Acquiring Contacts Via Gameplay, How do you handle it in your campaigns? Options

[The Grue Master]

I was curious about how people treat the acquisition of contacts during gameplay. Do you associate a karma cost? Is anyone the group interacts with significantly acquired as a contact? When do you reveal a contact's stats? What happens in long running campaigns when the groups little black book is getting to be rather hefty? BB is pretty light on this topic and there isn't much else in other books, so just looking for general community feedback here.

[Dashifen]

No cost involved and I hand them out like candy. It's a good way to reward good roleplay; almost every run they do for someone who isn't just a nameless, faceless Mr. Johnson may result in them earning contacts. Hell, they once had to find the daughter of a Russian couple as sort of a do-gooder's job and the entire Russian enclave (that I invented) ended up on their sheets as a group contact. It's not worth much, but if they ever need to find a member of the Vory, it'll be a good place to start.

As for stats -- if you mean connection and loyalty, I do that immediately. No other stats are revealed to the players, though. And, both can fluctuate based on what the players do.

[The Grue Master]

That is how I handle it too but the list of contacts can get a bit overwhelming. I even had to make a specific website just to keep tabs on all of the group's contacts. I tend to use the contact maintenance rules (forget what they're called) to keep most of the random ones at 'Just Biz' or there about. I was considering a karma cost to keep a chronic shmoozer from ending up knowing the entirety of the city. Maybe I should just up his Public Awareness instead...

[Jaid]

a loyalty 1 contact is basically someone who will do business with you at all. the runners really should get tons of those for free.

higher loyalty you would have to work for though.

[Shinobi Killfist]

I usually see the cost in nuyen not Karma. Favors can sub in for nuyen though. But you pay well to a bartender you are questioning he will remember it. While contacts can be friends but I usually think of them as business associates of some kind. All too often IMO I see people calling there snitch contact for info but not slipping him some creds. The way a lot of people play I'd be having them lose more contacts than they gain.

[Dashifen]

That is how I handle it too but the list of contacts can get a bit overwhelming. I even had to make a specific website just to keep tabs on all of the group's contacts. I tend to use the contact maintenance rules (forget what they're called) to keep most of the random ones at 'Just Biz' or there about. I was considering a karma cost to keep a chronic shmoozer from ending up knowing the entirety of the city. Maybe I should just up his Public Awareness instead...

I don't even worry about the maintenance rules; that's just a PITA. Even with handing out contacts like candy, I don't think anyone person has more than 7 or so. Some have less. Sounds like you might give out more than me.

[Yerameyahu]

We just ballpark it at need. 'Hey, remember that yakuza lieutenant we helped out last month? Let's call him for X.' 'Okay, he's… Conn 3, Loy 1'. Go.

[Fatum]

It's a two-step process for me.

First, you get a contact per se - that is, a number, an address, or such. You can start using the contact's services right away, but they are overpriced.

Second, you can pay the Karma cost - basically, twice the sum of Loyalty and Connection (but that depends on the circumstances, of course - say, if you first met the guy when you saved his sorry ass, the cost will be lower). From then on, you get the contact stats (Connection and Loyalty, Connection pre-set and Loyalty, again, depending on the circumstances involved) and can raise them via sidequests and/or Karma payment.

If it takes you a long time to jump from step one to step two, that is, to pay Karma for the contact, and you use the contact's services frequently, it ends with a sidequest for you to keep the contact.

Yeah, I know that the system is a bit meta-game-y, but it negates the problems with contacts you only need once or twice, and it gives some worth to the contacts since you've invested Karma into acquiring them.

[Voran]

In the old days, I would try to 'limit' the number of new contacts I introduced as freebies to about 2-3 per 'adventure' which lasted about 3-5 sessions. Sure they'd meet a lot of people, but only a couple would be worthwhile even as 'minor contacts'.

The way I saw it, well...take me IRL. I don't really have much specialized knowledge (sure social work background and child mental health stuff) that you can pretty much find out online anyway. I don't have any special connections, or access. You might meet me in the course of the adventure, I might help out with "Oh yeah, thats on K Street" but that's about it. Not everyone you meet has the quality to turn into a contact.

[tete]

Do you associate a karma cost? No
Is anyone the group interacts with significantly acquired as a contact? Not always, depends on the relationship
When do you reveal a contact's stats? Never
What happens in long running campaigns when the groups little black book is getting to be rather hefty? Contacts die from time to time.

[Fatum]

The way I saw it, well...take me IRL. I don't really have much specialized knowledge (sure social work background and child mental health stuff) that you can pretty much find out online anyway. I don't have any special connections, or access. You might meet me in the course of the adventure, I might help out with "Oh yeah, thats on K Street" but that's about it. Not everyone you meet has the quality to turn into a contact.

Well, you have an employer, right? You could hand over some info on its practices (and isn't that pretty much everything sample contacts like secretaries or rent-a-cops are for?) or even some dirt.
Then again, if you became a high-Loyalty contact, you could provide the runners with a place to crush when they need to lay low for a while; a place to hide their stash, and so on. Lend them your car so that theirs wouldn't be tracked.

