Another New GM, New to SR and to GMing Options

[Guye Noir]

Greetings oh great and honorable Shadowrun vets. :P

I picked up a copy of the SR4 book mostly out of curiosity. The more I read it, however, the more I liked it, both the setting and the system. I've been in a regular DnD group for about a year and wanted a change of pace; something sci-fi and a bit more realistic and gritty than d20. SR4 is just what the doctor ordered. Since my regular GM doesn't want to run 2 games at a time, and will be leaving soon, I figured I'd try my hand at running a Shadowrun campaign.

Since my players and I are new to SR, I figured I'd use the "On the Run" adventure when it comes out. Until then I was going to run the adventures from the "First Run" book, after converting them to 4th edition of course. I had the idea to let my players make "throw away" characters to play with in the adventures from "First Run" to let them get a feel for the world and the system, and then let them redesign, if they so choose, before we start "On The Run".

I'd appreciate any advice the vets can give me, both about GMing in general, and about GMing Shadowrun. I also wanted to ask about using minis during combat. I know SR combat isn't designed around them, but having a visual representation of the action can be extremely helpful, to both players and GMs, especially when determining who's in range of what, and who's affected by certain AOE conditions, such as spells and grenades.