Would this historical guerilla be a viable SR?, William T. "Bloody Bill" Anderson Options

[Wounded Ronin]

http://www.bullshido.net/modules.php?name=...warticle&id=291


I just read this article about a bloodthirsty Confederate guerilla.

[Sir_Psycho]

The history would work well for a shadowrunner. Hell, he would obviously be a from the Confederated American States, and his family was attacked in the Aztlan Conflicts. He could have also came up after the expansion of Tir Tairngire into CalFree, and grew up with with conflict in the buffer zone.

As a Shadowrunner, he could certainly work out in game statistics, either as a ruthless marksman adept or as a honor code removed sort of Sammie. He'd probably be ridiculously skilled with pistols (i'm thinking Warhawks), tough as nails and a fair few points into intimidation/interrogation.

The place where it comes down to for me is how "professional" he'd act in a team. And by professional I don't mean whether he loads his warhawks with gel rounds. If he gets into big gunfights when there's a more expedient option, or there's more to lose getting into a big fight, or if the other characters are not combat specced and he draws them into unnecessary conflicts, rather than using their strengths as well.

Basically, it's all how the player decides to play him. A good shadowrunner should be at least slightly versatile, work for the needs of the group (and GM). Also, while I understand the gel rounds argument is silly, both ruthlesness and restraint are useful for a shadowrunner.

[hyzmarca]

He got shot twice in the head in an ambush set up by Union Colonel named Samuel P. Cox, who had orders to kill him.

And that is the problem with such a character. It isn't that he was brutal it is that he attracted attention and was quite public about his acts. He even wrote to a newspaper.
It was inevitable that they would send someone after him.

A Shadowrunner doesn't have to worry about this nearly as much. Sending people after him once the run is finished would be pointless and simply cost more money, in most cases. But, if the public outcry is loud enough it will be done. Thus, such a Shadowrunner shouldn't be blatant and shouldn't brag about his exploits to news reporters.

[Lindt]

I think the term professionalism gets thrown around a lot because Shadowrunning is a business. Perhaps even a profession, and it needs a level of decorum to continue.
Now frankly I miss the old days of the rocker archtype, skintight leather pants and giant pink mohawks, but the 1990s happened and that kinda cleaned it up a bit, made the move from power chords and hair spray to power suits and professional 'resource adjusters'.

Now back to the question at hand. Yes, infact I'm SURE he would make a good shadowrunner, though somewhere on his 'corp. file' it would make a bigass note that he would be a total nutter.

[SL James]

[Ed Simons]

[Glyph]

Plus, if someone wanted to play a loser like that, I would still think "munchkin or twelve-year old, at least mentally." So there was an actual raving nutcase in history. Big deal. Jeffrey Dahmer was a "historical figure", and I would look down on anyone wanting to play him.

Yeah, I think "professionalism" is over-emphasized, and that it should only be the rule for the upper echelon of established runners, but raving nutters tend to be pursued with more than usual vindictiveness from their targets, if their teammates don't cack the looney first.

[Kagetenshi]

[Sir_Psycho]

So shall we take it literally and would this runner be fightin' fo' his god-given RIGHT to have trogs pickin' de cotton?

[Kagetenshi]

Add some tension. Make it a Trog fighting for his right to pick de cotton and for his right to make all other Trogs help him pick it.

(Civil war not about slavery, so on and soforth.)

~J

[Fortune]

[WhiskeyMac]

The main problem I see with that character type is that his actions were tolerated because it was wartime. If he was hanging out on the Yucatan Penninsula then I wouldn't have a problem with him in my games. However, if it was a normal city based campaign he would get ritually tracked or hunted down because brutally murdering (which is what he did) defenseless security guards would not endear him to many people. Killing a lot of security guards and corp personnel makes it very hard to not have the corps track you down and crucify you for your crimes.

Kane is around simply because he's a Prime Runner and probably a developer's character or idea. Notice how most people on Jackpoint and Shadowland try not to associate themselves with him because of his behavior. Yeah, he kills people and you're character may be based off a historical person but it still doesn't make it a good concept.

I would applaud you for the historical aspect and such but I would still find you immature and borderline psycho if you decided to bring a character based off of Bloody Billy to my table. Just my personal opinion though.

[Thane36425]

A character like this would fit in well in the Yucatan Wars, the Phillipines or any of the other war zones mentioned in Fields of Fire and its sequel. There are some brutal wars going on and there would be sure to be things that would push a man over the edge into madness. Being a warzone rather than just the standard urban jungle, they'd have much more opportunity to do things like that and essentially get away with it.

There were brutal people on both sides of the Civil War and especially in the preceding nastiness in West over free and slave states.

During the 1920's Prohibition Era, there were plenty of ruthless gunmen. Al Capone, Hiemi Weiss and all the others would make fine urban examples too, for gang bosses.

[Kasheu]

personally i think it would be a neat idea. so what if you want to make a character like that at least you put more thought into it than say someone just playing it for the hell of it. and any GM can find ways to adapt a game around that concept. sure most shadowrunners arent fighting "wars" but say you have a vendetta towards a faction/corp/etc. its not too hard to find a johnson with wetwork missions against that.

also another thing to look at is the whole writing to the newspaper thing you could easily put that in with a flaw and even get the enemy flaw for having written to the newspaper and such.

most importantly though is no matter what you play or how you play it as long as you enjoy it and the gm can work with it without popping a vein then by all means go for it. a good gm can work with damn near anything.

[SL James]

[Kagetenshi]

[hyzmarca]

[Wounded Ronin]

Just to summarize the tally thus far, out of 17 posts 2 have said that playing the role of Bloody Bill is immature and inherently bad.

