The eighth session.., .. Spirit summoner and Yakuza bandit Options

[hyphz]

So, session eight. I'm going to change this around a bit because this session, I was making a deliberate effort to challenge the players a bit more. So I'm going to go into a bit of detail about the tableside dynamics that were going on in the hope that I don't leave people thinking I'm just trolling because I'm not following your suggestions. I'm trying, honest!

That said, I am getting increasingly frustrated with the SR4 dice mechanic. It just seems too hard to strike a balance between picking stats that will be absolutely trivial for the runners to defeat, and picking ones that are blatantly unrealistic (or unverisimilar for pedants) for their opponents to have.

So, the session began with the runners still on a roof having fired a bullet through the window of Kaz's apartment. In the interim, Kane's player (NumptyScrub) had rebuilt Kane using karmagen as a mystic adept rather than a sniper, and Zod's player had rebuilt the hacker character (who he finally decided to name "Haxor", yea).

Now, I really didn't want them to kill Kaz. Not only did I have plans for him, but he was still the runners' key link to the tempo business - and not really someone who should die so easily. Since they had only blindly fired a single shot at him so far, I was prepared to finesse that he wasn't dead, and had simply hit the deck when fired at (thus why his commlink appeared to have fallen to the ground). Haxor announced he wanted to hack into the building's security system and look at the security cameras. He does this in a couple of rounds, but I point out that the building doesn't have security cameras actually inside the apartments - only in the corridors, which doesn't help him that much. He then asks if Kaz's apartment might have its own server for things like intelligent lighting and heating and similar, and I decide that doesn't seem too unreasonable, so he decides to hack that. To up the challenge, though, I rule that Kaz has gotten paranoid and gotten a Komun'Go spider to beef up the security on it.

So, he takes two combat turns to break through the firewall, and notices another icon in the node. Analyzing it, he finds that it's an IC which isn't active yet, as it hasn't detected him (it hadn't gotten its initiative yet and the node failed its tests to detect his hacking). He Attacks the IC, causing it substantial damage, and the IC runs Blackout on him, inflicting a few points of stun. On the next pass, he attacks the IC again and crashes it, before making a few abortive attempts at First Aiding himself while in VR. He eventually decides to scan around the node, and while again Kaz doesn't have cameras inside his house, he is able to find out that the lights are on in the bottom half of the house and that the system believes only one person to be home.

Rules Question: Can a hacker gain a User account on a node, then just decide to continue the extended test to get the 6 more hits required for Admin? Or do they have to be shooting for Admin from the start?

Dawg then summons up a Force 3 Spirit of Man to go and investigate Kaz and/or kill him. So, I now have to work out a way of bailing Kaz out - since there was no way his Armor or Reaction could have saved him from Zod's shot, I decide that he's having a "Vaju moment" and his wounds are being regenerated. The Spirit Of Man flees, reporting to Dawg that there's a huge-ass free nature spirit hanging around Kaz and it's not going near that. (Also, I pointed out that for a Hermetic - as he now is - to summon a Spirit of Man for attack purposes is out tradition, but the player brushed it off.) Zod decides to shoot at Kaz again, blindly, and hits.

At this point I start to point out that they may hear approaching sirens due to firing a full-auto weapon in public, but the players point out that it has only been a few Combat Turns - that is, only a few seconds - since the first shot was fired. So, I agree that there is not going to be a response quite yet. Still unsure of Kaz's status, Dawg summons another Spirit of Man and commands it to smash Kaz's blacked-out window and remove any obstructions from behind it. It does this, and Zod - looking through the window with Vision Magnification - can see that Kaz is still down, but his wounds are healing. Zod shoots at him again.

At this point it is becoming quite obvious to me that we are not getting out of this timestop until Kaz is dead. So I rule that Zod riddles his body with bullets and the spirit seems to have departed. Haxor then decides to try to break into his commlink and retrieve any contact details he has. For some reason this security-conscious gang boss who lives in a world where hackers are totally a regular thing only has a Device 3 commlink, so he manages to steal the contact info from Kaz's commlink and then wipe out the data and crash the commlink.

Setting Question: In the real world most people aren't that concerned about data security - but when the media reports that something can be hacked, people really make sure to stop using it. Look at all the reports about Bluetooth Discoverable hacks or cars and similar - people get paranoid about that. So how the heck do Meta Link still sell any commlinks, ever? Even Device 3 is trivial for a hacker who invests well. Well, maybe such hackers are rare and people aren't aware of them... oh, hang on a second, they have their own sodding theme bar in Seattle.

The runners now start wondering what they're meant to be doing next. I deliberately don't prompt them, figuring they should face themselves the consequences of killing the people who were giving them direction. Haxor scans through the contacts he downloaded from Kaz's commlink, and finds entries for "Wolf" and "Sac" (actually Chulsoon Grey-Wolf and Sacristan, of course), plus Dae and a few others. He scans the data for any messages sent to and from, but in all cases, Kaz simply scheduled meetings with them rather than sending any important data over the Matrix. He also decides to do a search for details on anyone named "Wolf", but with only 2 hits on a Data Search, he basically finds any number of users with that handle on various fora, etc.

Haxor asks if he can use the contact number he has for "Wolf" to connect to Wolf's commlink and trace him. This is where I hit a bit of a rules problem..

