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Message no. 1
From: Andrew Spurgeon <DragonC147@***.COM>
Subject: SR3 Skills
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 1998 20:23:47 EDT
I would like to know what you guys think about how FASA revamped the skills.
Like getting rid of Armed combat, Firearms, and Gunnery and breaking them down
into individual skills. I feel that this takes away from the game because you
need so many more skills than before.
Also what do you guys think about the revamping of Language and Knowledge
skills? I like the way they did these but the other things aren't very good
in my opinion. What do you guys think?

Dragon Claw
Message no. 2
From: Adam J <adamj@*********.HTML.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 1998 21:08:59 -0600
At 20:23 9/26/98 -0400, you wrote:
>I would like to know what you guys think about how FASA revamped the skills.
>Like getting rid of Armed combat, Firearms, and Gunnery and breaking them
down
>into individual skills. I feel that this takes away from the game because
you
>need so many more skills than before.

I like it. Characters needing more skills to be competent in a very wide
field (Which "firearms" is), is a very good idea.

I don't see how needing more skills takes away from the game at all.
Thinking about the number of skills an average human today has, then
compare that to a SR2 character, and a SR3 character, and the SR3 character
would be much closer to "real".

>Also what do you guys think about the revamping of Language and Knowledge
>skills? I like the way they did these but the other things aren't very good
>in my opinion. What do you guys think?

Knowledge skills, great. Language skills, haven't had a chance to read all
the way through yet. (Since the book I was using left for the Netherlands
when Gurth did..)

-Adam J
Payday on Friday!
Message no. 3
From: Gurth <gurth@******.NL>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1998 11:35:27 +0200
According to Andrew Spurgeon, at 20:23 on 26 Sep 98, the word on the street was...

> I would like to know what you guys think about how FASA revamped the skills.
> Like getting rid of Armed combat, Firearms, and Gunnery and breaking them down
> into individual skills. I feel that this takes away from the game because you
> need so many more skills than before.

OTOH you also get more skill points -- about 10 more per priority, plus
you can spend all of them on a smaller number of skills because you don't
need to buy knowledge skills with them. On the whole, it balances out
fairly well, IMHO.

> Also what do you guys think about the revamping of Language and Knowledge
> skills? I like the way they did these but the other things aren't very good
> in my opinion. What do you guys think?

The new way of handling knowledge skills adds some more flexibility to the
system, Ithink, so it's a Good Thing(tm) for the most part. (The bad part
being you need about three times as much room on your character sheet to
write down all your skills now :)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
"Nobody's going to murder anyone here even if it means I have to
kill someone!" --Kane, detective/rigger
-> NERPS Project Leader * ShadowRN GridSec * Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/plastic.html <-
-> The New Character Mortuary: http://www.electricferret.com/mortuary/ <-

GC3.1: GAT/! d-(dpu) s:- !a>? C+(++)@ U P L E? W(++) N o? K- w+ O V? PS+
PE Y PGP- t(+) 5++ X++ R+++>$ tv+(++) b++@ DI? D+ G(++) e h! !r(---) y?
Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998
Message no. 4
From: Bill ChewStriker <bill@*****.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1998 17:36:09 -0400
>I would like to know what you guys think about how FASA revamped the skills.
>Like getting rid of Armed combat, Firearms, and Gunnery and breaking them down
>into individual skills. I feel that this takes away from the game because you
>need so many more skills than before.
>Also what do you guys think about the revamping of Language and Knowledge
>skills? I like the way they did these but the other things aren't very good
>in my opinion. What do you guys think?
>
>Dragon Claw
>
>
Well I like it because it does make a lot more sense. How would someone
know how to use pistols,assault rifles, smgs, rifles, lmgs, and others with
one skill firearms. Also they did lower the cost of karma to learn the
skills in most cases so it isn't all bad.
---Myth-Chip/Striker/Bill
Message no. 5
From: Andrew Spurgeon <DragonC147@***.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1998 20:04:25 EDT
In a message dated 98-09-27 17:32:51 EDT, you write:

<< Well I like it because it does make a lot more sense. How would someone
know how to use pistols,assault rifles, smgs, rifles, lmgs, and others with
one skill firearms. Also they did lower the cost of karma to learn the
skills in most cases so it isn't all bad.
---Myth-Chip/Striker/Bill

>>

About how could someone know how to use pistols, assault rifles, smgs, rifles,
lmgs and others with only one skill, it is quite simple. The only difference
between AR's, Smg's, Rifles, and LMGS is the rate of fire, and in the smg's
case slightly different size. You hold rifles, LMG's AR's and Smg's almost
exactly the same way. yes they are slightly different because you have to
learn how to control your bursts, whether they be full-auto, or burst fire.
But target aquisition, fireing, hand position, and the like are almost exactly
the same for all of them.
The only exception to this rule is pistols, due to the fact that they are
different size, and the hold is different as well as most others. but i have
shot weapons before, not full-auto ones, but i have talked with people that
have fired FA, and they are basically the same. If you can shoot one you can
shoot the others, maybe not with as much skill but you can still use them
resonably well.

