How to encourage ganger characters?, What character creation limits? Options

[Lilt]

Okay, I'm interested in starting to run a gangers campaign (possibly a one-off). it's possible to make incredibly un-ganger-like runners even with 400BP, however, and cutting the limit even further just means that people can specialise to un-ganger-like levels. For example, the ganger could still tot an assault rifle and a bit of top-of-the-line cyberware.

I'm contemplating the following rules:

• 350BP
• Skill caps reduced by 1
• a max of 30BP may be spent on resources (150k :nuyen: )
• Max availability 6 on gear, alphaware has +2 availability, and the right to buy a runner-grade item (availability 12?) can be bought with a 5-pt quality.
• High Magic and Ressonance cost more to buy. It costs 15 to buy it to 3, 20 to buy it to 4, 25 to buy point 5, and 30 to buy point 6.
• Cyberlimbs are the only area where people are being cut breaks. -20% cost for obvious limbs and base stats for cyberlimbs are 4+Racial Mods

So... Do people think that will encourage ganger-like characters? Am I penalising any character type too harshly or not enough?

[Samaels Ghost]

You're penalizing Magic characters a little bit too much. Keep the whole "stat cap down 1" part and don't allow summoning (or oversummoning if you get PC's that really want it) and that should cover it, IMO.

[Shadowmeet]

[Lilt]

The idea of the increased price for magic is to encourage low power levels by making it expencive to be good. Sammies need to spend extra BP to get good (high availability) gear by buying the quality. Mages need to spend extra BP to have a high enough magic attribute to compare to a runner.

I think that sammies would be too hard-done-by if magic cost as much as it normally did. They can't get good weapons or ammo, they can't get good cyber, and they can't spend as much money. A magician could otherwise easily have a magic of 5 and spellcasting skill of 5, making it just too easy. Making it cost 30BP more makes them actually think about having that magic of 5.

Hmm. What do people think of the idea of making the normal resource cap something really low, like 10bp for 50k, but saying that a quality can be bought to increase that? The idea obviously being that I want to encourage low-resources characters. Perhaps I could even have the increased spending cap rolled-in-to the quality to buy a runner-grade item?

Do people agree with my logic? Would anybody be willing to make a (or some) trial character(s) to see what works and what doesn't?

[Cynic project]

Or you could use the normal rules, that make characters that aren't uberly powerful..Wait you say they are better than normal gangers..So what? characters will have a smaller number of people than most gangs....

[Squinky]

I tried this.....Didn't work well for me, so I just told the characters to remake their characters the right way, heh.

Magic can really blow when it is low level, almost to the point of uslessness. Keep an eye on your gun characters, it is real easy for them to become un-street like smartlinks and specializations combined with that level they can get of muscle toner/improved ability.

I think the best idea if you want to be restrictive at the start, is to put a limit on begining dice pools. Why should the mage with a magic of 3 and skill of 4 only roll 7 dice when the sammy can roll 14? Pick a good limit and apply it to everyone.

[FanGirl]

Maybe you could have them spend a certain number of points on contacts. After all, what is a gang if not a social network?

[Grogs]

[Lilt]

Hmm. Although limits on dice pools are vaguely the desired end-result, I'm not that sure about making it the deciding factor of character creation. Also, trolls could find it hard to fit under some limits without having unrealistically low attributes or skills. I also believe that it should be possible to specialise, and be good at something, but at the expense of weaknesses or less rounded abilities.

If sammies with smartlinks are realistically dead-eye shots amongst groups with limited resources and low-end gear then I want that in the game. The game-world defines what's realistic, not how many dice someone can throw. I do, however, want to make magic playable allongside a sammie. Just allowing it as it is when sammies are limited to availability 6 gear, however, would mean magic=win more than it does normally.

I'm well aware that adepts can throw lots of dice at a situation no-matter-what, that's one of the reasons that I made magic attribute more expensive. Perhaps I could make adepts more expencive, but really I think the increased price of the magic atttribute can limit them. Adepts don't have an availability on their powers, meaning that they can start-off with uber stuff, but they're spending far more BP than the sammie can possibly hope to spend on it at the same time.

