I almost posted in another thread a short list of things that a paranoid, pro Shadowrunner would do after every major run, and any minor run that went south. Its a pretty short, simple list, at least originally, so for the sake of discussion I'll expand upon each point in turn. Keep in mind that some of these can be 'assumed' behavior, particularly if you are not interested in running CSI:2070 on your players.

First the list:




Now the expansion
Collect payment from Johnson

Sounds pretty self evident, yeah? Well, first the Caveat: provided the Runners compleated the minimum requirements of the Job, hell nor high water should stop them from reclaiming their due from the Johnson. No amount of treachery nor recalcitrancy should stop them. Not even death of the Johnson should stop this... Once you get a rep as someone who can be shafted or shorted your due, you're on the downward slide to suicide runs for milk money.

But that shouldn't happen every day.

Once you have it, you're done, right?
Wrong: you need to launder that shit. You live in the shadows, and money is all electronic. This is why you have a fixer. If you're smart you have two or three fixers who can do this for you. Sure, it cuts into your margin. But 10% of the take is better than angry cyberzombies busting down the door to your doss, right? If you are really paranoid you don't even collect the washed nuyen from teh guy you dropped it with, or the same dude twice in a row. You pay your fixer, you get a paycheck from Vinney's pizza this job, next job, Sally's dry cleaning gives you a fat settlement for ruining your favorite suit. The point is that anyone after you has no idea where you get your money, and even good hackers have a hard time looking for your accounts to shut them down. Heck, with the modern wireless world the entire process can take minutes. Just cause the credstick was certified doesn't mean its clean, omae.


Dispose of guns and other non-unique equipment


At the start of their career, or even after the first job, any good Shadowrunner gets himself a case of his favorite gun, a closet full of his favorite armored jackets, and a box of cheap commlinks. Thats a minimum, chummer. The truly professional doesn't play favorites, scrubs his jobs to eliminate MOs, especially easy ones like 'favorite gun'. This time its a Predator, that time a manhunter, that job there? Used a shotgun all the way. Every safehouse, every doss will have spares. Urban Guerilla types might even set up caches around the city.

Once you start getting hot, start doing jobs that get the real fire down upon you, you start ditching everything. Its a business expense, really, and trying to keep the money in house is just asking for trouble. Guns should be tossed in the bay or left lying where strangers with violent criminal tendencies are likely to find them. Clothes should be burnt or left for bums, commlinks? yeah, those are annihilated. ANY data on those things is as bad as it gets. Voiceprints, brainscans... you name it and someone has the knowhow to get it off no matter how throughly they wipe it. Hacker's might feel the pain here, but a dedicated hacker works under different principles anyway. Drone riggers? Yeah, those too.. then again, if you use half a mill in drones on a Run you are playing with the Big Dogs now. Make sure you get enough to cover them too.

The thing of it is: equipment used in the commision of a crime is a strong link. You use the same gun, the same gear, on every run you start leaving behind traces of 'who you are' that smart people can use to build up quite a profile on you. And if they track you down? having that stuff on hand is just a nail in the coffin. Sure, it's paranoid... you work and live in the shadows Chummer, what do you expect? Lets not even get into Ritual Links.... that's just bad shit.


Dispose of any other swag and evidence, preferrably for money related to run. Including bodies


Most Shadowrunners are in it for the money, that's a default assumption. Its expected that new runners will probably loot in a limited capacity. Once you start earning 6 or more digits per runner the temptation to take every sec guards pistol falls off quickly. Still, a Shadowrunner even at the top levels should probably be keeping an eye out for ways to maximize his profits regardless. You are freelancers, not in house assets. If the Johnson doesn't want you to steal additional stuff from the target site, then that MUST be part of the contract... and a smart runner uses that to negotiate for more money... just like no kill provisos. Still, on a sneak and peak you don't want to get bogged down lugging eight tons of scrap metal with you, and if your run went as planned, you're exfiltration includes transpo... minimal loot.

But a lot of runs DON"T go as planned, and sometimes its not even a run you are worried about but some poor bastard you had to 'replace' to even DO the run. You have a body, you have a stolen car, you have some hot shit peice of loot that absolutely must be taken because it's just too damn valuable to leave behind...

Guess what? you have to get rid of it. Bodies lying around, outside of running gunfights with corpsec goons, just attract attention in a way that missing persons just don't. And with the prolifigation of RFID tags any physical objects taken (or for that matter, paydata swagged) can almost certainly be tracked.

