[KagedShadow]

Hey all,

Question regarding Armour Modifications and add-ons from Arsenal...

The Table on pg 44 giving capacity for all the mods/add-ons from the core book - can any of them be built into any armour  - or can add-ons only be applied to armoured suites

I ask as Im wanting to have a commlink built into a Form Fitting Half Body Suite? - which doesnt have a capacity

Cheers

KS

[WellsIDidIt]

Well the core rules don't have any limitations on adding things in.

Arsenal adds two new optional rules:
A.) Capacity
B.) Max of 6 or 1.5xhighest armor value in armor mod rating points.

The key here is that these two rules are both optional and independent of each other. They don't really seem to play well with each other, and we're given no direction on how they are supposed to play with each other.

That said, strictly by the RAW of both rules, there is nothing preventing you from slapping anything into the FFBA unless it (the mod/equipment) specifies otherwise. If the modification doesn't have a rating (such as a commlink) it just takes up one of the armor mod rating points for the armor if the armor does not have capacity.

So you could slap a Commlink in FFBA, it would just drop the number of other mod ratings in the armor by 1 (so for half suit of FFBA you'd go from 6 to 5 points of armor mods you could put in).

[Novocrane]

I was under the impression that they work fine together.

Shock frills has no rating point value listed, and the example given in Arsenal for armour without capacity says it takes up one rating point.

This means it could be modified with Fire Resistance 5, Insulation 3, and shock frills, but no more (5 + 3 + 1 = 9)

(refers to a lined coat (6/4) which can take 9 (6 * 1.5) ratings points of armour mods - FFBA has the same highest rating)
Looking at the alternative, the capacity rating for shock frills (ie; if you put it in bike armour, rather than FFBA) is dash. (-)

[KagedShadow]

cheers for the answers folks, much appreciated 

KS

[WellsIDidIt]

I was under the impression that they work fine together.

Shock frills has no rating point value listed, and the example given in Arsenal for armour without capacity says it takes up one rating point.

Using both rules, does an armor suit have:
A.) Max Armor rating to spend and capacity to spend?
B.) Just Capacity to spend?
C.) Must fall under both Max Armor Rating and Capacity?

Nothing under capacity negates the normal rules, which means that C is the correct interpretation by RAW. On top of that, many of the capacity's are much higher than one, leading to being able to fit much more in, say an Armored Vest, than in an Explorer Jumpsuit.

[Novocrane]

Nothing under the normal rules enables it, either. Armour and armour suits, when you use a rule for each, are not the same thing.

[WellsIDidIt]

Not all Armor is Armor Suits, but all Armor Suits are Armor. Using both rules, Armor only has to follow the Armor rule, while Armor Suits have to follow the Armor and Armor Suits rules. It's like squares and rectangles.

You can disagree if you want, but if you do, then you have to accept that Armor Suits only follow Armor Suit rules (and no Armor rules), which opens up a huge can of worms. For instance, Armor does not stack (unless specifically stated), but nothing ever states that Armor does not stack with an Armor Suit. If Armor Suit is not Armor, then it would stack with Armor. Likewise, is the rating from an Armor Suit considered Armor for the purposes of encumbrance? The Rule is regarding Armor and Encumbrance, not Armor, Armor Suits, and Encumbrance.

In addition, the rules already assume you're using standard rules regarding armor for Armor Suits, otherwise they would not need to reference the normal Armor encumbrance rules when detailing how Military Armor encumbrance works.

So if you choose to not apply the same rules to both, that's fine, but the rules never actually state to do that (or give any insight into how they are supposed to work with each other).

The best fix I've found to the main issue (being able to fit more into non-armor suits than armor suits) is to make unrated modifications and add-ons treated as rating 1 or their capacity cost whichever is higher. Then again, I feel that a lot of the capacity costs are way to high, especially for helmet mods (you can grab a camera with all your options and tie it to a HUD cheaper than shoving all the vision enhancement in usually).

