And when you think that an F10 should be rolling 20x edged diced...thats usually 10-11 hits. And Summoning Drain = net hits x 2. Aka, 20+ damage of drain to soak. Even had you gotten 7 successes, you would be dead.

Mages have more than raw dice to grow. Initiation gives you new powers that are not available anywhere else. The biggest one is masking. Right now, as long as Zod has is Increase Initiative spell on, he's a beacon in the astral. With his weak WIL, he should not survive any kind of magical opposition.

Refreshing edge every session was probably a bad move from the GM. Given your playstyle, it only rewards you for screwing up since you get even more edge to finish the mission.

If it's silly, don't do it? Why is it so difficult for you guys? Someone already quoted the carrying rules, your STR 1 character cannot walk with all that stuff.

Force 4 breaks the availability cap at chargen, he should only be able to get a Force 3. It also makes his mundane character vulnerable to magical defenses (wards, backrground count, assensing,...) but for that the PNCs should stop acting like depressed lemmings.

Yup, that's what mages are.

WiFi-Scan is IMO not exact enough to be used for blind fire. Not that much of a problem in a world full of radar systems, but still.
Professional criminals should have ballistic glass on their flats; or barriers behind the windows if those are blackened out anyway.
I would not permit anyone to rebuild someone elses char in absentiam!




Your players went onto that roof. Who knows what kind of alert was raised? Maybe someone saw a bunch of armed criminals enter the building, maybe a neighbor of Kaz saw the sniper on the opposite roof. Even if the gunshots triggered the alarm, first responders will be those cops already in the general area. BTW, what is the plan for escape?


Yes. I suggest to keep to the device rating table by consensus, removing any need to powergame hacking. It´s much like magic/spirits. And I hope that you own The Precious instead/on top of the original SR4 book.


You are really having some fun ahead if the proceed to kill people for being drug dealers, like Dae. If they were more enlightened, Grey-Wolf could have played along with them hitting Kaz.




At -2 per sustained spell, I hope Dawg has a bunch of sustaining foci for health. I´d still summon the spirit first. Are you aware that First Aid has a threshold and modifiers?

ZOD decides to have some action... hand it out. No reason to complain there.

An old suggestion for fixing hardened armor is treating it as "half rating auto-success, half rating rolled". Besides making things more manageable, it removes the almost binary results for better hardened armor (=if penetrated than destroyed). Agree with Gazzor on an appropiate force range for spirits anyway, as a force 9 Guardian can replace a fully armed munched Samurai. Force 6 is good, maybe 8 for high-powered games.



Rules Questions:
Can a hacker gain a User account on a node, then just decide to continue the extended test to get the 6 more hits required for Admin?
The latter. Going for Admin does not yield you lower access rights if you miss the threshold by just a few hits.

Tracing of commlinks via messages:
See Black Matrix Service Providers, Unwired p.85, and Unwired p.53-55 on Data Routing.

The action of searching a general area for hidden notes is an Extended test with a threshold of 15. So, what happens if a hidden node arrives in the area during the Extended Test?
If you are already having those dice rolled, be generous and don´t test again. May I ask what the player hopes to gain?

The Track User action lets you track anyone "whose icon is present in your node". So... if you hack someone's commlink, under what circumstances is their icon present in the commlink's node? Is it there all the time? Or only when they're in VR or interacting with the Matrix in some other way? Does an AR user ever leave their commlink's node?
The commlink provides a persona, and said persona is always on the commlink, plus on all nodes the commlink is subscribed to. In this situation (the commlink is already hacked), I´d give location data for matrix perception. If the commlink had GPS, the information would even be more accurate than ~50m.

For ZOD
Several problems have been pointed out. Agi 6(10) is available for 40 BP Agi 6, 5 BP Restricted Gear, 7 BP Muscle Toner 4, or 52 BP. In case someone needs to shave a few BPs.

Regarding efficiency, note that you can only kill a target once. Agi 10 + Firearms 4 + Smartlink is usually enough and provides more options.

