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Posted by: Stormdrake Nov 5 2004, 09:54 PM

Am trying to put togather a campaign based around collage students that some how escaped the spawl. I am trying to combine this with information I am getting from the Horror thread with the idea that the characters get recruited to do odd jobs for a professor to start them off. For character creation based around this idea how much and what type of limitations should I place? Any Suggestions?

Posted by: Cynic project Nov 5 2004, 10:12 PM

Well, cyberware should be limited.As should guns. But magic could be fully unleashed, as unlike cyberware and guns the ability to be magical is either with you from birth or not.

So you may start off limiting the force of the spells,foci and what not, but it would an act of G0D to say that magical character are baned or limited.

Posted by: GrinderTheTroll Nov 5 2004, 10:12 PM

Might consider the using the low-level campaign option in MJLBB as far a chargen goes. Maybe further restrict availability rating on gear/cyberware, etc.

Oh one more point, might even want to consider doing chargen yourself or get an idea of what the players want to play. Not sure how much control you want to give them/yourself.

Posted by: Doctor Funkenstein Nov 5 2004, 10:17 PM

I'd stick with the standard limitations and just let the players know what kind of a campaign to design their characters for.

Posted by: OurTeam Nov 5 2004, 10:28 PM

As a general rule, College Students have no Street Smarts, no Combat Skills, and low Wisdom. In general, they have no weapons and no damaging spells.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'escaped the sprawl', as the sprawl is what is all around us. Urban and Suburban running right into each other, with decaying infrastructure, high traffic, and low maintenance. Do you intend for them to be students that survived the mean streets of Seattle, with a background of Gangs and Drugs and BTLs and Protection rackets? Such characters are likely to decide internal strife with threats instead of negotiations.

Posted by: Crimson Jack Nov 5 2004, 10:30 PM

Have Sallie Mae hire a crack team of runners to track down the college students who have defaulted on their student loans.

Posted by: Stormdrake Nov 5 2004, 11:05 PM

Ya had it. I am having the characters be those legendary individuals that come from the gang controled streets either through corp. recruitment, hard work or just dumb luck. With this set up they can have street smarts and all the normal contacts but with out the heavy hardware some starting groups seem to gravitate towards. Thats the idea any way. Add to that the Profeser I am going to use as their "Fixer/Mr. Johnson". Who keeps recruiting them to retrieve unuseal items of historical intrest from rival researchers in and around the city and you can see where the horrors will slowly work their way into the game.

Posted by: FlakJacket Nov 6 2004, 01:31 AM

Depends of how want to play it. In general though I'd say that money and augmentations would be in inverse proportions to street knowledge and contacts - te ones that grew up somewhere like Touristville and managed to get out and the better off middle class ones that are more likely to cyberware like datajacks or decks and knowledge skills like art appreciation of corp finance.

As for imposing limits, why? If they have the contacts or backstory to go with it then let them have whatever they want. It's just as illegal for normal criminals and they still get the stuff. Just keep it in character is the best advice I can think of.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Nov 6 2004, 01:37 AM

Posted by: FlakJacket Nov 6 2004, 01:41 AM

Yeah, and really? Not sure where you went to college but that certainly isn't universal.

Posted by: Jason Farlander Nov 6 2004, 01:47 AM

I believe we have a case of fuzzy antecedents here. To what is your "that" referring?

Posted by: toturi Nov 6 2004, 01:48 AM

I'll allow the normal selection of skills, magic and augmentation. Look at college kids nowadays. Some of them come from gang backgrounds with AKs and shotguns (the gang leader big brother sent his kid bro to college), others have rich families whose parents do not care about them (which leads us back to cyber and the gangs), some of those kids are Boy Scouts who are doing postgrad after Westpoint (weapons and tactics training) or are ROTC. I do not see any need to limit anyone in a college based SR game.

