The role of the Street Samurai, Treatise on table balance Options

[Chainsaw Samurai]

(For the purposes of this brief rant the term Street Samurai is used as loosely as possible to denote a character who fulfills a group's role of primary combatant. Furthermore the purpose of this thread is not to tell anyone how to play, or insist that anyone is "doing it wrong," merely to point out something that can and does happen by the very nature of table top role playing games.).

The perfect run. Everything goes right, exactly as planned.

The Face performs remarkably. His disguises work as intended, blends in seamlessly, and sells ice makers to Eskimos.

The Mage provides all the utility spells and support necessary for the group to get the job done. Even provides spells like sanitize to ensure that the job doesn't go bad after the fact.

The rigger provides support, surveillance, and bugging. This is a combat multiplier that ensures everything else goes as smoothly as possible.

The Hacker trivializes all the right security measures at the right times, gets the data needed, and covers his tracks.

The Samurai kicks his feet up and relaxes. The player fills his table-time making snarky comments and one-liners. Three times he gets his hand on his concealed weapon, and doesn't get to use it.

This isn't to say the Samurai is useless. Far from it. Disregarding secondary skills that synergize with the Sam's primary functions (high agility makes for great infiltration rolls, some of these rolls are necissary in the leg work portion as the Sam helps the rigger and hacker "case the joint" before a run), while the Sam didn't fulfill his role, he was far from unneeded. You don't bring a Street Samurai on high risk runs because you are looking for a fight, you bring a Sam because on a long enough time-line a fight is inevitable.

A Street Samurai is protection. He is insurance. His most basic role is that of a bodyguard: specializing in combat, tactics and warfare. His skill set and ability to apply force is just as capable of preventing team casualties as the Mage's spells, the Faces cunning, and the techie's discretionary measures. The purpose of this look at game balance (more specifically, team balance) is to acknowledge the Sam's primary function within the team, but to analyze a fault in the Street Samurai.

We've all seen it happen, some of us more than others. Out of absolutely nowhere a long running team who has never before had much problem during runs is suddenly outmatched. The team is wounded severely and it's Samurai, normally a bulwark of defense and dervish of violence, is fighting for his life. How did this happen? Escalation of force.

While a Street Samurai is there to provide protection, he can commonly be the source of his group's demise. Not because the player did anything wrong, but because he did things right. Too right.

The Street Samurai in question can fire his assault rifle better with his eyes closed than mere mortal men can with them open. He is more resilient than most vehicles on the road in Seattle. His reflexes make him worth 3 men in a gunfight. He is become death, destroyer of gangers and security guards.

Obviously this is mildly problematic. Mostly because it isn't any fun. The characters at the table get to take a pass or two and then watch their opposition disappear into a fine red mist. The Samurai will smile as he rolls his large dice pool (with a specialization in "cuizinarting"), but the lack of challenge wears on him and eventually proves boring. The GM is more than frustrated. While most GMs don't see their players as "opposition" to be eliminated, they still want to create a feeling of tension with their combats, they want to make the fight worth everyone's time.

So the GM ups the ante a little bit. Then a little bit more. Then a little bit more.

Before long, the Face's respectable pistols skill isn't cutting it like it used to. Neither is the hacker's armor and meager body skill. Combats begin to become all too intense for these characters. The Samurai begins to finally break a bit of a sweat, but isn't worried.

Then it happens. In Shadowrun it doesn't take a lot, just a smidgen more opposition, and the face dies. While the Samurai was doing everything in his power to resolve the situation, a straw finally broke the camel's back and ultimately responsibility lies on the GM and the Samurai for this "challenging but nonlethal" encounter turning lethal.

Which brings me to the direction I'd like to have this conversation take. While it is the Street Samurai's responsibility to be better than his team mates in order to cover them and protect them, how much is too much? At what point does the Sam's power and purpose become a liability to the people he is trying to protect?

Is there a number of dice his pool should be ahead of his fellows in combatant skills to do his job well without making them entirely useless in the ensuing "escalation of force" combats in future games? How many more soak dice to keep him taking hits and fighting without making it so similar rounds at his teammates are potentially overkill? There are more such statistics that can greatly upset the balance of power at the table, any feedback on the subject?

