So my DM from the Game That Causes Cancer has some rl issues and wants to take a break to get his life back together. The rest of us have seen this coming for a while, so i've been subtly hinting that i'd be willing to take the reigns for a while. Last week, we got together, and i explained enough about the setting to get people interested. So finally, I GET TO GM SHADOWRUN! I'm gonna use this thread as a place to ask my silly noob gm questions.

Other than a few aborted attempts, I've never really been in the gm seat, so any general advice would be welcome. We're gonna be using sr4. The only book we'll be using to start is the BBB. I wanted to get a chance for all of us, including myself, to get a solid grasp of the basics before adding more stuff from the expansion books

Characterwise, so far the only definite character is essentially a Street Shaman with a bit of a Joker motif. He's the only other player with a copy of the core rules, so since he already has a completed character (complete with background) he can help me guide the others through character creation. It is going to be a fairly large group at eight players plus me, but i've been gaming with these people for years now, so i'm not too worried.

I know the others were a bit bewildered by the sheer possibilities. I didn't have any stuff with me, but it was just as well. I wanted to explain the history and a bit about the Sixth world, and I also gave a brief description of some of the archetypal character types. And then I wanted to let the info percolate for a week before our next session which is probably gonna be a chargen party. I've got one who seemed to be interested in a technomancer, i think as much to have a character different from any others she's played over the years. Another player is probably going to be a Troll,and he was asking a lot of questions about adepts.

You need to make sure that everyone is on the same page as to whether or not the world is "Pink Mohawk" or "Ice-Cold-Pro", also make sure that people understand how dark and "evil" the world is at your table.

As Ravor said, giving them a basic grounding as to what the world is going to be like, is a good first step. For example, in some games, killing cops (the Star) is a good way to get yourself killed, as serious response units start coming down on them. In others, it's no big deal. So make sure they have a common understanding there. I've seen too many games where new players thought nothing of riding a bus with an assault rifle.

If you're giving them a week, give a couple of players the loan of a book. Give them a chance to read over some of the history and shadowtalk on their own, so they get a feel for it. If you can get them to read any of the fiction in the books, or on the SR4 site, that might help too.

Eight people is a lot to take on for a first game. It helps that you all know each other, but you're going to have 6 people that have no clue of what they're doing rules wise. So for the first one, keep it content heavy, rules light. Give them more time to interact with the envrioment, and maybe a couple of quick combat sessions. Along the same vein, make suggestions like getting Doc Wagon, for when combat goes wrong. Other than that, just be patient, and be flexible.

Noooo, dumpshock ate my post

I don't feel like re-writing it at the moment, but the short version is, take it in slow steps, maybe don't use all the rules right from the start (Even all of them in just the core book), make them figure out their DPs, but correct them, and give them the benefit of a very high BP common sense because their characters will know much more about the shadows than they will.

All good suggestions.

I would think about splitting the group, at least until everyone has their character finished. That way you have 2 books per 5 people, assuming you are there on both sessions and can use your friend's book.

For a simple plot maybe take a look at Food Fight 4.0. I wouldn't however use the "simplified" rules contained in the book.

Thank you for all the replies so far.

I'm not really worried about the size of the group. Like I said, I've been gaming with this group for going on 6 years now. I'm familiar with most of their strengths and weaknesses as players. And I have a knack for "dumbing" things down without insulting people.



I'll discuss it with them, but I'd bet the group will lean more towards a step or two above "Pink Mohawk."



Great minds must think alike. I've already been eying that, and working on adjustments for a group this size, mainly adding a thug or three.
Any other thoughts on this would be nice. I've also got a copy of On the Run, but i'll probably want to throw a milk run or two at them before first.

Bully for you, the world needs more Pink Mohawks out there.

OK, so the chargen party went about how I expected. Earlier in the week i lent my book around. A couple of my players have enough experience in various systems so that they figured out SR quick enough to have characters that just needed tweaking, which meant i could spend more time with the others. So here's a quick overview:

Onyx- Troll Melee tank, cybered out to be a combat monster.
Romulus- Elven Street Ninja
Jester- BTL addicted street shaman
Kendall - Human Technomancer
Kachena- Navajo Smuggler (played by an actual Navajo)
Unnamed- Elven Weapon expert
Unnamed- Mystic Adept (more adept than mystic)

Then I have one more who's still undecided. Probably a face, most likely an orc. Most of the characters she's played could be described as face types, but she flat out said she likes faces. I have no problem with that. I'd rather her play what she likes. She's our groups artist, and I think she had an image in her mind, so I figured i'd draw on her strength and have her draw her character, and we'd work on the crunch later. She had the picture done by the time we broke for the evening. The two most interesting aspects of the character being one hell of a braid (which she already had a story behind) and what looks like a full replacement cyberarm.

Next session I'm going to run a modified version of food fight as a tutorial, then give the players one last chance to tweak characters.

I am sorry to steal a reply here, but I just wanted to say I envy you mate:) I would love to play more SR then I do by the time, and you just did what I really wanted to do, start a game from stratch.

I wish you very good luck:D

Metapunk

I hear you. I've been wanting to do this for years. The last time i had a chance to play sr was way back when a friend picked up second edition not too long after it came out.

Oh, something else to keep in mind is that although there is nothing inherently wrong with high dicepools, most of the "gamebreaking stuff" disappears and the ruleset runs much, much smoother at lower dicepools.

I kept all the sheets, and looking over them, it seems everyone has about a 10-12 dp in their specialties. I'm meeting with the two unnamed characters and the smuggler tomorrow to finish up with them. I left them my copy of the book, but the all the weapon expert and smuggler need to finish is gear.

Last night we had our first run. I'm just gonna post a link to a thread one of my players started. Apparently he enjoyed it enough to be posting about it roughly the time I was in bed.

Player's post

First I let them spend an hour real time engaging in a little light RP and trying out some skill rolls. Onyx and Jester both have mild addictions, and they decided to have a street dealer contact in common, so they decided that they're reason for being at the stuffer shack was to meet him (Jester had given him the name 'Candyman', so I decided to go whole cheese and make him an elf with a Willy Wonka motif). The smuggler decided that she had been out street racing with her tricked out Eurocar speed machine, and had stopped for coffee. The look on her face when the explosion went off was priceless. The tm decided that her apartment was just down the street, and she was a regular at this store. The others were just simple things, the ninja was there for a hot dog, the mystic adept for beer.

Barring a few details he got wrong, what he wrote was pretty much what happened in the actual fight. My dice loved the players. I know that in a few places I chose to bend the rules due to the Coolness Factor of what they wanted to do. The fight lasted all of 1 full combat turn, With Crank dead, Stooby ko'd, and Fornis throwing his hands up and leaving before it even got to the npcs turn.

So after the fight they got the backstory out of Stooby and the woman. I decided that Fornis grabbed Joeby (who never even made an appearance) on his way out of the parking lot. The pcs dispersed into the night. I was nice and told the smuggler that the car had just taken some minor cosmetic damage but was otherwise fine, I handed out karma and we broke for the night.

It seemed that overall the players are excited about this. I think I even had the one player who wanted to watch this tutorial game before actually making her character a little sorry she couldn't get involved,