Just curious has anyone ever tried running shadowrun using D20 modern?

I have been coming up with conversions for my group to give the D20 modern game a shadowrun like feel but it has been alot of work.

I scrapped the D20 magic system, and used a modified Psionics system from 3.5

Modified their cybernetics system from future and Cyberscape.

Also used some modified armor rules, and tweaked out the mass damage rule from D20 modern to make it more gritty and make armor more realistic.

and last but not least I made several new feats... example Awakened Caster, and Awakened adept which had to be taken at first level. and only Awakened Characters could use magic items.

I did this because we have 2 hardcore D20 fans in the group and while they like shadowrun They said they would like it better with different rules. We have 5 players total including me. I have been Running the campaign now for over a year.

Anyway Seeing if anyone else has attempted this? If so how did it go? and If anyone likes i could post some of the conversions i have done here. Would like to also see any conversions others might have used.

The hardest conversion to do is reworking their VR (matrix rules)... their VR rules seem fairly well done but it feels like everyone is a TM... so I have been trying to come up with comlinks and comlink stats... and keep their normal rules for TMs..

Anyway I guess thats it now, would love to see some feedback, or responces

...


'Konsaki turns away from cybertrucker muttering dark comments under his breath...'

LOL I figured I would get negative responces but was hoping for something constructive. I have not problems with the shadowrun rules. I have even come up with ways to run the Matrix for our TM and give it a reallly good feel. Even though there are SOOO many loopholes for hacking and rigging.

I am mainly doing this for the 2 players who like D20.. Which I dont mind D20 myself. Currently we are actually breaking from SR4 because I wanted a chance to Play a character for awhile and take a break from GMing... The person who is running is doing an Ebberon game. I figured i would take this chance to do the conversions.

Overall Either system would work fine with me. I have spent money buying both sets of systems. As long as it can keep the Shadowrun feeling with several mods to the rules I think it can. When we start back to Shadowrun I figured I would run one Run using SR4 rules and then one using D20 modern (modded) rules and see which the group likes better.

Shadowrun loses too much by converting it to d20. They don't mesh well IMHO.

One of the main problems d20 has in this context is, that it is not capable of handling realistic roleplaynig well, while Shadowrun is fairly (surely not absolutely) realistic.

Classes, levels, hit points, and all that just doesn't work well to carry the Shadowrun feel.

Bye
Thanee

I considered doing this several years ago, when d20 Future first came out, because back then, I was in love with the d20 System. However, having played Serenity and Shadowrun in the last year, I've discovered that classless systems are, for the most part, superior to the d20 System.

But if you enjoy it, go for it.

This is a fairly common topic on Dumpshock and also on ENWorld. You might want to do a forum search at both sites. Interestingly, I haven't seen this come up since SR4 was introduced. While you posted this in the SR4 forum, I'd like to clarify -- did you try playing with the Fourth Edition Rules? Most folks have been much happier introducing new players to this system.

Given that caveat, you'd probably be better suited to looking through the ENWorld Forums than here. Most Shadowrun players have a bit of a visceral anti-D20 response. For example -- From FanPro's GenCon 2004 Booth.

Having said all that -- if you wanted to try to emulate Shadowrun:

Start with the magic system from Grim Tales. It's a nice dark system where characters take hideous amounts of damage from casting spells.

Grab Mongoose's OGL Cyber book. It's substantially more comprehensive than the D20 Future/Cyberscape one.

Drop hit points entirely, and use the Wound system that was used in Star Wars D20 (and also included in Unearthed Arcana as OGL.)

You're still going to encounter a lot of problems -- D20 Initiative just doesn't reflect SR's initiative system. Armor works very differently. Etc. But, if you're dead set on it, this is a decent starting point.

The biggest issues with D20 system conversions maintaining a Shadowrun feel are .. unfortunately.. pretty core to what makes shadowrun well.. shadowrun.

