Well, it's more like they kill and eat people depending on the writer. This is definitely an area of SR canon that seems to change depending on who's writing it.

This is actually a rather intriguing idea. Especially if I’m already looking to make some changes with the Infected. To a certain extent, I already see HMHVV/HMHGV as being at least a little like rabies. It may take a while after getting bitten, but in the end, Old Yeller becomes a monster. Or, even if it’s a more insidious change and takes longer, after getting your brain rewired to be a predator of humans and eventually eating enough of them, how long would it be before you started looking at them as nothing more than the meat section at the grocery store?

Treating the Infected as hosts essentially Inhabited by the magical virus would actually clear up the whole morality of how to treat them. As you say, no one thinks twice about squashing someone’s body that’s now Inhabited by an Invae spirit, so why treat the Infected any different if their situation is basically the same?

That ghouls don't need to drain Essence via consumption of live human tissue has been canon since the 1st Edition BBB. The more feral ones may of course still attack humans when driven by hunger, just like other hungry animals. But unlike vampires, nosferatu, or the things you don't want to call "wendigos" (btw, I like your reasoning on that, it's just that I tend to be a canon traditionalist), ghouls are not intrinsically required to harm living people. They get by just fine on John and Jane Does from the morgue.

Again, I've seen this written both ways. They've been portrayed as "just normal folks who had the misfortune to become Infected and are doing the best they can to cope" or as "card-carrying monsters who revel in their perceived place on top of the food chain, to whom (meta)humans are nothing more than cattle."

For the last type, Asamando comes to mind first (though I've seen the ghouls-as-monsters approach in multiple SR sourcebooks and novels throughout the years). That particular nation knowingly deals with slavers who literally round up people by the truckload and sell them to the ghouls for food (see Feral Cities and Dawn of the Artifacts). I've repeatedly said that place needs to be hit with nukes followed by FAB III before their numbers grow any larger.

If you didn't like Asmondo before, then you might want to see pg 140-141 in Storm Front.
Now keep in mind Storm Front is the transition piece between SR4 and SR5 so keep or discard as you prefer seeing as this thread is focusing on SR4.

Turns out Asmondo has about double the number of ghouls as officially reported, which came to light during a UN investigation looking into claims of agreements between Asmondo and certain corporations who were basically shipping their criminals to them in trade for access to the nation's resources.

Since then the Queen has collapsed and her daughter has taken the throne with little news getting out since then beyond Horizon backed spin doctoring.

This has left a lot of people on edge about the place already and can only imagine that a lot of behind the scene power pulling has kept the place from becoming a crater.

Now one can argue that what they did was monstrous, though the corps supplying the live bodies are in that same category.
But again they are in the unfortunate position that they do require metahuman meat to survive and they were taking in a lot more ghoul refugees than anyone suspected, probably so at to not cause a panic with their neighbors.
They do not actively drain essence, but they do gather it from the flesh they consume and animal meat just doesn't cut it.
And even clone bodies won't work since they lack that quintessential spark by themselves which you would have thought would work, but that is the fun nature of essence.

So yes they should have been a bit more upfront, but given the world's attitude toward them one can see why they doctored the books a bit.

Tie this in with Storm Front talking about Infected appetites on the rise, so an Infected doesn't need more flesh/blood/essence to survive but their 'belly' or Thirst is always aching for more.

So you can use this to back the view of Infected as growing monsters if you are wanting to rewrite how Infected play in your world.


Next we might look at possible mechanics to reinforce the Old Yeller decent into Darkness path.

Sounds like I need to pick up Storm Front - it might be one of the few SR4 sourcebooks I don't already own.

But actual "descent into monsterdom" mechanics are another good idea. SR doesn't have character alignments, nor does it have quite the selection of Mental Disadvantages from GURPS, or even the Humanity meter/score from the World of Darkness. I'll have to ponder how to implement this one...