Posted by: FlakJacket Nov 6 2004, 01:57 AM

Posted by: Kremlin KOA Nov 6 2004, 02:06 AM

Hell many of the college students I know remarked on Sep 11 with comments and plans on how it could have been done better. Including the means to acquire materials and the methodologies and technical diagrams they would require

Posted by: Tanka Nov 6 2004, 02:43 AM

OurTeam, no offence, but have you ever looked outside of the frats for college students? Quite a few have street smarts, combat skills, and wisdom. (Not meaning to brag, but I qualify there. A few other kids I know do as well.)

If they came from the Sprawl, most are going to be Pedestrians with a few quirks (extra Attributes here, extra Skills there, mommy and daddy's money all around) thrown in for good measure.

Remember; Sprawl is not always Squatter with minimal "owned things." Sprawl could mean "really, really shitty apartment that has stupid-high rent and extra payments to the Gang of the Month/Week/Day/Hour/Minute/Whatever."

Posted by: Arethusa Nov 6 2004, 02:50 AM

Posted by: Bigity Nov 6 2004, 03:38 AM

College students in a nutshell:

All talk, and just enough knowledge to be dangerous.

Posted by: BitBasher Nov 6 2004, 03:48 AM

Posted by: Tanka Nov 6 2004, 04:05 AM

Not always, but most of the time, yes.

Posted by: Kremlin KOA Nov 6 2004, 04:36 AM

Bitbasher, frankly every successful long term criminal is an exception to your rule

Posted by: Kanada Ten Nov 6 2004, 04:38 AM

Posted by: Kremlin KOA Nov 6 2004, 04:56 AM

I'm sure there are more than that, gime a sec

Bill Clinton
Richard Nixo... no ignore him
Josef Stalin
Augustus Ceasar
Lucky Luciano... maybe
Bill Gates
the list just goes on and on

Posted by: Kanada Ten Nov 6 2004, 05:01 AM

Posted by: OurTeam Nov 6 2004, 05:11 AM

Posted by: Tanka Nov 6 2004, 05:16 AM

Not incredible by any means, no, but better than your average thug.

No, not in the "I can take ten at a time!" Just in the "one or two is no problem" field.

I, as well as several people I know, know when it's time to back off. We also know when not to even look attackable.

I'm not trying to be all "Ooooh, look at me" here. I'm merely disproving a point that your generalization about college students not having three qualifications of being a Shadowrunner to be false in some cases.

Posted by: Kanada Ten Nov 6 2004, 05:32 AM

I've just realized while trying to articulate my feelings on intelligence and crime that I cannot adequately define serious crime, nor can I actually name the various things I require to label something as intelligent.

And youth, while having generally lower skills and attributes should be awarded lower karma costs or granted karma for simpler tasks...

Posted by: OurTeam Nov 6 2004, 05:38 AM

tanka, well, even though you won't take the praise, I think you are exceptional.

And the fact that there are some exceptions (like you) never invalidates a general rule. That's what a general rule is.

/Edit: ----- I do not intend any sarcasm above this line -----

I know that English is a second language for many on these boards, so I won't heap any criticism on a non-native English speaker for not knowing what a "general rule" is. (However, I do find it amusing that someone on these boards would try to educate me about the basic Attributes in the game. There have also been people, who didn't yet know me, that suggested I should read the books before posting. My gaming group found that hilarious. If I refer to Wisdom, I'm not referring to a game value in Shadowrun.)

Posted by: Tanka Nov 6 2004, 05:47 AM

OT: See, your post towards me made it seem like sarcasm and trolling. You don't use emoticons well enough!

In any case, I was about to start going into "there are exceptions to every rule. Except that one."

However, then we'd get into a case of which rule supercedes the other, and then it would just get crazy. Can't have crazy, can we?

Posted by: Lindt Nov 6 2004, 05:50 AM

Posted by: Jason Farlander Nov 6 2004, 09:09 AM

Posted by: Crimson Jack Nov 6 2004, 11:18 AM

I think its *safer* to say that you can generally generalize a bit more if you know what type of college said students are hailing from. A state school vs. a trade school vs. a junior college vs. law school, for example.

