Shadowrun, Jr., aka KiddieRun! Options

[Bull]

Continuing this from Here. I'm going to use this thread to post up in bits and pieces stuff as I get it completed. To start with...

Concept

Shadowrun, Jr. is designed to be a light-hearted and somewhat goofy version of the Shadowrun RPG. It juxtaposes the world and dynamics of Shadowrun into a grade-school setting. While this can be taken in any number of directions, for my own version, I'm choosing a friendly, simple, very cartoony approach.

Players will play "stereotyped kid" versions of shadowrun characters. They'll have to deal with the day to day activities of school in addition to the "jobs" they undertake, ranging from stealing test notes, hacking in to change grades, "extracting" a buddy from detention, bodyguarding a classmate from some older bullies, etc.

Weapons may include things like sling shots, squirt guns, and rubber bands. Mages might know a couple basic illusions spells, or maybe a snowball spell.

Design Notes

Generally speaking, I love to get feedback. However, I have a pretty specific idea in my head of what I want the end product to look like. I encourage you to drop me notes of comment on what I post, but don;t expect me to make any major changes in tone or style.

I'm using SR4 as a base, though I'm stripping some of the extra elements away. My goal is that the game will feel like Shadowrun still and the rule sto be familiar to current players, but should also be very fast and loose. The emphasis is more on style and story rather than rules and combat mechanics.

My free time is pretty limited, and I'm easily distracted by stuff, so I may produce this in dribbles and drabs. But my goal is that I want to have a simple, fleshed out, and working game "world" and rules set together by Origins. Which gives me just about 5 months. :)

Bull

So that's what we got.

[Bull]

[Squinky]

This is a sweet idea :)


I was wondering how it would all work out based on your first post, but the setting makes it all work out awesomely. This should be cool, my ten year old is always wanting to play and something like this would be cool for him, and it also makes a great setting for adults too.

[Gelare]

I think this is a great plan, but I think your numbers might be a bit off.

[Fortune]

[Gelare]

[Bull]

Well, William MacCallister is my old character, Bull. Who was a really, really, really good decker by the time I retired him :)

Basically, the 5 Mill was an "incentive" for Bull to start something. Between his Decking skills and his own personal slush fund (Which was significantly more than that), well... That wasn;t the only thing he sused.

PLus, for the most part, the school isn;t cheap. Parents still have to pay tuition. THough the exact cost is fluid, and sometimes Bull works out a deal for a job with theparents... :)

And as for the student population, welll... Considering we're talking (mostly) just the kids of Shadowruners? How many characters have you played or played with that actually had kids? I can't imagine that most runners would actually willingly have kids, and I imagine that birth control methods are pretty reliable in Shadowrun. I know Bull never would have, but he got sucker punched by a very sadistic GM who knew that I didn;t know SR very well at the time. :)

Bull

[hyzmarca]

100-200 is just about right for a small community school, though not very practical for a full 13 grades.

[klinktastic]

Small communities around the united states have schools that size and they make it work.

[Gelare]

There are schools that are 100 students or even less, yeah, that I grant you. But a school with one hundred students from all the grades between preschool through high school combined is not only rare, and not only a bit unrealistic given the circumstances, but most importantly, it doesn't sound like it'd be any fun. A GM would only have ten or less students per grade to work with, and that makes for a constrained plot without room for extras - or without other kids the PCs can go to for enacting wacky and creative plans. And those extras are important, mind you. When the PCs pull off some awesome run, there have to be random people to pass along rumors and gossip and form fan clubs.

I agree that the school should be small enough to allow some familiarity among people within a few grades of each other. But if everybody knows everybody else, then there's no mystery, and it's not as fun. I'd aim for grades no smaller than 20, which means a school size of about 300, and no bigger than 100, which means a school size of 1500 or less (depending on how many grades the reader's country happens to have - I count preschool, kindergarten, and first through twelfth, personally, after which the kiddies go on to MIT&T.)

