Help - Search - Members - Calendar
Full Version: TrollTown: Land ownership in the Sixth World
Dumpshock Forums > Discussion > Shadowrun
Pages: 1, 2, 3
Spike
The concept of Land Ownership is an old one. Despite the long years of tradition behind it, however, it remains a somewhat controversial one as well. A stereotypical example of this debate is the old 'barb wire wars' of the American West, where Farmers and Cattlemen warred over wether or not the ranges were free, or if the farmer could lay claim to fallow feilds. Another is the traditional view of the nomadic tribes of Native Americans, who thought, as most Nomadic peoples do, that no one could 'own' land.

They have a point, of course. In Lone Wolf and Cub a Japanese saying was revealed to me. 'Half mat seated, full mat sleeping, fist full of rice." By thise they mean that no matter how powerful and rich a man is, he can only really claim the space he occupies and can only eat so much food.

But what does this all mean for Shadowrun? How is it relevant?

It is of paramount relavence for the Shadowrun setting. Consider: The NAN used, in addition to a successful guerilla war backed by magic, the idea that their 'lands' had been stolen from them and they were simply reclaiming what was theirs by right. This had a massive effect on the geopolitical landscape that, by rights, is still unsettled in the setting to some degree.

Yet, with equal relevance: The elves of the NA Tir took Oregon by force, pushing south to Mount Shasta, where, if I recall my lore correctly, Hestaby said 'um... no.', and ended their push for lands. Now, technically, the Tir is part of the NAN by virtue of the Salish-Shide council, but in reality, the Elves merely took land that didn't really belong to them, by virtue of force.

Now, as I stated in the 'Trolls' thread, we can go back endlessly through history and find all manner of people and nations that have lost 'their land' to some conquerer. By some lights the current Israeli/Palestinian conflict is unimportant if some group claiming descent from the Canaanite shows up and says 'Hey! It was ours FIRST', as absurd as it may be.

Now, from a purely practical standpoint, land only truly belongs, aside from legal fiction, to the people using it 'right now'. USING it, mind you. Simply owning it, and fencing it in, is not important.

This brings us to the truly relevant, rather than incidentally relevant, portion of the post.

Trolls.

Let us review the facts: Trolls are massive. On the order of twice as large as a big human or an average orc, though not quite twice as tall. They need, therefore, twice as much space to be remotely comfortable, their houses and even sidewalks must be twice as big. No one is providing these things for Trolls, not in any meaningful way.

Concurrently, there are also two massively lawless, ownerless chunks of real estate in the Seattle metroplex. You might know them as 'The barrens'.

True, the land IS occupied. But there are a lot of trolls out there, many of the already IN the barrens. And coincidentally, trolls are worth two or three times their numbers in a fight, possible more if limited to scavanged melee weapons and light pistols.

What happens when a hundred, maybe two hundred trolls stomp into a 'neighborhood' in the barrens and order everyone else out? What happens when they tear down existing structures and ruins and begin building 'troll sized' accomodations, businesses and infrastructure on a troll scale? Who is gonna stop them? You think the local street gangs will? Gangs are bullies, like any other opportunisitic predator they avoid fights they can't easily win. Organized Crime? Why? Why not cut a deal with the newly minted 'Trolltown', sell them building materials and other goods they can't easily get, barter for muscle.

It only takes one 'charismatic' visionary troll to put it together. One troll who is tired of cramped spaces and flimsy furniture. One troll who knows other trolls that work in those hard labor jobs like construction and the like who also are tired of living in a small world. And when it happens, how many other trolls, trolls that had heard of it but dismissed it, or who hadn't heard at all, are going to drift in and expand this 'Trolltown' until almost all of Seattle's 11,000 trolls are spending at least a part of their time in what was once viewed as unlivable shantytown lands, until you start seeing entire industries springing up, By Troll, For Troll (BytFot, the hot new fashion trend, specializing in 'Urban Trollwear'... in troll sized, and later in Humansize for all the troll rock fans out there...)...

