Ok, so I think I'm doing something wrong. See, no matter how tough I think my NPC's are, they seem to never be able to lay a finger on my PC's, and my players kill everything way too fast, and way too easy. Like, super easy. Tonight they took down a freaking wendigo in like, three rounds. What the hell. Any advice? Should I just give everything craploads of armor and dish out extra boxes of Physical Damage? To give some perspective, the PC's karma ranges between 12 and 16. I'm not entirely sure of the scale of power in SR4 yet (kinda new).

Thanks for any help.

First, running more will help get a better grasp of what works. Second, on the wendigo, your players have a big advantage : ganging up on something. That goes a long ways in SR.

Next , remember tacics. This isn't D&D, which is a common mistake. You hack away at things, and you're going to get hacked back. Read my sig. Bear in mind Initative passes as well, as that can be a real killer if mulitple PCs have them , and the opposition doesn't.

Remember modifiers, where and when to apply them, and that the opposition can find ways to make them apply to players and not themselves (Friends in Melee, vision modifers with correct gear, etc).

Also, a lot of players will try and get things over on a new GM. It's just what players do. Try and know the rule books better than your players. I'd suggest not allowing the expanded rules books right away, as it's a lot of information to take in at once.

There's a lot you can do to level the playing field. Most often though, it comes down to experience. So don't worry, you'll get it.

Shadowrun is a game of glass cannons (or Eggshells with Hammers, if you prefer). It is very easy to be killed. It is very easy to kill.

A full group of runners vs. one wendigo, I am surprised it took 3 rounds.

What you want to do is use tactics. Have your NPC's take cover, & pit multiple goons against the runners. Be sure to apply all applicable modifiers - note vision modifiers apply to attacks. Vision modifiers also apply to Line of Sight spellcasting.

Note that unless your PCs are specialized in soaking damage, a few shots (2-4) can & likely will drop them. If they are so specialized, give the goons AP ammunition; just do not take away their specialty entirely, as it removes the fun from the game. If they are specialized in avoiding attacks, use Friends in Melee, Wide Bursts, & Has Defended Against Previous Attack modifiers.

The real thing you have to ask yourself is, "What advantage does my side have that the players do not". In any meaningful combat(any combat that should be difficult) the enemies should always have at least one thing giving them an edge that makes them more difficult and requires the players to think on the feet or else wind up dead. Perfects those corp sec guards aren't all that well trained or armed, but they do have a mage with a mage-sight security set up giving them some mojo backup. Or maybe that cyberzombie had the area filled with a poison gas to weaken the team, a gas the he of course is immune to. Just as your runners can't expect to just go up against your foes guns blazing and win everytime, your foes need to use some tactics and play to their strengths and the runners weaknesses to survive.

Get your NPCs in groups (waves even), have them find cover before opening fire at characters, have them use gas grenades and flashbangs. If the NPC's are in their element (say, corporate security guards defending the facility they work at), throw in the Home Ground edge.

Don't forget shadowrun involves multiple worlds; The astral, the matrix, and of course the meat. Maybe your PC's have physical supremacy, but what happens when they have to weather an attack by an enemy hacker and his system's pet IC/Agent. Also, don't forget that any opponent worth the bullets you feed them has some magical support. Security teams might have an on-sight mage, who while can throw spells at you, is probably much more of a threat as an astral scout, and as a support magician counterspelling and using spells like Heal and Armour.

Also, don't forget backup. Sure, runners can walk into a facility and kill the security team, but there's a good chance a call for re-inforcements gets out, and then the runners have limited time before more, meaner enemies show up ready for action.

They key thing in Shadowrun combat, even in SR4, is that it's tactical.

In other RPGs often fights are more like a game of Rock 'em Sock 'em robots where the sides flail away until someones head pops off.

Tacitcs enter into play three ways

1. Taking advantage of modifiers or avoiding line of sight. Corpsec guards love to shoot around corners with smartlinks and generally get all the modifiers they can. Players should do the same. Though with large dicepools this isn't as effective as one would hope. However at the least it can prevent use of the "I call a +4 damage shot" thing..

