Hah. Hah. Hah. Never read anything with Art Dankwalther in it past the Will itself, have you?

~J

Didn't he get nuked from orbit as the only way to be sure he was dead?

Thor shot. They hit a single person with a bunker-buster. It provided so monumentally stupid an ending, I think it actually outweighed the fact that that it ended that plotline.

~J

As far as I'm concerned, anything involving orbital weapons employed against single targets falls into the "Nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure" catagory, even if nukes are not actually involved.


What did he do that pissed them off that bad, anyway?

I would think maybe Togo is alive because the guards get a bribe from his chummers. A few in the pocket of an underpaid slob and a favor from a group of SOTA cybered trolls can make the average guard's life much safer.

In return they keep an eye on Togo. And besides, what fellow prisoner is going to shank a troll like Togo?

That doesn't explain why he just wasn't gunned down in the street 'resisting arrest' even after surrendering, or after having been taken 'into custody' (but before processing), why he wasn't just killed and harvested, as has been suggested be the normal practice for Lone Star.

He either greased the right palms as he went in or someone in Lonestar decided that he was worth more to them alive then dead, and being the leader of a sucessful gang helps his worth provided that he is willing to engauge in a little quid-pro-quo from time to time.

Well, he is worth more alive than dead because dead he isn't worth anything and alive he's worth 50 bucks a day.

No, dead he is worth whatever recyclable cyber he has installed plus organlegging. Alive he is worth 50 a day minus costs plus whatever favors his gang can provide to Lonestar on occassion.

Why does Lone Star need favors from a gang if they have strike teams and wholesale organlegging operations?

Or... are there some things Lone Star can't get away with, and have to subcontract to deniable assets?

No, Lone Star depends completely on contracts signed by elected officials. Lots of companies compete for these contracts.

They are FAR more impacted by public opinion than most megas.

That only follows if you believe the elected officals pay more then lip service to the masses, and if you believe that the masses are both informed and motivated enough to vote based off their feelings for Lonestar. (Besides that I was under the impression that like all security companies Lonestar also handled private contracts as well, did I get a couple of braincells crossed?)

Look at the apathy level and short attention span of the American public in 2007, and adjust it for the world of 2050+. Right now people are largely able to choose their "news" sources to only hear the side that they agree with, now imagine what people would do with AR and VR tech.

Most of me laughs. Some part of me finds the suggestion that the penal system be more progressive than the system itself to be ironically entirely in keeping with the ideals of dystopia.

Maybe Lord Togo was rich/clever/influential enough to make it worth to someone rich/powerful enough to go to prison, or to make it better for someone to go to prison than to get killed.

Or maybe Lord Togo has been killed while resisting arrest and is now in prison and in command of the Spikes... I'll let you think about this one.

I think LT is a nod to the various, real-world criminals who ran their organizations from inside prison.

Or maybe he was like the real world's "Donnie Brasco".

I think it is a good point that being SINless is not a crime. They are the people being disadvantaged by the state that does not recognize them existing. By getting arrested and put into the system, you become recognized. this might in fact be a very liberal humanitarian part of getting arrested. "Oh my you slipped through societies safety net and so were forced into a life of crime. We shall now help you by making sure you are not so disadvantaged again. Please remember to file your taxes."

It is only we who view the world in a neo-anarchist player way would see this as a bad thing.

They do not want to sign up everyone in the barrens because that would force the expenditure of resources to support the population, but someone who hits the radar as a criminal clearly has to be watched because they have started acting against normal, read registered, society. They fear the SINless only if they threatened to disrupt the normal world. After all. Let he who is without SIN cast the first stone.

I have never read a post of yours that I agree with more than that.

The question arises however, if getting arrested gives you a SIN, why does the large SINless population not inundate the justic system with crimes to get welfare?

I read an interesting cyber-punk japanese graphic novel where a homeless person did something similar to that. He believed that going to prison would be much better for him, because of a bed and regular meals, so he decides to commit a crime in front of a cop.

