Currently, the runners in my game have completed a decent run and have some Karma to blow. Naturally, their minds have turned to training some skills. After perusing the rules in SRComp (pp. 48-51), I'm not quite satisfied with the mechanics of the system. Granted, it's optional, but I believe that there should be some mechanic in place to determine training time and costs, instead of the characters becoming instant skill gods overnight.

My problems are two-fold. The training times, for one. A particularly lucky character could finish his Masters Thesis in parazoology in a couple of weeks. A particularly unlucky character could spend half a year trying to learn how to bake a cake. Plus, apparently skills can only be learned one at a time, for four hours a day. Most college courses have three to four hour sessions a week, plus an additional ten to twelve hours of studying a week. And a full-time student takes four to seven courses at once. Which really doesn't fit with the concept of four-hours a day, plus half Willpower, for only one subject, and the slim chance at more at a Will (10) test.

My question is, has anyone created an alternative training system for their campaign?

In our team, we choose to make the adventures the challenge for the players, not the bookkeeping. It's a conscious choice, made deliberately.

Therefore, we treat all characters as working on improving skills and attributes as a large part of their time between runs. They are always just about to get to some new level of ability in something, but some small thing seems to stand in their way. Maybe it's their breathing, perhaps their timing, whatever.

The spending of Karma, perhaps immediately after a run, represents that final breakthrough where they say "Ah HA! So that's what I've been doing wrong. It's so easy now." And they've got the new skill, ability, or attribute. So while it may seem to be immediate, after earning the Karma and spending it, that's because you're ignoring all the work and effort that went into it before. Sometimes they are on the brink of a major improvement, but something's been blocking them, and they'll go up two levels at once. We don't allow going up more than two at one time.

Often the character knows what he's been working on, but the player doesn't. The player just knows the character has been working on something. At the time the Karma is spent, the player is finally aware of what his character has been working on during all his free time.

It's our choice for our game, but it works for us.

In my games i dont use game mechanics for such things as training time, I generally just limit "where" they can spend their Karma. Generally only skills used during a run, if they want to up a skill they didn't use during a run (or any of the large amounts of down time that i run) then i generally say no, untill they give me a reason (like spending time studying) then it's yes, but 1 point only.

Ok guys, what do you do for the next month?

"I spend time with my contacts and at the target range"

"I get the lastest electrical engineering texts and review them to keep current"

"I spend two weeks in my magical library learning some spells"

"I go on a coke binge and get an STD from a hooker. Oh yeah, and I help out at the clinic, learning more about medicine by assisting Doctor Goodbar"


I just wing it. Real training is boring; few players want to be told "well, roll to see if you get anything from that correspondence course", or "ok, lets roleplay your target practice session". Tell them to train for a month, snap your fingers, and deduct a lifestyle payment.

Actual mechanics for a training system should take a backseat to playerbase cohesion. Zazen is dead-on with his example. Wing it. Maybe throw in a rule that the characters can't gain more than 2 points in a skill between karma awards or something, unless they choose to be inactive for very long stretches of time. It will sorta limit the "Ok in the month between this last run, and this new run, I've picked up 6 points in shotgun!"

We don't use the training rules all that much. When there is a long downtime it might happen. Other than that I have ruled that if a character uses his skill sucessfully (at least) once during an adventure then they're allowed to raise it one step after the adventure. If they want to raise it more than that they're gonna need some heavy downtime and a teacher.

Our group just assumes you are spending the time, we don't do rolls nor time-delay. If you have the karma to spend, and you want to raise a skill, raise it since you've obviously been 'training' yourself for it for the duration it took you to get that Karma.

Sphynx

I let people with some karma pick-up a weapon off a guard's dead corpse, pay the karma to buy the skill, and use the weapon with it right there and then. Only within reason though, skills 2-3 are usually OK, skills of 4+ are only fair game if they have another skill in the same default group or a high linked attribute.

Another interesting system would be to allow 'instant' buying up-to the squareroot of the number of times you've used it recently. Thus, after shooting a gun for the first time, you can buy the skill at 1. After emptying a clip, you could probably buy your skill up-to 3 or so.

I'd apply 'lite' training rules to all Combat, Vehicle, B/R (within reason), and Physical skills. Technical, Knowledge, and Magical skills would require at-least a bit of tuition, practice, or book/matrix-perusal to learn.

Warning: long post ahead...

Okay, to gloss over a few points made, I'm looking for more than just "we don't use any". I respect that decision, and it may work for your game, but I just can't capture the level of realism I like to portray in my SR games if a character can become a master of kung-fu in less than a week's worth of running. My games are also fast-paced -- case in point, they've already completed two runs in three days of gametime since the campaign started. Granted, they were loosely based on module adventures from First Run and were fairly easy, but I don't foresee my gamers being the "run-a-month" type. Realtime events will pass them by too fast to take advantage of, and their enemies never stand still and wait. They crave action and nuyen, not necessarily in that order.

