Is there any good mechanical reason to wield a melee weapon in Cypher?
Ranged weapons have virtually no downsides compared to melee weapons. They deal the same damage for their light/medium/heavy weapon category, and they have the same accuracy.
There are no penalties for shooting an enemy point blank, and in fact, the difficulty is lowered by 1 (or 3 on a d20) for shooting an enemy point blank, which means that if an enemy is right next to you, you should fire your bow or your rifle rather than draw a melee sidearm. If you have a knife and someone is next to you, you should throw it rather than stab them.
On top of all this, the rules for movement are very harsh (unless you have a special ability or you succeed on a risky roll, moving more than a few feet costs you your action).
With all of this in mind, why ever wield a melee weapon?
>>46322799
Depending on the setting, ammo might be problematic.
>>46323368
Twelve arrows or twelve crossbow bolts in the "fantasy" equipment list cost as much as a burlap sack, a candle, three torches, or a "rusty and worn" knife.
50 rounds in the "modern" equipment list cost as much as a duct tape roll, a flashlight, or a day's worth of trail rations.
50 shots' worth of energy in the "sci fi" equipment list cost the same as a day's worth of survival rations.
Does the physical attack inability of the Calm descriptor affect the Adept type's Onslaught when the energies are used to assail the target's physical form?
Calm descriptor:
>Inability: You’re just not a fighter. The difficulty of all physical attacks is increased by one step.
Adept type:
>Onslaught (1 Intellect point): You attack a foe within short range using energies that assail either his physical form or his mind. In either case, you must be able to see your target. If the attack is physical, you emit a force blast: a ray of force that inflicts 4 points of damage. If the attack is mental, you focus your mental energy into a mindslice that disrupts the creature’s thought processes, inflicting 2 points of Intellect damage (ignores Armor). Some creatures without minds (such as robots or zombies) might be immune to a mindslice. Action.
>>46322799
Monte Cook cannot into balance.
This is the least egregious example of his works.
>>46322799
1. You use Speed instead of Might when applying Effort with ranged weapons, as far as I know, and if you're a Might-based character you're better off with melee then.
2. Lots of special moves only apply to melee attacks, not ranged, at least from my understanding of Numenera and The Strange.
>>46324295
These are hardly compelling benefits.
Just as many special moves apply only to ranged, and they are not much worse.
With Intellect Edge 3, does gaining an Insight cost anything?
Edge reduces all costs related to the pool in question, and Insights do not make any special exception. What is stopping an Intellect Edge 3 character from gaining a constant stream of Insights?
>>46324471
You asked me if there's a good mechanical reason, I gave one. If you're not satisfied that's not my problem.
>>46324516
>good
>>46324029
Well, it says it's a physical attack, so I'd say yes.
>>46324537
Scenario: Your character has 3 Might Edge, 0 Speed Edge, 20 Might Pool, and 12 Speed Pool. Your character has abilities from their class and/or descriptor that rely on Might. Your character must choose between using a Might weapon and a Speed weapon in combat.
Result: You use a Might weapon.
This isn't exactly rocket science. Yes, you might get more mileage out of a Speed build, but if your descriptor's already leaning towards Might or you want to use Might-based non-combat abilities and skills, you'll favour a melee weapon.
Are the rules geared more towards Speed and ranged weapons? Yes, because the system is garbage, but that doesn't stop me from answering your damn question.
>>46322799
>any good reason
You are That Guy
>>46322799
>Monte Cook
Why would you do this to yourself?
>>46322799
In Numenera and fantasy settings, the medium sized ranged weapons take two hands. In Modern settings, it makes sense that ranged weapons are incentivized over melee weapons. In sci-fi settings, the GM may need to adjust for the way he wants things to play out.
>>46324295
>>46324471
Melee attacks allow you to use speed, and might, meaning you have two pools that you can use to kill people.
>>46324507
Never mind. It seems that the margins explicitly state: "The cost of gaining Insight is not reduced by any Edge you may have."
>>46325014
But you always want to conserve Might, because Might is what most attacks chip away huge chunks from.
>>46325037
Better to kill them faster. depending on the fight. Also, as someone above mentioned, if you have might edge, you're going to be using it.
Being able to use both pools is a side benefit of being a melee user, but the main purpose is, in melee focused settings, you're either holding a shield in your off-hand, or you're using a two handed weapon for more damage.
Now, two more damage is slightly worse then having an asset on your attack. So, point blank range is still better in that regard. Personally, I think point blank range should exist as an optional rule, just like damage types and opportunity attacks. I don't remember seeing it in the Numenera book.
I think the idea behind it is that ranged characters shouldn't want to be in melee combat, and the bonus helps with bad situations. However, a close quarters speed character seems to have no reason to not use a light ranged weapon in melee for two assets on accuracy.
>>46325107
>I don't remember seeing it in the Numenera book.
Looked it up, and it's there. It's just never come up because the Glaive wears heavy armor and wants to get attacked, while the Archer Jack has speed defense, so does well when under pressure but would still rather not be in melee. The melee Jack might start throwing knives away though.
>>46322799
Did anyone suggest to Cook that he fucking stop making new games all the time and work on releasing some stuff for the games he already made?
>>46325426
>New Games
The Strange is basically just a different setting for Numenera, and Cypher System is a generic version of the same ruleset.
Numenera, specifically, has
>Guidebook with 4 new locations
>Character Options book.
>Technology book, mostly cyphers.
>Bestiary.
>Book of short adventures.
>Spess Book
>Ocean book that just went to the printers
>3 upcoming books, diferent planes, character options 2, and bestiary 2.
They finished a kickstarter that has a bunch of setting stuff, as well as Character Options 2.
He made that kids game, but it still seem to run off of the character gen. format from Cypher, since I know characters are still Adjective Noun that Verbs.
I don't know if he's done anything non-Cypher since he made Numenera.