EDIT:

A new negative Quality might do it for (-10 / -20 / -30) KP. A newly Infected person starts at level 0. At each month, the Infected must make a Willpower roll to avoid sliding down the slippery slope and gaining another level, and eventually, they've lost all remaining humanity, leaving only the monster. A cunning, intelligent monster, but a monster nonetheless.

It's one idea, at least.

Now one point in the Infected's favour is shown in the novel Crimson [which I did highly enjoy though that may be my inner fangboi showing through (^ v---v ^) - do not read if you want to keep the view of all Infected being monsters ] is about how hybrid form bugs still count as metahuman enough that draining or eating them can fulfill an Infected dietary requirement as they have the vampire Red drink up one to feed and the ghouls have been eating bug steaks as they call them which seems to work alright.

So while you are working up the Monster angle, don't forget the possibilities of playing one side off against the other, because a good slayer makes use of all the tools available to them, including the enemy of my enemy.
Which by the way does not have to make them your friend, as per Maxim 29


Edit:

The negative quality is not a bad idea, however it leaves a lot vague as to it's effect along the way.

I dislike the Essence Addiction Table because a) the addiction tables are already really hit or miss and b) ultimately addictions are supposed to damage you, which makes sense for the Drain victim to become addicted and burn out, but doesn't make as much sense for the Drainer where you actually should be powering up from all that feeding so it's a bit contradictory.
It has potential but needs tweaking.

Did have one idea tying the Infected relative power to their descent so as they grow into their powers, so to did they lose more of their humanity.

Will have to dig around to see where I left the notes and dust it off.

Actually, I did read that book recently. I could tell it was supposed to paint the Infected in a more positive light, but it actually had quite the opposite effect on me - I came away from it more convinced than ever that they're monsters. Red (and the ghouls) do a whole lot of trying to justify their natures and continued existences, but I was not convinced.

Again you are missing the point, the existence of feral ghouls was never up to debate. The point is that some Infected must kill or harm people, and others don't. HMHVV I Infected, no matter how civilised and pacifist they still are after the transformation, have no other way of surviving than to drain Essence by consuming tissue of live sapient beings. SR vampires cannot get by with blood packs or draining animals alone -- no matter how hard they try, those are the cards they have been dealt.

HMHVV III (as well as Type II) on the other hand does not cause Essence Loss, therefore ghouls can subside entirely on metahuman carrion and have no need to harm living beings. Which is why ghoul rights are a thing, while vampire rights are restricted to oddball countries like Amazonia
Yes, feral ghouls will attack everything that looks like prey when they're hungry, that's why they are called "feral". Name one at least partially carnivorous species where this does not apply.


And Asmondo is a crapsack country even if there was not a single ghoul there. Monarchy, forced labour, eugenetic ideology...

No, I get your point, I just don't fully agree with it. Yes, canon HMHVV II and III don't have to kill people, but plenty of them do, and I remain convinced that it's a slippery slope that leads to one destination; eat enough people and eventually you'll just start seeing them as nothing more than the meat aisle in the grocery store. Also, some authors take my side and some take yours - my point there is that their treatment in canon has been anything but consistent, as far how much sympathy we're supposed to have for them, and which side in this debate is right.

In some cultures, people eat dogs.

At the same time, people in those cultures can also keep dogs as pets.

If a man eats dogs, that doesn't mean he can't keep his favorite dogs as pets and love them instead of eating them. (He might eat them after they die of natural causes, I suppose, but not kill them himself.)

Or, he might eat dogs he's indifferent to, but simply not eat his pet dogs, because he has a different relationship with his pets.

That's why I don't really buy the idea that ghouls are inevitably going to be on some slippery slope to becoming total monsters on the basis of their dietary proclivities. There are real life counter-examples in dog eating cultures.

Not quite a straight comparison. The man in question above hasn't had has genes magically rewired into being a predator for dogs, and to require eating dogs specifically to stay alive. If I were that guy's dog, I'd be worried.

