[Reaver]

Wait, 6th? Have I been hibernating? Has that been announced?

Me thinks its a typo...  I think Marcus meant 5th... or possibly alluding that he hopes 6th will be that way...

[FastJack]

Please note, this thread is now being watched. If you need to, re-read the Terms of Service, particularly #1 - Play Nice and #7 - Be Constructive.

Criticism of the game (and it's developers) is okay, as long as it's constructive and not just complaining that you can't do what you want.

Likewise, stay chill when commenting on another user's posts, even when they are frustrating you. Be civil, even when the original poster may not be civil to you.

[PingGuy]

As a new GM, I find the problem isn't so much with inconsistency in the rules, but with difficulty clarifying a rule in a short time frame.  The index is amazing, but the full answer isn't always in one place, so the clarification often ends up being only half of the story.  That does lead to some inconsistency, but my players don't seem to care.  So for us it hasn't been an issue.

As others have pointed out, the inconsistencies occur more when you include the supplements.  I'm playing mainly from the CRB and Rigger 5, with a little Data Trails mixed in.  Generally I don't any find inconsistencies in the rules, though sometimes I find holes with no answer.  I'd imagine somewhere there is a supplement that addresses those holes.  As the GM, those holes tend to get ruled in a consistent manner, because my guess at the RAI tends to be the same each time.

Overall though, at my table, with my group, inconsistencies aren't a big deal.  My players aren't min/maxing, they are only familiar with the rules on a basic level.  They want to accomplish their goals using things from their character sheet that were interesting to them at creation.  As long as they get to do that, they don't worry too much about what worked this time versus last time.  To be fair, I don't have any magic users in the group, but I do have a Technomancer.  Finding consistency for a TM who is using his ideas creatively can be a challenge.

Generally though, if people are having fun, they won't get caught up in minutia and rules-lawyering.  With the caveat that for some people, the only way for them to have fun is by rules-laywering.  If they care about their character being perfectly capable of everything they envision, more so than they care about playing through a fun story, then there's not much you can do about that.  I remember some arguments on the D&D forums years ago, during 3.5e, that would make SR5's inconsistencies look like minor stumbles.  In the end it came down to massive over-complexity.  Shadowrun is complex, so it will always have more susceptibility to inconsistencies.  Some will be bothered by that, some will not.

[PingGuy]

I've played games with crappy simple rules (think old Marvel FASERIP with the random character creation) and a good GM and player group, and had a blast exploring what could have been hopelessly bad characters.

Thank you so much for raising this point.  The Marvel system was really only half there.  There were so many things with no answers at all, where you could cause your own inconsistencies just by trying to fill the holes.  I was going to run Marvel for my group originally, since i still have the box set laying around.  In the end I got the bug for some Shadowrun and we did that instead.  I think we would have had fun either way, but Marvel would have been more of a struggle to keep any form of consistency.  I figured we were in for some trouble when I had to think about house-ruling the movement rates for normal human speed.  That system had so much potential, but it was a mess.

D&D 3.5e had a lot of complexity and therefore lots of potential inconsistencies.  I remember the forums being awash in rules-lawyer adepts trying to figure out how to game the rules to do some crazy things.  There was some cleave-trip thing that was just broken and stupid and should never have even been a potential thought.  Yet, the rules left the question open, so there it was.

[Reaver]

I've played games with crappy simple rules (think old Marvel FASERIP with the random character creation) and a good GM and player group, and had a blast exploring what could have been hopelessly bad characters.

Thank you so much for raising this point.  The Marvel system was really only half there.  There were so many things with no answers at all, where you could cause your own inconsistencies just by trying to fill the holes.  I was going to run Marvel for my group originally, since i still have the box set laying around.  In the end I got the bug for some Shadowrun and we did that instead.  I think we would have had fun either way, but Marvel would have been more of a struggle to keep any form of consistency.  I figured we were in for some trouble when I had to think about house-ruling the movement rates for normal human speed.  That system had so much potential, but it was a mess.

D&D 3.5e had a lot of complexity and therefore lots of potential inconsistencies.  I remember the forums being awash in rules-lawyer adepts trying to figure out how to game the rules to do some crazy things.  There was some cleave-trip thing that was just broken and stupid and should never have even been a potential thought.  Yet, the rules left the question open, so there it was.

