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Posted by: Tyro Aug 25 2009, 08:31 AM

I was reading the recent thread on medically skilled shadowrunners and got to thinking about something I noticed a long time ago: Dumpshock is incredibly diverse, with a very high incidence of various industry professionals and other brainy types. It got me wondering about the actual ratios involved: gross income, location, profession, etc. Obviously this has the potential to be invasive; let me state right now that I'm merely curious and have no interest in the information other than satisfying my curiosity. I can't guarantee the motives of others who might read this.

I'll start. I'm medically disabled (chronic pain due to joint problems and scoliosis, Asperger's Syndrome, severe anxiety and depression). I live in Auburn, Washington State, USA off of government disability support (GAX & working on SSI if that means anything to you). By Dumpshock standards I'm pretty boring; I only speak 1 language fluently, I don't have a very high degree of education (high school diploma & some college), and I don't have a great deal of travel experience. I'm part of the Seattle area sex-positive community, and am involved in the BDSM lifestyle as well. I'm polyamorous, with a wife and 2 girlfriends (one of whom also dates my wife) as of this posting. Anyone else?

[Edit:] Changed a few things.

Posted by: DarkKindness Aug 25 2009, 08:39 AM

Sure thing. I'm new to Dumpshock, but I've been following SR since the first printing of second edition.

I live in Fridley, MN, USA with my wife and our cats. I'm currently a behavioral therapist working with autistic children, but am in the market for a career shift. I'm fluent in English and speak a smattering of both Latin and Italian (though they're pretty close, linguistically), along with a few phrases in French and Chinese. I have a MA degree in Counseling Psychology, and am currently working on my Marriage and Family Therapy certificate and the subsequent licensure process.

Other demographic information that may be pertinent: I'm caucasian, of middle European ancestry, am not an active participant in any religions (though I have historically identified most strongly with Asatru and Wicca), and my parents are divorced (and have been since I was 12).

Posted by: Tyro Aug 25 2009, 08:41 AM

Thanks very much, Kindness. Your quick and detailed reply was a much-needed pleasant surprise. Anyone else?

Posted by: bmcoomes Aug 25 2009, 08:43 AM

Sure way not,

I'm a Correctional Officer for Grant County Sheriff's Office (thats in Ephrata, WA US). I know parts of a few languages mostly dealing with Martial arts, or commanding somebody. I've been in the US Navy too, I only have a diploma and some college I'm just not a collage type. there we go who's next.

Brent

Posted by: X-Kalibur Aug 25 2009, 08:43 AM

I'm a soon to be nurse, never even got my AA, just dicked around taking various classes for fun. I work in healthcare doing claims and authorizations, as well as some back end coding. I know a little bit about everything and have been playing games (mostly PC and console, TT didn't enter until middle school) for 20 years. I'm also a gun enthusiast and a bit of a technophile.

Posted by: HappyDaze Aug 25 2009, 09:06 AM

I currently work for the US Army as a RN on a med/surg unit. I was working at a civilian hospital on a cardio-pulmonary surgical stepdown/progressive care unit, but my new job is both easier work and much more lucrative. I was previously a correctional officer (in FL and TN) and later a probation officer (in TN) before I went to work in the 'softer' field of mental health which then led me into nursing.

Posted by: Medicineman Aug 25 2009, 09:16 AM

I'm from Düsseldorf,Germany.
I'm in the Marketing Business,Do a lot of Computerwork and thats why I'm a little Overweight.
I Used to do some Martial Arts (Tae-Kwon-Do,Aikido,Wing Chun) but recently I've had some trouble with my Knees so I had to stop.
I Play RPGs for more than 25 Years ,Shadowrun for about 15 Years (starting with SR2)
English is not my native Language,but I hope I can make myself clear

with a german Dance
Medicineman

Posted by: CodeBreaker Aug 25 2009, 09:21 AM

Sounds good.

I am from Scotland, near Dundee if anyone knows the terrain. Small town that's only claim to fame is that the writer of Peter Pan was born here (I live a stones throw away from his old home). At the moment I am doing the University thing (Physics and Computer Game Development), last year I did straight Computing. Hobbies include Gaming of all sorts, table and computer, some Astronomy and sleeping. On the side I do some creative writing, currently doing some freelancer stuff for an old friends custom setting (which should hopefully be published, which would be nice). A few years ago I was diagnosed with Grave's Disease (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graves%27_disease) and Gilbert's Syndrome (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilbert%27s_syndrome), so I am a walking talking icon of poor health. I am also Dyspraxic so I have difficulty with motor control and putting my thoughts into written word.

Other stuff: I am a nineteen year old white male. I am a strong atheist with a general belief that structured religion tends to lead to Bad Things but am fine with people believing whatever they want too. I have an older half-brother, and a younger sister. Parents are technically divorced, waiting for my sister to turn 18 to avoid the stupidly high costs. I only speak English, but can generally read French and some German. I am a fervent technophile, and I am constantly irritated by the people who hold back certain areas of research because of their own moral code (ala Stem Cell research).

Posted by: TheOOB Aug 25 2009, 09:37 AM

I live in Washington State, USA, in the Sea-Tac area (thats the area between Seattle and Tacoma...yes that Seattle). I'm a car wash attendant by trade, and currently working on my Associate of the Sciences in Computer Science. I harbor aspirations of one day working for the gaming industry, though my own goals are kinda vague at the moment.

I'm afraid I'm not terribly interesting otherwise, I know a tad of Japanese, enough to let someone know who little I know and apologize when I make an ass of myself, but mostly it's just good only west coast style English. I've been playing RPGs for about 14 years, and Shadowrun for about 4.

Posted by: Phelan Patrick Aug 25 2009, 10:04 AM

I'm from the Philippines.

In between jobs right now. Used to work in a call center as tech support for a US based broadband provider. Will be starting with another job in another call center as tech support for another BB provider but this time based out of australia.

Though I graduated with a degree in business administration, what I learned was totally useless. So here I am, a call center agent for the past 7 years and for the foreseeable future.

Been playing RPGs way back since elementary, about 20 years ago. Did mostly GURPS and Battletech, though I have also tried some ADnD, Space Frontiers, Top Secret, and several Palladium games (TMNT, Robotech). SR2 was the last RPG I was into before I stopped and got into college. Just started back into SR4 while on my in-between-jobs vacation. Don't have a group yet but spent some of my savings buying the books online. Even if I cant find a group locally I plan to continue collecting books again.


As a side note, I have a wife and a 2 yr old daughter.

Posted by: Cadmus Aug 25 2009, 10:50 AM

Living GA corrently, North of Atlanta, I'm a lowgrade tech type at my job which is in the service ind.

Posted by: GreyBrother Aug 25 2009, 11:02 AM

Austria, Northeastern part (the flat one). A small village near Melk (pay a visit, i've heard it's worldfamous). Right now i work as a wholesaler for computer games which i'll probably do for a time, but i try to hit some higher education someday just for the sake of the knowledge. My hobbies include gaming on the PC and Wii, sleeping, meditating. My roleplaying habits started 2003 with my first corebooks being Werewolf the Apocalypse and Call of Cthulhu but i was hooked up to Shadowrun at that moment. After trying to set up some chronicles with friends we fired up a Shadowrun team and had our first runs. Then fourth edition came up, i sucked the book into me and my GM too and that's when i said "you know guys, those rules are kinky. Should we change?" And so we did and since now every Thursday (with some break ups) we play Shadowrun. One team is a group of shadowrunners in Seattle (our Classic), then we made some civilians who just happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and now i guide my players with some rookie runners through Viennas Shadows.

I'm 23, overweight and speak English and German fluently. I can read Dutch with troubles and try to get a grasp of Finnish and Russian. On the paper i am Roman-Catholic, but i prefer to call myself an Agnostic with a preferance for an animistic worldview. Atheism doesn't give me anything and i can't understand why people always misinterpret basic rules every faith offer.
Languages are something fluid for me, a notion a friend from Swiss dislikes with a passion when i "bastardize" Latin or try to go Italian on him (he's half-Italian).
Morally i am quite open-minded, a talent i attribute to my habit of making pet-peeves of certain things (don't ask me ever about my opinion on the nWoD or certain Retcons Blizzard did to the Warcraft universe). But i set up borders on some topics, but even then i at least try to come to an understanding with the subject in question. There could always be i point i miss. ("There's always a bigger Fish.")

Anything amiss?

Posted by: Machiavelli Aug 25 2009, 11:04 AM

Aaaaah....i love stuff like that. Gives a little bit of a personal touch to our beloved dumpshockers. So, if everybody else joins, i can´t refuse to make my move, too.^^

I´m from the south of germany (like you may see on my profile infos - near Stuttgart or "Benztown" if you like that more) and currently 31-years old white male. Because i don´t think i will manage to become younger, this could change quite soon to a 32.^^ (in october if somebody wants to send me a present *koff*)

After my higher-school certificate, i tried to study law for a couple of years, but switched quickly to economics which i finished. Simultaniously i finished an apprenticeship as an management assisstant and an education as an foreign language correspondent. So my english should be quite good (at least one language if not german) and i like money.^^

I´m also educated in french (low school-niveau) and because i basically "grew up" in an italian family, i was capable of speaking italian until my teenager-times. Now i lost most of it but i still have a very italian temper (my second-familiy is from sicily, so you shouldn´t be my sister or be interested in my sister...you understand?^^) and a foible for edged weapons.^^

Up to now play i SR since 2nd edition and alltoghether for over 15 years i think. I also tried some other RPG´s (Vampire, Werewolve, Earthdaws, Das Schwarze Auge) but i didn´t manage to save one princess per day so i sticked with SR.

I am not married, but i have a 19-year old girlfriend (no comments please, NO i don´t have a preference for young beautiful woman...right? ) and a 6 year old son from an older relationship.

Posted by: Chrysalis Aug 25 2009, 11:28 AM

I am from Finland. My father is Canadian and my mother is American, they met in Finland and had two kids (despite what rumors say, I believe I was born - not made).

Lived in Russia, Ireland, and Canada. I used to live in Glasgow, Scotland from 2004-2006. Started out part-time in a video rental (Moviebank) and got to run the place in a year. I also was in the TA, and was in the RE.

Went back to university and finalised my MA in English philology. Until a few months ago, I was working part-time at the Language Centre of the University of Oulu, Finland. The jobs that I did there habve by now completely dried up. I am now working in Libya as an English instructor for Berlitz Libya.

I still do proofreading work for the Language Services in Oulu and would like to set up a clearing house company so I can continue working on proofreading and translation work with colleagues.

I speak Finnish, English, some Russian, a little German, read Latin and Greek, and I am currently learning Dutch. I am also learning Libyan Arabic.

Worked as a freelance prostitute for a while, bar girl for a club, and a stripper in another club. Ended up getting to be AM in one.

I have been playing RPGs since I was 12, and have been continuing on and off for some time. I started playing Cyberpunk since I was 16 and started up the Edgerunner fanzine back in 1998 (I think). We ran for about 8 issues (I think). When Cyberpunk v3 came out, I really lost interest in Cyberpunk and moved on slowly to the Shadowrun forums. Here I am now. I think the future of gaming is in small FORGE pamphlet games and not large behemoths, like Shadowrun.

I have been LARPing since I was 16.

I am 29.

Last year I was the LCP of AIESEC Oulu and I found it highly challenging.

Nowadays my only RPGing, besides random forum posting, is freelance proofreading for Catalyst. It's work I like to do for free and joins my professional side with my gaming side.

Posted by: DagdaMor Aug 25 2009, 11:39 AM

27 Years Old from the UK. Originally from Manchester now living in Oxford. I am a Computer Programmer/Sys Admin. I am married. I have been playing Shadowrun since 1st edition and have been a member of dumpshock for a loooong time (although only just started posting again after a long break) and the ShadowRN and ShadowTK mailing lists before that.

I speak English and German fluently. I speak passable Welsh, and can just about get by in French, Italian, Spanish and Chinese Mandarin. I also have A-Levels in Latin and Ancient Greek (I kind of collect languages as a hobby)

Posted by: ravensmuse Aug 25 2009, 11:52 AM

Okay, why not?

I'm just recently 27 (Gencon was my surprise birthday gift from my girl) white male in a committed, live-in relationship in a tiny town north of Boston, MA, USA. Have you read Lovecraft? My town's the one that the protagonist of Shadow Over Innsmouth runs to after he escapes from Innsmouth. However, we're so tiny that we don't even show up on the radar when the local news does weather. Oh well.

Despite my charming and witty online persona, I'm just a quiet recovering geek working a cubicle job for a major insurance company, providing medical credentialing. Hey doctors: I'm that jerk you have to deal with when you try to join an insurance plan! Hate me! I say recovering geek in that I used to be your typical hardcore geek but after having met a wonderful girl who convinced me that there's more to life than downloading subtitled anime and slavering for the newest rpg books, I pretty much gave up the life (though I'm posting to DS and a few other places). I've only got a high school diploma and a smattering of college coursework done (Protip: never go to a college "because my friends are going there") and can only speak English and one or two phrases of French. I have thought about going back to school, probably for writing.

I've been playing rpgs since I was 12, which is the mid-90s / late half of 2e DnD. I have a gigantic and growing collection currently, though its very eclectic (the result of flea markets and various finds); the focus is on Planescape, Spelljammer, the rest of the 2e DnD campaign settings and classic DnD material, Werewolf:tA, Changeling:tD, and Shadowrun. My Planescape collection is getting closer and closer to being complete, and my current prize is a near complete collection of Iron Kingdoms material. I've also recently run into someone dumping their collection of Vampire:tM 2e material in a local bookstore, and I've become charmed by the stupid fun that the game really was back then.

My hobbies besides collecting rpg material include writing fiction (I'm trying to get published, but chronic laziness doesn't help), collecting and playing video games (just started trying to get a decent NES collection going), and flea marketing / antiquing with the girlfriend. My job's had me so busy lately that I just haven't had the time to play as many video games as I'd like...

That's about it.

Posted by: BobRoberts Aug 25 2009, 12:04 PM

Sounds amusing!

I'm 32, from the UK, living in Surrey just South of London.

I dropped out of my university degree in Chemistry due to boredom, booze and laziness. Got my act together and ended up wandering into a job in the Market Research business, retraining as a programmer as I went on. Now a manager and dipping my toe into sales.

Have been roleplaying for years (started DnD when I was 11 or 12). Have played a bunch of systems over the years - Deadlands, DnD/D20, Star Wars, Ars Magica, Feng Shui and Shadowrun were topping my list... Been jonesing for the shadowrunning lately, but my group is a bit big to do it properly and we're all meshed into 4e DnD. So I'm poking around dumpshock to get my fix and have some giggles.

Posted by: Chrome Tiger Aug 25 2009, 12:27 PM

I am currently in Grand Rapids, MI. I am from a military family and am ex-military myself, so I have spent my days on the move. This is where I ended up, ironically where I began as my folks were living in Hawaii and visiting relatives when I was born at the local hospital. I am 6'4", decent shape, and am typically walking around with the military haircut I can never seem to get rid of no matter how hard I try.

I tend to get involved in a lot of things, as evident by my laundry list of interests. During high school, I was sort of a hacker geek. After high school I became a Navy spook. After that, I tried a change of venue and became an ER phlebotomist and lab tech. During the lab's computerization I was asked why I did not work with computers, upon seeing bigger dollar signs involved I agreed. I then got some certifications and worked at an ISP for nearly a decade. After that, as a network admin at a local manufacturer. Nowadays, I am an AV system automation programmer and absolutely dig it.

My hobbies include role-playing, auto mechanics and modification (heavy duty engine/trans replacement/alteration stuff, not ricer aluminum siding wing-type stuff), sketching, firearms (father is a licensed FFL dealer, how can I not be?), SCUBA diving, photography, programming, web design, console gaming, cooking (lots of cooking), and miscellaneous electronics/computer hacking (as in tinkering, not cracking).

I hold a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, a brown in Hapkido (though I have not practiced either in about 19 years), and have now gone down a less aggressive path with Aikido. I speak English natively, speak German and Japanese near-fluent, a little Russian and Hindi, and am learning Arabic.

I have been gaming since 1982 with the old school D&D. Since then, I have dabbled in pretty much everything with my favorites being Shadowrun and Traveller. I have been playing Shadowrun since day one and will continue to do so as long as I continue breathing. It is my ideal gaming world. I have run a couple tournaments at Gencon, done some playtesting, even run a big fansite for a while before the server's drive tanked. Hell, my first tattoo is likely to be the Shadowrun 'S' serpent logo. Stylized of course. Fanatic? Perhaps at times, but it is one of the hobbies that I can always turn to even if it is just sitting down to sketch out a troll or build a vehicle. I am also fortunate to have a wife that supports all of my habits, which helps.

I have been rolling with the Dumpshock crew on and off for a while. Not even sure how long. At least as far back as when everyone was pretty active on the IRC channel. Late 90s, 2000 maybe? I know I was in the old house when a couple Dumpshockers came to visit for a week for gaming craziness. Though on the forums I am more of a lurker.

There, I think that about covers it.

Posted by: The Canterbury Tail Aug 25 2009, 01:07 PM

Why not.

Born and bred in Northern Ireland where I spend the first nearly 19 years of my life (bar a few days.)

Moved to England (guess which city from my name) to attend university where I got a degree in Physics with Space Science and Systems (yes I'm a qualified rocket scientist.) Then spend 14 years living there mainly working as a programmer/Business Analyst.

Two years ago I finally got my paperwork through and moved to Canada, Toronto specifically, where I now work as an IT Business Analyst for a subscription radio company (you know, the one with the satellites and the King of All Media.)

Played Shadowrun since 1st edition, not been gaming much of late. Not really met up with any groups in Toronto but I need to get playing again (or GMing.)

Other interests include Japanese language, travel, reading extensively, science fiction in general, movies, computer games (probably far too many) and occasional writing with currently only one RPG supplement to my name.

Posted by: otakusensei Aug 25 2009, 01:36 PM

I'm a 28 year old married white male, born in the state of Michigan and likely to die here eventually. I work as the entire IT department for a church based 501©3 non profit. I don't consider myself "religious" in the modern interpretation and the negative connotations there in, but I do belong to a openly evangelical church at the moment. While I don't agree with some of the tactics taken by the church, I'm heartened by some of the young people there who seem to "get it". That forcing a mindless obedience to a specific and often narrow interpretation of the bible will make nothing but enemies of the very people you are trying to help. The organization I work for split off from the Salvation Army over 111 years ago, partially based on the belief that if you want to help the needy you should meet their needs first and preach later.
I have a high school diploma, no college but nearly ten years of computer experience, no martial arts or survival training, speak only American English and possess a technofetish that extends to nearly all aspects of my life.
Shadowrun second edition was the first roleplaying game I ever played. My friends and I taught ourselves when we were 6th or 7th grade and I've been spreading the word ever since. It's always been my favorite setting and game, though I've spread out to play just about everything under the sun. Big focus currently on playing table top games over Skype, even adapting the Prime Time Adventures rules to the Shadowrun setting to speed up play and promote roleplaying over Skype.

That about sums me up

Posted by: Angelone Aug 25 2009, 01:52 PM

I'm 28 years old and am currently in the U.S. Army stationed in Kaiserslautern Germany. Where I was born. I was a military brat and have been all over. I was working on an electrical engineering degree but have recently switched to physical therapy.
Shadowrun was the first rpg I remember playing. The genesis game got me into it. I haven't played a wide varity of pnp games. Just the big ones I guess dnd, wod, rifts, and Shadowrun.
I used to be an avid videogamer but have kinda burned out recently.

Posted by: BookWyrm Aug 25 2009, 02:02 PM

I'm from Long Island. I'm between jobs right now.

Posted by: McCummhail Aug 25 2009, 02:33 PM

It seems there are a number of well-rounded characters out there!

I am a 28 year-old Caucasian male of Scott-Irish descent.
I am a native English speaker, am fluent in Japanese, and can process smatterings of French, Spanish and Korean.
I studied Theater with a focus towards writing and management at a Large University. The University is also where I learned enough Japanese to be useful.
I am currently living and working in the Charlotte, NC area. I am an interpreter / translator / project coordinator for a Japanese manufacturing company.
I am about as lean as our manufacturing (meaning we both have some fat to trim).

I have experience with various martial arts. Primarily Karate, Capoeira, and now Sil Lum Guoshu.
I also proficient in net-fu (with a specialization in search-fu).

SR has been a significant part of my PnP experience for over 15 years now.
I finally made the leap from lurker to Dumpshocker this year.

Posted by: nezumi Aug 25 2009, 02:39 PM

DeeCee, work on computers. Spent some time overseas when I was younger.

Posted by: Stahlseele Aug 25 2009, 02:43 PM

Hamburg, Germany.
25 Years old. Male.
Between 180 and 190 cm tall(yeah, no, i don't understand how it can differ between those two numbers between several measurements either)
I weight in at . . too much i think, 100 to 115 kilogram or something or other. It comes with the Job <.<#
I do Tech-Support.
I collect weapons.
I like to know how to destroy things and people.
I like to know how to make stuff go boom or all melty and stuff.
I do not think that those are a particularly bad combination at all.

Posted by: Zen Shooter01 Aug 25 2009, 02:59 PM

I'm thirty four years old, Caucasian, 6'5"/1.95m, brown hair, blue eyes, 235 pounds/107 kg.

I'm originally from northeast Ohio, United States, and I spend a lot of time there, for business and family reasons. I live in Orlando, Florida, half an hour from Disney World. I'm a militant atheist and a cheerful polyamorist. I'm a great second amendment advocate - all free men own guns. I'm a businessman, and I'm a writer. I'm editing the upcoming comic Earth Liberation Force for Across The Pond Studios, and my novel, Sojourns On Mars, is available at podiobooks.com as well as on the Kindle.

I started RPGs when I was fourteen, with D&D 2nd ed. I started Shadowrun when the basic book was blue, and was all there was.

Posted by: GreyBrother Aug 25 2009, 03:05 PM

QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Aug 25 2009, 04:43 PM)

Posted by: Ravor Aug 25 2009, 03:09 PM

Divorced father of three daughters. (Yeah, I've got primary custody.)

Born and raised in rural Wyoming, and if I have my way I'll die here. (My daughters are the Sixth Generation with the same mailing address, and the fifth to grow up on the family homestead.)

I make my money as an indepent contractor. (No, there isn't any money in Ranching, that's just an excerise in killing time, aka hobby.)

Posted by: Critias Aug 25 2009, 03:24 PM

31 (32 next month), white fella, originally from California but a happy Kentucky transplant for most of my life (and planning to head to Texas in the next few years, so my wife can be back around her zillions of nieces and nephews and such). I've been gaming for about two-thirds of my time on this rock, I practice a mixture of JKD and Kali, shoot pistols and rifles, and have created my own martial art (not really) called "Dog Wrasslin'" from tromping around on the floor with my pups (one of which is about 90 pounds and has no idea of that fact).

In January I dropped a bunch of what I was juggling and went back to school full time to wrap up my degree. Since then, I've learned that college comes much easier to someone with some life experience and maturity (who's paying for tuition out of their own pocket, and as such shows up to class), and managed to get shanghaied into being an officer in Phi Alpha Theta, the international Honors History society, on campus.

I do freelance writing for a bunch of RPGs and wargames (no Shadowrun, yet), and I'm currently looking at a few publishing options for my novel. Most of my mundane jobs have been, well, mundane. Clerical temp, gas station register guy on overnights, and eight years or so working a cubicle at DHL.

Posted by: ShaunClinton Aug 25 2009, 03:42 PM

I'm a Scottish male, living in glorious Glasgow. I studied Biochemistry at Glasgow University and now manage a lab where we manufacture synthetic DNA. I'm just about to start studying again, doing an MBA at Strathclyde Uni and have now been happily married for 2 years.

