Shadowrun Character Critics Requested

[sm3]

I have spent a little bit of time trying to create a unarmed combat-based shadowrun character to try to determine if this is a viable design, and maybe end up playing him. I am looking for criticism and help as I am not ENTIRELY sure what I am doing.

I have a lot of single-point-skills just for the sake of not being completely useless in any situation, and I think that it's slightly more realistic in terms of representing myself in having a lot of general skills but not being really good at most of them.

Also, I used the recommended (400BP) BP for building a typical character... a lot of the skills were purchased in skill groups, but they were written out individually because writing it that way makes it easier to keep track of what skills you have and what attribute modifies them during game-play(without having to memorize everything).

The NUYEN is not the starting NUYEN, it is they NUYEN I have left to spend before the character starts existing.

This is the result so far, but I am looking for criticisms:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AhSXM9mJyWiNdG93SGdXNkpDTi1YWkNFdEwzQ1psd VE&hl=en&authkey=COKLodkN

[Tyger]

Can't seem to access the sheet, it says I don't have permissions. :)

Is there a public setting?

[sm3]

It's set to "anyone who has the link can view" I am about to change the link to make sure it's the right link.

[Tyger]

There we go...

You noted that you had a lot of skills at 1, which is very obvious. I would suggest specializing just a tad more than you have. Its one thing to be mediocre at a lot of things, but the only thing you are great at is unarmed combat. Almost everything else you are going to be barely better (if not worse) than you opposition at. Skills of one or two ranks are not going to come up much.

You took Missle Parry at four ranks, which is great - if your GM uses bows and knives to throw at you. That's a whole point of your adept powers, which may or may not ever come up. You have great unarmed skill though, why not take a look at the Counterstrike power from Street Magic.

Your biggest issue, from a adept powers perspective, is your lack of initiative passes. You have one pass. If you use Edge or combat drugs, you'll get a second one, at a cost. Initiative Passes are THE currency of melee fighters. If you only go once, and your enemy goes three times, you'll be on the floor bleeding while they walk away. This can be offset with the methods noted above, but take a long hard look at the Increased Reflexes power.

You don't have a firearm... the shuriken are nice, but sometimes you are going to want to shoot something.

Those are my initial thoughts. Take them for what they are worth.

[estradling]

Generally melee fighters are considered a poor choice in Shadowrun.

Fighting tends to be very lethal in Shadowrun and so in the words of Captain Jack Sparrow you should be "Fighting to Run away." Not fighting to get in someones face. And you really can't match the versatility of using a gun of some kind

[Tyger]

Generally melee fighters are considered a poor choice in Shadowrun.

Fighting tends to be very lethal in Shadowrun and so in the words of Captain Jack Sparrow you should be "Fighting to Run away." Not fighting to get in someones face. And you really can't match the versatility of using a gun of some kind

Good point - though its not completely unviable. There are times when it makes sense, and times when its even better than guns. Close quarters where capture and containment are an issue, it can be a viable role on a team. Not optimal, but viable.

[sm3]

Even though guns (or at least bladed weapons) would probably be optimal... Killing Hands still lets me do physical damage (with Critical strike makes it more damage) and I find a character that uses unarmed combat to be a generally cooler concept.

Looking through my 4th Edition rulebook I do not see counterstrike or street magic, (I used Alt+f4 on the PDF file.) could you please give me more information about where that is and how to find it?

What skills would be useless for this sort of character and should be removed? The character is really based on unarmed combat, so I don't know what other skills I should focus either.

What is a good adept power for extra initiative passes? How powerful do I want my increased reflexes?

I could probably by a cheap firearm... but a lot of my GM's games revolve around settings where a firearm isn't easily accessible (in highly secured areas where they remove them first.)

[Another_Poet]

Generally melee fighters are considered a poor choice in Shadowrun.

Fighting tends to be very lethal in Shadowrun and so in the words of Captain Jack Sparrow you should be "Fighting to Run away." Not fighting to get in someones face. And you really can't match the versatility of using a gun of some kind

THIS.

But, if you're going to do it anyway, I see you have Toughness and Quick Healer. Good call. (Toughness is the one that lets you take an extra couple boxes of damage before you start taking penalties, right? If not get that one too.)

[sm3]

Toughness is the one that adds to your damage resistance pool, high pain tolerance is the extra boxes, I think. I've reached 35BP worth of positive qualites, what should I take out if I am to get high pain tolerance?

[Tyger]

Counterstrike is a power in the sourcebook Street Magic - I should have asked what books you had access to.

