/srg/- Shadowrun General

Infamous fraud? I haven't really been following the news, mind filling me in?

Was shadowrun hong kong the last game Harebrained schemes will put out? I've not found anything relevant to anymore of those games. And they are good for inspiration and presenting the setting to players. Giving them books and images isn't half as good as having them play through some vidyas.

Long story short. The dudes writing the books have were promised paymenty from the owners and copyright holders.
They were never paid and it's all a clusterfuck, so it's likely they never will be.

tl;dr CGL was originally set up out of the owner's personal accounts, for Reasons. Those accounts were never unlinked properly, and one of the owners of the company embezzeled a bunch of money to build home improvements. This led to MANY MANY MANY of the freelancers not getting paid; pretty much all of the good freelancers fucked off because of it.

geek-related.com/2010/04/17/catalyst-games-defiant-criminals/
The short story and links to find out more basically.

After seeing the trainwreck that passes for editing and layout by Catalyst, I wouldn't pay them a copper either

...

And what's worse is that this has been going on for years, will never be punished and will continue, while Catalyst keep making money.

Considering they were paid late, barely given contracts and their jobs was writing lore and mechanics and the editor is one of the dudes that's embezzling i disagree.

I am in complete surprise that they find freelancers to write more shit for them.

Pretty much everyone that writes for CGL writes because they love Shadowrun. That's why like Opti and Vox are writing shit for them now.

Currently building a Mystic Adept druid for 5e, who will hopefully have an Ally Spirit and Attuned Animal Companion (both Wolves, as that's her mentor spirit).

My question is this: their speciality so far seems to be tracking and detection. But how important will some of those spells be if I have both a spirit and a companion to help scout areas out for me? Should I focus more into illusion spells and sneaking for some utility, or combat support spells so my wolf pet is a bit better when I sic it on mooks? (I don't plan on using the ally spirit for combat unless things get too dire; they have a tendency to be broken, and using one to fight would bring more unwanted attention than would be helpful.)

There used to be a Doc file with some house-rules suggested changes for 4th Edition Shadowrun that 2D ( the story time guy ) linked that their GM used - but i cant seem to find it. Anyone have a copy?

And while we're on the subject, any useful or interesting houserules for 4eA?

yes, yes, "just play 5th edition" is probably the best answer but I kinda like 4A.

And some, like Bull, stayed around because it gave them them the chance to devolve the setting back to 3rd edition as much as they could.

I use the Ends of the Matrix (replacement Matrix rules that actually function, by a freelancer) - tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=48836

And most of his other houserules here: tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=58685#58685

They're pretty good, but some don't like that it lets hackers mess with brains - something like GitS style - it's supported by the fluff, but was usually glossed over by the actual rules.

Technomancer book WHEN?!

Probably 12-18 months.

Fuck waiting that long I'm going to make a Petnomancer.

never

>After seeing the trainwreck that passes for editing and layout by Catalyst, I wouldn't pay them a copper either
No, that's a newer development. Ever since the embezzlement story broke - literally years ago at this point - they literally haven't had an editing staff. And, believe it or not, doing editing and layouts on the book is very much not those unpaid freelancers' job.

The piss-poor editing is something caused by the embezzlement and lack of pay, rather than the other way around.

It's just a thoroughly scummy company.

>Technomancer book WHEN?!
Hopefully never. Technomancer a shit.

From a rules perspective or a fluff perspective? Because a new book can definitely help with one of those...

Actually a new book could help with both.

The point they suffer the most from is that everything they do, a dedicated hack or rigger can do just as well. The Techno's only gimmick is spamming Sprites, and even then the Machine Sprite is really the one that feels unique and can't exactly be replicated.

To be a good archetype, Technos should feel as different from Hackers as Adepts feel to Street Sams.

So maybe the problem does not lie in the Techno. If hackers had to stay at home and use massive computers to do their stuff, having a Techno with slightly sub-par abilities but a vastly improved mobility would be and intersting change. Just my two cents

>To be a good archetype, Technos should feel as different from Hackers as Adepts feel to Street Sams.
I disagree. Technos should feel as different from Hackers as Mages feel to Street Sams.

I think a better comparison would be technos to hackers, adepts to street sams.

So, they should be completely different and work with a different medium?

What are technomancers supposed to do that has no connection to manipulating computer technology?

Goddamnit user stop making me want to play a bug shaman.

Maybe I should just dm a bughunt game.

Because, y'know, magic doesn't do anything at all affecting physical reality, right?

Perhaps technos should be to hackers as adepts are to mages. Distinctly meatspace uses with some unique Matrix powers.

It very well does, but only at the very last step.

The question is, what would make a TM sufficiently different from a decker for you?

