[X] My Assistant

[Draco18s]

You know: bears will eat almost anything.

They also love getting drunk.

[Ol' Scratch]

I hear scavenging and hunting every day in the hope that you might find enough food is also much more preferable to having access to massive grocery stores, restaurants, fast food joints and convenience stores. Metahumanity really got the short end of the stick there.

[Kithanalane]

I see your point about small preditors moving into the city but most preditors big or small that move into the city do so simply because they have found more food acvailable there than in there natural habitat. Generally because metahuman population has encraoched enough into the territory that they don't have much of a choice and even bears roaming into cities present a danger to metahumans also looking at the geography in seattle which is surrounded by the salish shide which, I imagine, form the books is been returned to largely wilderness giving the indians revere for nature. I'm sure any large preditors would prefer to stay in the comfort zone. Of course with sentient animals there is no reason for them not to have sentient curiosity either. So the question is how aclimated would a "wild" shifter become to metahuman society versus a shifter born and raised in said society. Plus how many second or even third generation shifter are there in metahuman society as opposed to those who just wondered in for what ever reason. And you have to remember shifters are animals first and metahumans second. Though I do understand that just because they are in animal form does not mean that they have animal intelligence but just like there ability to shift there shape into two different forms I would think there mental capacity would be a combination of there to species. A high intelligence with a strong instinct where we as humans have evolve to almost completely suppress our baser instincts.

[fistandantilus4....]

Man, ouch, break up your paragraphs a little please.

[GreyBrother]

They also love getting drunk.

Apparently, they also love to load artillery, smoke cigarettes and join the polish army (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[nezumi]

I hear scavenging and hunting every day in the hope that you might find enough food is also much more preferable to having access to massive grocery stores, restaurants, fast food joints and convenience stores. Metahumanity really got the short end of the stick there.

You forget all the context that comes with it.

Would an ANIMAL prefer to steal or fake having a SIN so it can work 10-12 hours a day to earn a paycheck to order synthetic, artificial food and answer to a drek-hole of a boss...

Or spend maybe 5 hours a day actively hunting and the rest napping, hanging out, whatever, eating natural, healthy food, with no mortgage, no rent, no boss, no taxes and, hey, lady shifters.

(This is all assuming the shifter would prefer not to live in the barrens, where the bottom of humanity struggles to make enough to stay alive.)

By and large, animals enjoy more leisure time and more autonomy than humans do. Given the choice, I doubt they'd give that up.


HOWEVER, there are exceptions which might drive long-term habitation.
Lack of natural resources in the area (not an issue for Seattle, but for other cities, especially cities with more sprawl).
Fear of other predators.
Pursuit of mates.
Perhaps some sort of religious or spiritual inclination (they are sentient beings, so I could understand this).

I'm sure you can think of more, but these would largely be the exception, not the rule.

Also worth noting, the single most dangerous predator for shifter is humans. In cities like Seattle, shifters may be either shot on sight, or collected for magical experiments. 1% of the population can recognize shifters, in animal or human form, on sight. Seattle has a LOT of people. Would a shifter really rather live in Seattle, where the predators are, rather than the NAN, where the prey is?

[Walpurgisborn]

A scientific study of wild foxes showed that a mated pair with a mild tendency to tolerate humans at a closer range than normal would have a litter that was basically domesticated. In a SINGLE GENERATION! So, I think there may be more shifters in the population than people know!

Not quite, the Fox Farm experiment was 40 generations, although domestication was fully apparent in some as early as the 12th or 13th generation.

Still a huge jump, since previously the most common theory stated domestication was a long slow process, over a hundred or more generations..

[Draco18s]

You forget all the context that comes with it.

Likewise you're forgetting all the context that comes with being an animal.

[nezumi]

Weres do not form packs (they don't breed fast enough). However, they may travel with packs of normal animals - almost always as the pack leader. It's good to be king.

Studies show that human leisure time dived when transitioning from hunter-gathering to an agragarian lifestyle. The advantage of agragarian is not health, free time or even food security - it's the population boom that came with it. Neil Diamond discussed this at length in his books. Agragarian lifestyle is not good for the individual, it's good for the society, and weres are in too small numbers to be a society.