Visual Perception 11 is acceptable, a dp of 6 for everything else says you won´t hear an ambush or attackers behind you.

Depending on someone else for IPs is dangerous. Read up on barriers. Also on background count before buying that sustaining focus. Still nothing compared with your inability to climb, run or swim. Limits your choices for escape. The ability to kick in doors may also come handy.

It will also be dangerous to rely on the mage for defense against spells. Keeping LOS in buildings is mostly the same as staying within a single AoE for grenades and spells.

Uncouth... calling it a trap is a nice wording. Look at the Cha-linked opposed tests on p.130 of The Precious.

You only get to spend 4 power points. Imp. Agi is 3 PP, Imp. Automatics 4 is 2PP. (Terrible waste of BP if you ask me, and not legal anyway. Reflex Recorder + Imp. Automatics 2 provides the allowed 3 extra dice.)

The smartlink requires an image link.

Yes, he's very vulnerable to ambush - if someone reasonably good at sneaking and brawling comes from behind, he's going to be toast : snatch his gun (with the rules as they are he could use the alpha to blow his opponent to bits even if engaged in melee) and use the stock to smash his face. With neither hand-to-hand skills, gymnastics or dodge there's very little he could do about it even if he's as fast as greased lighting. And if he ever try to boobytrap the way to reach his position to secure his back, with no skills an 1 logic he's going to blow his traps in his face as he's trying to set them.

Even more of an humiliation : if he's perched on a rooftop, his very low willpower means a watcher manifesting in his back and yelling 'boo' has a good chance to make him jump to his doom in surprise...

Definitevely a one-trick pony that's flatly unable to survive on it's own. With his minimal charisma, the uncouth quality and an absolute zero social skill, he'll have problems just buying the bullets to keep his skills polished...

Shouldn't we run Zod throught he character clinic?

Definitly. Someone fetch his player, we´ll need input.

I'd rather say we should run Zod's player through a Shadowrun bootcamp. With examples of how fast can we obliterate his character as GMs, using a variety of tricks (preferably by making his own party kill him, that's the most fun solution!).

A lot of people think that "The hackers have no reason to be after me, I'm an unimportant schmuck." These people are prime targets for phishing, of course. However, successful criminals are smarter than that (specially because the FBI can institute all manner of phone taps), and treat cell phones as security hazards.

Don't store sensitive data on a wirelessly acccessible device if it's not necessary. Erase all call logs, don't keep a phone book but "remember" phone numbers instead:

Sensitive data is stored on an implant commlink in your head, which has its wifi antenna physically removed, and is accessed through a datajack instead. The cables help to make sure you don't forget to take off a trode net when leaving your inner sanctum, and make wifi hacking harder. The goal of the implant commlink is to be a computer, be an auxiliary memory, calculator etc, not a communications device. It also helps you store comm numbers in a less sensitive space. An important feature of this implant commlink is that it's immune to pickpocketing, theft or remote hacking.




I'm inclined to say yes... compare it to a movie scene where the FBI/CIA/whatever is trying to keep someone talking, keep the line open, so it can be traced. Maybe demand that there needs to be an open connection.




I'd say that it's in the spirit of the rules to be allowed to track a commlink that you're hacked into.





Here we have real-world computer stuff meeting SR again, always a tricky thing. It makes sense - the network routes stuff to a commlink based on its Access ID, and there are ways to change your Access ID. So logically you could turn off Zak's commlink and set your own Access ID to the same value, and masquerade as Zak's link. Of course, from a game balance perspective, that way lies madness...

In the real world, there's a great deal of trickery involved with spoofing your identity as an entity on the web. It's not very easy to impersonate, say, a bank - there are all sorts of third-party authentication schemes to foil that. But SR doesn't use that kind of detail. So this is vague...

Of course, the smart solution would have been to just steal Zak's commlink or hack it, and route calls through it.




Other people have pointed out that the rules for First Aid were applied incorrectly here. Read them extremely carefully, they're trickier than they appear, and if you apply them completely, less unbalanced than what happened here.

