I guess I just want to avoid the very anime-esque arm wrestling contests that somehow get won by little girls, regardless of the fact that their opponents are bigger than supermutants.
If the characters looks have a gameplay function (if the character can be shaped at all, that is), then I do think the governing stat should reflect upon the physicality of the PC somehow. If it's a mere cosmetic, I don't think anyone should really give a damn.
I agree with Chris. I don't think choice is as important as realism and believability in this context.
Your .38 Special shouldn't fire 2,000 rounds a minute and knock a man through a wall. If ti does this, it should look like the autocannon it is. Regardless of how you feel about porting an autocannon.
If you're wearing body armour, especially hard armour, it should look like armour, not a T-shirt. Unless it's a Kevlar T-shirt, but that's not hard armour and won't do you a lot of good. If you want to look snazzy or like Snake Plissken, great! But if you want to reliably repel 5.56 - you're wearing hard armour and look it.
If you buy extra cyberlimbs on artificial mounts, you should now have three or four or whatever limbs - not the starting two. Even if you do look like a spider now.
And if you have an unmodified BOD of 8 or higher, you should be at least a little bigger than 5. If you have a Bod of 10, you should be a LOT bigger than a BOD of 5.
People should respond to it, as well. I know they do in real life. It reduces fights, (except for certain special people - idjits) impresses many men and women and means you have to answer a lot of often dumb questions about lifting and steroids.
Now. If you like the lean and fast look, I know I do, leave your BOD at 8 and use cyber and biotech. And surprise the crap out of the bouncer at TheForlorn Hope.
Your .38 Special shouldn't fire 2,000 rounds a minute and knock a man through a wall. If ti does this, it should look like the autocannon it is. Regardless of how you feel about porting an autocannon.
If you're wearing body armour, especially hard armour, it should look like armour, not a T-shirt. Unless it's a Kevlar T-shirt, but that's not hard armour and won't do you a lot of good. If you want to look snazzy or like Snake Plissken, great! But if you want to reliably repel 5.56 - you're wearing hard armour and look it.
If you buy extra cyberlimbs on artificial mounts, you should now have three or four or whatever limbs - not the starting two. Even if you do look like a spider now.
And if you have an unmodified BOD of 8 or higher, you should be at least a little bigger than 5. If you have a Bod of 10, you should be a LOT bigger than a BOD of 5.
People should respond to it, as well. I know they do in real life. It reduces fights, (except for certain special people - idjits) impresses many men and women and means you have to answer a lot of often dumb questions about lifting and steroids.
Now. If you like the lean and fast look, I know I do, leave your BOD at 8 and use cyber and biotech. And surprise the crap out of the bouncer at TheForlorn Hope.
You hate me don't you Sard?
Every once in a while you say something I have to agree with.
*grumbles under her breath*
I would agree with this, with the obvious caveat of the character being augmented out the wazoo, and simply has the "skinny nerd" build to be covert.
The body size and strenght is connected of course, but not as much, as people tend to think.
John Brzenk is armwrestling legend. Obviously he is
extraordinarily strong man, and he looks... normal.
He beat Denis Cyplenkov (another armwrestling legend)...
...(as you can see very inconspicuous guy) multiple times.
Dennis Rogers, another super strong, not so impresive looking guy.
You don't have to be bulky and big, to be strong. Ergo, you should be able to create very strong, normal looking character without breaking the "realism" aspect.
John Brzenk is armwrestling legend. Obviously he is
extraordinarily strong man, and he looks... normal.
He beat Denis Cyplenkov (another armwrestling legend)...
...(as you can see very inconspicuous guy) multiple times.
Dennis Rogers, another super strong, not so impresive looking guy.
You don't have to be bulky and big, to be strong. Ergo, you should be able to create very strong, normal looking character without breaking the "realism" aspect.
All of those guys have wrists the width of their necks, and their biceps as big as their faces. They don't look normal, they look very strong, like people that work out a lot and are on a diet. They may not look like the people who are constantly juicing or whatever image superhero comics, Gears of War or bodybuilders have implanted on our minds of how a strong person looks.The body size and strenght is connected of course, but not as much, as people tend to think.
John Brzenk is armwrestling legend. Obviously he is
extraordinarily strong man, and he looks... normal.
He beat Denis Cyplenkov (another armwrestling legend)...