Is magic really weak at low levels? Assensing, astral projection, and a bunch of abilities are all bundled into those 15BP (okay, so you need to buy a skill rank to open-up assensing but it's still a powerful tool useable by a magic 1 character). Against gangers with pistols, force 3 spirits and spells are formiddable. Aside from having to spend the BPs on them, characters don't have lower limits on their drain attributes, so they can potentially over-cast fairly well.

@Cynic project: The idea is that the characters are mid-low-level gangers in a big gang, not a party forming a gang of their own.

@FanGirl: Interesting, but that's hardly different from just giving them fewer build points. Yes, they get something for it but it's not going to resolve the core issue of making it advantageous for them to make street-level characters.

@Grogs: Thanks for that sammie writeup. If you were a runner in my game, I'd suggest reconsidering the allergy to pollutants as a street-ganger, however. You can buy runner-grade gear multiple times, that's cool. That's still perhaps a level or so beyond what I was hoping for so I may well cut back on the BPs. Maybe 300? Seeing what can be doen with 50k, I think I'll cut the max spent on gear to 10BP. A separate quality can be bought to increase that total. Also, out of interest, did you buy your willpower above 1?

[Grogs]

[hyzmarca]

'Ganger' doesn't mean 'sucks'. 'Ganger' does mean that characters are below average. 'Ganger' means that the characters ar emembers of a street gang. SR Street gangs are hardcore. They are far more hardcore than real street gangs are today. There are some canon gangers who are real ass-kickers.
Look at the Spiders, for example. Many of their members are magically active and they have to kill Insect Spirits as part of their initiation rituals. Every member of the Red Hot Nukes has world class demolition skills because those that don't get blown to smitherines when they try to disarm one of Grinder's world class bombs during their initiations. And Lord Torgo, a giant morning-star wielding troll who constantly reads his dog-eared copies of The Art of War and The Prince, there isn't much that has to be said about him. There's very little difference between upper level gangers and prime runners. The main disparity is in connections.

If you want to limit magic then lower the soft caps instead of adjusting the prices.

Limiting contact to connections 2 or 3 is required for a ganger campaign. If they have better connections then they aren't a gang any more. They're a policlub.

[Grogs]

[Phobos]

Grogs :
Too many BP on attributes, limit would be 175.
Pretty slow and weak for a real barrens street gang ... even for a mage. Okay with C area gangs.
So, lower INT + LOG to 4
Ritual Spellcasting ? Binding would probably be more apropriate, even Banishing ... Best : COUNTERSPELLING.
Combat Paralysis ? Inapt Unarmed ? Street Gang ??? Not even a mage. Their are enough contests in normalday life for someone on the streets where using anything potential lethal (like magic) means a harmless fight turning into last-man-breathing ... you NEED a non-lethal alternative.
In fact ... ETIQUETTE !!! ... either high Etiquette (Gang) and decent Unarmed, or high Unarmed and decent Etiquette.
Even a mage.
Survival ... Athletics Group ... both don't seem very optional to me.
Back to the drawing board.

... oh, and ...
@All:

... more Contacts !!!

Gangs only work because they form a Group, a Community ... because there are a lot of people you know by being part of the gang ... because they ARE the gang.

Have a minimum of 50 or better 100 BP spent on Contacts, and only Contacts. high Loyalty, low-to-mid Connection : some C3 Contacts like the gang's Fixer, Fence, StreetDoc - whatever - Contacts should be fine, more for better connected gangs or CorpKid-ThrillGangs ... PLUS a LOT of C2 and C1 Conections signifiying people in the gang's turf ... PLUS the gang itself (probably something like a C2/L5 to C3/L6 Group Contact ! ... damn, they might even know people outside the gang, perhaps even on other gang's teritory ...

If you enforce this requirement, there's no problem with 400 BP Characters ... or you lower BPs and give them the Conections for free.


For anything else, make use of soft caps instead of cost, and of course GM aproval.
A good rule-of-thump would be a a maximum of one atribute at 5 OR 1, and at least 10 ratings spent on physical atributes.
Maximum of one skill at 5 or 2 at 4, all others at 3. Both active and knowledge skills.
Max. Avaibility 6, Max. BP on Gear of 5 (including a vehicle) or even 2 (=10k :nuyen: ) ... plus one item of player's choice and GM approval (better commlink for hackers, focus for mages, gun or cyber for mundies)

That should work out pretty well.