2. He who shoots first usually shoots last. SR is deadly. Most PCs will be able to kill or at least incapacity one of the other PCs in a single pass as often as not using guns or spells. Now maybe you gave the highly paid enemy $200 ity bitty pistols, and that could be a problem. But if they have a respectable firearm, especiall one with full autofire the PCs may have difficulty taking a single shot (unless they can build up modifiers)

3. Surprise. There are (kinda fishy) rules for it. Bottom line is that the players aren't likely to die to the cyberzombie charging across the road. It'll be the corpsec guard hiding the in bushes with a SMG. With aiming modifiers and no dodge on the PCs part (plus maybe the +4 damage thing or some autofire), surprise means downed PCs.

I actually avoid using that one too much. You'd be surprised(or maybe not so surprised) at how easy it it to kill PCs when you treat attacks like success tests.

SR, like most games using guns, has some significant differences from the real world or non-gun games.

First, PCs almost NEVER miss. At least they don't if the GM doesn't throw some huge modifiers at them. But even if they are at one die, 1/3 shots will hit if they have any chance at all.

Armor is a good thing to have, but it won't save your ass. It's only worth, on average, 1/3 of it's value in terms of reducing damage. If someone gets a 5p with 3 successes you need, on average, a total of 24 points of armor and body to soak it fully.

Remember that in SR people CAN dodge bullets. Make the roll, if you can exceed the number of successes they have they miss.

So

1: Don't allow the players to all shoot at one target. If you have 4 players in 3 turns that should be about 21 attacks the the Wendigo has to soak. That isn't going to happen without heavy magical reinforcement.

2: Have the bad guys use cover and concealment. Make the players make the rolls to see them. It's hard to shoot at what you can't see. If you do this, the bad guys also need to roll to see the players.

3: Have the bad guys use smoke and flash packs.

4: Use drones. A Steel Lynx has vehicle armor, so you need to get a DV of 9 (without autofire, etc) to scratch it. And it can dodge and use smoke too.

5: Use magical threats. We once had to take down a dragon with 8pts hardened armor and 8 points of magical armor. Very little hurts something with 16 points of hardened armor. It really kind of sucked before we killed it with multiple volleys of AVRs. Force 8 area of effect spells forced one guy to burn edge to escape death and had one other pretty hammered, with everyone injured to some extent.

6: Use mages. Stunball isn't just a great spell for the PC mages to know.

Ah, but there's a difference between killing and downing. There are a number of ways to achieve this. For one with a single shot weapon and a more gruntish dice pool there is only so much damage possible. If it isn't enough to insta kill a player they just need medical treatment.

A weapon that does stun damage is also fun. My personal favorite is a machine pistol full of flechette ammo (using the updated rules that make it worse). With recoil comp it can dish out a huge load of damage, but between the flechette modifier and full auto not adding to penetration it'll probably be stun. So let them take 15 boxes of stun and watch them fly. But they'll be alright.

Also it's a bit more realistic. The flechette ammo is more likely to just stick into walls instead of blowing them up like explosive or punching through to waste valueable company property or employees. But it still presents a lethal threat when needed.

Or just use gel rounds.

You get the idea.

Worse comes to worse in SR4 they can always use edge to stay alive by burning at the least.

Personally, when I throw something at the characters it falls under one of 3 categories.

1) The Goons. There is an endless supply of goons in the world, be sure to drown the game in their blood from time to time. The other side effect of this is that it gives the players a chance to feel like they are a big deal in the game world without toppling the game world.

2) The Hierarchy. If you have the urge to rough the characters up, throw some higher grade bad guys at them, that's self explanatory. The trick is that they tend to get ganged up on, and moshed over, looted, and otherwise foiled. The procedure that I've found that works is throw goons into the mix with a couple of higher grade enemies. Or if you want to scale it up, add a "Boss" archetype into the mix, as long as you have the rest of the hierarchy. And if that isn't enough, add in support, whether it's magic/matrix/snipers/whatever. And if that doesn't work, add backup, lots of backup. And if that doesn't work, the fight has gotten out of hand and gotten the attention of "The Authorities." And if that doesn't work, nuke them from orbit . . . it's the only way to be sure.