1) classless leveless character system.
2) universal lethality. (which sort of dovetails with the first point).

unless you're willing to go D20Cthulhu style with one hit die -ever- you're not really going to replicate the inherent danger of being shot. (perhaps the alternate d20 damage system could work too. forget its name though)

and given how inherent levels and classes (even the d20 modern system 'heroes' are classes) are to the d20 system I don't think it's really possible to maintain the system of d20 with the fluidity of the shadowrun character system (ex: it's very easy as karma increases to branch your character into multiple areas of expertise)

I suppose you could limit all classes to 5 or 10 levels.. but then you've put a hard cap wall on abilities (granted, SR4 does have a hard cap too.. but it's alot farther away than the 5th level (or even 10th level) mark would be in game time.)

could you make a cyberpunk setting with magic? sure. It's not like your setting is dependent on your system - but the SR setting (most cyberpunk for that matter) is not about playing the hero.. and the d20 system is designed around the assumption that your PC's *are* heroes.

cybertrucker, just walk away while you are still healthy. You are lucky the first few post are more measured, your luck won't last. Rest of you, slowly back away from the noob and keep your hands where I can see them.

thanks the dunner for the feedback I will check out the stuff your talking about..

one thing that D20 modern does have over regular D20 is that even with huge amount of hitpoints you have mass damage. I did a slight adjustment to the d20 modern mass damage rule in that... Mass damage=10 so if you have take more than 10 damage in a single hit you have to make a fort save or drop to 0 hit points...

The save DC that I was planning on using is 15+1 for each 2 points of damage over 10... so if your hit by a something hard it has a better chance of dropping you... seems it would keep it pretty gritty, kind of like shadowrun.

Also D20 modern has Defense that goes up when you level which makes complete sense. I changed the armor rules...in the following way.
Everycharacter has a touch Defense equal to their dex mod+level bonus+any feat bonuses...
Armor gives an equipment Defense bonus.. this does not make you harder to hit however. If someone hits your Touch Defense but does not roll enough to get over your Equipment defense they still hit you but your armor absorbs damage equal to its equipment bonus. if they roll high enough to exceed your defense bonus the manage to bypass the armor completely

Example: Tommy the mage has a Touch defense of 13 (+1from level +2 from dex) he is wearing an armored vest (equip Bonus +5) he is not proficient in wearing armor effectively though which slows him down giving him a Non proficient Equip bonus of +2...
Tommy's Touch defense=13 Equipped Defense=15 with 5 Damage resist
If someone shot at Tommy and rolled a 11 they would miss him completely
If they shot at him and rolled a 14 they would hit him in a spot his armor protected him and the armor would resist 5 of the damage dealt
If they shot at him and rolled an 18 they hit him in an unprotected area and would do full damage to him.

Anyway I will definately check out the alternate magic system suggested... and also the alternate cyber system..

I will say the Psionics from 3.5 seems like they would work with some mods... which I have already written down. With Psionic points translated to Mana points.. and Implanted Cyberware stripping characters of Mana points and also reducing the effects of magical healing.

lol i am not that big of a noob.. I played Shadowrun back in first edition. Heck i still have a copy of the dragon magazine where they previewed shadowrun the one with the jetfighter cockpit and the pilot taking aim on a dragon. I also still have my first edition first printing hardbound book, in good condition.I own all the books now for SR4 and have been running my campaign for it since november of 05...I really never played any 2nd edition and very limited 3rd edition. I was more into cyberpunk at the time.. Which I still believe to be overall one of the best systems evercreated. To bad their latest edition sucked and no one ever came up with a good magic system for it. Otherwise I would be playing it.

As stated before I am doing this for my 2 players who really are hard core D20 fans.

CLEANSE IT WITH FIRE!!! TAKE 6M DAMAGE PER TURN!!!


In truth though, while I can understand the desire to convert the heathens, but compromising the sacred canon is not the way to go about it! After all, doeth not the prophet Wounded Ronin write in his sacred texts:

"And the GM came from on high, and deciding I was unworthy of knowledge, did chooseth not to impart the rules unto me. And thus, when I didst overcast mine Increased Reflexes +3 spell, I didst expire, and it was good. Thus it is written."

If SOME players are not yet ready for the rules, simply don't explain said rules. Simply let their characters die horribly and bit by bit they will seek salvation. Compromise is Hasbro's tool.

Well, I have to agree, this is a bad idea...