And that kind of summoning is what you get when you refresh Edge every session. It's probably best to refresh it every mission instead.



Eh. For this kind of stuff I generally use a "luck roll" - if the player rolls well, he gets the good option. This really seems like a job for random chance.



1) If Zod wasn't aware of the sniper, he wouldn't get to defend against it in the first IP the sniper attacked.
2) No smart sniper has a wireless device with him, because it compromises stealth. If you must communicate, path in a cable to some local building's landline and get a fake account.


Anyway, concerning Kaz's fate: they didn't make sure the body was really dead, from close by? Then according to everything Hollywood has taught us, he must be alive, just playing dead so they'll stop shooting and let him regenerate in peace.


Let's vivisect this abomination.
STR 1, no Climbing - this sniper is not going to be climbing to rooftops. If he tries, he'll fall off, taking some falling damage, and ruining chances at stealth.
LOG 1 - smack him with a rolled-up newspaper every time he tries to come up with a complicated plan for anything. LOG is easy to dump because there aren't all that many skills that use it, but lockpicking is one of them, and with his lack of climbing skills, how's he going to get on top of buildings?
WILL 1 - No defense against magic at all. Use Control Actions to make him walk off that building (assuming he can get up on it in the first case.) Make him dance like a monkey during combat. Shoot him with a stunbolt. Tempt him with drugs.
WILL 1, no Influence Skills, Uncouth - he has NO defense against any social roll. He doesn't even get a single die. Young schoolgirls can make him their sock puppet.
No Dodge or Gymnastics - introduce him to the wonderful world of people trying to hurt you, and you not having any way to avoid it.
No Stealth skills - this is a sniper? Make sure to make him roll those stealth skills.
No Matrix skills, non-customized commlink loadout - every hacking trick the PCs have pulled so far, you can do to him, easily.
Fake SINs: these are things you show to officials to show that you're not a criminal. With those names?


This is really one of the most absurdly munchkinized builds I've seen, but with huge glaring holes in it. This is a character who can't hide, can't talk, can't take a beating. He's a maniac with a gun.





I wouldn't let players roll Edge on tests to notice something passively. Edge is for when a character puts in extra effort. Just make the passive PErception rolls in secret; get them to give you the numbers for their dice pools so you don't have to ask them. Just roll some dice behind the GM screen now and then.










INT 1 is a big risk though; low Initiative can be deadly if surprised, and low INT means your Perception checks to spot ambushes will be rather difficult.

Anyway, you seem to be more levelheaded that whoever plays this Zak creature Just remember that D&D tries to shoehorn people into balanced builds, while SR gives you a lot more freedom to minmax as you see fit. But with great power...

To be fair: a Willpower of 2-4 doesn't mean shit against magic either, since every spellcaster has Spellcasting + Attribute as his pool while the victim only has Willpower to resists against mana-based spells.

Personally, I don't think Zod is even optimized... he's got 1 IP, and utterly lacks skills or abilities that allow him to successfully get into situations where he actually gets to shoot someone.

Give him this character instead (courtesy of UmaroVI), it's a self-sufficient assassin character who's actually playable.

Honestly, with those stats it's highly unlikely he would have survived long enough in the SR world to even become a runner

Heavy Weapons? It kinda makes me ask something along the lines of "UMADBRO?". However, it can still be tweaked into a nice sniper character - instead of Heavy Weapons skill, LMG and plonker we can use Longarms at 4 and some decently kitted-out sniper rifle for something more assassin-like.
Which kinda gives me an idea to tweak my Russian para a bit. Not every soldier has to have points invested in Longarms after all. Most does well with Automatics.

Based on Gazzor's reply it looks like all their characters need to be run through it

With Zod's negative qualities, isn't he running something like notoriety 4 BEFORE he decided to be a runner and troll through Seattle in a DIY tank? At that point, I'd pretty much only be hiring a character like that for suicide runs.

Of course, feel free to tweak.

After talking it over with Suoq i'm pretty much waiting for the 10th iteration where this has been one elaborate troll. I think i'm done.