3) The Wacky. This is the category that you can use as a plot device. Bend a rule, within reason, and catch the characters off guard, under equipped, or under informed. This can anything from souped up goons who reanimate after they're killed due to adrenaline pumps and move by wire, to a Shedim ridden corpse pulling the pins on 2 incendiary grenades and giving one of the characters a hug. Pulling out the wacky scares the players into thinking . . . try it it's funny.

The other big option is to make the adventure not about killing something. Pull them into a political arena with dirty bureaucrats. Have them back stabbed by a dirty law enforcement officer on a "Perfectly Legal" job. Make them find something out through finding it out, instead of killing it, or nearly killing it. Let them pull a job for someone with unseen motives, and have that catch up with them . . . All you have to do is make killing not the option, and it's a whole different game.

Wow, thanks for the responses. I hate to admit, but I completely forgot about modifiers. I feel kind of dumb about that, especially since I spent most of last year running Warhammer FRP (very modifier heavy). I think that'll really tone down the amount of dice they're rolling, especially the fragging adept of the group.

And on the subject of mooks having backup, creating waves of badguys, about how fast does Lonestar, for example, respond to a situation? The PC's are in a Lonestar heavy area, and I wasn't entirely sure what their response time was.

officially they travel at the speed of sound or light and have a response time that's measured in single digit combat rounds . . realistically, i would say between 5 and 10 minutes . .

Lone Star response time are really up to you, but I'd base them off actual police RT or DocWagon RT. Several of the older books (most notably "Neo-Anarchists' Guide to Real Life" from 2nd ed) have charts for that kind of thing.

Lone Star response time is whatever is dramatically appropriate and intense <--IMPO

Books vary.

But realistically Lone Stars response time will vary a lot. And it doesn't all come as one blob.

Hackers can be present via the matrix and gridguide almost instantly. Mages and Spirits can also be realistically inbound in a matter of seconds. However you probably have to tick them off to get them to use their precious magical resources.

Next drones could come by. If an area is AAA rated, there is a fair chance that a drone is loitering in the air not too far off and could be around in combat turns. As the ratings go down the drones get thinner.

Cop cars, bike cops etc are highly random. Again in AAA areas it could be fast. For example with the few universities where I've seen such info they're supposed to have "campus" cops deployed so that there is one in any given block.

The books also have heavier responses showing up quickish. But realistically I'd say it'd be a while before the citimasters and choppers and such start rolling in.

Not that those shouldn't see use in your campaign. Remember when a runner blows a stealth roll or something the disturbed code monkey isn't going to start yelling that they've called star. They're going to try and hide under their desk and not wet their pants.

But star will be ready to party fifteen minutes later when the runners come out.

Hit them with a tactical nuke?

Escalation. First comes Lone Star officers and when they get wailed on then comes the Lone Star Specialists, then comes the thor shots. The thing is they will gang up on you with tons and tons of attacks. 40 officers even with crappy pistols they will take down a runner generally through destroying your dodge pool and nickel and diming you to death. Lone Star will try to beat you with numbers not with skill. They will use IR smoke grenades, or mortars, or explosive grenades to flush the runners out and then wail on them. Even if they are firing with penalties they are still going to be fierce. They might mob you with low level affordable spirits (force varying from 2-5.)

Think surround and win with numbers for a good tactic. Pen the runners in and force them to make a choice. Sometimes they shouldn't always fight.

Also remember colateral damage. The more they blow up or harm the more corps and response they will elicit. Destroying a store, wailing on some Lone Star, destroying some streets and killing civilians might have a larger response then just better Lone Star operatives. Sometimes corporations will work together to try and kill a threat.

For response time by lonestar to a public disturbance, the time varies depending upon the neighborhood. Here's my take:

AA or AAA, less than five.
A is at or about five
B is about 10 minutes
C is about 20 minutes
D and E is about 30 minutes

Z: No response barring spill over or major incident (like people start lobbing rockets) would they respond. Even then they would come in Platoon strength at a bare minimum.