...(as you can see very inconspicuous guy) multiple times.
Dennis Rogers, another super strong, not so impresive looking guy.
You don't have to be bulky and big, to be strong. Ergo, you should be able to create very strong, normal looking character without breaking the "realism" aspect.
You can have muscular, heavy and strong people, also, who don't look shredded, maybe because there's some or a lot of fat covering it but yes, unless we're talking strong as in "someone that can beat you in a martial art who is based around turning the opponent's strenght against him", stronger people are usually bigger in one way or another. Maybe they're not tall, maybe they don't look like the image of a skinned man we have for anatomy models, but it may be their arms, necks, shoulders, etc. that shows how strong they are.
Armwrestling is a terrible example, @Nars. VERY much of it is leverage and forearm length. It's not a trick, but it is a very specific exercise for certain body parts. Same with tearing phone books. Rogers is very strong, but it's pound-for-pound. I.e. for a guy who weighs 170 pounds, in a couple very specific exercises.
Rogers is a freak, a one-in-a-million person. There are freaks, absolutely. There's a skinny lifter with a back disorder, there's a guy who can redraw a city landscape after seeing it once, there's a guy who can steadily run effectively forever if fed and watered - but they are stupidly rare examples of nature doing some crazy things with adrenalin and lactic acids and so forth. There is a guy who is a perfect conductor of electricity out there, but Cyberpunk doesn't really want your PCs to be that guy.
Your BODY stat measures not only strength, but also ability to take a punch or a bullet.
NONE of these people will come anywhere close to Andy Bolton, a man who squatted over 1,200 pounds, deadlifted 1,000 and benched nearly 800. Any has good genes, but this is years and years of brutal hard work. You and I can't deadlift 1200 pounds - but we could work our way into the 800 pound range of BOD 10.
They just don't.
Rogers is a freak, a one-in-a-million person. There are freaks, absolutely. There's a skinny lifter with a back disorder, there's a guy who can redraw a city landscape after seeing it once, there's a guy who can steadily run effectively forever if fed and watered - but they are stupidly rare examples of nature doing some crazy things with adrenalin and lactic acids and so forth. There is a guy who is a perfect conductor of electricity out there, but Cyberpunk doesn't really want your PCs to be that guy.
Your BODY stat measures not only strength, but also ability to take a punch or a bullet.
NONE of these people will come anywhere close to Andy Bolton, a man who squatted over 1,200 pounds, deadlifted 1,000 and benched nearly 800. Any has good genes, but this is years and years of brutal hard work. You and I can't deadlift 1200 pounds - but we could work our way into the 800 pound range of BOD 10.
They just don't.
Sard! You've been reading X-men again? What did I tell you about reading X-men? Exactly, nothing!
You can put this definition in squat, deadlift and bench and it will still fit, cause it's all passive effort/exercise. Ask Andy Bolton to bend horseshoe and he will most likley fail. Strength is very ambiguous term you can't define it as amount of kg you benched. Good example is Pudzianowski five time World's Strongest Man, who was exhausted after 3 min of MMA fight. I would call Bruce Lee a very strong man.
[video=youtube;en2nM-7XIe4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en2nM-7XIe4[/video]
Thats just ridiculous. If we are talking about not enhanced, 100% natural person, it doesn't matter what your body type is (of course I am speaking about fit, in shape person). Just look on fights without weight class. In case of bullet it all depend on luck, you can be a 5 year old boy who survive 5 gunshots, and be Arnold in top shape and die from one.
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And... I'm going to throw this in here. Without editorial comment.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/05/13/world_of_warcraft_gender_switching_why_men_choose_female_avatars.html
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/05/13/world_of_warcraft_gender_switching_why_men_choose_female_avatars.html
What Reptile "said."
If you really think strength is that ambiguous and confused with endurance, and a 5 year old survives being shot or punched as easily as Arnold at his peak...okay. I will say that people who think strength is this ambiguous or relative and come to the gym with me, (or any other lifter), change their mind pretty quick. Strong is strong. Not-strong is not-strong.
Bruce Lee was strong for a small guy. He was not strong on any scale that goes from can-lift 100 pounds to can-lift 1200 lbs. His martial technique was quite good - he couldn't lift 400 pounds. Cyberpunk has no problem with that - Martial Arts adds your skill level to damage, it's much more potent than the add from BOD.
