What's the purpose of Ghostwalker?, The wizzworm doing what? Options

[Synner]

If the great dragon simply has to switch to guerilla warfare to become unbeatable by the military, the military can't beat a great dragon.
So, what is it? If a nation wants a great dragon dead, can they do it or can't they do it, no matter if the dragon goes gurellia?

If the great dragon goes underground it's unlikely a nation or corporation will ever find him. Unless of course, you know some way a human magician is likely to crack a double digit Initiate's Masking (and Extended Masking).

That said they could rain on his parade (for a while) by removing his known assets and seize his known lairs. Of course, as Dunkie's death revealed, his public assets were nothing compared to the stuff he left in his Will (and even that wasn't all of it), so it's unlikely a corporation or country would make a real dent. Meanwhile, of course, even if deprived of his entire fortune, his assets, and his lairs, a great dragon need only bide his time in hiding and nibble away at whoever's after him - after all he has all the time in the world.

Which again isn't going to happen because the great dragon would never take the loss of face without making a stand (which in turn might be the only way of getting him in a stand up fight).

Otherwise the only way a military or corp is going to have a chance at killing a great dragon is if they achieve a complete surprise first strike, have it cornered, and control the battlefield (or alternately put it into such a situation that it is forced into a stand up fight as matter of honor as above) - one openning and the GD is gone.

These things are fully aware of what human military technology is capable of in 2070 (heck several of them are invested in companies producing that technology - and its countermeasures). They know what to avoid, what to defend against and what to preempt. Lasers and rail guns may be new and dangerous, but these things were fighting off flying fortress full of magic users unloading spells that would make modern magicians weak at the knees at the speed of thought over 5 millenia ago.

Well, I think GW is still alive because the devs want him to be alive, no matter what they have to ignore to achieve that.

You will note that the vast majority of posters on this thread disagree with you and agree with the dev.

[Fuchs]

If the great dragon goes underground it's unlikely a nation or corporation will ever find him. Unless of course, you know some way humans can crack a double digit Initiate's Masking (and Extended Masking). That said they could rain (lightly) on his parade by removing his known assets and seize his known lairs. Of course, as Dunkie's death revealed, his public assets were nothing compared to the stuff he left in his Will (and even that wasn't all of it), so it's unlikely a corporation or country would make a real dent.

The only way a military or corp is going to have a chance at killing a great dragon is if they achieve a complete surprise first strike, have it cornered, and control the battlefield (or alternately put it into such a situation that it is forced into a stand up fight as matter of honor) - one openning and the GD is gone.

And since you also said that a Great Dragon who goes underground will beat the military even on their homeground with hit and run strikes, a Great Dragon can't be killed by the military at all.

Thanks for explaining how Dragons are the ultimate power in Shadowrun in your opinion, and not "one power among many".

It's a very good thing I can still play Shadowrun, and not Dragonrun, by simply ignoring this.

[Particle_Beam]

The vast majority? How many are they? Although I wouldn't mind if many more would visit and participate in my topic, as far as I can see, there are less than 20 people discussing. I mean, it's only the people who even care at all that are posting here. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Seven-7]

Add me to the list of those "minority" that agree with Fuchs.

This smells of PHB/Hambeastyness.

[Synner]

Fuchs seems to think there is some dev fiat involved here and that I am apparently disregarding something or other. I'm trying to make the point that even by the rules the GD is going to get away with it.

If you like we can invert Fuchs' experiment to make the point.

Assume a great dragon goes underground, takes human form and hides among the teeming masses, conceals his nature with his initiate grade 25+ Masking metamagic, takes enough gear and hidden money to ensure his physical disguise stands up to muster. He then launches a one-man (pun intended) terror/assassination campaign against the leadership of a major Sixth World nation using only his own magical abilities, all the spirits at his beck and call, and the assets he's squirreled away (let's say the equivalent of a prime runner). He begins striking soft government targets at random with massive overkill spells or spirit attacks. Try using metahuman military to find him and kill him.

(Note: I've actually run a scenario like this only with a metahuman toxic magician, Initiate grade 10, and he was hard enough for my hard core runners)

[Ryu]

Well, I think GW is still alive because the devs want him to be alive, no matter what they have to ignore to achieve that.

