[Ramlatus]

I am new to SR4, and can not find any rules for designing weapons and vehicles from scratch. I need to create the products for two new companies that are working their way to the big leagues during the course of the campaign.

[The Wyrm Ouroboros]

There are no such rules, sorry.  Best bet is to take an existing SR4 product, change a few things (take away a modification or two, replace them with other mods), adjust the price accordingly, and call the item by a new name.

[Ramlatus]

I thought so. Yay, more work for me.

[Mithlas]

Shadowrun has a lot of power and flexibility, but not every game system can be EABA. Besides, making minor tweaks (or checking out Gun Haven 1 or 2 if you really want canon products) should give you material you can use and isn't very difficult.

[Wakshaani]

Always a tricky balance, that's for sure.

[Critias]

I thought so. Yay, more work for me.

I don't see how "swap the name on existing products and give them a modification or two from Arsenal" is more work than "create brand new stuff from scratch."

I mean, I'm not saying folks shouldn't want the rules (don't get me wrong).  It just feels weird to complain about it being "more work" to not have to build guns from scratch.  You've got rules to modify existing guns, isn't that -- in theory -- easier than starting from nothing?

[JustADude]

There are no such rules, sorry.  Best bet is to take an existing SR4 product, change a few things (take away a modification or two, replace them with other mods), adjust the price accordingly, and call the item by a new name.

Agreed.

The exact way I do it is to take the base price of a weapon and then subtract out the price of all the stock mods to get the "baseline," then add in the other desired accessories. The three key points are:

1) Always strip out everything first.
2) Always strip out fixed-cost mods before "multiplier" mods (SmartGun, High Velocity, etc)
3) Add "multiplier" mods together and subtract all at once, since they all modify base price.

And a special note:

4) When making fancy "specialty" mods, be sure to charge appropriately.

[Wakshaani]

If there are some that you want, you can always ask... lots of people here are happy to fiddle with stuff.

For example.

Let's say that I want my KE guys to carry an SMG instead of an Assault RIfle. It has less penetration, so doesn't go through buildings to hit bystanders, and is also smaller, so easier to move in house-to-house style. I take a quick look at the SR4A book and see that Ares doesn't have *any* entry in the SMG market. Well that won't do at all, now will it!

So, a normal SMG deals 5P. Sounds fine. AP - s also fine... once again, we don't want to shoot through buildings with this thing. Fire mode of SA/BF/FA is normally good, but once again, I don't want something spraying death around quite so much. I'll give it SA and BF, but leave off Full Auto. Since it doesn't have Full Auto, we could crimp the ammo levels down, Let's go with 24 rounds of ammo, which is about average for an SMG. It's a newer Ares gun, so the availability should be a tad high, but not silly. I'll call it 8R. Cost will depend on what else is in there, so, we skip for now.

For features, I know I want a non-retractable stock, and we'll put Gas Vent-1 on there as well... with 2 points of RC, you get one burst a round for free, or several SA shots. You could go higher, but this is a mass-produced Ares weapon, not an elite high-tech one like Ares Alpha. Keeping costs down is good. KE has smartlinks as standard issue, so, to keep a hint of the Ares quality, we'll make it a smartgun instead of a laser sight.

So, if I wanted to use Arsenal, I could go through and find some neat mods, but we'll hang this one out there as-is.  So, I dip a quick eye into DeviantArt to see if there's not something out there that I could use in my home games. Wish I had a real art budget, but...

At any rate, I look around, and find a neat looking Bullpup design.

At this point, all that's left is to give it a name and a write-up, then throw it all together.

Ares Nike


SMG: Ares Nike
Damage: 5P
AP: -
Fire Modes: SA/BF
Ammo: 24
Availability: 8R
Cost: 600

The Ares Nike has become the standard-issue 'enhanced' weapon for Knight Errant city patrol officers. While the Predator remains the standrad-issue side-arm, a Nike is provided to each officer and waits behind the officerss heads in the front of the Patrol One patrol car. The Nike is a highly-portable bullpup SMG, allowing for increased firepower to deal with gang threats without slowing an officer down, allowing them full mobility in urban environments.

