There is a strong possibility that in one of my future campaigns, a runner will end up unconscious in Aztlan. I know that you can live without kidneys for up to 2 days, but I was thinking about being even a more pain and having a sustaining spell quickened be cast on runner and thieves run off with more then just the runners kidneys. 1. Would that work? 2. Any ideas, comments, suggestions.. None of my players has an over cybered character by the way.

What organleggers are going to waste karma on a quickened spell just go keep an some gutted guys temporarily alive?

Woops, double-post.

That was my first thought too. If they're taking your kidneys, they're not going to leave you alive. They will, instead, take all the rest of your organs and leave the unusable stuff behind in a dumpster somewhere.

That said, if the kidneys were taken by someone who was otherwise a good person, driven by incredible need - you're the only donor match for his child, for example - I could totally see that working out.

Or an Organ Thief with a conscious. Or maybe someone that knows that the person who's organs where taken is probably going to pay top price for his own organs back.

Kidnaping someone's organs for ransom? Yeah, I think it is crazy enough for Shadowrun.
An organ thief with a conscious? Hehe, good joke. Did I ever tell you about that one where a priest, a rabbi and a dog go to a bar?

What if the runner in question is a shifter or other character with Regeneration?
"Yoink, got your kidneys. Yoink, got your kidneys. Yoink, got your kidneys. Yoink, got your kidneys."

Hm. Crank 2: High Voltage, Shadowrun style.

SR4 has it actually more expensive to use an organ-legged organ than a vat grown one, as you are not on medication for the rest of your life with a vat grown one.

It's a lot of work to do the whole tissue typing, match, transport and implant stuff. Plus whoever is selling has motivation to verify that it isn't diseased, etc.

But yeah, if you assume that organ-legging makes sense, then someone who is going to go to the effort to carve you up it isn't going to do this one the spot in a few minutes while you are out, and they are unlikely to bother to sew you back up. You'd need to be taken somewhere with medical stuff and all the various tissue typing and disease testing done there. Once they have gone to that much effort you are going out the back as ghoul chow.

Do you have a hacker, rigger, techno, or mage? Are they an incredibly good sport? Implanted commlinks will help.

Just steal their whole body. Organleggers chop off the head, cauterize the bleeding, hook the head up to a pump which keeps blood flowing in and out, sell the body parts off, then go online and see if there's a bounty or anyone willing to pay for the runner. Have the runner wake up, realize that his whole freaking body has been stolen, then challenge him to escape from that (note, anyone with the above mentioned skills can escape from that, some of them easily).

This is a cool idea. Built-in time limit and intense motivation. Even better, kidnap his child's kidneys. Sure, you might find a match through regular channels in 2 days...

I really strongly suspect that DocWagon can locate a dialysis machine in two days.

True, true, but I would think the owner-till-recently of the organs would not want to live on dialysis if he didn't have to. But you are also right that such technology would greatly reduce the threat level. Damn.

OK, kidnap the kid, and send her kidneys back home. Yeah!

I've always assumed cyber-organs are dirt cheap. I've never understood why someone would want do get 'used' organs. But, perhaps this poor fool's about to learn, that he's a clone of some high-ranking Aztech exec in desperate need of fresh wetware after some nasty accident.

Surely, if you had the resources to keep a head alive, you'd have the resources to guard against exactly that? Spirits, Matrix cut-off, pointing-a-freaking-gun-at-the-head. Or just keep them sedated.

Nift the Lean was a character I think by Jack Vance. At one point he was controlled by an unpleasant Necromancer who puts "hooks into his liver". These hooks could be tugged at any time.

I think this idea is very similar: do as I say or goodbye spell. Have the necromancer maintain himself: so if you kill him spells cancelled and you die.

THe only flaw is that Dialysis and a kidney transplant are fairly easy to get: although not in the middle of an Aztech jungle prehaps

A local Ghoul with some influence and access to docwagon medical records has a particular taste for kidney's belonging to individuals with a rare blood type. After very much enjoying the players kidney's hes decided that he just hassss to have more and is wondering if the player has any relatives he isn't all that fond of.

It's not high tech, it's actually disgustingly low tech by shadowrunners. Essentially you'd be using techniques developed in the 1950s, the equivalent of somebody today building a riding saddle.

I believe the word I am looking for here is "Yoink" as that is so going to be a plothook in my next campaign.

you sir, are a bad man and my hero as a co-gm. I shall also steal this particular body part.

I could do peritoneal dialysis in my kitchen if I had to. I think by 207x hemodialysis would be as routine as having your blood pressure checked by the machine at the pharmacy. Plus there are detox spells. Essentially having your kidneys stolen would be an annoyance at best, but not all that life threatening unless you are in the darkest most remote wilderness or rundown shit-hole barren. Having said that, this might be why an organlegger leaves the runner alive: organ theft isn't murder... unless of course you actually murder the donor.

But the idea of a persnickety ghoul is just... tasty.

Organleggers cater two two types of clients: Those who cannot afford cloned or cyber organs (the SINless masses who have no health insurance) and those who have special dietary requirements.

In the former case, anti-rejection drugs do make it cost more in the long run, but it isn't like most SINless can get loans to pay for brand new organs. And it'll probably be diseased and it might not match perfectly, but it's better than dying.


In the latter case, it doesn't really matter as long as it's tasty and affordable.

Exactly. So any sort of scenario involving "You are just a head," is automatic game over. The head will be so secure, you could loudly monologue your evil plans and leave the door open and... wait a minute.