/srg/ - Shadowrun General

You finally escape your corp holding cell, & live life in the Barrens putting your vatgrown body to use stealing from the same corp that made you.

You & the neighborhood kids you grew up with team up to pull some petty shit to piss of your parents, several jobs, drunken tattoos, ill advised haircuts & a few dead bodies later, you wake up one day to find that ten years have passed with your best chummers by your side or in the ground & you are late to meet up with this week's Mr. Johnson.

You used to be a soldier, flying dronestrikes for the good ol' UCAS, you came home a vet with no job. Til you hear about a guy who hired an old army buddy of yours to clean out a shipment of Ares tech. You hit up your friend & next thing you know you have a job. Isnt america great?

So no assualt rifles or anything? I didnt know which way would be better.

Also, is there any rules for having back up mooks that could be a merc squad, kinda like WoDs Allies merit?

How would I run a game where it's so pink mohawk that the players are basically supervillains?

Like said, cyber is better for uniformity. That said, I really like the Nemesis Arms Praetorian for a universal sidearm. 6 Accuracy, 8p -1AP, SA, and it comes with a bitching bayonet and Custom Look standard. A good weapon, and in the hands of a pistol adept it could be fucking devastating CQCif you fix the broken melee rules.

Hey can I get feedback on this rigger? Based on a concept I saw in one of Shadowrun Storytime's threads. Two-Dee, but a rigger who runs a swarm of invisible sniper balloon drones.

While he could be an Adept, his crew would be mostly ware because most folks are mundies. I'm imagining the average guy rocking a pair of Cyberarms and an initiative booster (or Nephritic Screen to help with drugs) would work well. Two arms give each of them amazing agility and strength for any two handed weapons, and the 6 armor is handy.

For a distinctive and effective weapon, the Collapsing Spear from Hard Targets could work. Good reach, good damage, looks awesome. Don't neglect firearms though. Automatics means carrying a compact SMG for when you can't stab the opposition, and full auto with a pair of Cyberarms means big dice pools and rc. For armor, maybe play up medieval stereotypes. Full body armor with a tabard overtop? The helmet is styled like a sallet or frog helm or anything else that tickles their fancy.

Do you want them to be legit, do bodyguard work, security, or more hitsquad mercenary types?

>You finally escape your corp holding cell, & live life in the Barrens putting your vatgrown body to use stealing from the same corp that made you.
That's a solo revenge mission. As soon as you get into 'doing work for money' i.e. shadowrunning, you need connections.

>You & the neighborhood kids you grew up with team up to pull some petty shit to piss of your parents, several jobs, drunken tattoos, ill advised haircuts & a few dead bodies later, you wake up one day to find that ten years have passed with your best chummers by your side or in the ground & you are late to meet up with this week's Mr. Johnson.
That's gang life (which imo counts as 'some kind of criminal organization').

>You used to be a soldier, flying dronestrikes for the good ol' UCAS, you came home a vet with no job. Til you hear about a guy who hired an old army buddy of yours to clean out a shipment of Ares tech. You hit up your friend & next thing you know you have a job. Isnt america great?
So then your buddy is your connection to a criminal organization. Unless he's stealing a shipment of Ares equipment for kicks.

All of them are good backgrounds I've used variations on two of them myself but they don't address the central argument that you need criminal ties to be a shadowrunner.

There are leadership rules for controlling a group of people in combat, and group contacts, but not exactly like WoD.

by default isn't any group of shadowrunners involved in a criminal organization by virtue of literally being an organization of criminals themselves?

True, in the American version of runners. In Germany runners tend to be lone operators brought together by a fixer for a specific run that uses their specific skills, then get their cut of the dosh and fade away into the shadows.

But I'm referring more to the idea that you need ties to the larger criminal world to even start as a shadowrunner, because the central conceit is that people state a need and it makes it's way down an increasingly shady chain until it reaches you so you can fill that need.

By pairing them against a city-backed runner team.

Assault rifles are good to have, and why I said "favoring shotguns" as opposed to "only shotguns", but I went with shotguns for two reasons:

1. Shock and awe. Your team is not one that gets hired to sneak your way in, have prolonged firefights, or go for non-lethal takedowns.
Your team is hired to turn enemies into corpses.
Part of your image is instilling fear, and few weapons do that better than a shotgun to the face.

