Hi, I'm new to Shadowrun and pretty much pen-and-paper RPGs all together. (Played some 3.5 a little but didn't really know what was going on) Pretty much the art style of the Shadowrun game on the 360 got me interested in the RPG and me and some friends sat down to play. They each built a character and pretty much, we have 2 Street Samurais (One Elf, One Human), a Drone Rigger (Dwarf), and a Hacker (Orc). While doing the characters (400 BP) everything was fine until I noticed that 1 BP is 5,000 nuyen, which seems a bit high. So, essentially everyone was buying nutso weapons like katanas and Ruger Super Warhawks from the start, which seemed a little odd, since the campaign we're doing has them at a Low lifestyle setting. I'm also finding it hard to employ the use of the Hacker in the mission. I mean, what exactly can he hack in fights to make it beneficial for his party besides lights? He uses his Skin Link to touch enemies and upload disturbing things to their commlink, which is neat. But can hackers mess with other NPC commlinks? Also, in the Shadowrun world, there are no laptops or desktops, everything is really just commlink right? We haven't really gotten into the Matrix yet since it's only been two sessions and a lot of what we've been doing is just practicing/rule fumbling in combat. Alright, sorry for the barrage of questions. Essentially here's how the campaign has been.


Players start off in low lifestyle apartment housing in an urban district. They're contacted by a mute Troll who gives them a random anarchy mission to destroy a pizza shop using a rocket launcher he mounts on the top of the Drone Rigger's van. They drive to the pizza shop and are being followed by a police car, since there's a crude rocket launcher bolted to the top of his van, but the Hacker hacks the police car's commlink and car distracting him by telling him there is a huge disturbance in another part of the city. Players get to the pizza shop, I have them make a combined dice roll in order to operate the huge mounted rocket launcher since it's hard to swivel due to the crude bolting job. Players blow up the shop, high tail it out of there. End of session.

Next session, players are told upon completion of that mission that they have more work ahead for them by the previous mute Troll's higher up. They're told to meet at a bar just beyond a police checkpoint (police are agro'd from yesterdays explosion) so they leave their weapons at home, except the Elf Street Samurai since he's got concealed throwing knives in his coat. Players arrive at the bar after getting through the checkpoint, some having to bribe the policeman based on dice roll. They get to the bar, end of getting in a bar fight with some drunk gangers with survival knives (in order to test out combat system) Come out victorious and meet with the Troll boss in the VIP section of the bar. Troll boss is also mute, and explains through commlink text that he's the leader of a Technocult which undergoes special rituals to disable vocal guards in order to give up one's voice to that of technology.


Alright, that's all I have so far. That's where we ended. How am I doing, and sorry for the long read. =P

You are limited to a maximum of 50BP worth of ressources (250,000¥). Expensive weapons and ammo don't conflict with a low lifestyle. They can even be the reason for said low lifestyle.
The really neat stuff isn't even available during character generation, as said stuff has availability ratings higher than 12.
You should not be worried about the conversion rate. If you and your group want to further limit the money, lower the BP cap on ressources. I highly doubt it will be nescessary, though.


Yes, hackers can hack NPC commlinks.
Aside from Commlinks there are also Nexi (large computers). More information on Nexi can be found in "Unwired" but it will not be nescessary for a starting campaign and you sholdn't burden yourself and your team with more rules than nescessary.
What can a hacker do? Eject clips from their smartguns, screw with their Smartlink display, disable cyberlimbs, jam their communication... there is a lot of stuff a hacker can do. All you need is a bit of imagination =) I am fairly confident there will be other posters here who can give you a lot more ideas than me, though. Matrix is not my forte.


I'd say so far, so good. Especially considering your previous experience in PnP RPGs. You can also take a look at some of the official adventures to get an idea how to structure missions and how to include a few plot twists. That all depends on how you and your group would like to play and what you expect out of the game.

If you are pleased, and your players are happy, then you are doing well. There is no other measure of success.

As D2F pointed out, there are limitations on how many BP's a character can spend on resources and there is a limit on what they can buy at character creation. If you want your campaign to be more "low-powered" then simply put limits on the equipment they can acquire. However, I would point out that (as the background is written) warhawks and katanas would not be terribly usual among the criminal element in Shadowrun. It sounds like you've got a good start to things though... and I am glad that the gawd-awful 360 game did some good in the SR world... for once.

