Shadowrun 4th Edition

[consequences]

Well, I picked it up because I had a gift card for the store.

Overall, not bad from what I'm seeing. But the arbitrary inviolable dice caps are a bit annoying. Also, the whole concept of simplifying the system to appeal to casual gamers is more than a bit of a nuisance. So I'll give it a tentative B-minus.

Of course, there's the problem of the Adept. Everything else is subject to balance and fixed limits on capability, but the Adept can be min-maxed into an utter cheese-fest with minimal effort.

[TheFeniX]

I've been wanting to pick up 4th edition for a read-through for a while now. My 3rd edition handbook (along with my other source-books) makes for some good bathroom reading. I just never really wanted to blow the money considering that I haven't seen all my old RP buddies since high school, which is a damn shame.

I've always found magic to be fairly overpowered in Shadowrun, but it's usually a failing on the GMs part for not recognizing that (AFAIK) FASA designed it that way intentionally. I've had starting mages that could wax the floor with Samurai with few problems, mainly because I was the only one out of our group who really took the time to read and re-read the magic sections and the Grimorie many times. With your standard Street Sam, it's just "upgrade cyberware" and "buy bigger gun." But there's so much advancement for your magic classes (especially when 3rd edition allowed adepts to buy more force points, and with the Grimorie Initiation).

Our GM made the mistake one time of giving everyone an automatic 1,000,000 nuyen starting cash. He said he wanted a "higher stakes" game. Whatever... So, I bought a rating 6 katana weapon focus for my starting psyad. I was going to wait to bond it until I had the karma for it (35, I think), but he told me to go ahead and do it. This was 2nd edition rules, but it was pretty pathetic. I can only imagine the damage one could do if left unchecked.

Awakenings had a few ways to tone it down, but we only had one other GM (besides me) who didn't bother reading up on say... the "focus overuse rules." Anyways, you think the book is worth a read if you've got 3rd edition already?

[consequences]

I know that I wouldn't have bothered if I hadn't had free money at the store. But I have to say that some of the changes look like a good idea. Fluff-wise, I'd have to say that I haven't seen anything gloriously special in my first perusal.

Some of the basic stuff:

Character creation is done by a build point system only, the priority scale has been done away with. Effort has been made to stop starting characters from arbitrarily maxing out their stats and skills for the twink factor(except for the Adept, for which it is pitifully easy).

The racial maximum/modified limit has been cut down to racial maximum/augmented limit. Which means that more than three points of cyber enhancement in any attribute is pretty much pointless unless you are a troll.

All target numbers are now five. Modifiers affect the dice pool, not the number. You don't get to reroll sixes unless actively using luck.

Instead of having a karma pool and a good karma number that accrue over time, you have an 'Edge' attribute which is your luck factor. You can start with it maxed if you really feel like burning the build points.

Your number of damage boxes depends on your body and willpower.

The Adept is my major game balance gripe. Making one that can punch harder than an armor-piercing missile is a trivial exercise. Making one that's always armored better than someone in full battle armor is easily doable. Adding ten dice to your firearms pool is a piece of cake. A starting chracter can only fully munchkin one of these, but they also get the ability to initiate , and branch out into additonal domains of twinkdom. The fact that you have to pay karma for the added magic points slows the process down, but past a certain point, every non-magic character is going to run into a hard upgrade limit, while the Adepts( and mages) continue to build, and that hard upgrade limit is much lower thanit was in third edition(except that there was never a skill cap as I remember it, so there was still room for improvement, however slow).

[LadyTevar]

My god, I've not played Shadowrun in over a DECADE!

I can agree with the cap on rerolling sixes, tho. Ever see a light pistol take out a cockatrice?

[Stark]

Hilariously, I just heard about 4thed Shadowrun and had a read: ignoring the system (which is still broken), the setting now includes every lame 'edgy' technology and anything they could steal from GiTS. Oh dear - wireless Matrix! XM8!

Breaking the adepts even more is amusing, but it seems many more tests are opposed tests. This neatly doubles the amount of rolls, slowing an already glacial game down even further.

While Shadowrun is an interesting setting (Paul Hume hippy-wanking aside) the system has always been one of the worst, most munchkin-ised systems out there. Why not just use a better system in the setting?

It certainly wins some kind of personal award for 'most stupid game concepts introduced', though.