If he turns out to be one, I will definitely donate to Dumpshock. Many lulz were had in these threads, and it makes me appreciate my group of sometimes trigger-happy players a lot more.

True, but with a Will 3-5, if your party magician has Counterspelling, you've got a shot at it. With Will 1, even that is unlikely to work out.

Fair enough.

Do you happen to have this build in Chummer format? Uploaded on Omae maybe?

Unfortunately for us, this is indeed the properly chronicled misadventures of the clueless pink-mohawk gang. At least some of our problems stem from not reading the rules deeply enough (skimming != understanding), coupled with Chummer (our character generation tool of choice) not enforcing certain rules until very recently, coupled with our innate need to minmax because we're too used to hero games, where the protagonist is expected to be exceptional even when starting out.

The fact that most of the players are vicious sadistic nutjobs is, I would argue, actually a point in our favour given the setting for SR4A. At least it's not Paranoia...

Note that at no point would I put any of the blame on Hyphz; I've done my share of GMing and it can be hard enough in a system you are familiar with, never mind one you've only just started. Some of the judgement calls he's made so far have turned out to be innacurate once the rules were better explained, but we have categorically enjoyed every session so far, especially some of the WTF? moments as chronicled in earlier sessions. I fully intend to keep playing SR until we've worked through (read: mangled beyond belief) the plot options available in the sourcebook he's using. Even if it takes 5 TPKs and an endless stream of new character builds to do so

Regarding character clinics, I am perfectly happy to show my incompetence at creation in return for suggestions on improvement; I built Caine and Faceman for this campaign, as well as the late Mr. Happy Punch (melee troll who was ditched because he didn't roll 20+ dice) and prototyping a hacker. Would you recommend I start a seperate thread to keep the campaign trainwreck seperate from the character trainwreck?

Oh, your expected to be exceptional still. 400 BP is a pro-runner, the equivalent of a hard core professional - made that way because the other 90% are dead. But, not only are you expected to be exceptional in your field, but you need to provide utility in several others, and at least not die horribly to chipheads in everything else. Its not "Me big dumb fighter, but thats ok, becaus em need smash kobolds!" its "I'm a moron with a gun. Because I'm stupid, I don't have a chance in hell to figure out what this pay data is, whats on this link, or where that camera is likely tied to. I die horribly wondering how that drone got there."

Most of the games we've played previously have been level based though, where the expectation is that even if you max out at chargen, it's still pants compared to where you *will* get once you've scoffed enough XPs, so as a player if you want your char to be über at high level, you need to specialise right away. This is where SR4 completely derails us, as if you max shooting at chargen (and get 26 dice in automatics) that's as far as it is reasonably going to go, and you don't get defense for free.

And since players don't have a level, neither do NPCs, so we could be facing 8DP gangers who aren't that much of a challenge, or 18DP security pros who will likely kill us completely to death. As a DM you don't get the same "they are level 3, so I'll use some level 3 to level 5 monsters" and the balance happen by itself. It's doable if you start karmabuilding your NPCs and quantise by totals, but only if you minmax the builds to a similar extent; "they are 750 karma so I'll use 600 to 800 karma opponents" can still end up either being a challenge, or a walkover (going either way).

That aspect of the system is where we have completely missed the point, and ended up with massively unbalanced characters. Sure some of the guys have 20+ dice to throw around, but as pointed out by practically everyone, they are paper cannons at best.

I think I'm going to post up my hideous abominations in a new thread and see what I should have done right

I mean, the problem is that sometimes they're *not* paper. You can be okay-good-great at… everything, if you crunch harder than everyone else, and esp. use all the 'bought the book' bonuses. So there's character-roundness as an issue, and then there's simply 'power balance' as an issue.

It sounds like this group is running pretty much for the first time in 4.5. The GM has his hands full with some of the players antics too. Buying the farm in this game is easy, the hard part in this game is getting the challenge just right. For a pink-mohawk game this sounds about right. Some rules miscues happen, so don't be alarmed if it happens. I go by the play it as called at the time rule. For Kaz though, assume he got away. Nothing like a high power illusion spell to fool the runners....

