Shadowrun
Shadowrun General => Gear => Topic started by: Tagami on <08-10-13/0439:54>
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Is there a rule against Audio and Visual Enhancements stacking?
Example: Ear buds with Audio Enhancement 3 and Headphones with another Audio Enhnancement 3. Does that add 6 dice to the dice pool? (Assume Wireless enabled)
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Practicality. Presumably you are only hearing or seeing something at a time, not both. Or rather, only one of those being successful matters in most situations. So you use the higher pool unless one of your senses is inappropriate for the test.
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He wasn't asking about whether you get both benefits at the same time, but whether you can combine 2 of the same enhancement for a higher bonus.
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There may not be a rule specifically forbidding it, but it is definitely against the RAI, and worthy of massive phonebooking.
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Okay, so if you've got a person who has audio enhancement in their cyber implant, and ear buds in their cyber implants... I can only imagine their audio nerve overloading when a pin hits the ground or a cricket chirps, and it doesn't even matter if they're using a damper - the audio enhancement is going to bypass the damper built into their ear to some degree, and you've just done the cartoon thing where you line up a bunch of megaphones. Sure it'll stack. Right up until a half second after it is implemented when the person goes deaf in a very non fixable way.
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One would imagine that two audio or two visual wouldn't, but one audio and one visual should.
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Ah, if you're talking about bonuses to audio and visual perception... they're different bonuses, and not so much stackable as interlockable. They matter when the perception is going to be of a certain type - audio perception helps you hear the crack of a twig... but does nothing to help you notice that well concealed gun turret. On the other hand, Visual perception is great for the gun turret, but you might completely miss the sound of someone breathing. Put them together, and they'll work nicely to make a generalized bonus to the dice pool, with some few exceptions, like touch or smell (olfactory boosters can do wonders with smell as well, while touch sensitivity might be duplicated through an adept power.)
You're not going to see +2 to audio and +2 to visual = +4, but you'll see the +2 bonus come into play more frequently.
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Ah, if you're talking about bonuses to audio and visual perception... they're different bonuses, and not so much stackable as interlockable. They matter when the perception is going to be of a certain type - audio perception helps you hear the crack of a twig... but does nothing to help you notice that well concealed gun turret. On the other hand, Visual perception is great for the gun turret, but you might completely miss the sound of someone breathing. Put them together, and they'll work nicely to make a generalized bonus to the dice pool, with some few exceptions, like touch or smell (olfactory boosters can do wonders with smell as well, while touch sensitivity might be duplicated through an adept power.)
You're not going to see +2 to audio and +2 to visual = +4, but you'll see the +2 bonus come into play more frequently.
I can see only using one if the GM specifically calls for "Visual Perception Test", but if the call is just for "Perception Test", I do feel that both should be used.
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There may not be a rule specifically forbidding it, but it is definitely against the RAI, and worthy of massive phonebooking.
If you argue that using two pieces of gear that use the same bonus-giving enhancement should give double the bonus, you should get double-phonebooked.
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Being a munchkin here, but I was (re)building a Street Samie from 4th to 5th and decided to drop the cyber-ears and eyes due to the wireless situation (rebooting your eyes in the middle of a firefight: "Yeah, right!").
To do so, I decided to go the contacts+glasses/goggles way (depending on the amount of physical activity and hostile situations expected) and earbuds-headphones as well.
That led me thinking on getting a rating(capacity) 6 headphone with Spatial Recognizer and Select Sound Filter (3). Which leaves me with an empty slot and I was wondering if adding Audio Enhancer(1) in those Headphones are worth doing so or I should just save some nuyen and downgrade to capacity 5 headphones.
P.S. If I am abusing my gear, my GM is liable to let me have the phonebook, and the blown eardrum, but then again, I am not going to be daft and turn them enhancers on in a club and get my head imploded. Listening to an isolated convo in the next room and amp-ing to the max is with RAI.
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You can have Contacts and glasses, as well as earbuds and headphones. However, any identical enhancements would not stack. You don't get double the smartlink bonus from having it on both the contacts and glasses, and you wouldn't get double the audio perception bonus for having it on earbuds and headphones.
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I can see reasoning both ways on this one, so why not just say that it's up to individual ruling and call it a day?
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Because one 'interpretation' is blatant cheese, to the level that it makes Green Bay look lactose intolerant?
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And how would it affect any of you if someone in a group other than yours decided to use that interpretation?
I, personally, wouldn't let someone stack two Audio Enhancement or two Vision Enhancement, but I can see where some could think it would make sense.
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Because once you allow that, you no longer have anything to object against a huge troll wearing 4 armor jackets with Chemical Resistance 6 and Nonconductivity 6 on two, and Fire Resistance 6 and Insulation 6 on two, giving 12 extra dice vs toxins, electricity, fire and cold damage.