I loved the old FASERIP, system by TSR for Marvel! i still have several of the npc expansion books filled with superheros and adventures in the storage locker - but sadly I lost the old rule books for the system during a move years ago, and have been looking to replace them since with little luck.

But yea, the rules were only really half complete leaving tables to fill in the gaps on their own, which could lead to some epic story telling at times

[PingGuy]

I loved the old FASERIP, system by TSR for Marvel! i still have several of the npc expansion books filled with superheros and adventures in the storage locker - but sadly I lost the old rule books for the system during a move years ago, and have been looking to replace them since with little luck.

But yea, the rules were only really half complete leaving tables to fill in the gaps on their own, which could lead to some epic story telling at times

I can't make any promises, but someday I might get around to scanning the two books and PDFing them.  If I do I'll make them available somewhere.  In that case I'd be interested if you did the same with the expansion books. 

[Reaver]

I loved the old FASERIP, system by TSR for Marvel! i still have several of the npc expansion books filled with superheros and adventures in the storage locker - but sadly I lost the old rule books for the system during a move years ago, and have been looking to replace them since with little luck.

But yea, the rules were only really half complete leaving tables to fill in the gaps on their own, which could lead to some epic story telling at times

I can't make any promises, but someday I might get around to scanning the two books and PDFing them.  If I do I'll make them available somewhere.  In that case I'd be interested if you did the same with the expansion books. 

That may be possible...
I have about 6 to 10 of them, ranging from adventures to multi-hundred page "hero" resource books..

[忍]

How many cyberware clinics are there in Marvel? I think it's an inaccurate comparison as 'what counts as normal' is different between the two settings. Wageslaves can get commlink implants. Now anyone can be a 'genius'.

[Marcus]

We used to make character in the system simply for laughs.
You could get things like, human with mechanically power ability to breath underwater. No kidding you're super power is scuba gear.
LOL.

[忍]

We used to make character in the system simply for laughs.
You could get things like, human with mechanically power ability to breath underwater. No kidding you're super power is scuba gear.
LOL.

Aquaman?

[PiXeL01]

We used to make character in the system simply for laughs.
You could get things like, human with mechanically power ability to breath underwater. No kidding you're super power is scuba gear.
LOL.

Aquaman?

It’s the Mechanically part that’s fun. Basically the superhero wears scuba gear which makes him heroic ...

[PingGuy]

We used to make character in the system simply for laughs.
You could get things like, human with mechanically power ability to breath underwater. No kidding you're super power is scuba gear.
LOL.

I was going to let the tangent die, but since people are embracing it...

Marvel's system was very ala carte, you could build any weird combination you wanted if you had enough slots for the Powers/Talents/Skills you needed.  Even though the idea of an actual Iron Man was laughably impossible at the time, they gave you the tools to try to build your own version.  If you wanted to bring Batman into the Marvel universe, this system would let you.  In return for that, they left a lot of leeway to the GM since many potential situations weren't covered.

Yes, taking scuba gear is incredibly basic, but I believe you could build or acquire specialized items to make you more special as a hero.  For example, at the time this game came out, a micro scuba kit--that had the same amount of breathing time as a normal scuba kit--would have been hero worthy.
 Nobody else would have one.  So there was potential there for people to create the hero they always wanted to be.

It is a silly system for sure, I won't argue against that.  It's a product of its time, the 80's were weird.  It actually had some similarities to 1st edition Shadowrun, in how the tiers worked.  SR had a system where things moved through classifications like Moderate/Deadly/Severe, Marvel did also, but using the common comic book adjectives like Amazing/Incredible/etc.

It occurred to me that I recently found this site: http://classicmarvelforever.com/cms/

They may even have some of the books in digital form, I could have sworn I found them there, but looking at the links now they don't go anywhere.  I may have put some stuff on a USB stick last time I was there, so I'll check that.  Found them, the links are on the main page (duh).  I was looking in the download section and some of the links weren't there.

I'd still play that system, it has a huge potential for fun.  The main reason our group didn't is that I'm a GM who doesn't read comic books, and would have 3 comic book reading players.  They would always know more about the game universe than I would, and I'd have to do a lot of research to stay ahead.  But maybe someday it will happen.  With all the movies out, I could come up with an arc to jump onto from some point in that story line.

[PingGuy]

Stop hijacking please. Back to topic.