The cop, the protagonist has been severely mind-fucked by a serial killer throughout the novel, and as he pursues the killer on to the train and shouts "police!" the homeless fool sees his chance and leaps for a woman's handbag, and the cop subsequently shoots him dead.

I think in Shadowrun that would be the kind of rumor perpetuated amongst the SINless. Whether Lone Star mass-harvests the organs of their inmates, you can bet the SINless have heard that they do.

But there are taxes.

I started this thread to get a solid idea of how the world works for my game. Hell I've have done that. So it does not matter if I can see the inherently consistent logic in anothers model. Thanks for the help and lets stop before this becomes SR OCD.

I've tried to keep up with this thread but it went a few different directions here and there so I apologize if I missed something. Where exactly is it stated that a criminal SIN confirs anything other than a tracking number to associate to the dna, fingerprints, photographs, other evidence or documentation that was collected about the alleged criminal?

Since I have yet to find my copy of SOTA64 maybe it says something there about it. However, if does, that wasn't carried forward into the 4th edition rulebooks so I have to wonder if there's an interpretational discrepency.

It seems to me that an assumption was made that having a SIN (of any type) equals citizenship which doesn't seem to hold true. Verifiable citizenship for a mega or state requires an associated SIN for that entity but nothing I've read in the rulebooks suggests that the two are interchangable concepts.

The basic references from the sourcebook from pg. 83 (taking the SINner negative quality) says that if you take the 5 BP version you have a SIN, for 10 BP you have a SIN and a criminal SIN. Checking out the additional information from pgs. 258-259 also doesn't suggest that a criminal SIN confers citizenship, just that having one can make life very difficult when trying to do more mundane things like travel using public transpo, buy/set up a squat, etc.

The wholepoint of any SIN is to say you legally exist. If you don't have any SIN, you don't exist. So what some are saying is that even a criminal record is better than NO record.

Which, in the Sixth World, is not nessessarily true. A lot of people go to extreme lengths to remove that record, after all.

Not existing can have its advantages.



For Punks, having a SIN might just be a fate worse than death. Nothing messes up underground Anarchist societies like being identified by The Man.

That would be why they are extreme lengths. They change their fingerprints, they have deckers break in and delete the relevant records directly from the database. It SHOULDN'T be done, but it obviously can be.

Personally, I see criminal SIN as just a way to have a file on someone who's supposed not to exist, so that you can find him easily if he commits (or could have committed) a crime. But it doesn't grant you many rights.
It's also a way to show the population that the society does care about everyone.

Anyway, the idea of SIN in Shadowrun has always been very flexible and open to GM interpretation.

But most people who do not want to exist are runners. That is how we look at this. That means people with wealth and probably false ID's. Most SINless people, living in the barrens, do not have these advantages. They would love to get a SIN for the social benefits it gives. like being able to apply for a job.

Sure a criminal record might mean you can only be a janitor at Wuxing's Bellevue facility, but that is a real job with real bene's and so a step above scrimping in the barrens.

So, let's see....

SINless Slob A has no SIN, and wants no SIN, even though he is not a Shadowrunner. He is forced to resort to squatting day in and day out, scrounging up whatever cash he can, sometimes working odd-jobs for shadowrunners, other SINless with a bit more cash (like gangs, etcetera), and the like, sometimes simply scavenging what he needs. He pays no taxes, Lone Star does not know where or who he is (in the event they want to roust some people known to be in area A), the UCAS Federal Government does not acknowledge him, nor can it tax him.

SINless Slob B has a Criminal SIN, which he aquired by hoofing it to a B-area and heaving concrete blocks at windows until the Star arrested him. He did this solely to get a SIN. He spent time in lockup, where he was molested by Bubba the Love Troll without anywhere to run, and his jailers threatened more than once to organleg him. Somehow he got through with his meat intact, and was booted out on the streets with a Criminal-flagged SIN. He goes looking for a job, any job, since he's now a SINner. Nobody will hire him, since he's a criminal, and when he explains that he only did it to get a SIN, that gets him kicked straight out of their offices. Finally he finds a job working a miserable rate as a janitor somewhere awful. He gets paid whatever his employer wants to pay him, probably something stupid like 3 an hour. He dosen't even clear the full 500 required for his living expenses (squatting, still) at the end of each month, so he either has to go back to scrounging for the extra cash, or just do the "every other month payment" thing.