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And how would it affect any of you if someone in a group other than yours decided to use that interpretation?
I, personally, wouldn't let someone stack two Audio Enhancement or two Vision Enhancement, but I can see where some could think it would make sense.
If you could get a bigger bonus, there'd be higher rating enhancements. You can't put two smartgun systems on one gun and get +4, why would you get +4 from a pair of contacts worn under a pair of glasses.
Don't really like the idea of Audio and Visual stacking for generic perception tests. I'd be more inclined to say that you only get a bonus on specifically visual or audio tests. Although this is less clear cut and there's an element of logic involved for all three scenarios +0, +2 or +4
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Because once you allow that, you no longer have anything to object against a huge troll wearing 4 armor jackets with Chemical Resistance 6 and Nonconductivity 6 on two, and Fire Resistance 6 and Insulation 6 on two, giving 12 extra dice vs toxins, electricity, fire and cold damage.
And how does it affect you or your group if another group in a completely different city, state or even nation decides to do things the other way? Like I said, I wouldn't let the same one work more than once, but since it will only affect their group, I don't give a crap if someone else does.
Don't really like the idea of Audio and Visual stacking for generic perception tests. I'd be more inclined to say that you only get a bonus on specifically visual or audio tests. Although this is less clear cut and there's an element of logic involved for all three scenarios +0, +2 or +4
With both Audio and Vision Enhancement on 'generic' Perception tests, I just find it best to assume that if a descriptor (Visual, Auditory, etc.) isn't used when calling for the test, all sensory enhancement types apply.
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It's quite simple. If something is RAW, a player will try it. If it isn't, they will have to convince the GM and the rest to get a houserule on the matter.
So yeah, I honestly don't give a rat's ass on how you want to houserule the game. However, when someone asks for the rules on X, I want the rules. Not personal opinions on what might be nice to play with, but RAW and RAI. Going "ruling Z would be fine because it doesn't matter to me since my table doesn't use it" will only end up with GMs having to dig around to fight a player who ends up going "there's no reason for me not to get ruling Z", using you as argument.
Short version: If you don't care about other tables, don't give your houserules.
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Because once you allow that, you no longer have anything to object against a huge troll wearing 4 armor jackets with Chemical Resistance 6 and Nonconductivity 6 on two, and Fire Resistance 6 and Insulation 6 on two, giving 12 extra dice vs toxins, electricity, fire and cold damage.
And how does it affect you or your group if another group in a completely different city, state or even nation decides to do things the other way? Like I said, I wouldn't let the same one work more than once, but since it will only affect their group, I don't give a crap if someone else does.
Well, I guess it affects his group about as much as any of the stuff you've lectured people about doing wrong affects yours. (Not trying to insult, just pointing out there's been a lot of stuff you've been very vocal about, even though they didn't affect your table.) I'm not sure why you'd say "it's an individual thing" about a blatant rule change (because it is not an interpretation issue) like this, really.
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I am not asking for a houserule or someone's opinion. My GM is quite competent and can handle this if we go that path.
I am asking if RAW prevents you from stacking perception enhancers.
For armor, it is explicitly written that only the highest armor is the one that counts; all the rest just add encumberance.
SR5 p. 168
If a character is wearing more than one piece of armor
at a time, the value of the highest armor piece applies
for determining Armor. All the other pieces do nothing
but add a lot of bulk; too much can make Joe Shadowrunner look like the SoyPuff Marshmallow Man, slowing him down more than the protection is worth.
Armor accessories, items listed with a “+” in front of
their rating, add to the character’s Armor for the purpose
of Damage Resistance tests. The maximum bonus a
character receive from these items is limited to their
Strength attribute. For every 2 full points by which the
bonus exceeds the character’s Strength, the character
suffers a –1 penalty to Agility and Reaction.
Is there a rule like that for enhancements?
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I don't believe that there is an actual by-the-book rule preventing it, but I could have missed it.
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RAW no. RAI the idea is that the Audio Enhancement helps you notice things you'd normally wouldn't notice and filter out background noise. The higher the rating, the better it is. Given that functionality, the chance that running it twice would actually boost things more is very doubtable.
It's a good one for the FAQ and potentially the errata just in case.
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RAW no. RAI the idea is that the Audio Enhancement helps you notice things you'd normally wouldn't notice and filter out background noise. The higher the rating, the better it is. Given that functionality, the chance that running it twice would actually boost things more is very doubtable.
It's a good one for the FAQ and potentially the errata just in case.
That still doesn't address the effects of having both a visual and an audio enhancement during a general, multi-sense Perception test. Personally I'm all up in the air on that one. I can see arguments for both sides.
