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[5e] First Time Building a Rigger

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8-bit

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« Reply #30 on: <08-05-14/1355:50> »
Not sure on that Cha thing, Don't believe its been said that you loose the Contacts if its raised in the final stage of CharGen.

CS covered the Electronics issue.
Ballistics pretty much covers nearly all weapons.  I mean, not Missile Launchers I don't think.  But all your "guns"
Well at 7 Dice I really didn't feel you were "conning" anyone.  Where as Etiquette helps you fit in, not stand out, so that you hopefully don't need to Con in the first place.
I dropped Athletics for Stealth.  You can change it.  But I thought not getting caught/needing to run, was more important than after the fact getting running.  That said, both are things you can buy with karma as you grow.


I'm not at my book, but, maybe drop VCR down to R1.  I'm not a Rigger, but from what I've read on the threshold reduction.  I'd never get R3 VCR any more & even R2 is going to make most stuff really easy.  Basically unless your Rigging is repeatedly doing stuff out of a Transformers or Fast & Furious movie, I think your safe for the typical high speed engagement.

Personally, I'm a fan of the Hermes Ikon.  Solid quality w/o the Price of the Avalon or Fairlight.  And more than good enough for all the times you don't have your RCC lugging along w/ you.

IMHO w/ Repair Costs & Combat Firepower, NO drone is good at combat.  Seriously, even the Steel Lynx is wounded or destroyed with a couple guys focusing on it.  So IMHO.  You want drones that can retreat quickly & get there by stealth.  So the Roto for me is solid.  Buy up 2-4 of them & use them at Long/Extreme ranges for suppressive fire from AR's,  Smoke/Booms from GL's, and Silenced direct fire from Sniper Rifles.  2 Roto's w/ Remingtons w/ Silencers & 2 Rotos with Alphas is all the firepower you'll ever need IMHO.  And 1-3 is all you'll need at Char-Gen.

For the Mechanic my concern was Loyalty = Price Break on Repairs.  I'm less concerned about him being able to acquire me a Gauss Rifle and more concerned about him cutting me a deal on repair costs which in SR5E are through the roof.  But that is just my opinion.

I treated it as if the Charisma change didn't affect anything.

Thanks for the explanation on Ballistics, that makes sense. I can see your point about Etiquette, but I'll pull one of Csjarrat's examples:

GM decides a traffic cop notices you've overstayed your parking allocation and comes to ask you what you're doing.
with CHA 2 and no skill ranks, you roll one dice at a maximum (there are lots of -ve mods for social tests) with a 1/3rd chance of getting a hit.
with the skill ranks and edge, you now stand a pretty reasonable chance of convincing him you're not up to no good, thus saving your ass and the mission.

I'm just not seeing where Etiquette helps me there, as I think its better to be able to lie my ass off about my big Van with a bunch of weapons in it than being able to fit in. The Con check is also meant to be used with Edge (Which might be naive, but I feel like 5 edge means I can spend one to push the limit on a test), so currently I'm rolling 12 dice + Explosive 6s. So, although I like your suggestion of Etiquette, I feel like Con is a little more useful for getting out of sticky situations. The point about Athletics and Stealth makes sense, although I don't think I'm sneaking past much with 4 dice and a limit of 3. Better something than nothing I guess. You're right about being able to upgrade later, I don't have to get everything right away.

I guess your right about the Control Rig, but my inspiration for an ace pilot of any craft came from this story (Hopefully I'm not breaking any rules): http://www.shadowruntabletop.com/fiction/redeye-flight/
To me, that is seriously badass how she pilots, and I just love the idea of doing the most out of the world maneuvers without even having to think about it.

I went with the Renraku Sensei due to money problems. I can always buy a better one later.

That is actually a pretty awesome idea for the drones. I can already picture the amount of mayhem those would cause. I need to go back and look at the numbers, but I'll see what I can do to fit them in.

I understand that Loyalty = price breaks, but are there parts that a Connection 1 contact can't get? I don't need weapons or anything from the Mechanic, it's more of "does he/she have the tools and parts available to repair my broken stuff". If that isn't a problem, then I might as well dump all the points into loyalty.

Tarislar

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« Reply #31 on: <08-05-14/1543:05> »
I guess your right about the Control Rig, but my inspiration for an ace pilot of any craft came from this story (Hopefully I'm not breaking any rules): http://www.shadowruntabletop.com/fiction/redeye-flight/
To me, that is seriously badass how she pilots, and I just love the idea of doing the most out of the world maneuvers without even having to think about it.