And of course, they work him miserably, but that's not the worst. He's lived SINless all his life, he dosen't get trid. April 15 rolls around, he has no idea that since he makes 5,760 a year, he owes the UCAS Federal Government 576 . Maybe they don't notice it first, but I'd bet they do. His busted old commlink starts to hiss and sputter one day, but it's not his employer telling him his shift has been extended (for the third time this week, to a fourteen hour day), but it's a big, official-looking notice from the UCAS government telling him that he has 30 days to pay up or else.

And of course, none of this even comes close to contemplating what the gangs might do to him for trying to be a big shot, trying to play at being an upstanding citizen and what-not. Roughing him up, or stealing his cash, the like.



So, if you're a SINless Slob living in the barrens, does not having a SIN sound all that bad? You'll still be a slob living in the barrens, the only difference is that your new employer will take advantage of you ruthlessly, and the UCAS Federal Government will try to hit you up for a tenth (if only a tenth!) of what miserable salary you do pull down. And it may make you a pariah where you squat, too.

I'm not sure I agree with the line of thought that anyone would get busted just to get a SIN. If you really want a SIN to be an upstanding citizen, get around, and get a job and enjoy all the associated benefits and penalties of being a registered citizen you can register for one. The simple premise here being that "Acquiring a SIN so that you can get a job" falls into the realm of having something to offer worthy of granting you a SIN

The picture you're painting with the criminal SIN and big brother coming after you doesn't make any sense at all. That takes resources and effort that isn't worth the trouble. I think it's more appropriate to think of SINless with a criminal SIN as illegal aliens. They get busted, they get a criminal SIN, and they get sent home. There's no expectation that they'll be looking for a job now that they have this wonderful new criminal SIN, or that they'll pay taxes, or anything else.

Except SINless Slob A also works as a janitor for KongMart, just like modern illegal immigrants are hired for stupid jobs at terrible rates. I don't think Aztechnology i going to turn an employee away just because he has no SIN. No SIN means Aztechnology doesn't have to pay taxes or benefits for that employee and no one asks questions when that employee is canned (or worse). They keep the Stuffer Shack running for less cost.

The underworld doesn't want SINs for obvious reasons, so mafia, yak and triads will avoid them, and their many operations avoid them.

Smugglers don't want SINs. People who rebel against the system don't want SINs (which includes a ton of the NAN). People who can get a job without a SIN don't want a SIN. It's only when you're crossing that line from Low (you CAN get a low lifestyle without a SIN, and there are jobs out in the barrens which pay well enough to support it) to Moderate that you would actively want to pursue a SIN, but what moderate-level jobs would want an ex-con? You might do it so your kid would get a SIN though. Slob B gets a criminal SIN, so his son gets a normal SIN and hopefully son goes and gets a real job. I could realistically see people going from High to Luxury as wanting to get rid of their SIN. No SIN means, like people said, no taxes. Depending on the business, not being able to legally open a business front may be worth it if you don't have to pay taxes on it either.

There's really no reason why squatters can't have SINs, if they're flat broke they're still going to be squatting. I think we've been assuming that everybody in the barrens is going to be SINless because its implied in the fluff, but it doesn't really matter. Having money and no SIN is probably better than having a SIN and no money.

I think a lot of criminals (particularly organized crime, or high end people like Andre Brauher in Thief) are going to have legal identities that they protect, and fronts that are legitimate businesses. SINless criminals (or for that matter, Criminal SINs) are going to be the second-tier people, the disposable, deniable assets. (Us, in other words, although come to think of it, I don't think I've ever played a SINless character.)

What rights and proper pay scales? It's been a recognized fact that megacorps call the shots (especially on Extraterritorial property), not elected governments.

Besides, what's he going to do if they don't pay him the minimum wage? Sue?