MJ12 Commando said:
No, in 2020 Dragoons were effectively invulnerable because of how combat actually worked. Yes, it's theoretically possible to kill a Dragoon with a 7.62x51mm rifle and AP ammo if it literally never shoots back, but if you're in an actual combat situation, it destroys you.
To be fair, 2077 Smasher's body seems comparatively less armored than other depictions of the Dragoon body. Smasher has a lot of exposed cables and pipes relative to the older depiction and the actual chest plate looks to be less robust than on earlier art. Smasher's head is also more 'exposed' and while obviously that's some sort of synthskin and he probably has some sort of subdermal armor, I'd still imagine his head is offered less protection than on the earlier model seen in the line art which has thick plating.
I'm certainly not well versed in the TTRPG era lore, but taking the game's narrative depiction of Smasher at face value (i.e. what he does in the narrative and how he's designed), it would legitimately just seem like he's less durable than a 2020 Dragoon. Maybe 2077 Smasher modded his Dragoon to prioritize mobility and weight and made concessions when it comes to armor?
Removed-Notes said:
This is fully chromed up endgame V with access to all weapons and gear and perks.
I'm gonna be honest, this is only a minor improvement. Which weapons does V actually have on their person? V only has 2 hands and many weapons require both hands to operate. Are we supposed to interpret this as V having hammer space and they get to keep every weapon they've ever touched in their back pocket?
And what about the other combatants? Again, the Master Chief also uses a wide array of weapons, if we're giving everyone carte blanche this entire match essentially boils down to the Master Chief bringing out a 1 mt Fury, throwing Shepard and Isaac on his back and hightailing it out of there (and maybe throwing down a drop wall to protect his partners from the blast? I know Chief can survive the shockwave, but idk enough about the other two) because the Master Chief is probably the only person to be able to perform such a tactic and not get vaporized or turned to mush. That or he instantly vaporizes the competition with a binary rifle or incineration cannon.
Javik said:
So you have to accept that V can cut bullets out of the air even without Sandevistan. Fully chromed up V has about as much human flesh left as Adam Jensen does.
Again, 'bullet cutting V' is not actually consistent with anything else in CP2077. Ignoring the rest of the setting, it still doesn't actually work. It purely functions as a gameplay mechanic.
Say for instance, V needs to deflect an M855A1 EPR round traveling at 961m/s at a range of 5m, as you can in game, and they only need to move their blade a mere 0.1m. It would take 5ms for that bullet to hit V and highballing V's reactions so they react after only 1 microsecond, they would have 4.99ms to deflect that blade. In order for V to deflect that bullet, they would need to perform an 8000m/s^2 acceleration. So just as a baseline, movements of this nature are not depicted in game. Full stop, V is not animted to perform 8000m/s^2 accelerations. Bullet deflect animations are actually 'self-contradictory' as the game needs to use visual shorthands and other cheats to simulate bullet deflection even though it's not accurately modelled in game.
This is also grossly out of line with everything else depicted in game. Outside of inconsistencies within bullet deflect itself, this contradicts V's behaviors and how they approach things (again, V does not leap off Arasaka Tower to escape during the heist), this contradicts numerous gameplay animations (including the bullet deflects themselves) and this contradicts scripted events.
Take Dexter's betrayal for instance. This is a scripted, guaranteed, immutable event in 2077's story, regardless of your perks or cyberware. When Dex's bodyguard jumps you, it takes 0.1s for his fist to connect with V's face. If V could deflect rifle rounds at close range, this never would have hit them. Assuming the bodyguard's arm extends 0.7m during the strike (this is a highball considering we don't see the entire duration of the strike), it would have a velocity of 14m/s. This would be trivially easy for a bullet timing V to avoid. Assuming V only needed to move their arm half a meter and had 0.0999s to do so, they would only need to perform a 100ms^2 acceleration, 80x less than the acceleration they'd need to deflect M855A1. The entire scene would be nonsensical from a reaction perspective as well. Even just comparing to the 5ms needed to deflect a bullet, V would have 20x more time to dodge the punch. This would be the equivalent of a baseball player being able to hit a 95mph fastball but being unable to react to something moving 5mph. This is further supported by the extended fight scene in the cinematic trailer's depiction of the event, where normal ass punches consistently land against V, instead of V pulling out some crazy 8000m/s^2 acceleration to avoid all damage.
And this isn't the only time V fails to react like this. Take the quest 'Talkin 'bout a Revolution.' It's an explicit and unavoidable plot point that Tom, a joytoy with zero physical combat mods, can move fast enough that V fails to react to him. A whole 0.7s passes from when Tom begins pulling back for his punch to when he strikes V. Again, it would be trivially easy for V to react to and counter Tom's strike if they could bullet time.