[Old Plympto]

Fourth Edition? Man I barely used my Second Edition which I bought in 1990. Though I did manage to come up with a home made Shadowrun worldbook for my hometown and played there a couple of times. Good times.

[consequences]

Hilariously, I just heard about 4thed Shadowrun and had a read: ignoring the system (which is still broken), the setting now includes every lame 'edgy' technology and anything they could steal from GiTS. Oh dear - wireless Matrix! XM8!

Breaking the adepts even more is amusing, but it seems many more tests are opposed tests. This neatly doubles the amount of rolls, slowing an already glacial game down even further.

While Shadowrun is an interesting setting (Paul Hume hippy-wanking aside) the system has always been one of the worst, most munchkin-ised systems out there. Why not just use a better system in the setting?

It certainly wins some kind of personal award for 'most stupid game concepts introduced', though.

You forgot Metalstorm being used in an infantry weapon. Which I had blanked out too.

[TheFeniX]

Hilariously, I just heard about 4thed Shadowrun and had a read: ignoring the system (which is still broken), the setting now includes every lame 'edgy' technology and anything they could steal from GiTS. Oh dear - wireless Matrix! XM8!

I ended up flat-out banning a lot of stuff after the Shadowrun Companion came out. It was just Skills and Powers (which, to show how broken it was, I designed a fighter/dagger throwing specialist that could deal 85 damaged a round at 1st level... meh..) for Shadowrun. It seemed like FASA just starting releasing a bunch of bullshit to compliment their collection. Kind of pissed me off.

This neatly doubles the amount of rolls, slowing an already glacial game down even further.

It easy to speed up. You just have to memorized all the combat rules and modifiers.... I had lots of free time in high school. I quit fucking around with other "fluff" like threat levels and professional ratings, but you are correct: if you have a GM who really doesn't know a good chunk of the rules by heart, you'd better have a lot of beer to get through it.

And we ended up completely ignoring Matrix combat and a lot of the vehicle/rigger stuff. It just gets to convoluted when you want to run a high speed chase. I'd handle the Matrix bit (no one even wanted to play a decker, and I can't blame them), by how much money they spent to hire one if needed.

While Shadowrun is an interesting setting (Paul Hume hippy-wanking aside) the system has always been one of the worst, most munchkin-ised systems out there. Why not just use a better system in the setting?

The big seller for me about Shadowrun was that, as a GM, I could make it as deadly as I wanted without pissing off my players. The higher you got in AD&D or any palladium game (without instant destruction via MDC weaponry), the less you can just die for being a retard.

If my players did something truely fucking stupid in Shadowrun, their imminent character death was only a dice roll away. But yes, the occasional burning of massive karma pool points and refreshing dice pools could make a streetline special inherently dangerous to even a Juggernaut. GM discretion is advised.

[LadyTevar]

Fourth Edition? Man I barely used my Second Edition which I bought in 1990. Though I did manage to come up with a home made Shadowrun worldbook for my hometown and played there a couple of times. Good times.

Yes, a friend of mine and I were going to try to sell FASA a worldbook for the "borderland" of WV/VA... which in Shadowrun has reverted to its US CivilWar status of wild border between North and South (UCAS and CSA). I honestly think it would have sold.

[SirNitram]

SirNitram vs. the Tank...

'...They've brought a tank. We specifically planned to expend every heavy weapon and the GM sent a tank at us at the end.'

'Double back? There's only twice as many Samurai as we have bullets.'

Me: 'I take my Walther PPK out, and in a gesture of defiance, shoot the tank.'

(Yes, I had to have my Bond Gun).

Roll for a while, getting 6's. '...You're apparently finding a weakspot.' Continune rolling, start wondering about the dice. '...Into the crew compartment..' Roll a few more times. '..Getting richochets, um, let's use these dice now..' STILL SIXES. '..Okay, I give up. You hit the ammo and it explodes. You just killed a tank with a dinky handgun. Bastard. We're capping the damage now.'

[Stark]

This neatly doubles the amount of rolls, slowing an already glacial game down even further.

It easy to speed up. You just have to memorized all the combat rules and modifiers.... I had lots of free time in high school. I quit fucking around with other "fluff" like threat levels and professional ratings, but you are correct: if you have a GM who really doesn't know a good chunk of the rules by heart, you'd better have a lot of beer to get through it.