None of that should ever get near your doss, much less a safehouse. That's just asking...no BEGGING for pain. While your fixer can be an excellent source of info, runs, and even gear, this type of thing is best handled through specialists. We're assuming you can't just leave it in the barrens with a thermite grenade... always good for destroying evidence. Maybe its valuable, maybe you took it because it was valuable.

Well, organized crime contacts are always a good way to get rid of evidence... if you trust 'em. They aren't above keeping 'proof' of your misdeeds to hold over your head later, or even sell to the highest bidder if you get too hot. Whatever you do to clean up later, it had better be a part of the plan. What you do with the body of that poor bastered you interrogated for passcodes is your business, but leaving it lying around just ain't an option. I don't recommend 'hiding'... bodies have a nasty way of turning up when least expected. Destruction or 'dumping' both work fine if done right. Dumping, ideally, removes any links to the criminal... oceans and fire are excellent for this.


Set up new false ID and primary doss. Eliminate any used safehouses and previous primary housing used by old identity, again, preferrably for money

This is the real difference between the average shadowrunner and the true pro. This is time consuming, painful and expensive. Most runners won't do it, many CAN'T do it.

First of all, a Safehouse isn't where you hang your hat for fun. If you use it, you burn it when you're done. Its that simple. You HIDE in a safehouse, maybe plan the job in the safehouse, but you don't go back once you're done. Hell, vicious paranoid runners will burn a safehouse, literally. Arson is a great way to hide any accidental evidence you might leave behind. The problem with this approach is that arson gets noticed, arson gets looked at. If you just walk away, that Safehouse might never even get noticed.

The pro always assumes that he missed something, left something, or just couldn't avoid something and that someone is looking at him. He assumes that the job is hot enough that someone will, no matter how careful he is, track him back to his current Identity. Maybe he does it every job, maybe every three jobs, but the Pro ditches the ID, at least the 'legitimate one' every chance he gets and starts a new one. Only the really paranoid bastards change their shadow identities that regularly. Those are the ones that make enough, and have the right sort of rep that they can still get employed, and make enough, to justify it. Burning your Shadow identity is hard... and can be as easy as moving to a new town and taking on a new handle.

The real pro's will have a second ID already to go, waiting for them to step into their new lives at the drop of a hat if things go south on them. They won't touch that ID unless it does, and they might not keep it long if they DO use it. Some runners will bury themselves under layers of false ID's, creating a maze of paperwork to track the 'real' one down... all the while using one completely removed from the web they left behind. When you can pull a few million nuyen per job, you spend more time covering your tracks than you do on the job...

But you'll never make it that high...


not unless you already know this.

Interesting and really good stuff, but I think there are some things you're not thinking about..

A rep is what gets people work, so a Mr Smith [I'm English ] who messes his assets about won't have many to work with in the future..
..And an asset that is too much trouble to deal with will also start losing work.
As is often the case, you get what you pay for - if the rewards aren't good enough, walk away. If Mr Smith won't pay up, don't put yourself in a place where he can manipulate you.

I'm not sure a professional would really get rid of every single item of gear after every job. That alone, indicates he expects to be caught. For things like picked up gear, why was it taken away if it's just to be thrown away later ??
A more sensible method might be to have things to neutralise gear that was used and left behind - things to fry RFID chips, solvents to remove fingerprints, etc. Anything else is just too expensive - unless he is a millionaire and/or charges mega amounts of money for a job.

Any competent 'Runner has a series of IDs already - before they're needed, possibly even just ones belonging to recently dead people.

It's always good to have several safehouses - their location would help to keep you safe. High value safehouses would have good security, and safehouses in low value area would be able to use the unfriendliness of the locals to provide warnings of strangers.


Of course, all this assumes that Corps actually take revenge - and most SR material says they don't because it's not cost-effective.
And if the assets are any good, why waste them ??

This is also why very few 'Runners work alone - it's just too dangerous/difficult to be the only person involved..
..And that's a balanced team is so important - with overlapping skills, different contacts and different areas of expertise.

...Mr Smith? Is that in any of the books? I've been using Mr Heath.

A copule hookers, novacoke, long haul, and maybe some deepweed for me. My elf stripper girlfriend need her rent money, so that's spent in a flash. And she very well can't be driving around in public transportation so I have to pay the lease on her Lexus. Usually after that I borrow some money from the Technomancer for things like food until the next run settles me up and gives me some money in my pocket.