Why is Damien Knight alive? Lack of enemies or lack of tech?

Why should a modern military focus any kind of research on fighting great dragons? There are more important research topics, and there is substantial progress in weapons tech anyway. You have IMO not provided any reasons why GW should be dead. Your reasons why Aztlan wants! him dead are canon. Aztlan is sitting on a powder keg, not the right time to have a little fire. Plus, they only know the Gestalt did not work. Failed trials of attacks on Great Dragons can be very costly to your own ressources, and provoke a killing spree that you can´t stop because a) you put ressources into the attack and b) now it is the defensive war you will not win unless the 13+ mental stats dragon chooses the wrong fight.

[mfb]

And since you also said that a Great Dragon who goes underground will beat the military even on their homeground with hit and run strikes, a Great Dragon can't be killed by the military at all.

Thanks for explaining how Dragons are the ultimate power in Shadowrun in your opinion, and not "one power among many".

well, if you choose to define 'ultimate power' as 'nothing except another of my kind can kill me', then yes, i suppose you could call great dragons the 'ultimate power' in SR. those of us who take a less narrow view of power, however, find that there are many areas in which great dragons are merely influential players.

[Ryu]

And since you also said that a Great Dragon who goes underground will beat the military even on their homeground with hit and run strikes, a Great Dragon can't be killed by the military at all.

Thanks for explaining how Dragons are the ultimate power in Shadowrun in your opinion, and not "one power among many".

It's a very good thing I can still play Shadowrun, and not Dragonrun, by simply ignoring this.

You posted while I wrote the last response. Now you are there. Great dragons should not like hiding from humans, but if you mess up your first strike, they will know they have to. Is it worth trying? Damage the dragon did in the past does not count, only damage he will do in the future (Businessmen don´t give money for the past, or so a german saying goes). Lofwyr could be worth the attempt, but attacking a triple-A CEO gets you an omega order, especially if you succeed.

[Particle_Beam]

Why should a modern military focus any kind of research on fighting great dragons?

Because Great Dragons did destroy cities and topple gouvernments. Teheran is no more, Denver was single-handedly conquered by Ghostwalker, Brazil got re-shaped into Amazonia, Masaru is financing anti-imperial japanese organisations and fights against them, that Feuerschwinge-gal flew around and terrorised Germany before being shot-down, and so on.
They are a big threat to every nation, after all, and seeing as how the game developers are making the point of them being very dangerous, it is logical that every modern army would try to focus on anti-Great Dragon-research.

Of course, discussing how to defeat a Great Dragon would rather be appropriate in the other thread that Fuchs opened. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[swirler]

wow, some serious anger going on here
don't like dragons? don't use em. Heck make it better, and have it be "ShadowPern". Have your average runner riding around on dragons.
I have never seen dragons as the focus so I don't feel threatened by their existence in the game. I don't see them as anything but a fixture. Granted sometimes I wouldn't mind a lil more info, but hey, I don't want too much either.

[TW]

First of all, I think the 'plot device' label can be applied to anything in the SR universe, be it Ghostwalker, Damien Knight or Gary Cline. On the other hand, as past storylines show, plot device does not equal plot protection. And I'm pretty darn sure Synner would agree when I say that if it supports and adds to a specific plotline, the dev's will have any of the examples above suffer the same fate as Dunkelzahn, Captain Chaos, or Kyle Haeffner.

On Great Dragons and their enemies, or the threats even they face, the devs and authors have given several examples of how mortal metahumans can throw a monkeywrench at a GD's carefully constructed plans and penetrate their apparent invincibility. The Beloit/Spinrad conspiracy against Lofwyr )DotsW and SoE) or the DIVE dragon hunters (LA) are just two examples.

That said, I don't quite understand the anger towards Ghostwalker or omnipotency of dragons, or great dragons in particular. While they might have been portrayed as untouchable waaay back when, latest with Dragons of the sixth world they've been scaled down (pun intended) to make them more 'approachable' if you will, and allow game masters to use elements of a GD's agenda in a street level game or campaign. And IMO this also includes thwarting a GD's plans, putting (another) dent in his seemingly unpenetratable armor. This trend has continued under SR4 and I don't really expect this to change anytime soon.

