House Rules

SR4: Anniversary changes (All of these apply)

Errata (SR4, Street Magic, Arsenal, Unwired)

Official SR4 FAQ

Character Creation (KarmaGen)

• Using the Karma System for character creation (Runner Companion 41), instead of the BP system. Brief description:
• Metatypes do not cost Karma, but raising their attributes tends to cost more.
• Qualities cost (2 x BP cost) in Karma. Limited to 70 Karma in negative qualities.
• Characters begin with the minimum attribute ratings defined by their race, and you spend karma to raise it from there.
• Maximum karma you can spend on attributes is equal to 325 + (listed BP cost of your metatype x 2).
• One skill limited to Rating 6, or two to 5. Other skills must be 4 or less. Skill groups must be 4 or less.
• Maximum of 100 karma can be spent on nuyen. 1 Karma = 2500 nuyen. Availability restricted to 12, equipment ratings to 6.
• Spellcasters can choose up to (Spellcasting x 2) spells, and technomancers can choose up to (Logic x 2) complex forms.
• You can save up to 5 unspent Karma.

Character Creation (My Rules Override Above)

• Karma generation, with 650 starting Karma to spend.
• Metatypes DO cost Karma, equal to their original BP cost.
• Only regular metahumans allowed for now. I will consider metavariants on a case-by-case basis.
• Attribute increases cost (New Rating x 5) Karma , not x 3 (this is the new standard in SR4A).
• Contacts cost (Connection x Loyalty) Karma.
• You receive (Logic + Intuition) x 6 free Karma for Knowledge/Language skills.
• You receive Charisma x 4 free Karma for Contacts.
• Specializations cost 4 Karma, not 2.
• Technomancer changes.
• You may allocate up to 25,000 nuyen (10 Karma) to an Edge Fund.

Aspirations

General

Edge

• You cannot use Edge to reroll all failed dice on a test. 

Social

Contacts

• Contacts do not have complicated stat-blocks, unless they are running with the PCs.
• Instead, they use their Loyalty and Connection ratings for almost everything.
• When a contact agrees to help a player, the player rolls 6 + Connection rating (plus mods) to represent the contact's effort.
• Legwork: The player rolls 6 + Connection. If the topic is not in the contact's area of expertise, there is a -3 penalty to the test, or a -6 penalty if the topic is completely unrelated to the contact's profession.
• When opposing the player, the contact rolls 6 + Connection rating (plus mods). The player gains the contact's Loyalty as a bonus to his Opposed Test.
• When testing a contact's trustworthiness, the GM rolls only the Loyalty rating (plus/minus situational mods).
• Example: Torture may subtract Loyalty, while a recent bribe from the player may increase it.

Combat

Blast Attacks

• Isn't tossing a grenade on the ground by someone's feet (a Success Test) easier than trying to hit them directly with a grenade (an Opposed Test)? Does everyone caught in the blast get a chance to dodge/react? (from the SR4 FAQ)
• Yes. The reason it's easier to aim for a location is because it doesn't move. If the intent is to catch a mobile target in the blast radius, then it should be an Opposed Test, whether the grenade is actually thrown at the target or thrown a few meters away. Anyone in the blast radius has until the next IP to get out of the way.

Called Shots

• When targeting a vital area, for every +1 DV the attack roll suffers a -2 dice pool penalty, up to a maximum of +4 DV / -8 dice.

Movement

• You may move (rate / total IPs, round up) meters during each Initiative Pass, even if you have no actions.
• You choose your rate of movement (walking or running) and means of cover (none, partial, good, or total) before you take any other actions. That rate of movement and means of cover lasts until your next available action.
• Simply put: if you're shooting someone, they have the right to shoot back at you. If you didn't suffer penalties from Good Cover, then you don't have Good Cover when the bullets start flying.
• You can make only one Sprinting Test per Combat Turn.

Recoil and Strength (Arsenal 162-3)

• (DocWagon only)
• Characters with Strength 6+ can carry and use heavy weapons without a gyro-stabilizer. Otherwise, he must resist Stun damage equal to half the Power (round down) of the weapon, and may be knocked down.
• Characters with high Strength receive bonus recoil compensation equal to (Strength / 4).

• Strength	RC bonus
  1 - 3	0
  4 - 7	+1
  8 - 11	+2
  12 - 15	+3
  16 +	+4

   

Suppressive fire

• A group of enemies may take a suppressive fire action, even if not using full burst weapons. One roll is made for the whole group (using the average dice pool) with a +1 dice pool modifier for each additional shooter past the first.

Magic

Adept Centering (Metamagic)

• Free action taken during the character's Action Phase (ex. shooting a gun) or afterwards (ex. dodging a sword), but not before (ex. higher initiative enemy shoots you).

• Only negates the penalties of a single Physical or Combat skill test.

Attribute Boost (Adept power)

• Duration is equal to (Attribute Boost rating) Combat Turns, not (Hits x 2) Combat Turns.

• Drain is equal to the number of hits, not the power's rating.

Direct combat spells

• Every net hit used to increase the damage value of a Direct Combat spell also increases the Drain DV of the spell by +1 (SR4A).
• You can choose to ignore unwanted net hits so that your Drain DV won't increase.

Spirit Edge

• Summoned/bound spirits do not receive an Edge attribute, but their tests can be improved if the conjurer spends his own Edge.
• (The GM may still allow summoned spirits to use Edge against the summoner!)