And remember, Tom's a doll. There is zero evidence he's had any physical upgrades beyond the chip Judy gave him, which explicitly only boosts reflexes i.e. Tom cannot move any faster than a normal human, he can only react faster. Which makes sense, the Tyger Claws wouldn't want to give their dolls access to combat ware and they certainly wouldn't want to spend money on high end products. And that also aligns with how Judy's questline intersects with Fingers. It's a plot point that dolls and joytoys will go to people like Fingers because they can't afford more ethical and better equipped ripperdocs.
This isn't even touching on the Rosalind Myers incident in the DLC. Because even if you do stop her second strike, Rosalind is guaranteed to nail you the first time and even a 20 body V can still fail the QTE to stop the second hit. In fact, it's very telling that a 20 Reflex V receives no additional prompts to alter combat against Rosalind. Rosalind can land multiple successful strikes against even a V with max Reflexes. The narrative of the scene is very clear, V is not much, if at all faster than Rosalind in combat. It's also worth noting that once Rosalind throws V down to the ground and aims her rifle at V, V raises their hands in surrender.
So just within the context of CP2077's narrative, V consistently is struck by people with baseline human speed. Maybe the bodyguard has something going for him (doesn't matter, it still contradicts bullet timing), but there's zero indication Rosalind and especially Tom have anything boosting their physical speed.
And remember, there's also the issue of how speed intersects with strength. Bullet timing acceleration requires tremendous force generation—force generation that is utterly absent from everything else V does. It's scripted that V has to put in effort to open a shipping container's doors and they very explicitly can't open the doors on the other side (unlike a certain Spartan, who can pry apart 5cm steel doors like they're nothing). And again, literally every actual body check event in the game's story that having 20 Reflexes doesn't let you pass because the game takes zero account of the actual physics of bullet deflection.
Beyond that, there's the issue of gameplay animations as well. V's actual animations are not consistent with the ability to accelerate to such a degree. Take the sledgehammer animations. A downward swing can take over 20 frames at 60fps or ~0.3s. Modeling the strike as the hammerhead, attached to a 1m long haft, attached to a half meter arm, rotating around a point (V's shoulder) and assuming the hammerhead travels a 120 degree arc (33% of the circumference of a hypothetical circle with the 1.5m haft and arm as the radius), V would be swinging that hammer at an astounding 9m/s. Which, yet again, contradicts V being able to perform several thousand m/s^2 accelerations because if V could perform those accelerations, they would swing sledgehammers, far, far faster. Your basic 3-hit Katana combo also doesn't move the way bullet deflecting V should be able to move. In particular, the slight delay shouldn't be there at all because V would be able to decelerate their sword on a dime.
Even getting into the nitty gritty details of actual gameplay mechanics, things are still not consistent with bullet timing V. The implementation of 'heavy' and 'very heavy' weapons as a class, which includes. . . a big sledgehammer, indicates that V's physical strength is such that their jump height and movement speed are reduced while wielding them and very heavy weapons straight up prevent V from sprinting and dashing. So the game also acknowledges that V is weak enough that they cannot meaningfully accelerate, what a 15 kilo sledgehammer if we assume the Sasquatch's hammer is double the weight of a regular sledgehammer? None of this makes sense if V can perform several thousand m/s^2 accelerations the way they would need to in order to bullet time.
So just to recap, purely within the context of Cyberpunk 2077, V is not a consistent bullet timer. Within the game's narrative i.e. scripted events, V consistently fails to dodge the strikes of those with human, or near human level physical ability and regularly fails to demonstrate strength consistent with the high g accelerations required to bullet time. Within the game's broader setting, V being a reliable bullet deflector is not supported. V does not act as if their body can withstand such accelerations and falls from or below terminal velocity regularly threaten them. Firearms as a weapon are still the overwhelming preference for most individuals in NC despite all of V's cyberware being regularly available. If bullet timing was as easy to achieve in game, guns would not be the primary weapon of most individuals. V needs specific cyberware to increase their jump height, they cannot leap over Godzilla. When it comes to gameplay animations, V's depiction is not consistent with bullet deflecting. They swing their weapons far too slow and have recovery times far too long to be consistent with bullet deflection. And even other gameplay mechanics are at odds with V being able to bullet deflect. Very heavy weapons dramatically decrease V's mobility and some weapons are so heavy V cannot even stow them.
And remember, none of this is considering the rest of the franchise, this is only looking at how V and the setting at large are depicted in 2077. And even 2077 does not depict V as a reliable bullet timer. Looking at 2077 holistically, considering both the actual narrative as well as gameplay animations and other gameplay mechanics, V is very much not a character who can deflect bullets.
If someone wants to make the argument that high end V can bullet time? Sure, go for it I guess. But don't act like it's remotely consistent or reliable. And definitely don't complain when someone uses similarly shoddy evidence to argue hypersonic Master Chief or some sh*t.
