Duh, hormones. Puberty is akin to a 6 year long pregnancy.

By itself that probably won't work, though. They don't have the experience to describe what they want. Backstories are abstract to beginning and not infrequently even to experienced players. Backstories aren't seen as "real", so they won't affect how the player sees the character, and the crumbs just won't be seen as relevant. Never mind if they've sworn undying revenge on the [fill-in-the-blank] that destroyed their family, against the shiny new world (gritty to us, new to them) and shiny new runs and shiny new guns, it's really hard for many new players to see a piece of forced fiction as an immediate here-and-now.

In just about every group I've been with, new players tended to be between 13-17 (which seems to me to be a reasonable starting age - much younger children can sometimes have problems separating the fantasy element), have exceptional sense and/or quick pick-up of the skills and attribute crunching, and have little to no experience with the concept of an active and here-and-now relevant backstory.

So I walked them through it.

I set aside a period of time roughly the same length as a standard playing session. They were to bring their character concepts, however rough - just to have some idea of what they wanted to play. They could bring up any points in backstory that they wanted. I've yet to see anyone wanting to be the secret lovechild of Dunkelzahn and Ehran. More often, they wanted to be black ops types. Still more often, they want to be Joe Nobody, who ended up on the streets and hung out to dry without a clue of how they got there.

(Hung out to dry is something I try to avoid, in completely new players. It makes learning to interact with the SR universe in any non-martial way so much more difficult.)

I asked specific questions about background, especially as related to the plotline of their lives. They tried to answer them. Where they really got stuck, I offered suggestions ... carefully, because when you've no clue what you're doing it's easy just to start adopting someone else's suggestions in toto. Small events that spark at the time, I might drop into a quick one-on-one actual roleplaying - and that's how we ended up with some of our most notorious villains ... who were "real" to the players because not only the backstory of their characters but also they themselves had "encountered" them, and disliked each other on sight

Only then was I able to lay clues at all that the players would bother to follow up.

Interestingly: which is the part of character development almost completely overlooked by videogame shooters and rpgs?

I strongly suggest they start by playing a character who is in some ways closer to them: at least for the very first character, no meta variants or shapeshifters. I always start new players at lowest starting power, and interpret gear and other limitation rules fairly strictly. What they earn is "real" to them. If they're significantly behind the rest of the group in power, they get an adventure or two of their own or possibly with only one other person from the core group, whom I can trust to hang back and support while letting the new player make their own choices.

The principle of talking (as opposed to fighting everything in sight, aka information is a good thing) I try to bring across in two ways.

The first battle I try to arrange so they survive by the skin of their teeth. (I try to avoid the kind of damage that leads to permanent Magic loss, though.) I also deliberately design it in such a way that it is entirely likely they will be disarmed, or that their weapons will have less effectiveness against whatever they are encountering (simple cover does well here) - unless they think it through. Life continues around them while they heal. In the SR world, time is money. In the player sphere, time healing is time spent not being able to play. (Where possible, time the magical intervention for after that lesson is learned.) Especially, expenses need paying - and misunderstandings about who exactly owes what can be frequent.

Second, I make it clear, by something they find or hear, that they could have avoided all this and had a relatively simple shoot-fest, instead of the first-line security response. The concept of back-researching toward an end is a new one at the low end of this ages, even in real life. The first time or two, their contacts might approach them with appropriate tidbits, dropping information such as the existence of various runner and fixer social environments, along with the expectance of barter at the appropriate level. (Makes it easier for new players if one of the contacts is level II.)

After all this, the new players might still be interested in making themselves over into absurd killing machines, and it's still possible that your playing styles just won't be compatible ... but at least you'll have laid the groundwork for other options, when and if they want to pursue them. You're the GM. You can only help them to design a non cookie-cutter character. You can't force them to follow it.

Won't work, at least not for my group. The thing is, a skilled minmaxer can do more with 90 points than a fluffball can do with 150. All the time they spent writing background might just as well be spent figuring out more efficient ways to use points.

I have tried this technique. It has failed me.

As someone said, talk with them.

If that doesn't work, drop an orbital cow from space on them, and ignore any further actions their player claimsto make.

Seriously though -- as GM, you need to be both firm in your resolve and not let others walk over you (very difficult, no matter what age you are), and yet also understanding of your players' desires. If they want to make total combat munchies, why not say, "Look, this character is too powerful for this campaign, I'd appreciate something that is a lot less abusable."

Then, suggest that they ho0ld on to the character, and if they like, you can run an occasional (once a month? once every two months?) armageddon run, as a sideline for story -- basically, everyoen brings their most bad-ass characters (you included ) and you pretty much have a brawl. This could let them satisfy their desires for playing with REALLY wiz 'ware and over-the-top...

This is a great opportunity for you to point out that you can have high-stakes combat at ANY power-level, and that even at this absurd level you, as GM, are able to field opposition that can eat them for breakfast.

(Everyone probably knows this, but ...)


If these players want you to GM, you need to put your foot down and tell them that they have to let you do your job. You can tell them that if they don't want to accept your GM-ness, and don't wish to play in the guidelines you set, they do not have to play. Don't start with this, as I imagine you DO want to play with them in the future. Rather point out that it's always an option. "I'm not forcing you to let me be GM - you're welcome to run a game." is always a great comeback.


As an aside:
Somehow, I jsut had an image of a mage/shaman who is basically liek a dark jedi -- could someone sustain a magic fingers spell (to lift someone off the ground) and combine that with a choking effect? =D


Anyways, back on topic -- Build Points. Limit their build points. A LOT. 123 is normal, so 60-90 should be your target range. It's very very hard to have a character that is uniformly survivable and on par with other characters on 60-80 BP. Try making a character sometime! It's almost impossible to make an awakened character, or one with any resources, if you ALSO want them to have skills or attributes to speak of. (I learned this when I madea char for krishcane's 40bp run (Cage Fight). I had to load up on flaws just to have points to spend on skills!) I liked the idea of rewarding extra karma for well-written background.

Hence why the post didn't stop after that statement.

I also wasn't saying that you should force anyone through any plot line. Actually my post refered to guiding them along into things you think would be fun. Not forcing them into it. If it looks like it's not going to work; drop it. A GM should be willing to be as flexible as they can be with their plotline. I personally don't even write a plotline idea out until after a few sessions have passed.

*shrug* well, maybe it will for Lone_Runner.
Eventhough they can still make players with 90 points that are uber-munchers, they'll still like the idea of getting more points easily by writing about 5 paragraphs.