Dragon Claw
Message no. 6
From: Bill ChewStriker <bill@*****.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Sun, 27 Sep 1998 21:10:35 -0400
>In a message dated 98-09-27 17:32:51 EDT, you write:
>
><< Well I like it because it does make a lot more sense. How would someone
> know how to use pistols,assault rifles, smgs, rifles, lmgs, and others with
> one skill firearms. Also they did lower the cost of karma to learn the
> skills in most cases so it isn't all bad.
> ---Myth-Chip/Striker/Bill
>
> >>
>
>About how could someone know how to use pistols, assault rifles, smgs, rifles,
>lmgs and others with only one skill, it is quite simple. The only difference
>between AR's, Smg's, Rifles, and LMGS is the rate of fire, and in the smg's
>case slightly different size. You hold rifles, LMG's AR's and Smg's almost
>exactly the same way. yes they are slightly different because you have to
>learn how to control your bursts, whether they be full-auto, or burst fire.
>But target aquisition, fireing, hand position, and the like are almost exactly
>the same for all of them.
>The only exception to this rule is pistols, due to the fact that they are
>different size, and the hold is different as well as most others. but i have
>shot weapons before, not full-auto ones, but i have talked with people that
>have fired FA, and they are basically the same. If you can shoot one you can
>shoot the others, maybe not with as much skill but you can still use them
>resonably well.
>
>Dragon Claw
>
>
That is why there's defaulting you can shoot the others with not as much
skill but can still use them reasonbly well
---Myth-Chip/Striker/Bill
Message no. 7
From: Joshua Mumme <grimlakin@**********.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 00:53:32 -0500
<SNIP>
>About how could someone know how to use pistols, assault rifles, smgs,
rifles,
>lmgs and others with only one skill, it is quite simple. The only
difference
>between AR's, Smg's, Rifles, and LMGS is the rate of fire, and in the smg's
>case slightly different size. You hold rifles, LMG's AR's and Smg's almost
>exactly the same way. yes they are slightly different because you have to
>learn how to control your bursts, whether they be full-auto, or burst fire.
>But target aquisition, fireing, hand position, and the like are almost
exactly
>the same for all of them.
>The only exception to this rule is pistols, due to the fact that they are
>different size, and the hold is different as well as most others. but i
have
>shot weapons before, not full-auto ones, but i have talked with people that
>have fired FA, and they are basically the same. If you can shoot one you
can
>shoot the others, maybe not with as much skill but you can still use them
>resonably well.


Sounds like you are more looking for a rule than a reason. I believe that I
have adequately extrapolated on the reason. So here is a rule that I think
would work and be fair. If you don't have the skill then two things happen.
1. the difficulty chart is up one level. IE min diff of 5. 2. recoil
is doubled so on any bursts you would either need a recoil compensation of 6
for a three round burst to handle it normally or start takeing some very
serious modifiers. I have personally shot many different styles of
weapons. I know for a fact the differences and really am not going to go
into detail on it again as I have previously. This is my input. And
really if you just want to argue say so. We have all given oure arguments
and I have seen NONE for my arguments.

Grimlakin
"Now where in the hell did I put that clip of APDS."
>Dragon Claw
Message no. 8
From: "M. Sean Martinez" <ElBandit@***.COM>
Subject: Re: SR3 Skills
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1998 12:52:38 EDT
In a message dated 9/26/98 8:24:36 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
DragonC147@***.COM writes:

> I would like to know what you guys think about how FASA revamped the skills.
> Like getting rid of Armed combat, Firearms, and Gunnery and breaking them
> down
> into individual skills. I feel that this takes away from the game because
> you
> need so many more skills than before.

I personally wanted this in the orginal game since I though the Skill System
was to generalized. Also Shadowrun does not have that many skills, I have seen
systems wuith much more skills listed. (Web Games for instance)

In my campaign it is not unusal to have a character with a lot of skills.

> Also what do you guys think about the revamping of Language and Knowledge
> skills? I like the way they did these but the other things aren't very
good
> in my opinion. What do you guys think?

I personally thought this was an excellent way to do it, though I think the
language and Read/Write should be reversed. But that is just me.

-Bandit

Further Reading

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