Urthdigger wrote:

My most broken tactic is also the simplest: Simply pump up speed by whatever means possible, get several instances of ambidexterity, and roll out with an extra pair of limbs. Setting people on fire is all well and good, but when in doubt more guns and more speed is just a flat out damage multiplier.

So what you are saying is dual wielding Assault Rifles and quad-wielding plasma sword +3x knifes? :)

CordialUltimate2 wrote:

Ok, I forgot about the most munchkin thing that kept my character - semi-competent in combat alive while doing stupid shit and watching "combat monsters" around die like flies. ARMOR STACKING FOR NEWBS Biomorph - 100% legal. No multiple layers penalty. 1.Get Heavy Bioweave 3/4 3/4 2.Get Smart Skin 3/2 6/6 3.Get Second Skin 1/3 7/9 4.Get best armor you can. Heavy Body Armor. 13/13 20/22 5.Get Full Helmet. 3/3. 23/25 6.Get Fireproofing Armor mod 2/0 25/25 7.Get Ablative Patches or Reactive Coating Get Reactive Coating 5/5. 30/30 Total cost: about 4k credits You can mix and match but this is highest RAW armor combination AFAIK. Synthmorphs - depends on your DM interpretation. Ask how heavy can masked synthmorph armor be. Naked Guard morph has 12/12 so it seems logical it is this at minimum. 14/12 is a Light Combat Armor robotic enhancement which from the description in the book could reasonably be masked. Take Guard morph or Light Combat Armor morph and mask that shit. Now repeat steps 2-7 from biomorph guideline. You should end up 41/38 or 43/38 Armor. Now wait patiently till your GM hits you with heavy Railgun rolls 2x10 and smiles. Smile back and announce "I take 0 damage" Disclaimer: This relies on treating the masked synth body as biomorph body (layer 0) for the purpose of counting armor layers. Otherwise you have 2 layers of armor: synth armor mod and external body armor, which would impose -20 penalty for layering armor.

According to rules the Synth armor mod does not count as layer so you don't get -10 penalty for it. So Guard with 12/12 and Heavy Combat Armor is 28/28 immidietly. Now to add all other stuff like armor mods, second skin/smart skin/Helmet etc.

Why on mask? You upgrade your chasis armor (so basicelly your synmorph skin, chasis). And apply on that Synth Mask. It is the same as when you add mounted concealed weapon. You probably go to some sort of "cyber engineer store" or something, where they remove your Synth Mask, apply armor, mount your weapons and then reapply Synth Mask. Same as things like Wings, Vector Thrusters etc. can work with Synth Mask (no where is said they don't).

CordialUltimate2 wrote:

Ok, so here is definitive RAW ruling about robotic armor enhancements. These armor modifications add to the synthmorph’s built-in Armor rating. They are not compatible with worn armor. EP p.310 So Reaper in Heavy Body Armor is not allowed by RAW because it already has a robotic armor enhancement. Even Guard would not be allowed to wear armor if you used this enhancement. This is the rule that are there to prevents what Benny89 wanted to do: combine Heavy Body Armor and Heavy Robotic Armor. It is purely for game balance. Also Heavy Combat Armor: This modification is bulky and noticeable; the bot frame is encased in a heavy-duty carapace. (...) The shell’s mobility systems and power output are also enhanced to deal with the extra load. EP p.310 So it could be masked but it would look like a bad drawing of a gorrilla came to life. As for the Guard. I guess that to accomodate the mask and internal armor a lot of clever engineereng had to be done so it is more of an exception than something to base the entire reasoning on. I retract the previous comment about designer oversight with this morph. It is clearly logical now that I think about it. If it had robotic armor enhancement it couldn't by RAW wear any external armor. So with Guard the highest you can go is 12/12 + 16/16 + mods with Robotic Heavy Armor. Forget about looking human. Or go for the layered armor as described and get 41/38 which is cut to 40/38 by DUR at 40.

