That stuff was not 'in the course of their duties' - it's a fairly specific term that covers situations like this: You're on an armed patrol in a combat area. A civilian unexpectedly runs out at you, you shout the challenge, they don't respond, it's dark so you think they have a gun and shoot them.

Edit: To be clear - it has a specific legal meaning, like 'the reasonable man' or 'the idiot in a hurry' or whatever. There is an associated test to be met.

Wrong, they were in the middle of combat operations and decided to take a break to rape and pillage (My Lai)... the argument was that they were just following orders...

Same in Abu Gharib... they were just following orders, in the course of their duties...

I will admit that the distinction can be Made that once they diverted from "normal operations" that they were then not acting in their capacity, but this is not an accurate picture (and is for the Courts to decide)... Lowering themselves to their baser instincts was a choice that they made and they use their position to try to evade prosecution... in the case of My Lai, it worked for 25 of the 26 charged with the crime ("Following Ordders")... What a load of crap...

The military is held accountable to Codes of Military Justice, and during times of peace (and often times of war) to the Laws of their host country... Military crimes and war crimes are still punished in this world, though not as often as they should be in my opinion... But that is neither here nor there...

And from your example above, when they discover that the individual running was a child carrying a blanket wrapped baby, and did not speak the language, there is a military investigation for wrongful death... When something like this occurs, there is always at least a military investigation (or there is a coverup), and sometimes there is a civilian investigation, depending upon the country in which it happened... there have been several examples of such instances in both Afganistan and Iraq...


Keep the Faith

Yeah, there is a military security design manual (an old one, the current one is FOUO) that says a fence adds something like 10 seconds of time to the break in. It doesn't matter (within broad limits) how tall it is or what it has topping it. Unless you have something crazy like a double fence with mines between them....

If you can actually use it as the point where you detect the break in (instead of when they set off the alarm in the room you want to protect) it's great, as it adds at least a minute to the time the response team has to catch them. Otherwise it's a pretty pointless waste of money.

And yeah, assault rifles and MGs are really high threat. The only thing that gets you higher on the chart are RPGs and mortars.

This I can definitely agree with...

Keep the Faith

<<pointless>>

This is a bit of an aside, but one thing that both amuses and disheartens me is the fact that some people think of a residential privacy fence as an extra degree of security when in reality it's quite the opposite. Now, it's true that a simple solid fence might dissuade Dennis the Menace from trampling the azaleas, but when it comes to anyone with a bit of determination all you're really doing is providing them with some handy cover on the way to patio door (which, knowing most people, is made of glass and never locked). Oh, sure, it'll look a bit suspicious if they have to go up and over the fence, but that takes but a moment and after that they're free to wander around the backyard with impunity.

I remember when I was in high school a couple of bored teenagers committed a string of petty burglaries around our fairly affluent neighborhood. Predictably, they went up and over backyard fences and would help themselves to the fridge and maybe take off with a wallet. They were only caught when they tried getting into a home that featured no fence or fancy landscaping, which meant it was easy for the stereotypical retired busybody to spot them and report it to the police.


Moral of the story: Fences are often kind of silly, and there's a reason why real security fences aren't all solid and opaque.

However, it is greatly improved if you have dogs. Everything is more secure with dogs. Heck it just looks more dangerous so people will go elsewhere.

Now, I can't prove the veracity of this since I saw it on television once (can always trust the trid, ammirite?), but I've heard before that actually just having a sign that you have a dog or a security system is actually more effective than owning either, simply because you can put it in an area where you can be certain people will see it. Plus, if the dog is anything like mine, it's entirely possible that an intruder will just be warmly greeted and considered a new very special friend.

Oh exactly. Crims are not dumb, they can easily look at the houses in the street and do a risk reward calculation. Dogs are actually particularly cool because unless you're some sort of K-9 ninja, there is no way in hell you can tell what a dog does just by glancing at it. Is it an attack dog? Sniffer Dog?

Finding out requires sticking around for ages, and the last thing you want to do is 'lurk suspiciously' while an armed security team is watching you.