Then the only question becomes: Why did it take 50 years to happen?
Stahlseele
*cause Trolls are supposed to be the minority by about only 1 to 10% or something . . having 99% to 90% of the rest of the World WILL stop such plans untill you get to the size of Dragons . . if the Dragons actually all acted together FOR ONCE . . they'd pretty much be an unbeatable force who could easyly overthrow governments and take over whole continents . . untill the rest of the world decides:"fuck it, where are the thor-shots, where are the rail-guns, where are the orbital laser guns?" In Seattle it would be the Star and Metroplex Guard and probably at least a token unit of most corp. security guards that would have to put their foot down and say HELL NO . . else? massive loss of face, people laughing about them, not taking them seriously, not FEARING them any more . . they simply can't afford that, 'cause that would lead to a state of civil war like existance. . urban riots and poli clubs closing in on their targets because:"hey, who should stop us? the star? they didn't even manage to stop some frigging dumb trolls from taking over some parts of town". .
As for the Charismatic Leader Figure . . Boom, the Troll who inherited a Nightclub(sadly in Boston) from Dunkelzahn because of his good work as his watcher/operator . . or Ultra, the Troll who won at least 1 Million NuYen in a Game Show i believe *g*
mfb
QUOTE (Spike)
By some lights the current Israeli/Palestinian conflict is unimportant if some group claiming descent from the Canaanite shows up and says 'Hey! It was ours FIRST', as absurd as it may be.

heh, well, there's reasonably strong evidence that "Palestine" is a corruption of "Philistine".

as for Trolltown... eh, it could happen. going strictly off the material presented in the setting, i'd say the main reason that it hasn't happened is that trolls don't seem to have a strong racial identity. everyone thinks of them, and they think of themselves, as big orks.

the biggest roadblock, aside from finding a troll that's charismatic, motivated, and lucky enough to put together such a movement, is that it would immediately be classed as widespread gang-related race-based violence. Lone Star would come in and stomp on it hard. you can do anything you want in the Barrens except get noticed. taxpayers don't like to be reminded about the Barrens.
Spike
Stalhseele: there is a reason I put this notional Trolltown in the barrens. Nobody with real power CARES about the barrens. In fact, more than a few might actually welcome the mass migration of trolls to the area, might even appreciate the work they are putting into claiming the land, which is otherwise a blight and an embarrassement to the powers that be.

Why would the metroplex guard risk a battle against a large number of highly motivated trolls in the barrens? Never mind the logistical nightmare of moving troops and supplies in and out of the area. Trolls are only part of the problem at that point. An ironically small point, depending on how you run your 'barrens'.
mfb
see my edited post, above. the Guard, and Lone Star, would care because it would draw attention to the Barrens. places like the Barrens aren't something that governments are happy to have around, however useful they may be to certain sectors of the establishment. those in power are willing to let things slide--but only as long as those in the Barrens keep their heads down. the second the Barrens gets riled up, Lone Star's going to jump in and start swinging. and if that doesn't work, yeah, the Guard is next.
Jaid
QUOTE (Stahlseele)
*cause Trolls are supposed to be the minority by about only 1 to 10% or something . . having 99% to 90% of the rest of the World WILL stop such plans untill you get to the size of Dragons . . [snip] In Seattle it would be the Star and Metroplex Guard and probably at least a token unit of most corp. security guards that would have to put their foot down and say HELL NO . . else? massive loss of face, people laughing about them, not taking them seriously, not FEARING them any more . . they simply can't afford that [snip again!]

wrong. he's talking about taking over the barrens.

the star doesn't care, because the government doesn't care because there's no taxpayers there. the corps care even less, because they don't even own that area on paper, let alone have any kind of presence there. the metroplex guard? honestly, you think they care? (oh noes, some SINless people are getting kicked out of their hovels by a bunch of other SINless... oh wait, that's not even worth the bother as a training exercise...)

if anyone important actually cared about the barrens, they wouldn't be the barrens in the first place.
HappyDaze
QUOTE
if anyone important actually cared about the barrens, they wouldn't be the barrens in the first place.

Yeah, but that 'anyone important' would include your mythical troll leader. Any of the other metatypes could have tried the same thing - with greater numbers - but they havn't. It's not because of race, it's because organizing people requires motivation, and taking over a hellhole like the Barrens and then being stuck with it just on the basis of being a troll is pretty weak.
FrankTrollman
Shadowrun posits a setting where there is a lot of unoccupied land. Even in cities. The population is much the same as it is today, but a lot of people moved into arcologies. "Land" is virtually worthless. Less than worthless in a lot of instances because 1% of animal life has super powers. Firebreathing feral dogs and lightning shooting crows prowl the shattered remains of the horizontal metroplexes built in the days of subsidized fuel and tamed landscapes.

In the days of Shadowrun people flee from suburbs because their exposure and low population density make them dangerous. Dangerous because your town house could get attacked by invisible bears or filled with lifestealing balls of light and if you don't have sufficient neighbors noone will be there to save you. Population density is a form of protection - we're back to the days when the world was a scary place filled with leopards in the night.