One might argue we have more leisure time in Shadowrun. That forgets:
1) Shadowrun is a dystopia, so thematically, that should not be true.
2) That is generally true for the top dogs in society. Our weres and transitioning from being pack leaders, to being undocumented, uneducated, unskilled laborers - wanted more for their value to medical science than because of anything they can do.

An alcoholic bear shifter might find that transition favorable. Most others will not.

[Ol' Scratch]

Once again: Shadowrunners are the outliers of society. They're not a typical specimen of their race or their culture. By any stretch of the imagination. A shapeshifter that becomes a shadowrunner is just as likely as a human becoming one. There just happens to be a lot more humans running around.

Also, shapeshifters are not wild animals. They're thinking, resourceful, sapient beings who are every bit as intelligent, rational, and creative as other metahumans. More so than many, in fact. They just happen to also get along equally as well with the types of animals with which they also share a bond. They are no more one than the other. They're their own, unique entity and can blend in with both equally well should they choose to do so. And, like any other character that becomes a shadowrunnner, that's not an easy choice to make and one typically dictated by necessity more than desire.

And if having to forsake clothing, tools, and every other technology created and used by mankind makes for such a better, cushier, long-lasting life, there'd be a lot more people doing precisely that. So hippies like Neil frickin' Diamond can suck it and they can suck it hard.

[Daylen]

Also, shapeshifters are not wild animals. They're thinking, resourceful, sapient beings who are every bit as intelligent, rational, and creative as other metahumans.

As a wild animal I resent the implication that wild animals are not sapient, intelligent, rational or creative.

[Draco18s]

As a wild animal I

There are numerous things I could infer from that, but I'm curious as to which is correct.

[Daylen]

There are numerous things I could infer from that, but I'm curious as to which is correct.

a bit of a wide range of possibilities eh?

[Rasumichin]

Weres do not form packs (they don't breed fast enough). However, they may travel with packs of normal animals - almost always as the pack leader. It's good to be king.

The issue why fluff always mentions mixed packs of shifters and their predecessor species is that shifters do not always breed true. Their offspring are likely to be shifters, but more than half of the cubs will be mundane.

I do not recall them breeding slower. Do you have a source for that?

Agragarian lifestyle is not good for the individual, it's good for the society, and weres are in too small numbers to be a society.

Except for Yakut.
Which is not really agrarian, of course, but a civil war economy run by werebear warlords.

Our weres and transitioning from being pack leaders, to being undocumented, uneducated, unskilled laborers - wanted more for their value to medical science than because of anything they can do.

There's a couple of societies where shifters have good career opportunities. Atztlan, Amazonia, Azania, the NAN, the Czech Republic, maybe other places in Europe as well and most of all, Yakut.
Atztlan employs jaguar shifters among it's border patrols and secret service, for example. Amazonia has some of them in the upper echelons as well.
Any magically active, sapient critter could easily become one of the top employees in a critter-friendly corporation like EVO or Horizon.
Plus, there's all this merc and shadowrunning business that might look more appealing to someone who's used to fighting for survival anyway.

The thing about all the races from RC is that they are not automatically outlaws- their status as a citizen is under debate.
A debate which has been more and more turning in their favor over the last 20 ingame years, and which they have won in a couple of countries.

[Kithanalane]

Well after some thought and reading throught this forum discussion I came to the desision that the bounty would be a black market bounty. Such a rare and unique species of sentient animal would be highly prized.

Especially if one could get there hands on a cub which could be trained and molded into the perfect body gaurd or even soldier.

[Saint Sithney]

If a person could turn into a tiger, do you not think that said person would be curious as to the nature of tigers and how they live?

If a tiger could turn into a person, do you not think that said tiger would be curious as to the nature of people and how they live?


Don't forget black market demand on shifter organs for reagents. Also captured shifters don't really need to be nabbed young.
Just apply Programmable ASIST Biofeedback conditioning and you've got a wicked new pet.

[KCKitsune]

Does anyone know the status of Sapient Critters rights in the UCAS? Just curious.

@ Sithney: You would first have to have a trode net that would work on the animal in question.

