Now i'm curious.

So, in the Karma Point build system, races cost nothing, but give you the ability to have higher max stats? So, a nosferatu troll would just be awesome and stomp everyone into the ground? (not that a sane GM would allow that)

No' quite, for two reasons. 1) Trolls cannot become nosferatu. 2) Nosferatu are a quality, not a standard racial option. Becoming a nosferatu would cost 300 Karma in Karma-based chargen.

Note that Free Spirit is NOT a Quality but is a 'metatype' substitute. This means that in the Karma-system, they make out like bandits.

Kay. Too bad though. It would have made for a nice FBI campaign.


They tended to be shot, to be precise. Vampires, on the other hand ...


Thanks. I'll see if I can get my hands on a copy.

I can't speak for the decisions of the editing staff, but I have it on good authority that the original writer was trying to introduce new famous free spirits, rather than rehash old ones. Whether or not that was the Right Thing to Do, that was the way it was done.

Characters like Buttercup bring a huge amount of lugage, and the short profile we provided for each of the various races would not have done her/it justice-which is why I fully back the author's decision to go with something new. Inclusion of Pulsar was a late addition and reflects continuity with recent plotlines. And I was on the fence about including Milo Czerda, but he's obscure enough that I added him because he showcases two important points about centaurs.

Maybe not, but there are several incidents in which you probably are going to have to.



You know its still illegal to have them if they are in your house? Its not like I'm walking down the street with it. Its all carefully concealed and I'll get away with it. But that doesn't make it not illegal.



Sure, but loads of runners have guns with the R or F next to them, so they have actually illegal ones.

Could someone please explain the backstory about this to me ? I'm insanely curious. I'm vaguely aware this is told in an old FASA novel. From your nifty site, I gather there was one elven nosferatu in the 1800s (he must have been quite unique: elven spike baby, genetic carrier of the nosferatu strain, and having the right genes for becoming an elven nosferatu). I understand he was pretty unique back then, but how/why he wiped out all the other carriers of the "elven nosferatu" genes ? Insanity giving him a taste for the blood and Essence of his blood kin ?

[/edit]Come to think of it, I shall instead to refer to Mason's Annotated Review of the novel, which is much better than my nanosecond summary.

Heh. Now what y'all are really missing out on is the spectral wendigo playtest. That was killer, as in TPK.

So he had a quirky dietary requirement that forced him to feed on just those persons that shared the same genetic complex that would allow one to become an elven nosferatu, hadn't he ??? Aww, man, that sucks (pun intended).

There goes my hopes of playing the most elitist of the metatypes, Infected into the most elitist of the strains

And another plug for my website! Thank you, thank you, I'll be preforming here all week. Please, try the roast, and don't forget to tip your waiters.

I'm still relating that to the 'going to the pub' part.


Sure, but don't carry them unless they can get away with it.

Great web site, on a side note.

I guess I am saying that 'getting away with' and 'committing' one is merely a subset of the other. Maybe the vampire just murders street bums in the barrens. Not like it would be hard. Who would notice?

I love the first sections about how to run correctly. It's something that all dumpshockers know, but I'm currently introducing a group of about 6 to shadowrun, and less than half have played pen and paper rpgs before. I am making those sections of runner's companion compulsory reading.

Although, I was reading through, and was pretty happy with the art; nice cover (was it the same guy who did the Shadowrun Companion?), some good stuff to start off with and then I hit the metavariants. Honestly, the "my eyes!" description was not an exagguration. It dissapointed me because the metavariant artwork in SR3's companion was pretty nice and solid, and you guys already re-used a bunch of artwork in Arsenal, I don't know why you didn't do it here.

I am so glad me and the other players in the NeoTokyo game I am in are not standard Shadowrunners. I liked when one of our guys went and stabilized the security mages who almost died from Overcasting some major stun balls. And stabilized the guys driving the truck when they freed some of the other runners who were about to be shipped off to Berlin for, as my GM put it, "Vivisec-er...interrogation."