Spirit limits (following the sidebar)

• Summoning: Only one unbound spirit can be summoned at a time.
• Binding: Only (Charisma) spirits can be bound at a time, and any number of them can be summoned.
• For every bound spirit on hand past the first, the magician suffers a -2 dice pool penalty to all actions. 

Matrix

Cyborg rules

Matrix skill tests (Unwired 39, modified)

• The maximum number of hits on a Matrix Test is limited to your Logic attribute (similar to Force limiting Spellcasting hits).
• Agents, IC, sprites, technomancers, and cyborgs are not limited by this rule.
• Using Edge allows you to temporarily ignore this rule, as well as gain the bonus dice as normal.

Empathy software

• Only affects Judge Intentions tests. 

Technomancer changes

Rigging

Drone Edge

• Edge may only be used on a drone-related test if you are jumped in or remote controlling.

Evasive Driving

• Complex action for the vehicle's pilot. Similar to a full defense interrupt.
• When attacks target the vehicle:
• Driver gets +(Vehicle skill) to dodge ranged attacks. No help against ramming.
• When attacks target a passenger:
• Passenger adds +(Vehicle skill) instead of Dodge skill.
• Passenger need not spend a Complex action to gain this bonus.
• Everyone in the vehicle suffers a -2 penalty to (most) non-defense actions until the driver's next available Action Phase

Gunnery

• Firing a vehicle's weapon system while jumped-in does not count as a Complex action if you are jumped in. The action required is the same action that normal characters take with the weapon's firing mode.
• Autonomous drones and remote-control riggers continue use Complex actions to activate weapon systems.

Rigger skill tests

• The maximum number of hits on a Jumped-In test is limited to your Reaction attribute.
• The maximum number of hits on a Remote-Controlled test is limited to your Logic attribute.
• The maximum number of hits on Initiative, Damage Resistance, and Perception tests is not limited.
• Autonomous drones, technomancers, and cyborgs are not limited by these rules.
• Using Edge allows you to temporarily ignore this rule, as well as gain the bonus dice as normal.

Sensor upgrades

• (DocWagon only)

• Optionally (player's choice), you can upgrade the Sensor rating of a drone or vehicle by paying a flat cost.

• Same as upgrading a System: Rating 1-3 is (200 x Rating) nuyen, and Rating 4-6 is (500 x Rating) nuyen.
• Otherwise, you are free to follow the stupidly complex rules found mixed between Arsenal and Arsenal's errata
  

   

Equipment

Ammunition

• The DV of Stick-n-Shock ammo is 4S(e).

Armor encumbrance

• (DocWagon only)
• You start taking penalties if your armor rating exceeds Body + Strength, not Body x 2.
• Multiply this total by 1.5 (round up) if wearing milspec armor.

Armor penetration

• If an attack has a positive AP, the bonus dice given to the defender cannot exceed the defender's current armor.

• For example, if you shoot flechette (+5 AP) at an opponent wearing a leather jacket (2 ballistic armor), he rolls Body + 4 to resist, not Body + 7.

Concealment

• Reverse the Concealability charts (i.e., SMGs are now -4 and light pistols are now +2). Higher is better.

Custom cyberlimbs

• The attributes of a custom cyberlimb can only be raised to the character's natural value, rather than the natural maximum.
• In other words, the best custom cyberlimb can only match a character's current attribute, while cyberlimb enhancements boost it past that.

Cyberlimbs

• Cyberlimbs boost your augmented attribute rather than replace it. Always average your torso and limbs to get the final attribute.
• For Body, Strength, and Agility, take the sum of each limb (two arms, two legs) and torso attribute. When counting a real body part, use your character's actual attribute. Divide this sum by 5 (round down). This is your new augmented attribute.

• Ex. Tom Tinman has a basic cyberarm with Agility 3 and Agility enhancements (rating 3), for a total of Agility 6. His unaugmented Agility is 1, and he has Muscle Replacement (R1) installed, which improves all non-cybered body parts to 2. The Agility of his two regular legs (2+2), torso (2), and left arm (2) are added to the Agility of his right cyberarm (6) for a total of 14. Dividing this by 5, he ends up with 2.8, which rounds off to 3. Tom's Agility becomes 1(3). If he decides to replace his left armor with another Agility 6 cyberarm, his Agility would average out to 3.6, or 1(4).

• Cyberskulls can only accept Armor enhancements.

Edge Funds (Borrowed)

• An Edge Fund, allocated at character generation, accounts for general or character-specific equipment that your character would reasonably possess, but doesn't (generally because you forgot or didn't know better).
• This item might be a street samurai's stock commlink, an outlandish costume from the face's last year Halloween party, a white noise generator that the rigger keeps in his garage, or some other item. The point is you didn't anticipate to have this item at character creation.
• If the character gets into a situation where he needs such an item, then with GM permission, you can roll an Edge Fund test to retroactively obtain the item from the Edge fund. If the item has a high Availability rating, doesn't make sense given the character or situation, or for whatever reason, the Edge Fund test automatically fails.
• The player rolls Edge + Intuition against a GM-determined threshold. In addition, the GM may require you to spend a point of Edge.
• If you succeeds, your character owns the item. Deduct the item's cost from the Edge fund. The item may be found on the character's person, in the character's vehicle, or even stored at home.
• If you fail, your character does not own the item and must obtain it through normal means. Alternatively (especially for low-availability items), you own it but you left it at home. Either way, you still deduct the item's cost from the Edge fund.
• If you glitch, then you own the item, but something is wrong. It may be lost, you may have lent it to a friend, etc.
• You can cash-in your Edge fund at any time for actual nuyen, but you may never increase it over time.