The BOD stat measures how much you can lift. It also adds to damage, but relatively little compared to training. The ability to twist horseshoes or tear phonebooks, a technique-based trick, is measured in CP2020 with the Strength Feat skill. Someone with Bod 6 and Strength Feat 10 could tear a phonebook in half in one or two tries. Someone with Bod 6 could not lift 800 pounds. That's how the systems works and outside the Endurance aspect, it works okay.
As for gender-switching in games and why or how, it's always puzzled me. I play a male in RPGs, because I'm male. Takes a certain amount of effort out. I do find female bodybuilders and lifters attractive, though.
Muscle takes bulk - if you want to be strong, you're going to actually have to put on muscle. More muscle = stronger. Technique only goes so far.
Edit: to reiterate, this is NOT an issue for me in-game. Frankly, if ti makes Dragon happy not to have this, that's enough reason for me to happily sign off on supporting size not related to BOD. It's just that Cyberpunk 2020 tries for realism pretty often - nearly always - and small people lifting and carrying 800 pounds around, or even 400, just isn't realistic in any world or gym I've lived in.
If you really think strength is that ambiguous and confused with endurance, and a 5 year old survives being shot or punched as easily as Arnold at his peak...okay. I will say that people who think strength is this ambiguous or relative and come to the gym with me, (or any other lifter), change their mind pretty quick. Strong is strong. Not-strong is not-strong.
Bruce Lee was strong for a small guy. He was not strong on any scale that goes from can-lift 100 pounds to can-lift 1200 lbs. His martial technique was quite good - he couldn't lift 400 pounds. Cyberpunk has no problem with that - Martial Arts adds your skill level to damage, it's much more potent than the add from BOD.
The BOD stat measures how much you can lift. It also adds to damage, but relatively little compared to training. The ability to twist horseshoes or tear phonebooks, a technique-based trick, is measured in CP2020 with the Strength Feat skill. Someone with Bod 6 and Strength Feat 10 could tear a phonebook in half in one or two tries. Someone with Bod 6 could not lift 800 pounds. That's how the systems works and outside the Endurance aspect, it works okay.
As for gender-switching in games and why or how, it's always puzzled me. I play a male in RPGs, because I'm male. Takes a certain amount of effort out. I do find female bodybuilders and lifters attractive, though.
Muscle takes bulk - if you want to be strong, you're going to actually have to put on muscle. More muscle = stronger. Technique only goes so far.
Edit: to reiterate, this is NOT an issue for me in-game. Frankly, if ti makes Dragon happy not to have this, that's enough reason for me to happily sign off on supporting size not related to BOD. It's just that Cyberpunk 2020 tries for realism pretty often - nearly always - and small people lifting and carrying 800 pounds around, or even 400, just isn't realistic in any world or gym I've lived in.
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y not jus hav stats for each muscle.
This way the people that want beach muscles can put all their points into biceps and abs
also suffer the consequences for their actions.
This way the people that want beach muscles can put all their points into biceps and abs
also suffer the consequences for their actions.
. They do need to separate INT into INT and WIT or INT and PER. BODY into BOD and END. Turn ATTR into CHA. What else? REF is fine, although you could separate it into DEX and SPD or MANIP and REF...
Come on I didn't wrote anything about punching children.
In case of bullet i strongly belive, that your body mass pretty much doesn't matter. Bullet will not ricochet from your brand new ABS. It will penetrate the body, and a matter of luck is if it will, or will not destroy anything important.You refer often to realism in CP2020, and I'm walking in dark here, cause I don't really know the stats aspect of the game. Can you explain to me how it really works in character creation? Cause if it is connected like (not augmented!) BOD 10 limits your END and DEX, I'm totally fine with that. If not, all this realism aspect is a little bit too much selective for me.
On sidenote: my English-fu ain't that high, so my apologize if previous comment sounded a little bit to harsh. Wasn't intentional.
E:
And few more words about ambiguity in strength. You say Bruce was strong for a small guy. But i bet, that he can kick and punch harder than lets say Andy Bolton, so in this sense his even stronger than Andy. The type of passive strength you refering to is highly impractical on field. Thats why there is no Arnold, Andy or Pudzianowski body type dudes is military, merc or police. In other words, I don't buy it.
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