I can't claim too many special skills and my only language is English! However I make short films for a hobby (and a time consuming one at that) and generally like doing creative stuff. I'm passionately anti-religous and love debate about that and other subjects.

I've been roleplaying since I was 7 (started with WEG's Ghostbusters) and playing SR since someone showed me Shadowtech 16-17 years ago (still one of my favourite books!) I've played a couple of times but have generally been the GM for a number of long running campaigns (and a few shorter ones) across the various systems. I've recently finished up a seven year SR3 campaign and I'm looking forward to starting afresh with SR4.

As well as SR I've played D&D (which I generally hate but I played in one enjoyable campaign using 3rd edition), WEG Star Wars, WFRP 1st and 2nd editions (probably the most fun I've had roleplaying!), Dark Heresey, Mutants and Masterminds, Conspiracy X (total crap), Cybergeneration, Rifts, MERP and HERO System (starting with Champions before moving onto 5th edition - probably my favourite system!)

Shadowrun has always been the dominant game for me as it has a great combination of rules and setting, probably my second favourite in each and thus my overall favourite game! I've had a lot of awesome times playing it and look forward to many more.

As for Dumpshock I've been here on and off since the late nineties when I was at uni - over the years I've had a few different handles and every so often I get bored of the same arguments cropping up, at which point I vanish for a while before returning to see the old arguments trotted out in a slightly different format!

Posted by: Apathy Aug 25 2009, 04:17 PM

I'm a 42 year old white male living in northern Virginia, US. I build/support financial analysis software for a long distance phone company. Before that I was a materials testing guy for a civil engineering company, and before that I was an armor officer in US Army. Married, no kids, with a dog and a cat.

I'm agnostic, a moral relativist, and an animal lover. Politically I think of myself as independant/moderate with libertarian leanings. Hobbies include martial arts (muay thai, brazillian jiu jitsu, and wrestling), drawing, and computer games. I've played SR off and on since about '92, and been on Dumpshock since about '04. Currently trying to learn Turkish in my free time.

Posted by: Alexand Aug 25 2009, 04:20 PM

I'm about to be 30 in a month.

I'm of what I would describe as the 'mutt' race let's just say I would pass NAN's "one drop" test to be a Sioux citizen, but at the same time I could pass the same test for at least a dozen other countries too.

I am currently living in Kentucky, USA, and making my living as a Landscaper & Groundskeeper. I have in the past been a waiter, a masseuse, a farmer, a writer, a poet, and a $100 an hour computer hardware specialist. I was born in San Fransisco, and I've lived in over a dozen different states over the course of my life. I've also spent a year in western Europe.

My hobbies are numerous and include collecting and playing RPGs of all types, Aikido, Karate, Politics, and Religious studies just to name a few.

I currently live with my GF in a polyamourous (sic) relationship. (much to the dismay of conservatives whom constantly surround me in this state)

I have collected Shadowrun since it came out


Oh. And I have a basement storage room for when the apocalypse comes and zombies roam the earth. Just in case. Srsly.

Posted by: Bignaffer Aug 25 2009, 04:27 PM

I am 32 years old and married with two kids living in Austin, Texas, USA. I work as a network technician for AT&T.

i started gaming about 20 years ago with AD&D and have played every edition of D&D, all White Wolf/WOD games, extensive knowledge/experience with Rifts but i dont play anymore cuz i couldnt stand the rules system, and of course shadowrun.

hobbies include: spending time with my family, playing video games on my PS3 or Wii, reading all kinds of gaming books, Shooting guns, working out.

Posted by: JTNLANGE Aug 25 2009, 04:30 PM

I guess it is my turn.

I am a 38 yr old white male born and raised in Milwaukee,WI. I have been playing RPG's since I was 10. My older cousin got me into D&D. Now I play mostly SR with a smattering of a few others. I have a beautiful wife Janeen(36)and 2 great kids Nik(11) and Sydnee(7). The oldest is into SR which is great. I am a CSR for an Intermodal transportation company.
I spent 4 yrs in the US Army during the first Gulf War and 2 of those years spent in Germany. Loved it will most certainly be returning to visit friends I have there.


I currently own everything published for the RPG side of Shadowrun since 1st ed. I love it all


Trevor

Posted by: Blade Aug 25 2009, 04:36 PM

I'm a 25 single French male, living in Paris. I'm a mobile computer engineer for a small company where I develop applications for mobile phones.

I speak English, can read, write and understand German (though not as good as English) but lack the practice to talk fluently, I speak a little Mandarin and know a few words of Cantonese. Due to the language skill web, I'm able to understand a bit of Spanish and Italian when it's written or spoken slowly.
I love to travel and have been to a lot of places in Europe, spent 1 month in Mauritania (and not inside a European enclave) and 6 in Hong-Kong (for my studies). I play guitar, read a lot, used to write when I had time for this, used to play a lot of video games (now I've got a social life and spend enough time at work in front of a computer. I still play regularly but less than I used to). I'm slightly underweight, not what you'd call athletic but still in good physical condition and I walk a lot (and fast).

I started playing RPG about 10 years ago. Shadowrun has been one of the first game I've played, and the one I'm having most fun with. I'm finding it more and more difficult to have fun in traditional medfan settings though with good friends and good players you can have fun with nearly any game. I am the president of the French "Shadowforums" association which runs the main French Shadowrun forum.

Posted by: WyldKnight Aug 25 2009, 04:38 PM

I just turned 18 this month, live in Sacramento, California but will be moving to Brooklyn, New York for school in about 3 months. Obviously I don't have much experience in any fields besides school but when it comes to skills I am a decent shot with a gun, up to 200 yards I can basically call my shots, can run a mile in under 6 minutes which may not be the best shape but its not bad, and even though I have't aquired my license yet I can fly a prop plane with no problem thanks to a friend of the family and I want to expand into other forms of piloting (the air force is looking pretty good.)

I've been playing table top games since I was 13 when I started with DnD but I got tired of it because of its stale notions of "If its different its probably evil so kill it." Started playing Shadowrun just this year and before this played a couple years of Traveller.

Lets see I am a mix of things. My family is from Belize and I am a mix of African, Mayan, and Spanish. I'm 6'0, 150 pounds, and got the usual black hair brown eyes though my eyes change between a dark almost black brown and a very light golden brown.

Posted by: kanislatrans Aug 25 2009, 04:55 PM

Male ,caucasian with a little Senaca thrown in, 44 years of age. father of three and grandfather of 1. Business owner in the appliance repair field. Gilligan tour in the U.S. navy( 5 weeks, bad eye sight that was passed over in the induction center.) 15years food service, 6 years construction, 4 years small printing press operator. I

I live in North central Pennsylvania, USA. its easy to find just google a map of PA and look for the big area where there is nothing....thats us.

I speak english, with an american dialect. I know enough spanish to get my ass kicked and am learning american sign cause the wife wants to become foster parents and I figure it might come in handy if we get a special needs child.

Ht 5'6'' wt 160
RPGing since 1982. playing Shadowrun since the beginning with the exeption of 3rd edition due to alcohol issues. have played a drek load of other games (rifts, Marvel superheros, ect.

hobbies include fishing, hunting, gardening, writing, cosplay,

Politically i am a moderate anarchist..

Religion: eclectic pagan( any discussion on this will gladly be discussed in PM not the forum)

owner of 3 bitches,(border collie/sheltie mix). two stray cats, two rabbits and one gold fish.

homeowner

Ht 5'6" Qt

I enjoy pina coladas and getting caught in the rain....

Posted by: Leehouse Aug 25 2009, 05:35 PM

These types of threads always interest me.

I'm a 24, guy who was born and raised in Wisconsin. I just completed my first year of graduate studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for a Masters, potentially a PhD not sure though, in Atmospheric Sciences. I am currently working with the Antarctic Meteorological Research Center and will be traveling to Antarctica within a few months to repair, install, and remove AWS(automatic weather systems). I've been playing RPG's since the early 90's, starting with D&D, then stopping for a number of years until college. I also used to do a lot of console and computer gaming before school began to take up a great deal of my time. I only speak english, as other languages have always eluded my grasp for whatever reason. Politically I am left of center from the American perspective of things, I'm unsure where this puts me in a global perspective... probably more central. I shot, and swam competitively for about 6 years, throughout middle school and high school but both ended when I went to college.

Posted by: Adarael Aug 25 2009, 06:06 PM

I'm 29, and I've been playing Shadowrun since 1st edition, because I was a precocious bugger.

Most of my life I've lived in California, but currently I live in Seattle, on Queen Anne hill. I went to college at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and majored in two unmarketables: English and Asian Studies.

The only language other than English that I can speak is Japanese, though I imagine McCummhail speaks it a fair bit better than I do. I've held a lot of unusual jobs over the years: reporter, graphic designer, web developer, game tester, game writer.

Currently I'm a UI designer for the Xbox division of Microsoft, though I'd like to get back into game writing. If you own an Xbox 360, you use the dashboard that I and my team built.

Posted by: fistandantilus4.0 Aug 25 2009, 06:18 PM

29 year old caucasian (6'2"/200lb) father of five, married going on seven years. I've got enough college for my generals, but nothing specific in terms of degrees, and I agree with Crit whole heartedly, which is why I'm taking classes again. I live in San Diego, CA , about 10 minutes from the beach. I'm a Master-at-Arms in the U.S. Navy. I'm also Mormon, although less practicing than some.

Oh, and I've got dashing good looks.

Posted by: Adarael Aug 25 2009, 06:24 PM

Well, of course you do! Who can hate a Koala, even a blood-sucking, face-ripping one?

Posted by: shuya Aug 25 2009, 06:40 PM

i am a 27 year old boy/girl and live in the ozark mountains of southern Missouri as a member of an intentional community ("commune" to some people), where i spend most of my time working in a factory that makes peanut butter, or else working on our ranch (we raise cattle, pigs, and chickens for our own personal consumption, but not for selling).

i attended college and majored in linguistics and asian studies, and some graduate school where i was working on a PhD in translation studies before deciding that i no longer wanted to deal with all of the bullshit of trying to cope with living in a society that i had major moral qualms about being a part of. english is my native language, and i also speak japanese very well (i would not say "fluent" but i am damn close). in addition to those, i am competent with several other languages to varying degrees, including german, spanish, latin, korean, mandarin chinese, sanskrit, italian, turkish, and probably at least one more that i am forgetting. i also spent one year of undergrad as an exchance student in Japan, which was freakin sweet.

my non-rpg hobbies/interests include music (i can play guitar, bass, synths, and really pretty much anything that makes any kind of sound, and i love production and cut-ups and multitrack reel-to-reel tape recorders), marijuana, postmodern literary criticism and philosophy, japanese popular culture, avant-garde art, fashion, closet horticulture and mycoculture, gender anarchy, zen buddhism, 2d fighting games, shooting squirrels with pellet guns, ghost stories, entheogenic drug use and shamanism, collecting dead lighters, street kids and rainbow family, and cetera...

i've been playing rpg's since i was maybe 8 or 9 or so (i can't really remember, it's been so long), though not continuously. i'm also a big Magic the Gathering kid.

Posted by: Method Aug 25 2009, 07:00 PM

Started a thread like this many moons ago (http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=6593&hl=). Its interesting to see how peoples lives have changed over the years.

I was born and raised in Wyoming (what's up Ravor?) and currently live in Seattle WA where I am finishing school (finally). I have BS degrees in Zoology/Physiology and Medical Microbiology and a MS in Pathobiology. I will graduate from medical school in a few months and I am currently applying to general surgery residencies throughout the western US. I speak some spanish and some japanese (mostly related to 12 years of aikido training). Also an avid shooter (although its hard to be an avid shooter in Seattle). Married with 2 dogs. Expecting our first kiddy in the spring. Been playing SR since first edition. Also play TT wargames (WHFB and FoW) and PC-base RTS games. Other interests include history (military and medical), politics, music, cinema and sharp objects.

Posted by: crash2029 Aug 25 2009, 08:40 PM

Hell, why not?

I am a male living in Ephrata, WA. I am on disability. I am diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenia, severe clinical depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder with psychosis. I have been playing RPG's since the age of 9. I am a second generation gamer, my father actually played D&D with Gary Gygax and Car Wars with Steve Jackson. I got a GED during the tenth grade winter break. I'm pretty much a hermit. I'm a published poet.

Posted by: Stahlseele Aug 25 2009, 08:56 PM

QUOTE (GreyBrother @ Aug 25 2009, 05:05 PM)

Awww aren't you a cute little fella? I really can imagine how'd you look in real life

Posted by: Grinder Aug 25 2009, 09:12 PM

QUOTE (fistandantilus4.0 @ Aug 25 2009, 08:18 PM)

Oh, and I've got dashing good looks.

Posted by: Grinder Aug 25 2009, 09:16 PM

QUOTE (GreyBrother @ Aug 25 2009, 05:05 PM)

Awww aren't you a cute little fella? I really can imagine how'd you look in real life

Posted by: The Dragon Girl Aug 25 2009, 09:51 PM

Heh, Sure I'll give it a shot.

27 Year old white female, married with two cats. I live in north west GA, USA (Hi there Cadmus) About an hour north of Atlanta in traffic.

I've been a free lance artist on the convention circuit for 8 years now, a renny for 11, a RPer for 14 (mostly freeform text based) and grew up on a little farm. I can spin, weave, sew, can, pickle and bake with the best of them and have regionally award winning jellies to my name

I speak English primarily, and enough Spanish to make myself understood, though I really want to learn Latin (and Tolkien's elvish).

I've got a little college with plans to go back and finish my degree (..Which degree is still up in the air, between graphic design, horticulture, and the culinary arts(pastry chef) ).

Posted by: vladski Aug 26 2009, 01:11 AM

I'm a virgo and love taking long walks on the beach, deep soulful talks, watching sunsets while drinking wine and... oops, wrong personal profile!   Here we go....



Vlad  


Human Male Age: 40 Hair: Brown Eyes: Brown Ht: 1.78 meters Wt: 91 Kilos

ATTRIBUTES:
Body: 2
Agility: 3
Reaction: 2
Strength: 2
Charisma: 3
Intuition: 3
Logic: 4
Willpower: 2
Special Powers:


Low-light vision (I DO have incredible night-vision)

Qualities: 
Ambidextrous
First Impression
Iron gut (Nothing seems to faze me!)


ACTIVE SKILLS:
Pistols: 2
Longarms: 2
Unarmed(Brawling): 1(+2)
Perception: 3
Infiltration: 1
Etiquette: 3
Negotiation: 2
Con: 3
Leadership: 2
Pilot Ground: 3
Harware (Computers) 1(+2)
Computer: 2
Artisan: 2
Cooking: 3
Billiards: 3
Roleplaying games: 3
Auto mechanic: 2
Industrial mechanic(Construction): 1(+2)

KNOWLEDGE SKILLS:
Cooking background: 3
Sports(Football): 1 (+2)
History: 2
American Politics: 2
General Math and Physics: 1
Mechanic, auto: 2
Carpentry: 2
Retail procedures:2
Food preparation: 2
Sci-Fi/Fantasy media: 3
Kokomo Dives and Bars: 2
Kokomo dealers: 1
Shadowrun: 2
AD&D (2nd Ed.): 2

LANGUAGE SKILLS:
English: Native
Spanish: 1





Sorry, I couldn't resist.  Actually, it was a little thought provoking to try and simulate me in "stats." 

I am a Caucasian male and have been so for nearly 41 years.  Irish/Scot/French descent. Highschool diploma, 2 years college: Poly Sci & English majors. Have been everything from a thief to a web page designer, a head cook to a data collector, an arch-technopagan to a smuggler, a bartender to a construction worker, a pool hustler to a manager . 

Born and raised in Kokomo, IN (50 miles north of Indianapolis),  population aprox. 50K.  Moved to Wichita, KS about a year and a half ago. Spent a year in Tampa, FL and a couple in Bloomington IN. Divorced once, 1 child, son age 16, and am currently engaged (have been for a couple years) and living together with a wonderful woman and eventually will have a step-daughter and step-son, currently 8 and 12 respectively.

My hobbies include: RPGs (of course), reading (mostly fiction), loads of TV (I'm a news junkie and watch the news several hours a day and also enjoy many fictional programs... I am not sure which is FOX News.  ), fiddling with computers, riding motorcycles, writing, drawing and cooking.

I started roleplaying in Middle School at around 12-13 years old with 1st Ed AD&D.  Would have been about 1981-82. Over the years I have played many RPGS, running  AD&D 2nd (Forgotten Realms) for a gaming group that varied from 6-12 people and then moved them to SR3 when it first came out back in '98 I believe. Switched to SR4 about a year after it was launched.  My favorite RPGs to have played are SR, AD&D 2nd, Star Wars WEG (D6) and Space 1889. I authored an original RPG to play in the Firefly/Serenity setting before an official game was released.  My players and I still prefer mine over the official one. I have considered many times polishing it and attempting to sell it as a generic mechanics system. I also enjoy playing Axis and Allies and other wargames of that ilk and medium complexity.





So, there you have it.  The mystery is over. 



Vlad

Posted by: Ancient History Aug 26 2009, 01:29 AM

American. Male. English/Irish/Scottish/Sicilian/Walloon heritage. 5'5", 150 lbs. or thereabouts. Military brat. Just got my bachelor's in Electrical Engineering (w/minors in Tech Writing and Electronic Music); going for a master's in EE (w/grad certificate in Technology Management). Freelance writer for Shadowrun, with a couple other pieces here and there no one really need care about. Extensive collection of comics and books, particularly Lovecraft, his immediate influences, and his contemporaries; cyberpunk and its immediate precursors and some of its descendants; and occult or weird detective fiction. I also have a terrible habit of reading trashy Warhammer novels; like most bad habits, Games Workshop is very hard to break. I also love to cook and bake, but rarely get the time.

Posted by: Paul Aug 26 2009, 01:34 AM

I'm a guy who likes Shadowrun. In fact I pretty much like a lot of games-role playing, board and strategy games. Be it Heroscape, Chess, Shadowrun or some Stratego I'm down. I'm not interested in getting too personal, for a variety of reasons, but it's common knowledge I think that I served as US Marine, and now work in law enforcement/government, at a maximum security prison. I work on a gang task force, and enjoy playing games with my friends. (Guys like Chrome Tiger, 3278, and more-who sometimes post around here.) Like them I've been kicking around DSF since it was a mailing list; I've also had the privilege of meeting some of the people writing, designing and play-testing the game. Almost universally I think they're decent and fun people.

I generally have little that is very serious to say, and view the entirety of the internet as one big entertainment device. I have enough people making my day busy at work, I don't need to come here and get all serious and worked up. So hopefully that helps anyone who might take offense to anything I say. Picture it all with a sardonic smile, and it's all good!

Posted by: Omenowl Aug 26 2009, 01:43 AM

I am a geotechnical engineer working in Texas for the government doing dam and levee safety among other things.
36 years old
Military Brat
Been playing rpgs since I was 8 years old
1 baby boy
Go to a ranch with horses, dogs and chickens on the weekends
I have a bachelors and masters in civil engineering.
Enjoyed canoeing, white water rafting, archery, fencing and target shooting.
Took some tae kwon do, archery, aikido, and fencing.

Posted by: toturi Aug 26 2009, 02:12 AM

From Singapore. Han Chinese, 31 years old. A little on the underweight side, used to do the various endurance and water sports, but after a minor training accident, involving me jumping off the deck of an APC in full battle gear, my hip, knee and ankle has been bothering me, so apart from an annual run, I stick to jogging short distances now. Dad was a career military man, retired now. Mom's a homemaker. I am a civil engineer by training but I am looking for a career change. I am conversant in 2 languages - English and Mandarin, did a little bit of French, know a little Malay. I started playing RPGs since 1990, started playing both Shadowrun and L5R in 1995. I love reading, finished Sun Tzu Art of War in the original at 12 (when my grasp of Mandarin was IMO the strongest, it has been downhill since then), read Clausewitz's On War when I had nothing to do after my O levels, read The Prince after my A levels (again because I was bored).
I am a GPMG gunner when I go back for refresher training. I could field strip and assemble an FN MAG/GPMG under a minute. I am a qualified lifeguard (I have to keep telling people it is all about your technique and not about how buff you are). I suffer from nightblindness which is why I am not a marksman(I hit all my targets in the day, 100% score, but at night I barely managed 10%; luckily, the GPMG comes with a night scope now.)

Posted by: Red-ROM Aug 26 2009, 02:14 AM

this is kewl. I've been reading posts from a lot of you and it's good to get a feel for the real.

I'm 30(31 in a few days)

i live in Virginia beach, VA (you know, John Smith and all that)

I'm a recovering D&D purest that started SR in 3rd edition(I've played many other RPG's as well now)

I lived in Olypia, WA for 4 years and worked in Gig Harbor,WA

I'm a Heating and Air conditioning mechanic, married w/ a 1 year old boy.

I'm only fluent in English, but i took german in Highschool and I tried to learn Japanese once(I confused many people in Kyoto)

Posted by: Khyron Aug 26 2009, 02:37 AM

I'm 30
Live in Port Saint Lucie, Florida, lived in Florida all my life.
Work in IT and occasionally cust/svc due to the crap economy
Internet addict.

Posted by: Jhaiisiin Aug 26 2009, 03:11 AM

Lifetime resident of Albuquerque, NM (the place Bugs shoulda turned left at) and I hope I get to stay here my whole life. I just love it here. I've been gaming for... gosh, almost 20 years now? My cousin got me and my brother into it, first with a silly one-shot of D&D, then a much better Shadowrun game (Which he had to run from memory, using 2nd ed rules, because he had no books with him). He hooked us on it so hard we begged our parents for the books and thus began our life of RPG's. Since then, I've done SR mainly for years, all the way up through 4th ed and still going strong. At some point, my brother got into oWoD Vampire and has become an amazing storyteller (he's truly an artist of the word, while I am one of the hand it seems). Several years ago, my best friend and I got introduced to oWoD's Mage, and that has become our primary game, though I still play SR regularly (at least half the year). I'm also regularly involved with D20 Star Wars (not Saga edition, GM won't have it), and occasionally get sucked into paladium games, ridiculous as they are.

Beyond gaming, I'm 5'6-5'8ish (Depending on day, have a touch of scoliosis that tends to alter my height a bit), weigh in around 180 these days and am in better shape than I have been in the past. Just turned 30 last month, and tried like hell to avoid it with no success. I get to sport 3' of hair, which has caused me to be threatened with death should I ever cut it off. I'm currently a satellite TV install tech, and have worked various other tech fields over the years. Tech stuff just hits my brain really easily for some reason.

I'm also a freelance tattoo design artist and I sketch other things now and again. Just finally got back into school, though I'm at a loss what direction I want to go for. Would love to live off my art, but "Starving Artist" exists as a phrase for a very good reason.

Posted by: ColdEquation Aug 26 2009, 04:23 AM

I'm kinda new here, so I'll gladly introduce myself. I've been aware of Dumpshock and its fourms for a long time, but only recently signed up.

I'm a 31-year-old guy from White Bread, USA, also known as Salt Lake City, Utah. I was raised LDS/Mormon, whatever you want to call it, but when I got to be about 24 I realized that I'd learned more about how life works from FastJack, Captain Chaos, Matador and Hatchetman than I'd ever learned from Jesus, so I've been doing my own thing ever since.

I'm getting married on Friday (8/28/09 for reference) to a wonderful woman who prefers the Hedge to the Shadows, but I can't hold that against her. I work for a grand-format print company, which means we make things that are bigger than large. If you've been to a mall somewhere in the United States or Canada lately, chances are you've seen our work. The company's proudest moment so far was being one of the subcontractors that worked on the 20 and 30 story tall building wraps that were seen during the 2002 Winter Olympics. I manage the shipping department, which keeps me here a lot later than I would like sometimes.