I hear that. The most terrifying dog I have ever encountered was a St. Bernard that would stealthily approach strangers on his lot but not do anything to announce himself. It's only when you made eye contact or started moving away from him after he sat down that he'd start barking. As long as you stood still, he'd just stare you down, which was still rather worrisome. He wasn't actually trained to attack, as it turns out, but as you can imagine he still scared the hell out of people. It was frankly just bad enough that you turned around to see a big fraggin' dog.

This implies that once someone is viewing a "sim module," they are no longer capable of any action whatsoever. This does not reflect the knowledge I possess regarding the system. Could you elaborate, please?


Please explain the logic underlying this conclusion. The shadowrunners would have a chance of escape, but no certainty of it, just as they'd have had a chance of being captured, but no certainty of it; this is absolutely the opposite of railroading.


Professionally I've done some work here, too, and I think that figure is utterly ridiculous. I don't know what sort of checkpoint you're talking about, but these figures are distorted by orders of magnitude.


...okay, then. We're not playing the same Shadowrun. That's cool. Later.

I don't think that's true, but I also don't think you're completely off base. The Corporate Court is one option, and I think if you played your cards right you could get National Courts to intervene-however I think you'd be correct to say that these are exceptions not the rule.

Of course all of this assume there is no internal courts in various extraterritorial entities.



I think there's an assumption that Lethal force has to be used in these situations. Even in a corporate zero zone I think it'd make sense to start with nonlethal options-a dead infiltrator can't tell you who hired him, or how he found the loop holes in your security system. Now I do think you're correct in that if faced with overwhelming force any reasonable security officer would defend themselves, anyway possible.



I agree, that armed opposition has drastically shifted Use of Force paradigms but again dead men tell no tales. When you're discussing this kind of investment-a zero zone must cost billions of dollars a year-why wouldn't you pursue it to the next step? The team you shoot dead on the wire isn't the guy with the bucks who will just hire another, smarter stronger team, with better equipment.

Don't get me wrong I'm not completely disagreeing with you. I do agree that lethal force would be more common place in 207x than now, and that there are more tools in the box for LEO's and SEO's. But I don't think it precludes nonlethal options. But I think this all comes down to a personal play style argument. if you prefer a little more lethal, hey the game allows that! If I want a little less lethal, hey! The game allows that too!

Sure. But why not shoot him with ammunition that won't kill him, and thus eliminate any chance you have of learning who sent him, what he was coming for, how he found the weaknesses in your defenses, and so on. You may learn nothing in the interrogation - although that's highly unlikely - but it costs you very little to try, given the possible benefits. Since nonlethal means are at least as effective as lethal means, you can afford to knock him out, try to find out what he knows, and then kill him if you want to. If you kill him first, you lose any other possibilities.


Whereas the Use of Force mandate specified by your employer is very much a concern, in the future as in the past. If nonlethal measures were vastly less effective than lethal ones - as they are today - then yes, jumping right to the killing is reasonable if the opposition is highly lethal, but that's simply not true in Shadowrun.

As regards fences - speaking generally here, and not in response to any specific persons - they should, in my view, remain important portions of any layered security plan. Provided they don't obscure visibility, fences serve a number of significant purposes, the most obvious of which is preventing access by casual criminals. No fence will keep a dedicated, prepared operator out of your facility, but it will slow them - even slightly - and give another chance to detect the point of ingress. Since dedicated, prepared operators are rare, this function is significant. Double layers of fence with no-mans-land between costs very little compared to the possible savings.

Will a fence be enough? Almost certainly not. But they are, and will remain for the foreseeable future, an important, comparatively low-price, highly effective portion of the overall security plan. They're not applicable in all situations, and they're not a panacea for all ills, but they're important, nevertheless.

As long as the RAS override was disabled then dumping someone into full VR would prevent them from moving at all. Of course, I think it would be wise to use a special commlink that had no access to the outside world at all in order to prevent a Decker from working his special brand of magic. Not sure if you'd be able to do anything to a Technomancer since they could in theory hop into VR on their own first, perhaps give them a -2 Dice Mod for being distracted?

I was under the impression that with RAS enabled, the user simply suffered -6 to their dice pools in the real world. This is a good restraint, don't get me wrong, but it's certainly not disabling!