As for myself, I can say that most of my fellow students had a fair to above average amount of street smarts and intelligence. I also knew a small, but still substantial number of people with "combat" skills. There were a sizable section of people that came from the military with their GI bills, those that took martial arts/self defense classes, and plenty of people in my area who knew how to hunt (hunting may not seem very combatty, but I believe that a good hunter would probably have at least a 4 in their Rifles skill). As for the wisdom angle... I'm not so certain that wisdom is doled out that much at that age. Time tends to teach wisdom better than school, IMHO. All in all, I would agree with Tanka on this one.

Posted by: Tanka Nov 6 2004, 12:40 PM

And I'll disagree with you on the hunter aspect. At most, I'd say they have a 2. Remember, most people default to their skills. It takes actual time and effort to train a skill. Unless they've been hunting for 40+ years, chances are good they're a 2, maybe a 3.

Posted by: Kremlin KOA Nov 6 2004, 01:12 PM

Kanada, my point was simple. those successful at crime are usually quite intelligent. and if you check the laws of the time in each case each of these people worked outside or above the laws they lived in

Posted by: Kagetenshi Nov 6 2004, 03:37 PM

Posted by: Edward Nov 6 2004, 03:54 PM

By way of equipment the standard availabilities don’t represent what there likely to have. Most non combat wear would be available (what mother would not want to by an encefeleron for there aspiring collage student) but the Ares predator (in any incarnation) would be unlikely to appear on there equipment list in spite of being probably the single most common weapon on the streets.

Make them justify every skill and item of equipment in terms of there collage life. If you have high athletics your on the athletics teem (and bet not have any illegal biowear to improve it) you can have a modest kill in unarmed combat blunt weapons and even pistol shooting as a hobby. Be very fussy about complete answers to the questions where did you get your skills, where did you get your toys.

When I went to university I knew no shortage of very intelligent people with a wide range of esoterical knowledges and skills. Had we had the will (wich was often lacking) we could have come up with plans for anything from a thermonuclear weapon built from items we could legally obtain (I distinctly remember the conversation on where we would get the nuclear material it turned out somebody knew a place where a mining permit was disallowed) to a detailed plan for saving the environment while increasing the standard of living to first world middle class for everybody (but it usually degenerated into politician bashing sessions)

A university (or collage) will hold very skill a shadow runner could conceivably want but not necessarily within a small group of people and then not likely at the level a shadow runner has.

Edward

Posted by: Feonyx Nov 6 2004, 04:55 PM

The best criminals are the ones you never hear about.

Posted by: Edward Nov 6 2004, 05:53 PM

I know probably 20 criminals that could spend the rest of there lives in jail if it all got out (in some cases I wish I had the evidence) of these only one has the smarts to shut up when I say “I don’t want to know” perversely it isn’t even one of the ones I hate, there really chatty.

Most criminals just don’t have the brains but SR already assumes you’re in the minority when they give you such good skills/attributes/money as a starting character. Even the low power rules make you better than the trash I have dealt with (unless you take low int and spread your skills really thin).

Indecently the group I was referring to in this post has almost know overlap with university group or my gaming group. Most criminals just don’t have the smarts for an RPG.

Edward

Posted by: tisoz Nov 8 2004, 11:08 AM

One of my favorite character concepts is an old guy elf born near the awakening who decides to go [back] to school. He still looks young enough to blend in, but knows what he wished he'd known then, when he was 20 or so. Look out coeds!

Posted by: Shanshu Freeman Nov 8 2004, 12:13 PM

Posted by: wargear Nov 8 2004, 12:58 PM

Don't forget that if they were law abiding college students, then any of them who were magically active, specifically spellcasters, will have certainly abided by the licencing laws regarding spell force ratings. Lone Star takes a dim view, as no doubt does the college authorities, of kids running around with greater than force 2 or 3 combat spells...if they even have any combat spells at all. I cannot imagine Blowing Drek Up 101 being an approved part of the curriculum.