I went to college for a few semesters deluding myself that I could make a living with an English Degree; reality stepped in and kicked that out from underneath me.

I've been running Shadowrun for close to 15 years. I was introduced by way of the old FASA catalogues that came with my BattleTech stuff. Soon, my mechs were gathering dust while the streets of Seattle beckoned.

Posted by: KCKitsune Aug 26 2009, 04:23 AM

I'm a 36 year old white guy living in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania (right outside of Carlisle), and I am right now going to school to get my Medical Laboratory Scientist degree. I'll be taking Analytical Chemistry (CHM371) at Shippensburg this fall and Genetics in the Spring. All my other classes are taken care of.

I've been in the Navy. I almost made it through Naval Nuclear Power School, but fail to pass the Prototype stage of the training. I later got kicked out for Sleepwalking (no joke). I've worked in the Computer field (Earthlink, but got my job outsourced to the Philippines. That's why I'm going for my MLS degree... not much chance of getting outsourced.

Posted by: Earlydawn Aug 26 2009, 06:47 AM

Border of New York and New Jersey. I'm 21. I'm a Political Science major with a personal focus on Defense / Security Studies. I'm an Epee fencer (retired since High School), a firearm owner, and a cat lover. I started my political life as a Democrat, back when I believed that people were fundamentally good and possessed intrinsic self-value. Shifted off to a more moderate stance during my first two in College. In the last year, I have finally come to terms with the idea that I am a Conservative, particularly in the areas of national defense and economics. Father is small business owner, and mom is a upper management biomedical wageslave. Hoping the latter pays off in Deltaware eventually.

Very strongly considering commissioning into the Air Force. I'd like to do either intelligence or unmanned aviation. Army also isn't out of the question, although I would be very skeptical about heading down that road without having a specific specialty right out of MEPS (Do officers even go through MEPS?).

Posted by: The Jake Aug 26 2009, 08:31 AM

I am 30 years old, in a defacto relationship with the most wonderful, understanding beautiful woman. We just had our first child a little over four months ago.

I live in Melbourne, Australia. Contrary to popular belief we don't ride kangaroos to work. Awhile back I was married to an American and lived in L.A. for a bit over a year but chose to come back when the relationship went south as I didn't want the stigma of people thinking I wanted the green card. Also been fortunate to do some travel across Asia and South America.

I work in information security as a consultant across the company's internal projects. I'm hoping to move into a more focused architectural role soon. As much as I love security I am a bit disillusioned with it sometimes. But the pay is too hard to argue with. I've done my Bachelors degree and been accepted to do a Masters but I'm still not sure I want to do it - it costs a lot, and I'm still umming and ahhing about what I'd learn vs. how it will help my career and/or life in general.

Outside of work I am very interested in health and fitness and exercise regularly (6'2"/ 215 lbs). I used to do wrestling and Brazilian jui jitsu with an eye towards doing competitive jiu jitsu and at least one amateur MMA fight (I've also done karate, taekwon do and dabbled in others). However I've had two major injuries requiring surgery and my road to full recovery long with no immediate end in sight. I have taken this opportunity to look at my health more holistically. To maintain my competitive streak I am now learning poker. I also have interests in property investing and personal development.

I try to run or paritcipate in role playing games at least once a fortnight, usually running Shadowrun but it's hard with my commitments. I've been gaming since I was 9, having started on AD&D 2E, Cyberpunk 2020 and SR1.

- J.

Posted by: MKX Aug 26 2009, 09:49 AM

I came to find RPG's later in life, SR 1st Ed and AD&D around 1991 while studying/drinking at university. Born and raised in Australia, not travelled out of the country and don't speaking anything but English, which is kind of odd as I have quite a few mates from all around the world- ethnically my family on my fathers side came over on the 2nd fleet, originally from northern England after being busted for highway robbery (lol, no bread stealing here!) and my mothers side are 2nd generation migrants from Scotland with a little bit of French and German.
Unmarried, never married, no kids I'll admit too and I'm a continual disappointment to my parents in that regard.

Professionally, I'm a network admin/engineer, mostly telco stuff (SDH, PDH transmission, Base stations, fibre, wireless- I fix it all) for a mobile phone telco and also a wireless broadband provider... I also have a Bachelor of Arts in fine arts with a major in painting and drawing, needless to say, its not what pays the bills.
Unprofessionally, I privately import Japanese sports cars and spend my meagre spare time tuning them up, driving like an idiot, blowing them up, then having to fix them. I have written fan material for RPG's in the past when I had the time, wouldn't do it for a quid, only the love of the hobby, like most long time RPG'ers I know a socially unacceptable amount of facts about weapons, firearms, explosives, toxins, medical technology and chemistry.

Posted by: Erl of Ingst Aug 26 2009, 01:25 PM

Caucasian Redhead (do they come in any other brand than Caucasian?), 23 years old, 5'9"-5'10", 120-140 lbs (I live a strange life), American with some knowledge of Russian (far too little for how long I've lived here). I'm a child of chaos, but a lover of order. I try not to give myself labels for fear of the fanatic behavior that frequently follows, the desire to be unique, and the knowledge I'll quickly change anyway. For some reason I've had an unusually easy life, but sadly I'm very lazy. I'm a technophile.

I'm currently a volunteer in Kazakhstan, but I return to America in less than 3 months. I teach English but decided long ago I'm already bored of it. I have a degree in Psychology but decided long ago I'm already bored of it. I'm thinking I want to return to study Architecture or Civil Engineering, but so far my plans are vague. I want to learn Chinese (Mandarin) and Japanese (for the tech).

My history with gaming is boring as I've never found a group that lasts longer than a month or two. I love the complexity, technology, story, and roleplay-ability of Shadowrun. It also has a quality that keeps a strangely diverse group of people (as we can see here).

The characters I play frequently represent my desires and fears, but I guess that is more typical that not.

Posted by: McCummhail Aug 26 2009, 01:36 PM

QUOTE (Erl of Ingst @ Aug 26 2009, 08:25 AM)

Posted by: Straight Razor Aug 26 2009, 02:16 PM

Well..
28
6' 165lbs
nashville, tn
European decent with heavy native american features.
speek English and some Japanese(tourist level)

lots of collage, but no degrees yet. I'm sorta of an professional student. I'm always in and out of class. I'm just not happy unless i have at least a few classes in a year. I'm just now coming to terms with aspect of my self. lol

I hope to get back in to collage and finish up a BS in cellular molecular biology with a focus in human genetics. I'v been working on getting my massage therapist license for the past few years on and off. I'll have that done on Dec 6 of this year. YEA!! going to use that to pay for the rest of my collage.
I'd like to actually make it to med school someday.

as for what i do.. I have had a number of carriers. I owned my own 1-hr photo lab, though that ended in poorly. I built blimps of a number of years. (yes like the goodyear blimp, no not the goodyear blimp.) During that time i built the worlds largest remote controlled aircraft. Got to work with a lot of really cool people on a lot of really cool projects... for the DOD, so that's all i can say about that.

Now I'm a jeweler, I did a 2yr apprenticeship with Shane Co. I miss the people and the company, but not the management. I am currently employed with Jared. Been there for a year as of last month. I like my job there too.

As for hobbies. Well... I have been into pen and paper RPG's since i was 14. My first ever game was earthdawn. Moved to D&D and then found SR back in 02', been hooked ever since. Played all the whitewolf systems, but i could never really get into them.
I have been trying to wirght, but i'm having hard time devoting the time to it.
I like to build things. I'm currently making a japanese tea house in my back yard using only hand tools and traditional japanese joinery. no nails, screws or glue.
also trying to teach my self watch/clock repair. I have several electronics projects going on. Like i said l like building stuff.
I'm also into martial arts. aikido and kempo mostly. lived at an aikido dojo for a year. Been trained in kenpo by both a first generation tracy, and Ed Parker instructors.

Posted by: BlacKat Aug 26 2009, 03:03 PM

Lets see...

Living in upstate NY (Rochester) since about 93. College degree in IT/Network Administration. Currently doing Sys admin for Windows and Legacy VAX/VMS systems (Yes people still use these systems). White male, 34, a bit overweight (damn desk jobs), used to practice Northern Wushu Kung-Fu and may get back to it one day. Occasionally active in the SCA. Only fluent in 1 language, English, but know a smattering of French and Spanish.

Been gaming since 85. Started with Basic D&D and went from there. Picked up SR with 1st Ed. Also did Mechwarrior for a long time. Been on these boards since before it was DumpShock (1997 or so). Though I do not post very often.

BlacKat

Posted by: Tiger Eyes Aug 26 2009, 04:40 PM

This is more fun than the "getting to know you" game at the Mom's Club!

I'm a 34 year old woman - of a variety of nationalities, mostly Caucasian but with enough Cherokee that I don't sunburn and avoided stretch marks - and a married mother of two; a 7 year old girl and a 5 year old boy. I'm 5'3" (with shoes), 110 lbs, and despite my age, still get carded. My naturally dark hair started to go gray shortly after my son began walking (how exactly did the human race manage to survive more than one generation???). My husband is Upper Management for a Megacorp. I left my well paying Corporate America job 7 years ago to become a stay-at-home mama. I now write for Shadowrun, as many of you may know, primarily the fluffy bits. I have a BS in Botany and a BA in Creative Writing, and I started playing SR in college and never looked back. I have a incompetence in Navigation and an avid love of hiking, which has led me to become proficient at wilderness survival. In urban areas, I'm content to let someone else make sure I get where I'm supposed to go (as anyone who hung out with me at GenCon can attest to). I'd say something about my hobbies, but I'm afraid that someone at Catalyst will see that I'm admitting to hobbies and start pestering me about deadlines.

I currently live in Portland, Oregon but I'm moving to Anchorage, Alaska this year, and bemoaning the fact that I won't be able to drive to Disneyland on a semi-regularly basis (and the fact that there just aren't a lot of options for sexy clothes in 0 degree weather).

Posted by: BishopMcQ Aug 26 2009, 05:37 PM

A southern California native, I'm 28 years old. I currently live in San Diego, but miss Seattle and Lyon and think regularly about moving back. Fluent in English, Conversational in French and I can muddle my way through written Spanish. Single, caucasian male, 6' and 175 lbs.

I also work for one of the megacorps--a multi-national shipping company. Graduated with a Bachelors in History, Emphasis on pre-1800 Europe, with a minor in Psychology. College basically taught me how to write, think, and listen. These are the basic skills which I implement a work, even if I only apply the knowledge to other things. I'm a collector of odd trivia and remember small details that people talk about and never expect others to recall.

I'm familiar with ceramics, history, practical applications of firearms, computer networking, chemistry, logic puzzles, fencing, weight-lifting, applied martial arts, and baking.

Posted by: Navarre Aug 26 2009, 08:56 PM

I'm a 29 year old male currently living in the Chicagoland area, though I grew up in a tiny town in Northern Michigan (had to drive 3 hours to get to a mall.) 5'6" 175 lbs. Caucasian.

I have a Bachelor's degree in Technical Communication with a concentration in Computer Science, and no real interest in working in an IT field... Oops.

I am currently in an engineering position, where I shepherd clients through the process of lighting their products on fire (no kidding, I watch things burn for a living).

My primary hobbies are RPG's, board games, and SCA fencing. I love to read.

Posted by: Adarael Aug 26 2009, 09:01 PM

I love the disproportionately large representation of Japanese-speakers on a Shadowrun board. Not exactly surprising, but still funny & awesome.

Posted by: PBTHHHHT Aug 26 2009, 09:42 PM

QUOTE (Method @ Aug 25 2009, 03:00 PM)

Posted by: Sticks Aug 26 2009, 10:31 PM

39 year old father of three.

Born lived and probably will die in Ayr, a tourist town on the West Coast of Scotland, 30 (ish) miles South of Glasgow.

Qualified ( sic ) Musician and Percussionist, worked with many things in my time including, auto-repair, sales, warehousing and storage, electronic assembly and food production. Currently infiltrating the UK branch of Wal-Mart from the inside with a view to bringing down the whole damn corp. Still playing in local pub bands, and doing some tuition on the side.

Started gaming in the early 80's by writing my own system for my group of friends, money was scarce and times were hard , moved into the old TSR Marvel Superheroes game which i played for years, dabbled in D&D, Warhammer 40k and Warhammer RPG, TMNT the game, Rifts, Sla Industries basically whatever i could get my hands on i played.

A lifelong reader of as much Sci-Fi and fantasy as i could get, i got the first secrets of power book out of the local library on spec', and for the next few weeks could be found in a corner muttering about shooting dragons with mini-guns, from then i was hooked, found the old first edition rules(BBB) and london sourcebook in a secondhand book store and have them still, along with most paper releases up till 2nd Ed. As age, marriages and kids came along the gaming group dried up; but my love for the Sr universe and backstory never died, i continue to read avidly and would love to game again in the future. Had mild literary aspirations in my youth, probably why i became the resident GM and still find myself knocking up interesting scenarios and tidbits that i never use. . When i eventually got online and found Dumpshock i was in awe, all these people who also loved the game and a few who had made the same links and connections in the meta-plot, been lurking ever since, dont say much; usually cause i feel others are better qualified than me, last rules i played were 2nd Ed and Ancient History seems to have all the geek info sewn up , seriously dude i'm gonna put a Tm on my name as soon as we figure out who used it first.

To finish i would just like to gush a bit and say to all my fellow Dumpshockers, its an honour to read yer views and occasionally add my own, long may we and the game continue.

Posted by: Werewindlefr Aug 26 2009, 10:55 PM

I live in Detroit, Michigan, although I've moved there 18 months ago; previously, I was living in Creteil, France - that's 10 km south-south-east of Paris, and I've studied in Caen fo my Bachelor's/Master's - the major city razed in the Normandy landings.
I am currently a High-Energy Physics (aka particle physics) graduate Student at Wayne State University. I speak English quite fluently, at least fluently enough to play RPGs in the US. I've been playing roleplaying games for 10 years now, starting with WoD but quickly bringing Shadowrun 3rd edition to the table .

Posted by: LurkerOutThere Aug 26 2009, 11:13 PM

I am a 28 (as of yesterday) anglo male who might be best and generously described as a mutt. My ancestors were never the guys in the army with horses but they likely at least had their own swords or spears as the case may be. I'm ex-military comm guy who a few years ago left the military-industrial complex to go back to school full time. At which point I got tired of being poor and went back to work in the civilian sector. I took a ten grand pay cut but ultimately I sleep better at night. I was disabled in the military due to a fatefull run in with a hum-vee which I won in that I survived. I am 6'3 and clock in at around 280 pounds and take great pride in the fact that the last physical confrontation I was in not only was not initiated by me but ended with me standing and the other person not and me asking them if they wanted to continue. Last week I proposed to a beautiful woman with her parents looking on and despite what self preservation instincts might have screamed at her she agreed to marry me. Fortunately she is at least as big a gamer as I am so I anticipate no major changes to my life on that score until children enter the pciture some time at least a year or so down the road. My hobbies outside of gaming are hunting. I am only fluent in english however I understand Korean and speak it a bit. My hobbies outside of gaming involve amateur game programing and occasionally hunting. I maintain active first aid, CPR, and disaster response certifications through the red cross and have volunteered with them in the past. I live in Omaha NE USA, by choice as I like having four seasons and my family is here.

Posted by: TheOneRonin Aug 27 2009, 02:15 PM

34 years old, married, father of 2 (one more on the way in October), currently living in North Carolina but originally from the Louisiana Gulf Coast. Currently managing the support desk for the EPA. Prior Service Army Mechanized Infantryman (dismount), avid gun/ballistics nut, martial arts enthusiast (starting training in Inosanto Blend [Muay Thai, Wing Chun, Kali] JKD back in 91, dabbled in Judo and Krav Maga, currently training hard in Modern Arnis), 20-year roleplaying vet (started with D&D and Robotech, then picked up SR in '94), and electronic gaming fan (Xbox360/Wii/PC).

Also, I spend lots of time watching the Military Channel and UFC. And did I mention I'm a big Star Wars fan?

Posted by: Eric Aug 27 2009, 06:12 PM

37 male of Polish/Irish/English descent. Married 3 years with an 18-month old daughter. Am a manager at a tv station in Wisconsin. Started gaming in 1982, got into Shadowrun in college. Fell away from it for awhile after college, but starting to get back into it (although I will confess, I play more D&D than SR - hope that doesn't get me booted from the site). Otherwise, spend my free time with my family, working with my parish and local Knights of Columbus, hunting, fishing, watching movies, and playing games.

Posted by: Stahlseele Aug 27 2009, 07:43 PM

QUOTE (Grinder @ Aug 25 2009, 11:16 PM)

He's overcompensating.

Posted by: Wombat Aug 27 2009, 08:23 PM

I'm a 23 year old American male. I spent the last 5 years in the US Marine Corps as an Arabic Linguist, so I'm fluent in English and decent enough at Arabic. I just got out at the end of June and am getting ready to go back to school at the end of September for a BA in Environmental Studies.

Posted by: McAllister Aug 27 2009, 08:51 PM

I'm a 20 year old American male. Given the number of hours I've spent talking/theorizing about pen-and-paper RPGs, it's positively embarrassing how few I've spent ever playing them. So if you're ever in southern Maryland...

But I digress. I attend a small public college, where I am studying Psychology, Women Gender and Sexuality, Film and Media, French and Other Shit, in that order. A good man once took me on a trip with some of my peers to go shoot skeet at a sportsman's club, and I've decided I'm going to buy a firearm as soon as I have somewhere to put it. Interestingly, if I wanted to buy a handgun I'd need a license, but I could go buy a shotgun or rifle right now. My reasons for owning a firearm will be 1. zombies, 2. in case I need to overthrow the government, and 3. just in case. Again, those are in order.

I have a short list of things I've decided to do before I die. This list is in order, but it's the order in which I decided there are Things To Do, not the order in which they'll be accomplished. 1. I will hug a penguin. Doesn't it look like they'd just be so much fun to hug? Might have to break into a zoo at some point. That'd be the world's strangest shadowrun. 2. Own the collected works of Robert Heinlein. I don't live like he writes, but I wish I did, and nobody else turns a premise like "what if we made the moon into a giant prison planet?" into an amazing novel like he does. 3. I will hold friend auditions. I plan to make a number of posters, and put them around wherever I am living when I decide to do this; candidates will assemble at the specified place and time, we will all hang out together, and if any qualify for the position, I'll call them after. The trick will be to attract people who see the ad and think "Huh, that's a weird idea, but why not?" instead of people who are incredibly lonely and more emotionally needy than I'm ready to deal with.

Posted by: Snow_Fox Aug 28 2009, 03:02 AM

QUOTE (Ancient History @ Aug 25 2009, 09:29 PM)

Posted by: Neraph Aug 28 2009, 04:24 AM

I'm in the D/FW megaplex of Texas, and I work at a FedEx airport as contract security. I've gotten my GED (would have gotten the diploma, but my father moved out and caused us to lose 2 houses, so I couldn't finish Homeschooling, as the books kept getting lost in the move), and I have 15 credits to my name towards a Buisness/Administration bachellors degree. My family is largely military (mother, brother, 2 uncles, 3 grandfathers, my father washed out, I'm planning on it, my little brother is planning on it... that's all I can think of right now), so we've moved a lot.

I've studied martial arts for something around 15 years now: Tae Kwon Do, Hapkido, Aikido, Judo, Jujuitsu, Tai Chi, Karate, Ninjutsu... I'm forgetting like 6 more. I'll track down that list I made. My martial arts also includes weapons forms: katana, wakizashi, broadsword, longsword, rapier (I don't like it), saber, hand-and-a-half, shortsword, dagger (many lengths), throwing weapons (knives [I suck at them], shuriken, spikes, ect.), morning star, mace, flail, whip (I'm not too good at that one), chain, kama, nunchaku, sai, staff, spear, polearm, projectile weapons (I can hit my own arrow in the bullseye at 60 feet), and probably some more weapons I cant remember/don't want to take the effort to remember. I know a lot about causing pain.

I also know first aid; I was a Boy Scout for 3 years, and first aid is required for security officers.

If you couldn't tell from some of my earlier posts or my sig, I'm a Christian. As in, really a Christian (most people who claim to be actually aren't). I've chosen Christianity over many of the alternatives after a (less than some) colored youth of studying many religions, including (but not limited to) Wicca, Zoroastrianism, many flavors of so-called Christianity (the actual beliefs of, say, the Mormons are dramatically different than the Jehova's Witnesses, for instance, and most of the branches do not follow the original text at all and tend to teach what the Bible would call "abomination"), and Druidism.

I've been gaming for more than a decade; started with D&D 3rd edition and moved to Shadowrun when I could know right from wrong.

I speak English as my primary language, and know a good amount of German, and can feel my way blindly through a number of other languages like Japanese and Latin. The anime watching helped my Japanese a lot.

Posted by: ShadowPavement Aug 28 2009, 11:13 AM

30 Year old married male and father of a crazy two year old who lives in central Maine. I'm French Canadian by "birth" (I'm adopted) and I'm a physicist by training and physics teacher by trade. I train heavily in Okinowan Goju-Ryu and have been in Bujinkan Ninjutsu and Okinowan Uechi-Ryu for close to 23 years now.

I hunt dear and bear every year as my father is a master guide in both Maine and New Brunswick, and I have a thorough understanding of civilian firearms, but don't own many myself.

Started gaming my freshman year of highschool in D&D and picked up 2nd edition Shadowrun when I ended up transfering to a magnet school for my junior year.

My wife and I are active medieval re-enactors which takes up most of our weekend time and I just started running SR4 this past march after putting SR aside for about 5 years to play Eberron and Star Wars Saga Edition.

Posted by: Freejack Aug 28 2009, 03:04 PM

From: Currently Longmont Colorado, a bit north of Denver. This is my 46th move and I'm 52. Been gaming since I was a kid. Played D&D in 1976. Paranoia, Car Wars, Talisman, and then stumbled upon Shadowrun.

Do: I'm a Senior Unix Admin. The company I work at provides emergency 911 services to about 92% of the US and now Canadian market. So there's a good chance that if you call 911, the PSAP is communicating with a server I manage.

Been mucking with computers since 1979 so I do like what I do

Hobbies: Computers (well yea), motorcycles (just finished a 5,000 road trip that included GenCon; http://www.schelin.org/20090808 ), gaming (all types).

One little note. I'm somewhat picky when I read. I read a lot so when I get to a typo in a book I'm reading, it's like a scab. I keep going back to it and picking at it. I was surprised to receive an e-mail back in January while we were preparing to move asking if I'd like to help with the Shadowrun books. So I've been helping proofread when I get free time. It's cool to help and to see my name in the Proofreading credits in two books so far

Carl

Posted by: deek Aug 28 2009, 05:24 PM

33 year old white male (german/italian descent) born in Fort Lauderdale, FL but have lived in Indiana about 30 years of my life (about 24 of those years in Fort Wayne). I've been married for 5 years, father of two.

I've been gaming since I was about 8 (Intellivision, Atari, Commodore). I got my first taste of role-playing games in the late 80s and have been playing ever since (mostly DnD, but SR1 & SR4 come in a close second). I fell in love with computers in the early 90s and started college with focus in computer science and mathematics. After 12 years, I finally graduated with a business degree in information systems. I've been building and repairing computers since the mid-90s, with a short stint as a freelance programmer. Recently, besides gaming and the occasional favor, computers are just a hobby. I've been working as a software analyst for a life insurance and retirement company the past 8 years.

Besides computers and games, which is somewhat of a common thread with most of my friends, I enjoy reading (classic literature), writing (reviews, short stories and other fiction), photography (film and digital) and most recently, manual typewriters.