Rules Question! So.. can he? I basically said no, he can't, because that removes most of the point of Signal and any aspect of legwork in tracking people down. On the other hand, it does seem reasonable - commlinks act like mobile phones when they have to, and if you have someone's number, the network has to find their location to call them. Is there a nice explanation of this sort of thing somewhere?

Rules Question 2! The Track User action lets you track anyone "whose icon is present in your node". So... if you hack someone's commlink, under what circumstances is their icon present in the commlink's node? Is it there all the time? Or only when they're in VR or interacting with the Matrix in some other way? Does an AR user ever leave their commlink's node?

So, the runners decide to go and get a Voice Modulator to try and copy Kaz's voice, and then comm up "Wolf". It takes them a bit of dealing to find a Voice Modulator and in the end they're only able to go for a Rating 2 Secondary Pattern because anything else will take a week or more to obtain. They then call "Wolf", pretending to be Kaz. He doesn't answer - it being very late night at this point - so they leave a message telling him that the heat is on and they want to meet up. Haxor finds that "spoof a commlink's access ID" is quite easy to do, to make the message look like it was coming from Kaz's commlink. But Kane then points out that this means that Wolf will try to call Kaz's commlink back, meaning the runners won't get the message. Haxor starts to ask about how he can spoof Kaz's commlink ID to the network, so he'll get the call instead. Well. Um, can he do that?

Now. I now want to give the players a challenge and keep them in the story. I could rule that Grey-Wolf isn't fooled or is just damn suspicious and sends people after the runners. That could cause a nice fight, but on the other hand, it'd leave the runners out of the loop. On the other hand, what happens if he is fooled? Kaz just called him about a meeting. And we know that in the plot at this point, Grey-Wolf is considering handing over Kaz and Tempo to the Kenran-Kai, which includes setting up Kaz for a hit. Ooo, so have the players just gotten themselves invited to a meeting which actually turns out to be a room full of Kenran-kai assassins? That sounds pretty keen. Let's go do it.

So, the following morning the runners get two calls back. One is Grey-Wolf, who tells "Kaz" to meet him at the warehouse in the Verge that was used before, that afternoon. The other is on the commlink they took from Dae, and is from Jacob, telling her about her appointment that evening as arm-candy for Caesar. Because hey, maybe the runners would appreciate getting themselves in trouble with the mafia, as well.

The runners decide to head down to the warehouse early to set up an ambush. Before they go, Dawg casts Improved Reactions on several of the other group members, and then summons up a Force 10 Spirit of Man to hang out with him! The Spirit sends Edge against summoning, meaning that Dawg takes 6 or so points of Physical damage from oversummoning. Haxor, who has First Aid and Medicine as well, fixes him up in 18 seconds.

Parking the truck a few blocks away, Haxor asks if he can find any nodes in the warehouse. I rule that since it's an abandoned warehouse, its own node has been shut down, but there's an active security camera on a nearby building which he uses. He sees two guards, wearing smart suits, in front of the closed warehouse door. He tries to rewind the footage, but finds that a chunk of the footage has been erased - someone else has hacked the same camera, too.

(The guards, of course, were kenran-kai - I screwed up here. They should have been Stand Over Men, as otherwise Kaz - who they were expecting - would have known what was going on before he even entered the warehouse.)

So Zod gets levitated up onto a spot on a rooftop to observe, Kane and Dawg sneak into a nearby abandoned building, and the remaining runners decide to drive off and go buy some drones to scout for them. They consider Dragonfly drones, but on finding that they're restricted and hard to get, decide to get Centipedes instead since they're legal and have a low Availability rating, it seems they'd be easy to just find in "PC World".

Meanwhile, Dawg's Detect Enemies gets a "ping" from inside of the warehouse - it's actually the Kenran-Kai hacker, hiding in the warehouse office and scanning for anyone nearby. Which gave me another problem..

Rules Question! The action of searching a general area for hidden notes is an Extended test with a threshold of 15. So, what happens if a hidden node arrives in the area during the Extended Test? If the guy is just sitting and constantly sweeping for nodes, how long on average is it going to be before he detects a new arrival - is it going to happen when his current Extended Test finishes, or will he have to wait until the next test starts and finishes?

So, they wait in this position until Haxor and Faceman get back with the drones. Haxor promptly jumps in to one of the drones. After some consideration of whether centipede drones could run up the sides of walls or not (which we eventually decided they can't - even though they might be called 'centipede', they don't have gecko grips), Kane turned the drone invisible and Haxor walked it up to the entrance. Where it couldn't proceed, because the door was shut. Moreover, one of the guards made his Willpower check, pierced the Force 3 Improved Invisibility, and shot the drone. Haxor's filter soaked all but 1 of the stun and all of the dumpshock.

At this point Zod decided he was tired of waiting and opened fire on the guards outside the building, killing both of them. At the same moment, the Kenran-Kai sniper who'd been observing them from another rooftop fired at Zod, dealing 9 Physical damage. Zod's player complained that he should have been on the highest rooftop where this couldn't happen. I tried to clarify things by pointing out that there wasn't a lot of difference between the heights of buildings in the area ("it's a bunch of old warehouses basically"). Some further complaints. The sniper then ducked down to try to hide, and so Haxor tried to scan for his commlink. At this point I clarified the rules on Tracking and it seems to be, certainly, that scanning for the commlink would find the Node but wouldn't find the precise location of the sniper - and even using Track User wouldn't tell him exactly where he was, close enough to shoot him. However, on his turn Zod's regular Perception enabled him to see the sniper. I was using the FBI sniper stats from Ghost Cartels, but still Zod shot straight through his ballistic shield and blew him to bits.

