I was watching The Postman last night and began thinking about the importance of the Shadowrunner as a courier and courier runs in general.

Courier runs are, for the most part, milk runs. Take package A to location B without asking any questions. Any idiot can do it. For this reason, basic courier runs are probably one of the most neglected types of runs.

But, there are always wrenches that can be thrown into the machinery of a good courier run. For one thing, if a Johnson is hiring Shadowrunners to carry a package then something is most certainly up. There are plenty of legit courier services that won't ask any questions so long as you check the box that affirms you aren't sending any illegal substances and legit same-day delivery is almost certianly cheaper than Shadowrunners. So there will always be an element of danger from a courier run because either the pagkage is very special or the destination is so dangerous no legit service would ship there.

In fact, there is no end to the potential complications in a courier run. They could come from the enviorment, the authorities, other forces who want the package, and the package itself.

Imagine transporting a sealed silver coffin from a corporate office in Milan to a ghoul in Chicago's Shattergraves during Bug City.

Or finding and returning the lost package of Kevin Costner's talent

Hehe anyway, yeah I like courier runs, they can be a useful tool for solo missions or something a smaller team can do when some of the other players don't show up.

Alternately, courier runs can be like process-serving. You have to deliver a package that the target knows is coming, but doesn't want.

Or the faithful, "i'm paying you to run this package, but actually its not worth anything cause I'm using you as a decoy while the real package is sent another way".

Considering that FedEx ships to Afghanistan and Iraq, I cannot even fathom what kind of places would be so fucked up in 206x that even they wouldn't go.

I'd even bet they go into parts of the CZ by the mid-60s. But I mean, the SOX, maybe? But only because there's no official reason for anyone to be there. That or the very far reachs of human exploration and private property like remote corporate bases.

There is no CZ after 2058.

Does FedEx ship to Somalia?

~J

Well, the area-formerly-known-as-the-CZ.

And, no, they're embargoed from shipping to/from Somalia and some other countries (Iran, Cuba, Sudan). The only places that they seem to not go to because of it's danger is the Central African Republic and Sierra Leone. They don't go to Myanmar for some reason, either.

But they do go to Libya and Liberia.

I can think of a valid reason for an urban courrier run.

Gang X holds an area that Corporation Y would like to take control of. Gang X dosen't cooperate with Corporation Y. Corporation Y could just send in the soldiers to Pol Pot the gangers but that would be bad PR even if it were totally amusing. Instead they decide to take a soft approach by making the gang look bad.

So, Corporation Y hires a bunch of shadowrunners to make various deliveries of extremely valuable items (like medical supplies and so forth) to some of the clinics of the neighborhood. They give the neighborhood clinics money to serve the people and post uniformed guards at the clinic with Wired Reflexes III who can pwn the gangers. The shadowrunners come in making high profile delivers to flaut the gang and make their "offers" of protection seem laughably superfluous.

The Johnson also instructs the runners to blow away with extreme prejudice any gangers who might try and stop their deliveries. Indirect Pol Pot. The Johnson even says, "If you expend over 200 rounds of ammunition into gang members we'll re-supply you for FREE!", which they verify by having one of their guards look for huge piles of casings in the area.

Wow, that would be a hysterically funny and awesome run.

That'd be kinda cool. I know gangers are all jaded in SR, given the stuff they put up with day to day, but a bunch of -eager- looking SRs who step out of the van carrying assault rifles, LMGs and the troll with the assault cannon, would give them pause.

Probably get a free round on them cause they'd be all "c'mon, that's gotta be a movie, no one really comes out packing ordinance like that'.

Assault cannon? Why? LMGs do better damage.

Er, no, no they don't.

~J

Yeah. 6P + 2 EX EX +6 long narrow burst = 14P, 4 better than an assault cannon.

Assault cannon: 18D, no recoil. Simple Action (though the weapon can only fire once per pass). 9S against vehicles, bounces against vehicle armor >9.

LMG: 7S, 17D at full auto, +10 recoil, uncompensated is doubled. Complex Action. 8D against vehicles, bounces against vehicle armor >2.

HV-LMG: 6S, 22D at full auto, +16 recoil, otherwise as above. 11D against vehicles, bounces against vehicle armor >2.

MMG: 9S, 19D at full auto. Recoil and action as above. 9D against vehicles. Bounces against vehicle armor >3.

HMG: 10S, 20D at full auto. Recoil and action as above. 10D against vehicles. Bounces against vehicle armor >4.