And since Sendaz brought up the recent novel Crimson, here's an excerpt from that:

“These past few years...it’s like the hunger has become sharper. We don’t need to eat more, but the craving for flesh has gotten so much more insistent. Mouths salivate easy, and the temptation to go hunting for real human meat is always there, always at the back of your mind or right behind your eyelids when you go to sleep.”

.....

He paused. “I…I want to chew them up. I want to eat them while they’re still alive. I want to feel it, and I want them to feel it.” He turned his eyes on me with more soul than you’d expect from cyber replacements. “Don’t you ever feel like that? Don’t you just want to tear into them, let it drip around and flood over you?”

Even if they try to hold out, the Beast lives within them, constantly pushing - it'll win eventually.

But that's ok. Like I said, there's a cure – it's called fire, and it has a 100% success rate in curing HMHVV.

So it's like cats and mice: http://cute-n-tiny.com/wp-content/uploads/...ice-400x300.jpg

You can still have a situation where if both animals are socialized they can get along.

Besides, in the world of Shadowrun, there is almost always some enemy or opposition that the players will engage with deadly force. So the ghoul should always have access to snacks that don't interfere with team cohesion. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

That (admittedly adorable) cat has access to food sources other than mice. It has not had it's genes rewired and it's body remade by a magical virus into a super-predator with a magical compulsion to eat mice specifically if it wants to stay alive.

A more apt comparison would be Cats rewired to eat other Cats. Mice are not, nor have they ever been, Cats. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I don't know, might not affect cohesion within the party, but it seems several GMs get their collective knickers in a twist when the Rigger is boosting an occasional extra Americar to sell on the side or the party in general loots the fallen to help make ends meet because the table doesn't pay out enough for runs.

Now just imagine the fit they are going to throw when one of the team eats the driver of that jacked car or hauls one of the dead security guards back to base for snacks later to boot. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

And that is not even touching Rep and Notoriety ratings, because even if the team can keep their yaps shut, people are going to notice that the final body counts don't always match up after that team's runs.
Though to be fair, even a single body can last a ghoul a fair while if he parses it out, though he will probably find himself nibbling between meals.
Moral of the story: Let a friend hold the key to the long pig locker so you don't find yourself snacking in the middle of the day.
Remember eating those eyes just goes straight to your thighs.

On the plus side, things like a fridge/freezer is considered Amenities under increasing lifestyle of the vehicle in Rigger 5 and doesn't cost Mod Slots to install, so you can keep something reasonably sized in the Van though you do need to learn how to fold the body just right.
Making it a Hidden compartment to avoid embarrassments passing through checkpoints does cost Mod slots but can be well worth it.

Sure, there are ghouls who get a kick out of hunting live prey. But just because there are humans willing to murder people to put food on their table (colloquially known as "shadowrunners" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) ) you wouldn't advocate killing all of mankind with fire, so why would those ghouls make the idea of ghoul rights absolutely frivolous?




Cats are obligate carnivores and their brains are naturally wired to chase everything that bears a passing resemblance to a small rodent in size and movement (i.e. any small item moving along the floor). And they do this regardless of access to food, cats hunt stuff because it's stuff and they are cats (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

For truly creative feeding options, remember that Essence Drain and Dietary Requirement are not necessarily linked. Vampires drain Essence by drinking the victim's blood and they need to consume metahuman blood, which makes it prudent to combine the two, but not necessary. A vampire could also drain blood from a merrow for Essence, fulfill his Dietary Requirement on metahuman blood packs, and drink cow blood for any caloric uptake exceeding what he got from the previous two...

A fridge uses power; why not just make jerky? I would have a ghoul character called The Buccaneer, maybe perfect for a smugglers game.



Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buccaneer

mmmmmmm.. jerky ^_^

Wait, that might not work.

Ghouls are only supposed to be able to eat raw meat.

While Jerky is not cooked in the classic sense, it is not exactly raw or unprocessed anymore since you usually add salts and spices before applying a low steady heat to dehydrate the meat.