For private security, response from an offsite team is anywhere from 5 to 25 minutes, depending on the quality of the outfit.

I would also assume that Lone Star and the other Security outfits can get drones or and/or spirits and astral presece there much quicker, in half the time.

I agree with overwhelming numbers but a police force utilizing explosives greater than a flashbang would not see too many people renewing their contract. However, gas grenades such as neurostun and nasuea would be accepted. Collateral damage = bad.

First off, I'm a 3rd edition GM so not ALL of this will fit, but there are far more cross overs in GMing, especially within the same game under different editions, than there are differences, so, without further ado, I drop:

The Three Commandants of GMing Shadowrun

1) THOU SHALT: Lead by example when presenting your (NPC) characters. No matter how much it seems necessary to add in extra boxes of Physical Damage and the like, avoid it like the plague. The short term response may even look worse, but the Players will start to get wind of what is what if you abide by the rules AND by the spirit of the game, they'll usually stop being enamored of the childish die pool monsters and start making characters that aren't travesties made to exploit the mechanics.

Bigger even than one, no, HUGE over all; maybe the single biggest thing you can do to stop the problems:

2) THOU SHALT: Take the bull by the horns and TALK TO YOUR PLAYERS as equals who have not only an equal say in the game and how it is run, but also an equal responsibility for it's quality. There is a reason I preach so adamantly NOT EVER treating your Players as less than yourself and that is simply that the more the power, the more the responsibility. THAT is a fact of life. If you make them aware that THEY are as responsible as you are (which you can only do if you share the power of course) for the quality of the game they CHANGE, drastically, if they are worth a powdered blow to hell to begin with.

3) THOU SHALT: Be prepared! The Boy Scout Motto returns! Know your job, study it, learn it, and don NOT be afraid to admit that you were wrong and to try to fix any screw ups you WILL INEVITABLY make along the way. Do not wing it if you can help it. The more often you wing it, the more often you WILL SCREW UP. That is incontrovertible as death and taxes. More so than taxes. You don't have to spend tons of time on preparation, but you do need to know what you are going to do, roughly, and have either a fine enough command of the rules to drop in fully usable NPCs off of the top of your head, or you will have to use pre-made ones. Do NOT be afraid to use the archetypes in the book. They are never as good as decently made PCs, but they will do. Change a stat or two, drop a different name and personality on them and viola, you are good to go.


Isshia

Original subject:
Modifiers and mass numbers. There are no boss fights in SR4. Synner helped me out in a reply to my own call for help.


On the subject of cops:


Every game is different. I envision people who have suffered through all that brought the Sixth World as a dangerous frightful bunch. It wouldnt be hard to imagine everyday police officers buying and using milspec gear today, just imagine after some VITAS, Ghostdance and the Dunklezahn assisnation. Large sections of the populace would demand the police carry big boom boom and use it with "Extreme Prejudice".

"Why should the police carry something smaller than what I got at Weapons World?!!" -- someone like Brakhaven.

Or at least that's the way our group envisions the future.

Lone Star is never late, nor early, but arrives exactly when it wants to.

True. Although the Lone Star of previous editions had "Land Shark" missiles. I forget the details but they were sort of like bombs/missiles crossed with a small hovercraft. The idea being that when fired it would land on a road and attempt to ram the vehicle. If it couldn't connect it'd atttempt to not cause collateral damage. And if it does connect it'd be a point blank hit.

They're big and heavy though. Not the kinda thing you have a multi launcher full of. Rather the sort of thing a chopper or LAV would have a pair of. And even then you'd have to piss of the star fairly well.

That type of mentality is for when collateral damage does not matter. When the star rolls into the barrens, they roll out the big guns. For most encounters, they fear the loss of their contract if they cause as much collateral damage as they are trying to prevent. Of course, that is personal interpretation, but even the mechanics sway it to my thinking. Who needs a fragging HE missle when it's far more effective and cheaper to lob a few freezefoam, neurostun, and flashbang grenades at the same target. I'm not trying to make the star the fluffy, happy, play nice brigade, but it's just as effective as high explosive responses and more consistent in terms on most world views. By all means though, throw the gel and SnS rounds out of a minigun.