At this point the runners decide what to do about the people inside the building. Dawg sends his level 10 Spirit of Man to "kill everyone in the warehouse", and gives it a Powerball spell. There follows a ridiculous sequence of 10 Yakuza guys trying to shoot down the spirit. Now, I didn't realize - until Kane's player pointed it out - that Immunity to Normal Weapons gives hardened armor, not just regular armor. So the Yakuza tried to attack the spirit and all failed due to the hardened armor. This bothered me a lot that I'd missed this - not only should the Yakuza arguably have known not to attack the spirit, but Kaz while possessed by Vaju probably wouldn't have been killed. This is why I end up being cautious about winging things! The spirit powerballed 5 of them, and the Yakuza were prepared to flee at that point, but unfortunately for them they were out of initiative passes, and when they got to go next the Spirit would out-initiative them, so they were dead men standing. Sure enough, next round, the Powerball exploded the remaining Yakuza and the Spirit then flew around, finally finding the Yakuza hacker hiding in the office and blowing him to bits as well. (Oddly, Kane actually wanted to observe what was happening and nearly entered the warehouse himself, but fortunately didn't.)

So, yea. We left it there. Certainly there is now no way that any of the excuses the runners have made so far will wash - the sniper saw Zod, the hacker identified Dawg from his commlink, and could also report the spirit - as well as the fact that it wasn't Kaz who showed up to the meeting. So that's the Komun'Go and the Yakuza who are now pretty much fully aware of what the runners are doing. But the brokenness of spirits, and the short scaling, are still bothering me..

[HunterHerne]

Seem to be going well so far. An actual challenge has been presented, and given them some worries. They have a plan of action (namely not dying), and they have clearly defined enemies.

In the case of Kaz, if you are sure he would have survived the assault by Zod, then let him survive. The Spirit was disrupted (by a full stun track, we'll say), and Kaz is in the hospital, with a few men around at all times, and others on the streets looking for revenge. Even if he wouldn't have survived, the runner's didn't look at him to make sure, other then sending a spirit that knows nothing about human physiology, so you could Hand of God him alive.

On Spirit power levels, yes, they are powerful. But they have weaknesses. And the Yaks seem to know those weaknesses better then most underworld groups. Any response they send will likely include a few Lieutenants with boosts from a Tattoo artist (a Yakuza tattoo artist will usually be an initiated street mage who can quicken/anchor spells. Give the Yaks a couple men with say, a force 4 anchored fireball, set to release towards something the dragon's mouth is pointing at (conveniently located on the Yak's hand) and a quickened Combat Sense or detect enemies spell, and they can be a real threat, even to spirits.

Accounts: You need to aim at the account you want. You can't get an account and then upgrade it, at least, not without Admin access anyway.

In the real world some people care about the safety they get with their wireless equipment. Others don't care, they get what works and is cheap (or they can afford). Meta Link comms are basically the good will commlink. You have it, because you can't get anything better.

Tracking program: You need to be able to percieve the persona you want to track. If you want to pinpoint an exact location of a comm, that uses Scan, and might require a more in-depth mapsoft then is available on a basic link. The Commcode can't be used to track. Also, the Persona needs to be in your node, which means you need to have granted access to him, or he has to have hacked his way in. And then you'd have to beat his stealth program, if available.

Scanning hidden nodes: I would just use the test to detect the nodes that are within range when the test completes. Fewer logistics headaches that way.

Special note on spells and drones: The Improved Invisibility would need to be at least force 5 to hide the drone, I think. Object resistance needs to be overcome, and for the drone, that is the highest rating.

On the scaling: You seem to be doing good. This turn of events will force the players to slow down and think, since the main gunner got himself shot bad. At the very least, they'll need to rest for a night or two, and this could go interestingly depending what they do. Don't be afraid of over powering the opposition, you can scale down on the fly if they really are looking at TPK, or they will be forced to run. Either way, it'll be a learning experience. Honestly, the runner's should feel like running needs to be an option, even if they don't use it. But, YMMV on that.

[Loch]

Your players seem like total children, and I still don't get why Zod's player gets two characters, but at least this session seems to be going *mildly* better than the others so far.

[Traul]

The runners decide to head down to the warehouse early to set up an ambush. Before they go, Dawg casts Improved Reactions on several of the other group members, and then summons up a Force 10 Spirit of Man to hang out with him! The Spirit sends Edge against summoning, meaning that Dawg takes 6 or so points of Physical damage from oversummoning. Haxor, who has First Aid and Medicine as well, fixes him up in 18 seconds.

But did he get any services? What is his summoning pool to beat the Spirit's 20 dice?

[Udoshi]

Setting Question: In the real world most people aren't that concerned about data security - but when the media reports that something can be hacked, people really make sure to stop using it. Look at all the reports about Bluetooth Discoverable hacks or cars and similar - people get paranoid about that. So how the heck do Meta Link still sell any commlinks, ever? Even Device 3 is trivial for a hacker who invests well. Well, maybe such hackers are rare and people aren't aware of them... oh, hang on a second, they have their own sodding theme bar in Seattle.