2. Up close and personal. Your targets will probably use pistols, rifles, and automatic weaponry against you.
All good weapons, but ones that thrive at longer ranges.
Part of being an effective combatant is removing your enemy's advantages and capitalizing on your own.
With this in mind, your team would want to excel in fights that put the opponent on edge, which means closing distances and finishing quickly.

Anything that requires range can be dealt with by either grenades or the LMG previously mentioned (also a terrifying gun to be on the other end of).

First:
What exactly do you want to do with that character? Fire support? Surveillance?
>Those Stats
One shot on you and you are dying
>put a point into sneaking. You HAVE to be able to effectively sneak around if you don't wanna get shot
>how will you defend yourself if your drones are unavailable? put a point into automatics, get yourself a machine pistol with FA, Spray-and-pray
>What's your native language?
>you don't need to list every piece of clothing you have
rest of the build I can't really comment on

>I thought "physical initiative" and "Matrix Initiative" were separate? So if you use Matrix Initiative you get coldsim/hotsim bonuses, and if you use AR you use physical initiative?
Oh, Reaction and physical initiative have no effect on your cold/hotsim initiative. But maximizing Reaction is important because it's used for Pilot, which is your general-purpose drone skill. Acrobatics, Stealth, Running, and almost any other non-combat physical skill are all under Pilot - and that's Reaction, regardless of whether you're Jumped In, remote-controlling, or piloting manually.

He is right, with those stats you are an inch away from sitting in a wheelchair, you are basically a walking cripple.
And with 1 in charisma and willpower you are also socially handicapped.

Thanks. Him being frail and unable to defend himself is kinda the point - he's a deadly murderous rigger who turns into a screeching coward the second he's in actual physical danger. At the very least it gives the street sammie something to do.

>Put a point into sneaking

Good idea, I'll do this.

>Native language

Didn't realise this was a thing, sorry. English, I'll fix the sheet.

He's mostly intended to provide a combination of fire support, overwatch and surveillance.

>Socially handicapped

Yup. His team will take him to a johnson meet exactly once.

Not a solo. Character could have been picked up by any fixer talent scout

Gang life & organised crime arent the same

Army buddy could be working for another corp

There is more to shadowrunning than the mob. From talent scouts to friends in dark places

you intend to jump into drones
How the fuck do you expect to soak damage to your drones?

You absolutely can, but there's a lot more to it than that too. It's pretty easy to friend-of-a-friend your way into some freelance crime.

For example, let's say you've recently mustered out of a military tour. While you were touring, one of your buddies was dishonorably discharged for smuggling and trafficking. You try to get a job, but you got some kind of black mark after an injury, so nobody wants to hire you for security or law enforcement jobs. You're forced to work as a minimum wage wageslave, and it's killing you inside.

So, you reach out to your old buddy, explain your situation to him, and he offers to hook you up. Has you do a couple smuggling jobs for him - nothing major, but each one takes only one night and pays like an entire week at your day job - just to feel you out, make sure you're really down for it as he gets to know you again. You do well, so he introduces you to a fixer he knows after you keep coming back looking for more and more work.

After a few milkruns gone well, you're in good with the fixer now, you still have your buddy for smuggling jobs (and he can get you plenty of good shit if you're willing to wait a week or two for him to reach out to people) and voila, you're a shadowrunner now.

It's not hard to end up in the shadows if you go looking for them. The trick's just getting your foot in the door and having a profitable skillset.

That said, sure, plenty of folks enter shadowrunning from street gangs and organized crime.

>they don't address the central argument that you need criminal ties to be a shadowrunner
"Criminal ties" doesn't mean you're tied to an organization, is more the point. Everyone's got to get an in somewhere, but it's not necessarily with organized crime.

A heroic Omega Dawn team, of course.

>So no assualt rifles or anything?
Personally, I prefer burst sniper rifles and fully-automatic combat shotguns over assault rifles, but you do you.

I don't? The jumping in gets me the rigging bonus to gunnery tests doesn't it?

Chummer, if your drones are hit you take Biofeedback, which AFAIK you soak with either WIL or BOD

Well shit. I'll look into some biofeedback filters then.