I've dabbled in philosophy (both eastern and western), zen buddhism, the Japanese language, woodworking and psychology. All are still secondary interests that I don't spend as much time in as I once did.

Posted by: Ego Mcmahon Aug 28 2009, 06:48 PM

im a 23 year old male living in plymouth, england

ive been playing shadowrun for about 19 months and already have more ways to abuse the rules then 99% of the rest of my team. before that i played dungeons and dragons, world of darkness, marvell.

I've been in and out of work since i left college doing various different things, ive recently started working as a labourer on construction sites. I'm engaged to my partner who i've been with for 18 months and who introduced me to the game. some of you may have seen her round, she goes by cross the medic or something similar.

Posted by: underaneonhalo Aug 28 2009, 07:33 PM

I'm a 28 year old white male and have been in a serious relationship for about 6 years now. I live a bit north of Atlanta, GA in a town called Kennesaw. Yes, the town with the law that all property owners must own a gun. I am a carpenter as well as a painter, drywall installer/finisher, and all around handy kind of guy. Recently I've mostly been doing asphalt sealcoating with my buddy of 20 years because I just really enjoy it. In short I am a general subcontractor. I'm taking a medical transcription course at the moment so that I can work part time from home as well.

I am the product of poor Scottish and Irish immigrants mingling with Native Americans (I am 1/8 Cherokee to be exact) on the outskirts of Savannah. In other words I am a genuine Georgia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cracker_(pejorative).

I started playing Shadowrun in 2nd edition and I love what they've done with 4th. In my free time I play the bass guitar well enough to make people that don't play think I'm pretty hot shit, I also fiddle with the guitar and sometimes drums. Music is the only thing that keeps me sane. I paint miniatures as a hobby these days. I haven't really had the urge to play any of my 40K armies since GW raped my army lists. I'm a certified gunsmith and I love taking machines apart.

With languages I am fluent in Idiot, and fairly competent at English. I speak enough Spanish that I didn't starve to death while staying in Spain for a couple months, and I have an on and off relationship with German. The majority of my actual language experience comes from long term association with friends and family speaking Louisiana Creole and Anglo-Romani.

I'm thinking that in the next few years I'll be moving to southern Tennessee, probably the Red Bank/Signal Mountain area.

Crust Pizza in Red Bank rocks by the way.

Posted by: Aristotle Aug 28 2009, 07:49 PM

I'm a 33 year old caucasian male (250# - 6'3") and citizen of the United States. I grew up in Hanover, PA; but I currently live in Northern VA (Ashburn area). I've played Shadowrun (all editions) since I was about 19. Although I have not played for a few years, mostly for lack of a group.

I previously managed a production team for a company that built high end workstations and servers for extreme environments (i.e. all branches of the armed forces, FEMA, Red Cross, and even formula 1 race teams). I currently work technical support for the Department of Homeland Security.

I'm constantly tinkering with tabletop game mechanics, coming up with plots for campaigns, or designing home-brew game worlds. I spend absurd amounts of time playing World of Warcraft (Horde side on the Earthen Ring server, Guild Name: Assiduous Wake). I'm running the daily heroic as I write this.

I've used the handle 'Aristotle' for years. It was my very first Shadowrun character. A 16 year old decker with a chip on his shoulder, freckles, a mop of curly red hair, and a collection of vintage game consoles). He ran an arcade of sorts on the edge of the barrens. It was more or less neutral territory for local gangs, mostly because Ari's friends (shadowrunners) were kind of imposing and were frequently present. I more commonly go by 'Hildy' elsewhere now. It's a childhood nickname based on my rather long last name.

Posted by: Rad Aug 29 2009, 09:04 AM

Pismo Beach, California, U.S.A.

(Yes, the town mentioned in the Bugs Bunny cartoons--used to be a big Hollywood vacation spot back in the 30's-50's.)

I'm currently co-owner of a small fine art gallery and government teat-sucker on account of the SSI I get due to being disabled. (I have some lingering memory/organizational problems due to psych meds pushed on me in my youth, but I prefer to think of it as protection money from society.)

Never graduated high-school because my transcripts were "lost" by the school district when I changed schools in 11th grade, and I didn't feel like going through all that BS again. (I tested at college level when I was 7, so I was beyond bored at that point.) Did a few months of college before dropping out due to illness, didn't go back due to boredom.

I live on about $1,000 a month, sink about $300 of that into a "job" that only requires me to work one day a month on average and makes absolutely no money, and generally try to keep myself entertained while I wait for the world to burn down.

Posted by: Da9iel Aug 29 2009, 09:39 AM

Hmm. Nothing's changed since the previous thread.

[paste] I'm a failed aero engineer, former airline mechanic, current water treatment plant operator. Oddly enough, while still studying to be an engineer I played a character who was kicked out of college and became a mechanic. Water treatment gets me thinking about shadowrun all the time.[/paste]

Only thing that's changed is now I'm across the river from Fargo, ND, I'm older (35), and have a daughter. I was in Minneapolis, MN for all the previous history.

Posted by: Summerstorm Aug 29 2009, 09:59 AM

Well... i am a 27-year-old german guy living near Wolfenbüttel at the moment. I am trained as an... hm do i have to translate this? Ah lets just say i do computer stuff; low level. But i am on the job hunt now, after i quit college without a degree and did some odd jobs for a year.

I played roleplaying games for... hm about ten years now. Started with Shadowrun (2nd edition) and the Dark Eye. But i LOVE gaming in general (all kinds: tabletop, computer, boardgames, cards... all) so i tried MANY games and designed a few myself. At the moment i am pretty lazy and inactive. But my other hobbies (if someone kicks my ass so i move) are: Martial Arts (I trained mainly Shaolin Kempo Karate, but read/look into more), gaming in all forms (i... WAS... a good chessplayer and play some video games) and i am a media-junkie: I love movies, series, animes, internetproductions and so on.

My main language is german, but all the movies i watch in original (often with english subtitles) improved my english a bit over normal learned-in-school abilities. I now even sometimes curse in english... because it sounds cooler *g*.

Hm. that pretty much all about me.... aside from the dozens of quirks and weird aspects i won't go in detail on *g*.

See ya

Posted by: Demonseed Elite Aug 29 2009, 01:41 PM

Let's see...

I'm 31 years old, born in Queens, NY but currently living in New Hampshire. Got my B.A. in Film at Cornell University after I decided the pre-med program I was in (focused on genetic engineering) was not what I wanted to do with my life. I considered Computer Science, but the Film program was flexible enough that I was able to take half my courses as electives anyway and I focused on web design, programming, and the technology side of film (video production, audio engineering, etc.). Now I am a Multimedia Engineer working for a government-affiliated non-profit doing everything from building websites to designing video-on-demand web portals to shooting video for events. On the side, I've been a freelance writer for Shadowrun, my first gig being pitching Brainscan. I'm recently retired from that after some business-side disagreements with CGL, though I still love the game just as much.

I'm single and have a massive Maine Coon cat named Mocha. I am thoroughly addicted to coffee, love to write, and spend way too much time playing World of Warcraft (Horde side, Scarlet Crusade server). At various points of my life I've learned German, Russian, Japanese, and Mandarin Chinese, but lack of use has made me very rusty in all of them. I secretly wish I could draw or paint and I'd love to go back to school but I have no idea what field I'd pursue at this point.

Posted by: Snow_Fox Aug 29 2009, 01:46 PM

co eds?

Posted by: Demonseed Elite Aug 29 2009, 01:52 PM

QUOTE (Snow_Fox @ Aug 29 2009, 09:46 AM)

co eds?

Posted by: Snow_Fox Aug 29 2009, 01:56 PM

Not according to a b/f I had when I was in college.

Posted by: Krypter Aug 29 2009, 04:47 PM

QUOTE (Demonseed Elite @ Aug 29 2009, 01:41 PM)

Posted by: Lugbûrz Aug 29 2009, 04:47 PM

Nice to meet you all. Fascinating read.

28, male, red-headed, descended from Celts and Gauls. Born and raised on a dairy farm in the Uplands region of Wisconsin. (Owing to this background, I carry a pocketknife at all times.) Grew up as a loner and continue to be one- I've never been in love and am not the least bit sad about it. I have a B.S. in Art. (???!) Currently apprenticing as a restorer of violin-family instruments. Don't play music, but I'd love to. If given the choice, I would play violin/mandolin on an Irish folk group, guitar in a grunge-type rock band, or viol in a baroque ensemble. Seriously. I could go either way. To understand my character, I would invite you to imagine an amalgamation of these characters from books you might have read: Toad of Wind in the Willows, Arthur Dent of Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and Samwise Gamgee/Bilbo Baggins.

Having finally become a tradesman, I have fulfilled one of my life goals. The others are to have some kind of adventure equal to that of my great-grandfather, (who worked a bunch of jobs out west in the late 19th century) to learn to play some kind of musical instrument, to return to the countryside and settle down once my wanderlust has been appeased, and to marry a witch. Like a real one. If any actual witches are reading this, you are hereby authorised to turn me into a crow to prove it. Thanks. Another lasting goal is to continue making everyone's day a little more interesting/bizzare- as if any of you couldn't tell from reading this [truthful] nonsense.

My entry into the world of role-playing games came quite late in my life- 2005 or 2006 or something, and started with the "Serenity" game. Shadowrun 4th is the only Shadowrun I've ever known, which is kind of regrettable in a way- I imagine that I would have an even more special relationship with it if I'd known it longer. *shrug* I play some other games, too, and am gearing up for what will hopefully be a NOT completely failed GMing career.

EDIT: Dagnabbit, forgot that other crap everyone else is mentioning. Studied French, German, Spanish, and forgot it all. Still remember some useless Japanese- don't want to live there, but it would be nice to visit again and look at some more architecture/ceramics. I studied Judo and Brazillian Jiu-Jitsu, liked Judo the best. The Judo club I studied with is now disbanded, but I would drop everything to return if they started again. I've also killed thousands of thistles with a machette. I'm a self-taught adherent to the Luke Skywalker School of Unbridled Flailing.

Posted by: McAllister Aug 29 2009, 04:51 PM

First thought while reading Krypter's post: "Negative Quality: Media Junkie."

Second thought: "You can't write "corgies" without writing "orgies."

Posted by: Krypter Aug 29 2009, 07:58 PM

QUOTE (McAllister @ Aug 29 2009, 11:51 AM)

QUOTE (McAllister @ Aug 29 2009, 11:51 AM)

Posted by: McAllister Aug 29 2009, 08:41 PM

Posted by: Method Aug 29 2009, 10:12 PM

Ewwww...

Posted by: ShimmerGeek Aug 29 2009, 10:48 PM

Hi guys

Though I may aswell introduce myself with my first post!


I started Roleplaying *counts* Uhh, 3 years ago now - when I played in a Cyberpunk one-off, then followed that up a week later by joining an Ex Machina campaign. This led me to select Dark Future as my category at the Roleplaying Nationals that year, and I discovered Shadowrun! Unfortunately, those two one-offs over that weekend have been the only time I've been able to play Shadowrun; however I ran a short campaign that summer (set in Hong Kong) and I'm about to GM a longer campaign starting in a few weeks


Ahem, anyways - that's how I came to be here introducing myself to you lovely people -


I'm a 22 year-old female Computer Games Programming student from Scotland; I Roleplay two or three times a week (currently playing Orpheus and running Nobilis; hopefully I'll soon be playing Unknown Armies, Orpheus and running Shadowrun) - I'm generally geeky in all sorts of ways (Videogames, Boardgames, Cardgames, Roleplaying Games, Gadgets, Reading, Sci-Fi/Supers/Fantasy in all forms... etc. etc.)

Posted by: Chrysalis Aug 29 2009, 11:35 PM

QUOTE (ShimmerGeek @ Aug 30 2009, 12:48 AM)

Posted by: hobgoblin Aug 29 2009, 11:40 PM

allow me to say 29/male/redhead/norway...

beyond that, not much to say really...

Posted by: Synner667 Aug 30 2009, 12:04 AM

Been reading this from the start, and finding it interesting.

so here's my bio...

early 40's London chap, long haired, pierced, green eyed, between 5 1/2 and 6 ft, been roleplaying for about 26 years, started with gamma world, then onto ad&d, then onto call of cthulhu, then onto shadowrun.
everything i buy and every game i run is part of the collage of the things i like - that's the game i wrote rules for, and now it's the only game i run, and i'm having no fun at all putting it down on paper for others to have fun with

i work in london in the music biz, read a lot, love my computer, don't do much in the way of sports, just had a dog die recently, love travelling and hope to do either new zealand or america at some point.

no kids, swedish mother, indian father [that's indian, from india - for you yanks], can be a real pain to be with, am impatient with people who prefer to procrastinate rather than actually do something [though much better than i was], good listener, currently looking to leave my job and start things for myself, like music from sisters of mercy to frank sinatra

i piss people off, i love women in high heels and jeans and a white shirt, i don't drink beer but i do enjoy a bottle of wine while i sit and talk to people and enjoy a good meal.

if you're ever in london, gimme a shout

Posted by: Iduno Aug 30 2009, 01:04 AM

I'm a 27-year-old chemical engineering graduate doing environmental work in the state of South Dakota in the US. That location keeps me from getting in anywhere near as much gaming as I would like.

Hobbies include gaming, making beer, and cooking.

Posted by: Trillinon Aug 30 2009, 02:40 AM

I'm a 27 year old male living in Burien, WA, just south of Seattle. I'm pleased, but not surprised, to see my fellow Washingtonians here. Shadowrun feels like a hometown game to me. In fact, at the Penny Arcade Expo last year, had one of the writers for Wizards of the Coast berate the local gamers who had never played Shadowrun.

I'm a courier for an off-site data storage company and I'm currently starting an RPG company. I'm not married, and have no children, but I do have a wonderful girlfriend.

I speak English and have forgotten more Mandarin Chinese than I ever learned.

I've been playing RPGs since I was about 13, and Shadowrun was my second game, and in my first session had more influence on me than all my D&D games combined. I've also played RIFTS, WoD, numerous homebrews, and Savage Worlds (which is my newest love, though I do feel some guilt at being unfaithful to Shadowrun).

If anyone out there plays D&D, I'd like to make a shoutout to Privateer Press and their Iron Kingdoms setting.

Outside of RPGs, I'm into just about anything geeky. Computers, wargames, Sci-Fi, books, boardgames, videogames, food, firearms, politics, and office supplies are just a few of my nerdities.

Posted by: Method Aug 30 2009, 03:30 AM

Hmm. My wife works in Burien. Might move down there if we end up sticking around these parts (not likely).

Posted by: Tachi Aug 30 2009, 08:27 AM

I'm 30 as of last week, and would like to appologize for posting drunk the day before my b-day. I'm a white, male, redheaded (auburn, not orange) UK mutt with some Dutch and Souix (not enough to do me any damn good in the sun). I'm 5'9" and 200lbs, in pretty good shape except for a small gut, and heavily muscled from growing up on the farm. Also, I'm directly descended from Ben Thompson's (the gunslinger) brother.

I lived in Colorado Springs, Colorado until mid June and now am in the very southwest corner of Kansas (1 mile from Colorado and 22 miles north of Oklahoma) at the farm where I grew up, because it was deserted and someone had to take care of the gas wells and cattle (plus I had just become unemployed when the company I was working for tanked). Though the airable land is all leased out, I keep a pretty good garden, zen moments are very important, they keep me from killing anyone.

I'm attending college at OPSU majoring in CIS with the intention of getting a CISSP (white hat hacker) certification after I graduate. I have an Applied Sciences Gunsmithing degree and a fairly large gun collection. When I'm not studying, greasing welljacks, or doctoring cattle I tend to fire off a lot of ammunition. I read, well, almost everything I can get my hands on. I took TKD as a kid and learned CQC from one of the original 5 Delta Force instructors (Nam, 3rd SOG TLC vet). Also, I used to teach a CQK class, and, inside 20 feet, if you have a gun and I have a knife, I'll usually bet on me. I haven't been in a fight since high school, every violent confrontation I've had in the last 10 years can't be called a fight because I annihilated my attacker in 5 seconds or less each. Yes, that includes the time 6 gang bangers jumped me.

I've been playing RPGs since DnD 2.0 and have been playing SR for about 3 years.

I'm mean, ugly and I carry a gun. I'm a shoot first, shoot later, shoot some more and torture the corpse for information kind of person, but, despite that, I'm a fairly nice guy.

My most recent ex-girlfriend described me as a teddy-bear who just happened to have real teeth and claws.

Oh, yeah, and I'm an athiest Republican.

Posted by: McAllister Aug 30 2009, 08:50 AM

"Auburn, not orange?" Well, aren't you color-conscious! We need more guys who appreciate the different between maroon and burgundy.

And your drunken posting was certainly well-behaved enough to be forgiven, as far as I saw. Carry on.

Posted by: ShimmerGeek Aug 30 2009, 09:21 AM

QUOTE (Chrysalis @ Aug 30 2009, 12:35 AM)

Posted by: Grinder Aug 30 2009, 11:55 AM

Tachi, so you are actually part hermit, part rancher and part Walker, Texas Ranger? Cooool.

Posted by: MYST1C Aug 30 2009, 12:27 PM

So, let's see...

I'm a 30-years old German (with, according to some superficial genealogy, Polish roots on my father's side), living in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braunschweig, second-biggest city of the state of Lower Saxony (~250,000 citizens).

I'm about 180cm tall and weigh about 92kg (yes, I should exercise more - but I'm helplessly lazy, plus my GF is a gourmet-level hobby-chef), blue eyes, dark-blonde hair slightly more than shoulder-length, shoe size 42.
Son of divorced parents (father's a physician, mother's a nurse), brother of two younger siblings.

I'm recently engaged to my GF of ten years (who holds a MA in German linguistics and history and is about to finish a two-year apprenticeship as a TV journalist, camera operator and digital video editor). We actually met through playing RPGs together...

I hold a Diplom (German MSc equivalent) in biology (specifically, microbiology/genetics/zoology) aquired at http://www.tu-braunschweig.de/index.html, Germany's oldest technical university (250+ years), with a thesis on bacterial biodiversity in soil samples done using molecular techniques.
Since May 2008 I've been working as an editor at http://www.schroedel.de/ of Germany's three major publishers of school textbooks, specifically in the high school division's natural sciences department.
My scientific interests are in the fields of biodiversity and evolution research (and I will staunchly discredit "Intelligent Design" as religious garbage whenever possible!).

Besides my native German I speak and read/write English fluently and retain very rusted knowledge in French and Spanish (enough for some very superficial reading) from my school days (9 years of English, 5 years of French and 2 years of Spanish).

I dabbled in taekwondo in my teens and quit with a yellow-green belt after receiving an accidental rib-kick while sparring that left me with intense pain and breathing problems for three weeks. I did a standard 10-months conscript tour in the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_army aged 19-20 where I was trained as gunner on the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopard_1.

I usually wear all-black clothing and love listening to extreme metal music (especially Norwegian-style http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_metal), yet I'm a very extroverted and all-round funny person (with a special fondness for irony, sarcasm and dark humor). I like to present myself as cynical but am in fact a thoroughly positive and ultimately optimistic character.
I'm an avid festival-goer (not surprising as I live in the country with the biggest metal festivals in the world) and can usually be found at http://www.dongopenair.de and http://www.summer-breeze.de/site.php?newlang=english (a smaller, less expensive and all-round better http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacken_Open_Air alternative I cannot recommend enough) every summer.

I'm a scifi fan in general, especially all things Star Trek and Cyberpunk-ish. I've been playing Shadowrun since 1992, originally discovered the game through the novels and the SNES game before finding some guys at my school who played the pen & paper version. I love scifi and horror games (e.g. Call of Chthulhu or KULT), my true RPG love, though I'm a really big SR fan, is Cyberpunk 2020.
I also like boardgames and dabbled in wargaming once (somewhere back at my mother's house sits a half-painted Blood Angels space marine army worth about 3,000 points in WH40K 2nd Edition). I love PC gaming, currently playing GTA: Vice City and Fallout 3 - my all-time favorite is Deus Ex.

I am not a religious person (in fact, I wasn't even baptised - one of the few decisions I actually honestly thank my parents for) yet at some point in my late teens I decided that I wanted a spiritual aspect in my life and, after studying some philisophical schools of thought, arrived at my very own syncretist belief fusing pantheistic, agnostic and some satanist ideas.
Concerning politics I see myself as a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy with some green tint (quite natural for a biologist) and am a proud member of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piratenpartei_Deutschland.

I'm not actually playing SR anymore as I lack a gaming group but I do demo the game at conventions as an offical supporter of the German SR licensee, http://www.pegasus.de. In addition, I recently started freelance proofreading for Pegasus, currently working on the German translation of Runner's Companion.

That should cover it...

Posted by: MusicMan Aug 30 2009, 07:37 PM

I'm an Army Veteran ("disabled") turned musicologist. I do alot of work with obscure music and instruments from 16/17th century Italy. I'm currently living deep in the heart of Texas... but I've never actually stayed in the same place for more than three years... so, yeah.

I started playing RPGs since I was old enough to read. My dad DMed for me and my siblings (now I do). I started with AD&D and play everything from White Wolf to SR to D&D to Paranoia and beyond...

Posted by: Tachi Aug 30 2009, 07:42 PM

QUOTE (Grinder @ Aug 30 2009, 06:55 AM)

Tachi, so you are actually part hermit, part rancher and part Walker, Texas Ranger? Cooool.

Posted by: Grinder Aug 30 2009, 09:57 PM

Tattooed as well? Coooooool (having some tatts myself)

Posted by: Tachi Aug 31 2009, 12:50 AM

QUOTE (Grinder @ Aug 30 2009, 04:57 PM)

Tattooed as well? Coooooool (having some tatts myself)

Posted by: Erl of Ingst Aug 31 2009, 04:35 AM

This is why I say people with red hair should never become motivated. They are as crazy as hell.

I don't mean any offense by that, unless I'm offending myself... is it just me or is there an unnatural amount of redheads who play Shadowrun?

Posted by: Machiavelli Aug 31 2009, 06:30 AM

Im am a redhat as well...and basically you are right about our mental status. So i think i should never come to power....otherwise it could get really nasty for most of the people on the planet.^^

Posted by: BishopMcQ Aug 31 2009, 06:34 AM

I'm only a red head when I let my hair grow out...instead it grows in dark but betrays me at the first hint of sunlight.

Posted by: Hagga Aug 31 2009, 07:03 AM

.

Posted by: Machiavelli Aug 31 2009, 09:48 AM

QUOTE (BishopMcQ @ Aug 31 2009, 07:34 AM)

Posted by: Jame J Aug 31 2009, 12:29 PM

I'm a 29 year old man who's employed as a Crossing guard in Salem (the famous, Massachusetts one), living a couple of towns over. While I have a physical aspect to describe, I'm not going to unless I'm going to game with one of you - privacy thing. Well, I'm dark-brown haired, and I have a redhaird cousin.

Posted by: Krypter Aug 31 2009, 04:12 PM

QUOTE (Erl of Ingst @ Aug 31 2009, 12:35 AM)

Posted by: X-Kalibur Aug 31 2009, 04:21 PM

QUOTE (Krypter @ Aug 31 2009, 11:12 AM)

The "bastard stepchild" thing makes them rebels.

Posted by: Malachi Aug 31 2009, 04:39 PM

I'm from Regina (it's actually on the SR map!) in Canada. I have a degree in Electronic Systems Engineering, with my focus being on computers and how they communicate in a network (wired and wireless). Right now I work as a professional Software Engineer, writing some boring software for local governments here in Canada. In my spare time (when I'm not gaming) I do some contract video game programming and would very much like to make a career out of it some day.