Still, a couple of years ago I thought that I might give D20's Cyberpunk gam called 'Digital Burn' a look-over and see if it was useful. Needless to say it sits rather lonely on my bookcase, installing Cyberware does stat damage, cops calling for backup is treated exactly like DnD devils porting in allies with a delayed arrival. (Yes, cops even have a usage limit and if I remember correctly they don't get it at First Level either.)


Still, if you are really wanting to try this I'd go with a more deadly Star Wars HP system, give your characters 1/2 or maybe 1/3 of their CON score as real Hitpoints and then at each level give everyone 1 VP that isn't modified by their CON. That should go along way towards keeping Shadowrun's lethal combat.

As for classes, well don't use classes anything like they do in DnD, instead make a couple of very generic classes that give out only one aspect of what is normally considered a class, such as 'Combat Bonus', 'Skillpoint Bonus', 'Saving Throw Bonus', 'Extra Vit Point', 'Spellcasting Level' ect... And then allow chracters to Multiclass without any penalities at all, that way you can kind-of keep Shadowrun's classless feel as what you are doing is allowing your players to slowly create their own class and since none of the classes are really "complete" they will have to spread their levels around and won't be able to ramp up to Godlike ablities like in normal DnD.

However Magic is going to be the hardest, personally I think I would build every single spell from stratch, and then give each spell a different version of itself for each Spell-level. And then rule that casting a spell that your spellcasting level would allow does 1d4 VP per Spell-level and a mage can 'overcast' by taking 1d6 HP per Spell-level.

All-in-all I think that I would tell your DnD freaks to suck it up and get used to 4th Edition because in order to get anything even remotely close to Shadowrun you are looking at basically scrapping two entire Game Systems in order to create your own Game System from stratch.

What the heck is wrong with you people!?
Isn't anyone worried about the cancer!?!?
Cancer.

Thats the thing though D20 modern is not as hard classed as DnD is... It uses the basic mechanics of D20s DnD but class wise is completely different. I wouldnt use the D20 magic system at all for it.. It just does not capture the feel. Instead I was planning on using the 3.5 psionics system slightly modified and call it magic.

Psionic feats would be awakened feats etc etc... Also only people with the actual AWAKENED (caster) or AWAKENED (adept) can take the psionic (awakened feats) and they are the only ones that can utilize Magic items and weapons.

"You got your Shadowrun in my D&D!"
"You got your D&D in my Shadowrun!"

-- cut to NERPS™­ wrapper --

NERPS! two great tastes that taste great together!*

*some ingredients may be carcinogenic

Hmm not much positive feedback going on here. ... Well I will keep you all posted i suppose on how it runs. Looking over the 2 systems I think it can be done with some tweaking here and there.

If anyone wants me to post the rules for the conversions I can. I already went over Mass damage and Armor variants... Which was fairly easy and looks to keep the game with a more deadly and realistic feel.

Well, although I can't speak of the D20 Modern class-system, unless the classes are as low-powered and incomplete as the ones I suggested then you will have the "power-leap" of DnD as they level up, for the problems there-of I invite you to read about the campaigns that Emo tends to run. (And as long as that is fun for your group then more power to you, but be aware that the Shadowrun World tends to break at demi-god power levels, at least in my opinion.)

As for using the Psionic Points for magic, well at that point you might as well forget even trying to call it Shadowrun and just aim for a generic MagicPunk feel, at least in my opinion.

Steak and Spirits true, but just think, what they cost in health-care, they aren't going to cost us in future Social Security benifits.

Ok, we know a lot of people here don't much care for D20 , myself included. But the guy has a valid question so please either try to help or leave it alone. He's caught enough flak already.

cybertrucker, like the_dunner said, I'd suggest taking a look at the D20 Star Wars for some lethality comparisons. As for mages, maybe stick closer to sorcerers than wizards for the magical style.

Or there is always the D6 Starwars wound system. Again proving that classless systems are far superior. However, that said, I do greatly enjoy DnD, but D20 should have stuck to it as OGL is kinda crappy They tried incorporating it into Heavy Gear without too much luck in my opinion. Taking a classless system and trying to convert it will just end in pain.