And yeah, Trolls are big and scary. They get picked on by less para animals. They don't fit into cities well. As a people they feel less comfortable in crowds. They naturally gravitate to the countryside and they are better at homesteading than other races. It is entirley possible that in 200 years the trolls will have wandered off and claimed enough of the wildernes to be a major force.

They could well do something similar in areas of the barrens. Sometimes they do. But really there's no reason for them to do so in any organized fashion as a race. going off and claiming a portion of the barrens to build stuff on is pretty standard procedure. Noone is going to stop you because noone wants the plot of land you've chosen (at least, not until you build something on it).

-Frank
Spike
QUOTE (mfb)
see my edited post, above. the Guard, and Lone Star, would care because it would draw attention to the Barrens. places like the Barrens aren't something that governments are happy to have around, however useful they may be to certain sectors of the establishment. those in power are willing to let things slide--but only as long as those in the Barrens keep their heads down. the second the Barrens gets riled up, Lone Star's going to jump in and start swinging. and if that doesn't work, yeah, the Guard is next.

I see your point, but I have to disagree. First of all, the Star is a contracted corporation, someone has got to pay them to go in and 'stop the violence'.

Its cheaper to pay off the news corps to ignore a story they aren't going to want to report on anyway.

Its not like johnny taxpayer (where did HE come from? I thought the SINNERs were all corporate citizens now?) is going to stumble into a gangwar during his nightly shopping, or that the city is gonna burn over this.

The biggest roadblock to the trolls would be starting with sufficent numbers to keep the gangs from thinking they can stop them. After that the only real threat is the regular squatters that already occupy the space, and if they were dangerous to a massive gang of trolls, they probably wouldn't be living in the barrens.

Caveat: Of course, a Shadowrunner who maintains a barrens 'safehouse' in the affected area is going to be a serious threat. But then again, a professional might view it as an employment opportunity or decide he's not being paid to take on a 100+ motivated trolls...
Stahlseele
funny how people seem to latch onto ONE thing (not even the reason) they think of as being wrong and forgetting all about the real reason why they will HAVE to act . . they can't afford NOT TO . . they don't NEED to atually CARE about ANYTHING . . they just NEED to save face with the rest of the City at least . . it would be against the law, the star is SUPPOSED to be the law(and are a bunch of racist bastards) . . If the DON'T step in, the next who try something like that will be the Ancients . . 'cause you can bet your purdy little elven mouth on the Spikes and Lord Torgo being all the way with the other Trolls on that, like the Disassemblers will too . . who in turn can't afford to lose face against the spikes . . and so on and so on and all because the star did not step in and stop the first bunch who tried . . By the way, if the reasoning were correct, there would not have been the corp. raid on el infierno and the corps would not have marched into east berlin and . . yadda yadda yadda . . enough of that . . i will now be going on my very own war against tiredness . .
Spike
QUOTE (FrankTrollman)
Shadowrun posits a setting where there is a lot of unoccupied land. Even in cities. The population is much the same as it is today, but a lot of people moved into arcologies. "Land" is virtually worthless. Less than worthless in a lot of instances because 1% of animal life has super powers. Firebreathing feral dogs and lightning shooting crows prowl the shattered remains of the horizontal metroplexes built in the days of subsidized fuel and tamed landscapes.

In the days of Shadowrun people flee from suburbs because their exposure and low population density make them dangerous. Dangerous because your town house could get attacked by invisible bears or filled with lifestealing balls of light and if you don't have sufficient neighbors noone will be there to save you. Population density is a form of protection - we're back to the days when the world was a scary place filled with leopards in the night.

And yeah, Trolls are big and scary. They get picked on by less para animals. They don't fit into cities well. As a people they feel less comfortable in crowds. They naturally gravitate to the countryside and they are better at homesteading than other races. It is entirley possible that in 200 years the trolls will have wandered off and claimed enough of the wildernes to be a major force.

They could well do something similar in areas of the barrens. Sometimes they do. But really there's no reason for them to do so in any organized fashion as a race. going off and claiming a portion of the barrens to build stuff on is pretty standard procedure. Noone is going to stop you because noone wants the plot of land you've chosen (at least, not until you build something on it).

-Frank

All very good points but for one thing: the no reason to do so in an organized fashion.

We can suggest there is no reason for any 'outsider' immigrant or 'goblinized' to seek out others of their kind, yet they do. For Immigrants it's shared language and cultural heritage, for Trolls, its more physical.

Given the choice between eating at a resteraunt owned and run by humans that are less than half his size (on average) or half his size (at best), and one run by trolls who all look sort of like him, and are all his size, he's gonna go where they serve Troll Portions, on Troll Tables with Troll Seats, just for comfort. He can only do that if there is a large number of trolls in a single location to support such a business.