Feel free to adjust default settings for your game.
Anyone with a decent source of money to protect their things ought to be running the following on their commlink
Encryption 6(its a common use! its cheap!)
Analyze 6, Optimized 3, Ergonomic( having analyze 6 on everything makes Firewall+analyze tests to detect intruders a lot more viable, and optimized 3 means it can run on a shitty link. Its also a common use, so its dirt cheap. Even on a firewall 3 commlink, that's 9 dice)
Firewall 6. Because its fairly cheap, and isn't capped by the system.
Also keep in mind that Active Alerts give a +4 firewall bonus, so if someone trips an Alert on the way in, the threshold get inside the node also goes up.

Don't be afraid to make changes to NPCs to make their security-consciousness be more appropriate to the game world. Particularly as they aren't updated as more books come out.

Regarding security-consciousness as it pertains to MAGIC: What is good for the goose is good for the gander. If a runner team can afford a mage, likely large criminal organizations can afford them too. While they may not be on-site, they should make their presence known - whether its a bound spirit with counterspelling watching over a group of armed mooks, or sustaining some remote buff spells on an important lieutenant, or even responding to a test to pop over in the astral and banish spirits - there's plenty of ways to make the opposition not look like matchsticks in front of a mage, without resorting to 'everyone else has a mage on hand too'.

[Paul]

I'd say one step in a positive direction-not that you respond to any my posts-is to stop letting the players keep rebuilding their PC's to tweak them. And stop letting one player play two characters.

[Faelan]

I hate to say this but, while this is a step in the right direction it would really help everyone trying to aid you if we knew what these characters look like, because based on my calculations Zod not only has a 20+ dice pool, but also has 20 Ballistic Armor, to only take 9 Physical from a sniper shot he was unaware of. It would really help all of us if we were not speculating as to where things are getting messed up, and instead had concrete numbers to deal with.

[Stalag]

This is why I end up being cautious about winging things!

This sounded like it was a much better session. Don't worry too much if you figure out later someone probably should have reacted a different way or you should have ruled something differently - things happen, just learn from it and roll with it.

The real question is - did everyone enjoy the session (including yourself)... aside from Zod whining when he doesn't "auto-win" every time.

I've never been overly crazy about the hit system either, but a good rule of thumb to measure someones ability at something is the number of dice divided by 3 - that's the average number of hits you can expect (So 9 dice will average 3 hits).

[Stalag]

However, on his turn Zod's regular Perception enabled him to see the sniper. I was using the FBI sniper stats from Ghost Cartels, but still Zod shot straight through his ballistic shield and blew him to bits.

Some issues here. What's a sniper doing lugging around a ballistic shield? If he was set up in a sniping position and then 'ducked down' how did he get the large, man sized shield put up in front of him? Why was his only armor a ballistic shield? He should have been in a UEJ or, at least, some armored clothing. Did he totally blow his reaction roll?

Zod has what? 25 dice?

So assuming no environmental modifiers (wind, visibility) and, if he was using that assault rifle, that the target was closer than 50 meters (which he wouldn't have been) then Zod should be averaging about 8 hits on a roll

A trained sniper should have an Rea of at least 4 and he'd get at least +2 for being in partial cover and if he was actively hiding you could argue he was dodging so lets say he has a dodge of 3. That's 9 dice so an average of 3 hits

That would give Zod an average of 5 net hits.

So lets say sniper guy has a Bod of 4 (professional snipers are usually in shape), and is wearing Armor clothing so that's 4 Ballistic and he, somehow, has that ballistic shield up so another +6. We'll give Zod the benefit of the doubt, however and say he's using APDS so -5 to all that. That's still 9 dice for damage resistance which would average 3 hits.

Which would mean, on average, the sniper would have only taken 2 damage and because that damage didn't exceed the armor rating it would only have been stun damage.

So unless Zod rolled extremely well, or the sniper rolled extremely poorly, he should have still been alive

[Faelan]

Some of your numbers seem a bit off, particularly the idea that he is doing stun, and the fact his AP with APDS would be at least -7, but this is why I asked to see stats. For instance if he is using a Ballistic shield with SWAT Armor he has 20 Ballistic, and even though the likely modified DV is sufficient to inflict physical damage it was not enough to kill particularly after Zod got hit for 9 physical, of course I am wondering how Zod is still breathing after taking a 15 dice attack from a rifle doing 8P -7AP for which he only got a damage resistance roll. Not only is he a killer shot but a walking tank on top of it?

I would nail Zod with Blindfire since the sniper has no exposed body parts and you can only take an educated guess at where he is behind the shield (shoot at it and hope you hit him), and I would give the sniper +4 for Good Cover, but yeah it all depends on the Zod stats, not to mention I wonder what kind of cyber he has to take care of the pain for that -3 wound modifier.

[Bodak]

So Zod gets levitated up onto a spot on a rooftop to observe, Kane and Dawg sneak into a nearby abandoned building, and the remaining runners decide to drive off and go buy some drones to scout for them.
...
So, they wait in this position until Haxor and Faceman get back with the drones.

You have three players running five characters, correct?

The sniper then ducked down to try to hide, and so Haxor tried to scan for his commlink.

If he was trying to hide, his commlink had its wireless turned off.