True but in previous editions RAS was the default and you had to actually manually override the safety protocals ala Hot/Cold Sim in order to move at all, and you still took the massive penalty. So I figure that since the fluff is supposed to still be valid that it must still be possible to enable the RAS and imobilize someone.

You can absolutely enable the RAS by default and lock it on, but my point is, in no edition of SR that I'm aware of would RAS actually immobilize someone who tries to move: they face steep penalties, but those penalties are pretty small-scale compared to simply being unconscious. Why give someone a -6 die pool penalty - or a +6 target number penalty - when you can simply render them unconscious?

Hmm, I'll have to double check my books when I get the chance because I could've swore that the penalties were after you've disabled RAS. As for your second point, IF I'm correct and RAS does disable you then you'd render them unconscious first and then use VR to keep them helpless while you decided what to do with them. If you are correct about RAS then yeah, dumping them into VR is pretty much a waste of time and we are back to handcuffs and drugs.

Etraterritorality makes it kind of a moot. In Ares land it is an Ares judge. But on the last part, yeah they might want to ask you questions. But they can always interrogate your commlink later, after they kill you. ANd that is just a matter of time.

One thing to also consider, as a corp, what is the likelihood of the facility being hit? (Low value, or remoteness are factors)

Why?



So why wouldn't they attempt to limit what armed individuals would do? Otherwise why not arm all security personel with rocket launchers and miniguns? Why not let gun down even corporate citizens? Oh wait, because common sense dicates a use of force policy. Sorry for busting your balls.



I do agree that physical evidence can help, and I also agree that it's just a matter of time before you get the nine millimeter bullet billed to your family.



Agreed. One thing here that's difficult for people is to see how a corporation would prioritize things.

Probably the sort of checkpoint run by a government which spends $500 on a new toilet seat or 120 grand on a single air-to-air missile. He's obviously not accounting for the fact that most Megas will produce the weapons used in their own security and pay the workers in a currency they completely create and control.

Not to mention that the corps get to charge their guards so many fees and levies that they might as well be slaves in the first place.

Competent people don't work for people who don't pay well and provide decent gear. If you pay like mall guards you'll get mall guards with automatic weapons.

Exactly, which is why "corp sec" are generally nothing more than jack booted thugs armed with automatic weapons and are just itching for a chance to use them.


Exceptions made for "high end" security of course...

Keep in mind as well that a lot of corp employees will be probably running double duty as security assets rather than being a complete sunk cost, with the classic example being the wage mage who keeps a few watchers up while working on new spell formula or search. Sure, there'll be the occasional dedicated security mage or spider and a couple of guards that spend all of their time on checking the locks and making sure everyone is productive, but that doesn't mean that a coder cannot be allowed to put aside their work for a moment and load up the Attack Program in the event of an emergency.

Hell, one time I had a face who knew his cover was blown fail his perception check and critically glitched his infiltration roll (which I also make in secret*) while trying to find a spot to lay low for a second while the team got to work creating a diversion. He ended up huddling in the corner of the break room (shush, it wasn't a triple A; these guys gave breaks) next to a vending machine, completely oblivious of the secretary who promptly screamed and hosed him down with Pepper Punch and eventually tasered him on the next round. I mean, of course she was going to respond properly; she's technically one of the last people you see before you can get a meeting with the facility director, and this is in a world in which people have guns implanted into their arms.


*I let them stipulate whether they want to buy off glitches and 0 hit tests with Edge, before the roll, I just prefer that they don't know they've screwed up their stealth rolls until somebody spots them; kills the suspense.

We solved this dilemma by not actually rolling until they have been put into a situation where they might be spotted... at that point, the security team (drone, watcher, whatever) rolls its perception check while the infiltrator rolls his stealth... missed rolls are immediately obvious and initiative is immediately rolled... This tends to eliminate the "I rolled 9 Successes, so I am gonna go through this place with no real regards to what I am doing" syndrome...

Keep the Faith

How do you handle glitches and crit glitches?

Normal Ways... Spending Edge can negate, convert of course, however, when not obviated, then the glitch causes an immediate reroll for the opposition if they failed initially, and a crit glitch draws attention to the infiltrator, whether the opposition failled or not...