I'm married with two little girls: one is 3 and the other 9 months.

Posted by: Tachi Aug 31 2009, 11:26 PM

QUOTE (Erl of Ingst @ Aug 30 2009, 11:35 PM)

QUOTE (Machiavelli @ Aug 31 2009, 01:30 AM)

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 1 2009, 05:19 PM

hehe, enlightened dictatorships ftw?

Posted by: Tachi Sep 2 2009, 05:59 AM

Damn right. Freedom and justice for everyone, at least, until I run out of ammunition and the socialists finally drag me down.

*draws gun*
"No laying down on the job, I said get in that booth and vote with your logic, bitch!"
"No, they can't have it just because it's the nice thing to do, where would the money come from? I sentence you to 2 years of economics training! You'll get that cut in half for good behavior if you write me a 50 page essay on the value of the free market!"
"What? They're trying to take away your automatic weapons? Here, take this ammunition and handle it, I'm busy."
"Whose jumping the border? Why aren't the automated machine-gun turrets handling it? GREAT SCOTT, what do you mean we don't have automated machine-gun turrets on the borders?!!!!"

Yes, I should definately rule the world.

Posted by: Bladerunner Sep 4 2009, 04:23 AM

I saw this thread and thought I'd pop in here and give a bit about myself for the Shadow community at large.

Just shy of the 30 mark in life. I'm 6'4" with brown hair and hazel eyes (which I attribute to my Greek heritage) I've role played most of my life, since about age twelve (I played Blue Box D&D at age 8, but you can't really count that). The group of friends I grew up with started playing Shadowrun in 93' and played it pretty solid for about seven years. I think what drew me to Shadowrun was the writing of William Gibson. I found an older copy of Burning Chrome at a flea market when I was out shopping one day, and I got hooked pretty quick on his style and thematic prose.

I live just outside the current Chicago land metroplex, with my wife and two children.

In my professional life I work in the digital community as the Vice President of a web design and programming firm. I love working the field and with our client to direct their dream and visions into a digital reality. I blow off work related stream by ventilating KE security with my rigger and playing with drones. Our gaming group is a pretty close knit family that has been gaming together for over a decade, and after seeing so many posts int he past on different sites looking for groups, I know I'm lucky.

I'll stay away from religious and political stances, as it's best to do in good company.

Posted by: Method Sep 4 2009, 05:26 AM

QUOTE (Tachi @ Sep 1 2009, 10:59 PM)

Posted by: ravensmuse Sep 4 2009, 11:01 AM

QUOTE (Jame J @ Aug 31 2009, 07:29 AM)

Posted by: Hocus Pocus Sep 4 2009, 06:45 PM

are any of us truely from somewhere? do we truely do anything? are we the dreamer, or merely a part of someone else's dream?


I'm actually a billionaire, with many hot supermodel girlfriends.

Posted by: Tachi Sep 4 2009, 08:59 PM

QUOTE (Method @ Sep 4 2009, 12:26 AM)

Posted by: X-Kalibur Sep 4 2009, 09:13 PM

QUOTE (Tachi @ Sep 4 2009, 03:59 PM)

Posted by: Shrike30 Sep 5 2009, 02:23 AM

-27yo male from Seattle, born and raised here, don't plan on leaving any time soon 6'1", 195 lbs (about 10 of that I don't need), with the bulk of my size in my legs, torso, and shoulders (having inherited my father's barrel chest and small hands). I'm married, no kids, own a house, and raise chickens for eggs (which amuses my neighbors to no end, as it's a kind of yuppie neighborhood).
-3 years of college, at which point I realized I wasn't interested in a degree in the History and Philosophy of Science. Of all things, I mostly took away from that a solid background in mathematics, chemistry, and physics. I've been working as an Emergency Medical Technician for the better part of three years, and am going back to school to become a Paramedic... who knows, a Bachelor's of Applied Science might only be a couple more years away.
-I was diagnosed with ADHD-Inattentive (basically, all the organizational problems of ADHD without the hyperactivity parts) at 25; every day for me starts with a slow-release dose of amphetamines (which, if I also have a cup of coffee, makes me talk too much). No allergies, no other major medical conditions, one medication that I can't take because it gives me siezures, and one knee that, if I run downhill too long, starts to get sore in the ligaments below the patella (I've never pushed that one far enough to qualify as having a chronic injury, but if it flares up it stays sore for a couple of weeks). At 14, I managed to break my left arm and lose both the fine motor control and all of the sensation in my left hand for about 6 months... now that wrist just gets a little stiff with overuse.
-I can muddle through car repair, computer repair and software troubleshooting, I can wire and rewire a house, do plumbing and carpentry, and teach myself to do almost anything else that involves using my hands, as long as I can get my hands on books about it. I've worked in office environments doing scutwork, data entry, file management, and logistics support... and found that working in an office long-term is something I just can't do
-I'm fast and accurate with handguns, a fair shot (but not fast) with shotguns and rifles, and I studied Aikido for a couple of years (mostly learning how to land without breaking and how to lock joints and pin people... throws were not my strong point). I can drive a 7 ton ambulance through downtown city streets, through red lights, off-road through bad terrain, and into oncoming traffic, and haven't wrecked yet. I've placed nationally rowing (the long, skinny racing boats that look like water bugs), but it's been a decade since I stepped into a shell.
-I've hiked and survived in most conditions between the New Mexico high desert in August and a snowstorm on Mt. Rainier at -15 F (roughly -25 C), and I've managed to get through 3 years as an EMT in North Seattle and Everett without some meth-head deciding I looked like a pushover. Environmental skills, both
-I can tend bar, play piano and trumpet, and speak just enough Spanish and Russian to get myself in trouble without actually being able to effectively communicate.

I'm always a bit surprised to see how many other people on Dumpshock live locally to Seattle. I've always figured it had something to do with home-field advantage.

Posted by: Kumo Sep 5 2009, 11:43 PM

Really interesting people here...
I'm 27, male, single.
I'm Polish, living in Lublin (south-eastern Poland). I'm Catholic, but I also believe in reincarnation, spirits of nature, Tao... and some other things. And I REALLY don't have any problem with it - all that things fit like a cool set of puzzle . And I dislike these pesky catholic (or other) fundamentalists.
I own a herbal shop and also practice some kinds of natural medicine. I also use I Cing, runes, occasionally Tarot.
And I must start to work uot a bit... I'm not overweight, but my body starts to revolt against sedentary lifestyle.
I speak Polish, English (not fluent, but I hope You understand what I post here) and a bit German.

RPG: sadly, I never had enough time to play as often as I would. I started with Warhammer 12 years ago, later played L5R and a bit of oWoD Mage. My first Shadowrun was 2ed; I loved this universe, despite terrible Polish edition (one of first RPGs translated to Polish). Now my favourite is fourth edition. Oh, I also like boardgames, good books and movies... but I don't watch TV. 90% of it was a waste of time.

Posted by: tweak Sep 6 2009, 06:33 PM

I'm a 33 year old male, 5'9", 165 lbs.

I started roleplaying in '87 with first edition D&D. I spent half a decade playing the oWOD stuff until it went to shit. During that time, I also played Shadowrun (2nd), Rifts, and anything cool I could find at GEN CON. In the summer months, I played Battletech. Now, my main interests are SR4, Advanced Squad Leader, and Battletech.

In my spare time, I practice Aikido and shoot at the local gun range. So I'll probably bump into some of the other Aikido folk here at some seminars next year -- probably gonna hit up the one in Dallas.

For work, I'm the jack of all trades. I work as an analyst doing overall business analysis as well as software development as needed. I look at Marketing, Pricing, Risk Management, and I will write code to deploy new strategies. I know C, x86 Assembly, C++, R, SQL, and I'll even do some .NET stuff as needed.

Politically, I'm FTW.

Posted by: SincereAgape Oct 8 2009, 04:40 AM

Stumbled upon this thread a few weeks ago. I had originally abstained from posting, despite reading so many interesting biographies about various people who visit this community. This post will serve as a bump for those who missed this thread originally, or are just coming back to Dumpshock for a visit or to say hello.

Well. I work in a city called Hackensack in Northern New Jersey. Which is about thirty minutes from New York City. I do not go into the city as much as I used to, but it is always nice to know that I can hop aboard a bus or a train to avoid psychotic traffic and travel to a city full of culture and diversity. I grew up in a suburb around Baltimore Maryland, living the life of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer combined with reading and TRADING comic books, watching 80s movies, and watching a lot of Saturday morning cartoons (best child hood ever), before moving to a town outside of Chicago, IL. Moved out to New Jersey for college and have lived here for the past eight years. (Ugh has it been that long!)

Professionally I am a Social Worker, specializing in working with the mental illness population around the North New Jersey area. I provide counseling services in addition to setting up benefits for my clients. I spend half of my work week in the community, and therefore have the opportunity to interact and socialize with a lot of different people. Our clinical team is great, and we all work together very well. The benefits are good, but the money is not. There has to be a trade off. No one day is the same, and I love the fact that I am constantly on the go, and can experience an increased amount of stress at any given moment of the day (Stress gets the blood flowing the emotions stirring).

Personally, most of my life has been a different story. I suffer from Bi-polar II disorder, and was not properly diagnosed until early 2007. Therefore my life has been full of ups and downs, as I have experienced many rollar coasters and a lack of long term stability. I have been working since I was 14, my first job delivering news papers, and then becoming a supermarket cashier. Over the years I have worked in retail, security, as a marketing strategist, a journalist (No pay.), and as a EMT. One of my proudest achievements was paying for college on my own and not having any student loans to pay off after graduation. I also suffer from minor dyslexia, as it takes me forever to read anything off the computer and a long time to read from a book. Regardless I enjoy writing in my hand written letters and posting on forums like dumpshock.

Interests wise, I have so many. Music, sports, poetry, poker, reading, playing video games, hiking, biking, running. You name it I have tried it. My biggest claim to fame at the moment is being a practitioner of Muay Thai kickboxing for the past four years. I have trained at two fight camps, and have broken both of my hands. I use my geekery to work as a coach and a trainer for other fighters, after losing two amateur fights in 2006 and 2007. At the present moment I train at a kickboxing fitness gym, and serve as a part time fill in coach when the need arises. I am in the process of scouting Mixed Martial Arts Gyms in the local area, with the plans to join one if the prices are reasonable. In the future I want to coach basketball, soccer, or softball for kids or the developmental disabilities population.

Over the years I have dabbled the arts such as photography, and music. But I lacked the desire and heart to pursue those. I have come to the conclusion that I am a laborer and not an artist. If I had one had one wish in the world, I would wish to be a writer. That being said, I love working, and I love sweating. I love sports and anything that has to do with using my body. Religion has played a big factor into my life, and I have been away from mine for a long time. I have a vivid imagination and have been a fan of Roleplaying for a long time. Sadly, I spent a year of my life playing Cit of Heroes and am a 'recognizable' person on the Virtue server. Sad. Sad. Sad. But full of good memories, and I had the opportunity to make a lot of new friends from various places in the world. Many of whom I have met and talked to.

If my short time on Dumpshock has taught me anything, is that this is a community full of intelligent people, and filled with very creative minds and excellent writers. Overall it's a good community, one that is alive and active. Although it can be a bit negative at times, I wouldn't change the overall population at all.

Posted by: milk ducks Oct 8 2009, 04:55 AM

25 year old american musician. Married an australian girl, moved down there for a few years before moving back to start a family. Our son is just over a month old now. Aaand, wow, you'd think there'd be more to talk about.

love,
nathan.

Posted by: Metapunk Oct 8 2009, 10:42 AM

I am 20 years old, living in Denmark, still attending highschool, my third and last year:D before I went to high school I was at a circus school
I dont have a job at this time. I am not that strong in how to measure my height in feet and all that so you get it is plain metres, I am 1.74 metres.
I am trying to grow a goatee to match my long hair:P
For hobbies I am doing freerunning, acrobatics, juggling, double acrobatics and ofc RPG.
I have been playing Rpg for around, I think, 8-9 years now, but only 1 year with Shadowrun:( two of the years I was teaching RPG to young people as a job.

Nice to meet you all:)

Posted by: ravensmuse Oct 8 2009, 11:17 AM

QUOTE (SincereAgape @ Oct 7 2009, 11:40 PM)

Posted by: darthmord Oct 8 2009, 01:34 PM

Well, gotta add my entry...

I'm a 34 year old male. I stand 6'2" tall and 230 lbs in weight. I have brown hair (with hints of gold & blonde) & grey-blue eyes. My wife & I have been married 14 years as of July of this year. We have four daughters ranging in age from 13 to 2. Like some others here, we have an atypical marriage. We are strongly committed to one another but engage in.. ahem, recreational activities with certain friends of ours.

I speak fluent American English, not the slang and other degradations visited upon our language. I also pronounce words how they are spelled. Thus Norfolk is 'Nor-Folk' not 'Nawfawk'. I can read Spanish and French enough to understand what is being said but my ability to speak both languages is lacking. I can at least relate basic concepts in Spanish though.

I'm originally from a little town in NW Ohio but have since moved all over the eastern portion of the US due to being Navy for a while. It's how I met my wife. I now live in Norfolk VA.

As for gaming, I've been an avid player of RPGs ever since Battletech 1st Edition. I started playing that when I was in 7th grade (back in '87). Have played D&D from 1st through 3.5, SR from 1st through 4th plus a smattering of other games over time (various Star wars, Star Trek, Renegade Legion, etc).

Over the last couple of years I've become a bit of a firearms enthusiast, mainly in the target shooting aspect.

Professionally, I'm a Network Engineer / System Admin / Computer Tech / Jack-of-all-Trades. I work for a major megacorporation / defense contractor. My current position is in software development of a GOTS patching mechanism for very low-bandwidth systems. I maintain our software with monthly updates.

Posted by: Warlordtheft Oct 8 2009, 04:43 PM

QUOTE (Tachi @ Sep 2 2009, 01:59 AM)

Posted by: Seriphen Oct 8 2009, 08:35 PM

I'll add my entry.

I'm 25 and live in Clearfield, Utah. About 20 north of Salt Lake City. I have lived in Utah my entire life but with a previous job spent a year traveling around the country. I was a Network Tech for the city of Salt Lake untill two months ago. I have been gaming for quite a while now but don't get much time to play. I have played D&D, GURPS, and Shadowrun mostly. Also like to play Battletech when I get a chance. I have a Associates Degree from Weber State University and am still attending classes trying to finish my Bachelors in CS: Network and Security Administration. I am married with a 1 yr old son.

Posted by: SincereAgape Oct 8 2009, 09:13 PM

QUOTE (ravensmuse @ Oct 8 2009, 06:17 AM)

Huh. I credential in the NY / NJ area. Wonder if I've ever done you, lol.

I love working with behavioral health people, because they are the nicest providers that you can talk to (when you can catch them). Most of them will take the time to talk things over with you and are generally on the ball when it comes to sending things in. Ya'll just need to get some fax machines though

Posted by: darthmord Oct 16 2009, 07:26 PM

/casts thread necromancy

Having read all the way through this thread, I'm kinda amazed at the wide breadth of people and the walks of life we all come from.

It's neat reading a bit about some of the posters here.

Best of all, one of the folks who posted lives near me and we may be getting a local game going.

Posted by: Cheshyr Oct 16 2009, 07:40 PM

30 male
Electronics R&D
was from Seattle, and will be going back. Presently in Philly, PA.

I picked up D&D from my friend Mike back in 1993-ish. He's been playing longer, and is generally a better gamer. Shadowrun was appealing, but I rarely got to play due to lack of interest among my social groups. Ended up DMing 2nd and 3rd edition D&D for about a decade. Glad to be able to finally play a continuous game of Shadowrun.

Posted by: Fezig Oct 16 2009, 08:30 PM

I'm a 22 year old childcare provider, going to school to become an elementary school teacher. For a time I was going for a History degree, but I wanted a paycheck sooner and I've always loved education. I live in the Seattle area, and have for my entire life. I began PnP gaming when I was in grade school at first with my brother and later with a few friends. It is the one chance I get to both unwind and socialize in my busy schedule, and I really love getting to unleash my creative side at the same time.

I have a large retro game collection that my girlfriend doesn't try and take away (she actually loves the nostalgia of having all my SNES games around), I read history and philosophy as well as some good sci-fi/fantasy/punk/whatev fiction, and I am really into sports and classic cars. I currently own a 1968 Malibu and a 1964 Falcon that I'd love to fix up when I have the money. For now though, they are reliable daily drivers for me.

Posted by: cndblank Oct 16 2009, 08:31 PM

Dallas, Corp IT drone, married white male, been running SR since I picked up the 1st edition at Gencon.

Posted by: Phatom Oct 17 2009, 01:07 AM

33 born and raised in Montana with a Irish, British, Scotland, German, and Scandinavian descent, Brown eyes, dark brown hair( looks black), 5'10" 135 pounds, other then play SR 3rd over AIM I go fishing, hikeing, camping, and reading Sci-fi and fantasy books other then that I live a rather boring life unlike you all

Posted by: NeoSilver Oct 17 2009, 06:17 AM

24 years old, with the lousy luck to be stuck between jobs right now. Previous employment was for a telephone answering service; I worked the graveyard shifts on weekends. (Essentially I took messages for various business and services after they closed.) Well versed in human interaction, database entry work. I happen to hail from Walla Walla, Washington. Well-versed in SR3, though my introduction to it was the SNES game years ago

I'm also one of the newer (If not the newest) members here. So yeah: Hi.

Posted by: Triggerz Oct 17 2009, 06:18 AM

Are we all old teenagers? Hmmm... I feel like I'm getting old. Recently turned 30. From Quebec, Canada. I speak French, English, a tiny bit of Korean, and a few words of Spanish, Latin and Japanese. I've studied a bunch of things and have a master's in economics. I currently work as an English teacher in Seoul, South Korea.

EDIT: I'm a guy. French roots, although my family's been living in Quebec for centuries.

Posted by: Zak Oct 17 2009, 09:10 AM

Alright, let's chip in.
I'm a 29 year old guy currently living in Frankfurt, Germany. Finished University a year ago and am running a night club right now. Speaking german, english, some spanish, french and indonesian. ProbablyHopefully moving to Paris soon for a job at a research facility.

Playing this game since im 12 or 13 and I am currently active in 3 irregular SR groups and another one playing Vampire. Used to play miniature games, but quit a few years ago mainly due to time and money reasons.

Posted by: Red-ROM Oct 17 2009, 12:12 PM

Its crazy, everyone on here is about 30 years old. i mean, theres some exceptions, but still, pretty interesting

Posted by: Prime Mover Oct 17 2009, 01:15 PM

Male, Austrian/German, 39, married/father of 3 (Ages 10 months to 17 years) and long time employee of local hospital.

Live in the U.S. North Central Pa the woodsy part.

Been gaming since 83 (Club in high school, they handed me my first set of dice and we started making charecters and somthing clicked inside. It was like finding you had a destiny after all. Been running games ever since.)

Played and or own dozens of games but only a few last beyond there introductory phase. Shadowrun was one of the few and somthing I've been running since first edition with a long break during third edition.

Political views: Jaded
Religion: Irony

Posted by: Backgammon Oct 17 2009, 01:52 PM

Currently 27 but my age has been known to change over time.

French Canadian living in Montreal, though I speak about 50/50 english and french most of the time. I'm married to an extremely hot polish-canadian girl that I adore, which is basically my greatest accomplishment. My second biggest accomplishment is my career. I'm a Software Engineer working as Senior Consultant for an IT consultancy firm, specifically working with ERP systems (Netsuite to be very specific). Through my time as a consultant, I've learned accounting, business management, inventory management and enough stuff to basically tell you how a company works from a to z. Internally, I partially manage a growing team of 5 consultants. I'm basically a social geek, really.

My hobbies are writting, Shadowrun (I play no other RPG, except I now have an interest in Eclipse Phase I intend to develop), reading, XBOX, capoeira and I've recently rekindled my interest in Warhammer (bought an empire army. Ebay is my new god). I'm involved with the Shadowrun Mission gang and got to wrote part of the Manhattan e-book, which was an awesome experience. I love to cook. I do NOT bake. I have a partial interest in fashion - when I buy clothes, I buy nice shit, but otherwise don't think too much about it.

Posted by: Cthulhudreams Oct 17 2009, 02:11 PM

I'm a 26 year old Australian - of Irish descent, but I was born on a military base in Malaysia which causes endless problems. I speak english and schoolboy french, but I've been told before that I sound like Steve Erwin trying to speak french when I do try I did an IT - related degree at the Australian national university, but I do not enjoy programming, so I've been trying to change careers.

I live in Canberra, which is a small country town.. and also the capital of Australia so full of public servants and the primary industry is government. I cannot stand doing one thing for protracted periods of time, so I currently work for a Big 4 accounting firm doing management consulting. Obviously I work mostly for government clients. I play computer games competitively - TF2 mostly, working on getting a Heros of Newerth team together.

Posted by: CynthiaCM Oct 17 2009, 05:48 PM

I'm Cynthia Celeste Miller and I live in Parsons, Kansas (the cultural armpit of the universe). I'm the president of a small press game company called http://www.spectrum-games.com (responsible for such games as Cartoon Action Hour: Season 2 and Slasher Flick). I also do freelancing as a graphic designer and game designer. Another major activity I partake in is playing drums in a thrash/death metal band called http://www.myspace.com/slayground.

Hobbies include RPGs (duh!), miniatures games, terrain building, ghost hunting, death metal music, pro wrestling history (1890s-1980s), vintage comicbooks, 1980s action cartoons, H.P. Lovecraft and watching horror movies.

Posted by: AJCarrington Oct 17 2009, 09:29 PM

Just turned 39 and currently living in York, PA USA. I'm Canadian and have been living in the US for the past 2 years with my wife, 3 girls, 2 dogs and 3 cats...yep, pretty much working on my own version of the ark.

Senior management with international corp.

Cut my teeth on classic Avalon Hill games such as Squad Leader and Panzerblitz and was introduced to RPGs back in middle school. This lead to miniature games. Have been playing and collecting games/miniatures pretty steadily since the mid-80s. Have played/followed Shadowrun since 1st Ed - still think that it sets the standard for integrating fluff/setting/rules.

Currently time is my biggest nemesis - never seem to be able to balance family and work well enough to find time to hook up with a regular gaming group - will eventually connect with a PbP game or two.

AJC

Posted by: ravensoracle Oct 18 2009, 03:10 PM

I'm 29 and currently living in the middle of the woods near Fredonia, KS (Not to far from CelesteCM in fact. And I do agree this is the cultural armpit of the world.) I live with my gorgeous wife, 3 girls (all knockouts, Dad's worst nightmare let me tell you. ), 2 dogs, a cat and about twenty dear living somewhere on the property.

I've currently gave the finger to the rat race and moved to the country about 6 months ago. I used to work as a field service engineer on medical imaging equipment; meaning MRI's, CT's and various other devices that make you glow in the dark. But I sold the house in the city paid off all the bills and debt. Now I live a comfortable country life in early retirement, paying the bills working as a part time handyman. I get to enjoy volunteering time to help out other disabled Vet's like myself and all my numerous hobbies.

Of which, my hobbies include riding my motorcycle, taking the boat out on the lake, playing with the kids, hunting, fishing, just started blacksmithing, rebuilding vintage electronics, computer games, reading any book I can get my hands on, and Roleplaying.

First gaming experience was GM'ing a old Mage game. Then I moved on to GM'ing an assortment of others including 2nd thru 4th ed SR. I have only rarely been allowed to actually be a player in any game, but my favorite is SR.

Posted by: Tymeaus Jalynsfein Oct 18 2009, 04:40 PM

Well... Here goes...

