After GMing for a bit, I'm starting to find SR a bit overwhelming. Don't get me wrong, I love the fiction, it's just the gameplay that feels less than satisfying.

Why?

There's too much going on. Between the astral, matrix/AR, and the physical there is simply so many details that the game can become a nightmare for the players, but even more for the GM. Trying to keep track of what's happening on three levels and how much time/effort to spend on each is really starting to get me down. Add to this players that while being great guys & gals, don't have 'how to run in three worlds' hardwired into their brains, and they make constant slip-ups. Not to worry, so to do the NPCs because I'm far from perfect in keeping all the minute details straight.

Added to this is the insanely high lethalithy factor (SR4 has been described to me by one of my players as 'more lethal that real life' - and I agree with him) along with what can be a fairly long character creation process, and we have another problem that can range from a sppedbump to a roadblock depending on the player and the character.

Lastly, while the dice mechanic is simple, it's also clunky. Rolling a set of dice for each combatant in intitiative takes a bit, and that's only the beginning (or a turn, you repeat this step each time...). Then add in the resisted tests, the rerolls from edge, and everything else that comes up and it can take a bit to really get everything done. I'm actually finding the appeal of 'roll a d20 +/- modifiers to get to target number" - it works well enough without all of the 'clunk factor'.

I'm finding that I want a game without the 'three worlds' and with far less detail on what a character has in his pockets (or commlink) along with a fast and simple resolution. I really don't think I'll find a satisfying answer in SR4, but I'm wondering if anyone can give me some suggestions on salvaging a setting that I've loved for more than 15 years.

The whole multiple worlds thing has been a problem in every edition of shadowrun that I have ever played, personally. (2nd-4th) My group has gotten pretty good at integrating the magic and the physical but the matrix has always seemed to suffer a bit. I think that the longer you play the better everyone gets at integration and it eventually runs pretty smoothly. If you have people who have played magicians and hackers in the past and are now playing complete mundanes, they do have more understanding of what is going on when the other players are doing their thing and are more accepting of it, I find.

I like the lethality of SR4, quite a bit, in fact. I wouldn't change it at all because it would really screw with the setting I think. Character death should be part and parcel of the setting. In fact, my group briefly flirted with making combat even more lethal, but scrapped that pretty swiftly because it got to be too much.

I don't really find the rolling that clunky comparative to the cancerous game, but I am not really well versed in playing D20 games in general because on the whole I don't find them appealing. If I'm going to roleplay in the Star Wars universe I just break out my old WEG editions and then we start rolling. I guess I'm just used to rolling buckets of D6's because most of the games I love seem to use them.

I used to run Shadowrun 2nd edition back in the day and we had a blast with that set of rules. Things were simpler then and the gameplay felt smooth and dice rolls were quick. With 3rd edition, things started to get bogged down and the 4th edition rules continued that trend.

It's nice that there is a roll for pretty much everything now, but having to reference the rulebook every time a player wants to do anything is annoying. It's a good thing, that the index is so well done.

My suggestion is to really think about your game ahead of time. Figure out how magic and technology are going to involved, before you play the game. Knowing that Target A has a watcher spirit monitoring him and a Sprite in his Commlink ahead of time, can make things easier for you.

Ohh and if you don't like certain rules, change them. I've already made several changes to the ranged combat system and am preparing to simplify magic and hacking next.



Unarmed, you ever play Twilight 2000? If you like rolling buckets of d6, that's the game for you.

To help speed up combat I use the grunt rules and 4:1 tradein mechanic heavily for NPCs. Ex: Guard goes at initiative 10. Guard gets 3 hits when he attacks. Guard always rolls 2 hits to dodge, and soaks 4 boxes.
Then maybe when I get down to the last one or two guards, or an important enemy I actually bother rolling dice.
I freely switch between this mode and rolling properly, and my players all know this and are fine with it. It really helps to speed up combat.

Ok first off besides causing cancer D20s cause lousy probability distributions. That's part of the reason why D20 games tend to be so stupid. You simply can't rely on non combat skills because odds of success are either wildly unreliable or it's a blowout. The distribution also makes it a bitch to tie degree of success in. Not that they don't try.

