This poll was inspired by the Never Fudge a Roll thread, specifically Aku's post.

When you are designing a security team for a building the PCs may or may not be taking down in your next run, how do you determine their power level? Is it just the size of the corp, the sensitivity of the contents, the location, etc.? Or do you scale them to your players? A little weaker, fewer, or dumber for low level PCs, - stronger, more, and smarter for vets?

Just curious to see how most people do their planning...

I need an other category. I use a mix based on what I would find appropriate for a facility based on cost to value ratios (cost of security vs. value of secured item or facility) and based on how much prep time I have available. I almost always design custom archvillans. I have a binder full of canned NPC's to use, ranging from innocent bystanders to hardened prime runners, and I have been known to recycle them from time to time. I'm currently in the process of converting them to SR4 NPC's, I may share some on the NPC Wiki when I get done.

Yes and no. I tailor NPCs to what's appropriate for a facility, but I tailor the facility to the PCs (which isn't sinful, I don't think; the PCs wouldn't have been hired unless they had the skills necessary to do the job). In situations where the PCs aren't "hired" (they decide on their own to go off and mess with a particular gang, for example), I don't tailor the NPCs. I have a small set of standard NPCs (ganger, gang leader, civilization, wage slave, etc) that I built a while ago, that I use when I need stats for those characters.

I generally do the same thing as Taran - the PCs are sent after targets they have a good chance of succeeding against, but the world at large doesn't change just because the characters decide to interact with a part of it.

Usually, anyway. Sometimes, if the players end up heading for something they can't handle, but just had no way of knowing about it, or make reasonable decisions that nevertheless - either as a result of misinformation, or simple bad luck - end up being wrong, I might pull some punches initially to give them a chance to back out and lick their wounds instead of getting slaughtered out of hand.

i think the "often" category fits for an other as well. I would say it depends on what it is i'm going with. Critters and the like don't really get customized unless it's noted in the entry some how (like vamp. pawns having 1d6 essence)

Actually, i think that was the only run i ever got to the combat portion of I was so worried that my small group of vamp pawns would wipe the floor of a full group, and when only two members went i was biting my lips. one character wiped 2/3rds of them without batting an eye. so much for my big bad meanies.

I would also have the PCs hired for runes tailored to the PCs. This doesn’t mess up the world because the corp. and facility are chosen that have security that will be a suitable challenge to the PCs (from the Johnson’s point of view they hire the cheapest team they think has a fair chance of achieving the goal and that is eth PCs)

If the players decided to do a self funded run, or take on unnecessary risks on a payed run then the security responses are based on the parties annoyed (sometimes including there opinion of the PCs abilities and the type of message they want to send)

Edward

I probably go with the line, Taran, mmu1 and Edward allready described. Though I like to throw the pc´s a cakerun or realy hard bitches at times, so the chalange in the atventure would change to a moral decision or evasion out of self preservation. Had many bad experiances with this thoug. pc´s are very often immune to moral equations and allso players are often immune to retreat from a superior foe.

My Gm's tend to take and fully customize their NPC's or at least the opposition, We were allowed to create our own NPC contacts as if they were characters and not have to spend money of gear.

Hmm. None of the answers really cover what I do singularly.

The majority of the time, the world is the world. However, to start with especially, I stick to running the PCs up against targets they can handle. Once they start to get comfortable with what they're capable of, I'll subtly begin shifting away from any sort of tailoring, except for when specific circumstances call for it. This allows you to work on their ability to know when they should turn runs down. If I feel that they've got sufficient reason to believe that they can't handle something, and they attempt it anyway, I nuke em. Thankfully, it hasn't happened as of yet. (The last run, for example, was their indicator that I've shifted to "the world is the world" mode. They almost bit it.)