One thing I previously overlooked: The nocturnal negative SURGE.

What the hell? -1 on all mental attributes during day? Like why? Because they like to stay up at night rather than day? Are all other races' mentals reduced by one at night? Hunh? Or do Nocturnals have some unique feature that makes them require more sleep than average people? Can't they get used to the irregular sleeping patterns all runners follow for some mysterious reasion? What if they get themselves a sleep regulator?

The book appears more and more to have been a little ... rushed.

Maybe their biorythm is not as adaptable as others. Couldn't it be that being nocturnal means being more strictly so?

Is this guy like for real? Dude: magic.

i can actually relate to that . . or as i put it once during a gaming weekend when being woken up before afternoon:"i can't brain yet, i have the dumb"
i am pretty much nocturnal, i like to sleep for a long time and i like to get up late . . basically, with societys rules for work and most everything else, i'm pretty much thoroughly shafted . . and i do tend to be more alert at night times too . .
as for runners companion: now i wanna build a centaur-cyberzombie with 6 arms . . 4 raptor-legs with skimmer-discs, cyber-torso, 6 cyber-arms, cyber-skull made to look like a horse-head . . i'm gonna call him . . binky O.o
on that note, can one have unbalanced arms?
as in one left arm and 3 right arms?
and what about bio-muslce-stuff for additional limbs?
maybe not for centaurs and other things, but metahumans who surged into having 4 or 6 arms?
and what about cyber-replacement?
with more limbs one could actually gain something from an averaged stat if all of those limbs are cybered up to nowhere . .
or imagine the 6 armed 4 legged cyber-zombie centaur up there fully armored . . in the taking damage compartment, that one probably could duke it out with a main battle tank O.o

What Shadowrunner has an ordinary sleep cycle? Sorry, this doesn't fly. Also, stahl, by default, you are not nocturnal. You seem to have reversed your biorythm with training - which I see no reason as to why NOs shouldn't be able to do.

no, i did not . .
allways been like that, since i've been a little boy . .
sadly never changed over time, i suffered the whole time i went to school and the such . .
now i do tech support with work not starting before 14:00, so i am now a little bit more happy

Mutant!!

Did you happen to go to this school, by chance?

i have the diploma to be exact . . i will upload a scanned image some day . .
and yes, i am a bit on the mutant side . . allmost perfect night-vision, light sun allergy, eyes changing colour from time to time . . going berserk due to heritage from a viking tribe with some berserkers in it . . close to perfect immune system . . gremlins . . yes, i'm a powergamer built it seems *snickers*

The Nocturnal quality does not equal a "night owl" or someone who has a preference for a noctunal lifestyle. The Nocturnal quality specifically refers to some innate physiological or psychosomatic limitation, that makes the character/person feel lethargic, slow-witted, unattentive and unresponsive during the daylight hours. Someone like Stahseele above, or one of the numerous animal species that have noctural (or in some cases seasonal) biorhythms.

OK, that's more than fair enough. We'll probably see the full write-up on her when you do the "MegaCorporations of the 2070s" book or something, eh?

At the very least, what she's been currently up to, other than collecting Manga and slowly working her way through Dunkie's Comics.

Those are very valid arguments. Now I'm really anxious to see how they will be disregarded. I hope they won't be simply ignored, that would be lame.

Haven't you heard? She's dropped the manga and moved onto Tolstoy. She's also had a certain european dragon with a penchant for underwater shenanigans burn her a few Rachmaninov symphonies. I for one approve of her becoming a bit more eclectic.

Proof people really do not understand those who are mostly nocturnal. Thank you sinner for putting it so eloquently.
I know that I get more awke and function better at night, but, when the sun starts coming up, my brains tarts getting fuzzy, and those simple things most people take for granted(like, thinking on my feet) become less and less possible.