I went with the Renraku Sensei due to money problems. I can always buy a better one later.

I understand that Loyalty = price breaks, but are there parts that a Connection 1 contact can't get? I don't need weapons or anything from the Mechanic, it's more of "does he/she have the tools and parts available to repair my broken stuff". If that isn't a problem, then I might as well dump all the points into loyalty.

Here's how I look at the VCR & your Cash.
Your talking about 1/4 ?  Of your starting funds.  Allocated, basically, to reducing a "hard" maneuver from 2 Hits to 1 Hit needed.  And reducing EXTREME maneuvers from 3 Hits to 2 Needed.   9 Dice is going to average 3 Hits. 
Not counting your Edge, I think your still in shape to pull most moves out fairly easily.  You just might need edge to save your bacon in a combo of highly dangerous move + bad dice rolling comes into play.  Which shouldn't be more than once a mission or so, in most cases.

Again, that is based on my minimal understanding of the VCR in 5E as I'm currently playing a magic user.  But I have read up on the section a little.

IMHO, I'd shoot for VCR-1 now, grade dependent on cash for other options...........  And then shoot for a VCR-2-Alpha/Beta/Delta as a long term goal.

Sensei?  Is that the L3 one for 1K.  That is my next favorite one at Char-Gen after the Ikon.

For for the parts/contact.  If you were asking him to repair a Helo or Tank or something w/ an Assault Cannon mounted on it.  Then sure, maybe Connection is going to come into play.  But the NPC is a Mechanic.  He should have a full repair shop.  Basic/Upgrade car parts shouldn't be an issue at all.  Even Drones have to be pretty common at repair shops in 2075.

8-bit

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« Reply #32 on: <08-05-14/1659:03> »
Here's how I look at the VCR & your Cash.
Your talking about 1/4 ?  Of your starting funds.  Allocated, basically, to reducing a "hard" maneuver from 2 Hits to 1 Hit needed.  And reducing EXTREME maneuvers from 3 Hits to 2 Needed.   9 Dice is going to average 3 Hits. 
Not counting your Edge, I think your still in shape to pull most moves out fairly easily.  You just might need edge to save your bacon in a combo of highly dangerous move + bad dice rolling comes into play.  Which shouldn't be more than once a mission or so, in most cases.

Again, that is based on my minimal understanding of the VCR in 5E as I'm currently playing a magic user.  But I have read up on the section a little.

IMHO, I'd shoot for VCR-1 now, grade dependent on cash for other options...........  And then shoot for a VCR-2-Alpha/Beta/Delta as a long term goal.

Sensei?  Is that the L3 one for 1K.  That is my next favorite one at Char-Gen after the Ikon.

For for the parts/contact.  If you were asking him to repair a Helo or Tank or something w/ an Assault Cannon mounted on it.  Then sure, maybe Connection is going to come into play.  But the NPC is a Mechanic.  He should have a full repair shop.  Basic/Upgrade car parts shouldn't be an issue at all.  Even Drones have to be pretty common at repair shops in 2075.

Page 45 of SR5: Thresholds table: Easy - 1, Average - 2, Hard - 4, Very Hard - 6, Extreme - 8-10. That means my rating 2 rig makes Hard tests a threshold of 2, and Extreme tests anywhere from 6-8 hits needed. Not that that isn't strong, it is, since the possibility of having an Extreme test is very unlikely, but a rating 1 rig makes even Hard tests 3 hits still. Unless I'm interpreting it wrong and most vehicle tests don't even come close to Extreme on the scale, it still can be fairly difficult.

Another things on page 266 of SR5: "When you’re jumped into a vehicle, drone, or other device, the limits of that device are increased by the rating of your control rig. This includes vehicle and drone Sensor, Speed, and Handling, and the Accuracy of mounted weapons when used by the rigger. The control rig also connects more smoothly through an RCC when operating in VR." Seems pretty beneficial to me, but I should point out that I have never been in a Shadowrun game ever, so maybe those stats are already high enough. That section also only relates to jumping into vehicles, not just giving them commands, so that is another thing.