Depends on the character really.

My old mage has always followed this advice (even though he never put it so clearly). He is from 1st ed and has been converted up through 3rd. Not yet converted him to 4th ed.

My other characters usually don't. Course none of them are really successful yet. They're mostly low-grade runners.

Then there's Nazgul, my orc shaman. He is the wiseman of a very small NAN tribe. So he has a SIN and a day job. He is also their doctor. Makes life tough for him. Course the tribe is why he runs the shadows. Always need more medicine and such.

Personally I perfer the Pink Mohawk traditions much better, I find Ice-Cold-Pro games to be boring, to each his own I guess.

How in the HECK can you afford to do this? On the normal payscales seen in the published adventures, the PCs just about break even. If they did what you suggested they would be bankrupt in 2 runs. I am all for mission security, but this is paranoid BS.

Note I make a difference between the False ID and one's Shadow 'identity'. Generally, no, you don't want to burn your Shadow Identity, because that's where your rep is. There is a value to doing so, when the heat you've generated is sufficient that 'starting over' is tolerable.

Other than that, I'm not sure where you were going with everying starting with 'get what you pay for'... I vaguely assume you are referring to the entire 'make sure you get paid no matter what' bit. That's just rep business, if you start negotiations with insane 'make sure I get paid' restrictions, then sure... that follows. Negotiation is the fine art of knowing how hard to push for more, after all...



Actually: A good runner (assuming you worry about 'Ice cold pros', as another poster put it) only brings gear he needs, and probably bought it just for that job. Aside from that:

Guns: Ballistics trace at a minimum. If the same gun is used on multiple runs, eventually people will start putting together a map of your activities. Even if they aren't out for revenge, it does make it hard to pull jobs anonymously.

Armor and clothing: bloodstains at a minimum. Shooting people in the face is messy business. Further: realistically, you should replace your armor after every time you get shot. Obviously there is no RULE for that, but this isn't really a rules focused discussion.

Anything electronic/wireless: I've covered this before with my CSI:Shadowrun thread; to sum up: even in 'hidden mode' every object you pass these day, from teh coffee pot to the office chair, to the computer you want to hack, is looking for pan signals. They want to know if you want coffee, they want to know if you are going to sit in them (and how tall you are). Hidden mode is best summed up as your PAN telling them to 'bugger off, mate, not interested'. From a user end point, yes, your PAN is hidden. However, if you get into the system architecture, there is still going to be a record of the request for interface and the polite refusal. This can be debated, and yes, your hacker can 'spoof' everything with a single die roll... but seriously, a pro doesn't trust to chance.

Vehicles: Did you know that 90% of fleeing criminals are caught because they use a vehicle. Consider how much easier it is to track a two ton chunk of steel vs a 200 lb man. Yeah.

Picked up gear: I did address that. Likewise the money thing: you can, if you want to risk it (at lower pay scales this is far more acceptable) just sell it all off to criminal enterprises and use that to subsidize the expense of replacement. I swore I covered that, maybe I was unclear?

Commlink: Deserves special attention. Like all electronic equipment that is wireless enabled, it leaves a potentially trackable trail. Worse, shadowrunners tend to do stupid things like store phone numbers of their fellow runners, family members, and contacts in them. They also have personal profiles, addresses, and grocery lists. Firefights are chaotic, commlinks can be left behind by accident. Have you ever left your cell phone at a friends house? Known anyone who did? Imagine that you did that while stealing the hope diamond. Embarrassing? Not even close to half of it. If you are constantly disposing of commlinks after the run, you will build habitual behavior where you keep a clean (sanitized in operator lingo) commlink on you, not your personal one. You'll memorize your contact's, hopefully also sanitized number, or program in a list of 'clean numbers' that you can call if needed during the run and never after. Shadowrunners of all people do not have the luxury of personalized pet commlinks. Then again, I'm also a proponent of most shadowrunners weaning themselves from PAN use during runs at all, but that's a debate worthy of its own thread (and I think it got one or two...)

The thing is: Guns, armor and even commlinks are CHEAP compared to what a runner can earn on a job.



