Fragging Drek, Do you actually bother with SR slang? Options

[mmu1]

In my experience so far, none of the people I play with really bother with any of that "chummer" "frag" and "drek" stuff, aside from some occasional pseudo-Shadownet posts... I happen to think that's a good thing, for the most part, but I was wondering how things look like in other games?

[Kagetenshi]

Well, we do occasionally sling "chummer", and "frag" and "drek" we tend to keep for those occasions where the sentiment needs to be expressed but without the full vehemence of the RL equivalent… I suppose you could say that I use them similarly to the way the Irish use "shite" and "feck".

Then again, you've probably noticed that ;)

~J

[Sabosect]

In character, the group I'm with uses the slang. Out of character, we don't.

[Tanka]

I occasionally use them in real life. People just stare at me. Kind of funny, actually.

[Wutasumi]

Same here Tanka. I told a clerk to slot off once and he just gave me a blank stare. BUT IF YOU ARE A DREKING CLERK, LEARN WHAT FRAGGIN BUTTON DOES WHAT!

[Tanka]

[offtopic]Wutasumi: Never, ever, ever tell me you yelled at a clerk. I work retail. That pisses me off to no end. Now, if he was being blatantly rude to you before you said a word, that's fine. However, if he just can't find a key, then maybe you shouldn't be such an asswipe.[/offtopic]

It's always fun to randomly spout SR slang at people. They just kind of stare at you and blink a few times.

[Wutasumi]

[offtopic] Tell you what, try to refrain from yelling when you get charged 1000$ for cigs, then be told it's your fault. You'd yell too, and tell him all sorts of stuff.{/offtopic]

Or wonder if you are high.

Also, does anyone else speak the language the PC is speaking in?

[Sepherim]

I don't use much of the slang because we play in spanish, so it sounds quite strange to say "Hola, chummers, ¿qué tal va todo?". :D Still, I do employ it on occassions, and surely would if we played in english.

[Sabosect]

What's really fun is to have a character that speaks using a mix of three or four languages in addition to the slang and speak like that to random people. The looks of utter confusion are worth it.

[Joker9125]

ALERT!!!!! THREAD HIJACK!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Wutasumi]

Yea, he pressed the wrong button and then tried to blame it on me.

IT TOOK 5 HOURS TO GET IT FIXED!

And that, is why I hate Marlboros.

[John Campbell]

I use some of them, don't use others. "Frag" and "drek" are pretty good, though they don't entirely prevent me from using the real-world words when I get sufficiently exercised. I don't use "frag" when I actually mean "have sexual intercourse with", either (I say "screw" if I don't feel like pulling out the big guns)... it's more of a general expletive. Things can be fragging stupid, or get fragged up, but I'd never say that the sammy was late to the meet because he was too busy fragging some hooker (and if someone did say that, I'd wonder why he felt the need to kill the hooker with "friendly fire"). And I never, ever, ever use "hoop", and I laugh at any alleged shadowrunner who does. You can say "ass" on prime-time TV. There's no particular reason for a game revolving around career criminals to censor it. And it sounds stupid, to boot.

[Sabosect]

Actually, "hoop" has a possibly worse connotation than "ass" does. "Ass" refers to the entire thing, while "hoop" could only refer to the hole. It could also be a perversion of "hoolahoop" (sp?) in reference to jokes about how big the particular hole ends up after a stay in prison. No one said it is an attempt to censor anything. Considering what I have read in at least one book, my interpretation is probably far closer to reality than the idea of censoring it.

And before you laugh at them, keep in mind there is someone laughing at you for every internet abbreviation you use for being "too ignorant to use proper English and sounding stupid." To us, however, that slang sounds perfectly fine.

And, all of my checking says that "frag" does not mean the act of sexual intercourse. They use a different word for that.

[Kagetenshi]

Though there is the somewhat misleading term mother-fragger. Though is it ever actually used in a novel or book?