Knowing this, I'd like to tone down the training times slightly, or at least give some reward for "on the job training". I'm already brainstorming on houserules to do just this, in fact. Plus, I like the thought of allowing them to train for multiple skills at once, if they're smart enough to handle the excess courseload. It would sound like a lot of bookkeeping to do, and this has been brought up as a point against using training times, but bookkeeping is not a problem -- I would automate the training calculations in a spreadsheet, and pop it on my GMing Laptop along with the other handy tools I've created or acquired. I prefer taking the bookkeeping out of the players' hands anyway, as it is the GMs job to do the paper shuffling, and the players' job to do the actual running.

Here's what I have in mind so far...

Training times are the same as SRComp, i.e. Karma x 7 days for Active, Karma x 15 days for Knowledges. Successes on a Skill test with TN equal to the skill level goal + 1 will divide into this, failure equals x1.5 time increase. Instructors will add successes on a two-for-one basis to reduce studying time, but are not required to learn the skill, nor will teaching yourself increase the time any further. Virtual instructors can reduce time (as opposed to SRComp), but no Karma Pool can be used to reroll failures, as with a live instructor.

You can actively study INT/2 subjects per full day of training (assumed to be 8 hours, leaving plenty of time for recreation and/or the occasional legwork, meet, or fencing run). You can study up to INT subjects total by alternating days. If you go more than INT days without a day's study, you add an extra day to the time for each day over (the Spring Break Syndrome).

Last, the On-the-Job Training rule: every skill roll used for non-frivolous purposes has a chance of reducing training time for that skill. A player can trade in any success that is at least double the skill goal to remove a full day's training time from that skill.

Wow that's a... lot of verbiage.

What I have a problem reconciling is this

gm decides who can learn what cheaper. meaning if Joe Sam has absolutely no skill in Projectile Weapons, but had to use a crossbow for the entire run and managed to be somewhat effective (dicerolling against incredible high TNs) the gm might consider to let him learn either projectile weapons or crossbows for free (resulting Joe Sam to have a skillrating of 1).

skills can only be increased by 2 points in between runs. either 1 skill and 1 specialization, or 2 skill or 2 specialization.

magical characters can either initiate or increase skills by 2 points.

attributes can only be increased by 1 point till racial max. above that only every second run (but only if they save their points) meaning th character is not allowed to increase anything for two runs.


min-maxing is almost not possible anymore. makes the game much more fun to play for us.

Some of it depends on how you view Karma. I tend to view karma in a fashion similar to experience. In a game I'm running, if I want to keep advancement "slow", I have the PCs roll for any skill or stat they want to advance against a TN equal to rating x 2. If they pass, they get to raise it immediately. If they fail they don't. They can retry anytime they recieve karma (ie, they have gained more experience).

It's not super-realistic, but it's good enough.

I've always used this as a template for learning. I allow karma to be used as sudden leaps of understanding "Of course, it makes sense now". This allows characters to gain a large number of low level skills with relativly little karma spent.

I tend to follow the Shadowrun Companion for training, but limit how much skills can be raised (no more than 2 pts at a time), and require instructors for anything over skill rating of 3 (average skill).

Finding Instructors is an etiquette test:
Skill level 4 requires an instructor with level 6 skill, requiring an etiquette 6 test.

Skill level 5 requires an instructor with level 7 skill, requiring an etiquette 8 test.

Skill level 6 requires an instructor with level 8 skill, requiring an etiquette 9 test.

Anything over 6 requires an etiquette (2 x new skill level) etiquette.

The high etiquette TNs reflect that difficulty of finding an instructor who is A: that good,; and B: has the time to take on a new student; and C: actually wants to teach the PC the new skill.

Instructors are a minimum 100¥ per day, doubled if the character wants to overtrain (using Willpower/2, rounded up, hours) on top of the four hours per day normally allowed, and this includes the Willpower (10) test to train even further than 4 + (Willpower/2,rounded up hours) per day. Anything over 8 hours in a day is 2.5 x the instructor fee, per day.


I'd rather players learn new skills than take the same combat skill to OMG levels.

And this also ensures people take Etiquette and Charisma stats seriously, rather than being the "I'm a combat monster, who cares about etiquette?" type.

I allow players to spend karma in an instant. The middle of the game is okay. Heck, the middle of a combat turn is okay!

Good Karma doesn't really equate to training in my book. Plus I don't want the hassle of all the bookkeeping.

My current group uses a streamlined "learning" system copped from all over.

Any skill used during a run is marked by the player. That skill can be raised a level without question.

Any skill not possessed by the character that is used via defaulting (to either another skill or an attribute) is noted and can be gained.

Any skill not used in the current run can be raised at least one level IF it is below its linked attribute.

Any skill over the linked attribute and not used in the current run and we break out the SRComp and use the training rules.

It's fast, low on the bookwork (it's not that hard to put a check mark next to a skill or note it on your CS) and keeps the players and GM from having to deal with constant die rolls after a run ends just to spend some karma.