Seconded! I am trying to to repress any knowledge of this abomination, but just like shit, it keeps floating to the surface!

Awww, guys, it was a good game. Had about as much to do with Shadowrun as cowpies do to powdered doughnuts, but it was a fun game.

@Gardens:
It almost seems like you're taking a GTA style approach to the missions which... well.. isn't a bad idea and probably helps keep some structure for your players.

For your hacker, they're not REALLY meant for combat. Yeah, okay, they can muck with things, but usually by the time they've hacked in/mucked gear up your street sammies have new heads for their poles. What you want to start thinking of is ways to include them in the fight via a few different methods:
- the fight is aimed around covering their butts while they do their real thing
- security spider - anti-spider (A spider is a security specialist/hacker who usually can control a building and all its electronics). Imagine two hackers fighting over if the door opens or closes while security is bearing down on your team JUST up that hallway.
- hacking enemy drones/etc.

Do this slowly, like anything else. You'll also probably want to start leveraging 'legwork' times into your runs, where your players can utilize their contacts for varying degrees of additional information that can help (or occassionally, hinder with rumors, if it's not a good enough roll) them plan and succeed in runs.

But, as someone already mentioned, if you and your players are having fun... you're good to go. Find the toys you like playing with and see if other things work as you go.

Thanks a ton for the help guys. I'm pretty sure if it wasn't for that 360 game I'd know nothing about Shadowrun. And hey, it's probably the only 12 dollar game that still has a community going for it. Thanks for the compliments on creativity, and yeah, I suppose it is kind of like GTA, heh.


I also had another question. When we were doing our practice fight, pretty much an unarmed bar brawl, the gangers were all drunk. I took that as a -1 penalty to dice rolls that involved reacting/attacking etc. When NPCs get hurt, I noticed there's a -1 dice roll penalty than a -2, etc, etc. When I roll for resist damage after the drunk gangers get successfully attacked do I apply a -3 modifier, since they're drunk and wounded? Or does damage resist get modified by either one of these? When NPCs are wounded what does the -1/-2, etc, apply to exactly?

The modifier applies to all dice pools except resistance tests. Healing seems to count as a resistance test, since the given excemple for healing shows no penalty to the dice pool.

Alright, so what about him being drunk, that also wouldn't apply to damage resistance right?

Usually cumulative, yes. Think of it this way, stunned to -2 in the dark adds the -2 to whatever level of darkness the room is at (pitch black would be -6 without hearing or what not, blind fire basically, so -8 ).

Also, physical and stun do cumulative, so 6 boxes in one and 3 in another = -3.

Those modifiers apply to anything that doesn't specifically state skipping the effect, like magic drain tests. So a Perception(2) + Intuition (2) guy with 6 boxes of stun and 6 of physical is effectively blind unless he runs into the neon signs. A line of dancing pandas could trapse down the street and he wouldn't notice... although, with that much pain, not sure I'd care, either.

No, it would not. Resistance tests are not affected by dice pool modifiers (with the exception of armor and armor penetration)

Alright great, that definitely helps me out a bunch. Thanks!

You're welcome =)

Just out of curiosity, does a Skinlink actually work as he described? I'm not looking at the book, but I thought you needed links on both sides. Obviously, he can/would just hack wirelessly anyway, but I ask for my own edification.

I assume he talks about the Skinlink Echo for submerged Technomancers. If so, then yes. If not then no. the Skinlink Device modification simply allows the device to transmit signals through the biological electrical field. Both devices, the receiving as well as the transmitting deveice need to be equipped with a skinlink for that.

Ah, I thought so. Thanks. He said 'hacker', so I didn't consider Technomancer.

Alright, sorry, my bad. Still new at this! hehe

Been thinking about more and more stuff that I could fit in my campaign at some point.. Question, I know the book briefly mentions Dragons, specifically ones that are generally shapechanged as humans. Would a Dragon be a viable opponent for a boss and if so, what are the stats? Any suggestions, for that matter on how to create your own baddies, or should I just modify the samples in the 4E main book.

You can find the stats for "typical" examples of dragons and great dragons in the main sourcebook, right after spirits are detailed. Just look up "Dracoforms."