I am 42, 6'1" and 205 pounds... Blue Eyes... Would have blond hair, but I still maintain my High and Tight Flattop from my military days... I live in Aurora, Colorado, in a lovely house with my lovely wife (of 8 years), a 4 year old son, 3 cats and 3 dogs...

I started gaming in 1987 durign my 8 year stint with the US MArine Corps. Traveled throughout the world, spent time in Great Britain, Europe, Japan, Korea, Phillipines, Central America and various other places...

I am of Scott/Irish descent (not sure how I ended up with Blond Hair and Blue Eyes... seems more German to me), and I speak English with an understanding of Latin, Spanish, Japanese, and a little Korean... at least enough to get in trouble with anyway...

I am an avid Gun Nut and have been shooting since I was a wee lad of 3... have experience with all sorts of weapons, up to and including small missile systems, mostly learned in the Marine Corps. I have been trained in Hand-to-Hand combat of various styles, demolitions, Honed my weapon skills (Mortars, machine guns, sniper, pistols, sword, bayonet, Knife, etc), Communications technology, Counter-terrorism, Mountain Climbing and Mountain Warfare, wilderness survival (including Jungle, Cold Weather, and Desert Survival), and a various multitude of ways to kill someone (I was a very diversified Grunt in the Corps)...

I spent a year as a Security Guard in Texas after my release from teh Marine Corps before I went to University.

I spent many years at the University of Texas in San Antonio (where I grew up) studying for my BA in Humanities with a Minor in Computer Science (God I hate programming and Math)... and I currently work as a System Administrator for a Leading Payroll AA MegaCorp...

Other Hobbies include an avid interest in COmputers (have been tinkering with them since 1981) and a one-time obsession with photography (any and all types, but specifically in figure and nude studies)...

I have played games from 1st Edition D&D through Starwars, Rifts (love the World, Hate the System), Hero (Champions and their Ilk), White Wolf OWOD (1st Edition through the End of Days), White Wolf NWOD (Changeling, Vampire, Hunter and Werewolf), and currently (when it is my turn) run variations of either NWOD Vampire, Feng Shui (Star Wars Adaptation), or a D&D/Black Company Fantasy Customized Campaign that I have bneen running since 1990... I have been into Shadowrun since its inception and currently LOVE the new edition...

I tend to play twice a week... Shadowrun on Fridays (withouth my Wife) and Earthdawn on Sundays (with my Wife)... after the Footbal Season (when the current GM on SUndays switches), I will again take up the mantle of Gamemaster on Sundays for either the Vampire, Star Wars or Fantasy Game, as we have been switching off GM's every quarter or so over the last 2 years...

Keep the Faith Everyone...

Posted by: exSaint Oct 18 2009, 07:24 PM

I'm a 23 (24 next month) year old scrawny white kid who, aside from lack of acne and copius amounts of facial hair, still looks like he's in high school. I've got green eyes and short brown hair. I have zero tattoos and zero piercings. I'm 5'10 and ~130lbs. If most of you saw what I ate on a weekly basis, you'd hate me.

I'm shocked at that lack of Canadian representation (I saw two others that live in Canada, and another two that grew up/were born in Canada and moved). I live in 'the other London', in Ontario, with my girlfriend, two cats: one fat + grumpy cat and the other friendly and playful (almost to a fault). I'd like to get a bearded dragon in the near future.

I'm a roadside assistance provider - I dispatch tow trucks - in a call centre. I hate it only slightly less than I hate school. Ideally, I'd like to be selling cars.

I started roleplaying D&D 3.0 when I was 14 - a guy in my homeroom told me some stories about a few of his buddies playing D&D 2.0 and I switched them over to 3.0. I still to this day do not understand D&D 1 or 2. I started playing online shortly after meeting one of my best friends in real life (from Osh Kosh WI) the following year. This core group followed D&D from 3 to 3.5 to 4 where we realized D&D 4 was.. not good. Somewhere in there one of us stumbled across Shadowrun 4E and a few of us started playing that. It was about this time that I realized D&D was just not as good a system as Shadowrun. I'd like to thank Shadowrun for thoroughly ruining D&D for me.

(as a side note, I typically visit my American friend two-three times a year where we play 'weekend' games - if anyone in the Milwaukee area is interested, you could PM me)

I joined here some two years ago and was relatively inactive. I played in a short lived game my current GM was running then (well, it was short lived for me) and went dormant for 18 months or so. My thirst for roleplaying was never satisfied, and I've come back - now more active (I mainly just read threads).

I don't have any fascinating Shadowrun applicable skills, except for the fact that I have a good understanding of how a vehicle runs (internal combustion engines and hybrid systems). I speak English well and high school French poorly. I eat, sleep and breath hockey despite the fact I can't skate (I do play ball hockey in a league).

I soon plan on getting a car (again) so I would travel for an IRL game.

I'm a competition junkie and cannot stand losing to cheaters. I don't mind losing a fair game.

I enjoyed real time strategy, racing and first/third person shooters.

Other random facts:
- favourite color is orange
- I love Nibs
- I don't understand fads
- I can't cook but I can bake (I make delicious chocolate chip cookies)
- I love sleeping
- I hate getting wet and I positively loathe snow
- I think Pepsi is superior to Coca Cola and I can tell the difference

Posted by: Borbag Oct 19 2009, 12:27 AM

Talk about diversity... i really should read the whole thread.
well then, i'm 23, male, single and turkish (or rather, istanbulian, considering the city is larger than a small european country). 1.77 meters long with 74 kg mass. that should be one inch shorter than 6 feet and ~150 lbs? freaking imperial units...
brown eyes, brown-reddish hair... usual stock options really, aside from the fact that my hair is really long (reaching towards the waist area).
I'm an economics major and still in school (mba). i worked as an accountant for a year, and i really hope i won't need to be an accountant ever again. i can speak english pretty well, understand some german, fake french and imitate japanese.
i got conned into playing when i was 15 (they said it was very similar to diablo) with d&d 2nd edition, continued with 3rd. then came university years and i learned that there actually are other games/systems/worlds out there. then my curiosity overtook... after years of research, conventions and lots of forcing peo i can count around 30 seperate systems (name&concept only) on top of my head. i played planescape, dark sun, forgetten realms (peer pressure), ravenloft (mask of the red death)alternity and star wars from the d20 family, every single old WOD games (funny thing, all of them were convention games = i played once or twice each), all sorts of GURPS, Toon, Battletech, Arcanum (home made system), Fallout pnp, Shadowrun (4th only), Legend of the Five Rings. Jack of all trades, master of some i can gm generic d20, planescape, fallout, gurps, feng shui and shadowrun. i'm pretty new to feng-shui and shadowrun. feng-shui is pretty easy but shadowrun... oh boy.
before you say anything, yes, i have a life. works like this: borbag come across interesting game. borbag like. borbag download. borbag read some. borbag find suitable victim. borbag markets game. borbag troll the victim until he/she gms the aforementioned game. unfortunatelly most of these games are short-lived, hence the list. still, better than nothing.
right now i'm playing legend of five rings, and recently started playing shadowrun (i'm the GM).
now comes the fun part. back in 2007, i played my first (and only) shadowrun as a player at a convention. that particular gm somehow vanished, and other than him there are no other GMs. no. one. whatsoever. as far as i know, I'm the only Shadowrun GM in Turkey. If anyone knows about shadowrun, that's because i told them. the good thing is, i can make up rules because no one knows anyway
i believe frp is a game rather than a reality simulation; any rule that takes more time than the action itself (like doing math for 5 minutes for tying shoelaces) should be ignored; irrational behaviour should have consequences, violance can be pretty awesome if sufficiently roleplayed(don't say "i hit with my sword", get creative!) and gms with god complex should be reminded that players exist in real life and are perfectly capable of beating the crap out of said gm.
also, i would rather roleplay a lizard brain in a jar than spend the whole session rollplaying.

Posted by: toturi Oct 19 2009, 12:30 AM

QUOTE (Borbag @ Oct 19 2009, 08:27 AM)

Posted by: Nol Oct 19 2009, 06:05 AM

I've lurked here for quite awhile, figured I'd actually register an account to post here (So, hi).

I'm from Pennsylvania, USA, and compared to the rest of you I'm quite a youngster, only 18. Been player paper/pencil RPGs since I was twelve (Yeah, really).

Currently I'm in college doing a double major of Philosophy and Computer Science. I actually have a good deal of SR-related skills and background knowledge - hotwiring, lockpicking, reverse engineering, exploit development, programming (I would totally be the team's combat hacker), and something I'll save for later on in this post.

I'm quite a (post)cyberpunk junkie - I've read both the Sprawl and Bridge trilogies by Gibson, along with Snow Crash and Diamond Age, and I love Ghost in the Shell, Serial Experiments Lain, Ergo Proxy, the entire Matrix Trilogy, Blade Runner, and a good amount of mildly obscure movies (Avalon, Brazil, Cypher, etc). I usually GM, and probably due to me starting out in 4e and having a Postcyberpunk background, I tend to not view or run the SR world as a dystopia.

Here's a fun fact: in terms of spirituality (and I would like to note this is one of the few places that will actually have some idea of what I'm talking about) I follow chaos magick with a Qabalistic slant.

Posted by: pbangarth Oct 19 2009, 06:25 AM

I might as well raise the average age a bit. I'm 56, and started playing the first Dungeons & Dragons (before it got 'advanced') 31 years ago. I've played many, many RPGs and found none I like better than Shadowrun, which I have played all of its 20 years. I am a Canadian, and have lived most of my life in Southern Ontario (yes, including London). Toronto is my home, in many senses of that word, but currently I live in Whitecourt, Alberta, 2 hours by car northwest of Edmonton, in the middle of the forest where it gets really, really cold in winter.

I've been in the military. I've done martial arts. I was a computer programmer for many years, but my heart was never in it. I made the big mid-life realization while sitting by a cold stream in the Andes mountains. I went back to school when I was 42 to study Archaeology. Undergraduate Anthropology, Master's in Bioarchaeology, and I'm just finishing my doctorate in Archaeology now. The doctorate will be my fifth post-secondary degree. No more school. Ever.

My first role playing character was a Fighter named Trund. He made it through the cavern system and out the opening with one hit point left. Yes, I have lived that legend: a falling rock killed him. The DM was my first wife. A college counsellor with an uncanny ability to see into people within minutes. Except me. We have a daughter, a fine percussionist who is in Liverpool, England and is about to start her doctorate in Popular Music Studies. Awesome.

My second wife writes magical fiction for young adults. She made the most complete, compelling and thunderingly alive world for AD&D I have ever seen. Best acting I ever did was in that game. You guys in Shadowrun HQ could use a talent like hers. Her daughter, my stepdaughter, is in Victoria, British Columbia. She writes, too, and has a great job writing story lines for video games. More awesomeness.

My third wife and I live in Toronto, except for the latest bit in Alberta. She plays Shadowrun... because I do. She likes it fine except when a game drags on for hours and hours. Four is her limit of tolerance. After that, I start paying, in blood or worse. She knows half the jazz musicians in Toronto. She has a doctorate in Education and is testing her theories out on unsuspecting teachers in Whitecourt. Last time I whispered sweet nothings in her ear, she said, "Fuck off. Get a job." This one is a keeper.

I spent the summer and continue now into the fall writing my too-long delayed dissertation in a cabin in the woods on an island in Georgian Bay, part of the Great Lakes. All by myself except for our two border collies and the innumerable rodents in the forest around us. The dogs chase rodents all day long, and I am getting some good writing done. Soon... soon it will be over. Then I will be back to the adventure: climbing mountains in Peru, finding lost cities where my satellite photos say they are. Now if only my knees hold out long enough.

Posted by: exSaint Oct 19 2009, 02:56 PM

QUOTE (pbangarth @ Oct 19 2009, 01:25 AM)

Posted by: pbangarth Oct 19 2009, 02:58 PM

No, Christian Island. One of the biggest islands in the Great Lakes, but hardly anyone knows of it. Just off the peninsula with Penetanguishene and Midland. I've been through Southampton.

EDIT: Hey! This post made me a Neophyte Runner! Woohoo!

Posted by: Adarael Oct 19 2009, 04:23 PM

QUOTE (CynthiaCM @ Oct 17 2009, 10:48 AM)

Posted by: Tiny Deev Oct 19 2009, 05:19 PM

Hello hello.

My name is Robin, and I live in The Netherlands. I'm 18 years old, and a student. I'm planning on ending up becoming a Game Developer/ Programmer. I've done most sports out there for about a week or more. I consider myself a gamer because its probably what I do most. I play a LOT of computer games. I've taught myself how to draw, because I always wanted to impress people (read: impress girls). And how better to impress a girl then to quickly draw her a rose? Lately I've picked up writing short stories, which I enjoy a lot. I feel that Shadowrun has helped me develop my creative writing skill.
I've started Shadowrun a few months ago. Before that I played a small roll in a DnD campaign. Boths games were/are run by my brother, Dennis (Dv8).

Posted by: tete Oct 19 2009, 06:05 PM

I'm 31 male married (to a gamer no less) enjoy a ton of rpgs, boardgames, video games etc. I live in Seattle Washington USA. I'm a Contract Network Administrator for the Government.

Posted by: Tachi Oct 19 2009, 06:24 PM

@tete
*Holds up fingers in a cross*
Back G-man! Back I say! Damn, never have a stake and mallet when I need one.

Posted by: caul Oct 19 2009, 06:34 PM

I'm 33, married, no kids, I'm the lead trainer for an organization that offers support to people with developmental disabilities, and I live in Missouri.

Posted by: tete Oct 19 2009, 08:22 PM

QUOTE (Tachi @ Oct 19 2009, 06:24 PM)

@tete
*Holds up fingers in a cross*
Back G-man! Back I say! Damn, never have a stake and mallet when I need one.

Posted by: hobgoblin Oct 19 2009, 08:26 PM

QUOTE (Tachi @ Oct 19 2009, 08:24 PM)

@tete
*Holds up fingers in a cross*
Back G-man! Back I say! Damn, never have a stake and mallet when I need one.

Posted by: Tachi Oct 21 2009, 02:03 AM

QUOTE (tete @ Oct 19 2009, 03:22 PM)

I'm not the guy who reads your email

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Oct 19 2009, 03:26 PM)

Posted by: Ayeohx Oct 21 2009, 04:45 AM

Sweet thread!!! Really makes me feel a bit more connected.

I'm 34, 6'2", and 400 lbs of awesome.

I work in a freezing server room for the State of Utah.

I've been playing SR since 1989 when my friend stole his first roleplaying game.

I was shut in as a child and I developed all sorts of social related issues. Worked through most of it but crowds still freak me out.

Christianity screwed me up as a kid so I'm agnostic now. If you want to be agnostic too Google "The Brick Testament" and "The Skeptics Bible". See you in hell!

I got a girlfriend (over 6 years now). Guess we're common-law now but I'm not going to 'fess up to it.

I was once one of the best computer repair techs in Utah till my store closed down. Now my skills go to waste. So sad.

My arm/hand nerves are fried, RSI and a bunch of other related issues. Hurts to type but I still do it. I had my nerve surgically moved, helped a bit but still jacked. Can't play the guitar or bass anymore. Can't play computer games anymore (I was a hell of a sniper) but I can still play the 360.

Posted by: Joe Chummer Oct 22 2009, 01:02 AM

I'm 30, male (and although I'm straight, a lot of my friends say I'm a "lesbian." Make of that what you will), and an IT technician from Ohio (birthplace of aviation, yo).

Been playing SR off and on (more off than on, I'm afraid -- hard to find a group nowadays) since about 1994. And as you'll probably gather from the reasons listed down further, I've GMed pretty much every SR game I've played except for one. It was nice to sit on the other side of the GM screen for a change. The GM was new to SR, and although he had GMed many other RPGs before, he just couldn't get into SR and dropped the campaign altogether after only one session.

Like Ayeohx, I'm also agnostic (as atheists say, "An agnostic is just an atheist without balls") and for the same reasons, and my cohabiting SO and I are going on 8 years (at my brother's wedding and my grandmother's funeral, my mother still insisted on introducing the SO to our relatives as my "friend" ).

I do a lot of (novel) writing in my spare time. I've finished 8 novel manuscripts (none of them published yet) and am working on my 9th; one of them is very SR-influenced. Once, I even started writing a Shadowrun novel proposal and submitted it to FASA (they were actively accepting proposals at the time). I still have the postcard they sent, acknowledging receipt of my proposal, which said they would get back to me within X months, even if my proposal was rejected. I sent a courteous letter about 3-4 months after the expiration of the very latest of when they said they would get back to me, and I never even got a reply. I've always considered this silence to be my first actual "rejection letter" as a writer. At any rate, a lot of the characters and scenarios from the novel I managed to work into my campaigns as NPCs. I also had a good story for the RPG RIFTS. Their current rulebook said to expect "RIFTS novels" coming soon, and 2 years later, there still weren't any, so I sent them a letter as well. They replied (with a hand-typed, hand-signed letter, even), saying they weren't interested in publishing novels at the time due to downsizing in the RPG industry (they blamed CCGs for the damage *chortle*) and had to decline as a business reason, not because they didn't like my story. But imagine my surprise when I found a RIFTS novel a year or two later on the shelf of my local comic/game store. Doubletalk, or just bad timing?

I may sound bitter, but I'm not, not really. It's just amazing what you forget when you get older, and writing this intro brought back a lot of fond (and not so fond) memories.

Posted by: Ayeohx Oct 22 2009, 04:03 AM

QUOTE (Joe Chummer @ Oct 21 2009, 07:02 PM)

Posted by: Joe Chummer Oct 22 2009, 04:18 AM

QUOTE (Ayeohx @ Oct 21 2009, 11:03 PM)

Posted by: Harboe Oct 22 2009, 08:13 AM

I'm a Dane (as in, from Denmark).
I'm 19 years old and only heard of Shadowrun a few years ago. Started reading SR fiction about a year ago and now I'm starting in my very-first campaign.

I'm a student (English, German and Psychology) hoping to become a sign language translator. I work at a coffe shop for now and come August, I'll be serving in 8 months in my nations military

Posted by: vollmond Oct 22 2009, 06:58 PM

25, male, white, fat, grew up in the American midwest, though my wife and I moved to the Baltimore area this spring.

BS in Computer Information Science, BA in German, working as a software engineer for a large soulless corp.

Ron Paul libertarian, Catholic

No kids, but there is a cat and a dog. I play violin well, and guitar so-so.

My reading habits are all over the place. What I'm reading right now:
Against a Dark Background by Iain M. Banks
The Singularity is Near by Ray Kurzweil
Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Been playing SR4 for about 2 years now (still play with my group from back home via Maptool and Skype), with a short detour into Microlite20-flavored D&D. GMing Ghost Cartels starting tonight (a bit nervous about that. wish me luck!)

Posted by: pbangarth Oct 22 2009, 07:02 PM

QUOTE (vollmond @ Oct 22 2009, 02:58 PM)

Posted by: KageZero Sep 2 2010, 05:19 PM

Born in '73. Started 'running in '90. Average height, average weight, brown hair, green eyes. Dude.

Grew up in PA, moved to VA, moved back to PA, moved to MN, looking to move back to PA.

BA in Mathematics, Webmaster by trade, jack-of-all-trades by design.

Posted by: Laodicea Sep 2 2010, 07:01 PM

Mistook Glyph for a bloke called Eric b/c they both have the same icon. Ignore this stupid post.

Posted by: tifunkalicious Sep 3 2010, 10:04 AM

Omaha, Nebraska. 19, Student.

Ive played RPGs since I was 12, my dad got his roleplaying start in the military and brought home the books to teach all us boys how to play. That classic DnD structure is still very close to me, but in my quest to get my friends to play SOMETHING on a tabletop, I found they just can't get over the flavor of SR so here I am. I live in the dorms at University of nebraska omaha and am studying management information systems (I'm in your office yelling for you to upgrade your software). I don't have a standard job but am paid to judge high school speech tournaments on my free weekends.

I'm VERY two-sided when it comes to my games. I'm either in the extremely competitive such as street fighter or starcraft that I like to go to tournaments with (no pro player, just like to compete). Or it's freeform and/or cooperative like tabletop rpgs.

When I do something, I need to do it fast right then and there or I'll lose interest and it won't ever get done. I have stacks of half finished books, half watched TV shows, half played games all over the place, don't even remember what lead up to that point most of the time. So my favorite things are often movies, 1-season animes, individual books, etc.

Posted by: Paul Kauphart Sep 3 2010, 10:41 AM

Stevenage, UK (for another couple of weeks) then Toulouse, France.

23, student in aeronautic and space engineering.

Been playing RPG for the last 5 years, DD 3.5 essentially. I fell in love with SR when I discovered the game 5 years ago, but never find a GM worth my hopes for the game, so unfortunately never played it much.

Posted by: Mäx Sep 3 2010, 10:45 AM

24 for years old male IT-student in Lahti University of Applied Sciences trying my hardes to graduate during next year.
Fluent in Finnish and English, can speak only a little of Swedish, which is a big trouple for my graduation as its a mandatory class.

Posted by: codemonkey_uk Sep 3 2010, 11:55 AM

Woah impressive thread necromancy!

I am: M, 35, UK, Married, 3 kids, Programmer / Game Developer.

Posted by: Johnny B. Good Sep 3 2010, 01:11 PM

I'm 19 and a junior at University of Maryland. I study international business with a minor in Japanese. I went to a science and tech high school, and spent one of those years in a country town in Japan. I work on campus doing scheduling, room set-up, short tours, and reservations for Chinese University and Administrative Officials, for the low low price of minimum wage. I'm 6'4 and skinny.

My hobbies include Brazilian Jujitsu, wrestling, drinking heavily, DJing, obsessively collecting music, Dwarf Fortress, and tabletops. I got my first taste of Werewolf: The Whateveritis at 8, then D&D at 12, returned to D&D for a short period of time at 17, and started running about a year ago. I enjoy mind-altering substances on occasion. I speak English and Japanese. Next Thursday I'm going to be moving to Tokyo, and attending Aoyama Gakuin U for a year.

I've grown fond of legwork-y types who throw around bribes like candy.

Posted by: TommyTwoToes Sep 3 2010, 01:45 PM

hey all, I am 40. I live in the USA (North East PA).
I do workforce management for an insurance company.

Been playing RPG's since Star Frontiers and Marvel Heros. Went through the obligatory Car Wars and Ogre phase in the mid 80's. My current group is moving away from RPG's (unfortunately) and into Boardgames (which is ok).

Been playing Champions Online and SC 2 recently.

Posted by: Smokeskin Sep 3 2010, 02:34 PM

32 male, CEO and part owner of a 1.5 billion $ real estate investment company, never finished university but did a smattering of business, math and computer science classes, before that army recon nearly-sergeant (discharged with permanent knee injury a few weeks before graduation). Hobbies are mostly strength training and hunting (deer and bird), previous hobbies are parachuting, hardball, climbing, krav maga, muai thai. I have a 19 month old son, 2 whippets and 2 cats.

Posted by: Sharkman Sep 3 2010, 02:57 PM

Ok my turn I guess.

I am 39 years old. I am one of 'those' people. I believe in God, Country, and family. I was born in New York, raised all over the United States, by a patriotic and Christian family. I am not racist, I am not a bigot, I am no more of a hypocrite than the rest of the world. I am also not a legalist, tight minded, dork and I don't beat people up for not believing what I do. At the same time I do not let people beat me up for believing what I believe. Meek in no way is weak. Also I am ok with your beliefs - we'll all find out who is right about 1.5 seconds after we die.

I lived all over the United States, 4 years in Germany, 2.5 years in South Korea, and have had the privilege of travelling the world over. My father was a patriot the kind that serves his country in really cool ways that most of us can only dream of or try to simulate in Shadowrun. He taught me to love God, serve my country, and respect all people regardless of creed, race, color...probably the biggest weakness I have there is getting angry with people and their politics in my country.