>PHYSICAL DAMAGE
>Whenever the vehicle or other device you’re jumped
>into takes Physical damage, the feedback can hurt you.
>Whenever the vehicle or drone you’re jumped into takes
>boxes of damage, you must resist half (rounded up) of
>that damage as Biofeedback damage (p. 229).
CRB p266

>BIOFEEDBACK DAMAGE
>Biofeedback damage is Matrix code that forces your sim
>module to misbehave badly. It makes your body go hay-
>wire the same way that Matrix damage screws up devic-
>es. This can cause temporary or even permanent damage
>to a deckers’ body and brain. It’s used by Black IC, Grid
>Overwatch Division G-men, and unscrupulous hackers
>and spiders, although it can also come from other sources
>inadvertently, like dumpshock or the damage riggers take
>when their vehicles and drones are damaged.
>Biofeedback damage is only dangerous when you’re
>in VR mode. Unless the attack says otherwise, biofeed-
>back is Stun damage if you are using cold-sim VR and
>Physical damage in hot-sim VR. You resist biofeedback
>damage with Willpower + Firewall.
CRB p229

You'd only be able to resist with 7 dice (WIL 1 + your commlinks FIRE 6) if you jack in through your RCC
Since your stun track is already minuscule it means that you can't soak Biofeedback much

Look into some less-crippled stats. Starting with less than 2 in an attribute means you don't even have a dice pool if you don't have Skill Points in a relevant skill.

You're playing a character who's crippled - mentally, socially, and physically - in a quantifiable way.

OK cheers, I'll go back over the character and see if I can't buff him up a bit. Thanks chummers.

As a Rigger, you're going to want/need Reaction, Willpower, Logic, and Body to all be near-max, in that order. Those are your key stats.

As a living, breathing person, you're going to want to have Charisma higher than 1 unless you're the 'literally doesn't speak or make eye contact,' lower-functioning-than-Aspergers, serious-grade autistic. Similarly, if he's physically capable of jogging he needs a Strength and Body higher than 1, and Willpower 1 is something you should only see on someone one bad drug addiction roll away from being a brain-dead husk.

You can afford to dump stats - Charisma, Intuition, Agility, and Strength, if you're planning on being a remote-operator rigger without any real physical or social talent. But even then, have enough to be a functional person, if not a particularly healthy/pleasant one.

OK cheers, this is really helpful. I've put BOD, WIL and BOD up to four, with LOG at six. I can put them up to five but I put AG up to 4 too for gunnery tests because they get bonuses from my control rig. I can dump AG if I don't need them though. I didn't realise I could dump INT, thanks.

As far as social crap goes, I've got etiquette maxed. I am totally fine playing an asshole with no social skills, like my lord and saviour 2D. I kind of envisioned this character as a closet sociopath who comes out of his shell during runs, enjoying the opportunity to shoot people with high-powered sniperdrones. Give me a sec and I'll post the edited sheet.

Gunnery uses Logic when you're remote-controlling. REA is your primary stat, though.

>As far as social crap goes, I've got etiquette maxed. I am totally fine playing an asshole with no social skills, like my lord and saviour 2D. I kind of envisioned this character as a closet sociopath who comes out of his shell during runs, enjoying the opportunity to shoot people with high-powered sniperdrones.
Still have Charisma 2. Having Charisma 1 means you literally have 0 dice in any social skill without skill points. It means unless you're specifically trained for it, you're basically entirely non-functional - instead of just an obnoxious cunt.

That's low-functioning autistic, not just antisocial.

Oh shit really? Well nevermind then time to dump some AG

I dont have a preference for assault rifles, i just thought tg would recommend me fuckhuge guns.

I like the idea of collapsible spears, a customized spear could be a symbol of membership.

Statistically which is better shotguns or SMGs? Can they be used with a shield? Are there any drones that a normal person can use to follow them & shout out fanfare & carry guns/ammo/equipment, preferably flying drones?

Ive never made a cybered character before. I plan on two cyber arms or half arms, with blinged out casemods but i dont know what the best reaction/initiative combo to take or if there are other things a cyber character needs.

Where can i find that beautiful destroyer?

Here's the updated sheet. Thanks everyone for your useful advice, it was really helpful. It's because of stuff like this that Veeky Forums is my favorite board.

Cutting Aces.

>The manufacturer offers a wide array of customization options from chrome to gold filigree to electroluminescent accents, as well as seventeen different blade styles for the bayonet.

Go big, go brash, go beautiful, or go home.

>Statistically which is better shotguns or SMGs?
Different guns for different purposes. SMGs have better accuracy and can fire full auto, shotguns do better damage and have spread. SMGs are the gateway for assault rifles, though; if you want to be an actual security company, Automatics as a general choice are better than Longarms because you can carry pistols and SMGs anywhere and make people feel safe without looking like you expect to fight off Halloweeners at any moment. There's lots of security-grade SMGs for a professional look, not so with shotguns.

