Sorry if it has already been mentioned:

Hack Ares and plant fake shipping and payment orders to a rented warehouse registered to a fake company. Rating*100*2 for the fake business permit and fake security license, 2000 for a low lifestyle warehouse (minus ammo to clear out squatters), and however much time the hacker needs to spend on the credit card fraud. You'll need to burn the fake permits afterwards but whatever.

Alternatively:

Max out all the credit cards available on your fake SINs at WW. Costs you Rating * 1000 but you should be able to get far more return than that for your credit. Just make sure it isn't one of the legbreaking black market credit companies.

As a runner credit fraud is your friend!

I keep thinking but forgetting to mention: several people correctly pointed out that there's a price to pay for removing the gang, namely that another gang will simply move into that territory. One solution to this is to decide in advance who is going to fill that void; one method is to find a friendlier neighboring gang and work with them to remove the offender, but as anyone who has studied world history knows, this doesn't always work as you'd like it to.

If our group went this route, we would probably consider co-opting or headhunting the gang, and then simply moving into those leadership positions ourselves, or through trusted proxies. But whether this suited us as characters would determine if we went down that road.

That's a great point: you always want to get paid (currency, favors, whatever) by *all* sides involved. So you're helping the new gang take over while you're helping the farmers not die. Possibly you're even pretending to help the old gang against the upstarts; be creative.

Now, obviously this will blow up in your faces *later*, when the new puppet gov't goes rogue. But! that's just another fun shadowrun for next time.

That seems too easy. Why is this the first time I've heard of this in Shadowrun? Where are you getting those numbers?

Probably because the first step is Hack Ares, the second step is leave a giant paper trail, the third step is piss off a lot of squatters that could have connections, the fourth step is have weapons delivered to low lifestyle part of town where they're sure to draw the attention of gangers and other lowlifes that would be happy to back off for a cut or to just take what they think they deserve, and the fifth step is burning your fake SINs, which might be different in other people's games but in ours requires a while to acquire new ones.

The great thing about Shadowrun is that it doesn't care about this. In SR, it takes the same amount of time to learn how to use a gun and how to use a bow. Same thing applies for crafting a bow.

As for bows getting the drop on the group - bows, since they are slower to fire than a SA/BF/FA weapon, tend to encourage proper aim. That is my point about it.

And I'm saying it's a bad point.

It can be as "bad" as you think it is, it remains a valid point. Mechanically, by the rules of this game, it is an acceptable alternative with the added bonus of targeting the (often) weaker armor value of your target. Orks and trolls would have a definite edge over firearms at that point also.

I didn't say that. I said, mechanically, bows don't 'encourage' better Aiming. They're just slower. The gun, in whatever fire mode, can shoot just as slowly and just as Aimed, and just as Surprisingly; it's better.

Yes, but anyone who has played any FPS knows that slower guns actually do encourage precision. Go play Left For Dead with the assault rifle, then change to the hunting rifle - you'll see what I mean. At that point I don't mean mechanically, I mean realistically.

EDIT: And yes, you can be just as Aimed and just as Surprising with other guns, but at that point the other factors come into play that I've mentioned before: same base dmg targeting lower armor, more base dmg in the case of orks and trolls.

You seem to forget that you have to ready the bow after each shot, meaning you only get one per action phase. Once 7P AP 0 vs impact (at STR4) probably is not as good as twice 7P AP-1 vs ballistic. That is even without using BF or FA. Don't forget the range categories. For a bow short is from 0-STRm, for an assault rifle it's 0-50m. Maximum range for the bow is STR*60m (240m at STR 4) whereas you can reach out and touch someone with an assault rifle in up to 550m.
Additionally RC is relatively cheap and suppressive fire does not care about recoil. Try to do that with a bow.

The problems i see with that is
).
Crafting them will take a long time if they dont have the right materials in stock, also useable bow is hard to craft.
even if they have all the mats it will take a lot of trial and error..
).
Maintanance of Bows,
if u use Wood and string for them they wont be of any use if they get wet.
a rifle will even fire after falling in dirtwater/mud
).
the farmer wont have any skills in Bow if the are not complete back to the basics maniacs,
but will have decent skills in rifle.
99% of all farmer i know are pretty good with rifles. skillrange 2-4 with some even 5
a lot of them are hunters, cause farming and hunting always seems to go hand in hand.
and some of them are even in sportsclubs for rifles, schützenverein
Even if they are not hunter or sportsman, they still will have at least basic skills in rifle for getting rid of all that vermin (magic and mundane).
).
if youre GM is more story orientated like myself or my buddies, u will have a hard time telling him that it takes the same time to learn bow and rifle skills.
we tend to ignore rules in favor of realism and fun

and last but not least
rifles have much longer range then bows, most gangs favor pistols/smg which also have short ranges
so u have a huge advantage when using rifles
cause u can hit them easy, they wont hit u as long as u use cover and with use of a few grenades u can easy nail them down.