Okay, I admit it, I have D20 cancer. D20 is a fun system and is good for D&D.
But as people have said, as much as rules contribute to the overall feel of a game, trying to use D20 rules for Shadowrun would make it different enough to the point where it probably shouldn't be called Shadowrun anymore, but rather D20-future-with-magic-and-lesbian-elves.
If you want a game that feels more D20 but you love the Shadowrun world, that's awesome, but I think you'd be better off coming at it from the other direction. Take your D20 modern, your D20 Future, whatever books you need to get your cyber and hackers, add Urban Arcana for your metahumans, critters, and magic, and you're 90% of the way there. Limit the races (both metahuman and critter), spells, etc to things consistent with the SR universe, and then just use all the SR fluff with minor teensy rule tweaks as necessary.
But trying to take SR and convert it to D20 is really reinventing the wheel. D20 products have already done the work of giving you D20 cyberware, magic, etc. Oh, and make sure you check out Unearthed Arcana (not to be confused with Arcana Unearthed) for some suggested magic system variants. I'm betting one of them will be close enough.
My basic point is, I think you'll have an easier time of taking existing D20 stuff, removing what doesn't fit with SR, and using SR fluff, as opposed to taking SR and trying to do a full conversion.

There, was that more productive?
p.s. Cancer.

edit: Fixed a book name, Urban Arcana; thanks Trigger

Alas, I have also wandered upon the path of trying to create a semi-functional D20 SR system but the drive and very thought of doing so has long since left my being.

As Moon-Hawk said, Unearthed Arcan is a good startign point for a alternate magic system and I also recommend startign there. The other books I frequently used as reference points were D20 Modern, D20 Future, Urban Arcana (the campaign system for D20 Modern that is sort SR minus cyber goodness), and a rabble of others.

On another note, my radiation therapy for the D20 cancer is coming along nicely and another month or so of frequent lesbian-stripper-elf-ninjas and trolls-with-assault-cannons injections into my bloodstream should get rid of the rest of it.

You might also take a look at some of the rules for True20 which is based on the OGL but takes a different tack for a d20 game. Never played it but like what I have seen of the rules.

I'm not a big fan of D20 these days but I did a conversion a while back. I disagree with the need for a classless system in Shadowrun. I think that it would work. Most of the archetypes can be converted into classes easily. I personally would love to figure out how to put feats into shadowrun but it never works out.

One of the things that I would suggest is do not use D20 modern first and fore most. I think that it sucks. I based mine off of Spycraft 2.0 and it makes more sense. The feats are nicer. You just have to create a whole new set of classes. DO NOT use the ones in the book as they are VERY powerful.

Spycraft uses initiative bonuses as a part of your level which means the more experienced you are the better you react. It also uses Defense score. You can take the equipment bonus stuff and assign cyberware as gear.

I give everyone their constitution as their wound points from the beginning so even your normal ganger will have their con. I remember coming up with a fairly harsh system. I'll try and find it again. I think that you took a penalty to defense, initiative and dodge for each point of wound damage.

Armor is Damage resistance in that game if I remember correctly. Nearly every major kind of ammo is listed with damage codes for a huge number of guns. It wouldn't be very hard at all to add a few more and add smartgun links as gun modifications. Give it a few virtual feats and you have it.

I've seen a version that added to damage per 5 points past defense.

Keep in mind that shadowrunners are not 1st level characters. I figure that they are at least level 5 starting off. Come up with some classes for basic street type people and make shadowrunners a series of prestige classes. You could have a Soldato that becomes a Street Sammie. The Soldato would be the base class. Or you could have a Ganger (base class) become a Soldato (base class) and then a Street sammie (prestige class requires wired reflexes). Merc would require several levels of soldier. Maybe a Street Thief class becomes an Infiltrator (prestige class).

The mook system is a little complex but can be simplified. Just translate the shadowrun equipment.

Magic would be done as a saving throw for drain based on the drain code from shadowrun (multiply it by 2 and add 15 or something similar). You take a level of stun as in the game (staggared etc). Drain is also taken to hit points which are similar to fatigue ( I mixed hit points and fatigue but the game has them seperate - it's simpiler this way).