Indeed, a competent runner WILL have multiple ID's and even safehouses. That's not 'after the run' level stuff. Here is the thing: there is undoubtedly a 'solid' ID the runner uses as his 'Official identity', just like there is a house he 'lives in'. If you use an ID on a run, it's burnt, tainted, bad. Get rid of it. A Safehouse you stay at, for any length of time? not safe. Its burnt, tainted, bad. Get rid of it. The only value a safehouse has is its anonymity. Even a perfect ID is worthless if its linked to a major crime. Thus, after the run any ID's that are even remotely tangental to a run, and if it's hot enough, any place you've stayed, should be considered Burnt and discarded.




It assumes no such thing. A 'Corp' generally won't take revenge, you're right, its not cost effective and good runners are assets. However, PEOPLE who work in corps might. Revenge isn't the only motive for tracking down Shadowrunners, not by a long shot. I can think of a few published adventures where the runners are more or less 'forced' to take a run for a client they'd rather not... force requires information and a target that will stay still long enough for force to be brought to bare. Information requires sifting through outdated data trails and mazes of information.

Then there is the 'immedeate clean up'. You steal hot paydata from Ares? They might just track you down and shut you up to minimize the number of people exposed to said paydata. You want Ares strike teams busting through the walls of your doss? Not me, chummer.

What about the VP of security, say, who you just embarrassed in front of the board for his failure to keep that paydata locked up? He might not seek revenge, but then again... if he does how can you tell the difference between sancitoned Ares revenge, and unsanctioned Ares revenge, and does it really matter when the lead is flying?

What about the wife of that sec guard you wasted? What if her insurance payment is enough to hire a shadowrunner team of her own?

Lastly: I assume that despite a weakened government and contracted law enforcement that there is still some notional force of 'law and order' that is unconcerned with the bottom line. Shadowrunners are very often serial mass murderers, professional terrorists and generally some of the worst sorts of violent criminals the world has to offer. SOMEONE might want to stop them, regardless of the problems the corp extra-territorial nature provides the legal/judicial system. I assume the UCAS still has a CIA analog at the very least.



Inconsequential to the thrust of the post. Every member of the team should be covering their own six between runs. In canon most teams are not a close as they are played in game.



EDIT::: Special note on the expectation of getting caught: well, yes. Look, if I carry a gun, I am expecting to have to use it. I hope, by having it that it will act as a deterrent thus preventing me from having to use it.

Same principle: Clean up from a job as if you expect to be caught, thus hopefully preventing you from... imagine this, ever being caught.

I don't use published adventures, myself so I don't know what sort of range you are talking about but:

guns are cheap. Armor is cheap. a cheapo commlink so you can remain linked with your team is... dirt cheap (100 nuyen I think)

Cars? yeah, you should probably steal one if you need it on a run.



Really: runners tend to accumulate way too much gear, and then they try to bring it all on every run. In most cases where this would be applicable (bodyguarding maria mercurial does not... just for the record) the planning phase should include a 'shopping list', which would be most of the gear brought on a run, if not all. AND THAT LIST should be used to negotiate for ' plus expenses'. you DO negotiate for 'plus expenses' don't you?

You don't?






Oh dear.







If you bust out a Panther Assault Cannon on a 3000 nuyen job to rough up the local Stuffer Shack for their Competition (Zippy Mart), you are not acting very professionally, and the cost of replacing that panther is your own business. Appropriate gear for the job, chummer... that's the key.

People have different playsyles. Personally I like engraving my pistols with my my name and putting in gold inlay and ivory grips. It's cool that way and I enjoy it.

Sure. But since none of this is covered by rules, nor even suggests rules, its just things to look at, to think about, and if they catch your fancy to apply them to Shadowrun.

Its not like I'm GMing your game, after all....

When we started playing 4E the hacker/technomancer was actively deleting log files and traces while we were on a run so we couldn't get caught. We took off the RFID's on most of our equipment and replaced the RFID's on other equipment that needed them too.

But our new DM runs old 2E modules and if they involve someone tracking us down then it'll happen regardless of what we do!

I could point out, illustrative of your comment about the custom gats your character uses:

The Movie "War" with Jet Li and Stratham, the 'uber assassin' that Jet Li plays, illustrative of an extreme Pro, going so far as to get regular plastic surgery so that no one knew what he looked like, used a custom pistol that fired (stupid, I know) custom Depleted Uranium bullets or something.

During the film the 'good guys' are tracking his actions partly by chasing the makers of those custom bullets, then the surgeons who do face work.