Finally, we've all run in or played in games where this has happened. Does anyone have any interesting, frustrating, or funny stories they'd like to share on the subject of table balance being horribly skewed?

[CanRay]

The Street Samurai comes into play when you're dealing with people that can't be peacefully negotiated with. I'm sorry, I don't care how good your Face is, or how many dice he has, there's no way his Halfer is going to convince the street full of Humanis in pointy hats to not play "Dwarf Tossing" using a flaming barrel as a target.

That said:
Jack: "Meet Hamilton."
Murphy: "I said get a couple of guys, Jack. A couple of guys."
Jack: "He is a couple of guys."

[Wasabi]

Is there a number of dice his pool should be ahead of his fellows in combatant skills to do his job well without making them entirely useless in the ensuing "escalation of force" combats in future games? How many more soak dice to keep him taking hits and fighting without making it so similar rounds at his teammates are potentially overkill? There are more such statistics that can greatly upset the balance of power at the table, any feedback on the subject?

My friends and I happen to be building a team so I've been trying to get a sense of scale for the team and IMO the chief factors are:

1. Ignoring damage (Sideways, Pain Editor, Heightened Concentration metamagic)
2. Adrenaline Surge (the positive quality)
3. 3+ passes (matrix excepted)
4. Infiltration dice that are double the average Red Samurai's perception (for that game)
5. Using a weapon that autokills a target. (Narcojet in a high velocity assault rifle, for instance, or a Thunderstruck with AV rounds. Pornomancer social dicepools fit this category as well.)
6. Reaction+Combat Sense+Deflection dicepools of 12+

Having one of these is character-defining. Having two is powerful. Having three or more is borderline gamebreaking and 4+ is abusive.

So IMO the bulk of the team should have the same # of advantages listed above. The Sam should get maybe one more than the rest of the team.

[Chainsaw Samurai]

Exactly, the opening part is setup. Illustrating that the Samurai is a necissary part of the team for just this sort of occasion, which is the exact part of the run you don't usually plan for outside of:

"If the drek hits the fan, I'll have weaponry covered in the form of automatics and grenades...... alright no grenades dammit... but I've got fire support and I'll be here by the rear door so I can get in fast if I need to or to cover your escape."

The point was to talk about table balance. E.G. your GM calibrates an encounter so your 25 dicepool for shootin' Street Sam get's a bit of a work out, and suddenly your 11 dice pool for shootin' Face is a wet noodle.

Although it does work in reverse as well. The 3 charisma 4 con Rigger is at the bottom of the barrel compared to your Face and finds he can't even moderately affect talking situations with the Face in mind.

Most argue that Shadowrun is a game of specialization (sometimes to the point of weakness), I am just trying to hear people's thoughts on and stories from such situations where it has had negative repercussions.

[Chainsaw Samurai]

And I was beat to it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

...Pornomancer social dicepools fit this category as well.)

I hadn't thought of it in terms of qualities that you put it in. Interesting notion.

We were trying to hammer out a dice range. For instance how many more dice should a character that is "focused" on a task have over the average of his teammates? How many dice more is too much?

If the number is too small, why bother? If your Sam only outshoots the average character in your team by a single die, that is an issue. If he outshoots them by a dozen dice then obviously other problems could occur. After brief discussion our gut reaction was that 4-6 more dice is probably "good," but hadn't nailed down the upper or lower limits.

This was a big problem in that other game with the underground-strongholds and big-fire-breathing-lizards, especially when attributes were rolled for. Inevitably you'd get one character with exceptional rolls and the table balance would be skewed from the beginning.

I've always felt that the goal of a gaming group should be the fun of everyone, so it seems to me like building and balancing characters like a team rather than a group of individuals is in the interest of that.

EDIT: This could have something to do with the fact that I've always thought a proper team of characters (in almost any setting) should be built like a Special Forces Team. Each one has a role, which they cross train with the others to proficiency in case of dire situations, and they can all perform standard stuff (such as combat, social situations, basic computer stuff, and infiltration) within a certain degree of success.

[Saint Sithney]

Cap dicepools at 20 unless edge is used.