However, your point is sound, and I think I probably will drop it, if I need the money. It actually constitutes about 1/3 of my money, but I want to see what else I can rearrange first, and if I need excess cash, then I will lower it to rating 1, since it does give me about 40k more nuyen.

Yes, the Renraku Sensei is the 1,000 nuyen one that's right in the middle. I personally think it's good for a commlink that isn't too expensive yet still is functional.

Thanks for clarifying about the contact, I probably can drop the connection to one. However, one last question, what about Aerial vehicles? Obviously, I can't afford one at Char-gen, but I plan on getting a Banshee at some point, simply because it is such a cool plane. Would repairs for that require more parts?

If I come off as being rude, I don't mean to, I greatly appreciate your advice and input. I'm just one of those people that likes to understand "the why" of everything.

Csjarrat

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« Reply #33 on: <08-05-14/1714:50> »
aerial vehicles are very much GM/game dependent.
If you think about the setting and the uses of manned craft and specifically in relation to their need for landing pads/strips + hangars as well as air traffic control clearance; its just not something that you can really hop into if you're playing a reasonably realistic game of shadowrun.
Given the fact that-in setting you can achieve pretty much everything you need to with drones (except moving decent numbers of passengers), they're just not that useful either.
A small, fast recon drone covered in ruthenium paint and equipped with a tooled sensor suite can achieve just as much recon as a manned craft, land in half the space, can be stored in a backpack and costs a fraction of the price too.

They really come in more useful in merc/paramilitary/corporate HTR style campaigns where you have an organisation behind you to get you flight path clearances or where you're in an open warfare zone so people don't give a fuck.
Really, most of the vehicle stat blocks are there for the GM's usage when the runners encounter a corp/police/etc owned helo/cruiser/APC etc. most of them are vastly outside the scope of what a lot of people would deem to be appropriate for a PC to own and use in a "standard" shadowrun
repairs are no different for planes than cars, but obviously each pip of damage cost phenomenally more money to repair (so treat her well!) as the base cost of the vehicle is used to determine the repair value.


as for VCR, have a think about how you want this guy to function. if you're gonna be spending a lot of time in VR, then its totally worth getting the level two rig now as the bonuses to handling and perception via sensors are really damn useful. (especially on R3 sensor suites like on microdrones)
If you're doing the vast majority of your stuff through AR piloting or instruction sending, then you can easily get by with an R1 rig and put your cash elsewhere.
« Last Edit: <08-05-14/1722:23> by Csjarrat »
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Tarislar

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« Reply #34 on: <08-06-14/1347:54> »
Page 45 of SR5: Thresholds table: Easy - 1, Average - 2, Hard - 4, Very Hard - 6, Extreme - 8-10. That means my rating 2 rig makes Hard tests a threshold of 2, and Extreme tests anywhere from 6-8 hits needed. Not that that isn't strong, it is, since the possibility of having an Extreme test is very unlikely, but a rating 1 rig makes even Hard tests 3 hits still. Unless I'm interpreting it wrong and most vehicle tests don't even come close to Extreme on the scale, it still can be fairly difficult.

Check out the Rigger & VCR sections.
I don't have the page # but it basically lists off the examples of moves & the thresholds associated with them, IE, 1-3 w/ crazy stuff at 4+.
Like I said above, unless everything your doing is a move out of a Michael Bay movie,  I think your fine.


Another things on page 266 of SR5: "When you’re jumped into a vehicle, drone, or other device, the limits of that device are increased by the rating of your control rig. This includes vehicle and drone Sensor, Speed, and Handling, and the Accuracy of mounted weapons when used by the rigger. The control rig also connects more smoothly through an RCC when operating in VR." Seems pretty beneficial to me, but I should point out that I have never been in a Shadowrun game ever, so maybe those stats are already high enough. That section also only relates to jumping into vehicles, not just giving them commands, so that is another thing.

True. I look at it as....... If my base vehicle has good stats, then a VCR isn't doing much.  &/or I can only be jumped in to 1 thing so most commands default to not using the VCR for bonus stats.


Thanks for clarifying about the contact, I probably can drop the connection to one. However, one last question, what about Aerial vehicles? Obviously, I can't afford one at Char-gen, but I plan on getting a Banshee at some point, simply because it is such a cool plane. Would repairs for that require more parts?

As CS put it, Aerial vehicles fall into a whole different level of campaign.
The only thing I could see a dedicated Air-Rigger starting out with in 5E is a Yellowjacket.
If you went that route then I'd look at different contacts w/ a dedicated aircraft mechanic v/s an auto mechanic, but that's me.


