Exactly organlegging makes sense not only as a stop gap option. Not only would your DNA be on file, there is nothing preventing the biotech firm from using your DNA against you in a variety of ways, particularly if you piss them off. If they find out about your "special skills" and "questionable ethics" don't be surprised by becoming their permanent bitch. I can see a real shadow clinic priding itself on having no records of your visit, and a thorough 100% visible chain of custody ending in disposal of all samples not used in the cultivation of specific body part.

Where do the SINless go to get replacement body parts, yeah down to Billy the Butcher the local Mafia front. Waste not, want not. Instead of putting inconvenient bodies through the meatgrinder, you cut out the good bits first and stick them on ice, help recoup the cost of the bullet. Insurance, what is that. the bottom of the barrel can't afford insurance.

Growing a cloned body part costs money, collecting organs from someone you just turned into a corpse is free. For the organlegger it is almost 100% pure profit, and no one gives a crap about the people being harvested.

Don't get cultured organs. There's no need; just get Type O. Nobody needs to know about yuor DNA, just tell them you want a left kidney; they'll just plug it in tomorrow during lunch.

Except that a SINless person can likely get 2nd Hand Organs for far less than the Type O organ you are discussing. Why pay 6,000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) for an Organ when you can get it from a 'Legger for half that, or even less?

Lets see...
Item Stolen, Item Used, Price War and Market Flooded result in 60% markdown, FROM BASELINE (you could have other modifiers, but lets just stick with this)... so, if the Tamanous Agent pays 500 per Body, harvests even 5 useable organs, or other systems, and sells them for 40% of a Baseline Type O match, they have made Bank, and then some. Assume they are all Organs, at a Markdown from 6,000 Nuyen to 2400 Each. 5 Organs gets them 12000 Nuyen, and they only paid 500 Nuyen for it. 2300% Profit Seems like it would make for a Booming Business to me. Limbs/Hands/Feet give an even better return on the initial investment.

You might ask where I pulled the Cost of the Body from. In our campaign, Tamanous will make an arrangement for 500 Nuyen a Body, if you deliver it. I know that this will likely be campaign Specific. But it is a good place to start comparing prices.

But a type-O kidney still costs over a month's salary, working 40 hour days (per the Day Job quality).

My position at the moment, unless someone can point out something to the contrary, is that second-hand organs must be cheaper than cloned organs. As has been pointed out, the organlegging industry is difficult to explain if cloned organs are cheaper and safer than second-hand organs, and fluff suggests both that the organlegging industry is on the rise and that organlegger's products are 'low cost'.

Very good points on the street costs adjustments, Tymeaus. I'd forgotten all about them!

2nd hand would be cheaper by strictest definition, even if only by 20%.
Using the Classification of 'Ware would also work as well. A Straight 50% decrease is nice. I prefer the variability that occurs when you use Street Costs Adjustments, because you can have some interesting things occur due to "Gang War, Crackdowns, Legislation" or other occurrence on the street. But a Straight 50% is nice too. At least it sets a reliable method to use to calculate costs. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I'd forgotten all about Street Costs Adjustments. I think that's a really cool way to do it. Thanks Tymeaus (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

+1. That's pretty cool.

Just don't get stuck with two right arms, one of which is from an African descendant while you're Caucasian. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Hilarious, but it brings up the idea of cosmetic alteration, which can deal with the skin tone pretty cheaply. Try to keep it under-the-radar while you're trying to finance a clone piece and wait for it to grow.

A second right arm, is a bit trickier, though.

Some times, you take what you can get... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

My Pleasure... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Sorry, forgot that would be considered somewhat obscure in this day and age.

Harry Harrison's "Bill The Galactic Hero" is infamous for his Two-Handed Salute due to having two right hands, and gave us such wonderful moral statements such as "It's always Bowb-your-buddy week". With its humour, depictions of a corrupt government, massive slums, a never-ending war to keep emergency war measures in action, and a lot of other fun things, it's actually a pretty good view of a dystopian empire from the point of view of a soldier who happened to have been dropped on the head as a child. Repeatedly.

Heh... Interesting... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

It's a nice precursor to "The Stainless Steel Rat", who as we all know, is the patron saint of Shadowrunners. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

You are assuming that every body you haul in is made entirely of type-O parts, and that's a bad assumption. You might find a few out there, but sorting them from the useless organs most people are packed with isn't trivial.

See, unlike 'ware, there's no real reason to upgrade, so there's no reason to sell your type-O kidney back to the shop voluntarily. That eliminates the usual source for stuff which is priced second-hand. Involuntary involves sorting through a haystack of guts to find a few needles of type-O... and remember, you need to pay for the bio-lab which runs all these tests, either by owning it yourself, or renting time from someone else. I don't see any way that a low-margin business could afford such an expensive service. (Also you need to screen them for diseases, etc.)

It's a good idea to try to apply standard game mechanics, but in this case it won't work if people think about the implications at all.

Thanks, -- N

That's why they take more bodies in than they have clients needing new parts installed - besides the need to feed the ghouls, that is. You've got to have an assortment, for compatibility. Don't get too hung up on Type O. That's compatible with everybody, yes - but pretty much every body is going to be compatible with SOMEBODY.