I feel like the basic concept of a Technomancer is, that he has a natural connection to the matrix. He is part of the matrix and the matrix is part of him.

I feel like technomancers should be more like Matrix-faces, if that makes any sense. Using their report with all things digital to seduce ICE or befriend it.
Not just deck, but without a deck.

And with the upcoming themes of AI, there could open a real niche for that archetype.
Not just deck, but without a deck.

With special bonuses for using/exploiting technology in meatspace? The decker is the guy to find paydata or scrub evidence off a system, but the technomancer is the guy to live-edit himself out of all camera feeds, or hijack a car with a touch?

The problem is that I think that there's just very little actual space to develop a technomancer. Nobody has any ideas that can be made inu specifics - they just have vague notions of how their feel is supposed to be different.

>report
Rapport.

Isn't that kind of what they already are with Sprites? They negotiate with a Sprite and the sprite acts on their behalf?

Kinda, yes. Expanding upon this could provide the contrast to a classical decker, people seem to be lamenting.

I am sure, that people will start complaining that it is too similar to a conjuring mage in the matrix.

But that is the first idea coming to mind, that fits the spirit of technomancers in my opinion.

If anyone has more extravagant idea, they are welcome to come forward.

I feel a technomancer should be magneto. He gets bonuses the more complex the car he is throwing at you is.

And free spirits should be beetlejuice.

Free spirited free spirit, would be quite a mouthfull

Not to be that guy that says 4e did it better, but the mesh realities echo really should be a core gameplay element of the techno. Hot SIM VR without being catatonic in the real world is a huge enough feature on its own to distinguish techno.

According to CGL and a few of the freelancers who spoke up afterwards, they were finally paid, though some of them were waiting literally years from when they did the work to when they got their paychecks. This whole thing went down at the end of 4e, which had a very obvious effect on the quality of the books. SR4A is the last big book that went out before the gouging got so bad that staff and freelancers left in droves, leaving us with only shitty writers who would do anything to stay.

A couple of my favourite tidbits
1) At one point they lost all their warehouse staff, and the wife of one of the remaining editors was pressed into service sending out books

2) Bull owes his current position to vigorous white-knighting on the internet, protecting Loren Coleman from those mean SR- and BT-hating trolls who wanted him to stop embezzling. Same with Hardy, who staunchly declared he didn't notice the books were a million dollars out of whack and that the payroll clerks who said he wanted them to cook the books were lying, as were all the freelancers who says Hardy lied about checks being sent to them.

3) There's another Loren Coleman out there, some paranormal research guy, who had to put up a notice on his website saying he's not the CGL Coleman and please stop sending him messages

4) Coleman not only didn't go to jail, he maintained his position at CGL and AFAIK never gave the money back. Allegedly they were going to work it out, but considering that he had spent the money on a mansion where he still lives, and a bunch of other stuff, and that CGL (while paying on time) now pays even less to the very few people still willing to work for them, it seems he walked away scott free.

And some graphs of the theft. If you're wondering how he did it, apparently at this company nobody thought it unusual that the company accounts were not being held in corporate accounts and investment portfolios, but in the private account of one of the board members. And given that CGL never reveals how many people even own part of the company, let alone the identities of owners, it's impossible to know who else might have been involved.

I remember 4e had bioware that lets you graft yourself a metagetic quality straight from SURGErs. Does that exist in 5e?

I will never understand why Tops didn't yank the licenses from CGL around 2010. Several other groups, like the guys who owned Cthulhutech and Eclipse Phase (which CGL was printing) pulled out because CGL wasn't paying them. Tops was not being paid for things like overseas sales, CGL was just pocketing all the money that Pegasus was handing them with the expectation that it was being passed up the line, and frankly the books were fast becoming garbage. I guess sales were somehow good enough that Tops didn't care that they were being cheated out of thousands of dollars.

I don't think so, but it might be under Transgenics in Chrome Flesh.

oh that was an interesting read, thanks user. I like the idea in principle, it just seems to be odd that hackers can always edit brains. Unless I missed something, not having a DNI going means no signal input - so no brain scan.

Cool system though. Definitively adopting some of that.

Unfortunately, they are only cosmetic. But I guess they DID tone down SURGE qualities in 5e and could easily be replicated by various bioware scattered through all the books.

The one shining light I can see in this is Phil DeLuca, a CGL co-owner who released a lot of the data about the money that was being stolen.

An unmentioned dark stain is Randall Bills, the guy most active in covering it up. He doesn't appear to have been embezzling himself and making money, he just did Coleman's dirty work of carrying out wheelbarrows of cash and telling people to be quiet.