So yeah nice idea with bows but rifles>bows also a old/used rifle will be very cheap (without loosing accuracy) and u can always re-fill the ammo and re-use it
this also saves a lot of money.

Well, 5 would actually make them special forces. And even 4 would be above a marine. So those guys will have 1 or 2 max.
But this the problem of too limited skill range...

What Neraph says is all true. But the "gangers" will not have maxed out armor. And if they have one point more of ballistic, it actually does not matter. The second shot per combat phase takes care of that.
(It would be true, if they had optimized armor with Ballistic 12 and impact only 6.

I agree, Neraph: IRL, slower encourages aiming. However, as you were eager to point out, we're talking about SR4 mechanics. Again, I wasn't addressing the Impact armor/etc. points. Still, I agree with the points already mentioned: range, speed, crafting feasibility, etc.—advantage, gun.

Are these really 'hunting' farmers? There's a lot of assumptions that we're using, in various ways.

You don't need to be a sniper to be a marksman, but you need to be a marksmen to be a sniper. Civillians , take for example story of Alvin York: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_York

I would give most farmers a 4 since they shoot the vermin, hunt deer, and have to protect their crops. They also can't wait for the local law enforcement types to show up since the Sheriff could be more than 20 minutes away--so being proficient with a gun is pretty much a given. I am talking US experience here (assuming UCAS is similar). Now that being said just cause you are a civillian doesn't mean you're not with a gun. Realistically (of those trained) you'd probably have mostly 3's with a scattering of 4's, and a couple of 5's maybe a single 6. The 1's and 2's would most likely be those just beginning to learn to shoot.

@Warlordtheft
It is hard to get around it, but the fluff just says otherwise...
Yes, it does not work at all and your "farmers" won't hit anything. True.
And beware of the dancers for they have the higher pools.

One is that 15000Y really isn't enough to cover territory desired. If you bought a Defiance T-250*, some rounds, and an Urban Explorer Jumpsuit for about 1000Y, you could outfit 15 dudes. If you outfit your 15 best shots, you could likely make them roughly equal to a Halloween Street Ganger (likely a good example of the type of foes you'll normally face). That might be enough for patrols and the like, but it sounds like you'll be outnumbered a lot of the time.

My suggestion is figure out how to leverage your starting 15000Y into more gear. Options include raiding some place for gear or making some sort of deal. There may be groups such as military, police, security, or gangers who have weapon stockpiles. Stealing those would be a huge windfall. Who's the best target and how hard this is depends on your setting.

You could also try to negotiate a good deal. Under the table deals with quartermasters throwing out old weapons, organized crime looking to unload hot firearms**, or just funneling firearms acquired during normal shadowrunning are all good potential sources.

A potential good buy is a drone such as a Steel Lynx, Hussar, Air Supply, or LBD-1 with obvious armor (rating 12-16). It's quite possible to make a drone that's flat out immune to gangers. Put on a gun and you could mow down a huge number of people with your kill-bot. If flying is feasible, it'll be a great support vehicle since it can fly where needed quickly. You can keep it in autonomous mode, have a guy command rig it with optimized command 6 program, or jump in (especially if hacking is a worry though that's unlikely).

The flaw is that a drone good enough to do this is likely going to cost at least 10,000Y. One drone can't hold down an area of this size. However, I would seriously consider it after outfitting the 20th man. That gives you the ability to deal with multiple threats at once and have stuff like partols. You'll also have a huge unstoppable lynchpin for big fights.

*- The best gun to buy will depend on your men's skills. If they're good at something, buy them something cheap for that skill. If they have their own guns, that's even better.

**- Especially since I think the Plastic Jungles are a Z-Zone under a farmer's bed in the middle of a lawless zone is a great place to hide a murder weapon.