Some suggestions on where to go from here:

1. For the PC's--get a copy and go over it on your own and then with the players. Heck make a paralell thread for the characters, and us on DS will critique. Allow this one last review of the PCs and modify them to fit appropriately. Also remember the golden rule in PC gen, the gm has final say. Alternatively you can have the players make new characters from scratch.

2. For the PC with player no show's, put them in backgorund. Only bring them out if you need to have them fulfill their intended roll pretty much or if you need the group to make a common sense roll. Often when I have a lot of new players, I toss in a friendly NPC to do such a roll and he/she is there to pose the stupid question: "Yeah um don't you think riot gear in a bar is a bit over the top? or Is that an ARES ALPHA or are you just happy to se me".
Fo a game as complex (Not just rules either!!) as shadowrun is, a player can't really handle more than 1 PC.

3. You're all learning the rules--go with the GM call or look it up and show the GM the relevant rule. It helps if during the action one player that is non-active looks up the rule while the others are seolving theirs. Let the GM know what the rule is if something is missed. Even if it is a detriment to the party.

4. IMHO--RPG's are not about winning or loosing, they are about immersion. Anything that messes with immersion into the story should be glossed over or ignored. NERPS do exist. What NERPS (Non-essential role-playing stuff) are is an opinion that could be well debated across 5 internets (maybe more).

5. Hyphz's Players don't read this...

The only character who directly observed the incident (Zod) is Willpower 1. As far as we are aware it all went down exactly as decribed to us

As a lateral way of continuing with Ghost Cartels, see if you can posit the PCs as vigilantes trying to sort out this drug business, rather than shadowrunners working for whoever. The game system supports vigilantes just fine; it's a thin line to runners anyway.

Why not a datalock instead?


Not entirely accurate. It can go much, much higher than that.

A datatalock fulfill the requirement for "safe storage", but it's not enough if you need to frequently access the data yourself and want to be able to browse and update it without givng external signs of what you do and with as few as possible possibility of datas being intercepted (so no wifi access and even maybe no skinlink).

Hence the "reasonably " I guess.

A good idea. I might suggest you use a PM though, if you don't want them readin it.

This is why. A datalock is for secretaries who need to be able to "tune out" stuff they hear - not quite so useful for managers.

I really like this idea of the built-in computer as a method to achieve some measure of data security (and a paperless office!). Maybe with a cybereye (mod) to allow speed-reading of data into digital memory? Keep no records external to your body at all.

I wonder - is there still something you [need to/can] buy if you want a brain->gun smartlink cable through your arm instead of skinlink or wifi cheese? (I'm just prejudiced against skinlink. Indulge me.)

Simply implant a Datajack in the arm/hand? Wrist jacks are classy.

I wonder if a Cybersafety would suffice? Can you link a Cybersafety implant to your Internal Commlink?

I'm AFB right now, but isn't a Cybersafety little more than an implanted RFID?

No, he can't. Not directly, anyway.
The comcode system basically has your MSP working as an intermediary. It stores your comcode number, and links it to the Access ID you've most recently logged in with. So when you call a comcode number, the MSP 'patches you through' to the device with the ID it has registered you to. This means you have to actually have an ongoing call in progress to Track the location of the device, since you need an Access ID to do your Tracking on.

An image link (since those works both way) and the right image anamysis software running on the comlink should be enough. You can probably store the raw footage and post-process it later if real-time recognition seems too ressource-intensive.


As far as rules go, there is nothing. IMHO adding about 100-250 to the price of the weapon and the smartlink and +& or +2 to the availability (2 to 5 times the cost of a skinlink - it's something of an obsolete technology well on it's way out) is a plausible solution if you absolutely want that old-school "wire in the arm + induction pad in the hand + induction pad in the gun" feeling

You could just go Old-School and get the Smartlink/Induction pads from 3rd. A little more Essence Intensive (but not all that bad). I actually have a few characters that have such systems. It may be old-tech, but sometimes that's the best tech.

