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Drones and cyberlimbs

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Dudesomebody

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« on: <12-02-18/1248:03> »
  I have been kicking around an idea of a drone rigger using an anthrodrone as a remote body. Wont get bogged down in character data but, was wondering about drone limbs and agility upgrades. It says on page 145 of rigger 5.0 that an anthrodrone has a pair of drone arms, page 125 says you can upgrade drone arms with cyberlimb upgrades at normal cost. If I give my drone an agility upgrade and then jump in, do I use my agility or the drone arm's??
 
  The argument on whether riggers use there mental or physical attributes when jumped in is an old and ongoing one so, lets assume I use my physical attributes for the moment. While I am specifically thinking of combat checks (gunnery+agility) any specification or speculation on the arms agility would be helpful.
 

Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #1 on: <12-02-18/1250:09> »
The drone's.

But if you want citation.. it'll just end up going back to the disputes you're already aware of.

So I'm a voice in favor of interpreting the Jumping In aspect of rigging triggering the language from VR user modes of your body going limp and useless, and on that basis ALL your physical stats are meaningless in VR.
« Last Edit: <12-02-18/1251:43> by Stainless Steel Devil Rat »
RPG mechanics exist to give structure and consistency to the game world, true, but at the end of the day, you’re fighting dragons with algebra and random number generators.

Reaver

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« Reply #2 on: <12-02-18/1355:09> »
The drone's.

But if you want citation.. it'll just end up going back to the disputes you're already aware of.

So I'm a voice in favor of interpreting the Jumping In aspect of rigging triggering the language from VR user modes of your body going limp and useless, and on that basis ALL your physical stats are meaningless in VR.

This is the ruling I play with as well. (for the same reason as SSDR)

If you are jumped in and the test requires a physical stat, then the its the drone's stats that you use...
Where am I going? And why am I in a hand basket ???

Remember: You can't fix Stupid. But you can beat on it with a 2x4 until it smartens up! Or dies.

Spooky

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« Reply #3 on: <12-03-18/1324:33> »
The drone's.

But if you want citation.. it'll just end up going back to the disputes you're already aware of.

So I'm a voice in favor of interpreting the Jumping In aspect of rigging triggering the language from VR user modes of your body going limp and useless, and on that basis ALL your physical stats are meaningless in VR.

This is the ruling I play with as well. (for the same reason as SSDR)

If you are jumped in and the test requires a physical stat, then the its the drone's stats that you use...

+1 tp this, for the stated reasons.
Spooky, what do you do this pass? Shoot him with my thunderstruck gauss rifle. (Rolls)  8 hits. Does that blow his head off?

Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #4 on: <12-03-18/1401:45> »
I'll go ahead and undermine my own apparently popular position by going to the flipside:

Despite how much sense it makes to ignore physical stats, it gets really problematic if you ignore reaction and replace it with something else for rigging/Jumping in.

So, yeah.

Rigging rules really need some cleaning up :)  Whatever makes the most sense for your table is the way to go.
RPG mechanics exist to give structure and consistency to the game world, true, but at the end of the day, you’re fighting dragons with algebra and random number generators.

Michael Chandra

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« Reply #5 on: <12-03-18/1418:53> »
Reaction is partially in the brain and already was usable by Riggers in SR4.
How am I not part of the forum?? O_O I am both active and angry!

Stainless Steel Devil Rat

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« Reply #6 on: <12-03-18/1452:29> »
no matter what stat is used for agility while VR rigging/jumped in, the circumstance as described in the OP can be tricky simply because "cyberlimbs".

It'll inherently come down to GM's call when the task at hand involves just the cyberlimb(s) and when the task involves the entire drone's body, necessitating the averaging rules. 

Averaging isn't well defined.  The way chummer resolves it (and the way I also resolve it) there are six slots on the metahuman body, one for each potential cyberlimb (2 arms, 2 legs, 1 torso, 1 skull). That means there are 6 values considered for averaging.  For example if you have an agi of 3 but one cyberarm with 9 agi, your "average" is 4 for tasks where the arm helps but the task isn't resolved by just using your arm.

Whether a drone can have cybertoros or cyberskulls is dubious, and the averaging may be dealing with 4 instead of 6 values when calculating the averaged effect of agility in a drone's cyberarm...

And of course since cyberlimb stat averaging is so ill-defined, a GM could potentially ignore the concept of a "static" number of slots and judge them on a case by case basis.  Say you want to use a katana but you only have 1 augmented cyberarm.  Instead of averaging against 6 (or 4) agility values perhaps the GM might say just average between the two arms, or the 2 arms plus core (torso).  Or whatever.
« Last Edit: <12-03-18/1543:47> by Stainless Steel Devil Rat »
RPG mechanics exist to give structure and consistency to the game world, true, but at the end of the day, you’re fighting dragons with algebra and random number generators.