If I were an immigrant from China, who was, in China, a tailor of chinese style clothes, would I rather attempt to sell my chinese style clothes in Chinatown, or would I rather attempt to sell them to round eyes who at best buy them as gimmicks and costumes? Sure, I could learn to make bluejeans, but that's not really the point.

Trolls will want troll sized buildings, neighborhoods and services, and for the most part, they can only get those from other trolls. Never mind the whole 'racism' aspect. Trolls might very much want a place where they are highly unlikely to see a 'pink' on any given day, just for the peice of mind of not feeling self concious about themselves all the time. A place where they aren't 'Trolls' but 'People'. THAT is a powerful motivator right there.

Though, yes, there is no reason it would have to be in the barrens, other than access to raw materials not readily available in the boonies.
Spike
QUOTE (Stahlseele)
funny how people seem to latch onto ONE thing (not even the reason) they think of as being wrong and forgetting all about the real reason why they will HAVE to act . . they can't afford NOT TO . . they don't NEED to atually CARE about ANYTHING . . they just NEED to save face with the rest of the City at least . . it would be against the law, the star is SUPPOSED to be the law(and are a bunch of racist bastards) . . If the DON'T step in, the next who try something like that will be the Ancients . . 'cause you can bet your purdy little elven mouth on the Spikes and Lord Torgo being all the way with the other Trolls on that, like the Disassemblers will too . . who in turn can't afford to lose face against the spikes . . and so on and so on and all because the star did not step in and stop the first bunch who tried . . By the way, if the reasoning were correct, there would not have been the corp. raid on el infierno and the corps would not have marched into east berlin and . . yadda yadda yadda . . enough of that . . i will now be going on my very own war against tiredness . .

That is an exceptionally hard post to read, much less parse.

that said...

what face? What face are they saving? Its the faakin' barrens, man. No man's land. If they 'needed to save face regardless of the cost' the barrens wouldn't faakin' exist!

If you are talking about the gang's saving face...

... you seem to have an idealized view of just how much honor and face they actually have to lose. But then, I'm not entirely certain what you were going on about with Torgo and the ancients and whatnot, it's all sort of jumbled up...
martindv
QUOTE (mfb)
the second the Barrens gets riled up, Lone Star's going to jump in and start swinging. and if that doesn't work, yeah, the Guard is next.

And the Guard has fighter-bombers with AGMs...

And if that doesn't work, I'm sure JTF-Seattle has access to some really, really big guns.
Jaid
actually, a lot of the gangs out in the barrens basically *have* set up their own personal domain, with themselves being effectively the government. sure, you pay 'protection money' instead of 'taxes' and instead of police/military, you have groups of thugs driving around making sure no one else comes into their turf, there's no social services, but the gangs basically have carved out their own little kingdoms in the barrens before, and will likely continue to do so until someone else cares enough to go take it back.

i mean sure, the metropolitan guard *could* force them out. but unless they're gonna sit there and occupy that land indefinitely, someone is just gonna come right back in and start up the exact same thing all over again. it's a waste of time and money to bother stopping it, really.
Riley37
This works just fine as long as no one besides gangs loses out. Our hypothetical troll Moses would do well to reassure the corps and the AA neighborhoods that she only intends changes in the Barrens. Trolls kick ass in melee and small-arms fights; not so well against airdropped napalm.

The best opportunity to bust the move is when a section of territory is in transition for other reasons, eg a go-gang gets decimated when they mistakenly attack a heavily-armed Ares convoy, they limp back to base, and the competitors to take over their base area include Trolls United.
FrankTrollman
While it seems that people are gravitating to the Treasure Hunters option, I am still perfectly willing to run a game based on seizing portions of a city in the upcoming online game I'm running (discussed Here.). The thing about Trolls is that the reason that they gravitate to the wilderness is the same reason that troll centric settlements are rare: trolls don't like crowds.

The worst thing you can do to a human is solitary confinement. It causes them brain damage and depression. Humans need social contact or their health suffers. Elves, orks, and even dwarfs are like that too. Trolls are not. Trolls can take or leave social contact. It's useful, it makes sense to do it from an economic standpoint. But trolls don't have the same biological need for constant interaction with other sapients that other metahumans have.

They aren't as off the scale as dragons (who outright become uneasy when exposed to social contact), but trolls are not well suited to making social frameworks because they don't have a biological imperative to do so. The reason they are often seen as hangers on to orkish society is that orks are very sociable and actively seek out other orks and trolls. Trolls don't usually think of finding social interaction on a moment by moment basis, orks do. So the social interactions trolls have are quite frequently initiated by orks.