We could suggest that all PC runners are uber professionals that always do the right thing, but perfect runners are boring runners, just as perfect runs are boring runs. The tools I postulate, the techniques I describe, are not just 'behind the curtains' tools for GM's, but are things players could make use of too, to track a hated rival, on the job to whack a rogue assassin before he assassinates the Johnson, or a rating 5 contact, or...

And the mistakes that even an 'ice cold pro' can be prone too (custom guns that he won't ditch... and identity he has grown too fond of (the end of HEAT comes to mind here...) are the stuff of near legendary runs...

Technically, there are indeed rules for this very thing in Arsenal. It can affect the character's Intimidation dice pool, as well as his Public Awareness.

Using only clean (sterile) gear on every run and regularly ditching Doss and fake SIN for new ones changes your Intimidation Dice Pool?

And you say this is in Arsenal?







I gotta hear the logic behind that!

If you really want to misunderstand it...
What he means is, there are rules for custom equipment in Arsenal and how this influences social interaction...
Shadowrun is cyberpunk fantasy, and in cyberpunk, style is everything...

Oh, that I can see. Forgive me, for I have but a single, lowly PDF file to peruse in that regard, and reading PDF's is never any fun for me, so I mostly looked at the pretty pictures of guns so far....

There is a certain style behind 'doing it right'... just like there is a certain style in 'breaking all the rules and getting away with it'.

This runner never cuts a deal with a dragon, that one made a top notch career out of it.

Let's recap, shall we?






My response was in relation to Lord Ben's Pimped Weapons, as upon first reading I thought you were saying there were no rules for that type of thing. As there are indeed rules for Pimped Weapons in Arsenal, and they do grant a dice pool bonus to Intimidation in certain circumstances, I was merely pointing them out.

Spike..
..I don't agree with all your comments, but I do think they're interesting.

And it's great to see someone thinking like a Pro 'Runner.


I play a different game to you, and have a different style.

Sorry, that's not going to fly with most Johnson's.

It's a license to waste money. The J wants the job done at the lowest price that will accomplish his objectives. "plus expenses" is an invitation for the runners to overspend on gear. Maybe you can negotiate this on those "at all costs" jobs that come by every once in a while, but for bread-and-butter runs... forget it.

Actually, being able to size up a job quickly and put out a decent number (not inflated) and tacking it on as expenses shows you know your stuff. Occasionally you might be able to aquire certain equipment from the 'johnson' if, for example, you know WHO the johnson represents (either he's open about it, or pretending to be open about it...). For example, if Ares is hiring a team of runners as a deniable 'assault asset', with the intent being open firefights with hostile personel, the expense negotiations include possibly being 'loaned' Ares Alphas, plenty of ammo, some grenades and even security armor instead of negotiating for an expense budget to gear up for what is essentially a military grade operation.

The best part of that is that disposing of the incriminating evidence is often as simple as handing it back over to the Johnson.

The reason many runners think that negotiating for 'expenses' is forbidden, impossible or simply 'not done' is that they fail to understand that you are trading off. If you get a flat payment (or per person) it is incumbent upon the runners to ensure they get paid enough to profit after expenses. When you negotiate to ADD expenses being covered you get paid less 'flat money', because the Johnson understands that what you accept as a fee is actually profit/time spent, not your operation budget. The advantages for the runners is that they can be a little more spendy on planning the run, and unexpected expenses (like, having to negotiate an unexpected bribe with the head of an opposed Runner Team working security (it happens...) to look the other way are actually absorbed by the Johnson. The advantage to the johnson is both knowing that the Runners aren't padding their fee just for greed/working minimalist gear when the job is VIJ (very important Job). He also has the ability to weigh in additional expenses and even call off the run if it starts getting to pricy.

They also fail to realize that MOST of the time the Johnson has a vested interest in the run succeeding, therefore there is nothing inherently wrong with the Johnson being involved in the primary planning sessions (think Ronin for a model of this), though again, paranoid runners (thats... living runners) will always keep their contingency plans to themselves, just in case.


Again, we are covering ways that the top dollar runners differ from bread and butter runners. It isn't that Top Dawgs GET to negotiate for expenses, it that when you start realizing you CAN you take another step up to elevate yourself from teh guy running mystery packages for Vinny and risking miniguns to the face for rent.