If the face is going to get splattered, he burns edge for a critical success. Sweats a little, but how often do things go wrong when he's in the thick of it?

Riggers are murder on wheels. Mages are murder in pointy shoes. Hackers are murder on other people's stolen wheels. When it comes down to it, every archetype, save the overspecialized sneak-face, can cause massive death and destruction on demand. Sammy just wears it on his sleeve.

[Shinobi Killfist]

I kind of think a sam should be better than others in a fight about to the same degree other pure roles are better than the sam out of a fight. Not in a specific task but in a general way. Like I don't think he should shoot better than the face an equal ammout to how much better the face out talks the sam, but what does the face add to a team in the run, the sam should be adding just as much though his focus is combat.

[Kruger]

The escalation of force problem illustrated in the OP generally results from an excess of power-gaming. It's natural munchkin instinct to try and find the best combination of cyberware, skills, and gear. Heck, there's entire threads devoted to it here about how to squeeze as much out of the rules as possible. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but when a GM allows a player to create an monstrosity of a killing machine, he's going to immediately create an imbalance of power. In a world where some people "move like they do", those who don't are going to be at a distinct disadvantage.

I've always gotten around power gaming by making combat a story element instead of a constant. Players in my games know that if their character is too one dimensional they might end up bored when the rest of the team is participating in the parts of the story that don't involve caving in faces. The key to defeating this problem is good GMing, not some kind of character creation formula. Give the players incentives to make balanced characters, and then construct campaigns that do not make them regret not munchkining by tossing them against enemies they cannot defeat more with their wits and skill than explosive rounds and fireballs.

I have to put in my chips with Chainsaws idea that characters should be built to be a part of a well cross trained team. RPGs aren't about "winning", so to speak. But then again, I passed my smash and loot phase of gaming a long time ago. The so-called "Pink Mohawk" campaigns are going to run into the problem of overpowered samurai and mages far more often than other types, because those are the players who will feel compelled to create the "best" character, rather than a good one. In my opinion, the ideal Shadowrun team probably won't even have a "samurai" or other similar character in it because killing the shit out of a bunch of people would rarely be needed.

[Lanlaorn]

A Face, Hacker and Mage could easily be great at combat, none of those roles are mutually exclusive with violence. Face and Hacker are relatively very low investments in skills and attributes so they could easily BE the Sammy as well and the Mage just needs a few combat spells.

It's not really about roles so much as style. a Sammy kills differently than the Mage or Rigger, not necessarily more effectively than either.

[toturi]

Each member of the team should have enough dice to accomplish what he needs to do single handedly. Any help from his team mates is welcome but he should be able to handle that aspect of the threat.

If the threat is a Matrix one, the hacker should be able to handle it without help from someone else. If the threat is magical, the mage must be able to stop it without help. If the threat is physical combat, then whoever is supposed to handle that role should do so by himself. If that means totally outclassing the GM's opposition, so be it.

As a GM I expect the street sam to be able to handle my low-mid rating Grunt opposition all by himself. Higher rating Grunts can be dealt with cooperatively by the sam and the mage.

[Chainsaw Samurai]

The easiest way to ensure balanced characters rather than min-maxed is to ensure the occasional hiccup in planning. Some might consider this a bit meta-gamey but I consider it realistic. At any point in time just about any character is one poor social interaction away from raising the alarm. Similarly, letting the combat mage and Sam handle the combats only works as long as the combats go to plan.

Nothing ever goes to plan. When your rigger is droning away and notices a parking ticket getting written up outside from his van's outside cam, what now? Or the Mage having to talk his way around a janitor who is in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Really, I find table balance issues to be at their absolute worst in Pink-Mohawk games. Either by time put into the books or maybe just the way their brains work, some people make much better min-maxers than others. In Pink-Mohawky games min-maxing is more forgivable (some might say, encouraged) and so I tend to find larger discrepancies there. Two Street Samurai and one has 8 dice over the other for relevant combat skills.

The other time I find it is when players know it will likely be just a one-off game and they are likely to not revisit the character. This seems to invoke some sort of unavoidable urge to "get the most" out of the character in some people (I've certainly been guilty of it too).