Of course that It is for pure balance. But it is also stupid. A humanoid synth morph meets what? An invisible barrier that prevents him from wearing a body armor (same for carapace armor)? Like space magic does not allow it? Player buys it and I say as GM- you can't wear it? I understand a game balance reasons to mechanic (especially in cRPG games) but when it comes to pen and paper RPGs such things just look stupid when I have to explain player why the neo-gorilla uplift player (MUCH bigger morph) can get inside Body armor and his normal looking Humanoid Steel morph can't. There has to be some "logic" in RPG, because otherwise immersion is easly broken by simple... well, strange rules. Like "you can wear this armor but magically it loose all its protecion propertines, because magic". But I get that RAW says that and that will be homerule. As for Heavy Combat Armor- the "bad drawing of a gorrilla came to life" is just your interpretation. For me a standard chasis or Light Combat armor looks like normal muscled but slim humanoid. But with Heavy Combat ARmor you look like Schwarzenegger Terminatior- bulky, super muslced humanoid bodybuilder. Again- there is no detailed description of Heavy Combat armor apart from "bulky and visible". Well, professional bodybuilder is definitely bulky and visible :). That is just an interpretation. Sure even without Body armor you can easly get Guard to upper 40 levels of Armor values. But I am not that concerned about players stacking armor (there is always a way when I want to deal with it) but also a logic behind their action. For example, if player decided to smash nearby gas pump and then ignite it- that is something mechanic does not say how to handle (like damage, explosion radius, throws, etc.) but it is logical action by player. I can't say : you can't do that, because pen and paper is that - you can do what you want and suffer consequences. Hence why invisible barrier preventing humanoid sized/shaped synthmorph to wear body armor is simple...well.. stupid. Much better would be rule that says that you can't get armor value higher than for example 40. It is way more logical because at some point personal armor can only offer as much protection, after which you would have to start wearing vehicle armor plates or tank chasis. This way a synthmorph would have to decide how to get to that value, either by wearable armor/chasis upgrade or one + mods, or upgrade + wearable armor etc. Since at somepoint you won't magically make better armor by adding layers. If you war 5 bulletproofs vests- it will offer better protection vs what can already protect against, but 50 cal will still go through all and you like butter. I just don't agree with space magic reasons why something can't be pick up/wear/wield if logic 100% says it could be. Not in pen and paper RPG. Dam, I wrote too long post :D. Sorry, this is my personal of course taking on it. RAW is RAW. It will be houserule of course. Sorry for too long post :).

Btw. - about articulated weapon mounts - how are they cover by mechanic? They do not require ambidexterity, correct? So to save CP I can just have one ambidexterity trait, 2 normal lims (heavy pistol in each) plus 2x concealed articulated weapon mounts inside my shoulders and have 4x rail heavy pistols without worrying about off-hand penalties since.. well, they are not hands :). As for melee, so far I played only few sessions but each time I can say- shredder is always the best melee weapon. The penalty doesn't really matter if you are combat moster anyway and shredder will out damage every melee build on Full Auto with 100 magazine size plus -10 AP but also covers cone in front of you and you can hit few targers with it. And you can concealed it and add toxins/nanotoxins/chemicals. I know the argument "what if you are thrown naked without weapon bla bla", but same is for blades. Only unarmed is really the safe melee when you only think about scenario when you might be without anything. I was watching few interviews with ex-SEALs and some other ex-military guy and each of them when asked "best self defense system/training to defend in CQC/vs knife/vs multi opponents" said: "get a gun". And so far in EP I agree with it :). Ow, another thing. Zap rounds are OP vs meat bags (bios) :). You can have most loaded Remade/Fury biomorph with stacked armor all the way to their ass, with 20 extra limbs and 10 assault rifles, all best mods/augs. One action turn with full auto zap rounds and they have make so many tests vs shock that even if one fail- bum, they lie on ground and battle is over :) I'd forgot. How do you calculate exaclty a morph max velocity?

FrivolousVector wrote:

After that point, you add in 2 Alpha forks for 2 lead hackers and 2 support hackers for a +30 each. By that point, you are in the neighborhood of 190 for rolls. You can rush the hacking attempt by taking a -30 on your roll (dropping you to 160) which reduces hacking time to ~60%, which you are then doubling by having 2 hackers (all of you). Your enemy's firewall can be used as a penalty on your hacking attempt, but even the best things are described as having no more than a -50, which means you have to be hacking in the middle of an EMP before you can possibly even fail the roll. The only pity is that, without being able to use psi, you also can't take the sleight that reduces "planning time" by 20%.