-Frank
Spike
Frank: That sounds like a very interesting extrapolation of why trolls don't like crowds, but is is supported?

My understanding would be that they don't like crowds, not because they don't socialize much (though here, the low Charisma would be 'explained' quite neatly, I must admit), but because they don't FIT. The size thing. A troll in a crowd is a threat to everyone in it, purely by virtue of his size and relative clumsiness. Further, I'd suggest his 'comfort zone' is going to be much larger than the cultural average, meaning that, much like an american in, say, the Middle east, he finds other people get 'too close' for his personal comfort. It may be irrational subconcious behavior (however, reverse extrapolation, a troll from a close culture, like the Middle East, may find his personal comfort zone very neatly matched by pink Americans, and that American Trolls tend to stand too far away...)

In our day and age, I'd suggest that the Troll/crowd situation is a lawsuit waiting to happen, but I suspect its quite different in the sixth world.

Paradigm
QUOTE (franktrollman)
But trolls don't have the same biological need for constant interaction with other sapients that other metahumans have.


Where does this come from? Far as I've read trolls are just larger humans, a more or less 'fact' that helps bring a lot of flavor to the setting. All metatypes are people, they just have to cope with different physiques and the social stigma and practical difficulties that come with it.

A recent thing that to me would show how things like comments about trolls and orcs being less smart than 'real' humans would be recieved for instance is the whole furor a few weeks back about the nobel prize winning scientistthat claimed blacks were less intelligent. the way critics jumped on that would likely be about the same as metahuman rights activist would jump on a humanis Doc that would come with such claims over trolls (no matter what the game stats say)
FrankTrollman
QUOTE (Spike)
Frank: That sounds like a very interesting extrapolation of why trolls don't like crowds, but is is supported?

The 4th edition writeup of trolls is amazingly uninformative and contradicts itself frequently. It even gets the number of teeth trolls have wrong! (The correct number is 34, which you can even figure out from context).

But the long standing statement on Trolls was that they gravitated to rural areas, living with few or no neighbors. The 4th edition book repeats that statement but also retracts it immediately by pointing out that some of them band together or seek employment in cities - thereby giving the gentle reader no information at all.

But yeah, trolls as a people don't just prefer to be in areas where they can reach their hands out and not smack a human in the face. They frequently prefer not talking to other metahumans for days or months at a time. That's not something that other metahumans are usually biologically capable of.

-Frank
kzt
QUOTE (Spike @ Nov 16 2007, 05:05 PM)
Frank: That sounds like a very interesting extrapolation of why trolls don't like crowds, but is is supported?

If you like it, why does it matter if it's "supported"? Logic is in short supply in the SR background, you pretty much have to manufacture it yourself. Or steal someone elses work, which is easier.
Spike
QUOTE (kzt)

If you like it, why does it matter if it's "supported"? Logic is in short supply in the SR background, you pretty much have to manufacture it yourself. Or steal someone elses work, which is easier.

Thinking something sounds cool doesn't mean I want to take it and run with it. My thinking is much more in line with Paradigms. They are still, above all else, people. Differently shapped people with some other minor differences, but fundamentally people.

Frank's Idea, while cool, is a significant departure from that, providing them with not only a difference in shape, but in mind, in psychology. And it's not without attendant problems, like why they are even hanging out with Shadowrunners at all?
(Caveat: There is SOME precedent, however, for that fundamentally different psychology, specifically to Dwarves, I believe... in one edition or another. probably third... I'll look when I get home, I suppose)

In some ways he makes trolls more like Sasquatch. My impression from quoted text in the other thread was that trolls gravitated to outdoors 'wilderness' in context because it was open enough to not smack the neighbor in the face accidentally, not out of a fundamental desire to be left 'alone'.

If we extrapolate Frank's view, then we have to assume trolls breed more due to biological imperative, that is cycles, like animals, and less on whim and social context than the rest of metahumanity. Social organization fulfills far more than psychological need.
hyzmarca
The polarizing effect of obvious organized troll settlements is enough reason to allow it, particularly in the case of those politicians who base their platforms on racial enmity. In other to effectively control a group, you need an "other" an irredeemably evil outsider what wants to destroy everything you know and love. There are plenty of good "others" out there including Arabs, Hispanic immigrants, Free Blacks, Jews, Liberals, Corporations, Homosexuals. Of course, Black politicians get to use on Whites and Cops as their others.

The thing is that if you are a politician then you must pick something to hate. Usually, you must pick many somethings to hate. The idea is to pick things that most voters hate.