No, not coming off Rude at all.

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« Reply #35 on: <08-06-14/1422:42> »
I've taken your advice and I dropped the rig to rating 1. That freed up a lot of cash, so I now have 3 Roto-drones with Ares Alphas. I can't wait to try them out and see how much mayhem they can create. I really like the way my character looks right now, he seems like he's gonna be a lot of fun to play. I'm gonna run him for my Sunday game night this week, so unless you guys think I have something that can be improved, I think this is probably my last edit on this character. I really appreciate all the advice that everyone has given me, so thanks for helping me out!

ZeldaBravo

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« Reply #36 on: <08-06-14/1710:34> »
Could you please post feedback about your experience here? I'm interested about your field exam!
*I have problems with clarifying my point in English, so sometimes I might sound stupid or rude.*

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« Reply #37 on: <08-06-14/2136:48> »
Could you please post feedback about your experience here? I'm interested about your field exam!

Sure, I'll let you know probably sometime on Monday.

Tarislar

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« Reply #38 on: <08-08-14/1552:02> »
I'll be interested to hear too.

The idea of VCR-1 & RE-3U just seems like a good starter combo to me & I hope it works out really well.
I know I'll be looking into something similar if we ever get around to a Chicago campaign at some point.


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« Reply #39 on: <08-11-14/1203:40> »
So, we finished our first session last night, and it went pretty well. Everyone at the table was still familiarizing themselves with the rules, so it was a rather basic run.

We met with Mr. Johnson and he gave us the job of extracting a Biologist from a Shiawase subsidiary, with the condition that we have no casualties at all.

The decker tried to pull blueprints and stuff from the matrix, but apparently rolled absolutely horribly and got no information for us whatsoever. Fortunately, our mage was able to get some information with a Watcher spirit, and my drones were able to get a layout of the whole building.

Next night, we disguised my van to look like it had medical supplies so we could sneak in the back. The scientist was on the 5th floor of 7, so we figured it would be easier to start from the top. We sent our infiltrator to the roof of the building (she had gecko gloves and such). The face was able to get us through the couple of security guards into the building, where the decker then jacked in. He was able to loop the security feeds so our infiltrator could actually get to the scientist. Unfortunately, as she was leaving, a security guard showed up and she didn't shoot immediately on sight. She was able to knock him out, but not before he got the message out that we were here. She pulled the scientist into the elevator, and the decker hacked it to go straight to the garage where I had parked. A few goons showed up, but my drones wiped them up pretty quickly. I didn't get to use the grenades or anything, since we were trying to be sneaky and have no casualties, but I did knock out 2 of the goons with the Stick-n' Shock ammo. The only problem we had was when the mage fumbled throwing a Flash bang (why the mage was throwing one ... I'm not sure), so the GM decided it blew up next to my tire and popped the tire. So, my car's gonna need a little TLC, but overall, we got out of there with no problems at all. My drones made the fight at the end of the run a piece of cake, so we got a nice bit of cash.

Thanks for the help building the character guys, I had a lot of fun playing him!

Csjarrat

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« Reply #40 on: <08-11-14/1239:11> »
sounds great, well done!
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« Reply #41 on: <08-11-14/1514:31> »
Congratulations!

How were the rolls with your dice pools & thresholds?
Any issues hitting what you needed?

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« Reply #42 on: <08-11-14/1730:47> »
Congratulations!

How were the rolls with your dice pools & thresholds?
Any issues hitting what you needed?

Nope, not at all. I wasn't doing anything extreme, but I had no real problems staying stealthy while jumped in for recon, and driving/shooting was still a piece of cake. Although, I have to say I was glad that I didn't even use smokes or anything, since it was slow enough leaving the building with only 3 tires as it was. No, no issues here, unless we get in a ridiculous high speed chase and I roll badly (thank you 5 edge), I don't think I needed that rating 2 Rig, so that was a good call by you guys. While I can see this guy won't be working super miracles with drones/cars, he is more than proficient enough at it to be a useful asset to the team and to be fun to play. Again, thanks guys for helping me create this character, I've had quite a bit of fun even just from one session.

Tarislar

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« Reply #43 on: <08-13-14/1643:58> »
Awesome, glad it worked out well.