Still, much depends on what kind of gang you have in mind : the above is pretty much low-level (that is : a pretty normal) Street Gang; a GoGang or ThrillGang might have other requirements ... and of course the bigger and better-conected a gang, the less differences there'll be to 'Runners skill- or equipment-wise ... Gang Leaders and officers of the large and famous/notorious gangs sometimes even like Prime 'Runners, depending on who's backing them.

[Nidhogg]

Generrlly, a 300 point build limit seems correct for a ganger-level campaign. Plus an additional minus one to skill limits, and a minus one to skill group limits to skill group limits seem fair for ganger campaingns. More that seems excessive fir a ganger level campaign.

Forgive any spelling mistakes, for at the time of posting, I quite drunk.

[Lilt]

@Grogs:
Again, thanks for the quick write-up. Phobos's points aside, that's vaguely the level of ganger I'm looking for. The problem is that I may be reducing the BP limit down to 300. How do you think that woudl affect your mage character?

Pools of 8 to cast and summon seem fine, and are about what I expected.

If there was any problem with the particular flaws then they could just be replaced (with a mild addiction, for example). I don't think that's too few physical attribute points. Remember, 3 is average. I don't think you spent too many BPs on attributes, your total is 385 due to the negative qualities for a max of 190 on attributes.

@Phobos:
I do agree that gangers should probably have some ettiquette (gang). Otherwise they'll stick-out like sore thumbs and make social faux-pas, especially if they're uncouth and can't default. I do agree that counterspelling is far more likely than ritual sorcery, but I don't think that gang mages nessecarily need to be physically combat-capable. They can heal and do astral stuff, that should be enough. The exact flaws may vary from character to character, so I'm not ultra-bothered by particular limitations they give.

The problem with enforcing that X points be spent on contacts is that it means everyone will have the same general connection level. Does the uncouth troll really keep in touch with people as well as the charismatic street-face?

My plan was to let people be as well connected as was realistic. They're in the gang, and that doesn't have to be represented by contacts with numbers. They'll know the gang for free, and through it they'll be able to get in-touch with the local important people. Not everyone in the area/gang will know the local street-doc personally, but the street-gang as a whole will.

Your suggestions about skill caps were in my original post. That's what I meant by skill caps lowered by 1, if it wasn't clear.

I am not going to enforce people spending on physical stats. The numbers you're suggesting would mean the whole gang must have above-average physical stats, which I don't consider to be nessecary for all gangers. There's the slight one who seems to be the voice of the group ('face'), the weedy guys who are offered the protection of the gang in exchange for their services (hacker and mage), and others who realistically don't need to get into fistycuffs.

@hyzmarca:
I am not interested in running a game with the ancients or the spiders. Yes, some gangs are kick-ass, but some gangs are just anarchistic kids with smartlinks and wired 1 who's friends got them involved in organised crime for money and drugs. I suppose you could say that I'm interested in running a 'sucky gangers' campaign.

@Nidhogg Yes, I'm leaning towards 300BP myself.

[Cray74]

[imperialus]

These are the basic rules I came up with for a street level campaign.

1) You are street punks. Keep that in mind when designing your characters. Think of what skills, gear, qualities and abilities a street kid would have and try not to min max.

2) Buildpoints are capped at 300, however you get the home ground quality for free representing your characters knowledge of his/her home turf.

3) No more than 10 buildpoints can be spent on money or 50000¥

4) The magic stat is capped at 4. This is to prevent a team consisting entirely of mages and adapts and to keep their power level in sync with team members who rely on gear.

5) You may pick a single piece of equipment (weapon, armour, cyberware ect.) with an availability of up to 8, everything else is maxed at availability 6.

6) Skillcaps are reduced by 1.

7) Maximum starting dice pool for any skill is 12 (not counting edge).

8) You cannot take a lifestyle higher than low, and cannot take a lifestyle higher than squatter unless you have a SIN (either real or fake), however you must purchase a minimum of 2 months worth of a given lifestyle representing first and last months rent.

9) Try to come up with character concepts in keeping with the gang theme. For instance, if you want to play a hacker perhaps create a character who has limited hacking skills but focus’ on jacking cars. If you want to play a face, a street corner dealer might be appropriate.