~J

[Sabosect]

Actually, yes, I think. However, these days it can be argued that phrase doesn't mean the literal translation. In fact, note the following definition from M-W Online Dictionary (with a certain word changed to frag):

[FrostyNSO]

Slot-off is the greatest expression in shadowrun.

[the_dunner]

One of my all time favorite Shadowrun memories was when playing through the Harlequin adventure. There's a scenario that involves travelling to Germany. There, the character refers to the runners as chumlichen, instead of chummers. (In German, it'd be pronounced something along the lines of coom-leak-en.) He, of course, hadn't ever had any German, and just decided to pronounce using English phonetics.

So it came out as "Chum-Lickin". We've joked about the horny gay German troll ever since.

[Adarael]

I tend to use the sort of all-in-one cyberpunk slang lingo I've pulled from a dozen different sources, originally for a CP2020 game set in 2075. I mean, some of the SR slang is okay. Thinks like 'slot off', or 'geeked' or 'trog' - those are fine. But drek and chummer are the two that really, *really* get on my nerves, almost as much as 'choomba' from CP2020. Even if 'drek' is a real word, if you wanna swear, swear.
It tends to be polyglot, too, with an emphasis on Russian and Soviet slang. I'd toss in some Chinese, if I knew more than two words in Mandarin or Cantonese.

The end slang result tends to be something like this. Most of it is fairly self explanitory:

Massey: 'So this Veed rolls up on me while I'm walking, and downs the window. Turns out he's tryin' to bump the Vories for pimping in his turf - keeps quizzing me on if I know any of 'em, why I'm out so late, and so on.'
Pi: 'What happened? He try to get rough?'
Massey: 'Yeah, after I told him to stop jawin' at me. He gets all red in the face, tries to pop sights on me, wakarimasu ka? So what could I do but air him out? You rez how it gets out there.'

Veed: I decided this was Euro-war vet slang for VD, after the NKVD and its' successor the MVD. Basically any authority figure posessing means and wherewithal to detain or injure the populace. Cops, basically.
Bump: To rough up but not kill.
Vories: Slang for multiples of the Vory V Zakone.
Pop Sights: To draw and unsafety a weapon, usually with intent to fire. From the retinal sights that appear on a smartgun.
Wakarimasu ka: Japanese for 'You understand?' Technically, since Massey and Pi are friends, 'Wakkaru ka' or 'wakkata ne' would be more likely ('Do you understand?' and 'You understood that, right?' respecively), but I decided wakarimasu ka just rolled off the tongue a bit better.
Air Out: To perforate an animate object, usually a person, usually with lead. Shamelessly lifted from Blade Runner.
Rez: To be intimately familiar with. To know the 'resolution' - aspects and proportions - of a thing.

[BookWyrm]

I occaisionally use "frag" or "drek" only when usuing stronger language would be just a waste of energy. I also use "Smeg".

[toturi]

Mother-fragging hoop-kissing drek-eating son-of-a-slitch.

[FrostyNSO]

Tell that Mother-fragging hoop-kissing drek-eating son-of-a-slitch to slot off!

[toturi]

[Guest_Crimsondude 2.0_*]

Fuck no.

[Ombre]

Sorry, omae, but since we play in French, this fraggin'drek has never been brought up on at the gaming table...but my maternal language being French, it's got quite an "exotic flavor" when I read SR fluff and novels which may actually seem a bit stupid to you English-speaking trogs, dandelion-eaters, halfers and tuskers out there...
I tend to agree with one of the posts which said that a little bit more Chinese or Russian (don't you think, priyatel?) should appear in streetspeak...and to be even more logical, how come there's no Salish, Haida, Tlingit, Kwakiutl, lakota, Hopi and other Native American words and expression in Shadowrun linguo? With half of North America being Native, it seems there should be a heavier influence on 2060s English, neh?

[Herald of Verjig...]