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Critique my street sam please!

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Gnomercy

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« Reply #15 on: <11-06-11/0107:24> »
Sweet....I appreciate it.  This is one of those times where I wish I hadn't used a character generator because sometimes it's easy to make things that are illegal and not realize it :-P  Hooray for awesome forums though.

Short story on her big regret is that she ran away from home, got caught up in some go-gang activity in her misspent youth, lost an arm (hence the 'ware).

Glyph

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« Reply #16 on: <11-06-11/0154:58> »
A big regret isn't merely something the character is sad about.  A big regret is something the character is ashamed of, and something that other people would similarly find shameful.  The character has a -3 social penalty dealing with people who know about it, can possibly be blackmailed by people who know about it, and can gain a point of notoriety if too many people find out about it.

Maybe the more fleshed-out description has that, but simply "Ran away from home and joined a gang" doesn't sound like something that would get more than a shrug in shadowrunner circles.  A big regret would be more along the lines of, say, her convincing her best friend to join the gang, participating in her hazing, and having something go too far and her friend dies.  Or maybe she just lost her arm, when the other gangers were killed, because her nerve broke and she ran away.  But it needs to be a secret the character genuinely feels remorseful about, and wants to keep buried.

jonathanc

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« Reply #17 on: <11-06-11/0239:37> »
I always thought it'd be funny to play a street sam with the "big regret" of being a former "blue movie" star.

Johnson: Hmm....you there, behind the Face....you look familiar.
Sam: Uh, what?
Johnson: I've seen your face somewhere. No wait, it wasn't your face....
Sam: You've got the wrong guy/girl.
Johnson: No, I'm pretty sure about this. My memory is impeccable
Sam: I just have one of those  faces.
Johnson: It's not your face that looks familiar. I'm pretty sure it was your--
Sam: Please, just drop it and tell us what the job is.
Johnson --I've got it! It was the trid with the midget acrobats, and the donkey, and the peanut butter!
Sam: Just kill me now.

Phylos Fett

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« Reply #18 on: <11-06-11/0259:57> »
I always thought it'd be funny to play a street sam with the "big regret" of being a former "blue movie" star.

Johnson: Hmm....you there, behind the Face....you look familiar.
Sam: Uh, what?
Johnson: I've seen your face somewhere. No wait, it wasn't your face....
Sam: You've got the wrong guy/girl.
Johnson: No, I'm pretty sure about this. My memory is impeccable
Sam: I just have one of those  faces.
Johnson: It's not your face that looks familiar. I'm pretty sure it was your--
Sam: Please, just drop it and tell us what the job is.
Johnson --I've got it! It was the trid with the midget acrobats, and the donkey, and the peanut butter!
Sam: Just kill me now.

LMFAO!!!

Zephraim

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« Reply #19 on: <11-06-11/0347:23> »
I always thought it'd be funny to play a street sam with the "big regret" of being a former "blue movie" star.

Johnson: Hmm....you there, behind the Face....you look familiar.
Sam: Uh, what?
Johnson: I've seen your face somewhere. No wait, it wasn't your face....
Sam: You've got the wrong guy/girl.
Johnson: No, I'm pretty sure about this. My memory is impeccable
Sam: I just have one of those  faces.
Johnson: It's not your face that looks familiar. I'm pretty sure it was your--
Sam: Please, just drop it and tell us what the job is.
Johnson --I've got it! It was the trid with the midget acrobats, and the donkey, and the peanut butter!
Sam: Just kill me now.

Now you know that the Johnson watches trids involving midget acrobats, donkeys and peanut butter. Use this to you advantage, I'm sure he would want you to keep this a secret.

Phylos Fett

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« Reply #20 on: <11-06-11/0350:06> »
Now that's thinking like a blackmailer 'runner!

Tsuzua

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« Reply #21 on: <11-06-11/1024:09> »
You can't get rating 4 enhancements on a cyberlimb without a cybertorso.  Also, you really really want to have a customized cyberlimb.  It's not that expensive and I would move a point out of agility and have 50,000Y more to spend. 

Here's the limb at mimimum, I'll do for this character:
Body 5 (2 levels customization)
Agility 6 (3 levels customization)
Strength 6 (3 levels customization)

Then with agility 3 and strength 3 that gives an effective 9 agility and 9 strength with the arm.  You also have 2 capacity slots left over as well (after lowering the armor to 2 as well).  I'll rather use a spur than a hand blade but that's your choice.  I also like high body scores on my cyberlimbs due to averaging, but you can't have that and high strength without getting restricted gear (due to availability).  You could get a quite badass Body 9, Agility 6, Strength 8 arm (before enchancements) then. 

I'm a big fan of the cyberlimb gyromount, but that's forbidden so I'll check with your GM about how bad that is before I tried to figure out how to get the slots for it.

