With the current football world cup going on, I want a few sessions focusing on sports related runs. The problem is that in all the materials I read there is not much mention of sports of any sort, especially not Urban Brawl.

So if anyone can enlighten me on the topic: What is the state of sports in 2072? and What is Urban Brawl?

Urban Brawl: Two teams, thirteen players apiece, 12 square blocks of urban landscape, two goals, and a bunch of hidden weapons. Good fun!

Jason H.

Is there more? Do they use live ammo, or paintball esque stuff? Is there a world cup? Are there corporate teams? Does Lofwyr eat players when SK Dragons lose the finals?

Will such info be in Attitude?



P.S. Can the Desert Wars be considered a type of "sport"?

Shadowbeat had a very complete description, alas I don't keep my copy at the office.

Tha basics are as described above, players where heavy armor and Ibelive only stun ammo types are allowed though this doesn't prevent fatalities entirely. The object is to move a ball through the brawl zone. Pnealties are handed out for things like Arson. Teams are sponsored (though who sponsors what is up to you, and there was a Shadowtalk rumor about Lonestar running a prison league with more lethal weaponry for massive profits)

I'll try to look it up and fill in more detail whebn I'm home

I still want to see a Death Games net only pdf release. That would be a hot topic to hit.

Also, 30 rides needs to drop soon. :-/

I don't know about actual in story sports, but at my table we made "Dwarf Tossing" into a sport.

It's a big deal. Dwarf and troll pairings, though there have been orks and a few other strong meta-types. The one doing the throwing is called the Tosser, the dwarf is just called "The Dwarf" if not being called by name.

Tosser throws the dwarf partner in three different categories: Distance, Speed, and Technique.

The sport is noted by outlandish costumes and AR icongraphy, and silly wrestler like names. Such as reigning champions "Thunder and Lightning" (obviously their costumes are covered with lightning bolts to signify speed, etc). In fact, before and after there are great deals of smack talking and overblown drama, much like today's professional wrestling.

Strict on the use of only mundane tossers and dwarfs. No magic allowed, no adepts, no surge, no augmentations that directly enhance anything considered to have a direct influence on the outcome of a throw.

Every Dwarf Tossing event to date has been marked with protests outside the stadium, mostly comprised of dwarfs. There have been a few incidents of attacks on the dwarf participants by protesters, calling them "a shame to the race", but those incidents are rare.



I plan to do a run with this sometime. Maybe someone wants a player killed or something. Oh, and one of our team-members also attends the protests, but he's protesting that surges can't participate.

"Spirit Wars" is a pit fight between two spirits that's vid'd and live audienced, and is currently enjoying growing popularity and increased betting, at my table. The players, however, read this board and don't know why yet, so I'll leave it there.

Hidden?

I'll have to dig out my copy of Shadowbeat but I'm pretty sure there were some pretty specific rules regarding equipment.

Theres also a combat biking sport. Cant remember the name for the life of me of the sport, unless it is combat biking or something like that. It is mentioned in alot of the original novels (nearly all of them I can remember that arent uber-meta plot epics mention it in passing) with alot of it mentioned in the Wolf and Raven anthology, same with baseball too I think.

Other than that, they have traditional mexican hand ball in Aztlan, and other sports are played with cyber and awakened leagues for most of them. Dont expect a quote or a book name, since I cant remember it for the life of me.

Just going by what I remember of the fiction off the top of my head it is just Combat Biking, no fancy name required.

You forgot 20,000 rounds of armor-piercing ammo!

Urban brawl (dredging from memory here) started in Europe after the wars. Street gangs, having limited resources, mutually agreed to settle their disputes in controlled fights with some rugby-style rules for carrying balls and scoring goals. Some corporations began filming the games for a reality show, and found that people really got a kick out of watching the gangers fight. Soon, sponsorships were handed out, teams were formed, and "City Combat Sport" was born. In the UCAS, the sport caught on, but the name "Urban Brawl" was used to excite the American audience.

The game is simple- A zone is laid out, usually in an abandoned or barrens part of a city. It is three city blocks wide by four long- since a block is differently sized in each city, this means the zone can be bigger or smaller geographically depending on place. At the beginning of the game, each team of 13 players chooses a block to put their goal in. Each team has a ball, and must get it to the opposing team's goal. Thus, the strategy of the game is in deciding how much of the team to commit to offense and defense. Each goal is worth 1 point, whoever has the most goals at the end of the game (two halves of 1 hour each, I think) is the winner. If an entire team is disabled in one play, they automatically forfeit.

All the weapons and ammo used in pro games are live. Players are allowed to use whatever cyberware they can manage to jam into themselves. Each "position" is allowed only certain weapons. There's one medic and one outrider on a motorcycle for each team. Magicians aren't allowed. While the body counts are remarkably high, the game is legal in almost all countries because they are not intentional duels to the death. The object is to score goals, not to kill opponents- it says so in the rules. Only Tsmishian has completely banned the game in North America, and it is popular in Aztlan, but overshadowed by tclatchi- which somehow manages to be even more violent.

I don't know if this is canon as well, but in one of Markus Heitz's German novels, I think it was "Schattenjäger", Tattooo, a german Urban Brawl participant (are they called players, fighters or what?), muses that the Americans are wimps since they only use Stun ammo instead of regular. BTW in German the game is called Stadtkrieg (City War).

Personally I found a game much more believable with Stun Ammo.

-- I imagine Hurling is still a big sport in Tir Tairngire (basically, a more violent lacrosse).

Novels ain't sourcebooks, novels ain't...

