We regularly banter around the concepts of not killing guards, innocent people, bystanders etc. How about when we kill our own?

What would be the ramifications of a shadowrunner who earned a reputation for geeking other shadowrunners? This could be like "Il Duce" from Boondock Saints, as the killer with a conscience or the pragmatist who realizes that other runners often have the items he needs. I'm not sure if it should impact Public Awareness, but it should definitely have an impact when the runner walks into a runner bar and starts asking questions.

Thoughts?

It depends on how circumspect the runner doing it is. If a runner does it quietly with no witnesses around, he might eventually get a reputation as being a "jinx" - his fellow runners keep dying. Some people might even get suspicious at some point, since runners tend to be a paranoid lot.

On the other hand, a runner who shoots the decker in the face at a poker game might get the same notoriety that it took multiple kills for the first runner to reach.

Circumstances play a role, too. If the decker got shot in the face for blackmailing the other runners with vid footage of them breaking into the facility, then it would probably be seen as a "justified" killing.

Killing people that you're supposed to be working with is one thing, and can't be good for one's reputation. But it's far more likely that two teams will end up working for competing corporations, and when that happens, someone is going to end up dead. I can't see planting the opposition as being that much of a black mark on one's reputation.

I was thinking of beyond killing her own team members, or known associates. Due to the existence of runner hangouts and the like, it becomes obvious that members of the shadow community will know each other--by reputation if not by sight.

Now we have a runner who goes to the hangouts, meets people, and after a few weeks drops off the grid. Soon she starts geeking runners, members of the shadow community who have a different moral compass than she does, etc.

Well, if people are known by reputation, probably every male idiot between the ages of 13 and 30 with a firearm, something to prove, and a shortage of critical thinking/planning skills would probably have the idea of trying to kill the famous runners so as to boost their own reputation.

Their success, or distinct lack thereof, is a reputation itself. I don't think it would be too hard to draw parallels between shadowrunners of 2070 and gunfighters from the 1800s. Blurred lines of legality and morality, an image of a crooked sense of honor, etc.

The weary gunslinger who tells the kid to not even try it and finds himself killing young upstarts who got too big for their britches is a cultural artifact in our popular mythology.

Beyond the earlier references, Dexter would be another good example of the anti-hero who kills people worse than he is or at least believes that's the case.

Depends on where we start defining shadowrunner at as well, and I do like that bit of old west mythos also. Gangers with enough cred to saunter into a bit-better-than-shithole bar aren't that much different that the upstarts with a loaded Colt and more whiskey in them than sense.

The way I see it the biggest threat would be if they came after a runner when he was injured after a job. It's just a question of odds, if we assume infinite numbers of stupid young males with handguns...

Depends on the circumstances.

For example, in my current game, unless there is a significant turn of events, it is basically me (& Saeder-Krupp) vs. the rest of the group. How it is looking, one will be captured & turned in for a huge bounty, one will be killed, one will be let off unless he does something stupid, and the final one I am unsure what will happen - my employers want him badly, but I don't like my employers, & don't mind him...

Put simply, you do not want to piss off a professional assassin with legal licensing for milspec equipment in two major countries (UCAS & Japan).

In the above circumstances, if anything, my Street Cred may go up. If I were to just start killing other runners to cut down on the competition, however, I would likely earn some Notoriety & a lot of enemies...

The runner community is a web of shadow contacts. Whereever you are connected to the community, a small part of that net knows who you are and what you do, even if you do not know them personally. Evidence is of little importance, as the shadow community often has to act on reasonable suspicion.

If you have to hunt runners, it´s wise to communicate why you are doing that, and to act swiftly. If you give good reasons, you might even get help. Otherwise, your connections and those around them will constantly wonder when you´ll be coming for them.

Then you add that most of your targets have friends within the armed&dangerous category, who will take it personal. A corp would have to drop a pile of cash to get that kind of heat on you.