As for armor, you have high enough caps to have some choices.  I like armor that provides concealment like lined coats, Synergist jackets, or the Ulysses greatcoat.  I would especially consider them if I was going to be an automatics user.  If you're cool with helmets, you should get one as it helps keep the ballistic / impact armor values even.  The Urban Explorer Jumpsuit is also a nice foundation for your armor as well.

Also, how attached are you to your guns?  The executive protector is a very useful if niche gun so I'll keep it.  I would drop the Ares Predator and get a taser instead since you're only going to be using pistols when you can't bring in anything heavier due to legality.  However, I can see keeping it as a backup piece and it's cheap.

I would however get a "normal" automatics weapon as your main gun.  I can give a lot of advise on what guns are useful for that role after a few questions.  Is your GM using the Recoil and Strength rule from Arsenal 163?  If so, you'll be getting 1 RC from that.  If you can get your arm's strength to 10, you can get 2 points which is really nice.  Also how does your GM rule cyberlimb averaging?  If you use a foregrip, does that count as firing two-handed?  What if it's a stock?  If you do use a two-handed firearm, are the two arm's agility averaged or do you use the lower?  Can you live with a cyberlimb gyromount or will cops aggro on you to death?

Edit- Looking over your skills, you could also just go high base agility and ditch the cyberarm.  Then buy muscle toner either now or right away in play (you really want muscle toner 4).  You can also buy muscle augmentation to up your strength as well. 

Also with athletics 4, I'll instead grab athletics 1 and get a Synthacardium 3 for 30,000Y.  Same roll, but you save 24BP. 
« Last Edit: <11-06-11/1136:53> by Tsuzua »

Gnomercy

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« Reply #22 on: <11-06-11/1236:52> »
Is your GM using the Recoil and Strength rule from Arsenal 163? 
Probably not as I'm the only one in the group that owns Arsenal

Also how does your GM rule cyberlimb averaging?
Not sure if she's aware of this.  Our other games (that the group has run) have been cyberlimb-less

If you use a foregrip, does that count as firing two-handed?  What if it's a stock?  If you do use a two-handed firearm, are the two arm's agility averaged or do you use the lower? 
I can ask her these when we get to play.

Can you live with a cyberlimb gyromount or will cops aggro on you to death?
I could totally live with it...it jives with the character.


Tsuzua

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« Reply #23 on: <11-06-11/1641:41> »
Then I'll give an overview of the automatics group.  Since you had no mention of Stick and Shock (SnS), I'm assuming a SnS free world.  Also it sounds like you don't have Gun Heaven. 

There's actually only a few points of important difference between a firearms of the same group.  Since damage and conceal are more or less fixed within a group, you don't care about that.  As long as you keep up fire for 3 passes (27 rounds on FA, 18 on BF, and 3 on SA), clip size is at best a minor beanie.  If the other benefits are good enough, 18 round clips can work (2 passes on FA fire).  What you really want to look at is innate recoil compensation (not from stuff from gas vents and the like) since you really want to hit RC:8.  Built in beanies like smartgun systems or scopes are nice, but you often don't need to worry about them.  You should also keep in mind

Common modifications you should get are gas vent 3 (on the barrel), personalized grip, chameleon coating (-4 conceal is really nice), external smartgun system on top (if needed), and gyromount on the arm.  That'll give you 3 mod slots left over for other stuff.  Shortened Barrel is a nice choice for -1 conceal but reduces ranges.  Ideally you'll want a concealable piece and a heavier piece for heavy fighting and mod the weapon accordingly.
 
I'll drop the handblade and just own a knife or drop a point of armor for the gyromount.  If you don't get a gyromount, you'll have to find other sources of RC which would vary (underbarrel weight or foregrip + sling mainly).  You'll lose 2 points of RC, a lot of mod slots (auto-adjusting weights), or 1 RC and concealability.  Shock pads and the like are good easy to get 1 point of RC but may require two handed use which may lower your effective agility to 7 (average of the two arms) or 4-5 (lower of the two arms due to careful coordination).  Personally I don't think they do, but I'm not sure if there is a stock using 1 handed stance you can take in real life and your GM might care about that. 

Automatic Pistols are basically light pistols that are bigger and fire faster.  Thus, they fill a similar niche to light pistols for the automatics group.  They're your light concealable pieces (-2 conceal after chameleon coating).  With a coat, shortened barrel, and a concealable holster, you can get up to -6 conceal.

The pistol I like most is the FN 7-C after a small firing selection change.  You'll have 8 points of RC after mods.  That's enough to have no penalty FA fire.  You only have enough for 2 passes though.  If you can find 1 more point of RC, the Ares Crusader works after similar mod work (you gotta remove the old Gas Vent 2 though).  The MP9 from Gun Heaven is a forbidden 25 clip version of the FN 7-C (remove the foregrip for better conceal). 