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Hm, that one is hard yes... Well, in all fairness a general perception test would be basically you combining your senses to realize something's wrong, so the combination of a weird sound and a glare you see would help you reach the conclusion something's wrong. So it could be easily considered fair to let you combine the dicepool bonuses and use the highest of the limit increases.
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RAW no. RAI the idea is that the Audio Enhancement helps you notice things you'd normally wouldn't notice and filter out background noise. The higher the rating, the better it is. Given that functionality, the chance that running it twice would actually boost things more is very doubtable.
It's a good one for the FAQ and potentially the errata just in case.
That still doesn't address the effects of having both a visual and an audio enhancement during a general, multi-sense Perception test. Personally I'm all up in the air on that one. I can see arguments for both sides.
That one is certainly under the realm of "GM's call". Personally, I'd likely split it into separate tests, so you'd roll Visual Peception, Audio Perception, and then if you really wanted to, a Perception for your other senses. But since pretty much 90% of mundane perception tests in the real world come down to Visual or Audio, it is easy enough to just make them roll twice, and avoid this line of argument altogether. KISS.
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That one is certainly under the realm of "GM's call". Personally, I'd likely split it into separate tests, so you'd roll Visual Peception, Audio Perception, and then if you really wanted to, a Perception for your other senses. But since pretty much 90% of mundane perception tests in the real world come down to Visual or Audio, it is easy enough to just make them roll twice, and avoid this line of argument altogether. KISS.
Well, there's the whole age-old problem in P&P where every extra Perception roll made drastically reduces the chances of anyone sneaking around actually staying undetected, to the point of being ridiculous. Doubling everyone's rolls "almost" guarantees someone will make the check, really. Maybe it'd be better to take the average of your bonuses for audio and visual, rounded down. So someone with both at +3 would get +3, +1/+2 and +3 would be +2, etc.
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The problem with the averaging approach is that +3 audio and +1 visual should not be less than +3 audio by itself.
I suspect that for general perception checks I will allow audio to stack with visual, but that I will be more inclined to find out which is which.
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I rather like the idea of the averaging thing, since while it does end up less than the bonus of one of the pieces at times, it does give you a better bonus others. Its like having a specialization in perception giving you bonus dice. Last I checked, specializations were supposed to be in a specific field within a skill... so getting it all the time might be a bit much. On the other hand, if you had, as is possible with the SR5 rules, a specialization in all avenues of the skill... its effectively a +2 dice pool bonus overall... and if you start stacking the bonuses up... or rolling two seperate perception checks every time (ie: I have +3 audio and +3 visual) that is a +6 dice pool... which dramatically shifts the odds in the favor of the listener, as opposed to the one sneaking around. If you really want a solution for the general test that could benefit from both? Step 1. Roll perception as normal. Count the successes. Step two. Roll the bonus dice for your visual bonus. Count the successes. Tally them up. Now, step 3. Roll the bonus dice given to audio. Tally them up with the original successes - so you're not rolling the full dice pool twice. You should come out with two seperate results.
Example: Bob has Audio perception +2 and a +3 bonus to visual perception. His normal dice pool is intuition (4)+perception (6) He starts by rolling 10 dice. He does a little better than average, and manages 4 hits.
Bob then rolls his audio bonus dice - and gets no hits. So his audio perception roll this time came out to 4. He proceeds to roll his visual perception bonus dice, and gets 2 hits on three dice, which makes his visual perception a 6. Well, Bob doesn't hear the ninja, but he might just still manage to see the ninja.
This is a bit complicated I know, but it does solve any issue you might have with averaging out the dicepool bonus. Flaw is that if you do it like this, you have to do it regardless of whether the person has an equal bonuses to the two aspects of perception or not - otherwise, you might find yourself punishing players for having an equal set of bonuses.
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That one is certainly under the realm of "GM's call". Personally, I'd likely split it into separate tests, so you'd roll Visual Peception, Audio Perception, and then if you really wanted to, a Perception for your other senses. But since pretty much 90% of mundane perception tests in the real world come down to Visual or Audio, it is easy enough to just make them roll twice, and avoid this line of argument altogether. KISS.
Well, there's the whole age-old problem in P&P where every extra Perception roll made drastically reduces the chances of anyone sneaking around actually staying undetected, to the point of being ridiculous. Doubling everyone's rolls "almost" guarantees someone will make the check, really. Maybe it'd be better to take the average of your bonuses for audio and visual, rounded down. So someone with both at +3 would get +3, +1/+2 and +3 would be +2, etc.
And it also doubles the chance of glitches and critical glitches. And it would also take into account the fact that there are often different circumstance mods involved with different modes of perception. For instance, glare would affect visual perception, but not audio, while a crowded stadium with cheering fans would certainly affect audio perception to a different degree than visual.