To me, it depends entirely on what you mean by "geeking other runners." Are you running across another team of Shadowrunners after the same doohickey your team is after, and beating them in a gunfight? Are you slitting the throats of your teammates so you don't have to split the loot? Are you the last man standing after a brawl erupts in a Shadowrunner hang out? Are you ambushing people in the alley out behind the street doc? Are you surviving assassination attempts where whole 'runner teams are out to gank you at a not-so-safe-now-safehouse?

Some of these things would make you hot shit in a champagne glass. Some of these things would make you a cold turd in a dixie cup.

The concept began with a discussion on how shadowrunners who are starting out and don't necessarily have all the contacts that they need, get the cool toys that they have. One solution put forth was a pragmatist who realized that other runners had the stuff she wanted, and so she killed them and took their stuff. She didn't kill her own team but targeted other criminals--effectively a predator hunting other predators rather than herd animals.

The concept has evolved a bit into a 'hooder who kills people that "deserve it." A whole ethos built up because the pragmatic answer rarely carries any weight in a conversation about why a person does the things that they do. There can be a bit of a schism--load gel and stick n' shock when going up against corp types, and swapping out for Ex-Ex or APDS against syndicates or other runners.

Because of the mechanics behind Notoriety, Street Cred and Public Awareness, it becomes obvious that no runner is living in a vaccum. The actions that she takes will have an impact on those three reputation lines, I'm just trying to figure out how. Some of the scenarios put forth have an obvious notoriety bump to them--killing runners outside the street doc is going to earn a beatdown by the community. What about killing a runner on their way to the grocery store or shooting them as they first step outside their apartment? If we completely separate the kill from any professional interest and it's just one shadowrunner killing another one, doees the reason behind the attack matter at that point?

Would a runner be more notorious because she kills other runners to take their stuff, but be less notorious if she kills them because they are Evil with a capital E?

If you geek another runner in the context of a 'run, as in they were hired to defend the site you attacked, well, that's just the job.

If you are hunting other runners outside of work, the principle "He did it to that guy, he might do it to me." will likely have the entire community looking for you, unless you had _very_ good reasons.

QFT

My stance on this that a 'gang' mentality exists for each group. A third party may alter their perceptions of your runner depending on the shadow communities take on your actions. The nearest and dearest of the runner you geeked are still going to take it personally.
As such for the third party it all depends on their personal opinion, what they have to gain and the events that went down/said to have went down.

Accidents happen. Being a runner is dangerous. But if someone starts to get a reputation for losing bodies, who wants to work with him?

Generally, i try not to kill other runners . . but if they did cross me in a way bad enough, i won't even stop before killing them, if they are on my own team . .
it's kill or be killed out there, if you start to make differences you might as well buy your grave allready . .

I'd think that the vigilante runner who offs folks he doesn't agree with happens occasionally. I say occasionally because I'd also imagine that those individuals die horrific and very public deaths. After all, everyone has friend right?

Of course if you're out there geeking pedophiles and serial killers you might be seen in a better light. That'll still undoubtably fuck up your notoriety and the like, making it very difficult to get work. After all, in the runner community, having a moral compass that drives you to kill would be something of a liability wouldn't it? No one wants to work with someone who whacks people who don't agree with no matter how pure their reasons.

Easy, you just need to aim lower.

-Chrysalis

Shadowrunners are basically mercenaries and thus are bet served by a mercenary ethos. If they are hired to oppose each other, then they should not hesitate. If they aren't, then they should avoid conflict because they may end up working together in the future.

addendum: Even though you're working together doesn't mean you have to totally trust them. If they have a notoriety, it may be best to have an extra hidden camera to watch your back.

I guess a related question is, "If some mafia boss or corporate exec went crazy sometime and decided he wanted to kill all shadowrunners, would shadowrunners as a group have good enough communication among themselves and a cohesive enough society to unite against the common threat?"

Anyone with modest social skills and some in-the-know contacts (fixers, Mr. Johnsons, etc.) would probably find out in short order that something fishy is happening.

If the antagonist is a Mr. Johnson, news will probably take longer to filter down through the grape vine. Such an antagonist would probably be inclined to be more discrete.

On the other hand, if a mafia don or similar syndicate big wig went on an anti-runner rampage, it probably wouldn't be as well concealed, though it might go down faster, making it harder to react to.