Homosexuals is a good one. Most voters hate Homosexuals. Arabs is a no-brainer. Everybody hates Arabs, these days. But after those two it becomes a real struggle to pick the right groups. Sometimes, you have to go out of your way to ferment hatred to give yourself an edge.


Now, a troll takeover of the Barrens will produce enough paranoia to catapult the politicians who hate trolls (and that would statistically be most of them, simply because hating trolls is the same no-brainer in the Sixth World that hating homosexuals is today). So, the "troll menace" will allow politicians to court the "We Hate Trolls" vote even more readily.
mfb
QUOTE (Spike)
I see your point, but I have to disagree. First of all, the Star is a contracted corporation, someone has got to pay them to go in and 'stop the violence'.

Its cheaper to pay off the news corps to ignore a story they aren't going to want to report on anyway.

well, two points--first, the city pays Lone Star to stop the violence. that's their contract. as long as the violence doesn't get above a dull roar, everyone tacitly agrees to ignore the fact that there are thousands of square miles of metroplex territory that are effectively a low-intensity war zone.

second, the violence isn't going to stay in the Barrens. for one, the people (and gangs) who get displaced by the trolls have to somewhere. and the people they displace have to go somewhere, and so on, and eventually some of it is going to spill out of the Barrens. like dropping a big rock into a pool--it's going to overflow even if it eventually recedes back into its place. plus, gangs aren't isolated--they're connected to each other by alliances and hostilities. push one gang around, and not only are you going to get that gang's allies riled up, that gang's enemies are going to jump in and try to get a piece. and then that gang's allies and enemies get involved--again with the rock+pool analogy.

i'm not gonna say it couldn't happen, or that it couldn't work. i'm just pointing out that it's a pretty big deal, and it's going to cause a lot of people to get some antsies in their pantsies.
hyzmarca
If we have learned nothing from the second World War, it is that displaced people take up much less space if you cremate them.
Paradigm
After everything that's happened in the world since the awakening, I can imagine how people would get a bit antsy if a group of a certain metatype were to start separating themselves from society totally. The low intensity warfare in the barrens is one thing, after all, they're just the drags of society and too unruly to do anything about. But I think that the idea of a stable small troll city in the barrens would not appeal to a lot of people.

Aside from the political hatemongers, it's not hard to see how Humanis and the likes would start comissioning runs against the settlement. Metas in the slums are one thing, but metas setting up their own society can't be a good thing. Just look around the world, we have Tir na Nog, Tir Tairngire and other meta kingdoms would they really allow a 'Tir Troll' to go unmolested?

Then there's of course the corps, would be very hard to consider how they'd react. Some might be opposed to the idea, others might welcome the project as a good place to market that new troll line of clothing in a specialty store. As long as there'd be no threat to corporate interest, they'd more likely than not just try to exploit the situation.

Organised crime might find it a bit hard to really get a foothold, as a lot of the set syndicates aren't the most meta friendly. Regardless, there'd likely be some vying for influence over the 'locals' between the various syndicates, as there's a profit to be made in any enclave of civilisation, trolls have their vices, same as normal people.

EDIT: forgot the local government.. it'd be something for a large part out of their control, in their territory. This most likely wouldn't sit well in any case, but probably even less well than it otherwise might because of the friction between Seattle and the UCAS, in which both these groups would actively try to stop anything that'd diminish their control.
Fortune
QUOTE (hyzmarca)
If we have learned nothing from the second World War, it is that displaced people take up much less space if you cremate them.

Dead people are a perfectly viable commodity. Don't burn ... butcher!
Mercer
This was my point (or at least, one of them) in the other troll thread:
QUOTE (Mercer)
The other side of this is the idea of troll solidarity, which I'm not totally sold on. A troll from Beijing and a troll from Chicago aren't going to have much in common other than physical similarities. That can be a powerful force, but its the type of thing that can easily be overestimated by outsiders. One of the things I always liked about SR is the absence of a D&Dish "racial" identity. An elf has more in common with an ork from the same block than he does with an elf from the Tir, whether he'd care to admit it or not.

Without a shared culture, I don't see trolls (or anyone else) doing very much in the barrens. Street gangs, which are typically built up in neighborhoods and around groups of families I can buy. If a lot of trolls live on a block, you'll have a primarily troll street gang. But I don't see trolls flocking from all over the city to live in the barrens, no matter how high the promised ceilings are. Most of them have jobs and families, and who's going to pull their kids out of school to go build a perfect society in the city's crumbling, polluted, diseased heart? I think its going to be at best a statistically insignificant percentage of trolls, slanted strongly towards the ones that have exhausted all their other options (SINless, ex-cons, drug addicts and those that can't hold down jobs-- pretty much the ones living in the barrens already).