Well
for me its ok to give a farmer rifle up to 5, cause skill only says how good are u at something but not what u can really do with that skill.
a farmer/sportsman with 5 is really good with his rifle, but he surly lacks in attributes so he wont hit an moving target as easy as a sniper would.
Also he is not a professional and doesnt get the prof rating like a sniper would (dunno if this is only SR3 but i still use the rule and add up to 4 dice)
And also he isnt used to live or death combat, so he will make mistakes and or doesnt shoot the right target in the right moment.

@Money
for more money the best thing would be to find a fixer with Soyfood allergies
he surely will be glad to outfit youre farmers for natural and cheap food or free food.

call it Weapons for Food ^^

@Stahlgewitter
Well, I guss this is SR3.
In SR4 Rifle 4 means you are able to use this skill in combat.

I agree that it is not good the way it is, but this are the rules. Shadowrun is quite weak on the simulation side... But everything has ups and downs.
(You could introduce "feats" which tell you are able to use your skills in combat without malus.)
So a guy who is quite a good shot would have rifle 4 but if he is thrown into a combat situation he would be much worse than the marine with rifle 3 and "battle hardend III".
The civilian would take a penalty of, lets say, two dice and the marine even gets a bonus of one.

But this would be much more micro management.
(If you want to play a good shot out of combat, ask your GM for a spezialisation (out of combat))

thx for the suggestion but nah
i prefere to ignore the rules ^^ and simply add 1-4 dice to my professionells
this way the normal people are not that weak also and my players can continue to power-game ^^

also i cant stand feats, played to much d&d ^^

Hrm. I may have been lowballing the expectations of preexisting armaments - these are, after all, the plastic jungles, in a Z-Zone. They'd need shotguns and long rifles, if only to keep the devil rats in check (though in fairness, big loyal dogs go a long way in also keeping the devil rats in check.) So, there is that, but long rifles won't do a whole hell of a lot against gangers in close quarters.

So this leaves Shotguns (Defiance-T250) and dogs... what does a hellhound cost these days?

Pages 266 and 268 for rules on credit and using it to cover lifestyles. Not as explicit as previous editions but the numbers are there. A high lifestyle should be able to get you about 52.5K (3*10k+3*5K+3*2K+3*500) in credit before the credit card company comes knocking. Plus it takes them a couple of months before they really escalate things.

I thought stealing stuff physically or through the Matrix was pretty SOP for SR. Guess it is just my table. Why pay your hard-earned money to finish a run when stuff is available for "free"?

(PS: before the panty-waists start accusing me of being "too lenient" I have killed/arrested/fucked with numerous runners over the years for these hijinks)

I'm paraphrasing the description of skill levels (I'm sure someone can quote it-AFB)

1-Which way of the gun is up (I saw it on TV and learned how to shoot in 30 seconds).
2-Some training, been to the shooting range a couple of times.
3-Proficient, go to the range on a semiregular basis
4-Veteren, (A well trained soldier or police swat member)
5-Master, (A sniper)
6+ One of the best of the best, (Doc Holiday, Wild Bill Hickock, etc, etc)

This is why to me, most people in the 1 to 2 range don't stay there long as they are in the middle of training to be proficient (aka 3). Those scattering of 4's are people that are well versed in shooting and may have had previous experience in the military, a local LEO, or shooting it out with a gang one time too many. The 5's would be rare, but there would be a few (like 2 or 3 IMHO out of a population of 100 shooters there is a chance in someones background that they got this good), a 6 is doubtful but plausible (possible NPC to be statted).

...

1) You can make a bow in just a few days. That's what the Armorer 'softs and kits were for. I myself made a bow in about four days and it lasted about four years. It was my first time making a bow with no prior experience.

2) Aren't they in greenhouses? That pretty much removes them from getting too wet if they don't want them to be. And they'd probably be using nylon strings.

3 & 4)
This is why I do not pay attention to you.

5) If you check, bows still out-range pistols and smgs. Not by as much as a rifle, but they still do. Also, what prevents you from reloading a bow? Your closing argument is that rifles can be reloaded... does that mean bows can't be?


This is exactly why I suggested what I did. You get the most bang for your buck in making sure they can make their own weapons; and with what they have available, that's bows.

And last: the point was to discourage attackers, not murder them all in cold blood. Yes, you can get two shots with 6P -1 AP from assault rifles and 7P -1 AP from sports rifles, but one shot at 6P targetting their weaker armor is more likely to do the job - namely, making you an unpalatable target. The whole point of giving them the ability to craft their own bows was to provide them with potentially unlimited weapons and ammo, instead of moderately equipping fifteen or fewer people with a couple handful of shots each.

