How does the cover system really work?

[Lampros]

I am really confused: What's the difference between light and medium cover? And how does the cover system work in general? I guess you cannot be subject to critical hits when under cover? But what else?

[Lord Of Dorkness]

Light = You can't be critted.
Medium = Same, and harder to hit.
High ? Same, but even bigger malus to-hit.

Think that's about it, at least.

[frdnwsm]

There are three types of cover; light, medium and full, shown by the various shield signs. There is also "in the open", which is zero cover. Being under cover gives a chance for reduced damage if hit, with the odds being greatest for heavy cover. Every now and then, it will happen that either you or an enemy will get hit, and you will see a notification like "cover: 0.5x damage", meaning that some damage ... in this case 50% ... has been averted by being under cover. Cover also reduces critical hits, so even light cover is worth getting.

This is one of the uses for a melee character. They go in first during a combat turn, and if they score a hit, the target is automatically knocked out of any cover. Your ranged guys can then open up on the enemy to better effect. Cover doesn't extend all the way around you, as you can see from the position of the shield symbols; attacking from a different, unshielded direction gives a better chance of flanking the target and scoring a critical hit. In that case, you will see a hit show something like "Critical: 1.5x damage".

Training in weapon skills lets you see things like hit % and critical chance % when you scan a potential target. This lets you know when you have a favorable angle of attack.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by Lord Of Dorkness:

Light = You can't be critted.
Medium = Same, and harder to hit.
High ? Same, but even bigger malus to-hit.

Think that's about it, at least.

Thanks; any rough percentages?

And how do get high?

[Lampros]

Originally posted by frdnwsm:

Cover doesn't extend all the way around you, as you can see from the position of the shield symbols; attacking from a different, unshielded direction gives a better chance of flanking the target and scoring a critical hit. In that case, you will see a hit show something like "Critical: 1.5x damage".

Thanks much!

[Lord Of Dorkness]

Originally posted by Lampros:

And how do get high?

It's just really rare. Think covering behind a tank instead of a car, and you'll get why.

[frdnwsm]

High cover you get usually from the terrain itself; look for a fully opaque shield symbol. An empty symbol means light cover, half empty is medium.

As I mentioned weapon skill training lets you see what your odds of scoring a hit, or a critical hit, on an enemy might be.

If you are looking for cover for yourself, take note of which direction the shield is facing. There's no point in going to a square with west-facing cover, if the enemy is to the east of you. Unfortunately, you can't tell for certain when you are in cover from terrain; you have to estimate, based on the position of the enemy. This is why certain spells are quite valuable; they give you the equivalent of light or medium cover even when you are totally out in the open.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by frdnwsm:

If you are looking for cover for yourself, take note of which direction the shield is facing. There's no point in going to a square with west-facing cover, if the enemy is to the east of you. Unfortunately, you can't tell for certain when you are in cover from terrain; you have to estimate, based on the position of the enemy. This is why certain spell are quite valuable; they give you the equivalent of light or medium cover even when you are totally out in the open.

Which spell? The Adept?

Now I understand why some folks try to go for the medium cover spell on the Adept. But it's still 10 Willpower and 10 Qi Casting; couldn't just going up the Quickness/Dodge tree net you more?

[frdnwsm]

Quickness/dodge is a somewhat different story. It also costs a huge amount of karma for best effect; it helps you not get hit at all, but if you do get hit, it does nothing to reduce the crit level. Also, if you want to be a total tank, you will need something like 8 or more in quickness/dodge.

The thing is, it sort of depends on what profession you are playing. If you are an adept, you are already well trained in Qi casting; trying to grab a lot of quickness and dodge as well will be difficult; easier to continue to invest in a skill you already are proficient in. On the other hand, a street samurai with heavy ranged skills is already well trained in quickness, so it's more economical for him to grab dodge.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by frdnwsm:

Quickness/dodge is a somewhat different story. It also costs a huge amount of karma for best effect; it helps you not get hit at all, but if you do get hit, it does nothing to reduce the crit level. Also, if you want to be a total tank, you will need something like 8 or more in quickness/dodge.

The thing is, it sort of depends on what profession you are playing. If you are an adept, you are already well trained in Qi casting; trying to grab a lot of quickness and dodge as well will be difficult; easier to continue to invest in a skill you already are proficient in. On the other hand, a street samurai with heavy ranged skills is already well trained in quickness, so it's more economical for him to grab dodge.

Yeah, that sounds right. How do melee Street Samurais perform in general in comparison to the Adept? I imagine it's pretty weak in HK, due to the amount of Cyberware needed to optimize it, and the inability to do so given the financial scarcity (at least until the bonus content)?

[di eshor ribly]

Originally posted by Lampros:

Originally posted by frdnwsm:

Quickness/dodge is a somewhat different story. It also costs a huge amount of karma for best effect; it helps you not get hit at all, but if you do get hit, it does nothing to reduce the crit level. Also, if you want to be a total tank, you will need something like 8 or more in quickness/dodge.

