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Zimbabwean Aardv...
post Jan 26 2004, 03:41 PM
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I was thinking about playing a shapeshifter, but when I looked at the rules, I decided against it. They just seem boring to play. They regenerate, which takes almost all of the fun out of combat, and they seem to actually get a bonus for casting spells with a force over their magic rating.

I was sort of excited about playing a character who was really an animal, but these benefits just take away the magic of roleplaying games. So, does anyone play them, or even allow them in their games?
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BitBasher
post Jan 26 2004, 04:43 PM
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QUOTE
actually get a bonus for casting spells with a force over their magic rating.
You missed the part where they don't regenerate physical drain normally, and all drain only regenerates at one box per minute.

They also are permanently dual natured, a huge flaw to work around, and must by thair attributes twice, once for human form and once for animal meaning they start out far weaker than a normal character.

They have issues, but they can be used... It largely depends on the type of game being run.
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Bearclaw
post Jan 26 2004, 04:49 PM
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My group had a wolf shifter, and it was a lot of fun. Until the pissed off bat shaman came to deliver a little astral message and the wolf attempted to defend his territory. Astral mages with weapon foci should not be messed with by dual natured creatures.
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Aidley
post Jan 26 2004, 04:55 PM
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I've played one before(about 10 years ago), and the disadvantages were a little horrifying for a first time runner.

you tend to ruin your clothes if you shapeshift in them, so plan on either wearing something disposable or doing a lot of runs naked if you're planning on shapeshifting.

shapeshifting takes time, and you tend to be very vunerable during the transition.

if you lose a limb you have to wait for a new one to be cultured for you because cyber appendages don't change with you. your brand-spanking new wired reflexes will fall out the first time you morph. (this is how my first gm played it. might be different now, though.)

and if you REALLY get into your characters, the prospect of walking around sans an appendage while they grow a new one for you is absolutely horrifying.

they aren't as munchie as you probably think they are. if having that much power with apparent invunerability bothers you, take a few flaws that will balance it out in your mind.

as much as I loathed my first ever SR experience (long, long story) I adored my shapeshifter.

oooh - i thought of the other big thing..... shapeshifters are EXPENSIVE. That really bites during character creation. Really, really REALLY bites.

i'm finding i'm having similar problems convincing myself to take a cybered character, so i'm working my way up to playing one in stages. (first a street mage, then a physad, then a shaman, then a physad subbie nut..... i'm trying to nerve myself up to creating a rigger next. wish me luck) Maybe this might work for you.
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nezumi
post Jan 26 2004, 04:59 PM
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Firstly, the third edition rules suck horribly. Go with second edition. Secondly, get your GM to agree to let you do physical damage in melee with your animal form (my shapeshifter character had to be physad so I could get killing hands. Funny, the GM wouldn't let me do L physical with claws, but would let me stack physad powers for a +5d6 init and S damage).

Honestly, check out second edition... You don't get screwed over by having to buy stats twice. You don't regenerate in human form. You can't get armor that changes shape with you. You can't cast magic in animal form. Dual nature is a *HUGE* thing, and pretty much gaurantees you're awakened so you can get masking. That's kinda unfortunate, but talk with your GM about getting a masking type spell or something if you don't want to be awakened (not sure how you'll deal with cyber, but that sounds like a nice challenge). Also remember that weres have *NO* rights, are SHOT ON SIGHT and are worth quite a bit of money.

My character spent all her time dealing with the fact that she is an animal, but had to train herself to ignore her animal instincts and act like a human. She had serious regenerative abilities which were super useful, but she couldn't use them during combat (no armor, no guns, lots of attention, that's actually what killer he in the end). The fact that she was a shapeshifter rarely came into play in regards to mechanics because of that (she just would never need first aid), but it made huge differences in roleplaying. Go ahead and try it out : ) Just remember what your head is worth because of your species...

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Namergon
post Jan 26 2004, 05:16 PM
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QUOTE
Firstly, the third edition rules suck horribly.  Go with second edition.