As for using one as a boss, which I assume you mean in the video game sense of the word, sure you can use one. Just keep in mind that they're very powerful, cunning, and dangerous opponents. They're not the sort of thing you can just spring on a group and expect them to survive. They have to go in with intent, and stock up on the proper weapons and planning, to have a shot of surviving. I mean, if memory serves, even a basic dragon has Hardened Armor 8, Sorcery 8, and access to every spirit and spell in the game. And all but the youngest will have set up all kinds of contingencies and safeguards to boot.

Most usually have better things to do than meander around as a metahuman while toying with shadowrunners. They think bigger than that, and/or send minions to do such tedious work.

Well... if you have skinlink and the other dude has skinlink too... Yes might happen. It just like splicing some cables together, or having a wirless network and you budging in on the frequency and start to hack.

Problem is of course to keep in touch... MEGAPUN... while you are hacking stuff.

My characters often have a skinlinked dataport which connect my internal comlink/eyes to my gun. If someone could touch me, and keep on me until he broke my comlink he could get my eyes. Not very nice.... but also foolish since he uses actions for grappling/hacking while i keep pumping him full of lead *g*.

If you can touch him you should just strangle and disarm him... its faster.

Alright, so pretty much Shadowrun isn't really centered or focused around bosses so to speak. But on situations, average to hard groups of guys, and not just one main head guy, I think I understand. Dragons seem next to impossible as well, so I'll probably not use it until I'm more comfortable with the game.

Oh, there can be masterminds. But they're usually far removed from the things the runners are doing. They use Johnsons, hired by other Johnsons, hired by some random guy off the street who later turns up dead, who's assassination and hiring was outsourced by two different Johnsons who hired other Johnsons to hire the runners to do their dirty work for them. etc. But on occasion you can get close to one, especially if they have a vested interest in something. It just takes a lot of care and detail to plan it out without it appearing too contrived or unlikely.

And the masterminds tend not to be combat-types themselves. They're typically businessmen, old syndicate leaders with gray hair, or politicians. Tend to make for a boring climactic fight if it's just them you're fighting.

Ahh I see... That's kind of shame than. Not really any big combat climax to ending a session, though storyline wise there's room for a lot of rich opportunity.

Eh?

I don't think you're quite getting the possibilities. Think of it like this. Say you have a 'mastermind' who dislikes a dragon because it's been meddling in his affairs. He goes through a huge chain of Johnsons and other hired goons in order to hire the team to interfere with that dragon's operations. Satisfied with the result, he continues hiring those runners for job after job, slowly attempting to decimate the dragon's holdingss until he grows tired of the games and sends the runners to kill the dragon once and for all.

Yeah, Funk's right. That the mastermind isn't the big movie climax fight doesn't mean there isn't one. Just because a mastermind is a wuss doesn't mean he can't cause a dramatic scene either. If I had reason to suspect that a team of runners were coming after me and I had power, money, and connections... oh man, I'd do some crazy things even if I can't shoot straight.

Set his office room up to explode. Hardwired to a hand held detonator.
"Want to shoot me know that I have a dead-man's trigger on the whole floor? No? Then take a seat and shut up."

The fun thing, especially with Pink Mohawk or action based games is when the big bad sets up a situation where you CAN'T fight him. Well, can't fight and win at least. It will make the players want to kill him SO bad. Have this happen a few times and when you finally let them do it they'll feel so rewarded. Just make them outsmart him to do it.

Intellect, creativity, and planning are the strongest weapons in Shadowrun. The DV is limitless.

It's true that GMing Shadowrun is a bit trickier than oldskool D&D, from the perspective of successive fights. There's just so many angles going at once, but that's the whole reason we play it.

As a new GM, just start small and experiment. If you mess up, roll with it. A failed run can still be a really fun and exciting run.

CountingGardens, no one else said this, but welcome to the insanity known as Dumpshock.

Soon you'll find yourself hitting this board like someone hitting TVTropes, because you'll find a lot of good ideas for 'Runs here.

Most cyberware has a Signal of 0 meaning you need to touch it to hack it.

And in the meantime the dragon is hiring runners to find out who's messing with his holdings until a group of runners rushes in and he... asks... them who hired them. And they oh so willingly tell him.

