Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: Hephaestus on <08-17-19/2255:38>
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In the "Exotic Weapons and Spray Example" on page 118, it states the car resists damage with Body x 2, but there are no entries in the actual rules to state this is true. Is this the case?
By this logic, a GMC Bulldog gets 32 soak dice.
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Skimming the likely rules sections didn't turn up anything for me. Probably one for the Errata team unless it's tucked away somewhere.
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There's a part in the ramming section, which also talks about CM and wound modifiers for vehicles, so I'd consider it leading though hidden poorly:
Individuals and vehicles alike resist
the damage with their Body. Vehicles have a single
Condition Monitor that is (Body / 2) + 8. Their
Handling increases by 1 for every three boxes of
damage, and they break down when the entire
Condition Monitor is filled up.
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There's a part in the ramming section, which also talks about CM and wound modifiers for vehicles, so I'd consider it leading though hidden poorly:
Individuals and vehicles alike resist
the damage with their Body. Vehicles have a single
Condition Monitor that is (Body / 2) + 8. Their
Handling increases by 1 for every three boxes of
damage, and they break down when the entire
Condition Monitor is filled up.
Yeah, I saw that too. I had figured they kept the negative penalty per 3 boxes, but the single condition monitor is a step in the right direction.
But, it doesn't answer whether vehicles soak damage with BOD or BODx2. The example on pg. 118 states:
STEP 4: SOAK SOME DAMAGE
Carson rolls Body 6 against the modified Damage Value of the flamethrower, 3P (Base 3P - 1 sweeping + 1 net hit). He gets 2 hits. Things are not looking good.
The Westwind rolls Body x 2 ( 8 ) against the modified Damage Value of the flamethrower, 7P (Base 3P - 1 sweeping + 5 net hits). The car manages 5 hits.
My understanding was that vehicle soak with BOD just like characters (since there are no rules discussing it), but this seems to say otherwise.
And as an aside, the vehicle section lists the Westwind as having 6 BOD, so the example is wrong either way.
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That section explicitly states they resist ramming damage with Body, just like people, so while not 100% explicit it's enough indication that the example is wrong.
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There's a part in the ramming section, which also talks about CM and wound modifiers for vehicles, so I'd consider it leading though hidden poorly:
Individuals and vehicles alike resist
the damage with their Body. Vehicles have a single
Condition Monitor that is (Body / 2) + 8. Their
Handling increases by 1 for every three boxes of
damage, and they break down when the entire
Condition Monitor is filled up.
Yeah, I saw that too. I had figured they kept the negative penalty per 3 boxes, but the single condition monitor is a step in the right direction.
But, it doesn't answer whether vehicles soak damage with BOD or BODx2. The example on pg. 118 states:
STEP 4: SOAK SOME DAMAGE
Carson rolls Body 6 against the modified Damage Value of the flamethrower, 3P (Base 3P - 1 sweeping + 1 net hit). He gets 2 hits. Things are not looking good.
The Westwind rolls Body x 2 ( 8 ) against the modified Damage Value of the flamethrower, 7P (Base 3P - 1 sweeping + 5 net hits). The car manages 5 hits.
My understanding was that vehicle soak with BOD just like characters (since there are no rules discussing it), but this seems to say otherwise.
And as an aside, the vehicle section lists the Westwind as having 6 BOD, so the example is wrong either way.
The Errata document changed p. 115 to having he bike rolling Body 4 for the soak dice and listed the bikes having Body 4 earlier in the example. And again, the Errata document changed it so the bikes rolled Body 4 in the example on p. 116. Because of that, I have in my notes (I'm still gathering some for posting) that the Westwind should probably be rolling Body 6 for soak (granted, the example seems unlikely then, since it got five hits).
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As any summoner can tell you, the chance to score 5 hits on 6 dice is 'too high'. The chance to then roll 1 hit on the REROLLED drain roll also is 'too high'.
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Didn't ALL vehicle stat need to be overhaul?
Right now, driving any vehicle is the most dangerous thing in shadowrun.
Dodging a bullet is safer than driving a car and I didn't even taking about driving fast, it's driving at any speed.
Average dude with 2 Reaction with journeyman level at piloting (skill rank 3) and even specialize in ground craft (+2) has 7 dice when driving a car.
This dude is driving family sedan (Ford America) at 20km/h (12.5mph).
That 16 meter per 3 second, yes, very very slow, my grandma can outrun this car.
This person need 4 hit to handle his Ford Americar and he's even suffer -1 dice for driving at 20km/h.
He roll 6 dices and need 4 hit?
Yup, good luck with that, chum.
Final verdict: Don't get into any vehicle in shadowrun, it's dead on wheels.
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The conclusion: Don't do vehicle STUNTS if your car and driving both suck: "Normal vehicle operation does not require a test."