It's obvious that you have an affinity for strictness, and that colors your view of any system of rules.  That is probably why you write your own content to be strictly water-tight, or immune to oncoming trucks.  It seems like you are having a hard time believing that others may not share your affinity for strictness.  Making you wonder how huge gaps in the rules could not impact their gameplay experience?  It's simply a disagreement on the fundamentals of what makes role-playing fun.

That is part of why Marvel came up, it has holes you could drive a Chitauri spaceship through, yet it can still be fun.  Role-playing means different things to different people.  When I was young, I only cared about combat and min/maxing, finding a powerful build so the NPC's couldn't keep me down.  Now that I'm older, I care about playing a character with an interesting story, and that story mattering in the campaign I'm playing in.  Younger me would have cared more about rule clarity, and certainly would have driven my GM to care about it, having to deal with my constant mechanics calculus.

When people have said it doesn't bother them, you've pointed to glaring holes and said "but look at this!"  It must be frustrating that even being shown these glaring holes, they don't bother people.  But that is just an example of how people care about different things.  Shadowrun's strength is its setting, for many, that is the most important thing.  Even when you could drive a truck through the plot holes, people just roll with it, because complex things inherently have more faults.  It only matters if you can't bridge the gap and struggle to keep things moving when a hole is found.

There is no question that 5th edition has its issues, there are holes, there are ambiguities.  Even in cases where the RAI can't be gleaned from the RAW, it only matters if the GM can't determine how to make his or her own call.  That will happen, GM's will make calls where they have to and will end up regretting their choice.  A group of players might make them pay for it, and force the GM to go heavy in the opposite direction to compensate.  A good group of players will roll with it and keep having fun.  It's only a problem if the players see themselves as competing against the GM, rather than that they are all playing a game together to have fun.

I hope that better answers your question.  A lack of consistency only matters if it has the ability to disrupt the game or the cohesion of the group.  SR5 has gaps, but not so many that it causes constant problems.  They happen more as the number of sourcebooks involved increases.  They are easily overcome by any group that wants to keep things moving rather than winning an argument with the GM.  As such, most groups should handle them just fine.

[Jayde Moon]

The point isn't more valid.  Different people have different styles.  I've traveled for all of my life, never staying in any one place for more than 3 years with one exception, which was 7 years.  Sometimes I moved on in as little as one year.  This is all over the U.S. and some foreign travel as well.  I'm in my 40s now.

I've found most groups are generally laid back about rules arbitration as long as they trust their GM.  I've seen players who are inflexible about certain portions of their playstyle and generally GMs have been able to fit that in, without much problem.  Sometimes it creates a bit of a power struggle that results in someone having to give.  It's unfortunate when that happens.

Anecdotally, my experiences have been closer to PingGuy's than to yours, but I've also seen groups where the GM is less willing to go 'off script' when it comes to rukes interpretation.  Personally, I find that restrictive.  I'll also note that, again in my anecdotal experience, that this tended to come from less experienced GMs or when working with a new system.

I, myself, get frustrated when I can't quickly get an official rule on something in a system I'm unfamiliar with.  But in Shadowrun, if I can't find something quickly, I have enough experience with the system that I quickly arbitrate something, with the statement that I'll come back to it and future instances might be different, my players trust in my mechanical knowledge that they accept it and we move on with the important parts, which is telling our cooperative story.

But once again, I'm going to advise you to stop taking folks responses antagonistically.  You asked a very open ended opinion question.  People are giving you their opinions.  If they differ from yours, you don't have to defend yours or attack theirs.

[Jayde Moon]

For example:

Thanks for sharing the story of your life.

This is an unnecessary start to the statement you followed it with.  It's condescending/passive aggressive.  Someone gave you their experiences and you marginalized them with this sarcastic jibe.

----

As for the focus on you, this is your thread.  You opened the forum.  So it is incumbent on YOU to have the maturity to navigate the various responses with respect.  Others should definitely respond to your question with respect as well, of course.  However, most folks are not approaching this question with the intent to antagonize you or to hold a particular playstyle in favor over another.  When you feel their opinion does the latter, you've generally attacked.

In most cases where, in your various threads, you've been attacked, it was after a build up from responses in which the other poster initially offered their thoughts and advice in earnest.  That does not remove the burden of playing nice from them and the most egregious cases have been dealt with, as you've seen, but I am pointing out that your replies in many cases have not been emotion neutral, and I am simply requesting that you make a greater effort to do so.