[Saint Sithney]

Does anyone know the status of Sapient Critters rights in the UCAS? Just curious.

@ Sithney: You would first have to have a trode net that would work on the animal in question.

Ah yeah, the old "Silly Rabbit," 'Trix clause.
I suppose that's why they pay top dollar for research subjects. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/spin.gif)

[toturi]

Apparently, they also love to load artillery, smoke cigarettes and join the polish army (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

I wish someone would change the poster to: Bear Shadowrunners: Yeah. You are pretty much fucked.

[nezumi]

Once again: Shadowrunners are the outliers of society.

This is true. In fact, I'd argue if a shifter were to try and enter society, it would be far more likely to become a runner or some similar career (or research specimen) than it would to follow any other profession. However, that still doesn't answer the question of why a shifter would choose to live a long time in the city ('enjoying being a runner' is a valid answer).

Also, shapeshifters are not wild animals. They're thinking, resourceful, sapient beings who are every bit as intelligent, rational, and creative as other metahumans.

They are wild animals, per the books. Don't force me to crack open the Companion and find a quote for you. They are wolves/tigers/foxes/whatever first, and humans second.

However, there is no shortage of wild animals who are also thinking, resourceful, and yes, even sapient (and by and large, those animals prefer to avoid cities, because in the wild they're pretty high on the food chain, and in the city, well, they're not).

And if having to forsake clothing, tools, and every other technology created and used by mankind makes for such a better, cushier, long-lasting life, there'd be a lot more people doing precisely that. So hippies like Neil frickin' Diamond can suck it and they can suck it hard.

Actually, there wouldn't, because in order to afford the huge amount of space to live like that, you'd have to have already accumulated a significant amount of material wealth (which most of us don't have). And of course, you're comparing modern day man to ancient man. At this point in history, our agragarian lifestyle (in the west) has surpassed the hunter-gatherer lifestyle in most statistics you'd care to name.

If you move out of the west and into the rest of the world, hunter-gatherers are common in places with enough land to permit them to exist. They are, however, being encroached upon by farmers and ranchers, and are still facing the same pressures of being on the wrong side of the equation as before (which translates into being starved into submission as their watering holes are claimed for farming, or being shot).

But we aren't talking about the modern world, we're talking about Shadowrun - where all those statistics have gone down again, and the average man is living in misery, however there are large swathes of empty, wild land. The equation has changed.

I do not recall them breeding slower. Do you have a source for that?

The books on Striper Assassin indicated that shifters have a single child, and only when they can find a shifter mate (which is rare).

Atztlan employs jaguar shifters among it's border patrols and secret service, for example. Amazonia has some of them in the upper echelons as well.
Any magically active, sapient critter could easily become one of the top employees in a critter-friendly corporation like EVO or Horizon.

I've never heard of this, nor am I aware of any 'critter-friendly' corporations (outside of SR4).

[Ol' Scratch]

Feel free to crack open your books, because you're wrong. Runner's Companion, p. 86, informs us that they're animals (note the lack of the word 'wild'), and then solely to point out that spells that specifically target humans will not work on them. The same section goes on to say that many of them have been raised in the wilds or on the fringes of metahuman society (ie, places like the NAN or Barrens or other similar areas). And that's only 'many' of them, not all of them. Other than that, the only significant difference between them and metahumans is that they're more prone to violence if scared or provoked. As an aside, lion and wolf shapeshifters, as per Running Wild, are particularly adept at joining metahumanity whereas jaguars have a bit more difficulty.

Then you have the fact that some countries go out of their way to hire shapeshifters in the Intelligence communities as well as other high-profile, highly-social fields. Amazonia, for instance, actually seeks out jaguar shapeshifters (you know, the one species that actually does have a little trouble with blending in with society) for just such purposes. And as mentioned earlier, other countries like the NAN and Aztlan have particularly high populations of shapeshifters.

So you're wrong on just about every account.

[GreyBrother]

It's a blurry line, because (in my opinion) most people compare animal intelligence to dumb or not as adaptable as human intellect.
The problem is, we can't communicate with, say, a dog or an eagle about what he thinks. We can watch it's behavior and guess how it feels, but we can't find out if they actually create some kind of etiquette or maybe even religious/spiritual thoughts.