The thing is, it sort of depends on what profession you are playing. If you are an adept, you are already well trained in Qi casting; trying to grab a lot of quickness and dodge as well will be difficult; easier to continue to invest in a skill you already are proficient in. On the other hand, a street samurai with heavy ranged skills is already well trained in quickness, so it's more economical for him to grab dodge.

Yeah, that sounds right. How do melee Street Samurais perform in general in comparison to the Adept? I imagine it's pretty weak in HK, due to the amount of Cyberware needed to optimize it, and the inability to do so given the financial scarcity (at least until the bonus content)?

Melee street samurai, aka walking cyberweapons, can actually be fairly cheap. A cyber weapon, a hydraulic jack, magnetic arm, joltalert, and platelette factory are relatively affordable by late game, and getting the Adrenal Pump (+AP) is possible as well. The only real stats you would need would be Body, Cyber Affinity, Strength, and Close Combat. Some dodge might be helpful, as could taking 3 points in shamanism just for a totem (Leopard works amazingly well for this).

I said screw my teammates one game and dumped all of my resources into cyberware, sold almost all the loot (except that sweet laser for Duncan); getting the Poison Spit bioware, Flashbulb Eye, and lubricated legs, plus the cyber mentioned above to round out my combat oriented cyberleopard. She tore everything to pieces with her claws, like a cracked out Glory.

The financial scarcity is really to hammer home the point of focusing on one character archetype. Not only are jack-of-all-trade type characters weaker in the long run, but they're poorer too for having to buy all the various knick knacks to make them work. There is generally enough free stuff lying around to provide some form of upgrade for pretty much any fighting style, so you can save your nuyen until the third tier of gear gets unlocked. I'd have to crunch the numbers a bit, but you should be able to get somewhere around 20,000 nuyen to play with, at an estimate. I know it's said often enough in these forums, but I'll say it again: plan out your karma and nuyen expenses ahead of time so you can get the goodies you want.

[frdnwsm]

A close combat oriented troll street sam can be brutal. As with all builds, there are plusses and minuses. The obvious negative is that, unlike the magical adept, you won't have any spells to buff up yourself or other crew members; cyber only benefits you personally.

The benefit is that you replace the magical combat buffs with cyber, which costs money but less karma; all you need is some cyber affinity. This lets you pump all the karma you would have spent on Qi casting and support spells into strength, body and close combat. Trolls can reach huge strength levels. A troll cyber warrior with a strength of 12+ can do astonishing amounts of damage.

[frdnwsm]

If you use a free form character, you have a huge amount of flexibility. I have put over 500 hours into experimenting with different builds, and I'd say that just about anything can be effective.

Right now, I'm working on a Troll whose only combat skill will be thrown weapons, and a human cyber shaman, who will have no spells whatsoever, but get fully cybered up and wield a monofilament whip. Kinky!

Com'ere, Is0bel; let's "roleplay"!

[mckraken101]

Originally posted by Lampros:

Originally posted by Lord Of Dorkness:

Light = You can't be critted.
Medium = Same, and harder to hit.
High ? Same, but even bigger malus to-hit.

Think that's about it, at least.

Thanks; any rough percentages?

And how do get high?

Try smokin some weed :)

[Zadok]

Since I am "currently" (every now and then) playing a Gun Adept in HK I'll add to the necromancy by commenting on Martial Defense.

Originally posted by Lampros:

Which spell? The Adept?

Now I understand why some folks try to go for the medium cover spell on the Adept. But it's still 10 Willpower and 10 Qi Casting; couldn't just going up the Quickness/Dodge tree net you more?

In fact light cover is the thing. It is cover and prevents crits - that's all you need. To go for Qi 10 simply for medium cover is madness. Coincidentally Martial Defense 1's requirement of Qi 5 also unlocks Counterstrike, which is effective on gunners. It also unlocks Qi Strike, the lesser of the melee weapon Qi attacks. Add some more (Qi 7) and you've got Qi Onslaught, the "real Adept's" melee weapon attack. Although it is a lot better than Qi Strike it also costs 26 Karma (WI 5 -> 7 + Qi 5 -> 7), which are spent almost exclusively on that attack option. To go with Qi Strike only is possible although atypical. 26 Karma may well allow to build a more versatile Adept by investing in other skills. The damage however is best with Qi Onslaught.

All in all it is not a standard to get Qi Casting 5 just for Martial Defense, yet it is a viable option. Sometime later I may be able to tell just how viable it really is...

*On a side note the core question is still not cleared up entirely. I'd sure like to know the details of how cover works exactly.

[red255]

what McCraken101's necro post didn't fully enlighten you? then why did he necro it?

if targets are in cover you generally hit them for normal damage like 7, or occasionally reduced damage like 3 and an obvious penalty to hit.

if you hit them with an attack like a melee attack they will stand up and be out of cover and be flanked and take normal damagex2 from critical hits. main reasons why melee is viable, you thwack things with melee (I like using the drone user's drone for this) they stand up and you then use an assault rifle burst or something to deal with the unit.

you could also wander around flanking things and getting all complicated but my go-to is send in the drone have him knock people out of cover and then shoot them when they are exposed.

as a player you need to watch out for being flanked and exposed as well. but the AI isn't as good at it because they don't have a nasty melee robot to kill for them.