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I've never been clear on how much "normal operation" covers, for manual driving and for auto pilots. Emergency stops if people step into the road? Merging into fast-moving traffic? Swerving around someone who just pulled out in front of you?
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The conclusion: Don't do vehicle STUNTS if your car and driving both suck: "Normal vehicle operation does not require a test."
Doing something normal like avoid unexpected pedestrian is a handling test.
P.199
"When a pedestrian unexpectedly enters the street ahead of her, she has to make a Handling test to avoid them"
Racing car like Shin-hyung still suffer -4 dice at 100km/h (can't even call fast) and need 3 hit to avoid accident.
5 Reaction person with advance professional skill level (5) still fail most of time of that test.
For normal person with journeyman skill level (reaction 2, skill 3) with normal car (speed interval 20, 4 hit threshold).
They can't avoid any accident AT ALL when driving above 40km/h. (-2 dice, 3 dice roll with threshold 4).
Even when driving at 20km/h, they still suffer an accident 99 times out of 100. (4 dice with threshold 4).
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There's a part in the ramming section, which also talks about CM and wound modifiers for vehicles, so I'd consider it leading though hidden poorly:
Individuals and vehicles alike resist
the damage with their Body. Vehicles have a single
Condition Monitor that is (Body / 2) + 8. Their
Handling increases by 1 for every three boxes of
damage, and they break down when the entire
Condition Monitor is filled up.
Seems a lot like CGL´s editing best practice of nesting broader rules in the description of more specific rules, so that you can´t really tell when it applies.
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Gamemasters can
increase or decrease that threshold based on the
difficulty of the attempted maneuver.
Since the baseline is "make a hairpin turn at high speeds", I don't see why any GM would not decrease the threshold.
Also, a John Doe will be using GridGuide, which drives the car and has the pedestrian noticed by a random other car and then immediately plans the movement for all GridGuide cars to avoid the pedestrian. No test needed.
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P.204
Eye-fiver go-ganger (reaction 2, piloting 2), riding a famous ganger bike, a Scorpion (Handle 3, speed interval 30).
They do what Go-ganger do, anything that need handle test.
Will crash 89% of the time when riding under 30 km/h.
Will crash 96% of the time when riding 30-59 km/h.
Will crash ALL THE TIME, when riding over 60 km/h.
Go-ganger in shadowrun is kinda cute.
Considering that they're still around and not all die, meaning that they're riding very slowly and follow all traffic rule.
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Nah, they're just driving dangerously, not doing stunts. If a player drives fast, that's not a problem. If they start trying to ram...
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If a Go Ganger can't do stunts that is either a failed statline for the gogangers or the stunts are too hard.
In this case it is the later. Driving dangerously is ridiculously hard and that is a massive design flaw because it removes all meaning from low driving investments. Driving skill at 2 or 3 should mean something different than at 0, but it doesn't. It indicates strongly that the skill rolls were assigned thoughtlessly because the 'average' user of the skill can't exist.
This is a consistent problem in SR, because understandably the game about superhumans biases towards superhuman results of 3-4 hits consistently in bad situations without assistance, while the average experienced normal person can only consistently get 1 hit, but that consistent 1 hit should really strive to mean something. A lot of 'problem' areas of the game (Like the matrix) have been problem areas because the scale instantly forces you to be superhuman, while a lot of areas of the game that function really well, like face rolls, actually do have plenty of cases where just being an experienced person with the skill (by SR standards, a dabbler) means something.
Like a charisma 4 skill 2 street samurai is going to beat the average person rolling 2 dice to resist their con almost all the time on simple cons, even though they can't weave elaborate lies on people trained to handle con artists by having the con skill themselves like a face can. With the way vehicle handling works this... can't happen, which has bad effects for both the dabbler PC and NPCs, and the actual expert, because Go gangers are so bad at vehicle tests you really can't... have chase combat in 6e without superhuman drivers, which is kinda rough because 6e was pushing chase combat as a more normal thing to happen in order to make being a rigger more relevant. But instead of lowering the barrier to chases (Which is how you would make chases more common) they are still really really high, to the point it is akin to a matrix deep-dive where as a GM I wouldn't include them because the majority of my PCs would have literally nothing to do besides shoot out windows because my samurai with their cool motorcycle and 1-2 ranks in driving legitimately can't participate as an individual.
I would not be surprised if the errata process nuked driving difficulty tests to help give room for higher end 'power' stunts akin to what Rigger 5 had, and make doing basic stunts like... possible for a PC to be expected to do.