[hyphz]

Thanks for your replies. Paul, just because I don't post a reply doesn't mean I'm not reading - often it just means I agree with you and don't really have anything more to say. Plus, I had a fairly hectic week at work last week and didn't get a lot of time to write back (in fact I was a bit unsure about doing Shadowrun at all as I hadn't had much time to prepare)

Why do we have three players and five characters? The answer is that we actually have five players, but two of them are quite casual and often don't turn up, so usually we make characters for them and play them if they're not there. Yes, I know how beardy it seems for Zod to escape the results of being a one-trick-pony by rolling up a second pony with a different trick but that wasn't the intent: what he did was to remake the character of one of the absent players - that character being Mr. Happy Punch - into a hacker on the grounds that Mr. Happy Punch wasn't being very effective since most combat was not melee.

On allowing the players to rejig their characters a lot, it's mainly because nobody - myself included - is fully used to the system yet and it seems a bit harsh to imply that they would be punished for the rest of the campaign for mistakes they made when they had never played the game before. I'm not sure where the limits ought to be. It's the same thing with the timestop problem - obviously if the runners had been talking amongst themselves on the rooftop it would have taken much longer than a few seconds since the initial shots were fired, but a lot of the time the players are asking me questions about the game world which their characters would have been able to see instantaneously by just looking, so it's a bit tricky to differentiate.

As for stats for the characters. Here's the most recent set of stats I have for Zod:
Metatype: Elf
Bod 5 Agi 8 (12) Rea 5 Str 1 Cha 3 Int 5 Log 1 Wil 1 Edg 3 Mag 5 (4)
PosQ: Adept, Aptitude Automatics, Exceptional Attribute Agi
NegQ: Incompetent Archery, Incompetent Artisan, Incompetent Medicine, Uncouth
Skills: Automatics 7 (+2 Assault Rifles), Infiltration 0 (+2 Urban), Perception 1 (+2 Visual), Pilot Groundcraft 4
Powers: Improved Combat Ability Automatics 4, Improved Physical Attribute Agi 2
Ware: Smartlink, Vision Magnification, Vision Enhancement 3, Reflex Recorder Automatics, Muscle Toner 2
Gear: Middle Lifestyle, Form-Fitting Half-Body Suit, Armor Jacket, Ares Alpha (Gyro Stabilization, Gas-Vent 3, Smartgun, Additional Clip, Extended Clip 100 Drum, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex ammo), Steyr TMP (Concealable Holster, Hidden Arm Slide, Smartgun, Gas-vent 3, Stock, Shock pad, Ceramic Components 1, Chameleon Coating, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex Ammo), Meta Link running Vector Xim, Fake licenses 4 (Machine Pistol, Assault Rifle, Bioware, Cyberware), Fake SINs 4 (Neil Befor, Admiral Ackbar)
I haven't included the truck because I only have an old version of the character sheet that shows the incorrectly built car.

[maeel]

I have read all your session reports and finally decided to add a few comments:

1. One character per player PERIOD!

2. Know your shit, it appears that you often have no clue about the world of SR, just as an example:
It is ok to drive around in your DIY tank shooting all living things in a Z-Zone, however claiming being the cops in a Z-Zone will direct most, if not all, of the firepower of the dwellers of said zone onto you. Also if a crime happened in such a zone the police wont investigate, and if police move into a Z-Zone it wont look like CSI:Miami but rather like Marines: Sadr City.
If you need inspiration watch some war footage from iraq, they show pretty good ways of how to cheaply crack armored vehicles, or watch some vids from Brazilian favelas to get a feel what Z-Zone might feel and look like.

Licenses can only be obtained for ®estricted equipment. Driving a DIY tank with a RAM plate outside a Z-Zone will get you stopped by police and not just one RMP but several plus drones and they will have a shoot first ask questions later attitude.

3. Use your common sense!!! Just because the chars of your players have ridiculous dice pools (which i still dont understand how they acquired them at standard char generation) doesnt mean they can solve any problem with them. how exactly does one dodge while being levitated.

4. Stop arguing with your players, you are the GM. if they hear a siren then thats the way it is, maybe a patrol drone with a sniper rifle just patrolled the area and bang Zod is down, one player sobbing 20+ dumpshockes cheering.

5. Role the dice for your players. Especially when it comes to perception roles, nothing kills immersion more than a player who glitched his perception role, because he knows something is there but his character doesnt.
Have your players define how they share information between each other.

6. Thats more a suggestion TPK and then new chars with special limitations, all attr. minimum at 3, one at 6 or two at 5, must have some social and computer skills, i guess you catch the drift.

[hyphz]

2. Know your shit, it appears that you often have no clue about the world of SR, just as an example: It is ok to drive around in your DIY tank shooting all living things in a Z-Zone, however claiming being the cops in a Z-Zone will direct most, if not all, of the firepower of the dwellers of said zone onto you. Also if a crime happened in such a zone the police wont investigate, and if police move into a Z-Zone it wont look like CSI:Miami but rather like Marines: Sadr City.

Well, sure. Claiming being the cops in a Z-Zone? I don't think they ever did that. They claimed to be the cops to a guy who they later drove _into_ the Verge.

If you need inspiration watch some war footage from iraq, they show pretty good ways of how to cheaply crack armored vehicles, or watch some vids from Brazilian favelas to get a feel what Z-Zone might feel and look like.

.. That's how trained terrorists break armored vehicles, not a bunch of gangers.

5. Role the dice for your players. Especially when it comes to perception roles, nothing kills immersion more than a player who glitched his perception role, because he knows something is there but his character doesnt.

This is actually a big question that I've forgotten about before. Normally I _do_ roll Perception tests etc. for the players, but in Shadowrun it seems to be unreasonable to do so because the player has the option of spending Edge on the roll, which requires them to know that the roll is happening - and, afterwards, to know how it went. Is that intended?