Can they be used with a shield?
Only one-handed weapons can use a shield, and neither SMGs or shotguns fit that bill.

Are there any drones that a normal person can use to follow them & shout out fanfare & carry guns/ammo/equipment, preferably flying drones?
There's several different drones that a merc company could use in R5, from resupply to mobile cover to medivac. Read that whole chapter.

If you're going for cyberarms, commit to two full ones. Get WR2 at a minimum, and some cybereyes/ears with mods to cut through conceivable interference, and Bone Lacing.

>Statistically which is better shotguns or SMGs?
Shotguns hit harder, SMGs are easier to conceal. Personally, I wouldn't let anything larger than a machine pistol be used one-handed without a penalty.

>Intuition 1, Agility 1, Strength 1
So, do you intend for your character to be blind, deaf, and crippled? Because that's what that is.

I took max perception, I gotta dump something man. I'm fine with them being hilariously unfit.

'Dumping' is still leaving it at 2. 2 is unfit. 1 is physically disabled.

If I had any spare points left I'd use them, but I got nothing.

I'm kinda on the fence about deciding whether to get back into Shadowrun with 4e or 5e. I know 4e pretty well, but I'm just wondering if 5e makes very many improvements.

All I remember about it are the differences pretty much between the core books, as that's when I left. Nobody else around here (that I care to play with) plays Shadowrun, so really I'd be introducing it to new people.

So really all I want to know are the substantive system benefits of 5e over 4e. So for those people who've played both, what do you prefer about 5e?

I'm a GM but i can talk about two of my players
Let's see:
>Hacker started off running drugs for the Seoulpa Rings and has a few contacts there
>Mage has serious debts to both the Triads and the Mafia, and went into shadowrunning to pay said debts off.
>Party's primary fixer works for an small Ethiopian branch of the Seattle Mafia, so they're technically working for them.
>Their first post- FF run was to trash up an Jewelry Store being used as a data dump for the Vory who were encroaching on the branch of the Mafia their Fixer works for, so they're gonna have to deal with that in a suitably Wickian fashion.
So yeah, by campaigns end they should be suitably entwined with the upper echelons of Seattle's underground.

>Seattle - major corporate enclaves
>Germany - political micro-states and policlubs
>Hong Kong - kung fu, magic, and banned firearms
>Denver - cold war espionage
>Chicago - bug hunt
>Metropole - metasapients and other freaks
>Calfree - celebrity and social media

Is that about accurate for the type of shit that different parts of the setting tend to lean more towards? Obviously you can find a variety of other things in any of those locations, but that's the kind of thing they tend towards, yeah?

Denver isnt really the Berlin c.mid-late 80's of the setting anymore since everyone got thrown out on their asses by Ghostwalker.

Although depending on how the meta-plot goes the espionage just gets 300% more sneaky and convoluted, or the FRFZ turns into the next Bogota.

You can actually be a decker instead of being told to get fucked because Siri does it better. Adepts can no longer oneshot juggernauts with pistols. That faggot Stephen refused to learn 5e so we game without him now and don't have to listen to him talk about how every run is actually me trying to put in my opinion on American politics.

It's 10 karma per attribute you want to bring from 1 to 2.

Except Agents that can beat a properly built Hacker are milspec only.
What's more, they can only do what they've been told.

My crew generally works for this elf dude who is absurdly rich and has a penchant for antiquities, so its less of a criminal organization and more of an organized criminal, dude gives us the jobs personally, mainly cause he and my street sam bonded over their shared love of old stuff

So that's 30 karma to get a 33% chance to pass tests I shouldn't be making in the first place. Maybe during play but I'm not wasting karma during character creation on that.

Wrong.

That's a 33% chance to pass a test you WILL be making at some point because runs never go perfectly.

But you can build an incompetent runner if you like. It's not as though Shadowrun is a fairly lethal setting or anything. :^)

>Calfree -Nerds and xenophobia

Ihave 7 dice in ettiquette to act normal and social stealth through situations, and it's much cheaper to buy one point in stealth than it is to put one point in ag

How strong can adepts get?

My decker has level 4 gremlins, will this be a problem?

Base Strength +4

Yes. It means that he will be the worst hacker in the universe and the worst Runner.

