat thing, not a tactical combat thing too. 

My bad.  :-[

Ultra Violet

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« Reply #32 on: <10-15-10/2133:02> »
The whole 5 IP in meat space is overpowered and breaks (or bends) the ground rule, that nothing is faster than 4 IP...
In my opinion there should be a sentence like: The 5. IP must be spend on Matrix actions.

But since there is nothing like that, it lies in GM hands.

In the moment a power rigged drone is the quickest thing in the SR-Universe!
If you and your group can live with that, fine. If not, you need some arguments why not. (And that is my greatest concern.)

@A1
Overactive imagination? ;) Don't be afraid - she is only a child. She can't do you any harm. 8)

Dakka

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« Reply #33 on: <10-18-10/0328:44> »
Using Command on a drone to remote control it IS a matrix action.  One that interacts with the physical world, but it's a matrix action.

The_Gun_Nut

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« Reply #34 on: <10-18-10/0605:55> »
Hence the craziness with the 5 IP's in an anthroform drone with automatic weapons.
There is no overkill.

Only "Open fire" and "I need to reload."

Ultra Violet

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« Reply #35 on: <10-18-10/0638:39> »
@The_Gun_Nut
In a Heavy Milspec Armor... there are so many scary things out there. ;)

Btw: Some little startling discovery that I did was the fact that drones have no problems with the wrong hand (lefty) they all are ambidextrous by nature. So a drone with 2 Arms doesn't have a problem, and drone with 101 Arms either. But maybe we discuss it another Thread... ;D

« Last Edit: <10-18-10/0640:25> by Ultra Violet »

FastJack

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« Reply #36 on: <10-18-10/0903:15> »
Using Command on a drone to remote control it IS a matrix action.  One that interacts with the physical world, but it's a matrix action.
Oh sure, you can sit there and tell it to move like crazy with each action. But remember, accelerating past it's Max Speed can have a lot of control issues.

Welshman

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« Reply #37 on: <10-18-10/1228:56> »
Having played a Delta maxed out Sammie in the ancient days of 2nd Edition, I can say that the new SR4A rules for initiative are a very nice progression of the rules.

The ultimate break in the system was the time the Dwarf Sammie went from the main entrance of a converted fire station, to the second floor, using shape charges to blow three doors, all in the time the Shaman was able to say "wait".

The good news is the Shaman was still at the door when the building started to collapse in the second turn.

Oh the Dwarf Sammie? He jumped out the window and was across the street watching the dust of the collapse engulf the poor shaman.

Yeah, Init is so much better than it used to be.
The Welshman
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Dakka

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« Reply #38 on: <10-18-10/1306:18> »
Do drones operating on their own have to use a pass each turn to not crash as well?

FastJack

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« Reply #39 on: <10-18-10/1337:28> »
Do drones operating on their own have to use a pass each turn to not crash as well?
Yep. It's that annoying Pilot + Maneuver  Vehicle test. ;)

Quote from: SR4A, p167
Tactical combat primarily occurs when vehicles (usually drones) are supporting (or opposing) the characters, or in pretty much any situations where flesh-and-blood characters are involved as well as vehicles. (For example, the party is trying to stop the bad guy from boarding a helicopter and getting away.)

Quote from: SR4A, p168
Tactical Combat
In standard tactical combat, a vehicle is treated as an extension of the driver. Initiative is resolved as normal.
Actions
Drivers must spend at least one Complex Action each turn driving their vehicle, or the vehicle goes out of control at the end of the Combat Turn.

Now, if you give a command to the drone to move during combat, it takes that one Complex Action to do the movement. Which is why most Riggers will remotely control or "jump in" the drones during combat.

hazmat the monstar

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« Reply #40 on: <10-18-10/1436:14> »
I'm sure it's not excessive at all to someone who's forked out the nuyen, Essence, or Power Points (depending on how they got there).

"Speed kills" isn't nearly as true in 4th edition as it used to be.  Everyone's got it easy, these days, against a dedicated speed sammie.
I wasn't really reffering to game mechanics though. I was really talking about how it would look in the real world. It seems like it would be really really really fast. A combat phase is only 3 seconds. So, to perform 3, 4, or 5 complex actions in 3 seconds seems crazy. But I'm getting over it.

Critias

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« Reply #41 on: <10-18-10/1531:52> »
Well...uhh...yeah.

That's kind of the point.  Magic and Chrome let you do superhuman stuff!

hazmat the monstar

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« Reply #42 on: <10-18-10/1537:21> »
Well...uhh...yeah.

That's kind of the point.  Magic and Chrome let you do superhuman stuff!
Thanks for dealing with my rantings Critias. You have been very helpful.

Critias

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« Reply #43 on: <10-18-10/1644:29> »
I know that's not a terribly helpful comment on my part, but it really is one of the very basic concepts of the game -- the whole reason Shadowrunners use magic and cyberware and stuff is to let them do things normal humans can't.  They can leap tremendous distances, shoot a submachinegun built right into their arm, sprout claws and razors to tear someone up with implanted weapons, fire a weapon with ridiculous accuracy, punch through an engine block, or...yes...even move amazingly quickly.

As for how it would look?  Just watch any of a handful of recent action movies that play with time as part of their combat scenes.  The slow motion/fast motion trend that 300 used, for instance, would be great for melee oriented Adepts, as would some fight scenes from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (or any number of similarly modern and elegant kung fu movies).  Look at the combat in Watchmen for more, or -- heck! -- even the fight scenes in the recent Batman: Arkham Asylum video game, or parts of Wanted, or Jet Li's The One, or a ton of other Hollywood productions.  The Matrix, too, has some excellent examples of how Shadowrun combat could look (particularly the lobby scene, for a pair of cybered-up or Adept-powered Shadowrunners tearing through a standard corpsec team!).

Any time you see the whole world slow down except for one guy who is kicking ass all over the place, you've got some sort of idea of how Wired Reflexes or Move By Wire might make the world look.

Kontact

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« Reply #44 on: <10-18-10/1745:18> »
Something else to consider when you're envisioning this kind of speed is VR.

With Cold Sim VR, you have a person acting about as fast as they can consciously think.  That's two passes.
Juicing it up to Hot Sim, you have a person's brain firing so fast that it's cooking a little.  That's three passes.
Adding a Simsense Booster directly stimulates even more of the brain, and adds serial processing capability to bypass the parts of the brain not directly involved in conscious thought.  That's four passes.
Finally, with a Simsense Accelerator, you're taking care of the digital bottleneck.  You're actually thinking faster than the machine can process, so this mod allows for greater width of transmission to give you five passes.

So, with 3-4 meat IPs you've got a person who acts faster than most people (possibly even themselves) can think.