I don't think the question should be 'can you kill a great dragon' (it's been proven, you can) but rather 'would it be smart to do so' (the jury's still out on this one, but I think they're leaning towards a 'errrm, no'). (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Adarael]

I'm going to make a bold statement that I think goes a long way to explaining anger towards GDs and Ghostwalker in particular:

We expect dragons to be slain.

Actually, let me rephrase that.

The purpose of dragons is to be slain by heroes.

Now I'm not talking about dragons in that post-D&D, Puff the Magic Dragon sense. I'm talking about the traditional western notion of the Great Honking Lizard. The monster. The manipulator. The beast from beyond the hills. Deflowerer and devourer of virgins, razer of villages, get of the devil. It doesn't matter if it was a fire-breathing wyrm, a basilisk, or any other permutation of an oversized gila monster, all tradtional stories end with the thing getting killed by some Special Young Fellow(s) who put 2+ feet of steel into the thing enough times for it to stop breathing. Most of us here are culturally hard-wired to expect them to be killable by humans under certain circumstances. Compound this basic mythological nature as a target with many of us having grown up on D&D gaming. Dragons were scary. They were monstrously powerful, and they had all the riches... and you can bet your ass that at some point you were going to fight one in some D&D game. The Great Wyrm Red was the money shot hoardes and XP - you ice one of those in a fight and you can be pretty sure your character was incredibly bad-ass.

Now compare this to Shadowrun, where dragons - especially the old oens - aren't really supposed to be taken on by PCs. In fact, these dragons are repeatedly shown to lay waste to stuff that's much bigger and badder-assed than You Guys, and do so without visibly breaking a sweat. What's more, the dragons are bullies, but they're not the same KIND of bullies. Dragons bully kingdoms and kings, or wizards in lonely towers by using massive firepower. They're not supposed to bully people and then sue for libel when you call them on it. What's more, they're not supposed to be able to charm news networks, have fanclubs, or show up in tabloids. But SR dragons do, sometimes.

I think some of why people get pissed off at Shadowrun's dragons is that they break the rules we expect dragons to follow.
Just a thought.

And here's another tidbit to chew on: SR's great dragons have no middle ground in terms of fights. They're either totally (visibly) unharmed by everything that's thrown at them, or they're dead.
Or does that just mean most of them have quickened illusions spells over them, so they always look their most impressive, and never seem to bleed when they get smacked in the wing by Anti-Vehicle missles? As a human, I'm somewhat vain. As a dragon? I wouldn't think twice about doing something like that.

[martindv]

Denver was single-handedly conquered by Ghostwalker

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/proof.gif)

Have you actually read Ghost Stories, or are you just blindly repeating hearsay? Because that is not what happened, and is not what the status quo of Denver is. If he truly conquered Denver, there would be no sectors anymore because the nations that administer the sectors would have been forced out in the "conquest."

Masaru is financing anti-imperial japanese organisations and fights against them

And yet he's still fighting it a decade later.

all tradtional stories end with the thing getting killed by some Special Young Fellow(s) who put 2+ feet of steel into the thing enough times for it to stop breathing.

That makes more sense? Does not compute.

I think some of why people get pissed off at Shadowrun's dragons is that they break the rules we expect dragons to follow.

Well, they only break those rules because these rules don't allow PCs to level up to become as powerful as dragons.

I for one like these rules.

[mfb]

I think some of why people get pissed off at Shadowrun's dragons is that they break the rules we expect dragons to follow.
Just a thought.

i wouldn't mind dragons getting killed, i just think it should be something special. if dragons are just big, scaly pushovers, then killing one isn't important. if they're tough and badass and smart and the game rules reflect that, then killing one becomes a big deal.

[martindv]

The Line Developers of both RedBrick and Catalyst are in contact regularly. And of course every new ED book published by RedBrick has to be approved by FASA (who still owns the rights of ED), so I guess it's doubtful at best that a sourcebook will be released that contradicts SR canon (like in: "bang! all dragons are dead!").

And YET they can't tell Rob or Synner or anyone working on Shadowrun what they can or cannot do.

Denver was demilitarised, which meant, all the powers simply reclassified their military units as security forces. It was Cold War Berlin on steroids, basically.

What?