As for uniting against a common threat... I think it'd need to be a pretty exceptional threat, like, the UB or a Toxic lodge to get runners to put aside their grudges with each other.

-paws

The issue is how subtle he was. i mean people drop out of sight on runs or move town all the time. but if there's a sudden drop in locals or a runner bar blowing up people might notice.

The infamous Shadowtalker "Kane" still seems to get work somehow...

As noted, this depends on how subtle he is. Once word gets out, he'll be dead within the day.
Except he took extreme precaution.

ShadowSea, Nexus, etc are extremely fast moving places where information gets spread faster than wildfire.
Some time ago my team moved against a guy spreading HMVV(sp?) and once he managed to escape our effective operational area another runner team took care of it once we spread the word. Sure, favors got exchanged while doing so, but no real job had to be bargained about.



Of course. There is a demand for those guys aswell. They have a certain reputation for going over the top and your Johnson might want exactly that.

Or, sometimes, he's the only guy in town with a Blimp when you really, really need one.

OTOH I have done games before where I've encountered runners over and over sometimes they respect the fact that you can't always be on the same side of the fence, and don't go in all guns blazing.

I used non lethal force ^^ (where appropriate)

On the flip side, I don't think that every shadowrunner will have a mercenary's detachment of "You tried to kill me, but next week we'll knock back a few beers together, because it was just a job, nothing personal." Some of the colder pros might feel that way, ex-corporate or military types, or genuine mercenaries.

Most shadowrunners are closer to gangers than mercenaries, and they are likelier to have an ethos of responding to violence in kind, to show that they are not to be messed with. They will probably respond to violence by hunting the perpetrator down, and "Hey, Ares hired me to get the same prototype. Sorry I killed your hacker and ruined your cyberarm, but ambushing you guys was just business" really won't cut it.

And shadowrunners may be plugged into the same information network, and be capable of some minimal solidarity in the face of something threatening all of them, but I doubt they would all agree on appropriate behavior. There will be the cold hard pros, the criminals who take it personally, the ones who follow bushido or some other archaic code of honor, and idealists ranging from deranged terrorists to pacifists. And some of them will mix like oil and water.

Personally, I dislike street cred and notoriety, because they are not conditional enough. If your group got ambushed by another group of runners while sneaking out of a site, and hunted down/killed the other runners after the job was over, then the local gangers might be impressed, the MOM activist might be appalled, the cold hard pros might lose some respect for the group as being emotional amateurs (but demand extra pay to go against them, since they take it personally), and so on.

Blimp hit and runs, the shame of Topeka.

...that was the one nice parts of being a rigger in the earlier editions. Nobody else could do what you could.

..."good going drekhead. You just geeked our only ticket out of this jungle hellhole! OK, so who else here knows how to fly that thing?" [points at the "modified" Hughes WK-2 in the clearing as the sound of incoming choppers can be heard in the distance]

Oh, puh-lease. Just default. How hard can it be?

You know if someone starts a war with Shadowrunners I know a few teams which would see this as a perfect opportunity to "clean house". That annoying team that talks to the cops too much, the sleazy one, or the one who took your girl at the club last week.

All you do is give time and a place to the opposition and let them do the mop up. Or just blow them away with explosives, after all a 120mm shell is enough to take out a runner team in a sedan or leave a cavity for an apartment.

The effect of going after shadowrunners in general is probabily the same as going after a datahaven. Massive retailiation from many independant highly capable cells of professional misfits with to much intellegence and a bad attitude.

It's only really really bad if they're plager Wagner on the way in, then you know you're hosed.

Ha ha, like 4chan vs. Scientology.

...if the chopper had only a rigger tank and no external controls (as my rigger Josie's vehicles did) , very.


...hehhehheh...

I'm going to have Wagner playing in every Megacorporation Lobby that my group comes across.

Hell, it's going to be the elevator music!

Just to show them how boned they really are.

...of course it has to be in Muzak™ format and textures to work in the lifts.

OK, I'm going to need Wagner MIDI files...

Great, now i'm also inspired to get that music. Time to hit up itunes...