As for Increase Reflexes, the more you have the better. Due to their very high cost, it does become something of a balancing act though. I would get at least the first level of them, just so you aren't moving the same speed as every other unaugmented schmuck out there.

As for the skills you could lose... Your logic linked skills are almost dangerous. The odds of glitching are really high with only two dice. And a critical glitch is almost inevitable. I'd ditch First Aid (or put more into it), Data Search and Computer (leave that stuff to your hacker). Better to save those points for elsewhere.

As for the rest, why so many social skills? Instruction? Leadership? Does you character run a dojo?

Also, why have both Dodge and Gymnastics? They can be used almost interchangeably.

[TheCountAlucard]

(posting under a friends ID while he is out ATM.)
This is Slade, and I have been playing SR4 since it came out.

The only things you need as a CQB hand to hand specalist are the following:

1: Stealth gear and skills. In this game, seeing first is shooting first, and get shot first WILL put your character at such a huge disadvange once those wound penalties start racking up. Highly recommend are Cameleon Suits, Inflitration skills, and a hide specialty (urban, if a typical SR game).

I cannot stress this enough. Chameleon suits are a must, the -4 to all spot checks means some mooks and lower end security gear simply doesn't work (don't count on it getting you into ultra high security zones alone, but the right gear, the right skills, and some serious social engineering from your face buddy might make it possible).

Being an adept, work on hiding your aura too-- pesky mages and their Astral sight, not to mention all the other dual natrued beings in SR. All the stealth in the world will not let you sneak up on a ghoul-- they can see auras.

This is essential to a CQB guy, being able to sneak up on your opponant negates the biggest advantage guns gives you- range.

2: High Close Combat skill group- Blades, Clubs, and Unarmed. You may get away without taking any Blades skill- Stun batons are pretty broke (unless you find that ONE guy with insulation armor or that one spirit or two with Immunity: Electrical) and use clubs instead. Otherwise, stun weapons are a great investment. Shock Gloves, Stun Batons, Sticky -n- Shock rounds, and Narco Jet ammo. Great all around equipment. And disgustingly cheap too.

3: Do invest in some Martial Arts moves from Armory. Not essential, but nice to have. Extra dice here and there.

Also, work on Martial Arts moves that allow your disarm checks easier- no since in letting your opponant hang on to his firearm. Since most mooks in SR (and even some Prime runners that don't focus in combat) don't get the level of training your going to have (even with Skillwires), you can tilt the battlefeild in your direction sooner that way. A man without a gun is not a treat (not counting mages, of course).

4: Don't be a lone wolf. You are not the Batman. Don't even try to be. Covert Operators like your self need buddys. You need the hacker to nuke the security systems (Ultrasound emitters and IR scanners are a pain). You need the Face to social engineer you way into places. You need the troll street sam to lay down suppresion fire with the heavy Machine Gun. You need the Shammy to heal you up after missions. You need the Mage to nuke spirits out of the way (and have the shammy help him to do so). You need your fixer to get ahold of the highly illegal gear you WILL need to survive those Shadowruns. You need Johnsons to think of you as a successful operator so he will hire you. You want the crime bosses to also think of you as a good fella to go to with jobs (Hey, your a runner! you think you can get away with out resorting to kill people?)

Again, this is the Slade, TCA let me post under his screen name. Sorry if this upsets anyone, but I know him IRL, and he let post. Thanks for your time and attention.

-Slade

[sm3]

How would I go about understanding and using Counterstrike? since I don't exactly have the book to cover it?

Level 2 in increased reflexes is had. Wait? is this a passive? Last time I read it I thought I had to activate it (which is what turned me off when I watched it)! I thought I read something about resisting drain in it the first time I read it (I didn't see it this time) which also really turned me off... drain seems really unpleasant and I didn't want to deal with that much.

Got rid of the logic skills and other stuff that seemed useless and boosted my social skills, stealth skills, and athletics. I am starting to I think I only want the social skills for con and Negation... how exactly is etiquette useful?

That might be something interesting to work in.. running a Dojo... but I think that leadership and Instruction are skills I may drop.

I didn't know that you could use dodge or gymnastics interchangeably... got rid of dodge and spent points in aforementioned skill groups. Mind giving me some details on what to look up for in the rulings to find how to do this?

As well as upping my stealths a little, I got the Chameleon Suit with Thermal Dampening level 4. I don't see any "hide" skills, where would I get those?

How do I go about hiding my aura?

I looked through the entire book for more specifications on what type of martial arts (Ninjitsu vs TaeKwonDo vs Judo vs ect) I could know moves from, like disarming techniques. I went through the core book to find Disarm and only found about disarming bombs... so now I'm thinking Armory is an expansion set... which goes back to my question from earlier in this post: How would I go about understanding and using it, seeing as I don't have the proper texbook.

