Moderate use of drugs Options

[Jebu]

The drug/addiction rules don't allow the body metabolism to get rid of the drug, which leads to silly things. If you have a drug with addiction rating 2, and pre-addiction edge of 2, and use one dose every 5 years, your addiction rating will be 6 after 35 years, and bang, you might well get addicted. I know runners won't have a life-expectancy of 35 years, but the example is just trying to point out the non-existence of any possibility of reasonable drug use.

I haven't yet thought this out completely, but I'd like to see addiction rating decreasing over time, if you haven't been addicted yet. After addiction just stick to the rules of (forced) withdrawal.

Let's say the addiction rating will decrease after 10 x addiction rating in days. Of course the addiction rating couldn't drop below the original. Take Kamikaze for example. It has addiction rating of 5, and pre-addiction edge of 2. So, you could take 2 doses of Kamikaze, your addiction rating would increase to 6, and after waiting for 60 days (10 x current addiction ratting) it would drop back to 5. Naturally taking more doses would cancel the waiting period, even if the addiction rating doesn't increase.

This all is meant for physically addictive drugs. Mental addiction works differently in real life, but for simplicity I might try using this for mental addiction rating also.

[toturi]

Use Natural Immunity: Drug of Choice. At the 3 pt level, the PC gets to ignore the ill effects of an artificial drug.

[Kagetenshi]

One way or another, your waiting period is way too low IMO. I'm up in the air as to whether it should drop at all. Keep in mind that these things are more on the scale of ultra-morphine than any modern street drug I'm aware of.

~J

[Charon]

I don't think drugs are meant to be used nicely and rationnally.

It's one thing for a player to think, 'hmm, my PC is being tracked by two Yakuza hitmen. But if I use my kamikaze now, the addiction is currently 6 and I face a high risk of failure while if I wait two more weeks it will drop back to 5... I think I can take them. Without the Kamikaze'

But for a character to have the same reasoning is madness. That character would be scared. Having used Kamikaze in the past to win fights, he probably starts to doubt his ability to pull out of dangerous situations without it, even before the addiction kicks in.

It's pretty much impossible to force a player to separate metagaming from roleplaying. But at least you can, in that particular case, prevent the worse offense by not allowing for a decrease in the addiction.

Drug use is meant to have a price otherwise it wouldn't be very cyberpunkish. IMO.

[Jrayjoker]

And a lot of drugs (crack, alcohol, heroin) keep the used addicted for life once they try it. People who have been clean for years will "fall off the wagon" under stress, often quite easily. I don't think the lack of a reduction is unreasonable at all, and the Metagaming doesn't bother me at all.

[mfb]

except that, despite what Nancy Reagan wants you to think, there are lots and lots of lots of people who use crack, alchohol, and heroin regularly, yet never let it get out of control. in SR, that's simply not possible. i think the edge ratings of SR drugs should be multiplied by about 5, and that users should be able to make a body or willpower test to reduce the edge rating, if they go for a fix factor without using.

[Kagetenshi]

Again, I submit that the SR drugs have effects on the body very significantly more pronounced than crack, alcohol, or heroin.

~J

[mfb]

okay. but where are the crack, alcohol, and heroin rules, then?

[Kagetenshi]

I'm arguing that there aren't any present in Shadowrun.

~J

[Tanka]

[mfb]

so... there's no casual drug use in SR, then? i don't buy that.

[Kagetenshi]

In the Shadowrun rules. Actually, canon is that BTLs have edged out traditional drugs, but I don't buy that either; I do buy that traditional drugs do not have a significant enough effect to need to be enforced beyond roleplaying.

~J

[mfb]

eh. i'm a completist. if you're going to have rules for a thing, have rules for it.

[BitBasher]

[Crimson Jack]

[Kagetenshi]

You're right, there are references to drug use still being in the game. However, it also says

[hahnsoo]

It honestly depends on the type of drug. Opiates (i.e. heroin) and alcohol, for example, produce irreversible changes in neurochemistry that make the addict physiologically addicted to the substance, as well as increase the tolerance to the effect. While physiological addiction can be overcome, the tolerance and the potential for addiction never decrease. However, once you are at that point, your body starts to crap out anyway... most of the traditional therapies focus on the Mental addiction component which is harder to kick BUT treatable. There are a lot of genetic factors involved as well... most of the good studies involve alcoholics and inheritance of the susceptibility to alcoholism.

I'd say that using genetech to "cleanse" the body can reduce addiction factors, but the body's "metabolism" (which is an inaccurate term in the context of addiction medicine) never does. In other words, I'd uphold the ruling in the book.

As far as current drugs, just use the Street Drugs table and find the appropriate analog. I think that every class of drug is represented on that table, with reasonable effects compared to modern-day drugs.

Bliss = Opiate-based Drugs (heroin, painkillers)
Burn = large doses of Alcohol
Cram/Kamikaze = Meth, amphetamines
Novacoke = Cocaine
Zen = LSD, other hallucinogens, prescription anti-psychotic abuse
Deepweed = Duh.

[hahnsoo]

[mfb]

the problem is, as i recall, BTLs are just as deadly as street drugs. low edge rating, low fix factor, high addiction rating.

[Jebu]

Some arguments were made that addictions lasts for life, and that the drugs make irreversible changes to the addicts neural system. But I was looking for a way to avoid automatically getting addicted because of endlessly increasing TN's, by using the substances seldom enough. I agree I set the conditions on lowering addiction rating too low, but that was meant to give an idea of what I was thinking about.

And about metagaming, it happens if it happens. In other words, a single rule won't suddenly make metagamers pop out of nowhere, they could already take couple doses of any useful drug, and move to next drug, to avoid higher TN's.

[Weredigo]

[mfb]

yes, werendigo, but you hate players with a passion normally reserved for nazis and boiled spinach. under normal circumstances, someone with a mild coke habit shouldn't always end up OD'ing and cacking out within five years.

[Kagetenshi]

[Weredigo]

Incorrect. I love players with the love of a crotchetty Grampa with a really large inheritance going to someone and trying to figure out how much to give each since a few will make good use of it while others would blow the whole thing on a trip to vegas.

[Kagetenshi]

Even if it is, the fact that X-Star states it gives it a lot of credence no matter who said it first.

~J