Taa daa! New gun! Yayyy!

[All4BigGuns]

That's all well and good, but some of us like having design rules for firearms and vehicles. If someone tries going too far with 'em, just use Mirikon's method of hitting them with the Atlanta phone book.

[SunRunner]

SR does have design rules they are just not from the ground up. Pick a base gun and then add mods to capacity limit as desired. Anything that cant fit in the capacity limit is obviously TOO MUCH and the game guys dont want it in.

[Mirikon]

SunRunner, that's definitely not what we're talking about here, though. Ground up design rules would make for an increased variety of potential weapons (ranged and melee) and vehicles. For instance, if I wanted to have a Tachikoma, there aren't really any rules for designing one. If I want a whip-dagger, how do you stat that up and price it? There's no guidelines, so you're forced to wing it, which leads to problems when getting a DM to accept them.

And then there are things that just aren't allowed under the current system, like a silenced assault cannon, because you can't do silencers for heavy weapons, even though they've made an integrally suppressed FA grenade launcher IRL before.

[SunRunner]

They have no formal system for that stuff. It just means you have to work it out with the GM which may or may not work out. The real reason it does not exist is it would take alot of time to try and give you all the crazy options you want for your whip dagger and have any hope of balance. I mean the amount of broke ass stuff that is in the game as it is is pretty silly. If you want something just find something that is close and modify from there till you and the GM are happy. If you wanted a Whip Dagger for example I would probably just call that a mono whip. Which means I would tell you to buy a mono whip and the skills to use it if your in hero lab and you just skin it at a whip with a dagger on the end of it This means I would say it does not have the forbidden rating as its a crazy custom weapon they probably would just classify as a knife from a law enforcement stand point and I would make it take a hit in the conceal ability department since its a real whip with a dagger on it and nowhere near as slim and compact as an mono whip. If you want gun craziness then I just look at it and see if A I think its possible and B do you have the skills/Contacts/facilities to get it done. After that we go to C which is how much it costs. The sillier and more exotic the mod you want the more it costs to get it and maintain it. If your going for something really exotic its going to be expensive and probably subject to malfunctions ala the buggy ware quality and such.

[Unahim]

For vehicles, Arsenal suggests that vehicles in that book can deviate 1 point or so (or 20% for speed and such) from the market average, provided there's some drawbacks.

More cost and extra availability is a drawback.

[CanRay]

"I want the really super sportscar!"  "OK, fine, it's a Ferrari."  "SWEET!"  "The kind they only sell to people on THEIR list.  You could show up, dump elenventy-billion nuyen on their table, and they'll tell you to take your poser hoop out of there and let the guy who's been on the real waiting list actually buy it for a few ten million."  "...  OK Hacker, find me that list."

[Mithlas]

The exact way I do it is to take the base price of a weapon and then subtract out the price of all the stock mods to get the "baseline," then add in the other desired accessories. The three key points are:

1) Always strip out everything first.
2) Always strip out fixed-cost mods before "multiplier" mods (SmartGun, High Velocity, etc)
3) Add "multiplier" mods together and subtract all at once, since they all modify base price.

And a special note:

4) When making fancy "specialty" mods, be sure to charge appropriately.

Out of curiosity, do you have any rule for equipment "prepackaged into a designed gun" being discounted or some such? I've put the gear in S4A and most of the guns from Arsenal into an excel file to compare the prices and values, and I've yet to find a balance point with which to make the prototype vehicles, guns, or gear that will inevitably be stolen/used in my campaign. For NPC-only gear that's self-destructive there's no need to worry about the cost, but PCs need to do things like repair broken gear and might want to modify, and this makes base prices more important, but I haven't been able to come up with a consistent rule for myself yet.