I studied Soong Moo Kwan HapKido in Seoul Korea for 2.5 years. Achieved my 1st Dan when I was 14 years old. I later moved back to the United States and took Tae Kwon Do and achieved a red belt. I was the Texas State Heavy Weight Champion Full Contact karate in 1989...I had my own martial arts school when I was fifteen years old.

Years later I studied Aikido at the Sunset Cliffs Aikido school in San Diego which was interrupted as I transfered from Submarine Warfare training to my active duty status on the USS Grayling SSN646. I served six years on Submarines - did my duty...survived a world famous collision with a Soviet Submarine in the Berents Sea in March of 1993...you can find a little about it on the web - that was Red October for real and my 15 minutes of fame...got married had two boys. Then divorced - because as everyone else in the world I am not perfect, flawed, and made mistakes.

I worked high crime housing as a sort of advanced renta-cop...we called ourselves 2.5 instead of Five-O. But we did building sweeps, urban tactical deployment, domestic violence and everything a real cop and SWAT team does with the exception of traffic stops...as we were confined to large housing and government facilities which did not have public streets usually. That paid little to nothing and I got shot at twice. Exciting...but not worth it.

I have owned four businesses of various types; Overwatch Security (Private Investigation and Security Company), Future Computer Concepts, and General Retail Business, three of which have failed...one of which is going strong.

Tower of Games LLC in Chesapeake is the coolest game store. I have two business partners one of which is a long time friend who talked me into the idea of a game store. My other partner is my awesome brother who runs the business for us and is getting married in two weeks to my wife's sister...yeah I know it sounds old fashioned...and wierd to me too. Tower of Games does everything games, its clean, sharp, and we do airsoft, military simulation right along side of video games, RPG's and everything else gaming. I would like to point out that I had to work for every dime of my businesses started from scratch with my own money, no loans, and no hand outs. I learned from each failure and moved on to try again...

I have since remarried now have five children, a wonderful wife who is a lot like me, live in Chesapeake Virginia, have an AAS in computer science, and my day job consists of Commercial Medical Programming and Analyst which I've been doing for about 8 years. Its much more lucrative then all of the other more interesting jobs and careers I have tried before. Someday I want a chain of super mega game stores from the Tower and can spend my retirement playing all of the games I do not have time for now.

I run a Shadowrun RPG on Sundays each week with eight awesome players, I am an avid fan of Airsoft and Military Simulation Gaming - we have a new club in the Chesapeake area that is pushing 22 members now and twice a month meeting to shoot the crap out of each other in a military simulated environment...at a tremendous local field known as Ballahack Airsoft.

I still love God, what my country stood for (not the current nightmares going on), I love gamers and gaming and hanging out, my oldest son is 16 and headed to the Marine Corp to do his duty, like his fathers and grand fathers before him. I have a 12 year old son about to hit puberty (thank God), 12 year old daughter who is a beautiful ballet dancer for many years, a 9 year old son who is still learning to tell the difference between his head and a hole in the ground, and a 3 year old daughter who breaks my heart every day with, "Daddy don't leave me..." before I go to work.

I consider it a privilege to contribute to dumpshock, share ideas with others who love this game and have followed SR since 2nd edition, collecting every book I can get my hands on.

Posted by: Doc Chase Sep 3 2010, 03:19 PM

Idle question: Why do folk defend their faith to those who don't even ask about it?

Just seems like a...strange thing, I guess.

On topic, 29, journalist and accountant by education, fantastic lover by experience and gentleman adventurer by happenstance. Currently whittling my days away by arguing Shadowrun rules, playing various video games and exporting more beer in a day overseas than any of you will drink in thirty years.

I enjoy swimming, cooking, various arts both aesthetic and martial and collect hats. Next on the list is a straw boater so my costumer friends can finish out a few Roaring Twenties-era costumes that I could use it with. Need to finish out the Victorian coattailed suit as well.

Posted by: Sharkman Sep 3 2010, 03:29 PM

Answer...to above:

Because it is such an integral part of who we are and what we stand for that we feel its neccessary to let people understand what we believe. No different then describing your sexual orientation or your list of careers of what makes you who you are right now as you talk about yourself.

Posted by: Laodicea Sep 3 2010, 03:41 PM

QUOTE (Doc Chase @ Sep 3 2010, 10:19 AM)

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 3 2010, 03:47 PM

QUOTE (Laodicea @ Sep 3 2010, 05:41 PM)

Posted by: Doc Chase Sep 3 2010, 03:49 PM

QUOTE (Laodicea @ Sep 3 2010, 03:41 PM)

Posted by: Laodicea Sep 3 2010, 03:52 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Sep 3 2010, 10:47 AM)

Posted by: Sharkman Sep 3 2010, 03:57 PM

Fair enough.
You chose to respond to it the way you did as I chose to write it the way I wrote it. The OP did say "Exposing the diversity of dumpshock..."

The same as everyone else who responds to things...like martial arts experience...or what have you. I happen to know that not everyone on the internet is a liar or has any reason whatsoever to misrepresent themselves.
Also for those of us who actually enjoyed martial arts as a student or a teacher ...it isn't some mystically cool thing that fits into the hollywood humble warrior concept. Its a competitive sport that was a whole lot of fun! Why would I not talk about it? Its common ground for a lot of people. Tons of people have done it. I never said I was a super ninja but I did show up, I did teach and I did compete. I also played football all the way through high school...soccer in middle school....yada yada, but I doubt anyone would have attacked that statement...I'm curious as to why?

I want to ask you - what's up with the hat collection? Why did you mention that? I find that very interesting...I have friends who despise hats and make fun of people who wear them and it irritates me because I like hats...I don't own too many but I like fedoras and such...

Posted by: Mooncrow Sep 3 2010, 04:02 PM

Eh, what the heck.

31, male, Detroit. I've been table-topping for about 20 years now, and I've worked my way through a significant percentage of the games out there. Up until about 6 months ago, I GM'd for 3 groups of players: D&D 3.5, Rifts, and Shadowrun. Sadly, RL seems to be conspiring and they've become really sporadic =/ Thankfully, I've started as a player in a SR 4A campaign, and that seems like it will be a nice change of pace, since I haven't been able to be a player in ~10 years. I also play a fair amount of WoW when I'm in the mood.

On a non-gaming note, I have a master's in Political Science with some post-grad work and spent a year in law school before circumstances beyond my control forced me to drop out. Basically, I'm a giant dilettante, between my addiction to reading and my habit of switching jobs and industries every 6 months or so, I have a wide range of knowledge and skills. In the last few years though, I've settled down, and now I work as a freelance writer, which is pretty much the only job I can get But hey, it pays the bills, and I've found I enjoy it way more than anything else I've ever done.

Hmm, let's see, I'm married (if you want to call it that), I'm a huge nerd, have no life, and love arguing on the internet.

I think that sums it up.

Posted by: Mooncrow Sep 3 2010, 04:03 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Sep 3 2010, 11:47 AM)

Posted by: Stahlseele Sep 3 2010, 04:05 PM

fuck organized fighting sports.
brute strength brawling and going berserk si where it's at.
aside from evading, there is no defence against that stuff.

Posted by: Johnny B. Good Sep 3 2010, 04:08 PM

I'd mention martial arts as a hobby, but that's usually as far into detail as I go. It's just as much a hobby as anything else I do, but maybe a little bit more consistent.

I forgot to mention I'm a huge music snob though.

Posted by: Johnny B. Good Sep 3 2010, 04:09 PM

QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Sep 3 2010, 04:05 PM)

Posted by: Doc Chase Sep 3 2010, 04:09 PM

To quote Jimmy Pop Ali - I sing like an amputee.

Can't hold a note, can't carry a tune.

Posted by: Sharkman Sep 3 2010, 04:11 PM

Heh...I mentioned martial arts as a passion about...1989...minus 2010 ...helluva long long time ago.
It wasn't TV martial arts, super star ninja sword wielding kung fu hero, read a book mystical horse poop.

I attended Seoul American High School on the US Army South Post and you could take P.E. (boring), Hapkido, or Tae Kwon Do (How cool is that?)

I picked Hapkido because they wore cooler uniforms than Tae Kwon Do.

I studied it for 2.5 years while my family was stationed there five days a week during the school year, and 4 days a week during the summer.

Then moved back to the US and moved on Tae Kwon Do! (or Leap depending on your sense of humor)...

Don't mention stuff though that makes you diverse! It brings out the critics.

Posted by: Smokeskin Sep 3 2010, 04:19 PM

QUOTE (Laodicea @ Sep 3 2010, 05:52 PM)

Posted by: Method Sep 3 2010, 04:31 PM

I take pride in the fact that I am what other people lie about being on the internet.

Seriously though, I think the martial arts bit is just because people are following the form set forth by earlier posters.

Anyway, I've always enjoyed this thread. Always interesting to see who is attracted to this game. One of these days I'll have to update my little blurb.

Edit: Oh, and lets try to stay on topic. I don't want to close another interesting and long-standing thread because this degenerates into arguments about martial arts training. Thanks!

Posted by: hobgoblin Sep 3 2010, 05:05 PM

QUOTE (Smokeskin @ Sep 3 2010, 06:19 PM)

Posted by: sabs Sep 3 2010, 05:21 PM

I'm a White Sash
Which means way more than you might think, and yet.. so very little.

Not everyone claims to be a Black Belt in Mixed Martial Arts

Posted by: Doc Chase Sep 3 2010, 05:23 PM

QUOTE (Smokeskin @ Sep 3 2010, 05:19 PM)

Posted by: Abigale Sep 3 2010, 10:15 PM

Hm. I'll bite. I'm a 27-year-old student majoring in sociology. I have something of a talent for dazzling authority with bullshit, which is why I'm in university at all while shouldering the label of high-school drop-out. I'm in the poverty bracket for income and have been all my life, despite the fancy university (hooray for grants).

I've worked as a contractor for the government, florist's helper, door guard to a SCIF, sound-board operator, hip and knee vendor, and tin-foil-hat seller. I identify as a liberal, Hellenic Pagan female intellectual of mixed European genetic background. I enjoy playing casual computer games such as Plants vs. Zombies or Chuzzle as well as games like WoW, but I'm not really very intense with my games - definitely no FPS games because I find that I get too competitive and it becomes a nasty cycle because I'm bad at them but hate being beaten. I like to go hiking, swing dance, swim, bicycle, fence, read fantasy novels, cross-stitch, braise sterling (but not set 3mm stones), build sets, and play tag.

I got into Shadowrun quite recently and am still learning my way around the rules and the world. I don't have extensive RPG experience, although I've done freeform RP in some form or another since 1995. I'm certainly not comfortable enough in the setting to start bending rules around, and it's been a long while since I last wrote much, so I'm uncertain of my characterization and world-building skills.

I can vouch for a claim someone else in this thread has made, but I will name no names.

Posted by: Squiddy Attack Sep 3 2010, 11:15 PM

I'm one of them darn kids, all runnin' around on your lawns and breaking your windows with baseballs. ;P

All joking aside, I'm a lazy student-type from North California. I've found that most of my interests have a technological bent -- currently, I'm doing some auto-repair things... Taking a class, keeping the family cars in one piece... Though I might end up deciding I want to tinker with software guts as well as car guts. I am indeed a pasty nerd who spends most of her time sitting at the computer and playing games.

Hobbies-wise, I'm something of an artist -- sketch-and-doodle-type -- but don't do a whole lot of that any more. I write occasionally. I also do a bit of parkour. It's currently a little too hot for that over here, but I intend to start again when the weather cools down enough (parkour is hard).

Posted by: CanRay Sep 3 2010, 11:27 PM

I'm a computer tech from Northern Ontario, currently living in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada (No longer the Murder Capital of Canada! WOO!!!), currently unemployed. Over read and undereducated, full of useless knowledge. Oh, and a gun nut, which scares people in Canada, despite not owning any firearms.

I like to think of myself as an author, but am not. Other than that, I'm mostly just working on what caused me to be unemployed. Role Playing is part of that, actually.

Posted by: AStarshipforAnts Sep 4 2010, 12:05 AM

I'm a 20 year-old university student from a very, very medical family. Everyone in my parents' generation, and those old enough in my generation, are either doctors, medical students, or married to doctors. At the moment, I'm currently dishonoring the family by not going to medical school, and instead aiming for a career in medical and scientific illustration. It was actually quite the BFD. Unlike a lot of you guys, I can't fight to save my life and I only know enough Japanese to say "It's the fuzz, cheese it!" My mother is Chinese, and my father is half Italian--making me ambiguously brown enough to get searched at pretty much every airport that I enter, regardless of the country. I'm not really old enough to have actually done anything interesting, yet.

Due to a series of amazing snafus, I'm going to get my degree in Psychology instead of Art or Biology. But, I'm going to end up with either two or three minors from the fine art school, depending on how much double-dipping I can do with credits.

I can't digest dairy products or soy, and I'm insulin resistant. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's basically miniature diabetes and type 2 diabetes waiting to happen. So, basically, I don't eat food. I synthesize hopes, dreams, and unicorn tears. And by those, I mean vegetables and chocolate almond milk.

Most of my skills lay in artisan work. I've got rudimentary skills in jewelry working, glassworking (kiln, mandrel, stained, and a little in glass blowing), drawing, painting, etc. I used to be decent at woodworking, but have since lost that skill. But my main hobby outside of table top is costuming and tailoring. Sometimes I sneak around and take pictures to keep my photography skills at an acceptably mediocre level. At the moment, I'm thinking of taking up flash animation, some coding, and possibly embroidery.

Videogames are a pretty casual thing for me. I started out playing D&D when I was about 14, and muddled around in a handful of systems (one or two horrible home-brews from my high school friends) before joining a Shadowrun group. Now that's most of what I play.

Posted by: Whipstitch Sep 4 2010, 01:56 AM

I'm from Minnesota and spent most of my life in Minneapolis-St. Paul. I was an english major and art school nerd but eventually became a paramedic. I currently have one eye and a plate in my head so all things considered I rather wish we had come up with armored cyberskulls sooner since it would have saved me one hell of a headache. Then again, if this were 2070 I guess I'd probably be working for DocWagon right about now and that's a wee tad more high risk than the current gig, so maybe it evens out.

Posted by: tagz Sep 4 2010, 02:45 AM

Ok, mine. It's a shotgun approach, trying to hit lots of points randomly.

I'm 28 year old Caucasian male. Ethnic decent would best be described as "European Mongrel", little bit of everything thrown in there.

Grew up in RI, USA. Spent a few years in doing odd jobs in Providence, playing tabletops at locations that Lovecraft frequented. You'd be surprised how much it set the mood.

Attended Worcester Polytechnic Institute for computer programming on a near full scholarship until I had a nervous breakdown, mostly because I had been slowly realizing that I hated working on computers with a passion and I had somehow laid down my life plan doing exactly that. Spent a few years "finding myself" which consisted of mostly living in a crappy, rundown apartment in Providence, barely scrapping by financially, trying the college thing a few more times in different areas (not for me I found), and making friends of the most unusual and unique people I could find. Finally I felt it was time to move on...

During my odd jobs I found I had a knack for electrical work, understanding complex concepts and troubleshooting problem situations without much difficulty. I moved to DC and went to trade school. I graduated and was immediately hired as an apprentice repair technician for commercial and industrial cooking/heating equipment. Been doing it a while now and I love the work, it requires a tech to know plumbing, electrical, steam and pressure systems, combustible gasses, mechanical know-how, and electronic circuitry on a pretty high level, having many techs having backgrounds such as Navy fighter jet mechanics for example. But in a nutshell, when these machines break they have me go find out why and fix them. The problems can range from something simple to some Cthulhu-induced-maddening experience and you never know for sure which until you get there and see.

Because of my job and the area I live in I routinely gain access to highly restricted areas (well, the kitchens, cafeterias, etc past security. And lots of places with high security offer "in-house" dining of some sort so you don't have to go through security as many times a day), so my knowledge of practical security is fairly good as well, and of a few common "holes" that seem to keep popping up.

I'm currently in a long distance relationship with another man, and hope that we can shorten that distance soon. Kinda weird sometimes, being Bi and working in a field that is rather homophobic, but I just keep my private life private since they don't need to know about any of that.

I speak two languages: English and Bad English.

I've tried to table top game since I was little, but a lack of a group made that difficult until recent years. Instead I immersed in fantasy worlds and video games. Now that I can play table tops I do. I find the various role-plays and acting to be the best parts, for me at least.

Posted by: Troysome Sep 9 2010, 05:33 AM

Well, I just stumbled across this thread today, so I'll bite. It's kind of late for me, so this will probably be random and hard to understand.

I'm an old man for this forum: 42 going on 43. I have no martial skills. I am about 5' 7" and roughly 190-200 lbs. I used to ge physically fit, now I am just physically phhhttt!

I have a bachelors degree in music education, a masters degree in the creative arts in education, and I have taught K-6 classroom general music for the last 17 years.

I guess you could say that I am a closet RPG'er because I live in a very conservative town on the coast of Washington State, about 2 hours SW of Seattle.

I am married to a wonderful woman who tolerates my gaming passion (addiction?). I have 2 children: a 15 year old daughter and a 5 year son.I have played RPG's in one way or another since 1977 or 1978 with the original softcovered versions of D&D. I've mostly played D&D in that time with a smattering of Palladium, Deadlands, Star Wars d20, Vampire, d20 Modern, On the Edge, and maybe one or two others that I have forgotten over the years. I also play the Eve MMO and World of Warcraft in my (blessed little) spare time. I recently discovered Dumpshock and am scouring it for advice on how to GM Shadowrun and get some game ideas.

I currently play with a group of 5 others. We meet once a month for about 10 hours, drink a lot, and have a great time. We are currently playing D&D, but, come March or so, I will step up and GM some Shadowrun.

Shadowrun is my favorite world. I can't get enough of it, although I have played very little of it in my years of gaming. Maybe 1 or 2 adventures in both 2nd and 3rd edition.

I used to enjoy hiking, camping, and backpacking, but parenting has taken that (and a lot of other things) out of me. I love my children. Parenting is hard, demanding, and time intensive.

If you can send me some good Shadowrun GM'ing advice or link me some threads, I would be very appreciative.

Posted by: Scheme Sep 9 2010, 01:04 PM

Hi All,

i am a 34 year old project manager in the automation industry. And someday i
hope that my army of evil robots will take over the world ....

Just recently i moved from good old Stuttgart, Germany, to the much
nicer meadows of the rhine valley around Freiburg,Germany.

I studied software and electrical engineering. And after some time even
got my Master degree in that. Though i still can't rember how

Most of my hobbies are center around sport, rpg, computers and cooking.

I am myopic like hell and therefore proud owner of one of the few eye augmentations
currently on the market. Not to mention the bonelacing in both arms

The thing i like most is a cold winter day with looooots of snow. I actually can't
get enough of that stuff. Naturally that makes me an excellent skier.
Sadly enough the winter ends far to soon and during the rest of the year i have to stick to
cycling, swimming and diving. Although i admind that there is fun in that too.

My first experience with RPG was in a school camp where the guy next to me started
talking about beeing an dwarf raised some elven cult.
It took me about an hour to get the meaning of that sentence and since then i have been
hooked on RPGs.

have fun
Scheme

P.S: Still looking for a RPG group in the area around Freiburg. So if there is anybody out there .......

Posted by: Atomic Communist Sep 9 2010, 02:42 PM

Guess I'll throw down. I was born in Tennessee and moved to North Carolina when I was 10 or so. I went to college for a bit, but dropped out and now I'm in the Army. Currently stationed in Ft. Gordon, GA. Been playing RPGs since I was about 13 or so, and Shadowrun was one of my first ones.

Posted by: Rand Sep 9 2010, 08:44 PM

Born: Everett, Washington - Oct. 7, 1966 (Libra - Horse).
Lived: All over - Navy brat, then the Marine Corps. (Before the USMC: Everett, San Diego, Pensacola-Florida, Midway Island (of the famed battle), and somewhere in the NE, not sure where I was really young, possibly Vermont or New Hampshire. In the USMC: Okinawa & Oahu - yeah, it sucked to be me, oh yeah, and Saudi Arabia for Desert Storm. After USMC: Melbourne-Florida, Orlando-Florida, and now Knoxvile-Tennessee.)
Work: TV & Film Industry, mostly TV now as I work at Scripps Networks, the governing company for HGTV, Food Channel, DIY Channel, Great American Country Channel, Cooking Channel (was Fine Living), and now Travel Channel. Currently trying to get a script finalized and sold so that I can do that full time.

Posted by: Faraday Sep 10 2010, 06:05 AM

Wow, an ancient thread my buddy Tyro OP'd? Guess I'm obligated to pitch in.


I am a young 6' 6", 200ish lb white guy. Working as a contract security guard and living in North Seattle. I've always lived in western Washington and expect I'll die here when I get around to that.

High school degree and some college, dropped out when I realized I didn't know what I wanted to do and figured I'd save the money for later. After that, sat around unemployed or worked retail/warehouse jobs. Eventually I met a friend who worked for a security company and I figured I'd try it out. Couple years later, I'm still doing the rounds.

Got a light touch of asperger's and clinical depression, but nothing requiring medication to function. Speak english only mostly, but I have some (very rusty) french. Trained in martial arts for 5 years during high school for the hell of it, got my black belt in senior year. I got into P&P rpgs and Magic the Gathering at the tender age of 13, got into video games at 18 (computer use/maintenance shortly thereafter). I have yet to actually play shadowrun as I have not enough folks to put a game together.

I have no idea when I'll get around to picking up a degree. :x

Posted by: PBTHHHHT Sep 10 2010, 05:22 PM

QUOTE (Troysome @ Sep 9 2010, 12:33 AM)

Posted by: KarmaInferno Sep 10 2010, 05:39 PM

37 years old.

Currently taking classes in computer animation and game design.

Up until a year ago, Construction Engineering and Management. I help build skyscrapers for a few years.

Which annoys my gaming group sometimes because I know how to actually take down buildings.

Previously, graphic designer and illustrator. Which also annoyed my gaming group because I could and did identify every typeface in gaming books.

I've had an odd life.



And I have, in fact, taken martial arts and been in competitive shooting before, but that was years ago and I probably suck at it now.


-karma

Posted by: Faraday Sep 11 2010, 03:02 AM

QUOTE (PBTHHHHT @ Sep 10 2010, 10:22 AM)

Posted by: Mayhem_2006 Sep 11 2010, 03:10 PM

I'm a 37 year old White Male living in England.

I have a degree in Civil Engineering, have an HSE Offshore Commercial Diving Certificate, have completed HSE Confined Spaces Training, Health-and-Safety Management Training and HSE First Aid training. My most recent qualification however, was a post-graduate teaching qualification.

I now work as a primary teacher, teaching the full range of the curriculum to a class of 30 9-11 year olds.

I've been playing RPGs since I was 14, once had a standing ovation for a demo game of WFRP I ran at Gencon UK, and also wrote, planned and ran a 100 person Vampire MET game at a different Gencon UK. I've played around 50 different RPG systems, but now most of my games are played via message board except for a monthly LARP.

Posted by: Omer Joel Jun 6 2011, 02:03 PM

Resurrecting this thread...

I'm a 29 years old Israeli Citizen. I live in Rehovot, which is a bit to the south from Tel-Aviv. I was born in Chicago, IL and lived there until the age of 4; I have a US citizenship and I occasionally visit friends of my family in NYC. I'm currently studying for a Master's Degree in Geography (focusing on City Planning) at the Tel-Aviv University. I also do freelance English-Hebrew translations and academic editing for a fistful of extra shekkels. I live with my beloved spouse Hani (also a gamer) and our two cats Sake and Chicha in a cramped two-room apartment which is nice nonetheless.