Shit, I thought all that was one backstory at first. I wish it was actually.

I got you famalam

You escape whichever corp that made you at around 11-12, shadowrunners smashed up the place & you saw your exit, you find yourself just another unregistered kid on the streets of Redmond. Befriend some local kids & take turns crashing at their respective houses. Timmy Two-Tusks is the sort of leader of the other kids & you stay with his family the most even though his mom & dad already struggle feeding all them orc mouths. One day you notice that the a food delivery truck from the same corp has really shitty security, & comes to the local gas & go every week. You think that this might be a great way to pay your friends back for taking you in so together you stage a robbery. Thus befins your career as minor thugs til its time to grow up & be adults. Timmy has plans to join the military & so do you, it guarantees a SIN, skill training & most importantly clean food & shelter. You do your tour but come back to the same prospects. You think nothings gonna work but then you hear a rumor... old Timmy Two-Tusks is getting the old gang back together

What city, other than Seattle, would be the best to introduce to a group of players that have never played Shadowrun?

is this karmagen? can you post karma summary?

Thunderstruck Gauss Rifles, with bayonets on the end. Distinctive. As. Fuck.

nope i used priority A money B/C skills attributes (can't remeber which) D metatype E magic

It's why I balk at spending 30 extra karma on attributes

IDK, Seattle is pretty much the stock standard.

I've only ever played in games set in Seattle, or Sydney.

And the later can be batshit insane, given that it's like 99% corporate controlled, surrounded by a perpetual mana storm, and infested with bugs.

Seattle is standard, but Denver seems like a fun option.

What are Denver's quirks again?
I seem to remember Free Spirits are super common there.

City split into districts Jerusalem-style for each North American sovereign nation, ruled by a dragon.

do you have any moneys left?

About 8 grand, but I can always drop a drone if I need more for anything. Why?

drop one body for one willpower for that one sweet stun condition monitor
max reaction
get some chrome like reaction enhancers or cerebral boosters

also looks like knowledge skill ate remaining of your points
drop some because you can use active skills in place of knowledge with some penalty to dive pool

I'll drop the body for the willpower.

Reaction isn't critical for me, this guy isn't going to be piloting his drones all that often unless he's shooting something or things go tits up. It's already at 5, I'd rather have LOG maxed.

The chrome is interesting. Sadly, reaction isn't crucial for me, and just one rank of cerebral boosters would cost me an entire drone. Plus it doesn't make sense for this character to have a tonne of hi-end chrome starting out. He's an everyday rigger segueing into shadowrunning, he wouldn't have good mods just yet.

I made this with priority through chummer. I can't swap out my knowledge skills for other things, they're automatically generated based on my logic. Although I'll consider changing some, I updated my skills since I set them.

Thanks for the advice!

Any idea where i can find the books for my non english-speaking buddies?

what language?

Depends on what non-English language they speak. German 5e is in the Pastebin.

French, sorry, should have said x)

>I can't swap out my knowledge skills for other things
You used your "active skills points" on knowledge skills
>Etiquette 6
>First Aid 1
>Gunnery (Ballistic) 6
>Hardware 1
>Perception INT 4
>Pilot Aircraft (Remote Operation)6
>Pilot Ground Craft REA 3
>2 specialisations
This adds up to 29 points out of 36

Really? Shit I didn't notice that. Thanks!

Almost certainly a bug, my free time's burned until Friday though. Shall see what I can do to sort it out.

Hey, is there a 5e sourcebook about Seattle? Writing up my homebrew campaign and it'd be useful to have more info on Seattle in 2070 than the wiki is giving me.

Seattle Sprawl Digital Box

Cheers.

A city spirit
Ghostwalker grabbed the parts and mashed them into one

Does anyone have cool art of AR stuff? I want to give some to my players so they can understand what it's like living in a world where everyone is connected to a non-physical world of information that isn't just, "Yeah, there are popup ads in real life, crazy huh?"

vimeo.com/166807261

The 5e source book is garbage unless you want information about the updates in organized crime.

neat

Let's make a Roll20 shadowrun campaign. Anyone up for it?
Can't find a single good campaign in roll20

What edition?
What place?
What CharGen?
What Books?
What house rules?
What else?

Have you tried the Game finder thread?

>Have you tried the Game finder thread?
Not yet.

Edition place chargen books etc depend on the GM. I ask for a game but I can't GM it.