[Kesslan]

I'm not sure I'd agree with playing a char as Bloody Bill to be 'immature'. I mean what is it that supposedly makes such a person 'immature'? The fact that he doesnt sit down and civiliy talk things out?

Because, you know, dispite what some people say. Violence has solved a great many more issues in life than simple negociation. Look at divorce cases for example. They drag on for years, they can lead to the financial ruin of an entire family. And there are cases where eventually some one snaps and goes on a murder/suicide binge.

Where as if one partner had simply shot the other and been able to steal all their posessions along with any protesters it would have settled matters. Not at all in an 'acceptable' or 'civil' manner. But it damn well would have settled it. And in no more than an hour if no one protested, to perhaps.. say 2 years if there was vengance sought against the person for their actions.

I knew one divorce case a friend of my parents was in for over 10 years. And it was a pretty typical one too. Granted it didnt result in anyone's death, but you can hardly have called the proceedings even remotely 'mature'. Especially when you had people claiming to be 'emotionally attached' to crap like the kitchen stove, pots and pans and so forth.

If your speaking about it being immature from the point of view of vindictiveness? Well... that might well be true. But that has no real relation to the maturity level of a player. Some times you just want to play something different. And a modern day barbarian is certainly that. It also doenst mean they didnt actually at one point or another consider the implications of their actions.

Afterall the line of thought might well have gone a little something like this. (And even happen in a few seconds)

Ok so I need money, and really bad too.

I need food, I need enough cash for rent for about a month.

I've got no SIN so I can just get a decent job, and I wouldnt know how to do a 'real' job if it bit me on the ass anyway.

Hrmm. I do have a gun, and I know how to use it however.

And here we got Mr. Rich, flouting his certified credsticks... hmmm doesnt look like he's got a gun, or guards either...

BB: Excuse me sir?
Mr.Rich: Ew... get away from me!
BB: Dont suppose you could spare some cred?
Mr.Rich: Egads! Yet another bum from the filth of the street! Absolutely not! Get a job!
BB: Ah well, I tried. *Pulls out a gun*
Mr.Rich: Oh dear.
BB: Gimmie your money or else!
Mr.Rich: Surely we can talk about this! *tries to stall for time as he hits a panic button*
BB: I think not! *BLAM*
BB loots the corpse of Mr.Rich and runs before the Star can show up.

Now, in a scenario like that, maybe eh could have negociated a few yen out of the guy. But by murdering him in cold blood BB gets not only all the cash in cert cred Mr.Rich was carrying on him, but everything else he cared to steal while he was at it too.

He might well have to hide from the cops for a while, and might wind up with some one going after him in vengance. But in the end, especially in a world like SR he's actually quite likely to just be more or less forgotten about in time. So now, instead of having wandered aimlessly begging for jobs/money etc for days, weeks or even months. He instead simply murdered one guy, and wound up with enough money to hold him over for a month or two, possibly more. Meaning he can now actually surive, and afford to shower, shave and mabye get some decent clothes and land a decent job.

While I'd totally agree it's a psychopathic way of going about it. I'd hardly call such a line of thought 'immature'. The situation, and actions were to an extent calculated, and the risk was simply taken. In this istance the risk paid off in a big way. It all depends on the when and where.

If you murder a bunch of sec guards in a secure facility. But there's no recordings and no real evidence to catch you. And we'll assume for now that theres say.. sound proofing so the gunshots arnt heard and such. It's hardly immature to kill them all. Afterall a living guard can point you out down the road. A dead man tells no tales however. If your good enough at hiding, you could probably act like that your whole life, and never really feel any reprocussions what so ever. Your certainly more likely to have people hunting you and out for your blood. And while your also alot more likely to wind up in jail or dead than the guy hitting hte guards with gels, your also in a way, alot less likely to get killed by those same sec guards.

Afterall while in some facilities the guards themselves load gels. How many of them in your games are shooting bakc at you with live rounds? Better them than me I allway say. If the GM is actually having NPCs shooting gels at me on a regular basis i might well return the favour. But I"m not going to let that stop me if I'm feeling abit of a pinch. Afterall other than forcing knockdown tests gels.. just dont cut it against body armor like EX-EX or APDS.

[Sir_Psycho]

[Fortune]

[Kesslan]

[nezumi]

The guy had a vendetta against a particular group, Unionists. Fair enough. If I had a character who said orks killed his parents and now he is extremely, extremely biased against orks, I'd say that's quite fine. He can shoot orks execution style and eat their babies on the basis that orks hurt him. As long as he has a character BEYOND that particular flaw, he'd still be roleplaying.

[Pendaric]

Sociopaths and psychopaths are a challenge to play. To force your perspective to such radical extremes can be fulfilling. By this I do not mean "bang your dead cos am so bad."
Rather, understanding and playing an abnormal human/metahuman personality through its many layers.
(AT this point may I caution against doing this lightly! Doing this right means looking into the darkest part of the human mind. It can be positive but doing so without everyone consenting to it can just be harsh and not much fun.)

Such people are often not 'professional' for example Mr. Blonde from reservoir Dogs is not professional but still interesting as a character.
Most runners are not going to be shy of violence to some degree but complete nut jobs are going to cause trouble. Most sane runners would worry about running with hannibal lecter because insanity is scary.
Though it may be a realistic character the other PC's might just walk away or even murder them for the good of humanity due to their behaviour.

At the end of the day the style of game the character is in determines its validity.

[Kagetenshi]

I disagree with your assessment of Mr. Blonde's "unprofessionalism". He was the only one who gave a thought to the future consequences of his actions, and not just their short-term results.

~J