I've been role-playing since 1997, and playing Shadowrun since 1999 (IIRC). I introduced Hani into role-playing games with SR4 back in 2006, and while it took her some time to grok the rules, she dived into role-playing like a fish to water and really had a lot of fun in our game. However, after getting my first full-time job in 2007, I moved away from Shadowrun, then returning to other RPGs, such as Traveller*, Stars Without Number, BFRPG and Lamentations of the Flame Princess (the latter two are D&D "retro-clones"). I'm currently considering getting back to Shadowrun after this hiatus.

My other hobbies include 15mm miniature wargaming (maybe I should build a 15mm Shadowrun collection?), cooking, reading (currently halfway through I, Claudius), computer games (currently re-playing UFO: Aftermath after finishing all three STALKER games in a row) and watching birds and reptiles.

* By the way, I'm currently working on a setting book for Mongoose Traveller for the third-party publisher Spica Publishing; it is now at the layout phase and should be ready in several months.

Posted by: wusselpompf Jun 17 2011, 09:39 AM

28 years old, male, German

I am currently working on my PhD-thesis in socio-legal studies (on movie censorship in Germany and the UK). I also give lectures at our local university on a freelance base.
But to pay the bills, I work as head of marketing at a company that provides representation for US companies wanting to expand to the European market.*

I got into roleplaying around '95 and stuck to it ever since, I also like comics, movies, and I am a fantatic supporter of the best soccer team of the world.


* On a side note, we represent a US company, that is very SR-related, as they are actually working on DNI-technology.

Posted by: fazzamar Jun 17 2011, 10:15 AM

I'll bite, I'm a 30 year old father of 5 living near Tampa Florida who is currently attending college for a Computer Science BS but I already have a job as a web applications designer/developer although since it's only part time my family lives below the national poverty line. SR was my introduction to RPGs back in 93 and have been playing off and on since then. Hobbies include programming and SR of course. Religion wise I grew up a Christian, Methodist to be specific, but around 17ish I converted (is that even the correct term?) to agnosticism. Technically I'm an independent and have voted for presidents in both parties, but I seem to vote for Dems more often. I'm of Irish and German descent. I was born in Virginia into a military family, my parents divorced when I was 7ish, mother remarried when I was 10, biological father died when I was 11. I think that covers the main demographics stuff.

Posted by: Fatum Jun 17 2011, 10:44 AM

I'm 24, born and raised in Moscow. 183 cm, around 120 kg, which brings me over "overweight" straight into "obese" category.

I work for the Central Bank of Russia as an engineer-programmer (which is basically just a fancy way of saying "system administrator"), administrating a bunch of *nix machines, a small Win domain and participating in administrating a z10 IBM mainframe with all the DB software and other weird sticks running on it. While that puts my income into the 1% of highest-wage workers in my home country, I still can't afford a home of my own thanks to the Moscow price level, thus leaving me single.
I used to work in Cosmos Casino as a junior system administrator, and its subsidiary as the only system administrator they had, which gave me a bit of insight into the security systems used there (well, and casino and restaurant automation, as well) thanks to being the only IT specialist at hand.

I graduated from a school with advanced language courses, which left me with fluent if erratic English and some basic German. While the school was geared towards the High School of Economics, I decided engineering to be my calling, and went instead to study in the Moscow Aviation Institute as a radioelectronics engineer, where I am still studying to this day thanks to failing an exam session a couple of years ago.

I'm a huge fan of Planescape, which led me to tabletop gaming to begin with; however, I am only really familiar with the third edition of D&D thanks to only really getting to play around three years ago online due to the lack of interest among my then RL friends. The old Genesis game is what lured me to Shadowrun; however, the online communities I'm a part of make it easier to find players than a GM, so I run games more often than I run shadows. In tabletop gaming, I also have some experience with Dark Heresy system line (both running and GMing, I'm a fluff bunny mostly, though), Pathfinder and GURPS.

In what comes to other hobbies, I'm into collecting 1/72 scale minis, and summer often sees me hiking somewhere a bit to the South of here, like Crimea. Used to do a bit of martial arts, too, but that's behind me thanks to that arthritis I've got. Again, used to be into videogames and reading a lot; don't do those that much now due to lack of time between work and study. I do program on Delphi for fun and common good sometimes yet, my most recent and most popular development being the http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Servitor_Bot for IRC gaming.

Posted by: Aerospider Jun 17 2011, 11:49 AM

I'm 29 and living in Essex (UK) with my fiance and (soon-to-be) stepdaughter. I work as a contractor in the social services, currently in the role of a system administrator which basically means helping the social workers record their work in line with government requirements.

I've been into gaming since I was knee-high to a neotenous pixie and have been into most forms at one time or another – card games, board games, wargames, RPGs, CCGs, computer games, poker (if you count that). Never got round to LARPing but wouldn't rule it out for the future. I've done some playtesting and sometimes think I would like to do more.

Shadowrun was one of the first (but not THE first) RPG I was introduced to and how could a twelve-year-old gamer not fall in love with a game that lets him be a street samurai in a world of magic, machines and mayhem?! I own dozens of systems now but SR will always be my pet favourite, warts and all.

My only other hobbies these days (since having a family to occupy damn near all my time!) are pool and English sword-dancing. The latter is a form of folk-dancing like morris, only much more interesting. The swords aren't proper swords – they're no good for stabbing or slicing, though the heavy ones can give you quite a whack and the bendy ones will break the skin if you get your hands caught between them. The team I'm in dances at festivals and in pubs – I'm pretty sure we're on You Tube so search for Hawksword if curious. You even have some teams doing it in the US.

Posted by: Bigity Jun 17 2011, 02:11 PM

I would have sworn I posted in this thing years go. Oh well.

I'm a 35 year old Caucasian Protestant with a wife and 2 kids (with a third due in September). I speak English and very little Spanish. I've been lazily working on a degree for like 5 years now, it takes awhile when you do one class a semester. My ancestory is pretty mixed like alot of Americans - German (from Svengali), Cherokee Indian, Scottish (the Stuart family line).

I was a computer programmer/admin in the USAF, worked on training programs/systems for Intel students (linguists and analysts) and firefighters (which included actually taking a course on the P-23 crash rescue firefighting vehicle - which has since been retired lol). I got out after the USAF wouldn't send me anywhere but west Texas (I'm from Texas, I wanted to see some new places) and became a defense contractor for about 12 years after the Air Force- worked for both Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics.

I got tired of the year to year nature of defense contracting and went to work for a Texas school district three years ago, a job I am leaving next week to go to work for a rancher/farmer financial company in Lubbock TX as an IT person. Texas school budgets are taking a beating right now and it doesn't look good for district employees as far as benefits and raises for the next several years and I got a job offer I couldn't refuse.

I enjoy ice hockey, playing roller hockey, computers and tech of all kinds, and firearms, though my wife keeps me from pursuing that hobby much lately with kids running around I also snow ski once or twice a year when possible.

I have never worked on SR but have spent years with it, starting all the way back in '89. I spent alot of time on the two big SR MUXs (Detroit and Seattle) as a player and staff. I have also played alot of AD&D 1st/2nd edition, Star Wars D6, and Warhammer Fantasy RPG.

Posted by: Ellzii Jun 18 2011, 06:11 AM

I am from Fort Wayne Indiana. I am a 38 year old caucasian (German, Irish). I was raised Roman Catholic, but now I tend to be more Cafeteria Catholic.

I am a Licenced Real Estate Broker who owns my own firm specializing in property management. I have 3 people who work directly for me and another 8 through management contracts. In 1981 I found this intersting red box at the local dime store. It was called Basic Dungeons and Dragons. After that I fell in love with role playing games. I moved on through the old Expert system then on to Advanced. During that time I also played and ran some Star Frontiers, played some Traveller. Got into Battletech. Then the card game Magic the Gathering (should be Magic the Disease) came out. Somehwere between Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Chronicles of Darkus Thel I tried Cyberpunk 2020. It felt like it was missing something. Then Shadowrun 1st edition came out with Sally Tsung on the cover and I knew I had found the game for me.

Unfortunately I graduated high school went in to the Navy and left the role playing world behind. I came back from the 1st war in the sandbox and discovered Doom, Doom 2, and Descent I & II. Then I got hooked on Everquest and later World of Warcraft. I picked up a copy of the 2nd edition core and the Street Samurai catalog & Virtual Realities, but never found the time or people to play. 3rd Edition came out and I found out you could get the books over the net. Now 4th edition is here and I am tempted to start playing again.

I am sure I will add more to this when it isn't 2:00 AM in the morning and I need sleep.

-LZ

Posted by: CanRay Jun 18 2011, 06:27 AM

Damn but we're a diverse group, aren't we?

Posted by: ggodo Jun 18 2011, 07:49 AM

21 year old Civil Engineering student from the Tir. The one that's not egg nog. I've been interested Shadowrun for decades. Well, like fifteen years. I don't have recollection of where I first saw it, but that memory stuck, and I decided it was the most brilliant premise for anything ever. Since then I've been looking for Shadowrun related stuff intermittantly throughout the years, and once I bit the bullet and decided to GM I gave my players the choice of Pathfinder or Shadowrun. They chose Pathfinder. Two years later I've found the Anniversery edition on sale and buy it. The University based group fell apart, and the Summer group decided to try Shadowrun, so I whipped up a campaign as practice for Summer. It went ok. now I'm running the Summer campaign and loving it. I have so many ideas, I'm sad I'll never get to use them all.

Posted by: Brazilian_Shinobi Jun 18 2011, 06:04 PM

Hi, I'm Diogo and I'm a sex addict.

Oh, wait, wrong group

I'm from Brazil, born and raised in Recife (that we like to call it "Hellcife" because of the heat). 28 years old, graduated in Computer Sciences and right now studying french to submit a request for immigration to Québec (Go Habs!) and taking an MBA in IT management.
I began playing RPG with AD&D when I was 10, first met Shadowrun when I was 13 and bought every book that was translated to portuguese (all SEVEN!!!).

Posted by: Brazilian_Shinobi Jun 18 2011, 06:18 PM

QUOTE (Doc Chase @ Sep 3 2010, 12:19 PM)

Posted by: Tyro Jun 18 2011, 06:19 PM

Portuguese is a beautiful language, but I imagine not much is translated into it

Posted by: KarmaInferno Jun 18 2011, 08:58 PM

I would like to revise my earlier post.

I am a howler monkey.

I reside in the Bronx zoo and the warden here does not know that the lock on his office window is broken, giving me access to his computer.

Excuse me, I will be back later. I have to fling some things at people.




-k

Posted by: Tyro Jun 18 2011, 09:26 PM

QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Jun 18 2011, 12:58 PM)

Posted by: Kyrel Jun 18 2011, 10:05 PM

Heh. OK, why not.

33 year old male from Denmark. Single/"it's complicated" with no children. I have a Master of Science in International Marketing & Management (or International Manipulation and Exploitation if you will... ) and today own and run my own company, which sells power supplies and connectors in the Danish BtB market.

I speak Danish (native) and English very well, French and German at touriste level, and I understand and speak a bit of Swedish and Norwegian. Technically I also understand some Latin, but more than a decade's very infrequent use means I'm not very good at it any longer.

I've done competition swimming for 6 years in my youth, and I've been dancing for 30 year (around 16 of them at international competition level ballroom dancing, the remainding 14 a mix of ballroom, tapdancing, jazz, swing, show and more, at hobby and exercise level). I've also done a bit of Tai Chi and a couple of years worth of general gym workout. Oh ya', I'm also a certified movie lover, and go to the cinema around 25-30 times per year (rough average over the last 4-5 years...), plus the theater some 5-10 times per year normally. I also Scuba Dive once every blue moon, when I'm abroad, and I'm currently looking into improving my golf skills.

I originally got into tabletop gaming back in 1989 (mainly Games Workshop games, but also Magic the Gathering (1 year only) and Battletech), did a bit of LARP (mostly in-crowd Vampire) on/off for a few years, and finally got a chance to get into tableside RPG's a couple of years ago.

I enjoy a wide variety of music, but I LOVE classical jazz.

I've travelled extensively throughout most of Europe, andalso had a chance visit Canada, USA, Egypt, Tunesia, and China/Taiwan/Hong Hong on a few occassions.


/Kyrel

Posted by: Tyro Jun 18 2011, 11:45 PM

QUOTE (Kyrel @ Jun 18 2011, 02:05 PM)

Heh. OK, why not.

33 year old male from Denmark. Single/"it's complicated" with no children. I have a Master of Science in International Marketing & Management (or International Manipulation and Exploitation if you will... ) and today own and run my own company, which sells power supplies and connectors in the Danish BtB market.

I speak Danish (native) and English very well, French and German at touriste level, and I understand and speak a bit of Swedish and Norwegian. Technically I also understand some Latin, but more than a decade's very infrequent use means I'm not very good at it any longer.

I've done competition swimming for 6 years in my youth, and I've been dancing for 30 year (around 16 of them at international competition level ballroom dancing, the remainding 14 a mix of ballroom, tapdancing, jazz, swing, show and more, at hobby and exercise level). I've also done a bit of Tai Chi and a couple of years worth of general gym workout. Oh ya', I'm also a certified movie lover, and go to the cinema around 25-30 times per year (rough average over the last 4-5 years...), plus the theater some 5-10 times per year normally. I also Scuba Dive once every blue moon, when I'm abroad, and I'm currently looking into improving my golf skills.

I originally got into tabletop gaming back in 1989 (mainly Games Workshop games, but also Magic the Gathering (1 year only) and Battletech), did a bit of LARP (mostly in-crowd Vampire) on/off for a few years, and finally got a chance to get into tableside RPG's a couple of years ago.

I enjoy a wide variety of music, but I LOVE classical jazz.

I've travelled extensively throughout most of Europe, andalso had a chance visit Canada, USA, Egypt, Tunesia, and China/Taiwan/Hong Hong on a few occassions.


/Kyrel

Posted by: Brazilian_Shinobi Jun 19 2011, 12:34 AM

QUOTE (Tyro @ Jun 18 2011, 06:26 PM)

Posted by: Kyrel Jun 19 2011, 12:38 AM

QUOTE (Tyro @ Jun 19 2011, 01:45 AM)

Posted by: KarmaInferno Jun 19 2011, 01:08 AM

QUOTE (Tyro @ Jun 18 2011, 04:26 PM)

Posted by: Rubic Jun 19 2011, 01:41 AM

31 year old male, Virginia Beach, VA., U.S. Navy veteran (supply corp).

Currently bussing tables at a local restaurant, while seeking alternate employment. I have an associates in Computer Programming with a focus in game design, little free time to use it in, and no reliable transportation (this last of which I'm pursuing a solution for). My main computer rig failed on me a few months back (motherboard went), leaving me on a 5 year old laptop with half the ram. Although I would like to make games for a living, I would also rather be certain I have a roof over my head and food on my table prior to pursuing dreams, and am considering returning to school for a more widely applicable degree.

My musical tastes lie mostly in rock and alternative, with my favorite band being Barenaked Ladies.

My hobbies are anime and manga (Negima is my guilty pleasure), computer gaming, and tabletop gaming. I'm familiar with D&D 3.5 and 4th, Pathfinder, Shadowrun 4e, Star Wars Saga Edition, Old and New World of Darkness (I prefer new), Feng Shui, Big Eyes Small Mouth (currently possess the red book, but familiar with prior editions), Maid RPG. I have experience with WH 40k Dark Heresy though not much, and enough experience with Palladium games to know I don't enjoy them (I previously played more than a few sessions). As far as characters, I like to create interesting and alternative interpretations of archetypes, such as a cleric/magician who ISN'T a band-aid ([to my crew:] because I'm not a babysitter, and if you insist otherwise I'll start 'healing' with Powerball until you stop moving! I'll pull this game over to the side of the road and bring out the belt, so help me!!). With online games, I tend towards tank or healer, because control is almost never a viable end game focus, and secretly I hate myself and subliminally seek the abuse like everybody else in those jobs, thank God I stopped playing them.... sorry, where was I?

Oh yeah. I also like to draw, and though I tend to be overly critical of myself, I'm somewhat proud of my work. Nothing recent online to show, unfortunately.

I've been to several countries outside my own. While I don't speak as many languages as I used to (formerly fluent in French and Spanish), I have a tendency to understand more than I speak.

Posted by: Mr. Smileys Jun 20 2011, 06:07 PM

24 year old male from the Tri-City area, Washington

I am currently working as a Software Developer/Programmer for a Business Process/Software outsourcing company. I know java, C#, VB.Net, JavaScript, HTML, MS-SQL, T-SQL, PL-SQL, DB2-SQL, Database Normalization/Administration, and thats all i can think of at the moment.

I enjoy gaming of all kinds with my very large group of friends and am currently involved in a D&D 3.5 game as a PC, a D&D Pathfinder game as a PC, and a Shadowrun game as the GM. I have been playing RPGs on and off for the past 12 years or so and have accrued a large collection of different systems. I also enjoy gaming on my PC as well as most Consoles. I collect and shoot firearms and also collect blades of all kinds (prefer function over looks though).

Posted by: MJBurrage Jun 21 2011, 03:54 PM

I am a British-American from Vermont, just old enough to remember Star Wars before it was "A New Hope", and start playing D&D just before the books got orange spines.

After getting a degree in Mechanical Engineering, I worked in a lab studying acid rain, and got to go to a related NATO conference. Later I completed an MBA, and began teaching business, math, and computer classes at a local culinary school and the state college. For the last few years I have also been studying biomedical engineering part time.

In addition to a score of trips to England, I have traveled to Belgium, France (Calais & Nancy), Germany (North Rhine), Luxembourg, Netherlands, Scotland (Lowlands), Spain (Majorca), Mexico (the Yucatan), Australia (Victoria & NSW) and New Zealand (Auckland). I very much want to visit Islay, Mont Saint-Michel, Rome and Santorini

While I now spend enough time in front of a computer to be visibly sedentary, I have swum two-miles, and backpacked 80-miles. So while sports involving sprinting have never been my thing, I still like hiking and camping. My favourite place in the world is my grandfather's mountain cabin which has electricity but is otherwise off the grid (no phone, no internet, limited radio/cell reception, etc.)

Posted by: Cain Jun 22 2011, 12:36 AM

Why not?

I'm Cain, one of the old men here. I've lived mostly in Seattle, until I moved to Oregon a few years ago. I'm a disabled part-time single father with a live-in girlfriend who's 20 years younger than I am.

I've studied a few languages, but don't consider myself fluent in any of them except English. I can swear decently in twelve languages, so if the situation arises, I can cuss out anyone in the world.

I used to study martial arts in Seattle with some of the original Bruce Lee students, but I'm hardly an expert. Still, if you can say you studied with Taky Kimura or James DeMile, it sounds impressive.

Gaming wise, I think I started RPG's sometime around 1980. Dungeons and Dragons, of course. I flitted around with a few others, but in 1989, I finally fell in love with a gaming system: Shadowrun. Been playing it ever since. I used to play video games, but they're too complex for me to keep up (my girlfriend breaks up laughing every time she sees me try and play Minecraft, and I was banned from playing first-person shooters after the notorious Counterstrike Incident ).

Posted by: Machiavelli Jun 22 2011, 11:25 AM

QUOTE (Kyrel @ Jun 18 2011, 11:05 PM)

Heh. OK, why not.

33 year old male from Denmark. Single/"it's complicated" with no children. I have a Master of Science in International Marketing & Management (or International Manipulation and Exploitation if you will... ) and today own and run my own company, which sells power supplies and connectors in the Danish BtB market.

I speak Danish (native) and English very well, French and German at touriste level, and I understand and speak a bit of Swedish and Norwegian. Technically I also understand some Latin, but more than a decade's very infrequent use means I'm not very good at it any longer.

I've done competition swimming for 6 years in my youth, and I've been dancing for 30 year (around 16 of them at international competition level ballroom dancing, the remainding 14 a mix of ballroom, tapdancing, jazz, swing, show and more, at hobby and exercise level). I've also done a bit of Tai Chi and a couple of years worth of general gym workout. Oh ya', I'm also a certified movie lover, and go to the cinema around 25-30 times per year (rough average over the last 4-5 years...), plus the theater some 5-10 times per year normally. I also Scuba Dive once every blue moon, when I'm abroad, and I'm currently looking into improving my golf skills.

I originally got into tabletop gaming back in 1989 (mainly Games Workshop games, but also Magic the Gathering (1 year only) and Battletech), did a bit of LARP (mostly in-crowd Vampire) on/off for a few years, and finally got a chance to get into tableside RPG's a couple of years ago.

I enjoy a wide variety of music, but I LOVE classical jazz.

I've travelled extensively throughout most of Europe, andalso had a chance visit Canada, USA, Egypt, Tunesia, and China/Taiwan/Hong Hong on a few occassions.


/Kyrel

Posted by: svenftw Jun 22 2011, 03:13 PM

I'm 34 and from the redneck part of Southern California (yes, such a place does exist, we even have our own style of country music called the Bakersfield Sound). I'm a roleplayer, videogamer, golfer, bowler, motorcyclist, clays shooter, drummer, writer, mechanic, and hobby collector.

I was gifted with a high intellect, but I have squandered it and just get by with a moderate education and middling professional career.

I've never trained in any martial arts unless shooting counts.

Posted by: Stahlseele Jun 22 2011, 05:03 PM

Ah,y es, good old intelligent but lazy problem . . i know it well ._.

Posted by: CanRay Jun 22 2011, 06:14 PM

QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Jun 22 2011, 12:03 PM)

Posted by: Kyrel Jun 22 2011, 08:21 PM

QUOTE (Machiavelli @ Jun 22 2011, 01:25 PM)

Posted by: Fatum Jun 25 2011, 11:58 PM

QUOTE (Stahlseele @ Jun 22 2011, 09:03 PM)

Posted by: longbowrocks Jun 26 2011, 07:41 AM

Portland, Oregon, USA
Senior in college
Not a big fan of collages (as others have mentioned) so I majored in Computer Science (which is also under the arts department).
Working at a geospatial data hosting company for the summer.
Brony for two weeks.

Hobbies:
Powergaming
Avoiding any and all standards like the plague (including consistent use of punctuation)

Posted by: DWC Jun 26 2011, 11:49 AM

QUOTE (longbowrocks @ Jun 26 2011, 03:41 AM)

Posted by: Stahlseele Jun 26 2011, 11:56 AM

open source freaks . .

Posted by: Rubic Jun 26 2011, 12:15 PM

I prefer the term "General Purpose Freak" thank YOU!

On the other hand, I guess I'm more of a stealth freak. It can be fun to freak out complete strangers, but it's even more of an accomplishment to freak out people who think they know you.

Posted by: longbowrocks Jun 26 2011, 11:33 PM

The company I'm at doesn't have any established rules for code yet. Some has comments, other bits don't. One guy puts spaces at the beginning and end of every argument list.
But by standards, I meant that I frequently act outside the norm. For example: not getting a driver's license or permit; rollerblading everywhere including into class; or wearing swim trunks and a t-shirt in the dead of winter.

Posted by: Faraday Jun 27 2011, 04:27 AM

QUOTE (Rubic @ Jun 26 2011, 04:15 AM)

QUOTE (longbowrocks @ Jun 25 2011, 11:41 PM)

Posted by: Christian Lafay Jun 27 2011, 05:00 AM

Texan, born and raised.
Random listing of jobs.
Last job, military intelligence.
Current job, cook.
Dream? Start my own MC.

Posted by: longbowrocks Jun 27 2011, 06:25 AM

QUOTE (Faraday @ Jun 26 2011, 08:27 PM)