Some comparison arguments wouldn't have hurt. :P

QUOTE
Secondly, get your GM to agree to let you do physical damage in melee with your animal form (my shapeshifter character had to be physad so I could get killing hands.  Funny, the GM wouldn't let me do L physical with claws, but would let me stack physad powers for a +5d6 init and S damage).


IIRC, in 3rd Ed. When in animal forma you have a special attack damage code that rmeinds the original animal attack... 3rd edition doesn't suck so much, does it ? :D

QUOTE
You can't get armor that changes shape with you.


This part I don't understand.

QUOTE
You can't cast magic in animal form.


Granted, I'm not very fond of the way spellcasting and power use is handled in 3rd Edition.

QUOTE
  Dual nature is a *HUGE* thing, and pretty much gaurantees you're awakened so you can get masking. 


If I understand correctly, then you're horribly wrong. Dual nature doesn't grant you any access to Metamagic. You simply have kinda "free" Astral Perception ability, not really anything more.


QUOTE
That's kinda unfortunate, but talk with your GM about getting a masking type spell or something if you don't want to be awakened (not sure how you'll deal with cyber, but that sounds like a nice challenge). 


I can't find any meaning to this part, sorry. What are talking about ?

For my experience, I have a non-magic user Leopard shapeshifter, and it's quite fun to play. Roleplay is a must, however, and if the player can't ou doesn't want to handle that, he should forget about this kind of character.
Mine I play as a predator in a world of strange predators (metahumans), who has to learn this jungle's weird rules to be able to track down those who tried to enslaved him and his family. So he tries to learn the human world, and it can be quite fun for everyone at the table. :D
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Prototype
post Jan 26 2004, 05:27 PM
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Here would be my suggestions for making Shapeshifters playable.

1) Forget the crappy split your points between animal and human physical stats rule. That's ridiculous. The forms should be consistent - if you have average tiger strength you should have average human strength. Use one set of stats.

2) Forget the crappy bonuses in SR Companion. Look up the type of animal in Critters and apply the difference between its physical stats and 3 (ie. Stat - 3) as a bonus (or penalty) to be used in animal form. Then look up shapeshifters and apply the modifiers listed there to human and animal form. Give yourself the initiative dice of the animal/shifter as well. There's nothing worse in a roleplaying game than one rule for NPC shifters and one rule for PC shifters (apply also to Ghouls)

3) Go either a full mage or physmage. If you have to play an adept be prepared to rarely use animal form as the lack of armour is awful - at least sorcerous types can use the armour spell.

4) Tell your GM you should be able to use physad powers in both forms. Point out that otherwise it seems totally pointless being a shifter.

5) Take the attack from your animal form too. Tigers don't do (Str)M Stun in unarmed combat. Any other view on this probably deserves a severe beating. Don't have the book, but use the difference as a modifier again. Ie. if a Bear has Str 10 and the listed attack for a bear is 9S then your Bear form would do (Str - 1)S in melee.

6) If you want to fix regeneration a bit use stress points. Your shifter won't have cyberware, so use Cybersystem Damage on the stress chart as 'Power Stress' then make 1-2 Regeneration and 3-4 Shapeshift, 5-6 should be no effect. If a wound does regeneration stress then it has to be healed naturally and doesn't regenerate. Make up some effects along the lines of those for bioware (ie. Light stress is purely cosmetic, moderate maybe delays regen a turn, serious makes it take a minute per box and at deadly it craps out) and do likewise for Shapeshift (willpower tests of increasing difficulty to change shape is what we use)

Pile all that in, oh, and remember they get Essence 8, and thus have a starting magic rating of 8 as well.

Do that and a shapeshifter is still a waste of space till he gets some karma behind him... but one day he'll be playable.
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nezumi
post Jan 26 2004, 05:59 PM
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Lessee if I can do quote tags right...