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Imo a lot of it comes down to the core mechanic of 5 being the target number. 5 requires on average 3 dice for a hit pushing needed target numbers for a single threshold change up significantly and decreasing the value of a skill point increase. TN4 would swing it to 2 dice needed for a difference. Doesn’t seem like much 2 or 3 but as the pools grow it adds up quite a bit. Some thresholds which are supposed to be super humanly hard might need to go up but the ones in the normal range could stay the same as they are supposed to be hit by a relatively normal practitioner like a go ganger.
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I'm going to take a stab that Control Rigs were going to modify Handling or Speed or Something so Riggers were mechanically meaningful. It would be a fairly simple Errata to have VCRs lower a Handling test threshold by Rating or something similar.
Non-Riggers will still crash every time, but heck with those guys.
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I'm going to take a stab that Control Rigs were going to modify Handling or Speed or Something so Riggers were mechanically meaningful. It would be a fairly simple Errata to have VCRs lower a Handling test threshold by Rating or something similar.
Non-Riggers will still crash every time, but heck with those guys.
You can't really say 'heck with those guys' because you need rigging focused content to be compelling enough for non-riggers for them to be down with it happening.'
If a vehicle combat is going to be a really bad time for 4/5ths of your table, as a GM you are not going to have vehicle combat. The fact that most basic vehicles are going to require 9 dice to do a basic stunt at a very low speed is kinda bonkers and indicates the way that handling was implemented was kinda a bad idea because the difference of 1 handling point in the current system is pretty massive. I mean the GMC Bulldog is flipping handling 5, meaning a rigger with 15 dice to drive the most iconic drone transport option in the game fails more often than not when trying to do anything complex in a vehicle chase.
And you could push up the threshold for what a stunt *is* but that isn't really better, because then having vehicle skills at all gets devalued because stunts don't happen enough.
I can't beat around the bush here: The vehicle rules are... really bad. It is kinda mystifying they had 'stunts' be this generic thing that has a TN based on your vehicle rather than importing the stunt system from R5 that makes vehicle stunts essentially vehicle called shots: Ways to really reward mastery without punishing middling abilities. Like I don't get why they didn't just make doing cool chase combat as a driver 'free' for everyone with vehicle tests being used as an advantage, rather than making it so you need to do them at rather high difficulty to participate. It is the equivalent of forcing everyone to get 3 hits on an athletics test to find their footing to engage in a running gunfight: all that does is ensure the majority of the table can't participate in a running fight and thus running fights won't happen.
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Forgot the sarcasm font on "Heck with those guys". Agreed, Piloting should not be a 15 dice minimum to bother with, a 6 or 7 dice pool should give you a chance to do something. At the same time Vehicle Control Rigs need to have a mechanically meaningful benefit to represent the staggering investment required.
Honestly if I were to re-write the Priority table the "Magic/Resonance" column would be "Magic/Resonance/Rigging/Decking" and just build VCRs, RCCs, Cyberdecks and whatever right into the Priority table.
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Honestly if I were to re-write the Priority table the "Magic/Resonance" column would be "Magic/Resonance/Rigging/Decking" and just build VCRs, RCCs, Cyberdecks and whatever right into the Priority table.
An intriguing thought.
I'd only caution that it would kill Magic / Decking OR Rigging hybrids, as well as potentially Decker / Rigger hybrids. This may be an acceptable trade in the end, it is just something to pay heed to.
It would also have the added effect of moving Shadowrun closer to a class-based system. Again, this may be acceptable in the end. It just isn't something that should be taken lightly.
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Making it a priority pick falls into the same trap that the current edition fell for: Price doesn't equal a role.
I would just reduce their price a lot, and the price of the cyberjack while we are at it. There is this weird philosophy that I think came about due to 4e's total annihilation of tech roles that you need to put a massive cost gate on the minimum equipment needed to do things to 'protect' the role, but in reality that issue came about not due to the low barrier of entry but the fact that tools existed that completely removed the utility of personally having skills in those fields: Agents, pilot programs, and autosofts.
Control rigs are essentially the rigger equivalent of muscle toner, with a few minor benefits (you get bonuses to stuns mainly. Some argue that it also gives hotsim initiative, but you don't need a control rig to get hotsim initiative piloting drones, it only gives a bonus doing so AND makes you take damage from being hit) but a lot of drawbacks (it is a LOT more expensive to get your drones and command consoles than... you know... a gun. Because drones ALSO need guns), and probably should be priced at that level, but instead they were shoved at a massive essence cost to help prevent people from just taking them to have them because they are worth their price.
Which, obviously, doesn't actually protect a role, it just makes the role bad, because the value of the 'ware in question is obviously not worth the price. Why take a control rig that costs massively more than the samurai's ware when the rig basically does the same thing the samurai does anyway?