So in a sense it would probably fall under the Manufactured Low-Tech Objects and Materials category in the same way you have Bricks, leather and similar.

But does that mean Jerky is a no go as meeting their requirement?
Would it wreck the trace essence within meat so they would still need to eat something else to get their Essence part or could Jerky alone suffice?
Could they even process it or end up rejecting it?

Not sure, there is little in the forums confirming one way or the other.

Canray did make a joke about Troll Jerky here once, so others have had a similar thought.

Think I may drop a note to Patrick Goodman and ask about this as this seems like a good question and could at least give Ghouls some options.

Wonder if the Rigger would let me put a smoker in the back of the van....... Could end looking like the Mystery Machine in the first Scooby Doo live movie. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

If this works, it is definitely going in the Paracooking section.

Actually, I (and my group) abandoned traditional Shadowrunning years ago. Honestly, there's more than enough excitement in the Sixth World without playing an amoral psycho who's only morals are "I shoot people in the face for money, and I don't care who." The recent novelette "DocWagon 19" by Jennifer Brozek was a perfect example of this. Such "alternative campaigns" have far more appeal for me these days. If you're in search of excitement in the Sixth World, there's no shortage of ways to get it legally. A DocWagon HTR team, monster hunters, bounty hunters, escort duty / assisting the Draco Foundation or the Atlantean Foundation on digs in dangerous parts of the world (Tomb Raider, anyone)?

As for more "traditional" Shadowrun campaigns, I didn't mind basic industrial espionage/sabotage, as long as the damage was strictly property. Corp A hires you to spy on / trash the warehouse of Corp B, well, that's no biggie. Corp B will probably hire you to do the same thing to Corp A the next week. Both of them understand that's just how the game is played in the Sixth World. But the idea of wetwork for hire does not appeal to me.

So, actually, I don't blame people for shooting at Shadowrunners - they typically have good reason to. So they can shoot at ghouls while they're at it - they have even more reason to.



As Tymeaus Jalynsfein pointed out, it would be more like cats being remade into monstrous predators of other cats - and that they don't normally do. My furry little girl keeps hunting my toes under the covers when they move, but even she just tries to chase off other cats, she's never tried to eat them.

Well Patrick Goodman came back to us about this on the other forum with the following:


So simple air drying seems ok, even really low heat to help dry a bit faster, but no salt/nitrates/other seasonings as it may disrupt whatever residual essence there is in the meat.
Smoking it looks to also be out.

Ha ha ha, awesome! I am grateful he took the time to consider it! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

So basically simple dry meat is OK, but any kind of preservative is out? If anything that makes things simpler, although as a GM I think it would be hilarious as hell for the team vehicle to have a secret smoker compartment in the back or something like that. I would probably allow it for hilarity.

Well with the restriction about no salts/nitrates/other additives/smoking this does put several limits on the end product plus other factors.
Digging through various notes we see the following:

1) The meats for drying have to be fairly lean. Fatty meats will still go rancid pretty quickly if not treated/cured/otherwise preserved.
Metablubber (we are not counting essential fat like that found in nerve tissue or bone marrow that the body needs to maintain itself) can run to around 12-17% on average in a typical healthy person, with it ranging from 3-7% in a top athlete up to 20%+ in an obese person.
Ironically the most desirable ones to go after are the very ones best able to outrun you. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

2) Your skeleton accounts for another 12-15% of body weight.

So between fats and deboning you are losing from a quarter to a third of the carcess for possible storing purposes.

3) Air/Solar drying is not fast and does require some prep work. You can not just throw a whole leg in the drying unit and come back in a few hours to a finished item.
The meat has to be cut up into thin cuts and laid out or hung to dry which typically takes around 2 days and sometimes up to 4 days.

So time and space have to be devoted to this, making it harder to conceal such going ons.

The concern that was raised about the possible ease of buying 'mystery jerky' from a local vendor may have some merit as a Butcher shop would make for a good front to disquise some of this.
Though given how rare real meat is, even these shops may be few and far between in most neighborhoods.