[Bull]

The size of the school really isn't too important one way or another, honestly :)

Like I said above, I chose 100, because the Shadowrun community just isn't that large. TO me, this makes sense, but hey, who am I to stop someone's fun? If you want to run with the Shadowrun Jr idea and would rather have a school of 300, or 500, or 1000? Feel free!

For a smaller school, I'm imagining that the "grades" are grouped up a bit more. So rather than 3rd Grade (8 years old) being a single class, you might have 2nd through 4th grades grouped up and taking classes together.

of course, I'm mostly looking at this as a novelty setting that's really only good for a fun, light one-off game as a break from a serious SR game, rather than as a campaign setting anyways. If you were to try using this as the basis of a campaign game, having more students could be quite helpful.

Bull

[Snow_Fox]

oh wow, we actually did something like this set in HS a few years ago. We were limited in weapons, cyberware etc and were going more for local problems. gangers busting into the prom, lifting parts for a new car, pranks of the corp kids etc.

We had an ork who was the kid stuck in eternal shop class. the foot ball player who's rich daddy bought him some augmentation to snag a college sports scholarship, the decker was the nerd type, a phys-add was a track rat, the shaman was an outdoory type and the face was a cheerleader.

[Bull]

Aging and Metas

Children and aging has never really been touched on to any real degree in Shadowrun, that I know of. At best there may be a throwaway line or three in one of the novels, but there's nothing in the core books that I can recall. As for the novels, well... They had a Goblinized Dwarf once. <shrug>

Anyways, the one issue I thought about right away when I first started thinking about this game was the problem of aging. When Bull had kids, for simplicities sake our GM ruled that they aged pretty fast, since Orks have a shorter life span. I think we generally assumed 2-3 years for every 1 year in game.

However, this creates some problems in my mind, because if they aged rapidly, they need to develop mentally more rapidly as well, or things quickly become weird (16 year olds with the mind of an 8 year old?). And Trolls would grow even faster.

meanwhile, do Elves (and to a lesser extent, Dwarves) develop slower? Would an elf be a child twice as long? three times? I remember one of the things in the original Dragonlance trilogy that always bothered me was some comments about how 60 year old elves were still considered children in their society. Considering that they aren't stupid or mentally challenged in any way, why would they develop intellectually any slower? And if they didn't, and it was strictly a cultural bias, well... I dunno. weird, again.

So I'm going with the idea that until puberty, all the metas age at the same rate, at least until puberty or so. This keeps the pre-teen game on even footing, and really doesn't effect the teenage game too much. It's basically just a growth spurt at that point.

Likewise, the metahuman attribute advantages struck me as a potential problem. Since I'm thinking about 3rd graders as the central focus of my version of the game, giving a troll +4 or +5 to a stat seems a bit ridiculous. I mean, Troll Children don't come out of the womb with a 5 strength.

So I'm basically ruling that, mostly, those advantages also are a part of puberty. The pre-teen game is going to have attribute caps below the norm anyways (Probably a cap of 4), so the penalties won;t really be a factor either. I'll probably give the trolls a +1 Body/Strength bonus, but they'll be the only ones with a bonus, and they'll be the only ones it costs build points to play.

I'm debating on the size for the dwarf children, as well. If their growth is relative, a 3rd grader dwarf would be ridiculously small. I'm thinking that they'll generally just be a little shorter than the average child, until they reach a normal dwarf height (Which would be right around 4th grade or so, on average), at which point they simply stop getting taller, and start bulking up instead.

I'll tell you what, pondering this game has got me thinking about Shadowrun in some very unusual ways.

Bull

[Ancient History]

THis is great.

[nezumi]

It sounds like the school is made for the children of people who make enemies, but don't have the resources of a AAA corp behind them. In other words, it's special because it rolls up the knowledge necessary to survive on the streets, applicable 'technical' skills related to those their parents use, plus the standard schoolwork fodder, all in a high-security, well defended locale and with a heavy leaning towards anonymity.