Thanks but I still don't see how does it make combat hacking in 2 turns. Does every Alpha Fork cut down the hacking time if they all hack the same thing?

DivineWrath wrote:

Benny89 wrote:

I'd forgot. How do you calculate exaclty a morph max velocity?

See Transhuman p. 218.

Thanks!

FrivolousVector wrote:

Benny89 wrote:

Thanks but I still don't see how does it make combat hacking in 2 turns. Does every Alpha Fork cut down the hacking time if they all hack the same thing?

It's mostly a result of hacking being described in terms of "number of actions" instead of "number of turns". So if you stack Speed with the Multitasking implant, you are making ~4 assisted actions per turn. Basically, you reduce the standard time by 60% and then divide by 4. By that point, you have a hacker who can crack your mesh in less time than it takes for you to turn it off.

So...4 mental actions per turn x 4 hackers = 16 actions per turn for hacking? But I can't find in corebook where this is described (the way forks hack the same target to cut overall hack duration). Do you know more less where it was? I am trying now to find it :(

DivineWrath wrote:

Unfortunately, I can't find much info on articulated weapon mounts either. We're going to have to make some judgement calls. I'm going to point out that an extra limbs cost 250 [Low], while articulated weapon mounts cost 1000 [Moderate]. (not cyberlimbs, but robotic enhancement extra limbs). I think its quite reasonable to expect articulated weapon mounts to be able just as articulate as normal limbs. Look at the Rover morph (Morph Recognition Guide p. 82). The picture used is a good example of what I think articulated weapon mounts can do. The ambidexterity trait says it negates penalties for off-hand fighting. It doesn't matter if it is a hand, tail, tentacle, etc. Emphasis on etc. I think it should work the same for articulated weapons as it takes effort and concentration to use multiple weapons. In regards to the example of weapon mounts following where the head points, I think those weapons are being controlled by an AI instead of the person. They just follow where the head points. Limited AIs have built in limitations preventing them from exceeding basic professional training.

The Price - 250 for Extra Limb vs Articulated 1000 for weapon mount is exactly another point why I think Articulated weapons are NOT counted as hand or off-hand. Because they would be useless otherwise. Would be cheaper to just slap 2 or 4 extra hands at same price and have the same thing as mounted weapon! In my opinion this is where the Synthethic combat morph advantage is shown- that it can have automated weapon mounts for higher price and thanks to that Synths/Robots have another way of multi-wielding than extra limbs. Cheaper option is extra limb for bio and synths and require training because you have another limb you can move with muscles/servomotors and that require coordination from your body. The reason why extra limb (hand/leg/tentacle) needs ambidex trait is because your limbs does not move automaticaly where you want in perfect synchro. That is why we train muscle memory, eye-hand coordination, we repeat some moves hundreds of times - to simulate automated process of moving hand and gun to where you look without much of brain process. Weapon mount does not need any sort of muscle memory or coordination. It's a weapon system attached to your body (simillar to how tanks have autmated missle systems on them, flares etc.). Of course it requires aim from you (focusing vision) and choosing fire-rate but it doesn not require ambidex, because it's a automated system. Also "off-hand" is off-hand, another hand, hand. Automated Frame is not hand, unless you want to treat a flash light mounted to combat helmet as off-hand too.... Think logically- why would Extra Limbs be separate than weapon mounts if there was no difference? That wouldn't make sense. Weapon mounts are something different than cyberlimb or extra limb as shown in corebook. It's different augment. Also it makes perfect sense for robots to have automated weapon mounts. I mean even nowadays we have weapon mounts that work that way on various of combat vehicles/planes. Sure, some people may think otherwise, but I think that many just do not want to give synth another advantage over biomorphs in combat (because skipping off-hand penalty is big advantage) but for me it makes perfect sense- robot will always be better combat monster than flesh and has much more options of weaponized systems to install due to it's mechanical body. Weapon Mounts are not extra limbs, because extra limbs (which are called LIMBs) are seperate augments. As for AI- again, this is not RAW. By RAW weapon mounts do not mention AI, therefore PC must control them. Of course RAW says you can give control to anything in your body to another ego/AI/fork, so you can do that I am sure. But by default weapon mounts are operated by body user. Also Ambidexterious description: "The character can use and manipulate objects equally well with both hands (they do not suffer the off-hand modifier). If the character has other prehensile limbs (feet, tail, tentacles, etc), this trait may be applied to a limb other than the hand. This trait may be taken multiple times for multiple limbs" Limbs, limbs, limbs. It even describe what kind of limbs- tail, tentacles, feet, hands etc.- all are animal/humanoid limbs. I also focus here on etc., as its listing a limb-kind of augments. It's same as "this weapon mounts can be mounted on various ground vehicles such us: hammer, tanks, heavy transport trucks, military cars ETC.". And then (because of etc) we can think "ow, so bicycles and choppers too!". Weapon Mounts are not listed as limbs, they do not imitate any kind of limbs. Think of War Machine minigun attached to his shoulder or Predator Plasma Gun- what kind of limb does it look like? Also final argument: Weapon mount can be mounted any where in synth body. So you can have 2 heavy pistol fixed mounts (one direction) coming out from your chest (shooting boobs anyone :D ?), because they can be concealed. I don't see how that would look to anyone as "extra limb" :). Or you can have your stomach frame opening and having shard pistol shooting in front of you- extra limb? lol. I treat weapon mount as off-hand only if it's concealed inside limbs (because you still have to use your limbs to aim them to right direction) or fixed on limbs. Otherwise for me it just shoots where you look at and signal them to shoot (I call it mental trigger).

