Hey all!

I'm working on setting up a one-on-one campaign with a friend of mine and I've never done this before so I was hoping some people with experience would share any tid bits of wisdom with me about what to avoid and what has worked well for them in the past in these situations. I'll admit that I'm not the best at searching the forums so if this has come up repeatedly in the past a quick sign to the right discussion would the greatly appreciated too. With SR being such a team based game I'm a little concerned about having a single pc trying to survive by himself, of course there will be support npcs, but I don't want it to devolve into me playing three char's while he tags along. The idea is to run something kind of like the Monkey Wrench Gang with a character who is essentially an awakened Hayduke, and it seems to me that a lone mage infiltrating a corp to sabotage the joint is as deadly or far too easy as I make it how do you manage that without making it a milk run every time? I'm really curious how other people have toned this type of game in the past to get both the in-depth feeling and development of a single player while managing to keep it from being either: bang you're dead/pc is invincible just to keep the story going type of thing. Thanks in advance!

I'd recommend reading some of the "Welcome to the Shadows" IC posts. There are a few single-player campaigns, and they could enlighten you on how it could work. That being said, my first advice would be Contacts, Contacts, Contacts. A lone runner is going to have a tough time infiltrating a corp and getting away with it scot-free; he needs friends. One of the main aspects of the game (in my book) is the meeting of the 3 worlds. If you don't have someone to handle the meat world, the matrix, and astral, you're going to come up short somewhere. Maybe your mage glitches on his trid phantasm and shows up on camera, or your hacker gets harassed by a spirit; or either gets ganked by 5+ guards. If they're playing a mage, read up on some discussions on spell usage. The best interpretation I've found for control thoughts is "forcing someone to do something with a gun to their head". In other words, the person is conscious of what's happening, but they're only doing it because they're compelled to. That's not as subtle as many players I've played with have interpreted the effects, but I think it's a good way to balance how overpowered the spell is in general. Each facility is going to have ways to protect themselves from all three worlds; how is your character (who presumably only has access to one or two) going to handle the one they're short on? Things to think about.

When I run one on one campaigns I always keep thing simple, and low level. (Which usually means that money is not as good either)

Here are some scenarios I have used:
Private investigator
Assassination
Body guard duty
Recover an item from a simple/low security location. (ie house, by-passable with maglock passkey) / bus terminal locker
Terrorist act. planting a bomb
Steal a chip from a university lab

After there is some Karma and rep built up, then the runs can become more complex.

I don't really have too much experience with "Lone Gunman" kind of campaigns, so I can't really give much advice. I'm just curious, why are you deciding to just do a one person campaign? Shadowrun is kind of a team game and I would expect you'd get a lot of enjoyment with more people.

The more the merrier as the saying goes.

Eeeh, yeah. Honestly if you want a single-player game, play the Genesis/SNES versions.

Well by no means do i think it isn't possible to play with only on PC, I'm just hoping that the reason for playing isn't because you couldn't find anyone else who wanted to play.

If you can't find additional players, go down to your local game store or college campus or something. Plenty of Nerds around those parts.

But if you're playing with on PC just to try something new, then by all means, go ahead. Like I said, I don't have much experience in single player PnP games so I don't really understand why anyone would play with only one person, but maybe others get some enjoyment out of it.

I'm not precisely saying that either, but speaking as a GM I won't run a game for anything less than three people because there's just so much that I can't do that should be done.

Three people minimum does sound like a good number.

Well however it works out, Ellipsis, I hope you and your friend have fun!

If I had to do it for one person, I'd run it akin to the MGS series. Infiltration and extraction on a remote island, no support save via commlink, and depending on the makeup of the character I'd tailor their part of the mission to their subset.

There is a shortage of GMs in the state of North Carolina but no shortage of players. If it's like that where you are, you could have as many players as you want the same day you put out feelers.

Mesh

First of all thanks for the bits of info guys!

Much appreciated, I can see this probably is going to be as difficult as I thought. I'll probably be taking into account the many contacts aspect to help survival rates. Part of the idea to make the campaign playable at all is that the PC is part of a truncated team, essentially a kind of Terra First group that works in individual cells and have limited contact in every situation so that they simply can't tip off an enemy about who else or even really what else is going on if they're caught. In reality they're a reaaaaally deniable asset for a corp pr program that is using them to create bad press for the competition on a regular basis under the guise of a radical eco-first group. So he has particular pieces or roles to play in any given mission and is welcome to come up with and complete any other goals while in the midst of a mission as he wants (or is contacted for by outside influences), but will probably have some on site and certainly off site support from some people. The danger being if his unknown compatriots get fragged or just plain fail, well, it'll be real interesting....I'm still kind of fleshing out the whole idea as I go. The reason I'm doing a one on one campaign is because we don't really have a ton of other people to play with around here and both have odd schedules so just going down to the LGS isn't really that possible on a regular basis and he's been running a Cpunk game (which is admittedly real gutter level so a little easier to make for a single gunner)with me for the last few months and I want to give him a chance to play and a chance for me to be the eye in the sky. SR is my choice because it's the game I have the most exp with historically so knowing and creating a consistent and deep world is much easier. So far I've really enjoyed the way the one gm one pc has worked out between the two of us for character development, it has made for a really intricate story that I would like to try my hand at. I guess I'm just gonna have to see how it pans out. I'm mostly just afraid of being too lenient with the "a mysterious benefactor causes everything to work out for you despite the fact that there is no real reason for that" however there is a little bit of that in his BG...anyway gotta do some work now, thanks again for the advice so far! I welcome anymore!

There's always a shortage of GMs...

I'm one of the few people up at my college willing to GM a game...my problem is that most people there don't know that Shadowrun is.... which is a damn shame, 'cuz SR is an amazing game.

What's your area? You'd be surprised at the number of available players.

Put out a note on your local rpg meetup group with the word Shadowrun in it. You really might be surprised even in VT.

Mesh

You can do it. But having a loyal group contact helps. I ran a 1 on 1 for kicks once with a friend. He played a troll gang boss in the 50's in San Francisco/Oakland. Lots of fun, I would add it was arather pink mohawk style game under SR2 rules.

I really wish this were the case for me. There's a massive shortage of players where I'm at. Heck, there's a massive shortage of stores and players.

But is there also a shortage of GMs?

While I haven't run a whole lot of solo games, my group and I have had a lot of success running "buddy" games (2 players) and the occasional trio. One of the nicest things about small-group play is the virtual absence of rules-lawyering. (If you're not on the same page to begin with, you can resolve things pretty quickly with 1-2 people in the argument) With this, it's easier to downplay the mechanical, roll-play aspects of the game and subsist on higher doses of RP and narrative. At that point, challenging the player(s) is less about how many mooks there are (especially as even 1-3 can be TOO MANY in a solo game), and more about making the character use his ingenuity, contacts, and ALL his skills (even the ones he doesn't specialize in) in order to complete his mission. So providing an appropriate challenge becomes a bit easier with small games, in my experience.

Edit:Remembered to put in the conclusion this time.

I can see where you may correct sir. Fortunately for me though, I am the most experienced at this system among my friends that i regularly play with so the rules lawyering is kept to a minimum. But sometimes we do end up playing a roll-play game instead of roleplay, and it's never as fun when that happens.

Also, because I play a Mage for most games, I have to say: Awesome quote in your signature! Bravo!

More GMs than players. By a long shot. They're also the type of GMs, that much like myself, have been GMing so long they largely only make good GMs anymore (but awful players).