Advanced Combat Rules
Kind of scary we’re only now getting to the real meat of this review, isn’t it? The “Killshots and more” section is probably the best part of the whole damn book. It’s a pile of new combat options, mostly in the form of actions. Some of these are called shots, some require martial arts training, and some are just specialized variations on existing actions.
The first section is six optional rules for more or less lethal combat. Two of the six optional rules are massive changes in game balance. The first of these, RG1, allows multiple simple-action attacks per initiative pass. While they recommend to keep a close eye on progressive recoil, it’s not really enough to change how much more powerful ranged combat is than melee.
The other unbalancing option is RG4, which removes Initiative passes and has the person with the highest initiative go first. So, rather than everyone getting a turn before anyone goes a second time, the high-initiative characters get to go until they’re on the same level as the low init ones.
And heaven help you if you’ve got a decent drone rigger.
I strongly dislike this option, but I guess if you want to be eventually killed by someone with better initiative without the option to defend yourself, that’s your business.
One aspect of this rule I do like is how it makes the interrupt actions more dangerous. But even that isn’t enough to compensate for the downsides.
The other 4 options are much more mild. RG2 adds a size modifier based on body+strength, which is fine if you want the extra paperwork. Though it leads to some weird oddities where a slightly above average dwarf is easier to hit than an average sized human despite the latter having two feet on the former.
There’s a progressive movement speed penalty option (RG3) where the further you go the more penalties stack up.
RG5 is interesting. It takes armor away from damage resistance tests and applies it as a negative dice pool modifier to attack tests. Not sure how I feel about it, but the concept is at least more original than the others.
And RG6 adds a bonus to damage for when you’ve lowered someone’s defense test dice under zero. Perfect for that flechette round fully-automatic shotgun. Go ahead and start laughing.
Just don’t get caught surprised.
Acres of Called Shots
New actions start by piling on a heaping load of optional called shots. Oh my, so many. These come in more or less three varieties: Ammo-specific, Martial-art-trained, location. and general use.
One of my personal favorite location options is kneecapping. It does almost no damage (Up to 1 box), takes a massive -8 modifier to the hit, and kind of crippled. They get stunned, knocked down, have their move-speed halved, and are unable to make complex actions for a number of combat turns.
My old Ork Bouncer, Big Caper, would have loved this shit.
Naturally, there are also rules for shooting someone’s junk. It’s real bad all around.
Next comes the ammo-specific options. These can be things like shooting someone in the temples with a gel round to stun them (-10 initiative!) or shooting a capsule round in someone’s open mouth to improve the power of the toxin (get a ballistic mask!).
Another hiccup in editing includes a called shot for an ammo-type which didn’t make it into Run and Gun. If you had Hi-C rounds (or gyrojet rounds which are in the book), you could perform a ricochet shot. Which would be pretty sweet if they bothered putting the suckers in the book, especially as they’re the plastic rounds designed to go through MAD scanners.
There are so many tricky options here it makes me almost giggle. Maybe the best of them is “Through and through… and into” which has one shoot a little bullet through one person so it doesn’t harm them to mess with the jagoff using someone as a human shield. Not using armor piercing rounds? Don’t apply.
MOAR ACTIONS!
Next up is 8 pages of new actions available to anyone with the right gun, martial art skills, or will to live. There are a few major kinds of actions worth noting.
First might be grouped as, “empowered automatic fire.” Basically all the multiple-shot actions (Burst first, Long burst, fully automatic), except to improve their damage instead of making them harder to dodge.
Next is fancy melee moves, from grabbing an enemy’s hand to negate their reach and get superior positioning for a more serious grapple to reversals and finishing moves. Some of these require spending a point of edge to do them at all.
Modified suppressive fire which makes it harder to dodge at the expense of area of effect.
Even playing possum, which is awesome.
There are also preemptive versions of the three single-action defense tests which allow you to use your melee weapon, unarmed. or gymnastics skill for an entire combat turn instead of just a single action. They must be declared on your turn.
As well as some new interrupt actions which allow one to counter strke, dive for cover, throw back grenades, throw yourself on a grenade, and a few other interesting choices.
One favorite of mine is, “Protect the principle” which lets a defense-heavy character take a hit for someone else. They lose 5 from their initiative score and spend a point of edge to actively take a hit. They get no defense test, only a damage resistance test.
They also add new edge options. Such as using a martial arts technique one hasn’t learned, remove up to 4 points of called shot penalty, spend a point of edge for another player to dodge, get a defense test on an attack they’re unaware of, or find some lucky/unexpected cover.
Qualities
There are seven new positive qualities. Four of them let you substitute willpower for Agility, Charisma, Gymnastics, or perception during full defense.
The best name of anything in the book is the Charisma full defense option titled simply, “Too pretty to hit.”
The other three are also pretty cool. One gives you a bonus for brand loyalty with a product line or a specific device and a penalty for similar devices from different manufacturers. A second lets you perform a martial arts technique without learning it’s martial art. And the last gives you a bonus to called-shots for a penalty to less precise shooting.
Only one negative quality, though. Combat Junkie. Whenever you’re in a situation and you want to not assault people, you’ve got to roll a Composure(4) test to do so. Great for parties of people you don’t like.
The only thing I don’t like about this section is how changes to how the Tailored Pheromones mean Vicar can’t get the same benefit from Too Pretty To Hit as he can from Agile Defense.
Martial Arts
Shadowrun’s martial art rules have always been a bit awkward and occasionally overpowered. R&G has, I think, fixed this. There are 42 martial art styles to choose from each with 6 technique choices. You buy a style for 7 karma over a month and it comes with a technique. Each additional technique costs 5 karma and takes two weeks to learn.
Most of the techniques either let you lower a called shot penalty, a bonus on one kind of test, use one of the new action choices, or reduce another penalty. The max penalty reduction is 2 and the max bonus is +2 which clears up some of SR4’s awkward bonus stacking.
There are some rough edges though. The technique most of interest to Vicar is called, “Close quarters firearms” and it reduces the ranged combat attacker in melee penalty by one. You have to pick one skill for it to apply to. Vicar is a Longarms(Shotgun) man and all the martial arts which grant close quarter firearms specify a skill at either pistols or archery. If, as I assume, this is intended to mean those martial arts don’t teach being a guy who doesn’t care about wading into melee combat with a shotgun for some inexplicable reason, the only way for him to get this technique is to take the One Trick Pony quality for 2-3x the cost in karma.
Sad. Shotgun. Panda.
Still, even with the kinks it’s a big improvement on SR4 where some of the techniques were so powerful they would almost singlehandedly beat people not using them (Ex. Two-weapon defense).
There’s one last page in this overall section which describes how to heal/fix all the horrible things R&G allows you to do to people/gear. Pretty straightforward.
Check out part 7: Here
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