I'm not trying to be a lone wolf.. I've just found situations where I can provide absolutely no help to my allies and It really annoys me... XD And what's worse is when "face" comes up with awesome plans but I'm the only OTHER person in the party with even close to enough CON to try to help him pull it off... And I can't let him go in unarmed, he has like no stealth or combat skills.



----
Thanks for the halpz guys, I appreciate it.

[Slade]

Got rid of the logic skills and other stuff that seemed useless and boosted my social skills, stealth skills, and athletics. I am starting to I think I only want the social skills for con and Negation... how exactly is etiquette useful?

That is for your Face. Those points can be spent in other things more relevant for a CQB expert, especially at start up. Specialization is the order of the day in SR4.


That might be something interesting to work in.. running a Dojo... but I think that leadership and Instruction are skills I may drop.

I didn't know that you could use dodge or gymnastics interchangeably... got rid of dodge and spent points in aforementioned skill groups. Mind giving me some details on what to look up for in the rulings to find how to do this?

As well as upping my stealth a little, I got the Chameleon Suit with Thermal Dampening level 4. I don't see any "hide" skills, where would I get those?

Those are filed under stealth skills. Infiltration is the "hide & move silently" of Shadowrun 4.


How do I go about hiding my aura?

Its in Street Magic. I haven't played a mage before. I like the Cyber in Cyberpunk, ya know?


I looked through the entire book for more specifications on what type of martial arts (Ninjitsu vs TaeKwonDo vs Judo vs etc) I could know moves from, like disarming techniques. I went through the core book to find Disarm and only found about disarming bombs... so now I'm thinking Armory is an expansion set... which goes back to my question from earlier in this post: How would I go about understanding and using it, seeing as I don't have the proper textbook.

You need the book called "Arsenal".


I'm not trying to be a lone wolf.. I've just found situations where I can provide absolutely no help to my allies and It really annoys me... XD And what's worse is when "face" comes up with awesome plans but I'm the only OTHER person in the party with even close to enough CON to try to help him pull it off... And I can't let him go in unarmed, he has like no stealth or combat skills.

Wasn't implying you where, just saying don't go Lone Wolf on the team. As for the Face not being able to Social Engineer people is a bit weird. Either: the dice are not with him, or he is not doing it right. Not sure whats up there.

----

Thanks for the halpz guys, I appreciate it.

That's what we are here for! :smallbiggrin:

[sm3]

What martial arts are good and what moves are good? I'm thinking about getting Ninjitsu for the infiltration and such. I'm not entirely sure about what the visibility modifiers are for, but it seems like putting points into that would make me able to be quieter about killing someone if I wanted to.

Also Tae Kwon Do seems like a good one because of it's bonus to damage and bonus to "charge" attacks which would help me get closer to an opponent. The "called shots" bonus also seems nice(even though I don't know entirely how called shots works.)

Wildcat seems good for similar reasons to TKD.

I may be over-thinking it... but the best disguise in the world isn't worth anything unless you can act the part... which is where con is necessary (as I understand it) to convince people that you are a certain thing you are not.

[sm3]

In a related question... what is the stack-ness of these moves? If someone attacks me and I parry, could I reposte a counterstrike? if that counterstrike succeeds could I use a finishing move? Could I do all this with Critical Strike and Killing Hands editing my damage?

If that would work (which I think it does)... I would lose two combat turns... but during that downtime where I have no combat turns It seems as if I would be able to pull off the combo again if I successfully evade an attack and use riposte to get a combat turn as a interrupt for another counterstrike.

[comicshorse]

Level 2 in increased reflexes is had. Wait? is this a passive? Last time I read it I thought I had to activate it (which is what turned me off when I watched it)! I thought I read something about resisting drain in it the first time I read it (I didn't see it this time) which also really turned me off... drain seems really unpleasant and I didn't want to deal with that much.



No, its a Physical Adept power not a spell. Its always on and there is no Drain for it.

BTW do you have anyway of seeing in the dark, if not powers then just some goggles with Low-Light and Thermographic vision built in would be a must

[sm3]

I want to get astral vision, does that count? It would be great in most situations, but I guess I wouldn't exactly be able to see nonliving threats... but thermo-graphic doesn't see nonthermal threats either.

[comicshorse]

Astral vision is very dangerous for non-mages. While it does mean you can see astrally projecting bad guys it also means they can cast spells on you from astral space

also thermographic won't see non-thermal threats but there aren't many of them, just Spirits I'd think. Low-Light vision will obviously work given even a little light.