EDIT: Yep, Dahrken got there first... *shrug*

Alright, BUT: Shouldn't you be able to get the access ID through an ongoing call? Unless it's anonymized via proxy, that is. I've had this problem that the PCs basically found anyone's access ID via their comm-codes (by hacking from one commlink to the next), which led to immediate hacks of the discovered commlinks. Now... these weren't security conscious people they were hacking, but still, it seemed a bit too easy.

So how do you defend against this:

First of all, I believe you can't use an actual trace program to track a commcall, because to do that you need to spot the persona on a node, which means there has to be an open subscription - and only encrypted communication requires this. However, Unwired says that each Data request also leaves a data-trail that can be followed, and the SR4A book hints at this, but doesn't specify it anywhere. So, again, there seems to be conflicting information. Now considering that the data goes somewhere and must contain routing information, I would be inclined to house-rule this to work, anyway, and allow a standard trace during a running comm-call. The trace will end with the access ID, if successful, or end up at the Proxy if there is an anonymizer in place. In this case, you need to deal with that problem - hack the proxy, or similar. However, due to some rules specified in either book, you can't actually determine the access ID of the proxy, for whatever weird reasons, at the same time, because you can't gain access to a routing node. So you then have to do another trace on the proxy, or so it seems. (Which clearly doesn't make much sense.)

Now of course it would be smart to actually assign a secondary commlink to your comm-code, so that the tracing hacker can only find that, and then route the calls to whatever link you are really using. Of course these secondary links must also be protected just as well as your normal one, or else a hacker can easily hack them and again detect the route - if just from looking at the routing logs.

The next step would be running a Stealth program, because that would interfere with doing a trace, and adds its rating to the DC. Since tracing is only a complex action extended test, you would have to keep your comm-calls very short, however, in order to not still be found within a few IPs.

And finally you need to have agents watching for traces on neighbouring nodes. How you accomplish this I don't know, I would assume you could leave a few commlinks or nexi lying around which take care of routing (but nothing else), which also run those agents. However, this presumes you are in one location.

So in conclusion:
Get an anonymizer proxy, at best a few in serial mode, for comm-calls. However, this reduces your response for normal operation, so its at beast not used for hacking.

Run stealth

Only accept calls of two IPs or less from sources you don't know.

Sounds reasonable to me.

2 IPs is what, 1.5 to 3 seconds? Not an awful lot of time to hold a conversation in hot VR, never mind AR. Given the time window it would appear that the truly security conscious would instead only communicate by encrypted text messages, and the paranoid by encrypted messages steganographically hidden inside the encrypted text messages.

Or something

Use disposable comlinks to access one-time-access dropboxes. And reply with the Access ID of the next dropbox your contact should use.

For mroe security, have some codeword in the message incating what Id you should go. 'contact Id xxxx' is pretty straightforward to exploit. 'contact me on teh blue box' far less so.

Don't forget that Nigerian scam emails are always ignored. Plant a codeword, address, names... Sometimes, hiding in plain sight works.

There is no right way to play SR and I'd say that Dumpshock is probably the last place to come to learn the "right" way to play it. Rules questions maybe, world and character (apart from rules) advice I'd say no.

It seems pretty clear that the players are having fun with the way things are going. Are you as GM having fun? Don't include anything about "am I getting the setting right?" or "playing with the correct rules?" just think about the session itself and whether you had fun. It certainly seems the characters were challenged and things are only going to get tougher for them with so many enemies. I also think that you are doing the right thing by letting players constantly remake their character each session -- it allows everyone to adjust to new "rules discoveries" and allows players to adjust based on their preferred playstyle.

Basically, if everyone is having fun then you are doing it right. I said this about session 7 and I'll say it again: "if they want to play high-tech murder hobos let them do that as long as everyone has fun."

I'd say that the signal to noise ratio can make it daunting, especially for some one new, and unsure of themselves. However I think over the years I've learned to take away some tricks, and tips. I do agree that even asking to have the rules clarified can lead to twenty seven different answers, so you have to kick the filter on high, and sometimes lead the conversation.