[Unahim]

-snip-

So we -do- agree on some things! That's good to know ^^ I'm not sure if being able to fit less in an armour suit is a problem, as I haven't looked into it that much yet, but one could reason that the armour in it takes up place, I suppose... your ruling works just fine, though.

[Novocrane]

What are you fitting more of in regular armour? I could fit shock frills [-], nonconductivity r6 [3], chemical protection r6 [2], & fire resistance r3 into said biker armour suit, then a camera r6 [1] (with a full set of vision enhancements installed in the camera), plus another 5 slots in the helmet.
That's 21 rating points worth right there. (more if you put rated armour mods in the helmet slots) Only the bunker gear provides less.

Personally, I think you're not covering all the bases you think you are, and not seeming too happy with the results. But hey; I'm not playing with you, so fly it how you want.

[WellsIDidIt]

Holsters, Toolkits, Simrigs, Medkits, Survival Kits, Skinlinks, the list goes on and on. Anything that is unrated (most of what you listed doesn't fit that category) and takes up more than 1 capacity is easier to fit in normal armor than into an Armor Suit.

Look at Capacity, and compare it to the normal high rating x 1.5. Capacity is lower in every case. Meaning that 1 capacity actually takes more than 1 armor rating, 2-6 capacity is far more than 1 armor rating.

Sure, it can be ignored, but both the max armor rule and capacity do effectively the same thing (limit how much you can slam into a piece of armor) and using two rules to cover the same thing is just flat out sloppy game design.

It would have been much simpler to have Armor Suits follow the same rules and just give unrated gear a non-variable rating (which is what capacity is in all cases without variable ratings anyway) or give all armor a capacity rating and allow Armor Suits to have more capacity than standard since they are suits.

Now assuming you're going to argue that Armor Add-Ons, Sensors, etc. can't be put in normal armor (which flies straight in the face of the clothing and armor text on page 326 of SR4A), it's still exists in a few cases with purely armor suit vs. armor.

For example, let's take the Armored Vest vs. Urban Explorer Jumpsuit. I can slap an Auto-Injector, Rating 6 Thermal Damping, and Rating 2 Non-Conductivity into my Armor Vest. For my Jumpsuit, I can fit in Thermal Damping 6 and then neither of the other will fit anymore.

Yes, capacity kind a works with rated armor mods, it falls on it's face with unrated mods and add-ons though.

[Novocrane]

Climbing Gear [5]
Concealed Holster [4]
Holster [3]
Medkit [5]
Miniwelder [4]
Quick-Draw Holster [4]
Survival Kit [6]
Tool Kit [6]
Environment Adaptation [3]
Feedback System [3]
Simrig [5]
Skinlink [3]

This is the real list of stuff that you shouldn't be attempting to put into armour suits, if you want to be capacity friendly. Some of it, I question why you would want to insert into clothing or armour of any kind. (see; skinlinked armour, rather than skinlinked items) The holsters, I question why you would want it to be part of the armour.

Now assuming you're going to argue...

Not even going to bother, because you're not remaining coherent.

[WellsIDidIt]

What exactly was incoherent about what I said?

This is the real list of stuff that you shouldn't be attempting to put into armour suits, if you want to be capacity friendly. Some of it, I question why you would want to insert into clothing or armour of any kind. (see; skinlinked armour, rather than skinlinked items) The holsters, I question why you would want it to be part of the armour.

A nice suit coat or longcoat with a concealed holster sewn into the shoulder. Kind of a classic. Old WW2 Peacoats often had that feature to fit the .45. Skinlinked Armor? Ruthenium Coating and various other objects sewn into the armor would benefit from a single skinlink mod into the armor rather than each being separately skinlinked. Some GMs might even argue that your armor must be skinlinked for outerwear equipment to transmit via skinlink (ie must travel from equipment to armor to skin to armor to other equipment).

Ya, sure, you can just say "Well that doesn't need to go into armor so we can ignore it," but that's quite literally ignoring the problem, and not entirely true in several cases as I've shown.