I've grown out of my min-max phase. Mostly because of sense of progression. I could start with a bajillion dice and a modded out super gun, throughout the game I'll have very little opportunities to progress in the sense of becoming better at what I should be good at (because I'm already just about there).

[Glyph]

The rest of the group shouldn't be useless in physical combat, any more than the street samurai is completely useless outside of combat. The street samurai should handle the lion's share of the fight, and go toe to toe with the heavy hitters that the team encounters. The other characters should be plinking at mooks from behind cover, or using their other specialties - things like magic and hacking have plenty of utility during combat.

Honestly, the GM should be escalating the threat level as the characters get better (and presumably take better-paying jobs), whether they have a dedicated combat specialist or not. And just as the sammie should be becoming more well-rounded, the other characters should be dedicating some of their karma and/or money to becoming a bit tougher in combat, too.

[KCKitsune]

I also don't know why the Sammy could not have enough skill in another skill set that he can complement the Specialist in his field. Heck, in the Shadowrun books the sammy was the person who met with the Johnson, so he SHOULD have enough social skills to be effective.

In an advanced game (150+ Karma) the Sammy should be able to step into any role other that the mage because he can have the augmentation/skills needed to do the job.

[Chainsaw Samurai]

There isn't any reason why a Sam couldn't have enough points to compliment or step in to another role. In fact, ideally this is how everyone on the team should work. That way if something goes wrong there isn't a role on the team being handled by a single person.

For example a Sam (or any team member) with just barely enough Hacking skill to stand behind the Hacker and throw a couple heal programs his way would allow that hacker to do three times as much, easily. It is absolutely no different on the other end if the hacker can reliably lay down suppressive fire while a Street Samurai flanks. This is an example of cross-training vs extreme specialization, I know some groups choose to overspecialize but in real life (as well as in game usually) cross training and working together will almost always achieve much better results.

I'm not attempting to argue that they cannot. Best case scenario they do, I'm talking about Sams becoming too gnarly of combat monsters so anything thrown at them to have even a remote chance of phasing them is way more than other members of the group can handle.

Did I not express myself well in my initial post? I can't help but feel only a couple of people understood me.

[Saint Sithney]

Oh, I understand I suppose. It's as much to do with the type of player who takes the role as it is the role itself. The player who chooses to run a Sam often as not does so fully intent on becoming the baddest mother in this or any room. That motivation is pretty well fed by the advancement choices available to him. So, in the end, rather than rounding out, he beefs up until he is an absolute monster who can kill half the city's police force in a running combat.

IMO It's the attitude not the archetype, and if you want to control it, just cap dice at 20. Then Samwise will have to eventually branch out and games can evolve laterally.

[Whipstitch]

I'm not attempting to argue that they cannot. Best case scenario they do, I'm talking about Sams becoming too gnarly of combat monsters so anything thrown at them to have even a remote chance of phasing them is way more than other members of the group can handle.

I guess my issue is that I've never really had this problem, at least not with street samurai. Between combat mages, possession & shapeshifting tanks, cybered adepts and loaded riggers, I don't even really consider Street Samurai to really fill the "heavy artillery" niche on a team, for one thing. For another, I don't scale things around the idea that a 25 dice samurai means that opponents who can actually get out of his sights will somehow spring up from the woodwork. Frankly, at that point, he shouldn't really be missing anymore, at least not without some serious extenuating circumstances. That's a ridiculous amount of dice to be tossing around. But you know what? It's also a li'l bit of a waste. A dozen dice and a tweaked assault rifle should at least threaten the vast majority of targets on a Long/Full wide bursts-- more is usually only needed when you're suddenly tackling an uber-spirit or something but the rigger can't get any hardened gun platform drones or vehicles into the area. The opportunity costs that start presenting themselves at 15+ dice are pretty severe.