For me, I always customize my NPC's. I have found that my customed NPC's not only add to game balance and make the game more challenging for the PC's but it also creates a world that seems more realistic. You have a world filled with many different types of cyberware, bioware, magic, weapons,armor, etc, and that means different types of combinations, annd the NPC's should be just as individualistic in what they do to improve and set themselves apart in the shadowrun world as the PC's. By having different, custom NPC's, it allows for more variety, allowing the NPC's to have their own style and way of doing things, which hopefully, will allow them to be able to stand up to the player characters in combat, at least for a round or two.

The drawback, of course, is when it comes to combat, and remembering what mods each character has, how that affects their skills, initiative and gameplay. But other than that, I feel customed NPC's are the way to go.

Never - they are what they are. Who the runners GET to oppose is choosen based on their abilities. Or rather on their expected abilities. We are many players, most having more than one character.

I'm using something similar to the MJLBB low-level runner rules, so I have to make NPCs that are appropriate. However, this also means the runs they go on, unless they go off on their own, have to be appropriate as well. If they go off on their own against a major player, they will likely get burned. I think making appropriate NPCs also mean you have less incentive to fudge rolls since it is less likely that the NPC will kill all the players in one lucky round.

Tricky question. I generally keep an "across the board" chart of stats for all every day encounters. NPCs of value or interest, such as other runners, important corp or security figures and the like get customized.

The average guard stays the same, players should feel they are improving after all. (I like to create the "damn, a year ago this was deadly, now we manage it easily." effect to have them feel acomplishment.)
However, every once in a while, something like every 50 karma or so, I update my NPCs across the board to keep them in line with the characters. (I dont have a real system for this, I just look at what the party can do good and improve defenses somewhat.)

Once the players hit something that isnt average, they'd better stay on their toes. I customize whatever has a "special" tag on it and I really enjoy to play out the corp availability advantage. Runners may have a hard time getting their hands on that new gun, corps dont.

I also have a habit of making terrain and numbers the prime factors in runs, so NPCs fall somewhat behind on my "to do" list. I found that it's much more fun to use a few situational or terrain modifiers to make things harder than just to pump my bad boys to high heavens. It also leaves me the option to keep those pumped up guys for the real fun. If I combine both of them it usually means im royally pissed.

The NPCs are what they are, yet like many here I assume the Johnson tries to hire runners that can accomplish the task they were hired to do. I do my best to keep my knowledge of the player's actual capablilities in the dark and go off what they've pulled off, ie their rep for getting jobs done. I had a group that pulled off several amazing runs so they got hired to do a job they should have turned down as it was beyond their abilities, but their rep was so good for doing amazing stuff they got hired. Two PCs died and two others spent a long time recovering from their injuries, and they were lucky it was only that bad.

I'd thought they'd know better then to go up against a hard core hidden Mitshuma facility and I dropped lots of hints about how deadly it'd be but they were feeling their wheaties. I've also had experienced groups that deliberately took low paying runs that were super easy for them because they wanted to minimize risk. I think it's more realisitic then having gangers get more bad ass because the PC just got wired 3.

I also believe in scaling the job to the runners rather than the NPCs. I usually keep a stock set of NPCs ranging from easy to hard (like security guards, gangers, beat cops, SWAT teams, paramilitary, etc.) and just use them as seems appropriate for the situation. If a newly formed group attracts enough attention to bring in the SWAT team it'll be tough, but I don't think it would make sense to water down the encounter just cause the group has a hard time handling it. That leads to players thinking they can get away with anything.

I concur with most of the others. I would tailor runs to the PC power level, but I don't like changing the stats for a basic security guard based on the PC power level. As the PCs gain experience, they should face tougher challenges. But the mall security guard shouldn't suddenly have pistols: 6 because the PCs got tougher!

Changing NPC stats to match the PC's abilities takes away the feeling of accomplishment that you get from improving. What's the point of improving your pistols skill, if the Red Samurai guard will always have it at exactly one point higher than you, no matter what it is? What's the point of improving your break-in skills, if that maglock rating goes up as your electronics skill does? Yes, PCs should be challenged, but by moving up to better jobs, not by having the same jobs become inexplicably tougher.

When's the last time we got this degree of unanimity on GMing style? Ever?