>can always edit brains
that's the thing: they can't. The reason you have a commlink is that the commlink fights against any changes they want to do by disrupting the signals. Most people in EotM have commlinks that, while not very powerful have high firewall and good Biofeedback defense and AdBlocker programs to defend themselves.
>not having a DNI going means no signal input
the commlinks interface wireless with your brain using it as a gigantic wetware CPU. In the same way enemy commlinks can interact with you. One of the programs is Jingle which is simply broadcast in the entire store and wants to change your thoughts to "You want the new AzSoy Soyburrito" or "You are interested in our offer of high quality trid stations"
>no brain scan
your brain can be read wirelessly by scanning for the magnetic waves you produce. Your commlink helps obscure it.

That's dumb.

>filename

I don't see any time stopping.

Wrong Dio. Sheet is best Dio.

New GM. Where can I find the firewall ratings for things that aren't decks or Comlinks? I've just been using firewall=device rating but I didn't know if they had their own numbers somewhere else.

Why points in Animal Handling?

Also, pull a point from INT or REA and put it in BOD; you need an odd number for the break point.

Something weird with your tradition- says your resisting drain with WIL+RES. And get more mannequins or something; one is not going to cut it. That vessel will be shredded fast.

He needs to ride the tiger.

I guess that's was my stumbling block then - "scannig the magnetic waves you produce" kind of requires a lot of equipment, neuroimaging wise. Even with infinite processing speed it's a staggering task. I got that if there's a connection - you hack through the commlink, the commlink is connected to the brain with a DNI of some sort, that system-software is easily send-recieve two way because it's already wired into the brain through some FancyFutureTechnology Send something to the commlink and it'll go straight to your targets amygdala, no fuss. Or if they're in VR with a datajack on something wireless, go through that. That's cool, I like that.

Just hacking into someone's cortex with your commlink from 3 meters away (the signal strength of a metahuman brain being 0 = 3 meters ) is the "Wait what?" for me. Speaking as a neuro / psych person it's sort of a hard problem. What exactly is the commlink I'm using to do this sending out? Electric induction at that range? Magnetic changes? How am I targetting the neurons I'm targetting? That's basically impossible with any currently known medium of physics, I'm somehow generating an electrico-chemical charge inside a brain by transmitting data at it. It's literal mindcontrol rays from my phone. Using a program that I'm likely to have downloaded from the internet.

That seems a bit like the end of civilization since every wage-slave in the Sixth World just had their free-will obliterated by corporate PR departments, even if their firewall is really good ("This firewall to work against all intrusion attempts, except by legally sanctioned Evo represenatives" comes to mind too)

Hm.

Thanks for the link, I think I'll adopt a few of the things and definitively include some of the cooler programs for effect. Maybe with a clause that without a DNI you can't use ones targetting brainware or some such.

Best DIO is timestopping DIO, not horsey Dio.

HareBrained put out Necropolis, recently.

It sucked.

They're also working on a Battletech game, which looks alright.

All matrix stats are just the Device Rating unless explicitly stated otherwise. You got it right.

My player wants to play a technomancer
Im not really familiar with technos how do i make them good or at leazt good enough? And how do the use programs?

Just tell them to play a decker instead.

Tell them to get Cyberdeck headware with lots of AR initiative and the Go Big or Go Home quality. Mundane technomancer achieved.

I suggested that and he was against it.
"Sprites are cool and its like im a mage but with the internet"

If his character is too shitty ill have him re-roll s new one

>"Sprites are cool and its like im a mage but with the internet"
he cannot be trusted, you have to purge him.

Literally had the same discussion last thread. Lurk moar
shadowrun.com/forums/discussion/42995/technomancers-in-5th-edition

Its a shame data trails was such a huge fuck you to Technomancers. Almost all the problems they had in core still exist today.

The plan is for a technobook with all the goodies they could use, reinforcing the divide between deckers and technomancers. Putting the Resonance Realm stuff in DT was a mistake, IMO.

What does a mundane runner need to consider when he is going against a Mage.

Is there any helpful gear? tested and true strategies ?

How does on geek those mojo freaks in the most reliable way ?

Geek the mage first is a tried and true way to ensure your team makes it out of combat alive

Specifiy with enough damage in one turn. Harassing them by setting them on fire is pretty good to

But... HOW ?

Ok so this is good shit. And sorry man i was doing a field op for a couple weeks first thread in weeks.

Spot the guy who is glowing. Have everyone point a gun at them.
Go cyclic.

With explosives. Every problem can be solved with explosives.

If they're wearing robes, probably a mage. Shoot them lots. In the face.

You don't know what an individual mage is capable of (unless you have done some fucking fantastic legwork and gotten their spell list), so you have to make sure they don't have time to do something you don't expect and aren't prepared for.