Don't forget about Edge! Give all your NPCs a few points of Edge and cackle madly as the PCs begin to drop like flies. Combine Edge with autofire for double the fun.

Wow, I feel dumb. I completely forgot about Edge. That'll change things around a bit. I guess I'm just used to those kind of mechanics being reserved for PC's.

"Heavily armed terrorists holed up in fortified site. Had to hit them with a JDAM. Here's a form to file with your insurance company."

SR is a very violent world. Remember Knight Errant and the Cermak hive? Don't make KE really want to kill you....

Grunts are supposed to possess a "Group Edge" pool based on the number of grunts in the group. Use it sparingly, & never burn it. Any grunt can use Edge from the pool, but reduces the pool for every grunt.

Prime Runners (NPC's on par or better than PC's) possess Edge as normal PC's. The only difference is that for them, burning Edge to survive takes up all their Edge, opposed to PC's 1.

As has been said ... Mooks, Modifiers and Tactics make all the difference.

You gotta remember to be selective with modifiers though. Dice penalties in SR4 affect characters with low dice pools a lot more than characters with high pools, and the guys with lots of dice to throw around tend to be the PCs. That means that dropping a smoke grenade is a tactic that will almost always backfire on the grunt, resulting in a demise that is even more untimely than usual.

Some other things:
Area jammers + wi-fi inhibiting paint. Or as I like to call them "Rigger Bane". There are ways to get around these tactics but it requires a little prior planning and occasionally sacrificing some mobility.

On the other hand. Drones DRONE DRONE DRONES. They're cheap, they can be made fairly smart fairly quickly and if you'd be surprised what a difference 4 AR/LMG wielding doberman can make in a fight.

Suppressing fire is your friend and your NPC's probably have access to more bullets than your PC's do. Throw down a few fixed gun emplacements (at least places where corps sec can throw down a few sandbags and set up a tripod LMG/MMG with a couple boxes of ammo). Suppressing fire is an excellent way to:
A.) Pick away at your players dodge pools, health, armor, etc.
B.) Pin them long enough for a few guys with grenades to get close enough to be a few guys without grenades.
C.) Remind players that there are probably more of the enemy then they have bullets.

Suppressing fire isn't going to kill your average hardcore runner but it's going to make him rethink his "I stand up and headshot everyone" plan. It's also gives one IP mooks something more constructive to do than die in the 3rd and 4th intiative pass when they'd normally be drooling.

Remember that mooks are people too. They're PC's in their own lives really. They realize that there are all these horrible people out there who want to kill them for the stuff that they're guarding. They probably don't want to die all that badly. Mooks are going to take precautions, even if it goes against company regs. Most of my mooks have a hitter or two of some flavor of combat drug that gives them an extra IP or two. Furthermore they're going to invest a little of their own money in their equipment. Maybe not all of them but someone is going to drop the 100 nuyen or whatever for a custom grip or heavy barrel or whatever. Maybe her husband bought her some FFBA for Christmas... whatever. In every group of mooks there's probably an extra DP or two rolling around you aren't accounting for.

Also, don't forget to have your mooks run the fuck away and regroup or just panic and flee into different areas. With the surprise rules a single terrified guard in a broom closet can be a nasty surprise.

Three words for ya: Fully Destructible Environments.

Yeah, your Wendigo ain't much of a match for a large group of well-armed individuals. But Wendigo XP is smarter than Wendigo 98, he knows that Powerbolt can be used against inanimate objects, so instead of standing and fighting he just blasts the floor out from under the PCs. They don't fall far, but they fall hard, and they're hit even harder when he follows this up by tossing a grenade down the hole and then levitates a severely wounded PC back up the hole that was once a floor, summoning up one of his spirit buddies to conceal both of them while he escapes with his snack.