DivineWrath wrote:

Now we're in house rule territory. You're adding something that wasn't there to begin with. There isn't anything wrong with house rules, but don't try to pass them off as actual rules.

Sorry, but it was you who said A) Weapon Mounts are limbs and B) that they are controlled by AI Corebook says nothing about above, therefore we started with your house rules. By RAW none above is correct. While issue certainly requires some subjective interpretation and approach from GM, by RAW: Weapon Mounts are not listed as Limbs nor described as limbs, that is fact and they are not said to be controller by anything, therefore it's far more logical to assume (same as with most implants without detailed exception) they are being controller by EGO inside morph. Those are facts by RAW. Or if you prefer- facts by what RAW does not say. I believe that in this case we can agree that anything further than "weapon mounts are mounted and hangs there" can be said to be house rule because corebook has no more detailed information about weapon mounts. We can only try to follow logic or personal preferences. And I repeat my arguments: every other augment which is a limb is described as limb: cyber, cyber plus, extra limb. Also- what would be the point of weapon mount if it was a limb, if you already have 3 limb augments that can hold weapons? Especially Extra Limb is 4 times cheaper. Second: you can have concealed weapon mounts (by RAW description). Again, if your synth chest/stomach/leg/shoulder/back etc opens and you have there pistol mounts firing in front of your (fixed version of mount)- does that look like a limb to you?: https://imgur.com/a/cJeyG

DivineWrath wrote:

We're getting nowhere with this argument. How about we stop and worry about something else.

I am ok with that :). Although I treated it as discussion, not argument (if I got that correctly, I am not native speaker). EP has too many holes in rules... The more I read EP the more I see it as swiss cheese.