Does that cost mean a hacker or any PC may take a rig cuz its REALLY worth it if vehicle combat is common? Probably. But it doesn't devalue the rigger role or mean it doesn't exist if hybridizing the role is possible. Most good roles in SR CAN be hybridized, and it indicates something is very wrong if the writers can't figure out a way to allow the role to be hybridized.
Like if a samurai takes tailored pheromones, one of the broadest skill boosting pieces of 'ware in the game, that is fine. A Face can take Toner and a reflex recorder to boot at 3 levels for less than a rig. But if someone takes a rig or a cyberdeck and hasn't built literally their entire PC around the concept, that apparently isn't ok, despite ALSO the fact that there is a perception these types of characters exclusively operating on the matrix is also bad. I don't see any problem with a samurai who likes driving to get a rating 2 control rig for 80k and .4 essence but apparently that just can't happen and it needs to be priced at 2 essence in order to ensure no one would ever take a control rig under any circumstances where they don't base their entire PC around it. And because basing your entire mundane PC around one thing in SR is like... objectively a bad thing, people just don't make people with control rigs, even if they want to use drones now. Drones themselves are extremely useful, control rigs are borderline worthless, which is why most optimized riggers in 5e don't have them despite obviously being riggers.
It really feels like we are just repeating mistakes at this point because no one sat down and thought "Ok. What should a role even be?" They are trying to force it via high buy ins but don't bother to make the high buy in worth anything. A 1 essence 100k cost per rating would make sense if a rating 3 control rig alone was enough to make your PC amazingly powerful, like 3 auto hits on defense tests and attack tests to make it the equivalent of 3 essence of samurai 'ware, or giving you an insane laundry list of utility functions like how 3 ess of 'ware would play in a face, but it doesn't. It, effectively, is just +3 to some skill rolls.
Nominally, hybridization without role erosion like 4e had is a good thing, it makes characters more distinct form each other, gives mundanes way more room to grow, and helps make the nominal advantage of being a mundane of versatility actually work. Also, it fits the lore better: SR historically had most experienced runners dabble in most aspects of the setting because it was a smart survival strategy: a lot of veteran samurai went out of their way to learn a few decking skills because they knew it would come in handy. That hasn't worked for 3 editions now, one because decking skills were worthless (4e) and two because it just isn't feasible to 'dabble' anymore. But like it used to be a half decent deck could run 50k, maybe 100k, which feels like a lot but this was also when priority A was a million nuyen and B was 400k so it was 100% possible to just get a deck and some programs and skills and have at it on your logic 4 samurai.
We went from low end decking options running you 1/20th of your resource budget to 1/4th, totally ignoring the fact that logic and intuition boosters were insanely critical for 5e's hacking meaning you really were looking at 100% of your resources to even get started. Despite the matrix being more useful overall due to wireless, this change pretty much single handedly has forced deckers to be a shadow of a role, because almost nothing in SR is worth 1/4th your resources to get the bare minimum level of access. Maybe if you were effectively casting spells (It isn't an accident only mages really work with this system) but not to flick lightswitches...
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Driving skill at 2 or 3 should mean something different than at 0, but it doesn't.
Have you seen the suggestions for Critical Glitches on driving attempts? Having low skills means more likelihood of a critical glitch which means more chance of suddenly having a grenade where your driver seat used to be, or some other such horrible, character-scarring problem just for one bad dice roll.
I have issues with that chart. But that's OT for this thread. Point being, I agree. The rigging rules have issues.
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Driving skill at 2 or 3 should mean something different than at 0, but it doesn't.
Have you seen the suggestions for Critical Glitches on driving attempts? Having low skills means more likelihood of a critical glitch which means more chance of suddenly having a grenade where your driver seat used to be, or some other such horrible, character-scarring problem just for one bad dice roll.
I have issues with that chart. But that's OT for this thread. Point being, I agree. The rigging rules have issues.
The odds and consiquences of falure don't meaningfully scale. A near 100% rate of failure for something where a failure already likely is lethal means that I would never take the test. If you told me that I have a 1/100 chance of suffering some extra consiquence on the roll as opposed to most people having a 1/9 roughly, I wouldn't be more likely to take that test. It is still bad enough I would never take it. I already have an 80% chance to crash my vehicle. It is already bad enough that in any scenario I am asked to do a stunt I would just park and take my chances on foot. Which is kinda ridiculous, you want the system to encourage your PCs to do cool things that make sense in universe but a smart samurai would NEVER engage in a chase to try to thin the herd before the fight starts, they would park RIGHT AWAY even if facing down 30 Red Samurai just because the only thing driving can do is hurt them.
The outcome is identical: I don't make vehicle tests under any circumstance. It is equivalent to the difference between 2 dice to hack and 5 in SR5e: It doesn't mean anything because there is no scenario I would ever make that roll. Yeah, the 2 dice would crit glitch way more, but I will effectively crit glitch 0% of the time anyway because I never roll.