To quote from The Family Guy (something I usually loathe to do), "Black or white, the only color that matters is green." In SR-racism terms, "1 meter tall, 3 meters tall, the only size that matters is the size of your credstick."
toturi
QUOTE (Fortune)
QUOTE (hyzmarca @ Nov 17 2007, 11:14 AM)
If we have learned nothing from the second World War, it is that displaced people take up much less space if you cremate them.

Dead people are a perfectly viable commodity. Don't burn ... butcher!

I wonder if ghouls like their meat barbequed.
Whipstitch
QUOTE (FrankTrollman @ Nov 16 2007, 06:50 PM)
While it seems that people are gravitating to the Treasure Hunters option, I am still perfectly willing to run a game based on seizing portions of a city in the upcoming online game I'm running (discussed Here.).

Funny thing about that game is that I'm perfectly willing to play treasure hunters in Hong Kong who seize portions of the city before taking a Stargate SR-4 style EVO space station field trip with breaks to hunt Oni in the Antartic on weekends. I just can't figure out whether that makes me easy or difficult.
martindv
QUOTE (Spike @ Nov 16 2007, 07:05 PM)
My understanding would be that they don't like crowds, not because they don't socialize much (though here, the low Charisma would be 'explained' quite neatly, I must admit)

That should be the other way around. Low Charisma is why they don't socialize. It's even in the attribute description.
FrankTrollman
QUOTE (toturi)
QUOTE (Fortune @ Nov 17 2007, 09:40 AM)
QUOTE (hyzmarca @ Nov 17 2007, 11:14 AM)
If we have learned nothing from the second World War, it is that displaced people take up much less space if you cremate them.

Dead people are a perfectly viable commodity. Don't burn ... butcher!

I wonder if ghouls like their meat barbequed.

In various sources ghouls have referred to cooked and fresh meat as revolting - so I'm guessing no.

-Frank
Critias
...cooked and fresh meat as revolting?

What's that leave? Frozen? Or was the above a typo, and if so which one is correct? I've always assumed "fresh" meat was their favorite (because I tend to picture them eating like zombies, just tearing folks apart and gnawing away merrily).
FrankTrollman
QUOTE (Critias)
...cooked and fresh meat as revolting?

What's that leave? Frozen? Or was the above a typo, and if so which one is correct? I've always assumed "fresh" meat was their favorite (because I tend to picture them eating like zombies, just tearing folks apart and gnawing away merrily).

They prefer aged carrion. Ghouls are scavengers. Their violent tendencies are completely secondary to their eating habits.

-Frank
Grinder
QUOTE (martindv)
QUOTE (Spike @ Nov 16 2007, 07:05 PM)
My understanding would be that they don't like crowds, not because they don't socialize much (though here, the low Charisma would be 'explained' quite neatly, I must admit)

That should be the other way around. Low Charisma is why they don't socialize. It's even in the attribute description.

Do trolls still get a penalty to their Charisma attribute? Dont have my books here, so can't look after it myself.
Paradigm
They have no penalty, just a lower maximum attribute. just costs 10 BP to get it to 2 and 25 BP to get it from 3 to 4.
Fortune
QUOTE (Paradigm)
They have no penalty, just a lower maximum attribute.

Of course, no race actually gets any kind of penalty if you look at it that way.
Paradigm
Yeah, but a penalty implies that the score gets lowered if you put points into it. My first SR gm used exactly that reasoning to dock attribute points on Trolls and Orcs in SR3 if we wanted to raise their penalised stats in char creation. Because the modification table listed attribute penalties rather than a max reduction in his eyes.
hyzmarca
This also brings into question the idea of Adverse Possession, more commonly known as squatters' rights.

In English Common Law, which was inherited by both the United States and Canada, and thus by the UCAS, if a person takes up residence on a piece of property without its owner's permission then the owner has a limited window of time in which to file a complaint against the squatter. Once this period has expired, the original owner is presumed to have voluntarily given the property to the squatter and the squatter obtains legal ownership of it.


Abandoned buildings in the barrens still technically have owners, it is simply that these owners make no attempts to enforce their rights. This means that a squatter who has lived in an abandoned period for a certain amount of time can claim that building as his own property.
Fortune
QUOTE (hyzmarca)
This means that a squatter who has lived in an abandoned period for a certain amount of time can claim that building as his own property.