Has worked out great for our group... infiltrators tend to think about what they are about, rather than treating the infiltration like it was a walk in the park, knowing that the opposition had no way of detecting them...

Keep the Faith

Man, that's a simple fix. I tend to overthink things sometimes.

Yeah, It has worked wonders for us...

Keep the Faith

Eh... that just means you still roll immediately.

It is the difference between:
"Hey, where did Bob go?"

"Damn, I'm good."

and

"I can barely make you out, Bob. But I think you are just fine."

"OK."

Remember even your own teammates can try to make Perception against you.

Okay, some things about shadow run

A) It's a 'two shot' enviroment. If you get hit, you are then going to die with the second shot because the wound penalties mean you won't be able to dodge properly

B) Everyone has actual armour. Some of it is quite effective. All of your threats are going to wearing armour that is better than what the cops have today (because it has fully body coverage and is rated IIA), and many of them are going to be wearing stuff that is rated Type V and is quite difficult to penetrate (FFBA + chamelone suits is 14 dice? and is definately within easy reach of orks.)

C) Ammo is insanely expensive, and stick and shock is AMAZINGLY expensive.

D) Your options are normal bullets, gel, APDS or stick and shock.

Effectiveness of those options

1) Gel is out: Typically it's just going to bounce and the extra two dice are not helping
2) SnS: Strong option, counted by non conductive armour. If armour modifications mods on FFBA and Chamelon suits stack due to the override provision in FFBA, it is completely useless I play that it doesn't, but it is unclear).
3) ADPS: Will kill people, highly effective vs shadowrunners
4) Normal Bullets: Not as good as APDS, may struggle vs tougher characters.

It obviously depends on the enviroment, but it's typically much more effective to go with the APDS and cheaper too. Stick and shock is worth considering if you do want to capture people, but seriously it's hard enough to stop your guys on the door dying, and it is both less effective and more expensive than APDS.



Do you guys watch what happens in Iraq? I ask because if you do, you'll see people get killed for driving up to checkpoints all the time. I am unclear on exactly what you think the difference is in threat environment is. Please clarify.

@Cost estimates: I know you can multiple so

3 people at checkpoint

5 people for each person at the checkpoint to run the other 2 shifts, one to be on training/sick and one to be on leave.

Medium lifestyle = 5k a month, thus once we include long term savings, we can say that salaries are 6k a month (we're not talking rentacops here)

Indirect costs of employment: twice a persons salary, approximately

Total cost = 3 * 5 * (5000 * 2) * 12 = 1800000 Nuyen

If I am over inflating the cost, please tell me EXACTLY which cost area you disagree with. This is a significant underestimate as it does not include capital costs such as the checkpoint and equipment, and no-one is allowed to take a lunchbreak.

No, Of course they can, but the big difference is that you will not have people rolling tests every time they get a chance just to hopefully improve their infiltration threshold (which good GM's should curtail anyway)... it is IMMEDIATE rather than static... which, as I have said, tends to make people actually think about what they are doing rather than relying upon their nigh impenetrable infiltration successes of 9... it fosters a whole different level of interaction and caution. You never know how well you are gfoing to roll until it has possibly been defeated... Win-Win in my book

Keep the Faith

If you do not want people rolling tests every time, then shouldn't you make it static? Also house ruling tests like this makes it nearly impossible for Stealth type characters to work - if for every person they encounter (who then makes an opposed Perception test), they must make a Stealth skill check, it would mean that the odds of them eventually rolling low becomes a very real possibility and almost impossible to actually sneak or hide. In this case, you might as well just go in with guns blazing.

Unless of course, that is the type of campaign you want.

It is not the amount of rolls tht is the issue, in general, we roll when it is dramatically appropriate, when there is tension... Static is boring and removes the illusion of danger, especially when you know that there is no way in hell that the individuals can see you (you made an exceptional roll with a high number of successes and are wearing equipment that will remove dice from their perception)... doing it this way brings back the tension BECAUSE you could roll poorly and be discovered... it injects an amount of potential danger back into the scenario...