Surprise is the obvious way to do that. Car bomb, sniping, poisoning their pillow, a drone on the street that suddenly divebombs them, even a garrote at a fancy party will do it.

The next way to do it is to make the mage unable to respond because they don't know what's happening. Redirect the calls from security, lock them in the elevator, seduce them so they're balls-deep when they should be on duty, fuck with GridGuide and get them stuck in traffic halfway across the city. This can be easy if you have a decker, or hard if the mark knows something's wrong and can send a spirit out. It'll eat up a service for long-range work, and the spirit won't respond well to changing events (because the mage can't use new services and give it new orders), but it's the flaw with playing keepaway.

The last thing is to use the mage against himself. It's axiomatic that a mage uses magic, and usually they try to solve all their problems with magic. Put a locked door in their way, and they'll use Corrode to get through, instead of searching for the key. Two upsides for this. The first is that the mage will weaken themselves with drain, which makes other strategies more viable -they may even decide to cut and run if a roll goes bad and they eat 5 stun. The second is that magic is both obvious and regulated. If a mage is walking around throwing magic left and right, people are going to notice. If they're a wagemage on extraterritorial ground, that's not a huge thing (though it will put the wageslaves to flight). If they're on neutral and unfamiliar ground, though, it means that Lone Star or another PD will be by shortly. When that happens, they have made a new enemy and you can fade away as another mundane face in the crowd.

These niggas get it. Lock up dem wolves mang.

Although to be fair, maybe Bowie would be a better name?

How would you fine folks go about emulating Paul/J.C/Alex Denton?

Prototype Transhuman and Biocompatibility (Cyberware) seem like a given, however augmentation does not play well with Technomancers and some of the abilities displayed by the Denton's (Alex in particular) might be better conveyed with Technomagic.

I'm more used to making Street Sams and Mages, never tried to make a decker/techno character before so I'm at a loss.

What are some fun ways to fuck your team over?
Being secretly a bug spirit or shit like that.

Bring them highly out of their comfort zone. Fish out of water. See how they cope. If they are chromed murder machines that solve everything with bullets, make them do something adorable and hilarious.

>Team has to accompany the bratty 14 year old son of a johnson to the amusement park as bodyguards/babysitters

>The team has to steal the recipe collection of a world-famous chef. Turns out he keeps all of them in his mind

Something like that.

Techno can totally roll with some augmentation, just gotta watch your res loss. A good way to do it if you needed a bunch of augs would be keep a low res (2) and buy it up every time you lower it. Every time you submerge you increase your max res so you can get it up as high as you like when you are done augmenting.

Uh, you know Catalyst published 4e and 5e, right? And not 3rd edition?

3e is old school cyberpunk. Everything is wired, and some of the tech will seem outdated by what we have today. The rules can be a little clunky as well, but that's par for the course for Shadowrun anyway. You might also have a harder time finding a group if you're not running.

I need some GM help /srg/. Building shadowrun encounters makes me consider some weird shit.

Here is the basic concept for the run I want to build. Some eco terrorists are trying to raid a corp warehouse to grab some dirt and then blow it up. They want to knock out the power first, but not only does the building have a contract with the city power, but they have also paid for a secure underground line to a backup generator offsite. They don't have the manpower to hit both the warehouse and the offsite backup power, so in comes the players.

Problem is, I'm not sure what that would be like. Anyone know anything about power plants that could tell me a bit about how this shit is structured and how it could be disabled?

Depends on the type of power. Hydroelectric can make for an interesting one because breaking into a dam and sabotaging a bunch of turbine generators can be tricky. Tidal generator similarly so without requiring a damn. Wind farms and solar plants each offer some outdoors options. Nuclear reactors could be house to deep underground and arcologies. And traditional fossil fuel factories would really just be a series of generators powered by an enormous furnaces.

And let's not forget the option of bound lightning spirits.

>augment vision
>plant a bomb
>???
>lemon lime

You point a gun at them and keep pulling the trigger until they're dead or you need to reload. Then you reload and repeat until there are no mages left.

No special considerations at all, really.

Three Words:
FAB

Ok I know what you mean, but I read that as Fuel Air Bomb, which works against mages too in all fairness.

...

> amusement park

For some reason, I've always wanted to have a Mr. Johnson meet the runners at an amusement park.

Just do the negotiations on a roller coaster or the Pirates of the Caribbean or something.

The teacup rides are clearly the negotiation hotspots, senpai.

So do it. Not every Johnson comes up wearing a suit and a well-practiced peer-review researched smile.

Yeah, go for it. Have the johnson slowly spin with the team face in the teacups, discussing details, while 10 bodyguards in mascot costumes keep an eye on things.