/srg/ - Shadowrun General

Babby's first hacker. Good enough? What can a hacker do as a secondary role reasonably well? Is investing in diverse knowledge skills the best they can do? Another Borderlands character.

Oh look, another Gunsmith Cats character. I'm incapable of original ideas. I can't remember if I posted this one here before either. Is making an all pistols character even a good idea? Does it need more investment as a second face?

Thanks for looking. Hope you like the sheets, or dont and call me a faggot. I dont know, I'm not you.

Leadership is used to influence other characters, same as the other four social skills. The opposed check for it relies on the target's Leadership skill, rather than Perception, which can make it easier to use than Etiquette since the opposed check for Etiquette uses Perception which almost everybody has.

The modifiers for the skill test are different as well, being more applicable when there is some form of rank or authority involved. For example, Leadership would be the perfect skill to use when your ex-Lone Star sheriff character wants to talk his way around some other LS or KE goon.

Other than that, it's basically GM discretion. In my case, I wouldn't see a problem with allowing a good Leadership check to impart a temporary bonus to certain actions or Tests. Some guy rolls bad on his Composure Test against that pack of hungry ghouls charging you? Leadership.

Pain Editor. Even if you're not an armored up troll, you'll (eventually) want this one.

You'll probably want to do money vs essence comparisions between several bits of similar ware in cyber and bio varieties. If you can drop the money the two bio bits that equal the cyber Muscle Replacement, can you fit extra ware because of it? (Or would it leave you over a certain essence number so that you round up more for Social Limit if Essence was buoying it up.)

Also choose what kind of razor you're going for. If you're already gonna stand out, then the foot blades (if you also take the right leg mods) are just as good as spurs and only R rated.

Learn the MA Kick, and then it gets even better.

>Wired Reflexes 1
>Reaction Enhancers 1
>Muscle Augmentation 2
>Muscle Toner 2

First two help you get good initiative, second two pump your strength and agility respectively. A full kit to turn you into a killing machine, clocking in at just north of 3 Essence and 170k¥. Consider adding an Internal Router so you don't have to worry about hacking of your init boosters, which always happens at the worst moment.

Could someone know if their body doesn't mesh well with cybernetics before getting some? Would a SURGE'd person be less compatible with Cyberware than an average metatype?

Could I have a Cyberware incompatibility IC even if there are no mechanical aspects to it without it being total bullshit?

Yes, and not necessarily, and yes.

>On the note of SIN, does the licenses tied to it required to have the same rating?
No. As with SINs, you want a license of at least 4 to be mechanically likely to pass inspection, but you can have any grade of license tied to any grade of SIN. It just usually doesn't make sense to have cheap licenses, because they'll check both license and SIN in one swoop and it would be a shame to burn a SIN just because you cheaped out on the license.

Generally, when I get licenses they are a set of good licenses tied to my good SIN, so I have a reasonable paper trail and excuse for my illegal stuff. No point in getting a license for any burner SINs unless it's a SIN I'm using for a job where I'm pretending to be a bounty hunter or something else where I'll be checked out.

>dat gif
Click and drag to generate your very own fake SIN number!

Great, isn't it? I've always wanted to do some RNG with it, but I'm never sure for what.

thanks guys, I love how many options iv got the downside is there are so many damn options.

Why does that Thin Man have dreads?

I recently obtained a rocket launcher, which means I kinda need some rule help now.
The stats for rockets say anti-vehicle rockets have a larger blast radius than high explosive rockets, and that high explosive rockets have the same blast radius as grenades. However, the description says that high explosive rockets should have a larger blast radius than both grenades and anti-vehicle rockets. What's going on here?
Hand razors and implanted sunglasses. Being Molly Millions > not that

>Not recognizing the glory of Matthew Lilliard in Hackers, the greatest piece of cyberpunk art to ever be produced

Leave and stay leave.

Do I have to end my sentences with /loljk to keep you from yelling at me?

It would be nice.

not my girl just a pic of a random razorgirl I found but thanks for the advice.

Do corps own the hardest milspec stuff there is, like tanks, jet fighters and warships? Doesn't seem like there's a lot of point for them to do that since it's just wasted money, and they can't just drive them around willy nilly either since extraterritoriality only applies to land they own. It would seem a lot more sensible to use political leverage etc. to make governments do the heavy lifting and just focus on profiting out of the conflict.

SK has its own fleet.