Yeah, SR2 was a highschool thing for me too. We ignored most of the combat rules (initative? Bah) to speed it up, after using the rules properly had a 5PC vs 8NPC battle take hours. However, my brief glimpse suggested 4ed combat involves much more opposed rolling, which is a nice idea but the SR system really is slow enough already.

And we ended up completely ignoring Matrix combat and a lot of the vehicle/rigger stuff. It just gets to convoluted when you want to run a high speed chase. I'd handle the Matrix bit (no one even wanted to play a decker, and I can't blame them), by how much money they spent to hire one if needed.

The whole Matrix thing was bullshit. Everyone but the decker sat around drinking or jacking off or whatever for an hour or two while some lame sidetrack gets played out in a solo. Blergh. Rigging is a thankless profession: on a per-mission basis, riggers have the highest bills (ammo, repairs, replacing vehicles) but they get the same share the idiot street sam gets to buy more 9mm and redo his purple mohawk.

The big seller for me about Shadowrun was that, as a GM, I could make it as deadly as I wanted without pissing off my players. The higher you got in AD&D or any palladium game (without instant destruction via MDC weaponry), the less you can just die for being a retard.

If my players did something truely fucking stupid in Shadowrun, their imminent character death was only a dice roll away. But yes, the occasional burning of massive karma pool points and refreshing dice pools could make a streetline special inherently dangerous to even a Juggernaut. GM discretion is advised.

This is an interesting view: I've never really played ablative games, so Shadowrun wasn't that much more deadly than anything else for me. Even in highschool, the idea of getting paid $50,000 to break into a paramilitary corporate base, kill people, steal secret shit and run into the barrens and hide was ludicrous.

[Aeolus]

SirNitram vs. the Tank...

'...They've brought a tank. We specifically planned to expend every heavy weapon and the GM sent a tank at us at the end.'

'Double back? There's only twice as many Samurai as we have bullets.'

Me: 'I take my Walther PPK out, and in a gesture of defiance, shoot the tank.'

(Yes, I had to have my Bond Gun).

Roll for a while, getting 6's. '...You're apparently finding a weakspot.' Continune rolling, start wondering about the dice. '...Into the crew compartment..' Roll a few more times. '..Getting richochets, um, let's use these dice now..' STILL SIXES. '..Okay, I give up. You hit the ammo and it explodes. You just killed a tank with a dinky handgun. Bastard. We're capping the damage now.'

I havent looked through my brothers copy. Can that happen??!!

[dragon]

SirNitram vs. the Tank...

'...They've brought a tank. We specifically planned to expend every heavy weapon and the GM sent a tank at us at the end.'

'Double back? There's only twice as many Samurai as we have bullets.'

Me: 'I take my Walther PPK out, and in a gesture of defiance, shoot the tank.'

(Yes, I had to have my Bond Gun).

Roll for a while, getting 6's. '...You're apparently finding a weakspot.' Continune rolling, start wondering about the dice. '...Into the crew compartment..' Roll a few more times. '..Getting richochets, um, let's use these dice now..' STILL SIXES. '..Okay, I give up. You hit the ammo and it explodes. You just killed a tank with a dinky handgun. Bastard. We're capping the damage now.'

I havent looked through my brothers copy. Can that happen??!!

Not quite that straight forward but yeah. The amor of the tank will down grade the damage and make it easier for the tank to resist, but you still can make the golden BB's. And to tell you the truth its possible to hit the tank crew with a pistol in real life. My tanker body in Iraq had a pistol round hit him in the chest while sitting in the tank, good thing he had body armor on. Some how it found an opening.

[SirNitram]

I havent looked through my brothers copy. Can that happen??!!

If you roll a six on damage, you keep the six and roll again. Repeat until you stop rolling sixes.

This was a case of extreme luck; I literally used all the D6's I had, plus had the GM force me to use his at the end because he thought I must have weighted them(Despite them coming up 1 alot earlier). The tank's armour blunted it alot, but he just got sick of the obscene level of damage and declared it kablooied. Apparently, the god of dice said we got away that day.

[Jawawithagun]

The whole Matrix thing was bullshit. Everyone but the decker sat around drinking or jacking off or whatever for an hour or two while some lame sidetrack gets played out in a solo. Blergh. Rigging is a thankless profession: on a per-mission basis, riggers have the highest bills (ammo, repairs, replacing vehicles) but they get the same share the idiot street sam gets to buy more 9mm and redo his purple mohawk.