This idea of making it so there aren't real gates for specialized areas of gameplay isn't exactly a novel concept. Star Wars has solved it for ages. Basically it is assumed everyone can handle themselves flying and mostly specialized pilots are REALLY REALLY GOOD while non-specialists not even proficient in spaceship weapons can hit most basic enemy ships most of the time. Even the stuff where a specialized pilot weaponizes their piloting skill vs a total scrub doesn't end in a way that makes the scrub crash or die, the most you can do is make it so the scrub can't run away or shoot other people, which creates an interesting scenario where your player aces get to fly in and rescue their buddy from a dogfight.
And it works really well. I have had an ace pilot feel like an amazing badass while my social jedi player with no piloting or proficiency gets to still feel cool saving NPC scrub clone pilots from certain death just by virtue of PC levels being useful in space. But despite the scrub being still useful everyone can clearly tell that the pilot PC is shining and getting so much work done. This idea of beating people out of specialized content is *so* 2000's.
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The threshold guidelines also slate a threshold of 2 as things only slightly harder than walking or talking. Scrubs (2 stat, 2 skill, ie most NPCs in the book) are out of options when they hit a 3, which is "average". Maybe there's some other way that is supposed to be read though?
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Forgot the sarcasm font on "Heck with those guys". Agreed, Piloting should not be a 15 dice minimum to bother with, a 6 or 7 dice pool should give you a chance to do something. At the same time Vehicle Control Rigs need to have a mechanically meaningful benefit to represent the staggering investment required.
Honestly if I were to re-write the Priority table the "Magic/Resonance" column would be "Magic/Resonance/Rigging/Decking" and just build VCRs, RCCs, Cyberdecks and whatever right into the Priority table.
Mirage and 7 dice means almost 3/4 chance, and that's without using Edge. And you have approx 3/7 without Edge with the Scorpion, the Jackrabbit and the Shin-hyung. I'd consider that a chance at doing something.
Edit: As for a simple stunt at high speed: 7 dice, Mirage, 100 m/ct = 120 km/h = -3, stunt not at level of a hairpin turn but still tricky so say -1 threshold, 2-1 = 1 with 4 dice, 80% chance.
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Well, this has been an entertaining read. I haven't picked up the 6e CRB and I don't intend to, so before I share any thoughts on this let me just make sure I've got all these details right:
- To do any stunt in a chase or other vehicle scene, you need to roll a number of hits equal to your vehicle's Handling score, with the TN being adjusted up or down for more difficult or simpler stunts respectively.
- Handling ranges from 2 for particularly nimble motorcycles to 5 for the average truck or van.
- You take a penalty to your dicepool based on your speed; how big a penalty for any given speed depends on the vehicle's speed interval.
- Control rigs no longer reduce your TN, nor do they provide any powerful bonus to compensate. No, edge generation is not a powerful bonus.
- 2 is now the "average" in a stat for humans, as opposed to 3 in previous editions.
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That's my working understanding too.
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Putting all that together, let's say the getaway driver (a rigger) decides to try to force a crash test on his opponent. He makes (crazy maneuver), just barely executes, but only due to a combination of high skill and stats enough to soak the modifier, and maybe an edge spend. Pursuers are goons with average stats. They roll against similar threshold and all fail due to having 4 dice on average, losing X for their speed. Chase is over in one test. The rigger being a rigger is not relevant to the equation, since the rig is not actively helping them drive. Unless the Edge spend is a requirement to pre-Edge the die roll, Edge could be irrelevant too. Any character with an Edge score could replicate this effect, at least on the first turn. If the goons make the maneuver somehow, then the driver may need to repeat this effort, which is what allows a rigger to excel. They recharge the Edge effect each turn, where a Samurai must continue to work out other methods of Edge generation in order to executive similar edge maneuvers. Rigger are only getting advantages on sustained chases, or chases against potent enough enemies who don't wipe out on the first hard corner.
Did I miss anything?
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Did I miss anything?
Nope, sounds about right.
If the edge gains are per action (two on their own activation, and then one per every opposed test against them), then they will be a font of edge during a chase, to the point that they can just reshape the world around them (5 Edge Action: Create Special Effect) to clear their chase aggressors/targets. Its like playing Watchdogs with dice!
But at the same time, without lowering thresholds, the Rigger still has a solid chance of crashing in the same chase once they get over 3 speed thresholds (which is NOT hard to do in anything less nimble than a performance vehicle).
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Mirage and 7 dice means almost 3/4 chance, and that's without using Edge. And you have approx 3/7 without Edge with the Scorpion, the Jackrabbit and the Shin-hyung. I'd consider that a chance at doing something.