So yeah if I ran the joint it'd be a lot more like Bulldrek. But I don't, so I make the best I can of it all.

And it's been a good opportunity to share what knowledge we have (to others, if not the table in question) and learn some things in exchange.

Sounds right to me and not even terribly off reality. I'd also add a good level of encryption on top of that.

However, this being the future and all, to prevent someone hacking the proxy and then sitting an agent there watching the traffic come and go you'd want to jump through multiple anonymizers and, ideally, split your traffic so it randomly alternates routes through the anonymizers.

In past threads, I'd say neither group (players or GM) were having fun -- or at least that's the impression he was giving. I know the GM himself has sounded awful frustrated a few times (like with a thread title of "lots of work for nothing"), and last session or the session before, the complaint was that Zod's player spent all night sitting with a computer in his lap, playing an MMORPG instead of paying any attention to the game at all.

If that's their idea of having fun, awesome...but, uhh, it kind of doesn't sound like it from where I'm sitting.

Zod must be the worst assassin I have seen ever, bar none. Apart from the fact you can't specialize on a skill you don't have (Infiltration), he doesn't have any real skill apart from his Automatics and Pilot GC, and you as a GM are doing absolutely nothing about it.

From your last two threads you stated that Zod took sniper positions on nearby buildings on 3 occasions, the assassination of Dae, the ambush of Kaz and the rundown with Wolf and his yaks ... how exactly? It seems very convenient to me that these buildings were apparently unlocked and unoccupied.

Assassins generally need the Stealth group (Infiltration obviously, Shadowing to tail a mark and discover his/her habits and the best place to take them down, Disguise so they don't end up on the Star's Most Wanted posters and Palming to help conceal their guns), Hardware and Lockpicking to get past maglocks and standard locks (although the gear Maglock Passkey and Autopicker go a long way to substituting if the skill is not there), Con to get past security guards and receptionists, and Climbing (to gain access to less secure entry points as well as vantage points for sniping).

So, how would Zod cope with any of these obstacles? Uncouth and no social skill means he can't talk his way past guards, without any skill or appropriate B&E gear a lock or maglock would screw him, and with his STR of 1, I hope he is huffing and puffing (you could count as distraction, -2 DP penalty) for several minutes after he has gotten into position, if he can get his big heavy assault rifle to the roof in the first place.

Hyphz, you are still thinking the Other Game if you think there are convenient vacant and unlocked buildings for snipers to use all over the city, 'cos there ain't. You don't penalize his STR 1 for encumberance for wearing armour and carrying his heavy assault rifle around, you don't require him to get past guards or locks to get to his Instakill-NPC ™ sniper position. Fair enough, he could probably shoot anyone who gets in his way, shoot through a door or lock, but hey, that costs ammo, makes noise and otherwise brings attention to his presence. You really need to think about what the PC's say they are doing, and even for off-scene stuff think how they are gonna do it.

The other point I wanted to raise was your backing down when you told them the Star was on the way. Don't back down. There could be any number of reasons for them coming, like a little old lady in the residential apartment who saw a suspicious character (Zod) heading to the residential building roof and dialled 911, hell they could be heading to a nearby and entirely unrelated crime scene, although the PC's don't know that. If the PC's try and call you again on a decision you have made, just tell them that they don't know why the Star are on the way, but are they gonna distrust their ears? At the very least it will give you time to think of a reason they may be on their way, even if you decide it is just blind luck (or in the PC's case, a lack of it), although I think you can always think of a 3 letter reason why someone may have alerted the Star, a clue - it begins with Z.

If you watch a movie, there are a number of points where blind luck nudges the plot in the direction it is heading, GMing Shadowrun you want to try for the same effect. If the Star just happen to be a block away when Zod starts shooting out an NPC you want to survive, so be it. Let the PC's bitch all they like, although you don't want to use the same plot device too often otherwise the PC's will catch on and it will damage the realism of your narrative.