10) Don’t focus too much on firearm skills. Unarmed combat, and weapons such as knives and clubs are generally acceptable in a brawl. Pulling out a pistol and shooting someone however is likely to trigger a gang war and remember you can’t run and hide as easily as a regular runner, you have to protect your turf. It’ll be a lot easier to get revenge when they know where you live.

11) In keeping with point 10 the gang does not operate in the barrens. You will be based in an area like Tacoma or another lower class neighborhood. This means that there will be a police response to overt acts of violence, and even if they can’t prove anything the star can still make your lives miserable. A couple of pistol shots isn’t likely to get a response until the body is found the next day but a burst of automatic fire almost certainly will.

[Grogs]

[HeySparky]

Be careful with the positive quality, Home Ground. I played in a ganger game here on the boards (300bp, magic/skills/resource restrictions) and we were playing mostly on our turf, so just about every check had +2. I know I felt super cheesy getting +2 on my mechanics roll, just because my character was sitting in his garage. I think others did as well. Just some forewarning.

Restrict it or embrace it, if you restrict it then you'll have a quality that makes more sense (allowing it on perception and influence rolls) or if you embrace it, you'll have gangers that don't want to leave home - or, maybe better still - who want to expand their turf.

[Butterblume]

Your players have to want playing at ganger level (at least be ok with it), or it won't work...

[Aaron]

If it was me running a ganger game, I'd leave the BP cap where it is (gangers can be exceptional, too), and simply limit the starting gear to an Availability of 6 or less.

NB: This would include spell formulae. It wouldn't limit the Technomancers or the Adepts much, but "ganger" is really more of a social thing, ne?

[Glyph]

[Lilt]

@Glyph: I fully expect my players to make their characters as optimal as possible, tweaking every last die and every last BP out of it, that's why I'm trying to balance the chargen system.

Playing low-power may not magically make people roleplayers, but it does mean they have to throw any ideas of powergaming they had out of the window for the time being. To accept this sort of game is to accept that your character is weak. To reject it is to demand a certain level of power from your character. Why demand X standard and not Y standard which is offered with the game? Can it not be fun to roleplay a less powerful character?

Some people like powergaming, some people like low-powergaming. I can't remember exactly how many calls I've seen for 1st level D&D games, but 1st level games are certainly popular.

Butterblume: Actually, I'm fully aware that some people don't want to play at this power level. So-far two people have opted-out due to the nonstandard power-level, but with a theoretical audience of many (it's being run online), I thought I'd offer it up. The game is being offered as a take-it-or-leave-it thing. I just want to make-sure that if they take it then it's balanced.

@ES_Sparky: Home Ground is quite powerful. If someone takes it and seems to be getting too much of an advantage from it then I can change the scenery a bit.

@Aaron Interestign point, but don't you think that gives a big advantage to mages? Same BP, same costs, no restrictions aside from no combat spells. Sammies are screwed, mages aren't really beyond being unable to buy foci beyond force 1.

Otherwise, saying that they're as exceptional as runners but limiting their gear makes no sense. They can have the same skills, the same contacts, the same attributes, why then is their gear limited so much?

I don't think I've ever seen a game where mages had to pay for formulae for their starting spells, but it's an interesting point. I think I'll make the cost for a combat spell 5BP at chargen as they're hard to get hold of but don't technically need to be bought.

[Shadowmeet]

I've found that with the groups I love to play with, when we get into a lower powered game, things tend to get a little more bloodthirsty.

More powerful tends to be more professional.

So, I like down and dirty, low powered games. Love to play in them, and I love to run them.

[Jaid]

i would suggest you include rules limiting skills... in particular, academic knowledges should probably not be allowed, and weapon skills for weapons you aren't allowed to start off with (that is to say... heavy weapons, monowhip, pain inducer, etc are not realistic ganger weapons, and a ganger with heavy weapons 3 is just not realistic IMO... or at least not in a normal gang). possibly also vehicle skills would make sense, though with the new dirt cheap drones less so. depends on how you feel about drones in gangs and the gang territory (i daresay gangers who hang around the seattle docks might have pilot watercraft, but gangers in denver won't).


you will also have to make some exceptions for hacking programs, btw... they have a flat availability 12F iirc. perhaps make it rating x 2 F instead?