[Kraegor]

The good rule of thumb is: Did your players roleplay awesomely well?

If they did, then go ahead and award the contact for a 1/1. If the contact is more connected then that, make them pay karma.

Every time they actually roleplay, make sacrifices, help the NPC etc that doesn't help the player, or even sets him back, don't be afraid to boost their loyalty rating.

Now, if they only do a so/so, then just offer them discounts, or raising it via karma as normal.

[DingoJones]

I tend to leave it up to the players to keep track of which contacts they want to add to there list. It almost entirely based upon role playing in my campaigns. If they shmooz with the guy or slip him some cred for his trouble then thats the start. If they use the guy again, it's up to them. How they treat their contacts and how they develop the relationship is up to them, and I think thats the way it should be.

I think using karma to take care of it is a lazy way of doing it. Make the players get involved, it's far more rewarding for the players and the GM in the long run.

[Lok1 :)]

My players tend to amass contacts quite quickly in my games, though the usefullness of them tends to vairy quite alot. Anyone, who the players deal with and get a number for is treated as a /1 contact, sence I tend to introduce alot of NPC's in my games my players aquire them fast. Though many are not to be trusted, and will almost always charge for their services.
Infact, many people the players openly come up in opposition against can be used to some degree as a contact, for the right price of course. For example, I've had players have a off on retaltionship with the leader of a gang specalizeing in drug distribution, even though their first contact with him after a dust up with some of his men on their first run. Their were times when both had something the other wanted, or helping them helped him, it can actualy bring up some of the most interesting kinds of rollplaying you find in a game.
My definition of a contact: Someone you have a way of contacting.
That said, usefull contacts, the kind who you deal with in a friendly matter are always at least /2 and though they don't show up as often at least one is typicaly brought in a run with good rollplaying, alot may not be usefull all the time but haveing a friend with the right skills or connections at the right time will save your life more often then anything else.

[Abstruse]

There's a quick equation that I use:

(Player's interest in the NPC + How well they treat the NPC) x My willingness to keep playing this annoying-ass character = Likelihood the PCs got a new contact.

[LurkerOutThere]

Abstruse don't give out the universal formula, the players will see it!

In all seriousness, my name's Lurker and I'm bad at contact management. I used to be very good at it but since i moved to the Ipad I no longer rely on my notebook as much. Since then my contact database has grown to being mentally unamagable. I'll find myself forgetting the names of minor or even key NPC's depending on the situation when i made them up. It's actually on my to-do list to go around my players and write the contacts down from their sheets and get them back into a master database. Then if I'm feeling really bold i'll put them on a diagram showing their different relations.

Generally I'm very free with my players contacts but for those who actually buy them, which is somewhat rare, those contacts are usually better in some way. They can be more loyal, less needy, more useful. I encourage people creating contacts to start to design the contact. After that in play I'm very liberal and don't require karma expendatures unless the character wants something really special.

[Medicineman]

As a GM I like to give away Loy 1 Contacts as a kind of reward.
As a Player I keep those of Interest to me.
Some of my Chars have as much as 6-8 free contacts that raise in loyality in time

HokaHey
Medicineman

[Yerameyahu]

Yeah, low-rating contacts are a great plot-expansion tool. Definitely hand them out of the PCs deserve it: favors done, positive interactions, etc. If you're worried about the power, maybe even give them 'Loyalty 0' contacts: people they know have names and jobs, and can be called on (for a price). It's so much cooler on Burn Notice when Michael Weston calls in a favor from Sugar or the FBI agents than simply tossing in a new 1-episode character.

[DireRadiant]

For my campaigns if a player want to acquire a new contact and pay with nuyen or karma, I will let them. Contacts bought with BP tend to stick around. I consider it part of lifestyle the costs of upkeep of contacts to avoid book keeping.

Just meeting some NPC during a session doesn't make them a contact.

[Yerameyahu]

No, 'just meeting' doesn't. But things besides 'just meeting' certainly could.

[Faradon]

I like to give contacts throughout gameplay as rewards for roleplaying, thinking outside the box, etc.

I mean heck, if a player bribes a cop/guard to get information, access, etc. they have laid the foundation for a contact. In that regard a contact may start at loyalty 1 (or even 0) but if the players take an interest in cultivating that relationship at all they can definitely improve things.

I also liked the way the SR Missions did it. If you hired a coyote and didn't treat them like piss you got them as a loy 1 contact. This is just the general way players will fill their black book. Loy 1 contacts will probably still charge full price for most goods / services afforded, but at least you both know you didn't stiff each other last time... for whatever little that might count for. I find this also as a benefit to me when running the games because I have less names to make up on the fly as the campaign progresses.

I also tend to use contacts as plot devices quite often. A loyalty 1 contact can be a great tool for a run, to help or hinder players, to kill off in a dramatic fashion, etc.