Edit: As for a simple stunt at high speed: 7 dice, Mirage, 100 m/ct = 120 km/h = -3, stunt not at level of a hairpin turn but still tricky so say -1 threshold, 2-1 = 1 with 4 dice, 80% chance.
I guess, if you're driving the best handling vehicle in the game at less than half it's max speed and doing an easier than average stunt you'll be successful most of the time.
But any other vehicle at highway speeds you're going to need a crash test doing a sharp turn or sudden stop most of the time. Even at cruising through town speeds you'll crash frequently. And trucks/Vans, fergitaboutit.
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Imagine chase scene between Go-Ganger and Lone Star Patrolman !!
P.204, 206
Go-Ganger (Reaction 2, Piloting 2)
Lone Star Patrolman (Reaction 3, Piloting 2)
Go-Ganger maybe can get away with it if they're riding on Suzuki Mirage and never go above school area's speed limit.
- 4 dice with threshold 2, they're ONLY crash 60% of the time as long as they never go above 36 kmph.
But Patrolman is dead on arrival, no way they're patrolling in 115k supercar like Westwind (only car with handling 2).
From 5e stolen soul, Lone Star use Chrysler-Nissan Journey as a patrol car,
which is similar to Ford Americar in price tag and performance, let's said it's the same then.
- 5 dice with threshold 4 ?, yup 95% crash even when driving at below school area's speed limit.
Chasing Scene in shadowrun is super cute.
Both sides never go above 40 kmph and still crash left and right, kinda like toddler's playing tag in a tricycle.
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Just throwing a bit of cold water on the simmering fire here...
Remember that thresholds don't factor in to opposed tests. If you're doing some chase or race, where it's your hits against the other drivers', handling doesn't matter. Since thresholds don't matter.
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Mirage and 7 dice means almost 3/4 chance, and that's without using Edge. And you have approx 3/7 without Edge with the Scorpion, the Jackrabbit and the Shin-hyung. I'd consider that a chance at doing something. Edit: As for a simple stunt at high speed: 7 dice, Mirage, 100 m/ct = 120 km/h = -3, stunt not at level of a hairpin turn but still tricky so say -1 threshold, 2-1 = 1 with 4 dice, 80% chance.
I guess, if you're driving the best handling vehicle in the game at less than half it's max speed and doing an easier than average stunt you'll be successful most of the time. But any other vehicle at highway speeds you're going to need a crash test doing a sharp turn or sudden stop most of the time. Even at cruising through town speeds you'll crash frequently. And trucks/Vans, fergitaboutit.
I do believe that the high Handling and low Speed Intervals of some vehicles punish the drivers too much, even if the Speed Intervals are also meant to reduce firing dicepools. So I'll write a houserule about that later. But the examples used to complain about this rule, I can't agree with.
So, let's look at the situation as y'all are basically describing it:
- You're a mediocre driver
- You insist on driving yourself, rather than letting GridGuide take the wheel
- You decided on a hard-to-handle vehicle, despite cheap easier options being available
- You drive fast enough that your mediocre dicepool is reduced to near-zero, which in the case of normal cars tends to mean you're already above the speed limit of Highways (a -5 with SI 20 means driving 101~120 m/CT = >120 km/h)
- You're in a tricky enough situation that your GM feels a Pilot test is warranted, even if it's incomparable to the baseline of 'a hairpin turn at high speed', meaning that combined with your speed even the heavily reduced threshold still gives you trouble
At this point, I feel the only ones to blame are:
- You, for making all the choices that put you into that situation to begin with
- Your GM, for facepalming too hard to talk some sense into you
As for trucks/vans not being able to handle sudden stops well at high speeds: Sounds perfectly logical and reasonable.
Again, I do think the Speed Intervals go too low for the high-Handling vehicles. But I don't see much of a problem with the scenario as described above.
Anyway, to prevent going round and round in circles, I'm leaving it at that. Have fun, I'm out.
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"Let Grid Guide do it!" is fine for commuting. If there is some kind of action scene in a vehicle it's safe to assume the players will be making rolls. Also Grid Guide is just the Autopilot, it's got about 6 dice for most tests, less the speed modifier. With these rules Grid Guide turns into bumper cars whenever anything unexpected happens.
From Memory there are 2 vehicles with handling 2? The Mirage and the Westwind. These are not the cheap options, they're the expensive ones. Likely PCs will be driving something with a handling 3 or 4, with a moderate speed interval.
For an average stunt like a sharp turn, or a sudden stop, a PC will need 3 or 4 hits on a dice pool of 5ish if they're driving at normal in town speeds.
I personally don't drive sports cars or racing bikes, Minivans and Sedans are more my speed. I've made plenty of sudden stops over the years and a few sharp turns at speed. I'm not some pro-race car driver.
