Small runner teams, How to create a balanced group? Options

[GlassJaw]

As I search around and check out various character builds, I notice most of my characters, regardless of archetypes, tend to focus more heavily on combat.

Most of my Shadowrun experience, however, is in smaller groups of players, usually 3-4. Do most people assume a 6-runner team when designing a character or archetype?

In a smaller group, I'm used to each character having at least one combat ability that they are strong in, sometimes 2 or more. Rarely is there one character that is a combat specialist, like a street sam.

What are some guidelines for working in a smaller group?
How much emphasis on combat should each character have?
If there isn't a character completely focused on combat, what is a good way to divvy up the duties?

[DocMortand]

hey, when I played I was a ROLE player. I created a role and played it...didn't create the uber munchkin player or try to fit a niche...I created the player that fitted my concept.

But here again, that's just me. *shrug* I do believe 95% of RPGers play to blow things up and stick it to the weak little platinum dragons.

[Large Mike]

I find that players build characters with no concept that there will be a group to pick up the slack in any weak areas. My players tend to build with a) as much versatility as possible, 2) the ability to avoid their weak areas, or III) both.

Naturally, riggers will be riggers, and deckers will be deckers, but anyone who doesn't know which end of the gun to use stays the hell out of combatl, and anyone who's going to be inserting can bypass a locked door *somehow*, be it spells, electronics, or "troll maglock key" (10 Str and a boot.)

[AIM-54]

Generally, as long as there are experienced players, I find that most of the bases will be covered. I think it's easier to ensure flexibility if it is a small group and thus each player can be less sure that there will be someone else to pick up any combat/stealth/B&E or whatever skillset slack.

I remember one run where my group was missing one or two members, leaving the rest of us who were a little too specialized in a situation where the objective was almost impossible to achieve given the skillsets present. Had we been a smaller group to begin with, I don't think those shortcomings would have been as fatal.

Of course, there's always newbies who forget things like "stealth" and "athletics". :eek:

[toturi]

Purely from a metagaming, every character should have some combat ability with at least 1 mundane combat skill at 6 (usually Pistols).

In smaller groups I've seen, the characters seem to be more balanced if they create their characters together. Someone must have computer 6, someone must have etiquette 6, someone must be Awakened and can cast spells and summon spirits, someone must drive well.

[Solstice]

we tend to have small groups also 2-3 no more. We build with one or two deadly combat skills and then round out the skills. For more versatility we all use chipped skills as well.

[akarenti]

How to balance a small group = Contacts

The players can play pretty much anything they want as long as they know people who can fill in the holes when they need it.

I recently went from a 5 man group (adept, shaman, sammie, decker, rigger) to a
3 man group (mercenary, different sammie, b & e girl). It's quite a change. The 5 man group could go through a team of guards in security armor with 3 or 5 decently powerful elementals as magic backup fairly easily. The 3 man team, obviously, has absolutely no magical anything, and fairly unimpressive attributes for Constests of Will; they can take a team of guards, but a force 6 spirit could own them fairly easily.

But they know people who can get them a magician's services should they need one, and they know people who can deck, etc. I just set them up on jobs that are appropriate to their more specialized abilities (like bodyguarding and enforcing for the mob). It's actually kind of fun, because they are so poorly rounded. They respect (fear, whatever) freaky magical stuff a lot more. When they see things they can't handle, they run like hell and try to get in touch with somebody who can take care of the problem. But they seem to be enjoying themselves immensely.

I quite enjoy it, because I don't have to go through every adventure thinking, "Okay, sec magicians and elementals for the shaman and adept, need
to get some stats for the local Host for the decker, find something for the rigger to do, or at least give guards a few AV rounds, and um...yea, some gun fighting for the sammie."

It's a lot easier to give everyone their screen time, and you get a lot of good RP opportunities because the runners are so dependant on their contacts.

[Edward]

The first archetype I would remove from a small party is Decker, take one as a level 2 contact and subcontract out to him. For Decker insertion runs ether NPC the Decker, wire in a cell matrix link when you get to the terminal or just have the fixer turn Decker insertion runs to another teem (this party cant do it because they don’t have a Decker).