One way to get an easy start on the whole 'expenses' thing is to do it for fixed amounts. Johnson tells you the specs on the job (to whatever extent possible) and as part of the negotiation instead of just asking for 'more money'.... which you SHOULD be doing anyway, you say 'And we'll need 5k for expenses up front'. Now, this isn't any different than just asking for 5k more for the job, but it gives you a reason for the Johnson to approve THAT particular 5k, it makes you look sharper (you know about how much you'll need to get whatever specialized equipment you need up front), and it establishes precedent with that johnson. Now, he might toss back 3k as a counter offer, that's fine... if he says 'hell no' but then continues regular negotiations? walk. Seriously, if the Johnson can't understand that freelancers will need to spend money to accomplish his dirty deeds he is either a moron, or he's up to something... and you don't want to work for a moron on a man with ulterior motives, do you?*




*Obviously, OOC, doing that to your GM is probably not a great way to play the game, but it all depends on how you play. Ensure the GM knows why your characters would walk at that point and things may move swimmingly from thense on, or he'll tell ya 'but its the only run I have planned..." at which point you tighten your belt and decide if you really want to play with the default assumption that you'll take every job offered no questions asked. To be up front: I've never turned down a Run as a player, but then again, I also don't pretend to lead parties, I'm there to roll dice and have fun.

How is the runner's paranoia the Johnson's problem?

What J. is going to pay for the runner to replace a load of perfectly good gear after every job?

"I want to ditch every piece of equipment I used on the run on the off-chance it could be traced back to this job..." So far so good "... and I want you to pay for it." That part is the problem. Expenses I can see. You need some special piece of gear to accomplish the mission, I can see the J paying, but your paranoia is NOT HIS PROBLEM.

Traceable gear is only a problem if you get caught, so DON"T GET CAUGHT!

They hire runners because runners are disposable assets. So they could probably care less if you get arrested or not.

I have run a couple of characters who were scroungers. They usually have a crap load of stuff that they pick up "on the run" I usually get them a topped out tag scrambler and a good weapon smith contact right out of the gate. I find you can make a nice bonus just picking stuff up. and it takes care of the disposable problem. You just switch out what ever you used in the last run with the stuff you picked up and had cleaned. Its not a perfect system but it offers some protection against tracing or profiling.

They are usually the ones who add "We keep anything we find, right ?" to the negotiations.

Obviously, they aren't gonna stick around to strip the sec guard of his really cool heavy security armor( Unless your a troll, then you just stuff the poor sap in you backpack and dump him somewhere later), but a couple of pistols and maybe an assault rifle can definitely help pay the rent.(or pay off the gangs around one of your hole in the ground bolt holes .)

just my 2

Uhmmm... Either I'm getting hosed by me GM or yours are WAY to generous with your laundering fee's. My adept has to pay 40% of whatever money he wants laundered. This is the only way that he even remotely lets money into his real SIN's account (I guess if your not a SINer you can just pay the 10%) The reason is simple...

I pay my taxes...
Both federal and "state". That eats up 30% and the other 10% is my fixers fee for taking care of all the paperwork and making sure that there is a clear trail saying this is money I should legally have. The downside is that I have to do it in amounts greater than 2K or else 10% fee doesn't cover the cost of laundering it.

What does that buy me? Well for one I look a hell of a lot less suspicious to organizations like Lone Star. I have a much easier time getting places to live, travel and weapon permits. I actually have REAL health insurance (dental too). That means that if I have the flu I don't need to activate my Doc Wagon bracelet. IF I break my arm I can go to the ER and not to some dirty street doc.
I have a legitimate business license (Security Consultant and bodyguard) and funny as that sounds, yes my Kevlar vest is tax deducible as a business expense.

After the run? A steaming cup of soykaf would be whiz about now.


Seriously, I love this thread and the discussion, but the problem is that SR doesn't spend so much time on forensics. I agree that realistically if someone wanted to be a hitperson, lab animal liberator for hire, industrial spy, or whatever, that a great deal of their energy should go towards avoiding being tracked down by the police or other parties later. I always felt that this would be an interesting and challenging element of gameplay and planning. However, since it's not really clearly spelled out in the rulebooks how tracking you down works (not in the same detail as how a gunfight works) it's also tough to develop more mandatory stuff in that direction.

First: your quote sounds like a glitched negotiation test. Lets say you were married and didn't want kids. Would your wife ask you to get a puppy "so I can love it like it was one of those precious children I so desperately want but you tell me we can't afford yet" ?

Of course not. That may be why she wants one, but thats not how you get it.