But you know what? I'm fine with that. I have come to think of Street Samurai as being like surly boy scouts with a deep seated need to violence the hell out of things. You should build a Street Samurai if you're on an otherwise narrow team that needs a guy who won't get ambushed and who can say "I'll take care of it if you won't," as often as possible. If you're going for Real Ultimate Power so you can flip out and kill people you should probably go another route. If you build them right and leverage the sheer cost effectiveness of 'ware attribute augmentations you can kick the ass of 98% of the population with minimal preparation (unlike riggers, who have some obvious logistical hurdles) while still having the Edge and raw attribute pools to adlib your way through all sorts of situations (unlike most cyber adepts and shapeshifters, which are both serious BP sinks.) That's part of the reason why I didn't like the change to Active Soft costs-- with the raw attribute advantage of heavy 'ware and a relative disregard for essence (making higher rating Wires more palatable), Street Samurai were often quietly the de facto generalists of Shadowrun, and that was a role I didn't really think needed any nerfing.

[Voran]

In my game experience, it applies not only to Sams, but all characters, putting your eggs in one basket (one character) is a recipe for trouble. Sure you can have 30 dice Faces and Mages and Hackers and whatever, but what happens when that guy is either not there, or unable to participate (ko'd, whatever). The superspecialist team is great but lacks flexibility when their primary is down.

In a sense, a lone samurai is never really going to be able to be combat god. Why not? cause even with multiple passes, he's still ultimately just one character. In a sense, I would say if you're comparing strength/capability of PC team to NPC threats, the easiest way to neutralize the sam is to have them either 1)face another sam or 2)face something like an adept, built kinda like a sam. Alternately you can add a few wired, even low level wired, combatants.

It may not be a common feeling, but I've generally felt when you compare the sum total of something like initiative passes between a PC group and a NPC group, you start running into trouble when the NPC group has the same number of passes as the PC group does, which gets even harder if you add a couple more NPCs or add wires to existing NPCs. Sure in Round 1 hypersam takes out a couple guys, but then its the wired npcs turn and they start pelting everyone, perhaps just the sam, but also possibly 'spreading the love'.

[Glyph]

I understood the initial post. I don't agree with the premise. Namely, that anything that can "challenge" the street samurai will wipe out the rest of the group. The rest of the group should be supporting the street samurai intelligently (such as the suppressive fire someone else mentioned), taking cover, or using their own abilities in combat (street samurai may have the optimal mix of speed, dodging, offense, durability, and firepower - but spells, drones, spirits, etc. can be very effective too).

Also, hyper-specialization may lead to characters who are bored a lot when their specialty is not in play, but you don't need to hyper-specialize to have high dice pools. You can be a face, covert ops specialist, etc. and still roll 20+ dice for firearms.

And it should be less of a problem as a campaign continues, unless everyone stubbornly chases those last elusive few dice in their specialties, rather than shoring up their weaknesses. To my mind, the ideal shadowrunner has the high dice pools of a hyper-specialist in his main area, and functional dice pools outside of that specialty. A generalist who is not good at anything will be at the bottom of the talent pool, while a street samurai who can do nothing but violence will be considered mere muscle.

[Irion]

The botton line of the problem is armor.
Even worse then the Sams are possession mages.
They just strab 10-12 points of additional hardend armor on them and are also quite untouchable by spells. (Counterspelling, high Willpower and high body)
So no matter what you throw at the team, they keep standing.

Manaball->Counterspelling.
Granade->not exeeding armor.
Armor piercing shots-> high reaction, high body.

And the hacker/Face/Rigger is just dancing the dance of lead.

[Saint Sithney]

Leverage is really such a good example of the team dynamics. Eliot Spencer, as the Samurai (hitter) is a perfect demo of how that character type can really shine within the team. Most of the time the team will work together on a thing, but more than anyone else Eliot works separately. He can hold down his end by himself. He can probably talk his way in as a moderate Face, but, unlike the others, he doesn't need as much backup since he is fully capable of punching his way out of a bad situation. The Samurai is a self-contained unit, a force unto himself. Moderately sneaky. Moderately smooth. Extremely dangerous.

[Ascalaphus]

I disagree with the premise that a "perfect" shadowrun only involved the Sam fighting if something unplanned happens. Avoiding needless fights is one thing, restricting yourself to only nonviolent plans is another thing entirely, and not really a good one.

A Sam could be skilled in taking down enemies under a variety of constraints, such as "past the weapon detector; no obvious weapons", or "no ruckus", while the rest of the team just has basic combat proficiency.