The driving rules fall apart on the low end. Happens a lot in Shadowrun, but these rules come with Crash Tests. While less fatal then 5e, they're still kinda rough.
Shadowrunners shouldn't hop in a vehicle and drive away fast, they should run on foot and watch the security forces do some kind of Keystone cop revival and cause a multi-car pile up.
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So, I have a couple issues to mention regarding this debate on the vehicle RAW, and maybe it will extinguish any embers of here. I'm sorry it's long, but maybe it will help when these rules get their turn in the Errata process.
Fact is, per the RAW, there's no right or wrong way to rule this. No one can "win" this discussion, and all interpretations are equally valid and invalid at the same time. Here's why:
Looking at the RAW, there is no guidance whatsoever on when or by how much to adjust the Handling Threshold to account for the maneuver the pilot declares. Nor is "something tricky" defined in any terms that would lead one to believe that "hairpin turn at high speed" is intended to use the baseline number for such a maneuver because the GM can arbitrarily and with no guidance provided in the RAW change this threshold at a whim "based on the difficulty". For example, if I as the GM think a hairpin turn is harder than vehicular stealth, then I am probably cranking that Threshold up, not down.
There's also no guidance on when or by how much to adjust Thresholds up or down. So, there's no written basis for arguing that the GM should adjust downward for anything less than a hairpin turn at high speeds, nor upwards either. That interpretation is a personal one not supported (nor denied) by the text. The text is simply not clear enough for those assumptions to be made in either direction. It’s a complete guess by the GM, but one with devastating consequences if their best guess results in the inability to avoid a crash.
There was also a notion posed here that there is no Threshold involved when using Opposed tests, which is not a complete statement. Per the RAW, the GM (again at their whim via the use of the word "can") is also free to call for a secondary test after the Opposed Test.
Side note: This second test is called a Simple test in the text, not a Handling test, even though it uses the same dice as a Handling test, so it's unclear to me if they should be considered as different in some way--ie, does failing it not result in a crash? The Crash rules state you crash when you fail a Handling test, which this is not labeled as. I assume this is a typo and should be a Handling test.
There are also no examples given of what circumstances would call for using two driver's skills against each other for the Opposed tests. For example, if I am weaving in and out of traffic to evade pursuit, is that a Handling test or an Opposed test? Technically, I'm just trying to avoid hitting other vehicles at high speed, like an obstacle course. So is my pursuer. What's the intent here? No way to know this either. It's just a different way to roll the dice if it makes more sense to the GM.
The sum total assessment here amounts to giving the GM the advice "do whatever you want, just use this one dice roll, and make sure to penalize the dice pool for the speed".
Was the intent to be this vague, and leave the table hanging in the GMs whims? As written, we can't even have a meaningful discussion about it, because no one can be right or wrong. There’s no guidance, and thus no real “system” to follow.
But maybe that's uncharitable of me. I get that way sometimes.
Let's assume I am. What other tools are there? Perhaps the Thresholds table on p.36 is supposed to be the guidance for the GM here, and I'm wrong that there's "no guidance".
Threshold Chart states:
(3) Normal starting point for Simple tests. Complicated enough to require skill. Shadowrunners are expected to be more competent than normal people, which is why game thresholds are based here. Shooting a window out of a nearby buiding.
(4) More dificult, impressive enough to accomplish. Shooting an enemy in the window of a nearby building.
So, even here, I am still left to interpret the wording. However, with this standard as the only guidepost, is any GM ever going to look at this chart and adjudicate "tricky" maneuvers downwards from the baseline Threshold in the Rigging section? Based on this chart, I would personally put "hairpin at high speeds" around a 5 from the chart guidance. It's certainly not a 3 on this scale. However, given that this is the case, it also follows that driving has a different scale in the RAW than does the rest of the game. A 3 is "normal" tasks in the table, and Ford Americar Handling is a 3 to do "tricky" things. Unless the Americar is really supposed to be a 3 because it makes “tricky” (4) into “normal” (3) instead, the scales don't seem align, even if we use these vague terms to guess around.
Just to clarify, again, I'm not saying that the downward adjustment theory is wrong/bad/incorrect. I'm still saying there is no "right", because the RAW doesn't establish what "right" is, except As Thine GM Dictateth (so long as the modifiers are used).
I’m also saying that the only possible guidance that exists is suggestive that upwards is the correct direction, but I can only hope to draw a GM like Michael when playing, as his take is much more player-friendly.
IMO, it would be clearer if Handling rating was expressed as a modifier to Threshold tests to control the vehicle. The Threshold table shows what the thresholds should be for different types of tasks. This would align the Rigging scale with the game scale.