Another OP stuff (that I finally found and add together): Narcoalgorithms. I think many of you (reading corebook), had no idea how to treat them. They are software. So they travel with ego. Are they infinite? They do not have "expire date"? Are Drug Glads useless then on Synthmorphs? Once bought- you basicelly has permanent software that boosts you up? Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes. Why? Because they are being treated as Plug-Ins. They can be access immidietly, deleted in Quick Action and sits in your ego forever. Which Transhuman book finally explains (scattered info as always in EP). Ok, so first. Corebook, page 323: "Narcoalgorithms are software programs that simulate the effects of drugs on biological bodies. Almost all bio, chemical, and nano drugs can be replicated as narcoalgorithms, with corresponding effect (gamemaster discretion). Standard duration is 3 hours. Addiction to narcoalgorithms is considered mental. Narcoalgorithms may be run by infomorphs, egos encased in cyberbrains (pods and synthmorphs), simulmorphs, and even AIs." Ok, that is all. But we know we can get Klar, Drive, MRDR, Kick etc. as software. Ok, now to explain that they are Plug-Ins. Transhuman, page 149: "The same drug-emulating narcoalgorithms (p. 323, EP) used by egos sleeved in synthmorphs also work on infomorphs. Treat them as plug-ins (p. 148) for rules purposes. Inflicting a narcoalgorithm on an involuntary infomorph requires a successful brainhack (p.148)" Then page 139: SOFTWARE PLUG-INS "Plug-ins are simply programs attached to the mind- state emulation software, so that the ego may access them immediately. A plug-in requires a Complex Action to install; once installed, it is “carried” by the infomorph, so that if the infomorph moves to another device, the plug-in moves with it. Plug-ins may be deleted with a Quick Action. Almost any software (pp. 331–332, EP) can be installed as a plug-in, including standard programs, scorchers, and skillsofts (the latter require virtual skillware to run)." Finally Page 139 again, red box CYBERBRAINS AND INFOMORPH SOFTWARE: "any of the plug-ins and upgrades available to infomorphs can also be integrated into the cyberbrains found in pod morphs and synthmorphs (though some are really only useful to digital beings). The same rules for acquisition and installation apply. Certain software may note special rules when used with cyberbrains. Eidolons may not be run on cyberbrains. No infomorph software can run on the biological brain of a biomorph. The cognitive architec ture of a biological brain is simply not set up to run programs." So what does it mean- as synthmorph with cyberbrain just buy all good narcoalgorithms at character creation and you have infinite egocasting combat implants that are plug ins and can be accessed IMMIDIETLY (as per quote from page 139 Transhuman). No activation time, no expiration, standard 3 hours duration, trated as plug ins for synths. Therefore my Drug Combat Synth build just became even more broken :) EDIT: DivineWratch- google "articulated weapon mount" and go graphics- you will see. You google arm so obviously it will find arms. EP says "mount" so google mount :)

Getting back to topic since we off-top too much :P Another broken/munchies tactic is playing Synthmorph and getting yourself best software plug-ins (as I explained above in my Narcoalgorithms post) and have permanent egocasting "implants". Since you start a game with your current back up that means that you will pretty much have all of this forever, unless you will somehow loose your backups due to some GM sheme :). So the following things are being treated (read my post http://eclipsephase.com/comment/63419#comment-63419 and ThatWhichNeverWas post: http://eclipsephase.com/comment/63427#comment-63427 to fully understand plug-ins) as software plug-ins for informorphs and cyberbrain users: - Narcoalgorithms (Drive, Klar, MRDR, Kick etc etc.), Eidetic Memory, Endocrine Control, Hyper Linguist, Math Boost, Memory Lock (p. 149, Panopticon), Mental Speed, Oracles, Parallel Processor (p. 189, Rimward), Skillware. While you may want to buy some other upgrades for your body instead, think about it- if you buy any of those above- you won't lose them on egocasting. Also all plug-is can be "access immideitly" as per Transhuman. So I think Narcoalgorithms, Mental Speed, Skillware (!) and Endoctrine Control are definitely worth to always get as software plug-ins at charcater creation. Especially Skillware + Skillsofts. Think about it. You buy Skillware as software plug-in (same price) t egocast with you. Skillsofts are also software so they also egocast with you. Skillsoft cost 5CP and Skillware 5CP too. So lets say your combat Char has low COG and you won't spend on COG skill anyway since you are combat char. You spend 50CP- Skillware, Skillsofts x 3 (40, 40, 20). And you have 100 CP worth of skills for 50CP. And since all are software (including Skillware)- they always egocast with you. You can't improve them later (you wouldn't anyway). Choose skill you can take extra time on tests for bonuses and you are golden :). Synthmorphs ftw I guess :/