Aztechnology basically IS Aztlan.

Corps typically develop that stuff for governments and also keep copies/extras of the more useful bits.

This is a bit muddied by the corps that actually are governments, as opposed to just operating with the legalities of one, and ones owned by dragons.

But it's mostly 'ware and personal gear that they're going to have some of the best of the best of.

Depends on the corp in question. Although every mega has basically its own private army, some corps tend to see more use out of them. Ares and Aztechnology are good examples. Ares fulfills mercenary contracts all over the world and Aztechnology controls an entire country. A country that is still currently at war with Amazonia if I recall correctly.

Asstech is aztlan, but I thought that meant that they just own the govt officials, and for the most part it's national hardware over which the corp just has leverage.

I don't understand the reason for a corp to be putting a lot of money into military stuff. A private army, maybe, if mercenary business is lucrative enough, but other than that... Ehh. Why?

Some of them definitely do, like the Ares military subdivisions. I'd say that AAA's maintain aircraft like jets and t-birds, along with military outposts, while companies that have a significant interest in trade and shipping (like S-K and Wuxing) have their own warships. Remember, extraterritoriality cuts both ways - if someone starts messing with you, no one else is obligated to help. When Operation RECIPROCITY happened, that was corp on corp and it had all the trappings of modern war, from naval to armoured to air support.

AAs probably maintain a good land-based military, with close support aircraft, but they aren't at the level of 'being able to wage international war singlehanded' like the AAAs.

The war's over, Amazonia lost but the Azzies left with a bloody nose.

AV rockets have a higher damage code but lose blast power at a faster rate (-4/m versus -2/m) than HE rockets; they're designed to punch through a single hard target. HE rockets have a -similar- blast pattern to grenades, but larger.

>AAs probably maintain a good land-based military, with close support aircraft, but they aren't at the level of 'being able to wage international war singlehanded' like the AAAs.
AAs frequently have everything AAAs have, but for a mega title and seat on the corporate board.

Oh, I get it. I misunderstood how explosions work.

>Remember, extraterritoriality cuts both ways - if someone starts messing with you, no one else is obligated to help.

No, but that's also where political leverage comes in. Also if a corp owns land within a country, any player can't just waltz in with their military assets, since a war within their borders is also a national concern. I mean sure they could trade blows in international waters and have proxy wars, but direct action against one another in their own lands is not just their own business.

Imagine if EVO wanted to strike against a Japanacorp who has land in Hokkaido or something. IJN would be very likely fighting against them in that situation, since Hokkaido is still Japan.

Like I said, light stuff definitely makes sense, since being able to take independent action is always good. But the whole nine yards? I don't really see a point in that.

Now let's imagine that S-K has the equivalent of a modern CSG. If they have global interests, how the hell are they going to protect all of them with that single fleet? The truth is that it isn't going to work, so they'll have to make use of local assets anyway.

>Amazonia lost
Did Sirrurg died?

our team doesn't have a decker, so project freedom sent a decker with us on our mission and he hacked literally everything. there were cameras that never saw us cuz he hacked them. there was an anti aircraft turret on the roof that he hacked as we approached via glider. there were motion sensors on the ground, guess what? he hacked all of them. i was trying to figure out where the guards on the floor were so i could sneak behind them and kill them quietly, he just hacked all the cameras and found them.

seems kinda imba?

I'm assuming 5e
>future dystopia dominated by technology and magic
>having someone who can control this technology is imba

???

well based on the blurb i read technomancers seem pretty bullshit too, to be honest. just haven't met any yet. but yeah anyway, how do i become a deck?

Could've just been a well planned run.

If something went sideways, such as the decker taking fire or counter-decker things would've of been so easy.

Best way to counter a decker is to throw something they can't hack at them. Bullets, for example.

Frequently but not always. Maersk probably could invade somewhere just based on their naval assets, but I doubt DocWagon, Ruhrmetall, or Spanish Bank have that kind of military might.

The AAAs have a requirement for that level of muscle due to their diverse assets and holdings, the AAs have a better chance of getting the Court on their side because, ironically, they are not one of the big boys who need to be checked at every opportunity.

S-K doesn't need to protect everything with a single fleet. You're right, if something is big enough then the local national governments will get involved. This means that S-K is free to use their fleet for their own ends; they don't have to fight defensively, they can be aggressive and push where they want to. Even if they don't actually trade fire, the threat of a destroyer waltzing up and shelling your city is enough to make, say, Indonesia reconsider closing their ports to S-K merchant ships.