The aforementioned problem of a Sam hyperspecializing feeds on a GM who tries to challenge the Sam by "straight" combats, by increasing bad guy stats. In such a situation, going from 20 to 30 dice is useful; when enemies reach a reasonable plateau, at some point you're "good enough" and you can work on a different angle instead of continuing to specialize further.

Also, a way to challenge both the Sam and the rest of the team in a combat is to use more tactics; threaten to surround the Sam, or use crossfire and cover to try to pin down the Sam where the artillery can get at him. That gives the rest of the team a chance to help out by being "more bodies" instead of necessarily having high stats in combat.

[Irion]

@Ascalaphus
Well, the point is, that it is a game. So you are not interested in killing the team.
But if you really make some run in AAA or on equally guarded ground, one shoot fired (in the middle of it) would actually mean team kill.
Because whatever you got the Corps got more and bigger versions of it.
You got a mage? Fine, they got ten!
You got an assult rifle? Fine, they got a assult cannon!
You got a hacker? Fine, they got 1000!

You may hit gangs or even the mafia like that. As soon as it is the real big ones.

As long as you sneaked in and out, took some data, they can't do much.
Well, getting all active on it would spread the rumor somebody broke in, might encourage others.
Getting you won't get them a thing. Nobody knows about this incident so nobody cares if somebody is caught over something nobody knows about.
Last but not least the data woul be gone anyway.
So nothing won.

If you start shooting, it will be all over the news. You not getting caught would encourage others. Alone the possibility, that some terrorist group would be targeting this company is lethal for their products. ("Have you heard? Rumor has it, they poisend the food of XXX in the stores! I certainly not buying this anymore. I got two little children!")
As soon as it is public it is not about the data anymore. And a good way to make something public is to kill somebody.

[Ascalaphus]

I'm not advocating massive violence as a good tactic, but I do think sometimes people begin to obsess over nonviolence. Quickly and quietly knocking out a guard may be far better (in terms of time spent or chance of discovery) than the whole team trying to sneak around him. A Sam's job can also be to provide precision high-reliability violence.

[CanRay]

Hey, someone has to cut the celebratory pizza from Cosa Nostra Pizza and Pasta! Those Katanas come in handy then!

[Whipstitch]

The aforementioned problem of a Sam hyperspecializing feeds on a GM who tries to challenge the Sam by "straight" combats, by increasing bad guy stats. In such a situation, going from 20 to 30 dice is useful; when enemies reach a reasonable plateau, at some point you're "good enough" and you can work on a different angle instead of continuing to specialize further.

As you can guess from my earlier post, I agree with this wholeheartedly. The real tricky thing is just deciding around where the plateau should be. I like it to be fairly reachable within chargen. One thing I do to reinforce this is increase number of opponents without necessarily increasing their stats. Drones are great for this-- Pain Editors not withstanding, a half dozen Ferret perimeter drones or LEBD-1s with pain inducers isn't really something you want to be dealing with during a fire fight even if the samurai could absolutely either crush one in other circumstances. In such a situation, a face in the 8-12 pistol dice range can still do some good simply by thinning the herd or just drawing some fire while hunkered down behind cover or whatever. Another thing I like to do is allow PCs to make Perception or Leadership (tactics) tests to get a sense of just how professional and "dodgey" their opponents are and if they're opposition they've faced before I don't even require a test. Besides, it's fun to give PCs some info sometimes. Anything that has inspires a Samurai to stub out his cigarette mid-fight and say "Okay, so I guess these boys are legit," while pulling out his Armtech MGL-6 on some Triad adepts is good in my book. That way I can feel a li'l more comfortable sending pokey opposition at the Samurai without feeling like I'm rendering his big honkin' dice pool superfluous-- the non-combat specialists can still hit things, but suddenly the Street Samurai knows when he is up against bush leaguers and has the green light to start splitting pools and can two gun or narrow burst people down with impunity. It's a bit unrealistic, of course, but it's within my tolerance threshold given the fun we've gotten out of it, especially in more pink mohawky groups-- the tough guys singling each other out in the midst of the chaos to throw down has some good flavor to it. Between that and the ability to fight well despite wound modifiers I feel that Samurai at my table tend to be pretty valued whether or not their whole brick of dice in shooting stuff is always strictly necessary.