[HunterHerne]

This is actually a big question that I've forgotten about before. Normally I _do_ roll Perception tests etc. for the players, but in Shadowrun it seems to be unreasonable to do so because the player has the option of spending Edge on the roll, which requires them to know that the roll is happening - and, afterwards, to know how it went. Is that intended?

The recommended way of dealing with this is to ask the players to allocate a few edge dice to perception for the run. This allows you to spend the edge for them. Although, you don't need to spend that edge.

My players have decided to not allocate edge to perception tests, which, since most of them only have 2 edge, is pretty reasonable. They usually spend their edge surviving combat in some way.

[Neraph]

[ Spoiler ]

I have read all your session reports and finally decided to add a few comments:

1. One character per player PERIOD!

2. Know your shit, it appears that you often have no clue about the world of SR, just as an example:
It is ok to drive around in your DIY tank shooting all living things in a Z-Zone, however claiming being the cops in a Z-Zone will direct most, if not all, of the firepower of the dwellers of said zone onto you. Also if a crime happened in such a zone the police wont investigate, and if police move into a Z-Zone it wont look like CSI:Miami but rather like Marines: Sadr City.
If you need inspiration watch some war footage from iraq, they show pretty good ways of how to cheaply crack armored vehicles, or watch some vids from Brazilian favelas to get a feel what Z-Zone might feel and look like.

Licenses can only be obtained for ®estricted equipment. Driving a DIY tank with a RAM plate outside a Z-Zone will get you stopped by police and not just one RMP but several plus drones and they will have a shoot first ask questions later attitude.

3. Use your common sense!!! Just because the chars of your players have ridiculous dice pools (which i still dont understand how they acquired them at standard char generation) doesnt mean they can solve any problem with them. how exactly does one dodge while being levitated.

4. Stop arguing with your players, you are the GM. if they hear a siren then thats the way it is, maybe a patrol drone with a sniper rifle just patrolled the area and bang Zod is down, one player sobbing 20+ dumpshockes cheering.

5. Role the dice for your players. Especially when it comes to perception roles, nothing kills immersion more than a player who glitched his perception role, because he knows something is there but his character doesnt.
Have your players define how they share information between each other.

6. Thats more a suggestion TPK and then new chars with special limitations, all attr. minimum at 3, one at 6 or two at 5, must have some social and computer skills, i guess you catch the drift.

Less criticism, more constructive.

That aside: I'd have Zod rename his fake SINs unless they are really low rating SINS. Those names would never fly. Also, in my experience (GMing SR for a couple years at least), the one character that can unbalance a game more than any TM or mage ever could is a sniper. I had one pulling Called Shot/Long Shot using TacNet telemetry to shoot people through buildings and still killing them.

Improved Ability for Adepts goes to a max of 3. It's a skill add, not just a dicepool add, and you can only have a max of +skill to 1/2 your skill, rounded down. This applies for MBW's dodge bonus also (and maybe that Reflex Recorder, can't remember atm).

[LurkerOutThere]

Don't feel bad about having unrealistic response times, this is a game with magic, guns, dragons etc where combat only last seconds, go with what works for gameplay and stand on that, it's what the old lonestar book recommended.

I too am a little confused, your saying on 20 dice your spirit got only 3 successes?. Also did you take into account the negatives on the healing roll? At minimum your medic character should have been down 2 dice and needed 8 successes to heal 6 phyiscal damage. You might also consider a house rule that fading/drain can't be first aided. But put in perspective my medic character is rolling 20+ dice on first aid tests and only reliably heals 4-5 boxes.

Why did the sniper only take 1 shot? Your still afraid of killing them aren't you? Your still having your opposition act suicidally clueless. That is a problem that dumpshock can't fix for you.

You have many problems with the rules, you don't understand them but your players seem to be grasping them well enough to abuse certain points or at least abuse your lack of understanding. You don't stand up to your players and your unwilling to kill their characters, therefore their not threatened by anything. No one on here will be able to help you with any of those problems.

Basically as sometimes these have been an entertaining read your problem is still the same as it was in the first session and it sounds to me like your problem isn't the game world or the system it's your players, you, and how you interact with them. I'm not going to pretend that SR is perfect or that it's rules don't have a lot of clunk sometime, but your basically trying to run a complex storyline for some very very uncomplex people and they have no inducement to change their ways because your neither approaching them directly verbally or just putting some consequences in for their actions.

[maeel]

As for stats for the characters. Here's the most recent set of stats I have for Zod:
Metatype: Elf
Bod 5 Agi 8 (12) Rea 5 Str 1 Cha 3 Int 5 Log 1 Wil 1 Edg 3 Mag 5 (4)

Well there is some fun to be had with him:

Composure (WIL + CHA)

There are many common occurrences in a shadowrunner’s
life—vicious violence, death, metahuman misery, scary mon-
sters and magic—that would make average citizens crumple
into whimpering, traumatized rag-dolls. Whenever a character
encounters a situation that she has not been hardened to, the
gamemaster can call for a composure test to see whether she
faces the situation with cool resolve, temporarily freezes with
shock, or trembles and pisses herself.

Composure is a Willpower + Charisma Test, with a thresh-
old based on the severity of the situation (keeping in mind how
often the character has faced similar things in the past). Certain
situations are bound to become routine to shadowrunners (get-
ting shot at, attacked by a angry spirit, or seeing the remains of a
ghoul’s meal); in these cases, gamemasters should no longer ask
for composure tests.