You can keep up with your essence as normal. The ability to have magic was a feat that was negated if you got over 3 points. Otherwise it added to all of your TNs to cast.

And yes I think that this is the wrong part of the board for this. It should be in the general gaming or the shadowrun board - not the 4th ed board.

I was afflicted with D20, but a steady diet of ninja-pirate-stripper girls with brown...ahem into my bloodstream cured me of the cancer.

But I'd second Garro's recommendation of Spycraft 2.0 if you really have to do Shadowrun in D20(arrgh!) But I'd use the base classes at level 1. Remember the Spycraft system itself already have a system for mooks and level 1 PCs wipe the floor with mooks. To add magic, just include the Spellbound supplement.

Hmm... To be constructive. D20 would work... but for lethality just make sure you use very low Massive Damage Thresholds.. Personally, I'd use straight CON. Call of Cthuhlu d20 did something very similar if I recall correctly.

That will put the fear of combat into your d20 players... if they have to make a Fort save everytime they take a decent hit or else end up with -1 hps.

FLAME!!!!!!!!!!
ok, with that out of teh way, i guess it relly depends on why you play shadowrun. if you play it for the background and story then you could realisticly convert a d20 game to match with your shadowrun game. HOWEVER doing this would drasticly change how the game is played.

altho, come to think of it, doing this could allow characters to attain greatness within the span of a campaign, whereas using the shadowrun rules you could not do. for example, in one campaign i could not start out as a hacker and end better than fastjack. just cant happen.

stew on that one for a while.

Hey cybertrucker, I just put up a poll in General Gaming that might help you with this. You can find it here.

If you want deadlyness, used a fixed number of hitpoints for everyone instead of D20's usual level-based hitpoint progression.

I don't remember the specifics at the moment, but isn't it Unearthed Arcana, the book that's all optional rules and variants, that has a few different wound and injury systems in it?

Hi,

I do admire someone willing to take the time and make the effort to rewrite rules and do something different, but I think converting SR -> DnD20 is not really the way to go.

There's already supplements and source material for Modern Day, Future and Magic within a D20 framework, and they would cover almost all the material necessary.


I've disliked D20 from day one, from its Feats to the variations that people have done to the horrid way that things are described in a DnD-esque manner, to get games to work well and have a particular feel [Judge Dredd uses a variation, for instance].


From my point of view, if you can do it, do it - but it really is the arse-backwards way of doing it.


Peter

Shadowrun is, with a few exceptions, an excellent gaming system. It is far better than either of the d20 systems I've played in (Modern & D&D). I say this as a harcore D&D player who has only done three Shadowrun adventures, period.

That said, you could probably come up with a d20 system that would work decently well for Shadowrun. It would be a lot more effort than just getting your players to learn the system, but it could be done. True d20 looks like a good start, having scanned through the three rules preview PDFs.

If I was seriously going to do this, I'd probably model it after Frank's SAME system. SAME has the advantage of being easily scaled as level-based or 'open'/points advancement, and has a remarkably rebust and extensible combat/conflict system while staying very simple.

In terms of physical ability scores, you do the opposite of SR4: combine Strength & Body into one stat while keeping Quickness, and similarly combine Will & Charisma while keeping Intelligence. This gets you to the basic stat array (Strength Agillity Moxie Elan).

You can do skills in either a binary fashion (you have it or you don't) or in the normal SR fashion.

Anyway, I'm probably going too much into this. Good luck.

Sounds very time consuming. The only advantage to this other than to attract new players would be to limit player's ability to min-max. At least this way they wouldn't be able to start as the very best at something right at character gen. I also don't know how you would include all the little extras like VR, riggers, astral travel. Stuff like that. Plus I always liked the karma award system. You would constantly have to adjust the experience you gave out for things like roleplaying, or would you change it to the "you kill something, you get experience" model DnD has? Personally I've never seen the D20 systems, I just always imagined them to be a DnD knockoff.

I liked the West End GAmes D6 Star Wars system better personally.

D6 has been republished and sold as D6 Adventure. They have a scifi version too. It's a good system.

Ok, I have had this stuff rolling around in my head for several days and it is driving me nuts. I will dump it all here and let those that want sort through it and determine what they want.