There is in fact an indoor variant of UB called "Arena Brawl" where non-lethal weapons are used and the field is much smaller, naturally.
AB has much lower ratings than UB...

And it is basically Capture-the-Flag with armed and armored motorcycles (each team's flag-guardian is on foot), played in an arena styled as a maze of ramps.

Rollerball with motorcycles.

I never said novels were canon. It was just what I remember from that novel and said this may be in line with canon

To me Combat Biking sounds a lot cooler than Urban Brawl. I wonder, if you could do something similar with paintball IRL?

You'd be better off recreating Urban Brawl with paintball than Combat Biking. Wiping out on a bike hurts, and I'd rather not try to juggle a paintball gun in my offhand.

Now if you did 50cc bikes, or Vespas....Hmmmm.

Idea for GenCon event: 20 Shadowrun players. 20 Vespas. Combat Biking in the halls/rooms of the Indianapolis Convention Center. It would be the event of the century--at least in terms of liability insurance issues.

Jason H.

Jousting on Segways.....

I think just about every SR event at GenCon is going to involve this somehow.

I am so on board.

Theme song provided by Weird Al Yankovic.

The following information I translated from a german shadowrun wiki, so I don't know how much of it is canon:

Urban Brawl teams consist of 13 players in different roles. Melee weapons have no restriction (except no electricity weapons and no monofilament), but firearms depend on team role:

4 Scouts - light armor, pistols only
4 Bangers - medium armor, pistols only
2 Heavies - medium armor, shotgun or assault rifle or submachine gun / machine pistol
1 Blaster - light armor, machine gun with gyro-stabilization
1 Outrider - on a bike, not allowed to carry the ball, medium armor, shotgun or assault rifle or submachine gun / machine pistol
1 Medic - not allowed to carry the ball, heavy armor, first-aid kit, unarmed, may not be shot at

I also read that magic was forbidden in Urban Brawl till '64, but is allowed now. It's still restricted, no illusions, no manipulation spells, no foci.

The wiki contradicts the information froms Markus Heitz's book. It says that the German Allied States used gel rounds for a while but went back to lethal ammo since the UCAS used lethal rounds too.

So what you're saying is that we need to (re)create the rules for Urban Brawl.

I'm personally wondering how the Olympics are treated. Do the corps get their own teams? And are Combat Biking and Urban Brawl considered Olympic sports?

I don't buy Urban Brawl as a real sport if it uses live ammo. But speaking of post-apocalyptic, dystopic games... I recommend Blood of Heroes. Rutger Hauer, Joan Chen, and it's played with a (fresh) bloody dog skull not a ball.

Mesh

What little I know about Combat Biking is that it's akin to the WWE of 2070. People watch it as much for the drama between teams than for the action itself. Urban Brawl may very well be the same.

Well I was considering a nonlethal version of a Urban Brawl to throw at my players. While it might be fun for the players to participate in a Urban Brawl game, I am looking more for behind the scenes information.

Things like :

- is it a major sport in 2072, or just a minor bloody affair?
- major national/corporate/city teams?
- is it played in stadions or just abandoned city blocks?
- augmented/awakened division or not?
- typical player salaries?
- restriction on 'ware / drugs / metatype...
- tournament types (elimination, groups, etc...)
- popularity of the sport?

Mostly about things you can base a shadowrun on, behind the scenes action. Getting dirt for a news team about a player affair with a troll joytoy, smuggling untraceable drugs to a teams doctor, spying on a team for their new tactic/strategy...

I recall some smatterings of information in the Sprawl Survival Guide. From what I recall of it, the corps have teams, the organization that plans it clears out a few city blocks in urban areas two days before the event, a fairly popular/major sport, and teams have been known to hire shadowrunners as ringers to take care of the dirty work while the more popular face players of the team get all the camera time.

TBH I'd be more tempted to actually sit down with folks and (re)make the game from scratch so we have the rules and such right there.

Another project, Doc?

The most important thing is that hockey is still around and, apparently, Gary Bettman achieved NHL expansion beyond his wildest dreams since it is now called the INHL! They also STILL play for the Stanley Cup!

- is it a major sport in 2072, or just a minor bloody affair? Major Sport
- major national/corporate/city teams? I know of City and Corp teams. Not sure on National
- is it played in stadions or just abandoned city blocks? both. The top leagues play in the barrens
- augmented/awakened division or not? nope
- typical player salaries? not sure, The A-listers would be on par with other pro athletes though
- restriction on 'ware / drugs / metatype... nope
- tournament types (elimination, groups, etc...) whatever works best for you
- popularity of the sport? It's a major sport

Quiet, you. I'm not content unless I'm plotting a heist or a new pastime.

It takes one to know one. We both know how many hobbies I've collected.

But, FoolProof will come to pass, even if one or both of us has to die in the process. We can include a chapter with Urban Brawl.

...

That we shall.

They should be based on a blend of the vehicle chase rules and the Matrix rules.

What. For a no-vehicle brawl?

Are you sure you don't mean Combat biking?

Or are you just messing with me. Don't mess with a man who has to check a four-inch stack of invoices by hand and check them off a list. I be crazy.

Crazy.

"Hooch is crazy" crazy, or "OH GOD HE'S STILL STARING AT ME IT'S BEEN FIVE HOURS WHY DON'T YOU BLINK OH GOD PLEASE NO" crazy?

This movie is known as "Jugger" in Germany and in fact live-action Jugger games played with soft LARP-like weapons can be regularly found at bigger conventions...

LOL That's great! Thanks for letting me know! I always thought LARP was lame until it was used for Juggers. I can't wait to tell my group about this. We loved that movie.

Mesh

The second one. I like the second one.