[yesferatu]

I've always tried just giving them out as they meet people.
Contacts are as helpful to the GM as they are to the player.
Need an idea for a run...that troll bouncer contact needs some "evidence" to disappear.

I've toyed with the idea of letting players create extra characters and link them to each other through contacts.
If you suddenly need a hacker for a run, just switch to that contact character and you're good to go.

[Ascalaphus]

There's a quick equation that I use:

(Player's interest in the NPC + How well they treat the NPC) x My willingness to keep playing this annoying-ass character = Likelihood the PCs got a new contact.

That's a nice approximation (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I tend to divide NPCs into Named and Nameless NPCs. (see here why)

If the PCs make a real impression on a named NPC, that might turn into a contact, and perhaps with a >1 loyalty, if they made a particularly good impression. This doesn't really cost karma.

There's no reason ever to reveal the NPC's stats to the players. The examples in the book are merely suggestions for stats, too. Contacts should be described in story terms, not rule terms. Connection and general contact type (bartender, snitch, beat cop) abstract rule terms for what they can do.

Number of contacts growing? Not a problem so far, but I'm thinking if maybe you'd want a stat to represent how many contacts you can keep in your sphere of influence. Perhaps a stat based on Charisma and social skills?

[Jaid]

just for clarification, i feel the need to remind people exactly what a contact's ratings mean.

connection 1: Knows very few people and has practically no social influence.
Many are useful only for their Knowledge skills. Examples: squatter,
manual laborer, academic graduate assistant.

loyalty 1: Just Biz. The character and contact have a purely mercenary relationship.
Interactions are based solely on economics. They may
not even like each other, and will not offer any sort of preferential
treatment.

so yes, you, the player, you would count as a connection 1 individual (simply being able to access a computer/the internet puts you as being at least as connected as a squatter imo). if you would do something for cash, you have loyalty 1; for example, if you would be willing to let a person stay overnight provided they pay for room and board, you are essentially a connection 1/loyalty 1 contact. that kind of contact should be readily available to anyone. (note: in the case of shadowrunners, i would argue that loyalty 1 means they're willing to break some kind of law in exchange for money, but that describes a lot of people in the shadowrun setting. naturally, at loyalty 1, they only break the law for money if it's worth the money to them; if they know they're going to get caught, they won't do it unless you offer them a lot of money and the punishment is small)

looking further down the loyalty chart, the contact isn't really anything more than a business relationship (although you get to be a preferred customer as their loyalty increases) until you hit at least rating 4, so getting loyalty in the range of 1-3 i wouldn't consider to be very difficult. obviously 3 will require a bit more development than 1, but if you use their services a lot, they'll probably get up to 2 pretty quickly, and if you start spending time with them outside of just doing business, they'll probably go up to 3.

looking at the connection side of things, players should really almost routinely meet people up to about connection 4. mostly because a lot of the kind of people who are connection 4 are specialised in knowing people like the shadowrunners; fixers, gang leaders, police detectives, mr johnsons, etc all fall into connection 4. and really, most of these people would be willing to do business with you in general; a corrupt detective will lose evidence in a low-profile case provided he won't get caught, but you'll have to pay for it. a fixer will get you that LMG you want, but you'll have to pay for it.

essentially, for most of these people, the second you meet them and they're willing to do business with you, you've gained a contact. and that's fine. really, the runners *should* have a bunch of this sort of connection. they should know a few members of the local gang that they pay for security. they should know a fixer who can get them illegal gear and difficult-to-obtain information (for a price). they should know a bunch of mr johnsons, really, because that's who they work for. street sams should know people who are willing to install cyberware for them, mages should know talismongers, hackers should have connections to matrix groups that can get him pirated software. and all a loyalty 1 contact means is that they know these people, and those people are willing to accept money for them in exchange for something. that's it.

so yes, hand out loyalty 1 contacts like candy, even going as high as connection 4 with reasonable frequency. they could even buy loyalty 1 contacts by paying another contact for an introduction (for example, you could pay your fixer to get you in touch with a rigger who can handle your escape from a corp facility; that rigger is now a loyalty 1 contact, probably connection 2 or maybe even 3).

but really, don't be afraid to hand out connection 4 or lower contacts, imo, at loyalty 1.

[Mooncrow]

just for clarification, i feel the need to remind people exactly what a contact's ratings mean.

connection 1: Knows very few people and has practically no social influence.
Many are useful only for their Knowledge skills. Examples: squatter,
manual laborer, academic graduate assistant.

loyalty 1: Just Biz. The character and contact have a purely mercenary relationship.
Interactions are based solely on economics. They may
not even like each other, and will not offer any sort of preferential
treatment.

That's the fluff of it, but mechanically, a 1/1 contact is much more useful than those descriptions would lead you to believe.

But yes, all the contacts I hand out during game play tend to be */1 where the * means - to be be determined when it becomes relevant. And that number might be fluid too: that drugged up squatter they saved, turns out she's the local Triad boss's sister, and now she's clean...

Lot of fun things to do with contacts^^