The idea being aimed at is the traditional one that different vehicles should affect Handling tests. That’s a solid goal, always has been. Personally, the easy fix is to subtract 3 from the Handling listed and make this a modifier to the normal Threshold guidance. That hairpin maneuver may be a 5, but in a truck it's a 7. Then the system is unified to a core guideline, not making it's own separate one. Then make vehicle rig implants reduce the Threshold by their rating, and then I feel like a kick butt rigger in the 6E system, even driving a brick on wheels.
Regardless, as it stands, the debate is currently pointless, and we all should leave it behind until and unless it's addressed. Further questions should be answered as "that's up to your GM".
I can't expect the team to rewrite the Handling mechanic on my analysis though. There may be other factors I am unaware of too. So instead, to better approach this issue and enhance playability, if the Handling numbers/scale are to stand as written, then I would suggest that a maneuver threshold modifier chart would be in order for the Errata. There are also no other dice pool modifiers suggested for things driving on gravel, slick surfaces etc, which presumably would be their own adjustments to dice pools? A table for that would be helpful, unless the RAI are not to fuss with those things, and simply let Speed be the only factor the game cares about measuring. If that's the case, it would be good to have stated explicitly as well, so GMs don't start stacking on the penalties past the system tolerance limits.
Thanks for reading. I hope it helps somehow.
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I've been thinking about this since yesterday. I will say that in defense of these mechanics that Shadowrun is a setting where it makes sense that the average Joe and Jill absolutely suck at driving, on account of Gridguide doing all the driving for them. However, this isn't a good implementation of that because even experts struggle in this system. Part of the problem is that dicepools have generally gotten smaller, but most of it lies within the mechanics themselves.
Right off the bat, this system actively punishes the player for driving anything other than the most nimble vehicle available to them. Why should I drive anything other than a Suzuki Mirage if it means I'll need more hits on my test to perform any sort of stunt? Ah, but there are reasons: I might want to drive my fellow Shadowrunners around, haul gear and be protected from bullets and the elements. Too bad that driving any vehicle offering that would mean I have to hit a higher target number whenever I do any stunt, barring opposed checks for some reason, and there's no way of mitigating that until the rigger book comes out and tells us how much it'll cost to improve a vehicle's Handling. Compare this to 5e, where Handling is a ceiling on what you're capable of in a vehicle. Any given stunt has the same TN no matter if you're driving a Suzuki Mirage or an Ares Roadmaster, but if you're in the Roadmaster you can't do a stunt with a TN higher than 3 (unless you're a rigger, but I'll get to that later). As long as your vehicle is nimble enough to pull off a stunt, your ability to do a stunt depends entirely on how many dice you're rolling. The difference between editions is night and day: in 5e you want a more nimble vehicle because it will let you use your large dicepool to its full potential while in 6e you want a more nimble vehicle because it doesn't require a large dicepool to be used effectively.
The choice to have speed-based penalties is an odd one, as I thought the point of 6e was to streamline the game and remove modifiers. Perhaps this speed penalty, as well as how Handling is used, is more reflective of how vehicles worked in older editions (I've only skimmed through the older Rigger Blackbooks, but it seems to check out) but it flies in the face of the core mission of 6e. You can't really argue that it's more realistic either because not all stunts are inherently more difficult at higher speeds; merging into 90 km/h traffic isn't any more difficult than merging into 60 km/h traffic. Is it a mechanical issue? Yes, but mostly because dicepools were already shrunken. Then there is the issue of speed intervals; I haven't looked, but I suspect that the vehicles with high Handling will also have smaller speed intervals, meaning you're doubly punished for choosing to drive them.
Then there's the brutal nerfing of control rigs. In 5e, they granted extra dice, reduced TN and increased limits; this sweet trifecta of bonuses simultaneously lowered the bar and raised the ceiling for riggers, making them far better than other drivers of the same dice pool, as they needed less hits to achieve the same stunts and could keep more hits than they would otherwise be allowed to. It also meant that riggers had greater freedom of choice in their selection of vehicles and modifications, because their control rig bonuses made a vehicle's handling a lower priority. Control rig bonuses also applied to Sensor checks and Gunnery, so it also boosted a rigger's reconnaissance and combat abilities. To be on par with 5e control rigs, 6e control rigs would need to grant bonus dice, reduced TN and since limits are no longer a thing some other fitting bonus such as reduced speed penalties. What do 6e control rigs actually grant? Bonus dice and.......free edge generation. Someone stop the ride, I want to get off.
Disclaimer: I'm playing a Roadmaster-driving rigger right now, so I might be biased on account of just how hard my character would eat shit if I made him in 6e.
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I have no horse in this race, rigging is beyond me, but since Grid Guide came up here's a fact. GridGuide does not have 100% coverage. In Seattle specifically it has 100% coverage for only downtown.