I'm assuming medical advances in dealing with rejection-related issues, of course, but I don't think that's unreasonable, given that you can pick out a piece of metal or bundle of tissue at the mall and have it installed in your body.

It takes a 30BP PQ to be a Type O donor; most people aren't. Their organs will only work well for people with sufficiently matching bodies, and even then require immunosuppressant drugs (a perpetual expense!) In fact, people that will easily be missed are also likely to be unhealthy and not a good donor for anyone.

The only way organ-legging is really going to be plausible if the 'leggers buy extremely cheaply, and sell quite a lot cheaper than cloned organs.

But I think running an organlegging business has significant overhead; it's one of the most loathsome professions, so you need to pay hefty bribes to be left to your devices, or use a lot of legbreaking to keep people off your back. But that can easily cause a collision with more mainstream syndicates as well - again expensive.

I think the only way to make organlegging plausible, is to increase the prices of clone-grown organs above RAW.

Or just operate in areas where nobody cares at all. Hell, some might see you as a hero! You get rid of the malcontents and dangerous people, and provide life to the good and wonderful poor people of the community.

Still wouldn't take much to get folks riled up and the urban equivalent of pitchforks and torches, however...

Nobody likes an Igor in the neighborhood. So unsightly. But then there was that accident, and young Bill lost his leg...

Actually, a good way of working Organleggers in as a legitimate (If still squicktastic) thing is to read Discworld novels and think of them like the Igors from that.

Even the highly non-racist Sir Samuel Vimes (He hates everyone equally, including himself. ESPECIALLY himself!) liked having one on staff. Medic and forensic expert in one (misshapen) form!

They aren't liked, but yes, when Young Bill loses his leg...

I know igors are good with needles and thread and sometimes inherit organs/limbs from their relatives, but I can't remember anything about organlegging. In a more advanced society they probably would be good at cloning as well.

Yeah, but that requires storage and record-keeping on a massive scale, so you can match "donors" with patients. That kind of record-keeping means leaving a HUGE data-trail which anyone who dislikes you (i.e. everyone) could use to destroy your storage, and therefore your profits, if not also destroy you personally.

People prefer to get paid in goods that are easily concealed, untraceable, imperishable and valuable-to-everyone for good reason.

Organ-legging as-written is dealing with goods that are bulky, traceable, perishable and valuable-to-almost-nobody.

-----

Actually, here's an interesting organ-legging reversal: imagine a crew that steals organs and replaces them with type-O so they have ritual links to screw you over later in life.

Cheers, -- N

Here's some ideas I came up with when brainstorming for a campaign:
- If somebody needs an organ grown, he invites tenders on a (legal & legitimate) "biotech classifieds" network. Organleggers are active on these sites and can of course undercut the competition in price and delivery times, if they have a matching organ on offer.
- A street doc checks whether he can get a matching harvested organ before ordering a cloned one for his client. Of course the client is billed for a new one.
- Somebody in the biotech facility to which the actual cloning got sub-subcontracted is the malefactor. If an order comes in for something he has in the freezer, he'll fake the paperwork to make it look as if the organ got cloned, and then ship the harvested one.

Assume the illicit supplier can pull his trick on 5% of all offers, then all three scenarios offer a nice cash stream in the long run.

Additionally, human organs could be made more expensive for a number of reasons:
- The old "natural salt is better than NaCl" story. People believe that "natural" organs are better and organlegging is just banned to protect the biotech monopolies of the AAAs, and believers are always willing to pay a markup. One could even con these people by selling them normal cultured stuff.
- An organ from a fitting donor counts as cultured. Which actually makes a lot of sense, because there are few people with Type O organs.

No, I actually was not assuming that. The cheapes Cost ofr Parts is Type O. Which is what I was basing my cost analysis upon, not that fact that everyone would have Type O parts. Organs can be implanted in anyone, with the right Immuno Suppressants. And an Organ can be FOUND for anyone, with enough looking. So, If you want to base the Cost on a "Clonal PArt," The Organleggers make even more money. They will sell their parts to those who can use them.

Clonal Parts need no Immuno Suppressants...
Type O Parts Need no Immuno SUppressants
All other PArts likely require some level of Immuno Suppressants, dependant upon how close a match is provided. In a Black Clinic, you take your chances, but at least it is likely cheaper than a Type O or Clonal Replacemewnt part.

A Black Clinic or Street Doc with at least a Shop can perform any of the required tests for Organ/Limb replacement. It does not cost all that much, actually.

As for Usual Source for Second Hand. Any body can be a source for Second Hand Ware. No one says that they have to survive the procedure. I think you are making some assumptions about the world that are not actually true. I think that you are concentrating on LEGAL Organ and Limb transplants, which Organlegging takes absolutely no part in. Again, you get what you get, and hope that it works.

The problem is that whether the organ is cloned or not can be verified by a DNA test, and the fraud will be revealed.

With good PR you can convince the public of all sorts of crazy stuff. This type of brainwashing will be expensive as well though. Even if a lot of people hate the Megacorps and their power, few will think that a possibly criminally obtained organ will be better than what is essentially your own organ.
What benefit is there from cultured organs besides not being Type O?