And yes, it is the type of game we prefer; as I said, I have been in the other type of game, where the characters check each other with perception checks until they are effectively hidden (ie, they continue to roll until they get an acceptable roll, in their opinion)... it ruins the suspense and tension of the game...

Of course, the other option would then be to have the GM to secretly roll infiltration for everyone, but a lot of people do not like this solution (and the GM has better things to do anyway)... our way is a very happy medium, you are still in control of your own dice, but you do not have knowledge of the outcome before hand... it is quite a nice compromise...

Keep the Faith

The part where they get paid in nuyen and have a hope for retirement where the corp doesn't simply liquidate them and their savings just to increase their 3rd quarter profits. These guys are nothing more than house slaves who don't know it because of strict information control and a lifetime of brainwashing. Hell, I'd also assume that they have a low lifestyle. Barracks life for years. Corpsec is property, not people. What are they going to do? Quit and get tossed out on the streets with nothing?

Right, the problem with that is

A) You're going to get second rate personnel. I'm assuming we're guarding serious stuff, which means we have serious professionals with skill ratings of 4 and stats in 3-4 area. If you pay peanuts you get monkeys, and in the 6th world VITAS is going to ensure that labour shortages of skilled personnel are even more acute than than today, remember that the black death laid the foundations for the end of serfdom.

Now you COULD use underpaid chumps, but then you're going to get underpaid chumps, who professionals are going to carve through like a hot knife through better

B) Second rate troops just don't rate as a threat to a cyber sammie. You're dealing with hostiles with synaptic boosters II coming at you. Second rate troopers cannot even hit them. If they don't have cyberware, training and professionalism, they are just not going to be able to deal with the tight professionals and fantatics coming at them.

Basically it boils down to if you choose to use the Pakistan or Egyptian army vs the American or Israeli's. The opposition are slick pros, and those others guy don't know how individual initative is spelt due to conscription and bad schooling. How can you expect them operate correctly in a very difficult and infomation rich enviroment? It's proven not to work.

You're looking for people who will die for they are protecting!

Part of the problem is that in the setting, despite the population reduction the SINless masses represent massive unemployment that allows the serfdom to still be a valid policy for the corps, and of course, I disagree with the idea that Runners in general are nearly as skilled as Dumpshock makes them out to be.

Nova Hot facilities of course are the exception, but even there I see the truly badassed guards as being the HRTs and not the standard shift rotation.

The problem is the SINless are extremely poorly suited to have jobs. At Rouke's drift, the Zulu's had a couple of tens of thousands of rifles - but because they didn't understand how rifles work they didn't understand that because the bullet fell off at range, you didn't point directly at the target. So their snipers couldn't kill the english in the compound. Despite outnumbering them literally 1000:1.

The vast majority SINless haven't been to school. They don't even know how to do formal arithmetic. Most of them probably don't even know what thermo-optic camo even is, let alone how that impacts you as a guard.

The SR4 enviroment actually requires a fairly in depth education about the range of possible threats, because you have to know exactly what independant spirits, summoning mages, cyberzombies, adept, cybernetics, hackers, riggers and possession mages can all throw down at you. You have to be aware of magical, matrix and mundane threats and be aware of how to deal with them. You have to know exactly how to deploy smoke to maximumly impede mages, and also how to recognise that someone is possessed, or notice the you smell something that shouldn't be there.

You have to know how to operate ultrasound, radar, UV, thermal and low light optical equipment. You have to understand what capabilities that gives the guy with the sniper rifle firing at you (for example, you need to know to stand back from the metallic wall so your body heat doesn't warm it up). You have to be able to order dozens of different drones.

Soldiering has changed radically with the introduction of technology - now the US army tries to focus its recruiting efforts on those in the top 25% of mental apptitude. The threat environment in the future has cyber and magical warfare tightly intergrated. Unless you understand all categories of threats, you will not be particularly effective at your job. The consripts are going to run away from spirits, because to them they are literally a creature of myth. They'll fire their pistols 'Gangsta style' and not hit anything at all.

A beat cop of a soldier is a product of 12-14 years of training. A SINless doesn't have any of that. They are in the masses of unemployed because they have no skills at all.

