I've been using the Game Mechanics' Initiative Cards quite successfully in my D20 campaigns for a while now, and I've decided to attempt to apply a similar concept to my new shadowrun campaign.

With the concept of quick initiative in mind, I've been designing Character Initiative Cards for my players, to help me keep track of initiative orders of effects and such. The cards are designed to be used in a sleeve protector with an erasable marker. When the players roll initiative, you write it in the top right corner, along with the # of passes they have. As they take damage, put dots in the physical and stun boxes.

Once init is rolled, order the cards in your hand, placing the End of Pass card in the back, and one by one cycle through them. When a character has acted, and she does not have any passes left, remove her card from your hand and place her down, and move to the next character. When a character has acted and they have additional passes, cycle them to the back of the hand. When the end of Pass card comes to the front, place it behind any remaining cards. Continue the process until only the end of Pass card is left, and then reroll for the next combat round. Erase the scores and write in the new ones.

I'm not sure if any additional information should go on, as mainly these are for GM use. Check out the sample page and tell me what you think.

I'm considering making a whole suite of SR4-helping cards based on the layouts of the old CCG.

Biggest problem I see with them.... What do you do when someone delays their action?

Turn it sideways and move it to the back of the hand as if they had acted. If they choose to act before they come back around, resolve their action and turn them back. If they don't act, just turn them back up when their turn comes back around, and resolve their actions as per normal rules.

At least, that's how the TGM cards do it.

I didn't particularly like the TGM cards. They just had too much superfluous info for me, so I ended up cutting them in half and changed some things.

For Shadowrun though, I think a small dryerase board works pretty well, as it makes it very easy to handle initiative passes. The cards don't.

I've been using the cards for so long, the concept of constantly writing and erasing on a board rather irritates me. Plus, we never have one around. I'm debuting the cmaller trading-sized cards tomorrow, so we'll see.

Of course, to each their own. Cards don't work for everyone.

I have to say, to me it seems that the cards are more trouble than they're worth. That's a lot of "doing stuff", where as jotting down initiative on paper takes very little time or effort. No erasing when the next pass comes up, etc., I just scribble out the old numbers and write in new ones.

I use a similar method when running convention games. Aside from helping with gameplay, it helps me remember the names of all the players and what character they're playing.

I, on the other hand, really hate scratch paper. I find erasing one number a lot easier, especially since I am the kind of GM who paces around the room as the game progresses, rather than confining myself to a chair and GM screen. I like to have quick-reference tools on hand.