I do miss the variable target numbers in that modifiers made shots harder for even very skilled people. Instead of now where a skilled person can almost ignore modifiers (also a problem in cancer land).

The three worlds thing is complicated, but adds tremendously to the setting, and makes planning a run much more interesting due to the availibility of extra options. I don't find that it's so hard on the players. I give them tips if I think they lack some knowledge. And try to teach them as we go along. My current hacker didn't even know how to play SR when he started. I just explained briefly how things worked and told him he can start out just saying what he wants to acheive and I'll get his char though doing it. They catch on fast.

As a GM I find it can be a bit vexing getting the hang of it. But once you do handling the wireless matrix is a snap.

If you really have problems consider cyberpunk 2020 no magic and the decking is so time consuming you'll only do it every few sessions at a major plot point. Though it is supposed to have a different feel from shadowrun so while it is in theory easier, making it actually punk is often beyond most GMs. In that case you could just run SR without magic and without the matrix stuff. Pretty easy really.

*EDIT: Practical advice.

1. Make "shadowrun dice" you take a marker to your dice. Make the dots for 2,3 and 4 match the color of the body of the die so you don't see them, make 5 and 6 s one easy to see color and 1s anther color. It makes this surprisingly easier.

2. Either buy rolls or queue them (roll a bunch, write the rolls on paper, when something happens just read across the line. I do this. Added bonus, you can do perception checks for the players etc without them spazzing.)

3. Matrix. If you need to do matrix on the fly have most everything be at the same rating. The fact that systems can't run many IC helps a lot, though remote IC could be piled up in there, I tend to avoid that until the higher levels of security. Also helps to have canned systems you by default use. And generally as few systems as possible.

4. Astral. Have some canned mages you can use if it comes up. Assume any business that has some cash flow and wouldn't want astral people poking around has wards.

Finally don't sweat it some much.

Adding different aspects of the game incrementally can also assist you make the world more complex without being mind boggling. We started with magic and very little hacking, then added hacking under full immersion for research and infiltrating, now it is part of every session, and we will add in the AR aspect soon. Then the RFID tags will come out, and constant surveillance will creep in.

Shadowrun isn't for everyone, and GMing isn't for everyone. *shrugs*

Not worthless as if they run and dodge your team should generally be able to evade 9 die. But yeah that's the problem in a nutshell.

Jrayjoker's advice is solid though. I figured that cat was out of the bad for you. But when I've got newer or less clued in players (seems to be most of the time) I tend to start them out a little on the down and out side maybe out in the barrens. I offer "rough start" as a negative quality for extra BP so they tend to not complain when I start them off with a broken leg and no contacts whatsoever in Redmond. And starting with lower resources/equipments not only means they tend to have well rounded skills but they're also very karma hungry.

In that case hackers only have a little to hack and it has little IC, and nothing complicated. Their rating 3 comlink will do the job just fine without them needing to know all the rules. As they work their way back up to the bigtime they get introduced to more and more stuff.

Ditto with mages. Initially they'd face little magical opposition save the occasional shaman. As they keep playing they start running into wards, wagemages, spirits. I have to start deciding how long it'd take a group to call in some rent-a-spirits. They start running into threats in astral space.

I also introduce concepts they need to be leary of by havign them be usefull in what they're doing. i.e. the other hacker didn't clean the security logs, or had his agent spoofed, or the other mage left their magical fingerprints all over the place and didn't take the time to clean up. And so on.

Hey...HappyDaze...just give it a few sessions...you'll get into your groove. I'm a long time DM and ran SR1 a long time ago. Started with SR4 about a year ago, getting back with a group of friends to RPG. The first 2-3 sessions were horrible, for exactly the reason you said...just a ton of stuff going on!

But, after a year, all the basics are second nature and we now are able to implement a lot of the little details and our game is much better because of it. I would say, just get through these growing pains, focus on a few things at a time and you will end up just fine and end up loving the multiple realms!

I agree that things add up quickly in the game when it comes to rolling dice.

My solution was to write my own campaign manager.

Personally I have my group only roll once for initiative. I do allow for a complex action to reroll, you keep what you get. I also never roll for NPC's. Once you have all the info down you can speed up trying to figure out where and when people go. Once you have the system down, you can go back to once a turn.