Similar conisations will be made for any lacking archetype. A fixer will not assign a teem without any astral access to a run on a facility known for its high number of spirit paroles. Or a teem with no transport to a cross country delivery. Of cause sometimes a run requires a skill the fixer didn’t know would be needed so you can throw a spanner in the works, just remember, the fixer didn’t know about the new force 8 bound elemental guarding the facility or that the backers local contact (Johnson) would be killed and they would want delivery to France.

Edward

[FrostyNSO]

I've noticed that when my group (3 to 4) is lacking in a certain area, they actively pursue jobs that play towards their strengths.

I think this is the best way for a small group to function. Rather than everybody try to cover two or more areas, the team in general is good at something, and so tries to get jobs that they'll excell at.

Like if our team is combat oriented, they'll tell their fixer, "Hey, we don't have a decker, so keep that in mind if you hear anything on the pipeline." Or something to that effect. Sure, they take a hit every once in a while in the form of being unsuited to perform a particular job, which usually cost them a chunk of change, but they're actually fine with that, so long as they get to do what they love. If a team decides it is lacking in a certain area and it becomes enough of a concern, you can rest assured that one of those players will make an effort to become proficient in that area.

Another avenue to explore is NPC's that the team can contract. This has worked pretty well for our group in the past.

It could be that I just have strange players....Who says they have to balanced anyways :spin:

[Grinder]

We are a small runner team with only 3 runners. One is a sniper with decent close combat sklls and a good smg skill. The next one is a ki-mage with some good spells and a deadly bow. Last one, my face, has some good natural combat skills (but lacking any sort of ini-booster) and skill wires, so he can use a wide variety of skills. And he ahs an assload of contatcs. Worked fine so far; we played 15 runs or so and all turned out good.

[torzzzzz]

:rotfl:

we are a small runner team with only 3 to 4 players max, never played an archetype, or if it has been done we tend to customize to fit with the situation we are in. you don't have to create a character by the book completely thee is plenty of scope to have a play!


torz x

[Cray74]

[Brambles]

As a dm I told my group that rp wise, my boyfriend (real on) would be the one that brought them together (in game) and consequently be their leader. My boyfriend explained them his vision of how a group should be, after me and him had talked about it.
In the end, we got a sniper, a mage, a cybered electrician with a shotgun and a military type guy (the leader).

For my group, this was the best solution. I talked with them about their contacts, but appart from that, they all did it themselves, influenced by my boyfriend. They're all nice and balanced now. The areas they don't cover, that's where they use contacts, or they solve it in a different way than I had predicted.

[Aku]

[Endgame50]

Not even going to comment on that...

But in general, for smaller groups, you need to coordinate a lot when making PCs.

Deckers and riggers (though a sec rigger is like gold) can be outsourced to NPCs or ignored altogether.

Everyone should have some combat ability, and someone should have some basic B&E type skills (Electronics, B/R) and someone should have face skills (Negotiation and Ettiquette). Overall, I'd suggest much more self-rounded characters in such a group (instead of the specialization you can afford in larger ones)

I'd suggest at least one magician--spells are useful, and without one (or an adept with killing hands) a spirit could ruin your day. Fill out the rest to the group's taste.

[Backgammon]

[AIM-54]

[Brambles]

Maybe I should have explained the situation better:

First, most ppl in our group play rp games for the social part. They prefer not to be bothered with too many rules. When we still played Dnd, most people wanted to get over char generation asap. Noone had an original concept, every char was a variation of the munchkin.
Now, everyone has a char they like to play because we talked about it. I did influence their choice of general concept a bit, but not as far as to forbid certain things normally allowed by the rules.

Secondly, they're newbie players and I am a newbie dm. We only have 1 sr3, mine. It complicates matters a bit, specially because all my players are short on funds and I'm very protective of my book :grinbig:

As for favoritisme... my boyfriend is the so-called leader, but while they're running, everyone in the group has a say. My boyfriend is only the leader rpwise: he brought the group together. I've known every person in the group nearly as long as him. They're good friends, and we talked about this before we started making chars.

I supose every group is different. In my group it turned out perfect this way.

[torzzzzz]

:S

[The Question Man]

I am GM'ing a Shadowrun Campaign currently where I have asked the Players if they wanted to create a 2nd Character for the Campaign.