Memory (LOG + WIL)

If a character needs to remember an important fact or de-
tail, the gamemaster can call for a Logic + Willpower Success
Test. The threshold assigned should be based on how memo-
rable or noticeable the item was: the face of the man that shot
him seen close-up would be an easy task (threshold 1), whereas
trying to remember the color of some random stranger’s tie
glimpsed for only a moment would be more difficult (thresh-
old 3, or even 4). Dice pool modifiers should be applied based
on how far back the memory goes or anything that might have
prevented a character from taking in all of the details (poor
lighting, distractions, etc.).

A character may also attempt to memorize something in
advance. In this case, make a similar Logic + Willpower Test
to determine how well the character retains the information.
Memorizing long or drawn-out information may have a higher
threshold. Each net hit from this test adds an extra die to any
memory tests made to recall this information later on.

A character who glitches on a memory test forgets some
details or gets some parts of it wrong. A critical glitch means
that the character has deluded himself into believing something
entirely different.

PosQ: Adept, Aptitude Automatics, Exceptional Attribute Agi
NegQ: Incompetent Archery, Incompetent Artisan, Incompetent Medicine, Uncouth
Skills: Automatics 7 (+2 Assault Rifles), Infiltration 0 (+2 Urban), Perception 1 (+2 Visual), Pilot Groundcraft 4
Powers: Improved Combat Ability Automatics 4, Improved Physical Attribute Agi 2
Ware: Smartlink, Vision Magnification, Vision Enhancement 3, Reflex Recorder Automatics, Muscle Toner 2
Gear: Middle Lifestyle, Form-Fitting Half-Body Suit, Armor Jacket, Ares Alpha (Gyro Stabilization, Gas-Vent 3, Smartgun, Additional Clip, Extended Clip 100 Drum, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex ammo), Steyr TMP (Concealable Holster, Hidden Arm Slide, Smartgun, Gas-vent 3, Stock, Shock pad, Ceramic Components 1, Chameleon Coating, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex Ammo), Meta Link running Vector Xim, Fake licenses 4 (Machine Pistol, Assault Rifle, Bioware, Cyberware), Fake SINs 4 (Neil Befor, Admiral Ackbar)
I haven't included the truck because I only have an old version of the character sheet that shows the incorrectly built car.

I have bolded the parts that dont work out.

[Neraph]

Well there is some fun to be had with him:

Don't forget Mana spells.

I have bolded the parts that dont work out.

What's wrong with a license for an assault rifle? They're R not F. Well, not the Alpha...

[Faelan]

As for stats for the characters. Here's the most recent set of stats I have for Zod:
Metatype: Elf
Bod 5 Agi 8 (12) Rea 5 Str 1 Cha 3 Int 5 Log 1 Wil 1 Edg 3 Mag 5 (4)
PosQ: Adept, Aptitude Automatics, Exceptional Attribute Agi
NegQ: Incompetent Archery, Incompetent Artisan, Incompetent Medicine, Uncouth
Skills: Automatics 7 (+2 Assault Rifles), Infiltration 0 (+2 Urban), Perception 1 (+2 Visual), Pilot Groundcraft 4
Powers: Improved Combat Ability Automatics 4, Improved Physical Attribute Agi 2
Ware: Smartlink, Vision Magnification, Vision Enhancement 3, Reflex Recorder Automatics, Muscle Toner 2
Gear: Middle Lifestyle, Form-Fitting Half-Body Suit, Armor Jacket, Ares Alpha (Gyro Stabilization, Gas-Vent 3, Smartgun, Additional Clip, Extended Clip 100 Drum, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex ammo), Steyr TMP (Concealable Holster, Hidden Arm Slide, Smartgun, Gas-vent 3, Stock, Shock pad, Ceramic Components 1, Chameleon Coating, Personalized Grip, High Velocity, Ex-Ex Ammo), Meta Link running Vector Xim, Fake licenses 4 (Machine Pistol, Assault Rifle, Bioware, Cyberware), Fake SINs 4 (Neil Befor, Admiral Ackbar)
I haven't included the truck because I only have an old version of the character sheet that shows the incorrectly built car.

Thanks Hyphz it helps a lot because just a cursory glance tells me Zod likely took liberties at character creation. The Attributes listed shove him above the 200 BP limit in fact quite a bit over. Of course I have not seen such a bit of munchkinry for a beginning character in a very long time so please accept what follows as not being directed at you if the tone gets a little gruesome. How he is even functioning in Shadowrun is a big question to me. So here are a couple of pointers based on seeing this idiot savant. 1) Really take a good look at the modifiers for various actions. He is accomplishing things too easily because you are dropping the ball on that. His numbers are not really that exceptional. 2) He overspent on Attributes past the 200 BP limit. , 3) Improved Combat Ability 3 is the limit even with Aptitude. 4) His firearms are clearly operating on wireless, have a hacker hack them. 4) Have people sneak up on him, because while he might see most threats he ain't going to hear most of them.

One question how did he take out a Sniper behind good cover with 20 Ballistic Armor, 6 Body, and 11 dice to Dodge while using a 25 dice pool reduced by -6 for Blindfire, -3 Wound Modifier, so actually a 16 dice pool with a weapon doing 7 P -2AP. I mean sure he could be going full auto but the numbers still don't work out, and it still makes me question how he survived a 15 dice attack from a weapon doing 8P -7AP, for which he only gets to make a damage resistance roll.