WARNING: Read at your own risk. d20 is known to cause cancer and this article deals with d20. Do not read if you plan to operate heavy machinery, drive, or stay up late.



First up, let's start with attributes:

I will assume human for the basis of comparison based on humans being the average/base for SR, DnD, and generic d20. Given that I have never played d20M, I will have to assume that this is still accurate.

Minimum attribute
SR - 1
d20 - 3

Maximum
SR - 6
d20 - 18

It looks like a simple x 3 multiplier; however, let's check a few things.

Mathematical Average
SR - 3.5
d20 - 10.5

x 3 holds

However, while d20 has a simple way of dividing these - both 10 and 11 are considered average scores. SR doesn't have this benefit. The stated average for human attributes is 3. Our x 3 multiplier gets us back to a 9 in d20. This correlates to a -1 attribute modifier. More on this later.

3.5 is actually not a bad average for SR as with maximum BP expenditure (assuming 400 BP build) a human would have 4 3's and 4 4's for attributes. The issue is going back to d20. 3 -> 9 (-1) and 4 -> 12 (+1).

In d20, the attribute isn't nearly as important as the attribute modifier. This means that average SR humans are less than average in d20. d20 tends to lend itself to better than average characters. The issue is compounded by the "elite array" - a device used in d20 to avoid rolling scores. The player gets 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, and 15 for scores. The mathematical average is 12 (SR - 4). Also the total attribute bonus is +5. Furthering the gap between SR averge and d20 average.

Where does all this take us?

If you translate SR to d20, the average human needs to be made stronger or the characters weaker in order to preserve the feel of SR.

Next up: Attribute Correlation and Classes.

You could try looking at Mutants and Masterminds, and make the damage system a little more harsh.

It is classless, doesn't use HP, (it is possible to take someone out with one shot, just not very likely). And you can easily duplicate cyberware, magic and bioware, as well as the various races through powers and drawbacks with the appropriate descriptors.

Attribute Correlation and Classes:

Since SR has 8 main attributes and d20 6, we have to economize. Here is my take:

SR ~ DnD

STR = Strength
AGI & REA ~ Dexterity
BOD ~ Constitution
CHA = Charisma
LOG ~ Intelligence
WIL & INT ~ Wisdom

I didn't put intuition and logic together b/c d20 treats wisdom as intuition for many rolls.

Classes:

1. Face
2. Technomancer
3. Hacker
4. Rigger
5. Street Sam
6. Mage
7. Adept
8. Mystic Adept

You can argue that the Mystic Adept isn't needed but then you get into collapsing Mage and Adept which dominoes to collapsing Hacker and Rigger and perhaps Technomancer as well.

There ya go.

Next up: Feats and Skills

Feats and Skills:

After this I am done.

This is where any conversion to d20 meets the road in my opinion and is therefore the hardest to deal with.

Are Adept Powers feats? Skills available only to the Adpet class? Part of the Adept class "ladder"?

All I can say is, "Good luck!!"

May cybertrucker et al have fun with this!



Yeah, the d20 demons have been expunged.

If you really want to convert to something, then convert to the WoD system. Hell, SR4 is the new WoD with d6s instead of d10s

Yeah, but Shadowrun has more dice, and besides, d6s stack, d10s don't, they heap.

I think Moon-Hawk has the direction you should be going in right. Build a set of DnD rules that can support the big ideas behind SR and then bring in the atmosphere. The problem otherwise is that your trying to go from a very dynamic system to a linear one.

I.e. in SR if you want your adept to have some minor hacking skills you can spend a couple nights karma and be only slightly poorer for it, but in DnD you will forever be behind everyone else by a full level. And not just that but with the way DnD scales DCs your either going to have to level your hacking class up again or it will be useless shortly. This is not to say DnD doesn’t have its place, it handles the whole hero angle better then SR ever could due to its linear nature but as I hope I’ve illustrated they just don’t mesh going SR -> DnD. And yes there are solutions to this but their messy and timeconsuming.

Now with all that said I have contemplated turning DnD rules into SR rules so I could run a non-linear grittier DnD game, but most defiantly not the other way around.

Now recovering from his cancer thanks to a pair of lovely nymphs.