~J

and the thread becomes SR3 v SR4

I like the LMG. More options than an assault cannon .
(SR4)

That said, courier runs can be quick fun. As long as they don't happen to often.

OT: I'd rather see The Postman again instead of Waterworld.

Heh, iirc I remember an old comment back in the sam sourcebook that questioned what the heck they called it a 'general purpose' machine gun?

I remember that comment .

A general purpose machine gun is build for (you can guess) different purposes.

So, usable as an infantry man-portable infantry support weapon (light machine gun). Or, mounted on a vehicle or tripod, as medium machine gun.

Any campaign can work for both approaches if the GM is ready to handle whichever direction the party decides to go. In our games there is rarely a "no deaths" clause, and if there isn't he Johnson really doesn't care how the job gets done as long as it gets done. Some have raised their eyebrows and opted not to hire the group again, but that shouldn't derail a campaign, because a campaign shouldn't have a rail in the first place, unless it's been discussed by the players and GMs that it'll be that kind of game, in which case the PCs should be developed as types that would work in the game style desired.

In the campaign that I'm playing we've had 1-2 missions where it was pretty much "Anything goes.". Those were fun, unfortunate a mage disintegrated my LMG in the big showdown at an abandoned mall where the gangers were hiding out. Time for me to get an Assault Cannon. I regret not making him an Ork or Troll, but he's still fun to play.

Charisma of 3, and he's the leader of the pack.

ronin Run it on DS
I want IN!!!!!!

play by chat?

For examples of what can go wrong during a courier run, just watch movies like The Transporter

Wha... He got the girl and kicked ass. How is that going wrong?

Assuming because he botched the Run?

Dunno, I didn't watch it. But then again...

Hey, sometimes you gotta screw a run, screw a Johnson, and eat a point of Noteriety in order to sleep at night, you know?

Then, of course, there's times you need to geek the Johnson, and string his corpse up from a light-pole. I'm still waiting for just such an occasion... Note that the Johnson dosen't have to be geeked before the light pole.

His car was blown up. Girls come and go (as is apparent from the sequel) but cars are forever.

And one thing to remember is that the transporter didn't rescue the girl because it was the right thing to do. He delivered her and came back because the Johnson blew up his car. He didn't come back to rescue her, either. He came back to kill people as revenge for blowing up his car. She just happened to be in the back seat of the Johnson's car when he stole it and he tried to get rid of her. The rest of the stuff was about clearing his name (somehow the police did not care that he kidnapped two cops, stuffed them in his trunk, and that they blew up with his car; possibly because they couldn't prove wrongdoing) and taking down the guys who were actively trying to kill him.

I like courier runs, but I have trouble coming up with stuff to be transported. After all, most data will be transferred by matrix right? What sort of high value items would have to be transported via meatbod?

Information that you absotively-posoloutely can't risk being e-Intercepted.

Anything that can't be put on the matrix because it's a physical item, not information.

data lock cyberware
and have a TM hash the file
you see the enemy knows all ya in house couriers

At some point you have trust someone new to deliver your package, whether it's a shadowrunner with a good rep (or an affordable price) or the new inhouse courier that just started on Tuesday. Places with inhouse couriers capable of handling the job probably won't hire runners for the task unless they need deniability. Others, including smaller businesses and people doing it for non-business reasons, would have to use runners for their packages that can't be delivered via standard courier services.

There are orgnizations that don't have in-house couriers. Fed-ex works well enough for most items but there are some things that require a personal touch, like 1000 kilos of C-XII. Fed-ex doesn't do explosives.

There are also things so dangerous that your in-house couriers simply refuse to transport them. Drums full of toxic waste or a sealed coffin contained the remains of the unkillable first vampire Dracula (do not open), for example.

There's also the fun:

Get hired to deliver a messagechip/etc and upon giving the chip to the intended party, the party reads it and goes "This says to kill you. Sorry chummer"

and I raise you ancient greece.

I'm pretty sure Hamlet was around before Bellerophon.

Yeah, and Navajo White , PapayaWhip and LemonChiffon

How bout some crazy rich eccentric wants something delivered, right?
And there's these folks who are trying to get the package, right?
So when the runner(s) finally deliver the package to some other guy at some R&D lab, it turns out to be a chess move...

i don't know, just wanted to be apart of the group...

---end of line---

My players might throw something at me if I pulled that.

You sure arn't going to use in-house talent to sell out your own corp...

Why not?

~J