QUOTE
Some comparison arguments wouldn't have hurt.  :P


Complaints about 3rd edition...
The two sets of stats sucks, I can't understand why they did that. Regeneration in human form is very overpowering, and they made it a lot faster (you regen ALL your damage now instead of just like 4 points). I don't recollect 3rd edition stressing as much about how you are an animal and you are a particularly valuable one at that (but that might just be my memory). There are some other minor things, but that's the big stuff.

QUOTE
This part I don't understand
(Armor)
If you're wearing your armor jacket and FFTB like a good little runner, and you decide to shape shift... you now have shreds of FFTB and armor jacket on the floor and when you face 9M hits, it's actually 9M. You can't wear armor as a shapeshifter unless it's made for you, and your human armor has to come off when you change. Being naked *SUCKS*.

QUOTE
Dual nature is a *HUGE* thing, and pretty much gaurantees you're awakened so you can get masking. 
...
If I understand correctly, then you're horribly wrong. Dual nature doesn't grant you any access to Metamagic. You simply have kinda "free" Astral Perception ability, not really anything more.


No, but it means that, as a dual natured creature, anyone who's awakened can tell at a glance that you're a shapeshifter. It's part of your astral signature, and you're ALWAYS projecting. Since being a shapeshifter means you have no rights and you're worth a lot dead, that's pretty much a death sentence right there. Masking is required to survive because it hides your species. I simply can't imagine anyone playing a shapeshifter without metamagic or serious GM help. (This also leads to the next thing you quoted.)

My shapeshifter never initiated (we didn't have the rulebook for it), but in the SR world, she should have been dead very early on. Well she was anyway, but if she hadn't died from that... From reading your info Namergon, yours should have been as well. Just remember, YOU ARE WORTH MONEY, YOU HAVE NO LEGAL PROTECTIONS. Any corp or joe shmoe can shoot you on sight and will make hundreds of thousands for bringing you in.





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spotlite
post Jan 26 2004, 06:18 PM
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This was under SR2, so I'm going to leave the SR3 rules alone, cos we haven't used them. We had a character who played a Tiger Shapeshifter. Now I don't know how to make body armour in Real Life ™, but she had made a suit of armour similar to form fit that used sort of a lycra substance between the plates with the ballistic cloth sewn in strips around it. The plates were hardened (so it wasn't really form fit. She couldn't really wear it in polite company because it really was kinda obvious unless she wore very baggy clothes) so that it was all the armour she needed to wear. We worked it out as about 5/4.

But in tiger form it was all stretched out. Because of how it was designed it still gave her protection, but only at about 4/3 (or possibly 3/2, I can't remember off hand). 4/3, or even 3/2, was just about enough for melee combat (tiger form) with regeneration added in to boot, and 5/4 was plenty in human form where she didn't have the Body to soak it down.

It was custom made, and thus when it got damaged it was lots of fun trying to get it fixed, it gave her a slightly better than armour jacket armour rating in one form, and armour vest or lower ratings in another. Not at all gamebreaking, when you consider you're a walking astral target. We always liked the way Astral perception and shapeshifters was done in one of the short stories which were published, where the shifter could 'smell' astral things like mages, spirits, wards, spells and so on. The target numbers stay the same cos its an innate ability, but the game description changes wonderfully.

As for regeneration, as a GM I have a horrid tendency to roll a 1 any time something with regen goes down, except once, very recently. So that shifter didn't last past her first single unsoaked Deadly wound (which was actually after a good four or five karma pool's worth of game play). The point being regen made her LESS survivable than other characters - shifters don't have overflow. you get to D, you roll a dice, you live or die. With another character, there's a chance of doing something about it first.
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Namergon
post Jan 26 2004, 06:21 PM
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QUOTE
Complaints about 3rd edition...
The two sets of stats sucks, I can't understand why they did that.  Regeneration in human form is very overpowering, and they made it a lot faster (you regen ALL your damage now instead of just like 4 points).


I agree about regen speed and I find the shifting time a nonsense, but I can understand they wanted it to be playable in a SR combat.
I don't find regeneration overpowered, given the limitations. You're also quickly spotted as abnormal.