Posted by: Kagetenshi Nov 8 2004, 01:06 PM

Not that they have any real way of enforcing that limitation…

~J

Posted by: wargear Nov 8 2004, 01:19 PM

Depends on the game and the GM.

Our GM tends to keep the Star well able to enforce this kind of restriction...with the general public. Corporate law is something else entirely, and Security Mages can get licences for bigger spells readily enough.

Posted by: Kagetenshi Nov 8 2004, 01:23 PM

But how are they going to identify a violation? It isn't like a mage's aura has a printed spell list on it…

~J

Posted by: wargear Nov 8 2004, 01:36 PM

True, however specific violations...for example a mage casting a force 6 powerball...would leave an astral signature that forensic mages could assense. With enough successes you can generally determine approximate force level, can you not?

Posted by: Kagetenshi Nov 8 2004, 01:44 PM

You can. The trick would lie in not actually using the spell most of the time, and doing so in an out-of-the-way or warded area when you do use it. Oh, and cleaning up after yourself.

~J

Posted by: toturi Nov 8 2004, 01:59 PM

You just reminded me of something. Other than taking an astral photo of the area, how is one mage going to tell another what the astral sig looked like? If Mage X cast a lawbreaking spell at a lawbreaking force, how is Mage Y going to tell Mage Z what Mage X's astral signature looked like?

Posted by: Kagetenshi Nov 8 2004, 02:02 PM

We've discussed it before on the boards; the consensus was that there must be some way, otherwise magical forensics would be nigh-worthless. If you want to take the view that the astral cameras are, in fact, very much not SOTA but have existed for quite some time, then you could have it be indescribable without bending the world too much.

~J

Posted by: BitBasher Nov 8 2004, 05:16 PM

Posted by: Edward Nov 8 2004, 05:57 PM

In a collage game I would assume that every character has a sin. It could be a good fake but a sin is required to show up to classes.

Second formulas for illegal force or combat spells would not be found in a collage library. Some commonly licensed spells (heal) would be available but only on showing a licence. Thus any unsilenced spells would have to be accessed from another illegal source.

Force 1 and 2 fetish and exclusive spells would be very common however including spells created as project by past students being made public domain (every other industry has a significant amount of useful public domain information spells would be no different)

Edward

Posted by: lorthazar Nov 8 2004, 06:05 PM

Actually for skill levels I would place College students in the 3's and 4's for most things. Just enough to useful but still short of being an expert. Of course there might be quite a few 2's in academic skills representing the general education. But on the most part College students will have 3's, 4's, and sometimes 5's and 6's in their area of expertise.

Posted by: Arz Nov 8 2004, 06:05 PM

You have tons of story plot hooks in a college settign though.

Fun with Alumni: Get the dirt on them and get scholarships. Help them recruit that big hoops prospect. Help the office get the alumni to donate ....{shiver}

Posted by: tisoz Nov 9 2004, 12:42 AM

Posted by: Mercer Nov 9 2004, 01:50 AM

I'm surprised that no one has brought up the possibility that many of the students have turned to shadowrunning in order to pay off their student loans.

Why it may be true that the majority of college students would be ill-equipped to take on the duties of say, a group of elite criminals or special forces operatives; given that the group will be player-characters, it goes without saying (despite the fact I am saying it now) that they will be exceptional in some way. Where there may be some value (comedic or otherwise) in a group comprised only in inept, useless people, its probably not something you could interest players in long term.

As a gm, I prefer to stay out of the character creation process as much as possible. As long as it is by the rules, I don't care. People should be able to play what they want to play. I have the whole game world to worry about, they have an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper. I don't like meddling with that sheet of paper.

Posted by: Rev Nov 9 2004, 02:45 AM

Another obvious motive is some sort of political activism. Enviromental terrorism, etc.

Posted by: Bigity Nov 9 2004, 04:14 PM

A comic expressing an opinion of college people:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2004/20041108l.jpg