First of all, Berlin was very much militarized in fact and in law. Second, the sector arrangement was significantly different. Occupying forces could and did travel between sectors. Meanwhile, when the Wall fell the Chancellor of West Germany had to be flown to Berlin by the USAF because of the politics involved meant that he couldn't fly in on Lufthansa. Vienna/Austria was administered the same way, but eventually let be.

[Synner]

Because Great Dragons did destroy cities and topple gouvernments. Teheran is no more,

Tehran had no magical support worth mentioning and its military had never gone up against anything similar to Aden. The tactics Ghostwalker employed on Denver would have been twice as effective back in the day.

Denver was single-handedly conquered by Ghostwalker,

As martindv has already pointed out, you are incorrect. You should reread Ghost Stories and Dragons of the Sixth World if you think that is the case. In fact, Ghostwalker aided by an army of powerful spirits demolished an Azzie teocali, damaged (not destroyed) the Azzie arcology/building, and proceeded to attack soft targets around the sprawl and destroying apparently random buildings over the course of a week.

Brazil got re-shaped into Amazonia,

And to achieve that it took 3 Great Dragons, dozens of dracoforms, legions of spirits and paracritters, and thousand of metahuman allies.

Masaru is financing anti-imperial japanese organisations and fights against them,

You're slightly behind the times. The country is now independent and Masaru is a major power in the new government. The anti-Japanese struggle continues but now in the shadows, given that while the Japanese Marines have withdrawn the corps remain in place.

that Feuerschwinge-gal flew around and terrorised Germany before being shot-down, and so on.

Again wrong, Feuerschwinge woke up to find herself, her eggs, and her lair irradiated by a nuclear disaster that made Chernobyl look like a summer party. She was out of her mind with pain and radiation poisoning and went on a rampage over a mostly deserted part of the country. Armed forces were sent in to stop her and shot her down - apparently killing her.

They are a big threat to every nation, after all, and seeing as how the game developers are making the point of them being very dangerous, it is logical that every modern army would try to focus on anti-Great Dragon-research.

Two points here: Obviously modern militaries have developed tactics and technologies to deal with great dragons. Whether those strategies and tech are actually effective and whether they can be deployed effectively are entirely different problems. Having the firepower and the knowhow doesn't mean squat if you're not in a position to use it to full effect.

Which brings us to the other half of the equation. Great dragons are fully aware of these technologies and are developing their own counter-countermeasures and responses. They also manipulating things so that such a confrontation never comes about.

Of course, discussing how to defeat a Great Dragon would rather be appropriate in the other thread that Fuchs opened. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

It would be if the premise were different. As is a stand up, straight on fight is just unbelievable.

I should note that I'm the guy that came up with Graff-Beloit and Spinrad's conspiracy just to show that humans can be as canny and machieavellian as the biggest lizards. I also helped with the Dragonslayers and DIVE (which according to reports has knocked off quite a fair number of dragons to date). Humans, even lone humans, can be a threat to a dragon and even a great dragon. An honest fight just isn't the way to do it, the big lizards certainly don't fight fair.

[martindv]

There is a reason why we didn't fight over Berlin. It wasn't because we didn't want the whole city - both sides did - and it certainly isn't because we didn't think that we could win - both sides did - it was because we knew that in the extremely unlikely event that a hot war escalated into a nuclear war, victory would by pointless and we also knew that the only way to prevent Global TNA in the event of an escalation was for one side to nuke the other so fast and so completely that it is unable to retaliate and they knew it too and both sides knew that the other side knew and and knew that the other side knew that they knew it, therefore the only possibly successful strategy was an unchangeable policy of nuclear first strike in the event of a hot war both to prevent the other side from escalating it into a nuclear war.

Holy cow. Someone else figured out that the authors knew what they were doing. What is the world coming to? In a game that is predicated on PCs being pawns in political machinations (Checkmate had a great quote in this week's issue: "It's espionage. Politics is always involved.") it is amazing that people are so eager to disregard it when it interferes with their personal opinions, and how a straightforward look at the politics of a situation explains why Thor shots aren't raining down on a daily basis in SR.

This is why Aztechnology could have a million flying tanks with a top speed (without Movement) of Mach 6, and Ghost Stories would end the same way.

Synner. You need to get the Cities of Intrigue book published immediately. Even your old writers don't seem to get it.