QUOTE
(Armor)
If you're wearing your armor jacket and FFTB like a good little runner, and you decide to shape shift... you now have shreds of FFTB and armor jacket on the floor and when you face 9M hits, it's actually 9M.  You can't wear armor as a shapeshifter unless it's made for you, and your human armor has to come off when you change.  Being naked *SUCKS*.


Shapeshifters are not "designed" to be ultimate warriors in human forms. Their human form is a "chamaleon" adaptation to human intrusion in their turf.
I don't see a background problem with the fact that armor doesn't transform with the character. The contrary I would have find dumb.

QUOTE
No, but it means that, as a dual natured creature, anyone who's awakened can tell at a glance that you're a shapeshifter. 


There's some successes to obtain on a Perception Test. So I would say that any perceptive and/or trained magician in astral perception or projection would spot the shifter. That's a big difference.


QUOTE
It's part of your astral signature, and you're ALWAYS projecting.


(nitpicking) perceiving.

QUOTE
    Since being a shapeshifter means you have no rights and you're worth a lot dead, that's pretty much a death sentence right there.  Masking is required to survive because it hides your species.  I simply can't imagine anyone playing a shapeshifter without metamagic or serious GM help.  (This also leads to the next thing you quoted.)


Shapeshifters usually don't live in towns and preferably avoid humans. Your point is part of the reason why. Basically, to be honest, shapeshifters are not intended to be PC. They're not human, they don't understand human society, aren't part of it, and endanger themselves whenever they have contacts with human society. But as they're so "cool" and people would love playing some, they made rules for that.

QUOTE
From reading your info Namergon, yours should have been as well.  Just remember, YOU ARE WORTH MONEY, YOU HAVE NO LEGAL PROTECTIONS.  Any corp or joe shmoe can shoot you on sight and will make hundreds of thousands for bringing you in.


Maybe that's why my shapeshifter tends to live in areas where speaking the word "legal" either makes you killed either makes a lot of people laugh. He lives in the barrens, and in any area where he's as safe from corps and cops threat as any SINless living there. Lurking in A-zones is an entirely different matter, I agree. But that's life. 8)
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spotlite
post Jan 26 2004, 06:26 PM
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One more thing, before I forget - remember that Shifters are animals FIRST. They are savage. Most DO hunt sentient prey (hence that shoot on sight, not letting them become citizens policy that everywhere I know of except amazonia has). If the shifter is in animal form I'd guess that's even more so as their sense are heightened. When they kill something, they may well just start eating it without thinking about it. Like security guards. That's a roleplay choice, but one you shouldn't ignore unless you're playing a shifter which has always made it a policy never to eat anything that can tell you a good recipe at the same time.

imho, etc.:

It also means that the shifter, even in human form, if it gets into a melee fight, is still going to fight like an animal. If I was Gm'ing I'd let 'em make a bite attack with a -1 reach and L physical damage if they wanted, because they will bite, scratch, kick, gouge, go for the throat, eyes, whatever. I might even put the opposition on pluses for the sheer unnerving-ness of the fight. That's obviously my call, and not a rule, but I think the roleplay choice in something like a shifter is greater than even a shaman, and its not a type of character i'd want in the hands of a player who would only be doing it for the funky powers. Not because its necesarily unbalancing. Because they don't deserve it.
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Namergon
post Jan 26 2004, 06:33 PM
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QUOTE
The forms should be consistent - if you have average tiger strength you should have average human strength. Use one set of stats.


My problem occured when a player once asked me to play an Eagle shapeshifter. There's no stats for normal eagles in Critters (nor in any Shadowrun sourcebook I can remember of)...

QUOTE
There's nothing worse in a roleplaying game than one rule for NPC shifters and one rule for PC shifters (apply also to Ghouls)


Except if the former rule (NPC rule) was designed to handle a critter, and now players want it as a playable PC on a "normal" game.

QUOTE
4) Tell your GM you should be able to use physad powers in both forms. Point out that otherwise it seems totally pointless being a shifter.


While I agree that Magic rules are not explained enough (to tell why these rules), I would rather say "it's pointless to be an adept and a shifter".