You sure? I'm fairly certain that Signal represents the broadcasting strength, not reception. And with the goofy way the hacking rules work, you could do a one-way hacking. And, heck, I'm not even certain if the target's Signal rating matters at all even then.

that's just plain common sense - you need some feedback to hack, if the return signal can't reach you (or at least a relaying node in range), forget it. There could be some expections - spoofing drone commands in autonomous mode seems a likely candidate - but there are excpetions.

One thing that could be done would be to have a signal modifier for reception to represent a fine-tuned receptor able to pick a fainter signal - meaning you're boosting the signl rating of everything you get. Though probably with a lot of EECM to sort out the right signal and limited to a +1 or +2 at best. You could probably pick an even fainter signal if there was nobody else on that frequency, but they would be lost in the closer transmissions using the same channels.

Won't the cyberware be part of the wearers PAN, meaning if you get into the targets commlink you'll be able to get at the cyberware?

Tips and tricks for protecting cyber rule #1-turn the wireless off. If for whatever reason you want to have it connected to your pan, slave it to a commlink which is kept at a signal of 0.

Side note a signal of 0= 3 meters.

Only if the Character is not a runner, or not very paranoid... there is generally no reason to have wireless connectivity for most cyberware, and with DNI Connectivity, you do not have to add it to your PAN for it to be effective... it should be its own DNI system, with no outside connectivity except for maybe a Data Jack for Diagnostic Purposes...

At least, My paranoid ass goes that way with it... keeps those annoying Technomancers from screwing with your augmentations through your PAN... and if you are having that system hacked by a Hacker through your Datajack, you have got other problems anyways...

And the Signal 0 signal of Cyberware just means that you need to be within 3 Meters of you, not touching it... 3 Meters is still a pretty significant distance if you are just walking down the street...

Keep the Faith

Alright, so I'm trying to follow what you guys are talking about... Fairly lost. So he can't use the Skinlink to transfer data such as a picture to someone else by touch?

Says in the book, "With skinlink, a device is adapted to send and receive data transmitted through the electrical field on the surface of metahuman skin. Though limited to touch, skinlink communication has the advantage of being protected from signal interception or jamming."

Granted I know almost nothing about hacking, matrix, or anything the like and should probably read up on it. When you're doing hacking tests, you have to hack an individual commlink? Is it just a threshold set by the GM to do so? Or does everything (commlinks, lights, electricity, cars) have a firewall?

And thanks a lot for the welcome Kitsune. It's nice to know that this a really friendly and active group who aren't elitists. Was scared about PnP RPGs for a while cause most RPGers I know are extreme elitists.

Well... to send data from Point to pPoint with a Skinlink, BOTH individuals must have the Skinlink Option on their equipment, or it does not work... a device without the Skinlink modification will not transmit/receive anything... Of course, you could always just use the wireless connectivity to accomplish that data transfer, assuming that e both devices were connected through either a Data Request or Subscription...

With a Technomancer, he can Force a Skinlink Connection with any device upon touch if he has the correct Echo...

Many devices have Matrix Attributes of System, Resonse, Firewall, and Signal... these devices would need to be hacked in order to access them... you have to hit a threshold of Firewall (+ Access Rights: +0 for User, +3 for Security and +6 for Admin Access) to do so... Unless you have authorized access to the device...

Keep the Faith

Well, skinlink is often operating by taking the wireless out of the picture, but sometimes used as a backup for when you're being jammed. Instead of using wireless it uses the bodies electromagnetic field. So, if put skinlink on all your devices and you've not using wireless anymore on those devices and can't send or receive normal signals. It would be just like turning your wireless off on your laptop: you can still play your games, access your files, run your programs, but you can't chat, you can't do google searches, can't research on Dumpshock, etc. Of course, you can still have devices that use skinlink with the wireless turned on, but that takes out a big piece of it's hacking defense. Best to turn off the wireless on everything but your commlink and skinlink everything to that, that way all hacks need to go through the comm before they can touch the cyber. You can also slave all the devices to the comm but I'm fairly certain that still leaves them vulnerable to spoofing.l

And the one way hack tricks are possible on 0 signal devices using spoof. You don't get nearly the same control but you can still mess with devices. Just need an authorized Access ID, to get the device in your signal range, break encryption if present, and have a command that the device will understand. Great for cyber hacks. "Cyber-arm, punch me." when spoofing a command to look like the user... ah... fun.