First it would allow them to play a different Character.

Second it allows the Fixer to tailor teams to a specific mission.

Third if one Character is hospitalized, killed, or can't be interupted then the Player has another Character ready to play immediately.

So far all, but one Player has decided to create a 2nd Character. The Players are having fun and the GM doesn't have to worry wheather the Team/Group is capable enough to accomplish the mission.

Cheers

QM

[tisoz]

I was in a group once that had the "team" thing with designated leader. I remember our first get together to play. The guy that was hosting the game was 'in command'. His friend was 'second in command'. I forget if they were assigning ranks or not, but I do remember I was way the heck down the chain of command, maybe the ball on the end of the chain.

They also decided you had to fork over 1/10 of your starting resources to the team. I was surprised things went as well as they did, and I had a fewer reservations when I saw the work and planning they had put into the group headquarters. Turned out they didn't just choose lowest priority resources and steal the other characters stuff. IIRC they had several shops and magic libraries, that sort of thing. Team vehicles, comm equipment. All back in early 2nd edition so there wasn't nearly as much stuff to buy. A lot of the gear was things some characters overlook, can't afford, or just plan on mooching from others.

The guy that hosted the game got evicted by the next game night, his friend was apparently his old landlord, so he quit. I think we lost about half the group of 8. But we kept their resources. ;) The command structure never came up again that I remember.


I've played in several small groups. Many times we play what we want without regard to what anyone else is playing. Other times we got together to decide what character types people wanted to play and tried to cover bases. It seems there is a lot of back up or second characters that get made after their first is discovered to not be as fun as they thought it might be. Or they saw a glaring hole that they actually liked the idea of filling.

I've seen the character made whose whole reason for existance was to kill another PC, too. Also characters that no one would actually hire or willingly run with. Skill-less slots whose only function was mine detector.

In a lot of these groups, it seems like the mage and the combat monster form a nucleus and the other characters tend to come and go.

[Joe Outside]

We usually have 4-6 players in our game, and we talk over who is going to do what, then we make our characters to fill out the Ms--Muscle, Magic, Matrix and Machine. Our M is decided, but what we build to fill that slot is entirely up to us. Designated leader changes from run to run, who whoever gets the call from the fixer or Johnson (or however they get the job) being the leader for that run.

[toturi]

[Sharaloth]

The longest running campaign I was in (and for the most part, GM'd), started out with a group of thrown-together Runners, as per normal. Several million nuyen (silly GM's, not me, using internet-published adventures) later and one of the originals retired (Troll Sammy who became impossible to kill). Another (mine) vanished to begin his metamorphosis into the Uber-NPC villain, and we were left with two team members and an influx of new players. The two 'original' characters became the de facto leaders of the various incarnations of the running team after that (very few of the new characters survived more than three runs in a row). One of the originals, in particular, was a very well done face/combat Adept, who basically ran the team, while the other was a mage/decker who, for some reason I can't remember, became the 'official' team leader. This became worse when the Adept had to retire (fell into a plot point and came out working for Saeder-Krupp), and the team was left in the care of the Mage, whose player tended to fall asleep in parts of the run that didn't directly affect him. ... Oh yeah, he annoyed the hell out of me doing that.

No one really complained about the 'originals' as the team-leaders, since everybody got a say in planning, and things usually went the way of the action movie (though there was one time when we successfully assaulted an armored transport vehicle without killing anyone, or getting injured ourselves).

Generally, with a good GM, any team can work, with any combo of characters. The all-muscle team will just get jobs that don't reqiure much in the way of decking/magic. the all-magic team will just be stuck in a magic-centric campaign. A team that covers all the bases will be doing all sorts of stuff all over the place. Of course, if the players don't like that, they can always make new characters, and/or request that the game go in a different direction. Meh, I guess it's 'to each their own'.

[Weredigo]

Well the general small shadowrunning team usually includes a streetsam or merc, a magic user, and a decker. But I'm having trouble finding someone who wants to play a Decker, and when I do they rarely deck, so at the moment I'm experimenting with a StreetSam, Magic User, Thief team, including an NPC decker.