Consider two great FPS games, Red Faction and Jedi Outcast. In the former, blasting holes in the environment is one of the best ways to get around. In the latter, Force Push is more powerful than a rocket launcher due to the plethora of unshielded bottomless pits that are a staple of Imperial architecture. Attacking directly is rarely the most wise option.

Go watch Aliens and Predator and then run that encounter again

Or, in the case of the wendigo, spirits.

And don't forget that enemies might know their home turf much better than the PCs.

How i'd handle the wendigo encounter if i'd be in the mood for some GM sadism :

Let him set up a cadre of watchers (not to patroll or anything, watchers are too dumb for that- but as a set of magical survailance cameras- remember that a summoner is mentally connected to all of his spirits) as first line of defense.
Then let him send in a summoned and a couple of bound spirits to soften up the PCs.
Make use of the wendigo's ressources, that guy's most likely a full-blown mage.
The spirits will be using hit and run tactics, of course.
Materialize in a safe place, sneak up on the group using Concealment, hitting them with their nastiest powers (for starters, splitting the group with Fear), vanishing into astral space and retreating to regroup and do it all over again.
The summoned spirit, most likely having the highest Force, will make use of the powers most crucial to your NPC's plan, the bound ones will serve as a nasty distraction.
Avoid direct confrontation, as directly confronting half a dozen of well-armed professionals equals getting yourself killed.

As soon as one of the group's members has to be stabilized because a hostile spirit almost choked him to death and another one is isolated, confused and stumbling through the wendigo's lair while constantly falling over his own feet (ah, the wonders of the Accident power), it's time for the wendigo to walk up to him and start using mind control.
Influence and Compulsion are just lovely powers, aren't they?
Especiallly when combined with Physical Mask to pass as one of your teammates...
Ta-daa, your hunt for the monster of the week has just turned into "save your abducted friend from being turned into a cannibal servant/wendigo chow".

By that point, the thread's title might change from "My players are too tough" to "Help, our GM is murdering us", though.

But the expression on a player's face who has just realized that, for the first time, he's not able to one-hit that enemy is just priceles.
And as long as you play fair, they'll love it (once the initial shock has worn off).

This thread is so full of win.

Don't limit yourself to just tech solutions... like in the OP, wendigo's have natural vision magnification, meaning they can hide a long ways away and cast like crazy on and around the party. Slap a camo spell and higher ground, the poor PC's may never find him, even though they are getting harassed every step of the way.

SQUIRRELS!

Seriously, squirrels are the source of all evil.

They shoot their teeth you know.

Just one thing:
BOOM, baby, boom!

Seriously: Have the runners go into a trap where the bad guy has set up lots of fancy explosives. Bring the house down on them.

If youare needing security that will not do that, gotta ask this: Do the PCs have protection against Neurostun Gas? Are tehy all running around in insulated armour? You want to give some corp sec some lasers? It is not about power..it is about playing seriously. You goal is not to kill the PCs, of course......it is MUCH more fun to capture them!

In many ways I think it's better for the players to lose a fight to a gang armed with mediocre weapons than to get hit with something that pushes the "I Win" button.

A bunch of gang bangers on kamikaze (at least 3x the number of PCs) armed with pistols, some AKs and maybe a scoped sporting rifle or two (from a good distance) can clean the clock of most any group of PCs who are careless and/or overconfident. Particularly on the gang's turf, where they know the ways to maneuver behind or to the flanks of the PCs out of sight of the PCs. A concrete wall to your front isn't cover when your being shot from the rear.

Having the PCs get a bloody nose and retreat in confusion works just as well or better than killing some of them.

I had shootouts with gangs end with everyone agreeing to take their wounded and just back off when both the PCs and gangers decided their friends were all likely to get severely dead in a few seconds if they didn't back down.

Of course, there are players who would never consider retreat to be an option.

That's what invoked high force spirits with the Fear power are for.

If a player is too dumb to retreat when he's being pwned then he deserves to have his character killed.

Agreed ornot, death is the only cure for the stupid.