QUOTE
5) Take the attack from your animal form too. Tigers don't do (Str)M Stun in unarmed combat.


Nor does a tiger shapeshifter by 3rd Edition rules.

QUOTE
6) If you want to fix regeneration a bit use stress points. Your shifter won't have cyberware, so use Cybersystem Damage on the stress chart as 'Power Stress' then make 1-2 Regeneration and 3-4 Shapeshift, 5-6 should be no effect. If a wound does regeneration stress then it has to be healed naturally and doesn't regenerate. Make up some effects along the lines of those for bioware (ie. Light stress is purely cosmetic, moderate maybe delays regen a turn, serious makes it take a minute per box and at deadly it craps out) and do likewise for Shapeshift (willpower tests of increasing difficulty to change shape is what we use)


Nice ideas.

QUOTE
Pile all that in, oh, and remember they get Essence 8, and thus have a starting magic rating of 8 as well.


Funny how many people are sure that the starting Magic Attribute value is equal to Essence. That's wrong. Starting Magic is always 6.
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spotlite
post Jan 26 2004, 06:42 PM
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regarding that point about NPC rules vs player rules - we now use the PC rules for Ghouls and Shifters, when it comes up, just like we would for other, metahuman NPCs. it works fine that way, and is completely fair. And karma pools are a bitch on an NPC shapeshifter...
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Lantzer
post Jan 26 2004, 06:51 PM
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I agree that the Companion's rules for shapeshifters are pretty bad. Of course, I also know why: It was an attempt to allow the creation of a shapshifter balanced with a normal starting PC.

Problem: A properly implemented shapeshifter is such a powerhouse that it will not balance with a normal starting PC.

So we get poorly implemented shapeshifters, or no shapshifters as PCs. I generally go for the latter.

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Hot Wheels
post Jan 26 2004, 07:02 PM
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I did a shape shifter once, it was lots more role playing than worrying about effects. Lots of acting out that she wasn't human. And as for the clothes thing, I wore lots of coverall on runs that I could get rid of when I changed.

Regenerating was a bitch because I'd still bleed when hurt and aso clothes quickly got torn up and stained. I learned to play dead when shot (will power test not to freak out and go all bestial) becasue otherwise someone goes down from a blast and then gets up aqain gets more firepower on her faster thnvyou can say 'geek the mage"
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nezumi
post Jan 26 2004, 07:04 PM
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QUOTE (Namergon)
QUOTE
Pile all that in, oh, and remember they get Essence 8, and thus have a starting magic rating of 8 as well.


Funny how many people are sure that the starting Magic Attribute value is equal to Essence. That's wrong. Starting Magic is always 6.

A lot of people quote 2nd edition, where the magic is set to your essence, and since your essence was SUPPOSED to be 6... 3rd edition they actually specify magic can only start at 6.

Namergon, most of your responses I agree with. I'm not saying that the rules are stupid. They make perfect sense (like losing armor, dual nature etc.) But the point is, they work to the shifter's detriment and need to be taken into account.

Some things I'd disagree with... There's no reason for them to regen in human form. That IS unbalancing and isn't required background stuff. I have the armor, the body, the magic AND I heal in one or two turns? That means I need to get deadly damage on the first round or whoever shot me is done for (because next round he'll have a wound and it only gets tougher from there). Even with deadly damage, there's a good chance I'll force feed you your weapon. I just don't think they playtested that as much as they should have. At least in animal form, you don't have armor, which does sort of make up for it. The only way to balance out regen in human form is if you have a seriously high powered campaign, or if everyone always says "he's healing! He's a mage!" *geek*

I'm not sure what the rules are on how hard you have to check an astral signature to determine species. I always understood that to be pretty easy, after all even one success starts telling you about emotions and what not. That might be a GM call, but the way I've read it is you don't need a lot of luck to tell the monster from the Joe Shmoe (not that you don't draw suspicion in the first place, since you're percieving). That means that when you're in the open, every mage who's projecting or percieving gets a chance to roll to see if they notice 1) there's someone else on the astral near them and 2) the person isn't human (neither is all that tough, IMO).
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BitBasher
post Jan 26 2004, 09:20 PM
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QUOTE
I agree about regen speed and I find the shifting time a nonsense, but I can understand they wanted it to be playable in a SR combat.
No, they just made PC regenration work the same as NPC regeneration instead of having disparate rules.
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k1tsune
post Jan 26 2004, 09:52 PM
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One of my players is an Awakened Cat.