I treat corps like late 19th-early 20th century America. They're not the biggest kid on the block, and if you really pushed them you could hurt them, but they're hungry for more and they don't really care who they need to threaten to get another slice of pie. Working together, they can use both economic and military means to convince just about anyone to give in to the power of the CC, and from there scale down to inter-corp warfare.

Sirrurg got beat up by the Big A, but before they could deliver the finishing blow some other Great Dragons showed up with Great Form Spirits and hauled him off to dragon jail. Whereabouts unknown, condition unknown, sentence and prison term unknown, scaled ass health unknown but assumed whipped.

>AAs have a better chance of getting the Court on their side because, ironically, they are not one of the big boys who need to be checked at every opportunity.
Honestly, I don't know where you're getting your info from.

For example, Market Panic. I wish I could find the exact page, but they mention MCT (IIRC) and a AA, and the dance that was played for MCT to use their justices in their favour, and down the line MCT acquired them. Obviously a less than ideal situation if you want to stay independent, but that whole book is basically, "The AAAs are uniting for the first time ever to deal with the AAs, but there's still enough jockeying between the AAAs for who can gobble up what that the As and AAs can maneuver and get some leverage."

But getting into conflict is always bad for business. It's a different case if you aren't fighting yourself, because then you can just profit from selling the belligerents the stuff they need.

With that in mind, I really don't think any corp would be willing to resort to threats of 'shelling a city', because 1) it's bad for all business, making the other corps hate your guts, 2) you're not going to able to sustain the conflict anyway, so the threat is empty, and 3) it would tie up the few military assets you have in the conflict, leaving you defenseless elsewhere.

For S-K I think a fleet might make sense, since the corp is 95% Lofwyr. If he goes down, the whole thing goes down, so protecting the wyrm is of the greatest interest of everyone in the corp. A fleet sitting around near Loffy to protect him against any kind of a threat is a sound plan. Threatening to shell a city in the 4th biggest country in the world is not.

So, he's a fat Ork, no two ways about it.
But would you build him as a Bio-Borg, or an Adept?

Ignoring Awakened Supremacy, for one minute.

It's bad for business in the short term, but not necessarily long term. We have canonical stories about stuff like the PCC taking over southern California by force, along with Saito who stayed with the backing of the Japanacorps against the wishes of the Emperor, and both of them reaped economic benefits. Even the Japanocorps still have strong influence over places like San Francisco.

And there was the Corp War of 2059-2060, which helped kill Fuchi and birth CAT. I already brought up Operation RECIPROCITY. The long and the short of it is, corps have armies for the same reason modern nation-states have armies: to protect their assets and enforce their will upon the global community. You can ride out some ill will, the Azzies famously did it and everyone outside the shadows loves them today, you don't need to sustain a war indefinitely (guerrilla war sucks for everyone, and if there's no clear profit a corp can pull out), and it's often worth the risk to fight in one place of your choosing to demonstrate strength, rather than hoping that no one will attack you, or else we wouldn't have countries sending soldiers off to fight in Middle Eastern deserts instead of keeping them lined up at the border.

Tell me runner-senpai, are you eating healthy?

Man shadowrun lore is in parts awesome but in other part it makes no sense. Corps and nations are interesting because they are not similar, and then they go make them the same.

Would nuclear reactors the size of those used in a submarine have issues in Shadowrun? They use a chunk of uranium about the size of a fist.

Sure! Soy is a health food, right? So eating 5 Soy Crunch Gordo Burrito Mucha Libre Platterinos at once is super healthy.

Hahahahaha, no.
My Street Doc wonders how I'm still alive.

Significantly lower power output, but other than that, not really.

So how is 5E coming along now?
I played a bit when it just came out and aside from some editing issues and outright retarded street level play rules it was pretty great overall.

It still has awful editing, but it definitely shines once you get the core rules down. Also sum-to-8 makes awesome street level play

Wouldn't that mean they'd have to increase the amount of uranium, in order to keep on boiling the same amount of water?

Yep.
Or use a system with less water to compensate for the lower Uranium output, thus putting out less energy.

why not make him an ogre variant if you really want to fluff him out.

hi shadowrun general, I need some new guns. are there books for 5e with guns in them beyond gun heaven and run and gun?