Although something to remember is that in higher dicepool games modifiers really lose allot of their teeth and in my opinion this detracts from tactical thought, both sides should not only be trying to raise thier dicepool mods as muich as possible they should also be doing everything in their power to lower the other sides as well.

I think one thing that is important to remember (at least its important for me to rember as GM) as that the PCs are supposed to win most of the time. You job as GM isn't to defeat them, it's to challenge them. This is an important distinction to be made.

A second thing to remember is that you don't have to play fair. At all. Often times I fall into the trap of designing a set of opposition that would be a 'fair' match for the PCs. There is no reason you should do this. Design your opposition to be over-matches. If an equal number of security goons isn't proving challenging enough, then double it. Triple it even. If one wendigo is not proving enough of a challenge, then you run can have a twist! The runners thought they were hunting one wendigo. Opps! Turns out its a pack of them!

Or you can design a single opponent who is an over-match. It could be a very powerful magician, with associated spirits. A well armored cyber-zombie. A killer rigger and his drones. A dastardly technomancer or AI. Or an insect spirt, free spirit, blood spirit, or even lesser dragon.

Don't play fair. After all your players probably aren't either. They may complain a bit at first (it's a force WHAT spirit?, it's rolling HOW many dice to resist? don't these gangers ever end!), but in the end they will usually find that their triumphs against the odds are much more satisfing then when they steam-roll the opposition.

This is certainly true. Your job as a GM is to give them interesting choices to make, not to just throw the table over and scream "The world blows up! I WIN I WIN!"

Don't be afraid to cheat... but be sure to cheat for both sides.

Pulling an extra wendigo out of your ass is a perfectly reasonable way to make combat interesting rather than "We roll dice at it until it dies". If that second wendigo starts spanking the crap out of the party and you're hazarding a wipe... consider some alternative solutions for the players to pursue (read: RUN AWAY RUN AWAY!).

Don't be afraid to introduce complications in the heat of battle as they become available. In my experiences players are more than willing to suck up some bizarre complication (the crane in the loading dock is going CRAZY!) than simply walk all over the opposition.

Make it interesting by god. Combat shouldn't be fucking dull.

No, you don't pull out another Wendigo to up the challenge. What you do is pull out the Wendigo's uninfected kid, who runs out swinging his plastic Neil the Ork Barbarian sword to save mommy from the bad men.

Any GM can pull out extra opposition to prevent an overwhelming PC victory. It takes someone special to let them have their easy victory and yet make them feel like total assholes for it.

The real trick is to time it so that the PCs still have a precious few seconds to perform first aid on the dying Wendigo, without stretching the rules, so that they have a chance to avoid a depressing ending without being coddled.

What hyz said. That's so much cooler than an extra wendingo

As a player, if I carefully figure out how to crush the opposition using excellent recon, appropriate weapons and effective tactics I really DO want to effectively walk all over the opposition. It's the "your character wakes up in his pajamas and there are 8 SWAT guys aiming automatic weapons at him. The statement of intent for your character is?" scenario, but in reverse.

Yeah, you definitely want to avoid voiding all your players hard work and planning...

Unless of course that's the point.

There was a great Blackjack SR column back in the day:
http://web.archive.org/web/20020214172248/...page=bovine.htm

Weird shit happens, the best laid plan of mice and men... all that... strange unaccountable shit happens and the likelihood of your players figuring out every contingency for fighting a wendigo is pretty low.

Someone on /tg/ pointed out a while back that the ultimate "screw you" to your players was to have a sequence with Yakety Saxplaying while Lofwyr chases them through downtown seattle. Just to break from the normal grimdark of the Shadowrun world. Perhaps you'd like to try it? Sure, it makes no sense, but it gives you an excuse to toss enormous enemies at them afterwards.

I have to disagree, I think it is bad DMing to sculpt the world around the character's abilities, unless Corp A has a really fragging good reason to staff Lab X with world class special forces as opposed to standard sec guards then the characters are going to face standard sec guards and their 6-8 Dicepools before equipment mods. Still, I really liked hyz's idea as ussual.