I advice most gaming groups to discuss this issue before they encounter a shifter in any context, simply because the novels don't help much.
And i look specifically at Striper here, nothing wrong with the book etc, but her "integration" isn't an issue in the novel, quite the opposite. And i wouldn't take information from a novel into a canon discussion. It's a bad thing. The spirits kill kittens because of it.

[Draco18s]

Other than that, the only significant difference between them and metahumans is that they're more prone to violence if scared or provoked. As an aside, lion and wolf shapeshifters, as per Running Wild, are particularly adept at joining metahumanity whereas jaguars have a bit more difficulty.

Reminds me of Bear Who Digs Through walls. The player picked up Pacifist for him because Bear really was not a fighter. Oh, he'd scare the crap out of people, but he was extremely laid back and calm about things. Much like a typical bear (when they're not interested in ripping your head from your shoulders--which is rare). The only reason he's in the city at all is because he was tranquilized and hauled in by the request of some Renraku scientist (it was only after they had him in storage that did it come to light that no one knew why he was there as no one wanted him).

Given that the campaign is the Renraku Shutdown, it was a good intro for the character.

[Dread Moores]

The books on Striper Assassin indicated that shifters have a single child, and only when they can find a shifter mate (which is rare).

Running Wild seems to contradict that. As the more current source of information (and being an actual sourcebook, rather than a fiction novel), I'd be more willing to go with that.

[Rasumichin]

The books on Striper Assassin indicated that shifters have a single child, and only when they can find a shifter mate (which is rare).

Running Wild describes a pair of wolf shifters that have a normal-sized litter of both mundane wolves and shapeshifters, so that seems to have been retconned by now.

My guess would be that the number of offspring would equal the progenitor species- bear or tiger shifters would have two young, wolves would have a small litter of about 6 and so on.
And not all of them would be shifters themselves, of course.

I've never heard of this, nor am I aware of any 'critter-friendly' corporations (outside of SR4).

SR4 is what's relevant here, though.
EVO is run by a free spirit and promotes the rights of non-metahuman sapients whereever possible, Horizon, Wuxing and SK (and several AA corps, see RW) don't mind employing infected, so i could imagine that they'd offer corporate citizenship to shapeshifters as well.

Besides that, RC states that Atztlan, Amazonia, Azania and the NAN states offer SINs to shapeshifters if they come in from the wild, that several corporations employ them (though it does not mention which ones, but EVO, SK and Horizon seem like a good guess for employment besides "we've captured and brainwashed them for our supersoldier program").
All the relevant information is on p. 66 of RC, BTW.
It also says there that shifters "are uncommon but not rare and many choose to mingle with metahuman society particularly in Awakened nations".

Regarding older sources, Atztechnology/Atztlan have been described as issuing full citizenships to about anything since SR2.
Atztlan sourcebook describes that they give SINs to free spirits, shifters, dracoforms, whatever.
The shadowtalk of this book also includes posts by two feline shifters.
One of them is an Amazonian jaguar shifter with very close ties to the government, the other an Azanian (presumably a lion shifter) who's also some kind of bigwig used to the company of IEs and great dragons.

On the issue of bounties, RC claims that "many nations who are not members of the United Nations" offer them.
So i'd say that the UCAS issues neither SINs nor regular bounties.
But the idea of a black market for shifters seems reasonable- and with their legal status in Seattle, it would rather be a grey market.
Besides that, a shifter acting violently would legally be treated like an animal, as he is not eligible for citizenship and not officially recognized as sapient.
Bounties in individual cases are certainly not out of the question, but i don't think Seattle offers them for all shapeshifters.
Of course, metahuman rights groups would also be likely to adopt the cause of a shifter who is held captive if they learned about this.
The 2070s are a time of heated debate about who qualifies as sapient and how to treat several awakened species.

Another important question is how authorities in Seattle would react to a shifter who has a valid SS-Council SIN and walks into customs.
Quebec doesn't give a damn about that ("animals have to fly in the cargo bay, even if they are cops in the NAN", see Running Wild), but Seattle seems to be at least a bit more liberal on the issue.