Again: Players (for whatever reason) accumulate 'stuff'. Like the guy with thirty different guns, and he claims he carries them all... and his Katana. Never mind the stupidity of trying to strap thirty guns and a katana to your person, its indicative of an 'out of character' phenomenon.

Since this topic is more "In Character' in tone, the fact that you feel you need to carry, say, a respirator with pressure regulator with you on every job (something that many of my older Shadowrun characters always had...) is irrelevant.

Stuff you own, and stuff you use on the job are two seperate things. At least in a sensible outlook (exceptions for 'custum signature guns' or what have you).

Does the job call for a hang glider? Great, go get one. Otherwise, you don't need it, leave it at home for hobby time.

How it actually should go down, at the negotiation table is like this: Johnson lays out a snatch and grab job, one that is virtually garaunteed to go south. He offer's 80k for the job.

The Team leader notices that they'll need to access a vault. That's cutting equipment and/or explosives to get into the vault. Call it 5k in equipment right there. Then he sees that the security layout possibly includes gas in the ventilation system, that's another 1000 in respirators for the team. Then he estimates that they'll burn through (as a team) 2000 rounds of ammo, plus some grenades, and should probably bring assault rifles on the job. Between the ammo, grenades and the rifles he chalks it up to 10k, never mind the fact that anyone shot is going to need new armor, plus potential first aid and potentially medical (another 5-10k, just in case). Then he figures, new IDs, bribe money, investigative costs. Before long he sees that half his payday is just covering the job. After expenses and splitting the payday 6 ways (large team, say) that means hes only up about 6k in profit per person.

So he goes: Sounds nice, but a job like that requires specialized equipment. 80k isn't going to cover it, I'll need 120k for expenses and because of the heat it'll generate for us."

Then the Johnson will look at his budget, and his assets and maybe hell negotiate on how much he'll cover for expenses, or offer to supply some of the tab (say, picking up medical... if the team doesn't need it he comes out ahead. Rifles and ammo he can take back (unexpended ammo anyway), which would knock an easy 20k off the job.


Sterilizing yourself is an assumed, known expense, and if the Johnson won't pay you enough for the heat (a factor in how important it is to sterilize) then he's just not paying enough.

I assume that the pay scale rates are based on metagame considerations (out of character behavior, like never ditching equipment, never having to replace bought safehouses and ID's), rather than the 'realistic' behaviors of professional terrorists. Obviously, if this sort of stuff is happening in game, then the pay rates should rise to reflect the cost of doing business. Of course an unspoken question is 'how long between runs'. Thats another factor: A job that pays 10k profit per runner is enough for one month high lifestyle, meaning if he wants a high lifestyle to be his standard, he needs to do an equivilent job every month.


A job likely to generate serious heat (say, assassinating the CEO of Ares) should pay enough for all those expenses, plus a nest egg PLUS enough money for a high lifestyle for a year in the bahamas to let things cool down, at a minimum. Of course, a job like that isn't offered, seriously anyway, to a runner with the none of the habits suggested here. That runner is going to get caught after a job like that, he is going to be interrogated, and with all the toys available, he IS going to spill everything he knows about the Johnson. No, runners with sloppy habits are patsies and errand boys. Great for getting your feet wet, but eventually you should be looking at big scores, not more of the same milk runs.


Plus you keep missing the point about getting caught: Traceable gear will incriminate you, sure, if you get caught. However: using traceable gear INCREASES you chances of getting caught. You cut a man's throat and you are covered in blood. You keep walking around in the bloody clothes you WILL GET CAUGHT. If you put them away in your house you might not get caught, but if anyone ever looks in your house...well...

Same principle, only less obvious: Runner A uses the same gun every job. He's discreet and professional, has a good hacker cover his electronic tracks, sure, but he keeps using that gun. Eventually someone notices that this same gun has been used on seven different runs agains ARES (lets say an internal investigator, from the Corp...) and they start looking closer, obviously this runner hits them regularly and that moves them into 'not an asset' on the balance sheet. They start looking at the lot numbers of the ammo he uses, maybe they can find his supplier (assumption: RFID tags in ammo, helps track current ammo load with your PAN, so is reasonable assumption of Canon), then they start looking for any shootings outside of Ares that may have used that same gun. Your Runner may or may not have shot someone near his regular haunts, maybe the noisy neighbor who beat his wife, and they start assembling a map of places that gun has been used. they'll know the make and model (CSI guys can do this now, betting its just as easy in the future) within reasonable tolerances, and they'll have other evidence against him as well, the gun was just the starting point. Maybe they've got a PAN account number from a coffee machine OS that got overlooked on one run, maybe they have more information on his less discreet partners... heck, they probably have a line on which fixers brokered some of the deals that led to those runs. Fixers care about survival, money and the runners, in that order. The Corps threaten his survival and can pay lots of money to make him squeal, most will turn (this is Shadowrun, after all, trust no one).