I had to come up with house rules on nudity just because of him.
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Hot Wheels
post Jan 26 2004, 10:27 PM
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I never thought of LD as nudist
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RedmondLarry
post Jan 26 2004, 10:29 PM
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In our four-year campaign, one player played a Shapeshifter Fox as his main character for over a year, until the team realized that during the last two months of play she'd been possessed by a Mantis Spirit and they killed her. Five times.

Four other players have played a Shapeshifter briefly, but never for very long. They have always returned to their other characters.
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Panzergeist
post Jan 26 2004, 11:45 PM
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Shapeshifters may be considered animals, but that shouldn't mean you can just kill them any time. They are rare animals, so they should be protected, like eagles and whales. If they are completely illegal to hunt, people should at least need a liscence to hunt them. And just because an animal is legal to hunt, doesn't mean you can shoot at it in crowded city streets. Imagine if a shifter is in the streets of Seattle, and a person starts shooting at him with a pistol. Now, even if that person has a liscence, he is still going to get arrested for discharging firearms in a crowded street, which could easily result in collateral damage. After all, it is legal to hunt pigeons, but you never see anyone pull out a shotgun and bag a flock of pigeons for dinner, because bullets have to land somewhere. Also, people need permits for guns and spells over level 2. The world of shadowrun may seem like a really violent place, but keep in mind that as a runner you are only dealing with a small section of society. Most people in 2063 still don't pack heat all the time. So, anyone who just hunts a shapeshifter for profit is likely to be a criminal. And criminals don't walk around using astral perception all the time, because A) that leaves them open to astral ambush and B) It's harder to do stuff in the physical world while watching the astral, giving you a +2 target number to everything that doesn't involve your astral perception. Also, in 2063, animal rights and civil rights activists are a lot more militant than they are now, like everyone else. Anyone who is found hunting shifters or selling their body parts might just be targeted by an ACLU hit squad, or made an example of by PETA.
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Herald of Verjig...
post Jan 27 2004, 12:41 AM
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Since the awakening, preservation of endangered species has not been a common concern. Preservation of humans has been more popular. Quebec offers bounties on all paracritter hides, and most nations classify paracritters as dangerous pests.
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BitBasher
post Jan 27 2004, 12:47 AM
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QUOTE
Shapeshifters may be considered animals, but that shouldn't mean you can just kill them any time. They are rare animals, so they should be protected, like eagles and whales.
Er no... they are animals, typically carniverous, and above most humans on the food chain. They are hunted, and there are bounties on them. They are valuable to corporate research because of their rarity and properties, and in SR money drives motives.
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Dveeb
post Jan 27 2004, 01:05 AM
Post #24


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Luckily, they are worth a lot more alive than dead, which provides chances for escape (or rescue). Unfortunately, if they can't escape, a shapeshifter's resiliency will prevent the tests from killing them, or even knocking them out for long.
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Tziluthi
post Jan 27 2004, 01:08 AM
Post #25


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Er no... they are animals, typically carniverous, and above most humans on the food chain.


If you think about it, in the natural order of things, most large carnivores are above humans on the food chain, if not on an equal level. Just because it can eat us, it doesn't mean that governments are going to eradicate it. Added to the fact that shapeshifters are sentient, there would be serious ethical implications. Food chain position is not a good reason for there to be a shoot on sight policy.

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They are valuable to corporate research because of their rarity and properties, and in SR money drives motives.


This, on the other hand, is an excellent rationale for hunting our zoanthropic cousins.
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