Doesn't this sound like it would be enticing for a lot more people than just shadowrunners? Government and corporate spooks for one (especially those with questionable loyalties, such as if they're double crossing someone or secret agents). Maybe a few high-level corpers who don't want their kids fed the corporate line. A lot of people in corps which are AA or lower and are easier targets for the big boys.

In other words, you'd likely be looking at a good deal more kids, but little Sally, child of Shadowrunner, sits next to Roberto, child of Renraku Red Samurai. This gives you the chance for some proper cliques. Now if only the school were next to Lone Star's School for Poor Employees' Children.


In regards to brain growth...
From what I've seen, orks and trolls have slightly larger brains than the other races, and are carried longer before birth. However, ratios are also important. I believe a troll takes 12 months to gestate? Can't remember where I read that, but it sounds right. That puts it as being a little later than a horse. I don't know what a troll's birthweight is compared to its adult weight, that is pretty important. Given the very long gestation though, I would assume the ratio is smaller than that of humans (in other words, its born being more developed than a human baby).

So in these cases, trolls, and to a lesser degree orks would be more mentally developed ever so slightly from the getgo, and with more brain developing in parallel, a well fed troll likely is slightly ahead of the curve in regards to many important skills. The fact that trolls have a penalty to their intelligence leads me to believe that a troll brain is not precisely like a human brain, and likely has more space dedicated to physical activities and less to higher mental processes. So trolls are probably walking, running, throwing, etc. slightly before their human classmates. It is quite likely they develop their social skills earlier too, which means that in pre-school, the little human boys are still hitting each other over the head with blocks, while the troll child is learning how to share, draw and engage in teamwork.

I seem to recollect that dwarves also had a slightly longer gestational time, so they'd also have a slight advantage in the early brains department, but it would be so minor I think you'd only see it when you averaged out grades.

The book does clearly state an 18 year old dwarf is an adult. I seem to recollect the general rule is dwarves and elves become adults at about the same rate as humans, and I don't believe I've seen anything to contradict that. So I'd assume no one develops slower than the average human.

As we climb up the grades, it is pretty clear orks and trolls hit puberty younger. Currently I believe humans generally hit it around 12-14, so orks especially would hit it closer to 10-12. Better believe that'll be awkward! On reading it doesn't look like orks and trolls are naturally any more aggressive than anyone else, they're just reacting to being a marginalized minority. However in this school, they'll be reacting more to the fact that they have body hair and an interest in girls and no one else does. When I was 14 I remember feeling like the locker room was full of silver-back gorillas. Now it really would be! Presumably this is also around the time that orks and trolls (those with the penalty to intelligence) are going to start having a little more difficulty, as the school material gets more technical. I'm sure there'll be remedial classes for them, but a lot I suspect would decide they're banking on getting a sports scholarship to get through university. Elves MAY hit puberty later than average, but really, who can tell? They all look like 12-year-old girls anyway.

Of course, if they goblinize, all bets are off (talk about embarrassing moments in the locker room!)

[Method]

Haven't read the entire thread (short on time) so I don't know if you're at a stage where you are thinking about run ideas.

If not you can file THIS away as a future plot device. :eek:

Love the concept, btw. :D

[Nightwalker450]

Other people to enroll in the school... Don't forget Mr. Johnson's kids, if he's double crossed a team or two. So you have the runners kids in school with the Johnson's kids.

Parent's Day... Awkward...

This concept is awesome, and I look forward to seeing how it develops.

[Lindt]

Zounds.
I agree that you would have a fairly reasonable calling to admit students from outside the shadow community, especially considering the state of the public school system, and taking into account the amount of 'programming' that the corp schools would involve. I could see some of the less.... zelotus, parents wanting to get their child into a quietly prestigious private boarding school.