But its best to not include all the modifiers and tables until your more familar with them and can do it quickly.

It is better to stick to the absolute basics of the combats and make the game richer then making sure the rules are correct at the cost of quality.

just my opinion.

You know I should actually make my game a bit more lethal... My players still had edge left at the end of the last game...

HappyDaze, you do have copies of my cheat sheets, ne?

HD,

I definately feel your pain, keep working on it and it'll get better! Or if you want to, play Warhammer FRP, it's a great system.

Here's what I have to offer:

The secondary worlds of the Matrix and Astral Space are in fact secondary. There is nowhere to "be" in these worlds and basically nothing to "have" either. Furthermore, generally speaking characters do not interact with these worlds unless they choose to.

The Magical World, for example, is actually relatively uncluttered. There is essentially nothing that you can take through it or from it. One extends one's self to the Astral only to get information, and one fights on the Astral only to prevent others from getting that information. You cannot attack from the Astral, nor can physical things attack you. There is no food to eat, no treasures to find, and no place to live. The Astral plane is someplace you go only to take advantage of Astral Perception and to fight with opponents who are trying to take advantage of astral perception.

It's actually very clean. If there isn't anything astral to discover, just slap a big ward around a place and be done with it. The players will rapidly figure out that sending things through a ward instantly sets off an alarm and they'll avoid doing it, and then the entire Astral portion is basically zeroed out.

-Frank

On the lethality issue.

First off I don't think I'd say it's more lethal than real life. Just that's it's set in a lethal world where sometimes security guards have SMGs, the drones have LMGs, and Street Sammies will put that preditor round through your heart at 40 yards.

In game, however, this is largely reconciled with the "burn edge to stay alive" rule (p68).

It means you can play the game world as it should be without losing a character they'd finally started roleplaying with just because they let a yakuzza get a shot at them and the yak managed to get seven hits. They just get slapped for a couple sessions worth of Karma.

Actually what is happening to your characters edge? If someone is already wounded and they get hit hard again, that would be a good time to use edge in the regular way to soak. If your characters are using up their edge quickly on rolls that aren't critical that's a technique issue (which results in them having to burn edge ) If they're regularly getting up to their eyeballs in shootouts that's also a player issue that would get them killed back in SR2.

EDIT: Also you guys know you can take a full dodge action at the time of an attack and give up your next action, you don't have to declare it ahead of time. Also running gives +2 dice on dodge. So runners should typically either have the jump on the situation, have cover, or should seriously consider running.

In your sniper example the guy had 9 die. Runners tend to have reactions of 5 or better and some dodgy skill at 4. So assuming no other modifiers if they just scramble they'd have 11 die. And non bad asses typically only have 9 die to start with.

The problem is that the sniper was just one of many opponents and still had 9 dice after being targeted. The fact that the spell underperformed compared to Stunball - yet is a higher Drain DV - just sucks.

Even people who are trained shooters typically miss quite a lot in firefights.

In system it would seem you might be happier with the "alternate combat" rules on p uh 69 I think.

They have modifiers affect threshold instead of dice pool in most cases(maybe for most everything besides recoil and called shots). Now if people are trying to hit with modifiers they have hard shots they'll miss a lot, because a change in threshold corresponds to roughly 3 die. Similarly less damage will be done.

Actually I rather like the idea as it helps bring tactics back to the game in a way I've missed, making cover and the like very important. Though it also somewhat shifts other game elements, for example smartlinks would once again be a huge factor.


Of course tactical play takes longer. Instead of just standing up and having two groups whack each other players will be running behind cover, trying for good fireing spots, aiming to lower the threshold, and that sorta thing. But I rather like that. Also unmodified shots are just as lethal now as before, which I believe is also accurate.

matrix is hardest for me too. Mostly it's the fact that sooooo much information is out there, readily available with a quick extended test.

I just ran my game again tonight. The session went well enough, but both myself and some of players spoke and decided we would rather play a less 'cluttered' with details. We want something that's more fun for less work. Hopefully, we'll find it. I'll be going now. It's been fun.