[Medicineman]

Don't forget to hamstring him if he's a typical Unarmed Combat Phys Ad.

[ check Hamstring with Leo....]

 
Now (for the first Ed that I know of)
a  close Combat physical Adept rocks !
( I'm so proud of my Troll, he's got so much Potential)

with an unrestricted Dance
Medicineman

[ZeConster]

He forgot to add "Strength 3-ish" to that description. A4BG is part of a group of people that is very unsatisfied with the way going from STR/2 to STR and making Critical Stack a 1-level ability has reduced the potential of low-Strength unarmed adepts (although there's an Athlete's Way metamagic now which counters that).

Catchphrase!

[Zwischenzug]

How does Athlete's Way alleviate the lack of stacking for Critical Strike? Just curious; I don't feel strongly one way or another about Critical Strike being a single level power, to be honest, I just don't see what Athlete's Way changes about it?

Or am I misunderstanding you, and you're saying that Athlete's Way helps with low-strength unarmed adepts? Either way, would you care to elaborate?

[Michael Chandra]

Not Athlete's Way in itself, but as he said the metamagic it allows you to take. You can replace a Physical Attribute with Magic+Initiate Grade for an entire combat turn, 1+Grade times a day. This lets you replace a low Strength with a higher value for a bit. Of course a GM could argue it's only meant for dicepools, but I'd consider Melee Damage akin to Physical Limit.

[Zwischenzug]

Oh, very cool; I hadn't even considered that. Thank you.

[Namikaze]

So Medicineman, do you just cap all the skills of the NPCs at 6 as well?  Bear in mind as well that in 4th edition, you could only cap one skill at 6.  All the other skills had to be less - in SR5, you can have as many skills at 6 as you want at creation.  I just think that if you're not going to convert to 5th edition's rules, you might as well stay playing 4th edition.  Thus, you are wrong. 

[Glyph]

There is literally no point in creating brand new characters and converting them from one edition to the other, rather than simply making brand new characters for the new edition.

The trouble with any conversion is that SR4 characters are weaker in absolute terms than their SR5 counterparts, but relatively stronger.  In other words, they might only have one 6, but that 6 is better than most NPCs they will meet, rather than being a respectable but middling ability.  The other problem is that augmentations and gear have changed so much - dice pool boosters and initiative improvements are much more expensive, deckers and riggers require expensive decks, and so on.  It is better to rebuild them with SR5 rules, then add Karma equal to what they had earned.

[Namikaze]

It is better to rebuild them with SR5 rules, then add Karma equal to what they had earned.

This is actually what all the characters at my table did when we converted to 5th edition.  Overall, it was more balanced in the end and it felt like we'd hardly moved editions at all.

[Medicineman]

So Medicineman, do you just cap all the skills of the NPCs at 6 as well?  Bear in mind as well that in 4th edition, you could only cap one skill at 6.  All the other skills had to be less - in SR5, you can have as many skills at 6 as you want at creation.  I just think that if you're not going to convert to 5th edition's rules, you might as well stay playing 4th edition.  Thus, you are wrong. 

I know about the Skillcaps (been playing SR since end of 2nd Ed )
Since I'm not the GM at our SR5 Table I can't answer that issue with NSC Skill caps
But If I would be GM ,I'd cap Skills at 9 for PCs and NPCs both (6 for Starting Chars and normal NPCs and 7-9(10) only for special/ High End NPCs )

I just think that if you're not going to convert to 5th edition's rules, you might as well stay playing 4th edition.

ImO there is no great difference between the two Eds (except for the Matrrix) only the 5the ed is more ...limiting so its not such a bad Idea to stick with the 4A Ed and take everything good of 5th ed and add it on top
In One of my two SR4A Tables we strongly think of Merging SR4A with SR5 ( Using Skillcaps of 9 (10 with talented) , Karmasystem of SR4A, no Limits,  SR5 Matrix, SR4A Rigging Rules,no WiFi Schmo, etc) which is by far the best solution (ImO) and name it 4.5A Ed

 With the right Dance
Medicineman

[Namikaze]

With the right Dance
Medicineman

LOL Medicineman, we may disagree but I love that you do it in a sporting fashion. 

[Lucean]

Our group uses the conversion rules every time. Since we really like karmagen in SR4 and don't have that option yet in SR5 it seemed to be the best way for us to create the characters we want to play. This weekend it was especially helpful because someone wanted to introduce a decker into our traditionally awakened-heavy group. I don't know exactly which deck he got out of it, but surely saved him like 300,000 to 400,000 bucks. So it definitely works out for us, YMMV.

[Michael Chandra]

Which notes the big problem with the conversion rules: They're not really helping character balance, because they clash with the rebalancing aspects.