Next thing you know, they've got him under surviellance, maybe they kill him to prove a point, maybe they pick him up and make him an offer he can't refuse... maybe they wait until his next job against Ares, and having seen him planning the whole thing are waiting at the front door with a minigun... no matter what they've punched his ticket. Why? because he didn't plan on getting caught so he carelessly kept using the same gun on every job, and made himself an easy target. God forbid he ever bled on an Ares site, then they have DNA and potentially a material link for ritual sorcery.

Casually dismissing the threat is one way to play, but its only scratching the surface of what can be done. Not every 'Run' (by that I mean game session) has to be 'Meet Johnson, accept job, do job, get paid/screwed, go home and spend karma'. Not by a long shot. You can build entire Runs (again, game sessions) around cleaning up from a messy job or setting up a system to maximize profit/diminish risk by quick and easy loot disposal. You can arrange Runs where the players are the targets, and have to survive and escape.

Or, you know, you can do like I mostly do, and just hang out, let the party leader do his thing, and shoot bad guys when necessary. I'm a gaming slut, I'm easy to please. That doesn't mean it isn't fun to explore the details. I just wish you (plural/royal you?) would quit defending yourselves, I'm not attacking you. Its a buffet, man, take what you like and leave the rest...

Debatable: Runners are disposable, certainly, but they can also be fonts of information about the Johnson if interrogated appropriately. Depending upon who picks them up, of course. Lonestar will just make examples of them on trideo in showtrials and execute them as terrorists/mass murderers in all liklihood. The targets of the last Run is more likely to give them the chance to earn their freedom by doing a run against the guys who hired them (steal BACk our prototype or your head goes pop).

Fun stuff.

I can see getting rid of any gear that might have been involved in a compromised run, but otherwise it would be a waste.

Same with weapons. Ballistics only work against you if they know where the incriminating weapon is. Chances are, unless you are stupid and get pulled over for speeding with the gun in your trunk, once you are caught with said weapon you are already hosed. Sure, they can pin extra crimes onto the rap sheet. A true desperate 'Runner would either not be taken alive or try his damnedest to shoot their way out, either way the offending ballistics would not matter. Besides, would your ballistics information taken from one corporation's security team be available to another corp security team? Not everyone banks on Lonestar or Knight Errant for security and I am sure Shiawasee is not about to share intel with a possible competitor.

Now, however, some of my runners like getting licenses and permits for their 'favorites'. I mandate baseline ballistics analysis and recording to attain licenses for each weapon. If they are stupid enough to get caught using that weapon, well, then they get what they deserve.

Laundering money is one of those things that SHOULD be done. Most Johnsons (or Smiths and Heaths) will want to maintain good relations with a team if the run goes well, so they are not likely to mess with the money. Happy runners mean good reliable freelancers available in the future. If the run goes south, I can see the money being more likely to be tainted.

That would be true if the missions were set up in a rational fashion, but the typical SR approach the guys who just got arrested have information that can cause the Johnson major issues. Like pictures of him. And it's what they have to trade. So not getting the "disposable assets" arrested is extremely useful to the Johnson, as he probably doesn't consider himself a disposable asset.

My team is well known for no unnecessary geeking. The team leader is an Alley Cat Shaman.... make it personal, and he' will geek you quite publicly, as a stupid message of hormonal dominance thing, but you'd be surprised how many corps are willing to write off losses when they don't include death benefits. It's the cost of doing business, and by going non-lethal, you are saving your target money. It's professionalism. The law never even gets involved if you do it right, because there is no way that Ares is going to Lonestar and telling them that the contingent of Knight Errant trained secmen got taken for the latest R+D info on a new type of *insert anything here*

Hell, I know people who are low-rent security guards... they go to work to put food on their kid's table. There is no reason to kill them when a stick and shock or a stunbolt will suffice.

Do it right and if they find out who you are, they hire you, not try to off you.