[maeel]

Well, sure. Claiming being the cops in a Z-Zone? I don't think they ever did that. They claimed to be the cops to a guy who they later drove _into_ the Verge.

Wasnt there some shooting at some gangers in front of a night club?

.. That's how trained terrorists break armored vehicles, not a bunch of gangers.

Explosives are cheap, and you dont have to be an expert to place some of them on the roadside.
Plus i seriously doubt that all insurgents in iraq are highly trained terrorists, the way the fire their weapons tells you a lot about their training or lack thereof.

This is actually a big question that I've forgotten about before. Normally I _do_ roll Perception tests etc. for the players, but in Shadowrun it seems to be unreasonable to do so because the player has the option of spending Edge on the roll, which requires them to know that the roll is happening - and, afterwards, to know how it went. Is that intended?

you serioulsy tell them the truth? just tell them what suits your need in bringing the story forward, if there is a sniper the player catches a glimpse regardless of what the dice say, and if the story goes a better way if the character dont notice something then they dont regardless of what the dice say.

[maeel]

Gyro Stabilization: This is a heavy upper-body harness
with an attached, articulated gyro-stabilized arm that mounts
a rifle or heavy weapon. The system neutralizes up to 6 points
of recoil and movement modifiers. Attaching or removing a
weapon takes a Simple Action. Getting into the gyro-mount
takes 5 minutes, while using the built-in quick release to get out
of it takes a Complex Action.

a strength 1 char simply shouldnt be allowed to carry something like this.

Lifting and Carrying (STR + BOD)

A character can lift off the ground 15 kilograms per point
Strength without making a test. If the character wishes to lift
more than that, she may make a Strength + Body Test. Each net
hit increases the weight she can lift by 15 kilograms more.

A character can lift 5 kilograms per point Strength over
her head without making a test. If the character wishes to lift
more than that over her head, she may make a Strength + Body
Test. Each net hit increases the weight she can lift by 5 kilo-
grams more.

Characters can lift and carry their Strength x 10 kilograms
in weight without any sort of test. Lifting and carrying more
than that calls for a Strength + Body Test. Each hit increases
the weight she can lift by 10 kilograms more.

For more details on carrying gear, see Carrying Gear, p. 300.


Carrying Capacity

Characters can lift and carry their Strength x 10 kilograms
in weight without any sort of test—this is your carrying capac-
ity. Lifting and carrying more calls for a Strength + Body Test.
Each hit increases the weight you can lift by another 10 kilo-
grams more.
Encumbrance

If a character overburdens herself with gear, she will suf-
fer encumbrance modifiers. For every 5 kilograms that you
exceed your carrying capacity, you suffer a –1 dice pool modi-
fier to physical actions. A character with Strength 3 (Carrying
Capacity 30) that is trudging along with 50 kilograms of equip-
ment will suffer a –4 dice pool modifier.

The maximum any character can carry is equal to her
Carrying Capacity x 2 (or Strength x 20 kilograms).

[AppliedCheese]

First aid plus medicine heals 6P in 18 seconds? I was fairly sure first aid required a minute or so to execute, and was a "one time only per wound", so you might want to check into how the healing is going. There are some substantial healing times associated with full up medicine if I recall.

Also, 20 dice with edge is going to produce 10-11 net hits...helluva summoning pool to beat that. Helluva drain resist pool to turn (net hits x 2) to turn 20 DV into 6.

A note on blind fire...you still need a reasonable "man sized" target area. It represents shooting where you, by all rights know the target should be, but can't actually put a sigh picture on. Muzzle flashes from a bush, radar outline through a wall, that sort of thing. Not firing into a room trusting your DP to magically put your bullet in the right place.

Enemy sniper didn't fire on semi?

Also : For Zod. The roof is where snipers go to die. Everyone and their mother can see you on a roof. Plus, if there's so much as a fly spy up, looking down...well, your exposed on the roof. And to fire lower, you need to expose yourself in a manner that makes you silhouette against the sky, making it EASIER, not harder, to find you.

[Faelan]

Also : For Zod. The roof is where snipers go to die. Everyone and their mother can see you on a roof. Plus, if there's so much as a fly spy up, looking down...well, your exposed on the roof. And to fire lower, you need to expose yourself in a manner that makes you silhouette against the sky, making it EASIER, not harder, to find you.

I did not even want to go into his tactical choices. He might as well be firing from a bell tower with a big fat bullseye on his forehead. Still have not seen their opponents use a single drone... Foolishness should really receive an appropriate award.

[HunterHerne]

One question how did he take out a Sniper behind good cover with 20 Ballistic Armor, 6 Body, and 11 dice to Dodge while using a 25 dice pool reduced by -6 for Blindfire, -3 Wound Modifier, so actually a 16 dice pool with a weapon doing 7 P -2AP. I mean sure he could be going full auto but the numbers still don't work out, and it still makes me question how he survived a 15 dice attack from a weapon doing 8P -7AP, for which he only gets to make a damage resistance roll.

Also, don't forget that blind fire links to Intuition instead of Agility, so, instead of that 24 dice pool to start, he's looking at 17. -3 for wounds, -6 blind modifier, he's actually throwing 8 dice, max.

Edit: I missed the Smartlink. That modifies the pool to 10, after penalties.