If he has a SIN ... and if he can actually prove his occupation.
Whipstitch
Ironically, I'm williing to bet that we've had more bright (3-4 logic) orks and trolls in my group's games than we've ever had bright elves. Logic just isn't that great of an attribute if you're not a hermetic, and elves tend to take charisma as their drain stat. Typically elves and humans in our groups end up sitting at the 2-3 range simply because they're already veering dangerously close to the 200 bp attribute limit by the time they're considering how much logic they really want. As a consequence it always seems like it's the ork samurai who ends up taking 3-4 logic and filling the demolitions and first aid roles.
kzt
QUOTE (hyzmarca)
This means that a squatter who has lived in an abandoned period for a certain amount of time can claim that building as his own property.

There are several minor issues.

One is that you have to openly occupy it. The second is that you have to have paid the property tax on it. The third is that "some time" can be a long time. IIRC, in Texas it's 25 years. It's more typically 7 years IIRC.
Critias
QUOTE (Paradigm)
Yeah, but a penalty implies that the score gets lowered if you put points into it. My first SR gm used exactly that reasoning to dock attribute points on Trolls and Orcs in SR3 if we wanted to raise their penalised stats in char creation. Because the modification table listed attribute penalties rather than a max reduction in his eyes.

Well, that's because SR3 worked differently than SR4. In previous editions there's been an outright penalty (which was also effectively a lower cap). In SR4, there's just the lower cap. It wasn't an issue of "in his eyes," it was an issue of "in every edition until SR4."
Paradigm
Technically it was in the rules, yes, but that didn't stop us all from argueing against it. In the end it just lead against a strong bias among the players against playing orcs and trolls, due to the double 'penalty' you got. BP cost/a higher letter on the metatype and on top of that the loss of attribute points to those penalties. In that regard the SR4 rules are a bit more streamlined.

A later GM changed the penalties by ruling that the extra cost was only incurred if you wanted to raise the attribute above the normal, funnily enough we then ended up with 2 trolls, one a sammie, one a shaman, an orc Decker, a human face (racial issues) and the obligatory elf.

As for squatter right, they've traditionally been mostly accepted, but a few morons locally have drawn the ire of politicians and the cops by rigging a building to collapse on top of the cops during an eviction. It failed, luckily, but you can imagine authorities were none to pleased. It lead me to question now though.. how would 2070 authorities, wityh their shoot first - ID the bodies later policies, react to misbehavior by squatters, especially in the livable parts of barrens. (C-D areas that is, noone would care for Z zones apart from those stranded there).
kzt
You really don't have to ask that question, do you?
Whipstitch
The same way they deal with everything that comes out of the the Barrens; they bring a Citymaster, automatic weapons, assault drones, knockout gas and some extreme prejudice. And if it doesn't warrant that kind of response than they likely don't bother to show up in the first place.
HappyDaze
QUOTE
The same way they deal with everything that comes out of the the Barrens

Or they hire runners to destabilize the organization and allow it to collapse on its own. Lore Star and security corps hire runners too, as they have many needs for deniable assets.
Jaid
LS doesn't need deniable assets if they want to take down criminal organisations from the inside. that's their job. they're supposed to do that. that's what they get paid for. they can use their own corporate assets for that. now if it was the yaks or the mob, that would be different... they wouldn't legally *need* shadowrunners, but they would certainly want to make sure that whatever they do isn't traced back to them. but an organisation composed entirely of SINless trolls that take over a block or two of real estate in the barrens? or even a gang as relatively well-connected as the Ancients? they likely don't bother with shadowrunners. or subtlety, for that matter... the Ancients vs LS, LS will win. it's not that LS *can't* destroy the Ancients, it's that it's cheaper not to.
HappyDaze
Sometimes its still better to use deniable and ultimately expendable resoures. If your own assets get compromised in any manner, you have much higher costs than you do with shadowrunners - this is one of the main points that makes the concept of shadowrunners even remotely feasible.
Whipstitch
I would expect that the major problem with taking down a troll organization from the inside would simply be finding competent but anonymous troll personnel to begin with. I would bet that most troll officers are assigned to Riot Control and SWAT duties where their physiques are an asset rather than steered towards clandestine detective work. I believe it would be a lot easier to find a tough, smart troll shadowrunner than it would be to find a tough, smart troll officer who isn't already somewhat notorious in the underworld.
Stahlseele
QUOTE
it's not that LS *can't* destroy the Ancients, it's that it's cheaper not to

that and i'll hazard a guess and say they don't want to take away the one gang holding the spikes back at least a little bit . . or were the Ancients at war with the Disassemblers?
This is a "lo-fi" version of our main content. To view the full version with more information, formatting and images, please click here.
Dumpshock Forums © 2001-2012