Anyhow, the rules for matrix can be tricky, even for veterans of the game. My advice is to be relaxed on the rules and concentrate on making it stylish and fun until you get a good handle on the rules.

While it's true that you need *mutual* Signal range for direct connections (and 3m really can be a lot), what's the problem with indirect (routed) connections? Yes, this won't work if you're Detecting Hidden Nodes or Capturing Wireless Signals, but it will for most other hacking—for example, the kind CountingGardens is talking about. Right?

Follow-up: why is Spoof different? Is that RAW or a house rule?

AS long as you can establish Mututal Signal Range through the mesh network that makes up the Matrix, that would work just fine, but it becomes harder when the target has a signal of 0... after all, 3 meters is not all that much either... but it is doable... and it will even work if you are trying to Detect Hidden Nodes or when cCpturing Wireless Signals, as long as that signal integrity can be maintained, which is the challenge with a Signal 0 Device...

Keep the Faith

As I understand it, Capturing Wireless Signals requires that you be at the source, or at every node in the 'next level' as it routes to the Matrix. Failing that, you can't capture the 'intact' signals at all.

But you're right, 3m isn't nothing, but it may not be enough to maintain a connection if the target isn't also connected to the Matrix (via personal commlink); I assumed he was, but there's no real reason to guess that.

Spoof requires no subscription and requires no return signal from the device, usually. It may fail if the device does not understand the command it will likely ask for clarification and that would require 2 way traffic. If you can get YOUR signal into it's range to receive signals then you can spoof it.

Just humor me, is there a list or at least a page reference explaining what Matrix actions require subscriptions? You just send the command via a trusted access ID?

Thanks Tymeaus, for the hand-holding. The Matrix has always been the trickiest aspect of SR.

Yes... In Unwired...

Pages 54-55... It explains the difference between Data Requests and Subscriptions...


Keep the Faith

Alright, probably having difficulty following since I don't own the Unwired book, guess I will just read through the Hacking section and try to understand.

Good luck with that. I've been playing the game for years and, in none of the incarnations of the game, have I successfully gotten a solid grasp on the damnable Matrix rules. It's made me think that I may be autistic or something.

I mean, for simplicity's sake, should I just not include complexities with the Matrix rules and make everything like a Hacking dice roll with a made of threshold in my mind? I think, since I barely know anything yet, that would be the quickest and most fun of my options right now for the player using the Orc Hacker.

There are some mechanics you want in play, from the start, Gardens, and then you want to layer them in to find your group's personal threshhold.

The reason that your hacker may/may not be willing to live with more limitations is because you have to make them a two way street. What your hacker can do, so can the enemy. In this example, it means I could have a guy with nothing but speed and a skinlink upload an agent to every comm I can get near and completely and utterly hose your entire team.

You definately want to bring in range and unreasonable gear usage so that it can't be turned back on them. Also no, your techno can't just upload a picture at whim, he's got to hack it. Even rudimentary commlinks with bare minimum protections require a password to use. (Not spoof, which is another ballgame)

Player/enemy hacking can be one of the most complex rulesets involved until you get a solid handle on subscription vs. security vs. ranges vs. things you can do. It can also be the most powerful, thus the layers. Start smaller, in a different way. Cameras, doors, automated turrets, sharks with frickin' laser beams on their heads. That kinda stuff. Probably the easier way to immerse yourself.

Dr. Funk has an excellent point. The setting is populated by criminal super geniuses that could probably trick Lex Luthor in to stealing cakes for them. With so many conflicting corporate, Awakened and other intrests all trying to get the better of dozens of their respective enemies. The only real limits of the levels of intrigue and levels to any conspiracy are really your storytelling skills--so have fun with it.

For reference, the final battle in Boondock Saints 2 comes to mind, small group of allies finally taking out the "mastermind" to find out there's really more going on. Or Lex Luthor and Superman in "Superman: Red Sun," which really shows you what competing super-human intellects are capable of pulling off. (alas poor communist Batman )

Then there's David Xanatos, who anticipated this thread.