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Message no. 1
From: Gurth <gurth@******.NL>
Subject: Adrenal Pumps
Date: Thu, 13 Jul 1995 13:02:23 +0200
>Willpower is for activating it without injury or drugs or having it not
>activate in a circumstance it normaly would.

Which is what I normally used unless I really thought I needed the boost.

>The stun is resisted with Body,

Yep, you're right. Not that it mattered, my character had both Body and
Willpower at 4 :)

>Which is just as bad from a balnce POV, except that folks with AP's tend to
>have big bodys.

I think the Stun damage should be less. OK, I can see you become exhausted
after a boost like that, but Deadly is too much, IMHO. The way it's now,
only orks and trolls can use this thing without taking Stun damage from
it... (I use _natural_ Body to resist this thing, not Body + Dermal Plating
+ Titanium Bone Lacing :)


Gurth@******.nl - Gurth@***.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
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Message no. 2
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Robert Ennew)
Subject: adrenal pumps
Date: Wed Jul 3 23:50:00 2002
with M&M & SR III ed. the adrenal pump no longer has the bonus +1 body per
level of pump (while functioning). I assume the extra body was to signify
how much punishment & stress the body can handle when psched up or in a
critical state, defence mechanism. I can understand It's a bit munchkinous,
thats why they probabely got rid of It. Would It still be balanced If
instead they kept the bonus but instead It was +1 impact per lvl for
duration of the pump, with a possibility for +1 body for a lvl 2 pump
(extremely psche up), sort of like boxers that can take the pummeling &
punishment as the amount of adrenaline coursing in their systems makes them
hard as their pyched up,withstanding being knocked out. Studies have shown
that some of the hits boxers take in the head could have killed most people
or even them if they hadn't had so much adrenaline in the blood.Comments.

Grunt (GZ)

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Message no. 3
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: adrenal pumps
Date: Thu Jul 4 00:35:01 2002
Robert Ennew writes:

> with M&M & SR III ed. the adrenal pump no longer has the bonus +1 body per
> level of pump (while functioning).

Hi Ground Zero!

Actually, the original ShadowTech Adrenal Pump did not grant a Body bonus,
either, so your source must be misinformed. The main difference between a
ShadowTech Adrenal Pump and a M&M Adrenal Pump is that the drain (for lack
of a better term) was doubled in the new version. The original version
caused (Turns Active/2)D Stun, while the new version causes (Turns Active)D
Stun. There is an additional differnce in that it is no longer possible to
make a Willpower (6) test to voluntarily turn on/off your Adrenal Pump, as it
was with the ShadowTech version.

> <Snip Adrenaline/Body/Impact argument>

While I do have to say that Adrenal Pumps are rather sucky, especially the
M&M version, I'm not so sure that granting users Impact Armour is the right
answer (armour rocks!). (For the record, statistics-wise, there are _much_
better ways to spend 1.25/2.5 Bio Index and 60kY/100kY. However, when it
comes to style value, there aren't too many cooler bit's o' 'ware ;-).)

I allow Adrenal Pumps to work for minutes, rather than Combat Turns.
Adrenaline doesn't tend to fade out in around 10-20 seconds or so (or does
it? anyone actually know?), and the rather severe drain is a real
disincentive to get one (you'll probably be passing out either during a
fight, or pretty much immediately after one, which are both bad things).
Lengthening the bonus time allows the pump to be more usable, and also less
hazardous to the user.

What does everyone else think?

