QUOTE (Samoth @ Jun 28 2012, 08:51 PM)

Nosferatu and Vampires, agreed - no. Ghouls and other "normal" infected? Why not?
I can't remember a time in the past 23 years of playing Shadowrun where I've looked at the core book, and the core book alone, and looked at the character generation options inherent to that core book, and said, "You know, there's not enough variety. I need to play something completely out there for this game to retain my interest." Sadly, though, this is a thought process I see a lot of these days.
While I can see where Tom was coming from, and where I think he intended to go, when he made ghouls playable, I didn't agree with the decision. Even when I broke down and played myself a ghoul back in SR3. I didn't necessarily think it was a good idea. That said, I can see a point being made for ghouls as PCs. I might not like it, but I can see it as a viable alternative even as I actively try to convince people not to do it.
There's no such thing as "normal" Infected, by the way. Ghouls aren't normal. Vampires, wendigos, goblins...they're damn sure not normal.
I don't think, and I never have thought, that
any Type I Infected has any business as a player character. They're monsters. Ghouls are bad enough, having to feed on human flesh, but they can get their food from a chop shop. Someone has to die for them to eat, yes, but they don't necessarily have to kill their next meal themselves.
Type I, though...to survive, you've gotta get up close and personal with your victim...and you can't just get lunch second-hand, as it were, from Tamanous. Tamanous doesn't stock Essence...and you can't hand-wave that away as a 30% increase in lifestyle cost. The game stops being about shadowruns and becomes about the vampire getting his Essence fix.
They wanted rules for PC vampires from me 12, 13 years ago when I first wrote the piece for
Running Wild when it was still an SR3 book, and I told them no then. If I'd been consulted when the notion of Infected PCs was being put forth for the RC, I'd have fought tooth and claw against it then. It's a Bad Idea.
But you don't have to listen to me, since I know from elsewhere in this thread that I'm just a hater.