Edit: Plus drying means water loss through evaporation and meat can expect to lose 60-70% weight loss due to the drying process.
So you end up with quite a bit less than you might initially think.
Taking an average 180lb man might yield between120lb - 135lb meat to start, but once you've dried it out for storing, you are looking at around 42-48lbs (presuming an average loss of 65% to water loss) of edible jerky.
In third the ghoul had to eat a minimum of 1% of their body weight per week (Shadowrun Companion pg 32), but in 5th they say they need at least one meal per day, appropriate to its size and metabolism (Core pg 401).
Edit: Most people consume around 2-4lbs of food a day, though they have a wider diet and ghouls are always supposed to look a bit skinny/bony so saying about 1 lb a day of jerky for the dietary requirement and the rest can be filled in with other meats might not be a stretch.


4) The worry about having them store food for months at a time is mitigated a little bit as the shelf life of dried meats without the use of salts/preservatives/cooking/etc.. is about 1 month unless you are refrigerating it and even then they only recommend keeping it for 2-3 months total.
I would probably rule that past the 1 month mark denaturing within the meat makes it no longer fulfil the dietary requirement.

So they could still eat it past that date, but it would not provide the essence of the meat so they would still need to eat something else to appease that hunger.
Kind of like when they eat ghoul caps to stave off the hunger a bit. Tasty but lacking the right nutrition to keep them going.

You may even want to enforce addiction rules for eating Man Jerky.
Since it only has traces of the Essence, lifting a page from Essence Addiction an Addiction Rating of 1 with an Addiction Threshold of 2 would not be remiss.
Which puts it on par with Soykaf, so your ghoul may find he just can't start his night without a quick SkinJim™ or two as well as needing to have some through the run even though he already ate his meal for the day earlier and might get cranky if he doesn't get his snacks.


As to the secret Smoker, I would say you could smoke the meat, but it ruins it for purposes of the dietary requirement because it disrupts whatever trace essence there might have been in the meat.
So again they could eat it because they are hooked on that hickory smoke flavour, though they may have problems keeping it down and they would still need some regular man meat to sustain themselves.

Edit: That said, MijRaj on the other site put forward you could probably fit a suitable for drying in the back of an ice cream truck/ van so even the aforementioned space requirement could be handled.

Course convincing your Rigger to let you set up shop in back of his ride is another story. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

Congratulations, but I'd say your characters are a minority among shadowrunners. Refusing to harm people unless in self-defense even is a negative quality.

Now of course, "that would be hypocritical" does not mean "that is not going to happen" (I'm sure everybody can think of several examples himself), but it makes a good in-universe argument against it happening.


The argument was that cats, despite being instinct-driven to hunt pretty much everything, can be socialized to not eat something which normally makes up a good part of their diet. What that "something" is does not really matter for the argument.


@Sendaz:

However it doesn't say the entire meal has to be the required diet, only that "Critters with this weakness have to include something strange or exotic in their diets."
Except for a daily dose now being the default, I read that as the same "depends on the critter" as in the 4th BBB. It was only in RC (or maybe RW) that the exact requirements for Infected were specified. Run Fasta! didn't say anything on the matter, so as usual I'd supplement uncertainties with old rules (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

And no matter what the actual percentage of body weight is, it should be calculated from the "natural" weight of the meat. AFAIK meat does not significantly lose calories when drying it, and whatever those mysterious aura traces which ghouls require are, they are probably not some homeopathic "water memory" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

PS:

Interesting point: Since the Dietary Requirement is magical, is it influenced by how "unnatural" something is, similar to how Object Resistance affects other magic? In other words, is there a difference between troll jerky prepared by a hermit in the woods according to a secret process passed down the family since the dawn of time, and freeze-dried troll in a vacuum pack (Best before 2575. Warranty void in case of metaplanar invasion or if exposed to more than two nuclear exchanges)?