[DocTaotsu]

First, Kiddierun sounds like an excellent one off "The-GM-Needs-Time-To-Think-Of-New-Ways-To-Kill-You" adventure. I find it particularly appealing since you want to run it with simplified rules and what sounds to be a firmly tongue in cheek atmosphere.
I must have missed this but: Are you using a point buy system with various attribute and skill caps? Seems to me that a buy in of 100-150 would be a pretty good starting point. The specialization such a set up would require would lend well to the “School Age Archetype� model you’ve mentioned.

And now my few sheckles on brain development and meta children.

I’d suspect that orks and trolls typically develop physical coordination much sooner than baseline humans. After all, if you’re only going to live to 40 or so you better hit the ground running (provided evolution hasn’t gone straight out the window at the first shout of “Magic!�). Socially and emotionally I’d imagine they develop at the same rate as your average human, up until their early puberty. As they’re puberty happens much earlier, it’d get done early and as a result their brain development probably finishes up much sooner than baselines humanity. All that hormonal soup crap gets flushed out sooner which is probably pretty nice (aside from the horribly traumatic experience of starting puberty when you’re 6). You might also use this to explain why they have lower mental stats. You get there sooner but stop before your brain has a chance to lay down the finer detail needed for higher order work (logic). I bet a corps like Evo is probably working on various nano treatments to allow meta children to develop to the same mental level as their peers. I’d be interested to see if orks and trolls have gender differentiated development, and to see if it’s the females who develop first or the males. I also have a great deal of time on my hands which explains why I’m writing a three page treastie on the finer points of the developmental physiology of beings that exist in the fevered imagination of individuals that accept “frag� will ever supplant the sublime f-bomb. (Yes I know that all changed in 4th ed but every time I cuss at my gaming table I catch myself mentally substituting.)

You could probably make arguments that an ork is physiologically mature at say 14 and (chemically) mentally mature before their 18th birthday. To contrast, humans don’t finish puberty until they’re 16 and our brains don’t settle down until our early 20’s.

The social implications of a group of people who go through the hormone fueled turmoil of puberty years before the rest of humanity is probably far reaching. Unless educational protocols were quickly updated there simply wouldn’t be the support structure in place to deal with things like a depressed, suicidal, and pregnant 6 year old. Furthermore, this child has the physical development of someone perhaps twice their age. Are you going to let your 90 pound baseline human child play Pee Wee football with a troll kid who weighs almost twice as much? Humanis must have a field day with statistic concerning troll on human injuries when the developmental disparities are greatest. See! See! They’re too dangerous to put in daycare let alone give decent jobs.

Of course with puberty comes that whole interest in the opposite sex thing and THAT dear friends is something I’m not going into right now. The image of a sexually developed 10 year old troll girl falling for her not so developed human “boyfriend� is probably a work in fanfic waiting to happen.

The bit about dwarves and elves being “adults� at 18 would probably have a lot to do with societal pressure. All your human peers are ready to go of to college, why aren’t you? I’d imagine in places like Tir, where elves have thoroughly embraced their odd nature you might see a more permissive attitude towards development. Eh, so you haven’t moved out of your house at 25, who really cares? It’s not like you are going to die anytime soon.

Of course in gaming terms, particularly Bull’s game, it would probably be easier to say everyone develops at the same rate and trolls and orks are just a little bigger. For comedic value you could even throw in that they go through puberty a couple years before everyone else. The emotionally scarred orc rigger who got made fun of in middle school gym class because he had to shave his back comes to mind.

And lordy, if you have read this far I wish I could give you a point of karma for diligence.

[masterofm]

Sorry I'm a bit new to the forums but I found this topic to be quite interesting. One thing I thought was why gimp the stats on character generation? I mean if you want to keep some of the core rules why not just have stats for children and stats for adults on completely different level? I mean a teacher will be much harder beat then Jimmy... the little brat who stole this days shipment of milk and is selling it to students at a 60% markup. The principle of the school could basically be a dragon (in the sense that you never deal with the principle [squealing] or tangle with him/her.)