And this has always been the case..I really do NOT function well during the day, ever. I have always found it more natural to sleep during the day, and be awake all night. Allt hose freaks who are diurnal need to quit thinking that beign nocturnal is a choice! Heck! Sunlight gets me depressed, while night time makes me not!(Yes, that is right, I suffer Seasonal Affective Disorder in the Spring and summer, when the days are getting longer, instead of like most people do in fall and winter)

Still begs the question why people who prefer daylight activity aren't slapped with the same modifiers.

Scratch the nosferatu bit, and the point still seems to be valid. Being a troll lets you spend more points on your attributes than being a human does, on top of the higher starting values...

oh but don't they?
most people i know ain't all that bright at night compared to daylight time . .
and they REALLY don't see good at night either . . i don't even switch on lights in my flat when it gets dark, i can see just fine, and if i have visitors they don't even see me coming from time to time . .
oh, you mean shadowrun rules wise . . my bad . . not at the top of my game at the moment <.<

Do ordinary characters get -1 on all mental stats during nighttime? If so, please show me a quote and correct citation ...

In IRL terms, I seem to be fairly flexible. I don't have jetlag either, I just accept the new local daylight cycle. Guess that's my special mutant power. Go me.

I believe this all falls under psychosomatic effects.

yes, yes, i ninja-edited in that i misunderstood you ^^

So it can be bought off by behaviour therapy or something? oô But is magogenetically determined?

And the behaviour therapy would be represented by the karma buying off the flaw.

It's basically a genetically based phobia.

Also,

Die, surgeling freak!

hey, leave the little one in peace, i am much more stranger than him *snickers*

You can buy off race-related disadvantages? For real?!

And thanks Stahl.

How about the Pixie's Race-Based Disadvantage of being ~45 cm?

'Cause one of my players just made one.

Makes sense. A group may not want to use some types, like sapient critters, but it's hard to pretend they don't exist entirely when they make up part of the fictional universe.


Damn. For real? I mean, is that the official position?

Anyway, one of the things that bugged me was the organization contacts. It's neat, and the general info was useful. But it would have been useful to have some info on the similar/related groups as well, especially when you consider how very different the Atlantean Foundation and, say, Apep are in style, tone and apparent goals are.


Oh, speaking of DF trustees. Grace. That character sounds familiar.

try and find ANYTHING in that size . . cyber, bio, weapons, clothing, armour, tools, vehicles . . damn, the whole fairy would fit into a CCU or into certain drones to commandeer them O.o
and if you happen upon a fight inside a room where you can't just fly up out of reach? a troll could put you into his pocket for fucks sake x.x . .
there's heavy pistols that are larger than 45cm . .

No, that's just my position. Officialdom has not ruled either way. Of course, officialdom has also not ruled either way on the sapience of cockroaches or the existence of "toy" paracanine breeds either.


Do tell.

Question about the Karma generation system:

Is it right, that the characters will start with their natural minimum attribute without any costs? You don't pay for your metatyp, but you still get the advantages for free? Ok, you will pay more Karma for incresing the attributes, but if I think about a troll, who will get 82 Karma for free for his Strength 5 and Body 5 at the beginning of the generation.

seems like it.
as far as i understood, this karma system is using the same system to build the character as is used to improve the character . .
so technically while in creation the karma-system works as if you had built a character using build-points without improving ANYTHING and then takes the (un)finished character to proceed to improve him with karma untill he's actually done for game-play . .

Got it in one. Humans have a slight advantage in KarmaGen as they can get higher attributes while spending less points than metahumans, which is part of the reason the cost for race is waived. The real slam-dunker is skills, though.

Ironically enough, there was an old joke in a previous group I was in about "If you can fit into someone's pocket, you can also fit into their mouth."

"for you're crunchy and taste good with ketchup!" not only for dragons anymore!

"What wine goes with Pixie?"

"They're magically delicious!"

"Betcha can't eat just one!"

"Shortpig, not just for ghouls anymore!"

but that is a rough comparison, because the Human has to pay more, to get to the same level as the troll...

moreover, the Troll gets improvements like +1Reach, +1Armor, Thermo Vision, which are worth some BP/Karma...

cya
Tycho