[sm3]

What is the best item for that? and doesn't that ruin the camouflage of the chameleon suit?

[Tehnar]

Initiative passes and initiative are must. In typical games you need 2-3 passes and a initiative of 10+.

I would not neglect Willpower either. It helps you resist a spell and adds to your stun damage track.

As far as I see you have only 160 points in stats. Take away some skills and fill up those stats. Magic (and Resonance/Edge) don't count for the 50% BP limit towards stats.

To hide your aura you need the Masking metamagic, but you will need to play a bit for that.



What is the best item for that? and doesn't that ruin the camouflage of the chameleon suit?

Well any sane GM won't hold it against you, and its not spelled out in the rules. The only thing you need to worry about are larger then pistol weapons, and on then you can get chameleon coating to counteract that penalty.

If you have Arsenals I suggest you take Ruthenium Polymer coating and add it to a Armor Jacket (since you can afford it body wise).

[sm3]

WHAT? Magic doesn't count?! That's awesome, thank you... that helps so much XD Does magic count towards the "You can only have one at your natural maximum or two that are one less than your natural maximum" rule?

[Tehnar]

As I see it you can have one physical/mental attribute capped and magic. Generally speaking its not worth it having any attribute capped, let alone two.

[sm3]

I was told that for attributes you can only have one capped OR two at (cap-1). I was wanting three at cap-1 including magic. Does that count?

[sm3]

I decided upon ninjutsu, still deciding... can get three out of four of the bonuses. (+1 gymnastics dodge, +1 die to suprise attacks when initiating an attack, +1 to infiltration, -1 to visibility modifiers in combat)

[VirOath]

Sadly, adepts got the royal bone when they moved over to 4e, because they kept most of the stuff at 3e costs and power. A good example is the Improved Skill power, for a combat skill it costs 0.5 of your magic, getting a magic point costs you 10, but to get that skill up two more ranks will cost you 8. Most adept powers that are comparable to cyberware have the same essence/magic cost, which is a problem because you have to -pay- for your magic stat and -pay- for the adept quality. Ripping that off of your character is going to free up a bunch of points for money and skills.

I know you are looking at Killing Hands being able to deal physical damage, but it's a trap. Normally other types of characters have to pay -more- to deal stun, you shouldn't be dropping nice chuck of magic on dealing physical.

But my real advice? Don't play an adept. Cyberware and Bioware do it so much better and cost only money, Essence starts at 6 for free as well. Bone Lacing improves your flat out damage as well as boosting your body and armor, stat enhancers share the same hard limit no matter if they are magic or tech, and if you want to deal physical damage then Arsenal has more weapons for the Unarmed Combatant that lets you deals that physical damage. And there is stuff that cyberware can do that adepts can not.

But a melee combatant, even one with unarmed strikes as the weapon of choice, is viable. Just be smart and always carry a gun of some sort on you, nothing sucks more than getting in a fight that you just can't get into melee with.

But, the reason why melee combat works is that most combat should be about room to room, short distances with cover.

Though, I'd make sure that a melee character jives with the group. Because nothing hurts the group more than a player against the grain, and nothing sucks more than playing a character that is useless for a campaign.

[sm3]

That's probably good advice... but I haven't played an adept yet and kind of want to... and I think it's (flavor-fully) cooler even if it's inefficient (which is the same reason I want a unarmed-combat specialist.)

From my experience, stun damage doesn't do a anything useful besides give them minuses to their dice pools. I'd imagine that stun damage could stun them or at least score a K.O... but my GM has been playing to full stun damage to where it carries over into physical damage, and the only thing that they get is - to their dice pool. I don't know, maybe those minuses are more useful than I thought? Anyways, if I ever need stun damage, I can turn Killing Hands off.

I haven't checked with the group yet.. but most of the people in the group, I feel, would be ok with it. Though, I'm really just making this character because I enjoy making characters... I may not actually end up playing him this campaign.

Still deciding... can get three out of four of the bonuses. (+1 gymnastics dodge, +1 die to suprise attacks when initiating an attack, +1 to infiltration, -1 to visibility modifiers in combat) They all seem good, granted, I don't know how the visibility modifiers or surprise tests work.

Also, no one has answered my question as to whether I can combo out by using Riposte+counterstrike on a successful block, then if that is a successfulness hit, trail into finishing move. Then, can I add to my combat turns that I have to wait by using Riposte if I successfully block again?

For disarm, how am I supposed to disarm a gun? It seems like you can't exactly Parry a bullet...