I find the idea really interesting, but if this is a school of only 100-150 students it might limit the amount of characters you could introduce if you decide to turn the setting into a long term game. If it was an urban public school with about five thousand students it allows the flexibility to incorporate other aspects of the Shadowrun game. It will allow you to incorporate various aspects of the game while allowing you to turn it into Shadowrun kid style. For instance the "gangs" can just be different groups of kids trying to do biz on the school yard. Might there be a child's version of troll biker gangs where they ride around on tripped out bikes or scooters? I don't know I just think a small school means that as small little Shadowrunners can't get themselves tangled into a crazy web of school politics, shady toy deals, and small time comic deals. I mean if they already know every single person and every single clique (trust me small schools = you know everyone and everyone knows you) it would make it harder to have a continuation of the game sessions. With enough students child SIN's (basically their student ID cards) someone could try to pull themselves off as Sally or Jimmy O'shey - 3rd grader in chess club. Maybe after the great computer crash (just 10 months ago) the system was terribly scrambled so a lot people have just kinda gotten lost in the system?

I think another interesting idea is scaling down the quirks so that it matches kids. Like mild addiction - milk, or common mild irritation sugar. Maybe some of the drugs could also be scaled down as well like coffee - +1 to Init +1 IP (man that kid is just tweaking out... he started to blur after that first cup.) If your keeping it lighthearted it can fit into the realm of being restricted or at least frowned upon by teachers and can allow for the same basic mechanics to be used.

I think it is a great concept though that you could really go far with. The only question I wonder about is how would you deal with damage tracks in a setting like this? I guess it justs a question of what do you want to run with, but I think you could make a lot of similarities between an adult version and a kiddy version of shadowrun.

[DocTaotsu]

In other news today, The Dunkelzahn Memorial School for Gifted Youngsters suffered a tragic loss as one of their students succumbed to a common food allergy...

Shadowrunner kids, they'll kill your kids, and make it look like and accident.

Okay, that's way to dark for this setting, but I still find it darkly amusing.

While Masterofm has some good ideas I think some of the charm is playing characters that are totally unlike what were used to playing (no stat lower than 3, a bevy of diverse skills). Looking down at your "average" strength of 1 as you try to kick a door would highlight such amusing disparities.

Plus we wouldn't have to make all new tests and what not.

[Bull]

Just a quick note to say I haven't forgotten about this, but with the board relaunch and such, I've been a tad busy keeping an eye on other things. I'll hopefully have some more soonish.

Bull

[masterofm]

If you scale the system and lets say double the barrier rating of all objects it allows you to keep with the core rules instead of having to develop a whole new system. If an average persons str is 2 and a child's average is 1 then doubling the doors object rating gives you the same effect w/o needing to do a ton of reorganization. If children are 1/2 or 1/3rd adults stats then one can see that a teacher or adult might be more of a threat then an average child.

If you say piss off the child of a Yak gangster (so much so that he tattles on you.... the little brat) then one can see how if the adult steps in to try and "handle" the party he would pretty much be a boss NPC that the whole party would have to subdue. Maybe trip wire traps and contact drying super glue on the floor followed up by some rope and maybe silly string or mustard applied directly to the eye?

I think the main thing that would need a lot of retooling would be almost *all* of the spells and how child mages would be able to see on the astral or take on an astral form.

[kindalas]

If you scale the system [snip]

I love that idea.

As to development and puberty I would have it for simplicities sake that Orks and Trolls hit puberty at the earlier end of the human range while Dwarves and Elves would hit late.

However for the sake of game quality I would add a flaw (say 5bp) that is called prepubescent that way players would be able to choose just how "developed" their characters are.

As to the transition to physically adult I would guess Orcs and Trolls would be mature at 15-16, Humans 18-20 and Dwarves and Elves would be around the 21 range. However I would leave the emotional maturity level dependent on their social surroundings.

[nezumi]

The problem with scaling the system means there's a huge amount more variance in rolls. I do like that, unlike The Other Game, with Shadowrun you can pretty much depend on a firearms master hitting a can at 300 paces.