@Neraph
The bows in shadowrun are not normal "wood" bows, as far as I can tell. Crafting is not that easy...

Define Normal Wood.
I had a wooden Bow (60 lb) that was just as potent as my metallic one (Variable Compound 55-70 lb). It does not have to be the best in the world to do its job.

Crafting a bow is not all that hard. I used to do it when I was younger. Crossbows are not all that hard to make either, especially if you are using Leaf Springs form a Truck. They may not last forever (though the crossbow might), but they will work. Not like you are making rating 8+ bows after all. A Rating 3-4 Bow will work just fine in this regard. Either option will work for what Neraph suggested.

Not 'normal wood' bows. Normal 'wood' bows; as opposed to metal/composite ones. And assuming the farm happens to have usable wood for them.

First of all, sorry to cause this kind of confusion. I meant (like yerameyahu suggested) wood opposed to metal.
The description of the Shadowrun bows talks about wheels and several strings, which does not connect to bows made out of wood.

Why? My Wood Bow was a compound bow with Wheels and Strings.

That is an assumption, to be sure. Not all wood is viable for Bows.

1-Which way of the gun is up (I saw it on TV and learned how to shoot in 30 seconds).

2-Some training, been to the shooting range a couple of times.
sounds like a 7 year old boy to me but i guess some of us dont get training this early
or everyone that has made his 6months military service in western Europe

3-Proficient, go to the range on a semiregular basis
seems like someone who is hunting from a few months to a few years

4-Veteren, (A well trained soldier or police swat member)
so could we say someone who has at least 10years of training with his weapon?
if yes, welcome you're average Hunter.

5-Master, (A sniper)
some of the older hunter could be easily that good, 40years+ of training doesn't make u bad i guess
yes not every old hunter will be that good, cause eyes are getting weaker, muscles and concentration will go down.
But still that would leave us with about 1 in 10 old hunters

6+ One of the best of the best, (Doc Holiday, Wild Bill Hickock, etc, etc)
just one thing, u dont have to be famous to be that good.


@ignoring rules
every good GM does that, cause its about the story and not about + or - 1 dice

Lets do this again, but this time with the real table:
Unaware:Never seen a gun before.
0:Point the barrel, pull the trigger.
1:Shot some tin cans with a BB gun a few times.
2:Trainee in police academy or military boot camp.
3:Regular beat cop or military grunt.
4:Riot control cop, combat veteran, superior regular force (Marines, Airborne)
5:SWAT team, elite military (Rangers, Special Forces)
6:Individual superstars amongst elite forces. Ghost-Who-Walks-Inside, Hatchetman, Matador
7:“Wild Bill” Hickock, James Bond, Thunder Tyee

And yes, your "hunter" could go up to 4. But even a guy who has been hunting for 40 years will probably not have a skill of 5. After the fluff.

I still say it's unreasonable to easily craft a *modern* 2070-style bow (i.e., using the stats and ratings from the book) entirely out of wood. So, they'll still need to acquire specialized bow parts, even if they happen to have perfectly suitable wood lying around. Besides, I was under the impression that SR4 basically did not include specific build-from-pre-scratch. Armorer doesn't explicitly allow you to craft a new bow from a pile of wood. If you had a build-a-bow kit, you could make a B/R test to *assemble* it. Possibly you could stat up a series of tests to craft those components ('woodworking', not Armorer?).

In broad terms, it *is* a good idea for long term armament given minimal retail transactions.

Modern or Ancient makes no real difference. Old English Longbows are just as powerful (if not more so) as some of our Modern Bows are today. It has to do with the Draw Weight, more than the technology behind it. Yes, Modern Bows can have a greater Draw weight, within reason, but the difference between the damage a 50 lb Recurve bow puts out and the Damage a 50lb Compound bow puts out is almost nonexistent. Each is shooting at 50 lbs draw weight. The big difference is that the compound bow is easier to draw, becuase it has a break point at which it gets easier, whereas the recurve does not. I have a really hard time shooting a 70 lb, recurve bow, because I just cannot pull the draw to my cheek. I hunt with that draw weight on my Compound bow.