SMGs are a good compromise between conceal and offensive power.  Since you're a cyberlimb user, SMGs have the advantage of being one-handed which is a big deal for you (you'll get to use your agility 9 with them, then either 7 or 4 for heavier guns depending on gm ruling).  After chameleon coating, shortened barrel (if desired), and a coat, they're -3 conceal.  They're a good option for you to specialize once you earn some karma. 

They're 5 SMGs that I'll recommend.  The first are the Ingram Smartgun or HK-227.  Both have a lot of innate features including restricted sound suppressors.  The Ingram Smartgun has slightly bigger clip, but has no SA fire option.  With enough RC, you'll want to BF even when you're using the sound suppressor, but some GMs make BF louder than SA.  Since they're innate sound suppressors, they're extremely quiet (-6 to hear).

The best full offense regular SMG is the Praetor.  With its huge clip and 1 point innate RC, it's quite easy to reach the magic 8 RC threshold.  It even comes with cheap electronic firing so you save a mod slot there.  It's only flaw is that it's forbidden.  It's a good gun for when you don't care about how legal your gun is.

An interesting option is the M4A1 from Gun Heaven.  It's a SMG that has 6P base damage, but is vintage (no smartgun or other electronic mods, other mods are x2 price).  With a laser sight (or red dot sight from the same book), you're losing a die to hit for +1 DV which is a good deal.  You can't get chameleon coating so it's not a particular concealable SMG.  But, it's a cool option for when you can have a gun out.

The last SMG worth commenting is the Ingram Supermach 100.  With an gyromount, you can hit 11 RC needed.  Then means you're hitting for 9P and 9P narrow bursts instead of 10P and 7P which is an arguable tradeoff.  The Supermach really shines with SnS rounds.

Assault Rifles were formerly the heaviest of the automatics group.  That title now belongs to the Battle Rifles.  Without optional rules, you must fire them two-handed.  This may or may not be livable depending on averaging.  With a coat and coating, you have -0 conceal. 

The best AR without question is the Ares Alpha.  The 2 innate RC seals that.  The grenade launcher is a fun beanie if you ever want to use it.  It's forbidden though.  After that, it's the AK-147 due to its innate recoil compensation of 1.  If you don't have War!, then any other AR will do.  They're pretty much the same after the Ares Alpha.  The HVAR is fairly meh HV option, but still worth considering.

Battle rifles were introduced in War! and expanded in Gun Heaven.  Basically they're AR with LMG ranges and 7P -1AP base damage.  I assume you can't coneal them.  Since you have a gyromount, the HVBR is the best.  Unlike other HV weapons, it loses no DV making it just win.  Otherwise, the AVC-7.62 or Sig Sauer 574 are good choices.

I hope that helps!



All4BigGuns

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« Reply #24 on: <11-06-11/1834:18> »
Despite the cost, cyber ears can be good because of the Damper (mentioned previously), and having all those enhancements in your body as opposed to in a piece of gear, if something very, very bad happens you'll still have those enhancements. (Same thing goes with cyber eyes)

Strapped for cash? Go ahead and drop 'em. If you can afford 'em keep 'em and maybe get some contact lenses for the visual enhancements you couldn't get in your cyber eyes (if any). Getting the ear buds even with cyber ears and nothing in the buds is still a good idea though. It can really help with receiving calls. :)
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Glyph

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« Reply #25 on: <11-06-11/1928:53> »
One of the other attractive features of cyberears is that you can turn them off completely - there are sonic attacks, as well as critters with the paralyzing howl power.

Joush

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« Reply #26 on: <11-06-11/2317:35> »
And of course, everything you hear can be recorded to your cyber-gear, allowing you to review what you heard later if you have to.

Kaptain O

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« Reply #27 on: <11-07-11/0943:37> »
Can you not do that with earbuds?

What about a Simrig?  I thought that recorded everything?

(as an aside, do I always have to type a Captcha to post/reply on this board or does that go away after a certain number of posts?)

FastJack

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« Reply #28 on: <11-07-11/1012:37> »
Can you not do that with earbuds?

What about a Simrig?  I thought that recorded everything?

(as an aside, do I always have to type a Captcha to post/reply on this board or does that go away after a certain number of posts?)
Earbuds can be turned off, but you still have your natural hearing to worry about. Whereas, when you turn off cyberears, you're effectively deaf.

rasmusnicolaj

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« Reply #29 on: <11-07-11/1118:48> »
(as an aside, do I always have to type a Captcha to post/reply on this board or does that go away after a certain number of posts?)

I think it is only for the first 10 posts.

Rasmus
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