That's why my rigger always insisted on expenses to be dealt with before handing out the shares. Strangely enough he found some support - just not from the sam. Though, I think I broke the sam player and the GM when I first brought up the topic.

[TheFeniX]

Yeah, SR2 was a highschool thing for me too. We ignored most of the combat rules (initative? Bah) to speed it up, after using the rules properly had a 5PC vs 8NPC battle take hours. However, my brief glimpse suggested 4ed combat involves much more opposed rolling, which is a nice idea but the SR system really is slow enough already.

Yea, the initiative deal was easily handled by: Each level of wired reflexes/equivalent = one extra attack per turn. Then we just killed the asshole who went and bought Boosted Reflexes.

This is an interesting view: I've never really played ablative games, so Shadowrun wasn't that much more deadly than anything else for me. Even in highschool, the idea of getting paid $50,000 to break into a paramilitary corporate base, kill people, steal secret shit and run into the barrens and hide was ludicrous.

But, Shadowrun has mages that pack submachineguns and cast mean ass fireballs when starting out, so.. you know.. it evens out.

Although, you got me thinking on this one. That's about the description of every RPG I've played: ludicrous. I think the only RPG I really played that had an actual "believeable" basis would have to have been "Human Occupied Landfill."

I havent looked through my brothers copy. Can that happen??!!

For a bit longer explanation (sorry if you already know this): Shadowrun (as of 3rd edition) has 4 levels of physical "damage" to all objects. Light, Moderate, Serious, Deadly/destroyed. Your standard heavy pistols do something like 9M (9 power, moderate damage). Vehicles downgrade the damage one level, so it does 9L.

Then the tanks armor would almost certainly push the power down to 2L (the lowest damage you can inflict). But, for every two successes (that's 2 dice above say... 4 (which is the default target number for a pistol attack, assuming no modifiers)), you can "Stage" the damage up one level (light goes to moderate, moderate to serious).

So, as long as Nitram's pistol does at least Moderate damage, he has potential to damage the tank. If he were to roll 6 successes in an attack, and the tank failed to roll above any dice above 2 on it's defensive test: yes a walther could take it out. Shit like this can happen in Shadowrun.

The issue stems from say: a skill of 6, plus combat pool of 6, and maybe some karma pool. Rolling 15 success dice against a target number of four, could garner at best 15 successes. If the tank only has say 8 dice to roll on a damage resistance test, then no matter how well it does: you've still got enough left over to blow it up with your PPK.

So, in conlusion: Shadowrun does have some serious damage scaling issues, and I spent too much time memorizing all this crap.

[Stark]

[But, Shadowrun has mages that pack submachineguns and cast mean ass fireballs when starting out, so.. you know.. it evens out.

Although, you got me thinking on this one. That's about the description of every RPG I've played: ludicrous. I think the only RPG I really played that had an actual "believeable" basis would have to have been "Human Occupied Landfill."

Shadowrun's basic premise is ludicrous. Getting paid such a paltry sum for taking massive risks and pissing off huge, militarily-independent corporations and making the guy you work for millions upon millions of dollars is stupid. You know, like how risk should equal reward? We grew out of the way you're 'supposed' to play after one mission, since noone is going to take your average 'shit pay, suicide, they'll hate you so much you'll never work again' mission. I'm not interested in RPG cliches: like I said, I've hardly played games like palladium and D&D. If *I* had a body full of $500,000 dollars worth of high-spec chrome, I wouldn't take a part-share in $60,000 to risk horrible death and being hunted forever to make someone else heaps of cash.

[HRogge]

I havent looked through my brothers copy. Can that happen??!!

No it cannot happen in SR3... never.

Tanks (and all other vehicles) have "hardened" armor... if a single projectile of your weapon has not more power (which doesn't get changed by your dice roll) than the tanks armor you are unable to damage it at all.

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<edit>
I have played SR2/3 a long time and we play now by SR4 rules. The new rules seem to be faster and easier, they have streamlined most stuff and got rid of many extra rules without loosing much. Especially the new dice system (5/6 is a success, modifiers are made by adding/removing dice) works much better than the old system.