Yeah, that's what I hate: A modern world completely run by relics from the fatansy world. Not in my campaign. In my campaign, megacorps run the world, and dragons either play by their rules, or get stomped.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/proof.gif)

It isn't. If it was, there'd be no human-run Corporate Court.

Are you fucking kidding me? It is you that is pleading with the developers to change and remove certain parts of the core setting, not I. How am I ruining anyone else's game by using the setting as written? If you choose to change the setting in your games, that's fine and more power to you. But you are advocating wholesale change to the setting merely because you personally don't like it and don't want anyone else to use it, and that is what I take exception with.

I'm just going to quote Fortune and be done with the futile effort of trying to deal with the hyperbole and unproved, imaginary even, nonsense Fuchs and to a slightly lesser extent Frank are spouting.

[Particle_Beam]

I did answer to the question why any military would spend ressources for fighting Great Dragons, not argue semantics and details how it was done word by word, nor how the Great Dragons would counter such tactics, Synner. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
If one really want to discuss the tactics applied, this thread isn't the correct one.
Personally, I'm satisfied with this thread. I now know the purpose of Ghostwalker, and that reason was indeed that the developers thought it might improve the Denver-setting if they added a dragon to it. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[kindalas]

Which brings us to the other half of the equation. Great dragons are fully aware of these technologies and are developing their own counter-countermeasures and responses. They also manipulating things so that such a confrontation never comes about.

I would imagine that every GD would have a vested interest in ensuring that research and development into dragon killing weapons was a long process with many dead ends and the occasional patent being denied to complicate the R&D efforts. Not to mention the work that is commissioned to shadowrunner who often have no idea why they are being payed to destroy an isolated research complex.

[martindv]

Not just Denver.

The whole Rite of Succession was because of him. And arguably a lot of Hestaby's current power as a result. Which influences the Tir, California, and a whole new AAA mega.

[Grinder]

The Line Developers of both RedBrick and Catalyst are in contact regularly. And of course every new ED book published by RedBrick has to be approved by FASA (who still owns the rights of ED), so I guess it's doubtful at best that a sourcebook will be released that contradicts SR canon (like in: "bang! all dragons are dead!").

And YET they can't tell Rob or Synner or anyone working on Shadowrun what they can or cannot do.

True, but what would be the benefit for them to put work in sourcebook that doesn't get approval by FASA?

[Synner]

True, but what would be the benefit for them to put work in sourcebook that doesn't get approval by FASA?

For the record no book is approved by FASA, they're approved by the IP/copyright holders who happen to be Wizkids.

[Grinder]

Oh, ok.

But that doesn't make much difference, I guess.

[DocTaotsu]

I think Ryu made an excellent point.

What is your average military more likely to deal with; angry anti corp rebels, rival corps interests, shadowrunners, bug spirits, or dragons? I will concede that if a military focused all it's energy on killing Great Dragons that they would certainly be successful after a period of trial, error, and flaming death. But why in god's name would they waste the time? I'm sure they would put doctrines down on paper, but would they even bother to run excercises? No matter what your stance on GD's fighting a GD is pretty much a "Worst Day Ever" scenario. Planning for the end of the world is of limited utility when so many other mundane things can and will fuck you up in the mean time. How many times have full scale engagements between military forces and Great Dragons occured? Less than 10? Less than 5? When those engagements happened were the Great Dragon(s) in question the sole concern of the various forces fighting? Or were they just throwing their weight behind one faction or another?

In my mind I see this big bookshelf with hardcopies of military doctrines for various situations. "Fighting a Rampaging Great Dragon" is probably just left of "Limited Nuclear Exchange", "Grey Goo Rogue Nanotech", and "Azzie Blood Spirits Eat Everyone". All three of those things exist in the realm of possiblity, a couple of them have happened, but they hardly get touched compared to, "Quietly Depose Rebel Leader Using Orbital Lasers"


My personal feeling is that a GD that needs powered body armor and vehicle gauss cannons probably already has one foot in the grave.

They should have people they pay good money to carry that crap for them (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Fuchs]

I think most militaries would focus on defense of their country against threats, not doing black ops stuff, that would be left to the secret service. Our military, back when it was not busy getting wrecked by system change after system change, certainly was training for the worst case, a full-scale soviet invasion.