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Message no. 4
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Lone Eagle)
Subject: adrenal pumps
Date: Thu Jul 4 05:10:00 2002
>From: Damion Milliken <dam01@***.edu.au>
>Robert Ennew writes:
>
> > with M&M & SR III ed. the adrenal pump no longer has the bonus +1 >
>
>body per
> > level of pump (while functioning).
>Actually, the original ShadowTech Adrenal Pump did not grant a Body >bonus,
>either, so your source must be misinformed. <Snip>

> > <Snip Adrenaline/Body/Impact argument>
>
>While I do have to say that Adrenal Pumps are rather sucky, especially the
>M&M version, I'm not so sure that granting users Impact Armour is the right
>answer (armour rocks!). (For the record, statistics-wise, there are _much_
>better ways to spend 1.25/2.5 Bio Index and 60kY/100kY. However, when it
>comes to style value, there aren't too many cooler bit's o' 'ware ;-).)
>
>I allow Adrenal Pumps to work for minutes, rather than Combat Turns.
>Adrenaline doesn't tend to fade out in around 10-20 seconds or so (or does
>it? anyone actually know?), and the rather severe drain is a real
>disincentive to get one (you'll probably be passing out either during a
>fight, or pretty much immediately after one, which are both bad things).
>Lengthening the bonus time allows the pump to be more usable, and also less
>hazardous to the user.
>
>What does everyone else think?

I haven't had to worry about it yet, only one character in our campaign has
an appreciable degree of bioware but I like the idea of it giving you
additional Body dice. I'd be tempted to make them "virtual" ie effective
against only certain things (damage, overflow damage and very little else)
while imposing either an increased target number or a dice reduction against
things like toxins (the adrenaline increases your heart rate which moves the
toxins around your body faster).

I'm going to have to do some thinking on that!

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Message no. 5
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Gurth)
Subject: adrenal pumps
Date: Thu Jul 4 05:30:01 2002
According to Damion Milliken, on Thu, 04 Jul 2002 the word on the street was...

> Actually, the original ShadowTech Adrenal Pump did not grant a Body
> bonus, either, so your source must be misinformed. The main difference
> between a ShadowTech Adrenal Pump and a M&M Adrenal Pump is that the
> drain (for lack of a better term) was doubled in the new version. The
> original version caused (Turns Active/2)D Stun, while the new version
> causes (Turns Active)D Stun.

Which only makes the thing even less desirable. I remember buying an adrenal
pump for the first character I made after buying Shadowtech back in '93 or so.
Within a few months, I paid a street doc to have it removed because it was
simply impossible to function in a combat situation with it. Sure, you get a
bunch of bonuses for a while, but after that you needed such a tremendous Body
to not take at least Moderate damage, if not Serious, halfway through the
fight that it just wasn't useful. Now with the Power Level twice as high, I
wouldn't touch it with a barge pole :)

> While I do have to say that Adrenal Pumps are rather sucky, especially
> the M&M version, I'm not so sure that granting users Impact Armour is the
> right answer (armour rocks!). (For the record, statistics-wise, there are
> _much_ better ways to spend 1.25/2.5 Bio Index and 60kY/100kY. However,
> when it comes to style value, there aren't too many cooler bit's o' 'ware
> ;-).)

Enhanced articulation. This is, IMHO, _the_ best piece of bioware -- it's
(relatively) cheap and gives (relatively) huge bonuses.

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
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Message no. 6
From: shadowrn@*********.com (Damion Milliken)
Subject: adrenal pumps
Date: Fri Jul 5 01:05:01 2002
Lone Eagle writes:

> I haven't had to worry about it yet, only one character in our campaign
> has an appreciable degree of bioware but I like the idea of it giving you
> additional Body dice. I'd be tempted to make them "virtual" ie effective
> against only certain things (damage, overflow damage and very little else)
> while imposing either an increased target number or a dice reduction
> against things like toxins (the adrenaline increases your heart rate which
> moves the toxins around your body faster).

It probably wouldn't give a decreased Body resistance against toxins, but it
might speed up the effects of them, say from 1 Combat Turn to 1 Initiative
Pass, or something like that, perhaps.

Thinking about how relatively sucky Adrenal Pumps actually are in the game,
I am beginning to come 'round to the idea of allowing them to grant a +1
Body bonus per level. Otherwise they might never get selected.

--
Damion Milliken University of Wollongong
Unofficial Shadowrun Guru E-mail: dam01@***.edu.au
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Further Reading

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