Problem is, they're supposed to be short, and this guy is easily more than 7 feet. Probably better to just have his gut represented by a ludicrously high Body.

Hard Targets has a couple decent options. Besides that I think there are a few scattered far and wide that I don't remember.

I heard technomancers were a bit trash at decking compared to a decker. And that their powers are expensive and should be used only in emergencies .
However, I also heard that sprites are the true heroes of technomancy. Being their own little competent deckers. And machine sprites to help you out in meat space bricking cybereyes, cyberguns, and causing cyberdongs to go off prematurely.

So the one question I want to ask that will decide on making a technomancer or a decker is this, can I make my sprites cute robots?

I imagine your sprites can look as cute as you want them to be.

I also kind of want Technomancer Traditions in Echoes and Mirages which represent different interpretations of what Technos are

You can make your Sprites look like whatever you want.

>only player in the group who never GMs for us reveals he wants to run a Shadowrun campaign
>He's a prolific GM outside of the group, but mostly plays with us
>he's super excited about the setting and works closely with us when we're making our characters
>runs a fantastic first session that stops halfway through a two-part run
>it's been two months
>he'll almost certainly never continue the campaign
>my ork decker will never see play again
I just wanted to go on adventures with my friends in future Seattle, anons. Life is suffering.

thanks friend

>Technomancers
God how I hate them.
A group made solely to shit magic over one of the best parts of the fluff vis a vis Deckers. (and undermining the tech vs magic angle that was going on when they were introduced)
The only thing worse as-written is the older editions mary sues (Harlequin) and BBS posters in the books with extremely shitty "storylines".
The sole positive thing about them is that they're not called Otaku anymore.

I have half a mind to run a game now just so I can retcon those fuckers out.

Here's some important things you'll need for maximal sprite wrangling. First, you want the Complex Form Static Veil. Second, you need a good Edge for emergencies and more hits on your summoning. Third, you need some Long Haul. Fourth you need a good doc (medicine skill, not first aid) with a good medkit.

You won't need all of this for sprites with a level equal or lower than your Resonance, but most of it still helps.

Now if you get unlucky and take more Fading from the summoning than you want then here's what you do. Thread Static Veil on your Sprite at Level 2. Take a dose of Long Haul. Get the doc to make a medicine roll for your wounds so that you can heal it better. Heal for three days total. Then try and Register the sprite. Spend edge freely at this point.

If you're lucky, boom. Nice high rating sprite.

Honestly, yes. Which is not something I expected from such a fat lazy slob, and something I squarely credit my teammates for. They tend to look for real food and real coffee when we're out because we do well enough to afford nice things.

Which reminds me, I should probably think about finding a hangar for our newly-acquired airplane and move out of my apartment. Not like I'm getting the deposit back anyway, and I'll need someplace to work on the Steel Lynx I'm saving up for.

Shadowrun's rules really need to be pared the fuck down.
The move from 4E to 5E might have cut down character creation from three days to merely half a day but saner games, with as much crunch in play, let you do it in 10 to 30 minutes.
>everything's a subsystem
>everything has inane restrictions/requirements/different versions that add nothing but bookkeeping
>there's tons of page space spent on rules that will never come up in actual play, often obnoxiously specific and overcomplicated ones at that
How many people here seriously use the rules for explosion damage reflection?
And since technomancer's were mentioned, what fucking language did they write those sprite rules in?
Because it sure as hell ain't english.

So what's good ammo for a shotgun?

I know it triggers the /k/ how flechettes work, but are they actually decent to use? Gel seems better than stick-and-shock.

What happened to the subs carrying nuclear missiles once nuclear missiles became useless? Have they been added to the mothball fleet?

5e or 4e ?

5e's SnS are significantly worse than 4e's. They are still great on guns that have low base AP in 5e, because they get the full advantage out of the base -5 AP.

Nukes aren't useless.
They're less useful, but they're still hellishly scary.
Especially as the effect of their radiation is more persistent.

Don't be a dumbass. Technomancers were added cuz Gibson's Mona Lisa Overdrive had Angela Mitchell, who didn't need a deck.

5e. Most of the shotguns seem to have a -1AP base.

There's still plenty of dangerous warheads out there, even if they don't want to risk nuclear weapons failing.