As for the Creating rules... Yeah, there really are none. But you can still do it, within reason. Some things take a lot of resources. My uncle had a full machine shop, complete with automated milling machines and the works. He used it to craft parts for Colt as a sub-contractor (I would classify that as a facility in Shadowrun, not a shop, as the machines he had were in the multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy and maintain, but *shrug*). However, It takes almost NO technology to make a bow, especially if you opt for Straight or Recurve Bows rather than Compound Bows. I would likely allow a group of people to do so in this situation, BECAUSE it is so easy to do. But yes, I would likely use a "Wooodworking or Bowyer/Fletcher" skill instead of Armorer (Though that IS the correct skill by RAW). It would make the most sense.

It is the best solution, given the amount of money that is being talked about.

@Irion(thanks for the table I'll ad my interpretation to what this means civillian wise)

Lets do this again, but this time with the real table:
Unaware:Never seen a gun before.
0:Point the barrel, pull the trigger.
1:Shot some tin cans with a BB gun a few times. (civillian)
2:Trainee in police academy or military boot camp. (daddy took me to the range a couple of times)
3:Regular beat cop or military grunt. (shoots on a semi-regular basis)
4:Riot control cop, combat veteran, superior regular force (has been shooting on a regular basis for a few years)
5:SWAT team, elite military (that guy at the gun range that knows how to adjust his rifle, optimize the ballistics with his hand loaded ammo, and can shoot 2" groups)
6:Individual superstars amongst elite forces. Ghost-Who-Walks-Inside, Hatchetman, Matador (you know that guy at the range, yeah him, he gets upset when his 10 shot groups more than 1" apart--damned perfectionist)



Yes but probably, and never are two different qualifiers. Probably not, but is plausible for a 6, a 7 is 99.999% unlikely and would be miracle territory.

7: Gets upset when his 10-shot groups don't go through the same hole.

@Warlordtheft
But everything(after 1) one step down and you get close.
Daddy taking you to the range is not two.

Just caught up with the thread, and... Oh boy, there goes the "Sherwood Forest" cliché
Aside from that I like the idea of arming everyone with a bow, but they may likely not be trained.

Using the startup money to get more guns would be the way I'd try to figure it out (if not shooting and plundering the offending gang right away). Remember, the real key problem for runners in making cash out of stolen goods is to find a way to sell a great mass of those stolen goods without great cuts in the margin to please a fixer or without upsetting current market balance in the area. Giving it away to a bunch of farmers in the Barrens, though, will cut that out. Plus, you may call in for a favor later for such extraordinary effort. It's always nice to have a few well-armed friends in a lonely place. It's not always about the money

According to Wikipedia the old british Sten Gun was very cheap in production costs and easy to assemble (or at least cheap copies were). That may be a hint, though it is terribly outdated in the 2070s. That was my third take on this whole idea...

Was for me....

I'd rate myself a 3, but only because I don't get out to shoot that much.

Honestly, I can't get that worried about the relative skill level. You're likely only going to be able to arm 30 or so people. Thus you'll outfit the top 15% of your population of 200. Those people ought to have stats* roughly equivalent or better to a street ganger from the books. That's going to be 6+ dice. That's enough to hit motionless targets 92% of the time and hit gangers (reaction 3-4) more often than not. They're nothing compared to a shadowrunner, but should be enough to deal with gangers and the odd solo paracritter.

Ideally you'll outfit them with laser sights or smartlinks for more dice as well. A centralized tacnet would be amazing, but would require a large upfront investment. You'll want a decent cluster for the hub, sensor channels for everyone, and sat uplinks for everyone's commlink.

*- I assume the most common setup is agility 4 + pistols or longarms 2, but maybe you'll luck out and find an agility 5 + automatics (assault rifles) 4(6) ex-military badass as well.

Put K-10 into the other guys' drinks. Then get the hell out of dodge.

Capsule round+K10+Sniper Rifle on a drone=Hilarious

You already are out of Dodge.

This. Great post. And you will deter vampires too!

- J.

I just don't agree. Even assuming the whole bow-making scheme works perfectly, I see gangers only being more annoyed by such a strange defense. They *do* have guns, and they'll use them to kill, not just 'discourage'. If anything, knowing their enemy is so weak would embolden them (or others).

You wouldn't say that to Rambo!

PS - the drone/k10 idea is a treat Dakka Dakka. I will use that one.

- J.

That's true. Freaking Rambo.

So what this thread comes down to is you need an army of muscular ninja-like spec ops types who hide in the woods and knife everyone.

And now for your moment of Zen: http://youtu.be/BANS3gKTx_w

I can't believe after earlier editions people would knock the bow of the freaking bow. Troll Bow Adepts anyone?

- J.