Sure, but I'd argue that the invent of simsense has leveled the playing field, 'jacks are cheap and allows the use of knowsofts which should cover most of the background training that you rightly bring up as being important, sure, their active skillsets would be below par, but the knowledge that you aren't really anything special and will be discarded by the corps after they rip out the one piece of tech you need to be able to survive in the world should provide the motivation to get better and fast.

Umm, if your guard is powered entirely by skillwires and knowsofts, you should just use a robot. They can work 24 hours a day and don't get distracted/relax, and are cheaper in every way.

I'd fully support entirely automated facilities. A human guard obviously has to be more capable than a drone.

Drones are only really cheaper if you go the skillwire route, which I don't necessarily agree with, knowsofts and 'jacks sure, but skillwires are alittle much for a simple guard.

*EDIT*

Plus I'm not sure that Drones are smart enough in play to be able to relaibly think on their feet to trust without a Rigger's overwatch.

But someone using chipped skills and no actual knowledge of their own is? When you knowsoft someone up, you're just giving them computer programs to execute. Drones are incidently way cheap, a drone costs less than a datajack + equipment for a basic guard.

Actually this might help us understand each other - what do you think a basic guard looks like? At a secure research facility or something. (not at the mall)

Well remember that I see the corps as merely renting the guard's equipment to them in order to keep them and their children's children endebted to the corp for all time whereas drones need regular repairs and upgrades, ect...


Still when I get a chance I'll have to stat out a few guards again, I lost most of my notes recently.

What you fail to realize in all of this is that you can acquire all of that training by enlisting in a Corporation and serve a stint in Desert Wars... you will learn all about everything that you just ran that comprehensive list of when it comes to environment, and opposition and threat assessment... at that point they move from the Desert to the Facility to become guards... No Formal schooling or knowledge other than hard life experience... MANY of your lower level guards for corporations would probably see something of a similar scenario... Experience trumps simple training every day of the week and twice on Sundays...

I knew a grunt in the Marine Corps that was not very bright when it came to classical education, and he scored the absolute minimum on the ASVAB test for entrance into the Military, but his experiences in both the grunts and in the Gulf War led to some pretty in depth knowledge in those things that you enumerate for a competent corporate security guard... and he was capable of operating every piece of equipment in the Marine Corps arsenal (Radios, UV, Thermal and even Low Light Optical Equipment), as well as most of the various weapons from light pistols to heavy machine guns (Including Rockets, Mortars and explosives)... you do not have to be cream of the crop (education wise) to be effective at your job...

And by the way... a typical beat cop serves in this capacity in the first year after Graduating from Cop School... not the 12-14 years you are ascribing to them... they must gain teh experience on the street just like any other beat cop... now whwen they have teh expereince of being on teh job for 14 years, then yes, they are very skilled...

Not all SINless are SINless because they have no skills...

Keep the Faith

I get your point that you don't necessarily need academic education or aptitude to be a competent guard. On the other hand, once a guard has become skilled, through whatever means at his disposal, he is no longer part of the faceless masses of wage slaves. He is a trained professional and if his employer won't pay him accordingly or give him the necessary equipment to survive, he will simply leave to take a job with someone who pays better, unless the SR setting has changed in a way that there is even a surplus in skilled employees.

The problem with security guards, I asssume is, that the necessary skills are at least thought to be taught or learned quicker than a lot of academic or other professional skills.

BTW Those of the SINless who have skills will a) apply for one ASAP b) wouldn't want to become CorpSec Guards in the first place.

This is one of those threads that just gets stranger the longer it goes on. I'm going to chalk it up to differences in play style and life experiences, and leave it at that.

Really? Oh well...

Keep the Faith

Yeah. I've been in these situations before, and it generally ends up leading to a couple of guys listing off their qualifications, which just makes it look like I'm swinging my big dick around: this does no one any favors. That said, for purposes of credibility, I guess it wouldn't be a terrible idea for me to post to the "who the fuck are you, again?" thread.

Suffice to say I'm not convinced Cthuludreams knows what he's talking about, but people should do what works at their own tables.

Yeah, everyone has their own opinions, and sometimes you just have to let it go...

Keep the Faith