>How many people here seriously use the rules for explosion damage reflection?
>he doesn't chunky-salsa his enemies with a bandolier of grenades surrounded by an overcast max Force Physical Barrier

The kids table is over there user. If you can't deal with inane amounts of crunch, FASA franchises are not for you.

t. battletech player

I built a little in vitro meat processor so I can cultivate my own. Actual meat is a real treat, the team appreciates it (our troll especially) and it's good for morale. Sure it's lab grown, but it beats soy.

I even installed some electrical pulse generators to stimulate muscle contractions, makes it considerably more palatable.

Only downside is I have to find the muscle cell cultures to seed it with. I'm at the point where I try to steer us towards runs that takes us into any of the large bio corps in the hopes that I can snag some samples on the way through to add to the collection.

It occurs to me that there are likely people who play Shadowrun who've never read any of the Sprawl trilogy.

On a shotgun that does 10p -1ap, Stick n Shock does 8s(e) -5 AP, whereas Gel will do 10s 0 AP. Every 3 AP "increases" the damage a weapon does by 1, by reducing the opponent's soak pool by 3 (an average hit to resist). So, SnS will do a modified 8 + (5/3) = 9.66s(e), so a little less on average than the Gel rounds would do.

Electricity damage can drop a guy's initiative score below a pass threshold or make it costly to use an interrupt, and it reduces their dice pools temporarily. Plus you can shoot vehicles, drones, and spirits because of the higher AP Gel Rounds, especially on a shotgun, will knock a normal metahuman on their ass if you get a good shot, but I value that less than electricity damage. Also Gel Rounds are cheaper, if that matters to you.

I'm talking about their effects on the setting. Otaku only served to shit magic all over the Matrix.

Yo.

I should really do that sometime.

I still need to see if I can find a good audio-book version of 'em. Preferably bundled with an e-book version.

5th edition

Trying to build a mage but i'm having trouble figuring out what spells would compliment my active skills.

I was thinking of using magic has the debuff and stun damage source and the active skills like first aid and medicine to treat injuries. Is this viable? (Not optimal, viable)

Question:
What career did your Mage come from, and what do you want to do with him?

Aright, cringe time!

Dude grew up in a wealthy family, went to medical school and trained in a healing lodge (Hermetic).

later in life he established a clinic in a shitty part of town thinking he would be able to cure the sick and all that jazz, place got torched by gangers. Lost someone dear to him and now is looking for vengence

Basicly he's a doctor in skills and a bounty hunter in spells (to find the leader of the gang that fucked him over)

another point is the guy still respects his hippocratic oath. Do no harm and shit (basicly stun damage only and no kills indirect or direct)

what is sprawl? i thought this game was based on ghost in the shell?

That's what Adobe Acrobat is for user. Remove pages like they're going out of style and change art to fit your desired tone. Maybe throw in a couple of cheat sheets or an alternate subsystem or two while you're at it.

Devil Rats and dumpster diving don't make for the healthiest meals, so no, not really.

Once the debt is paid, celebratory steak will be in order.

but, speaking of ghost in the shell, does anyone know if there's a higher tech version of the chameleon suit? this armor is light, doesn't completely turn you transparent, and it's really really cheap. surely there has to be a bigger, badder version somewhere or another

I'm going to assume you're joking, but in case you haven't, it's a book trilogy by William Gibson, and literally all the non-magic elements of shadowrun come from it, up to and including the words, like Street Samurai or Razorgirl.

Ruthenium Polymer Coating

shadowrun without magic? where can i sign up?

well, that is what the chameleon suit uses. what book has the rules for adding that to any armor?

Run and Gun. The Chameleon suit gives a limit/dice pool bonus to sneaking, whereas the modification adds a negative modifier for anyone trying to spot you by perception.

Shadowrun predates Ghost in the Shell by over half a decade.

The Sprawl Trilogy is a series of books by William Gibson:
Neuromancer
Count Zero
Mona Lisa Overdrive

The series is notable for many reasons, including coining the term "cyberspace" as well as 99% of Shadowrun, including nuyen, cyberdecks (as "cyberspace decks"), bunraku, razorgirl, and more.

Run and Gun. Hard Targets has slightly cheaper Ruthenium Polymer Cloaks as well.

...

>>A group made solely to shit magic over one of the best parts of the fluff vis a vis Deckers.

Shit magic over? How do deckers shit magic over when a mage can be completely untouchable by the matrix but magic can still fuck over the decker no matter what he does?

I believe he means "shit magic over" like "inject magic into."