So, I have three regular players, whose PCs are as follows: Hideki Chosokabe, former Japanese Imperial Marine drone rigger; Mike Lawson, a technomancer who plays the greedy-dwarf stereotype to the hilt; and Random, a free spirit who lives up to his name.

Hideki and Mike want to found a security company. I have advised them that they will need someone with a real SIN to be the owner of record, on the grounds that background checks for a business license are more in-depth than the random "SIN, please" checks runners normally encounter. Beyond this, I'm not sure how to handle it. They want to start out as a penetration-testing firm, then branch out into security contracting. They also want the business to be legitimate, as far as it goes, while still doing runs on the side.

Random, for his part, wants to found a magical society to serve as his own private initiatory group. He plans to offer various spirit pacts to entice recruits, including a Life Pact, wherein a mortal pays him karma to heal damage; he also plans to offer immortality to the head of the society through the pact that turns the recipient into a copy of Random's spirit formula, thereby conferring immunity to age.

I'm perfectly fine with the players succeeding at these goals; I just don't want either of them to be easy. I particularly don't want the security firm to be a source of free money and gear to Hideki and Mike, or the magical group to be a karma farm for Random. I would appreciate suggestions as to how I can best handle these situations.

Could always lull them into ''a false sense of security'', giving them these things at first and then having something go wrong later. Perhaps shadowruns are taken against the security company, possibly costing them more nuyen than they've earned thus far and forcing them to start acting like a real company or corporation... upping security and whatnot. Or Random enters into a pact with a toxic or insect shaman unwittingly, seeking to expand their influence.

Not really the best ideas. In fact they're kinda bad... but here's to hoping some obscure spark of inspiration will hit you. Cheers.

Gah! Double post again.
Something must be wrong with my mouse.

A Rating 6 fake SIN should do the trick. Alternatively, there are probably ways to get a real SIN for a SINless person. I wouldn't reccomend finding a front man without like, installing a cranial bomb in him, less he decide that since the records are all in his name, he can just take the money, close up shop and leave town.

Anyway, running a legitimate business is going to be very difficult, especially in an era when it is considered acceptable for one small business to pay some deniable felons some cash to go and murder the employees of the other small business. Finding work would likely be difficult, but not impossible: they might consider starting out by supplying legitimate neighborhood security on the cheap to a neighborhood that can't afford Lone Star or Knight Errant but is wealthy enough to pay for security.



This is actually a pretty clever damn idea on Random's part. But remember that if a person becomes a copy of your formula, they can be used against you. So he might want to consider the cranial bomb option, too.




How often do magicians find themselves with an urgent, desperate need to heal two boxes of damage? Not very often. I'd say that basically, once a session, roll 1d6. If it turns up 6, give Random a Karma as one of his buddies pays for health. If that's still too often for your tastes, roll 1d6. If it's a hit, roll again, and if that die is also a hit, award a Karma.

For the security company, their biggest threat, early on, is going to be a lack of work and competition. Most big clients would rather hire deniable assets to do security penetration testing rather than a legitimate business; hiring a legitimate business means there will be a paper trail, which will be inconvenient if the penetration testers stumble upon some atrocity or black lab and need to be discretely murderated. Also, it's hard to stiff a legitimate business by paying them in bullets instead of nuyen. The competition won't like there being competition, and hiring some deniable assets to wipe the competition out altogether is probably a pretty common thing when dealing with companies with less than ten employees. You may also have to worry about the fact that Knight Errant or Lone Star or whomever is in charge might just offer the owner-of-record a sizable cash incentive to just sell them the business lock, stock, and barrel - it would be a kick in the ass to set up your business only to find out one day that some contractors are installing Lone Star's sign out front of the franchise, there's a bunch of Lone Star goons moving into your offices, and the owner of record - that front man SINner you found - has skipped town in possession of a cool million nuyen, having sold "his" (your) business.

I cannot find anything in the wording of the Life Pact that says the recipient can use it a limited number of times per day. An urgent, desperate need to heal two boxes? Not likely. An urgent, desperate need to heal, say, six or eight boxes? Much more likely, particularly if the recipient is a runner. Four karma and four Complex Actions to bounce right back from the brink of death sounds like a damned good deal to me.

How often is a magician going to have four Karma on-hand? Only when they're saving up for something.

And if those Runner magicians are anything like my players, they'd rather risk death than the loss of Karma.

We ran a game when we were a security firm. It was fun. The whole setup bit was handwaved, we just were a security firm at the start. My character's long-term girlfriend was a rather senior KE official. Pacific Regional Director IIRC. She needed off-the book assets to do stuff for her and KE/Ares that wasn't part of the usual chain of command. Plus it helped assure we were were not throwaway assets.

We naturally managed to get into lots of other trouble along the way. But having a free spirit would be an awesome asset to a red-team.

Anyone can have the Life Pact, only Magicians can start out with it.
At least that is my understanding from others here on the Boards.

Though, honestly, I do not see the Life Pact as anything but a waste of Good Karma (You have to pay to have the Pact, Karma equal to 2x the Spirits Edge), and then Karma to Heal Damage. And yes, they have to have it available to spend. Waste of resources.

Hideki's yummies?


No. That makes Perma-Banishing a Free Spirit (Street Magic, page 109, second paragraph) too easy.

Also, I long ago thought of (and posted around here) that all you need is a FSPC with Spirit Pact to take Power Pact and have a group contact of mages with 6 loyalty and charge 1 karma a week for your spirit power. You get access to tons of spells (upwards of all of them, depending on the size of your Group Contact) and they get to use whichever Power of yours they like. Welcome to your 1k+ karma per week plan for the low, low cost of 18 BP for one group contact.

In any event, the FSPC player is actually fairly clever to try something small-scale of this. I'd allow it, but I'd rarely give out karma from the Pact. The leader suddenly gets a massive boost of good luck and finds he almost never needs to use the Pact. You can even have it so that the guy believes that getting the Spirit Pact in the first place is what created his unusually awesome luck in never getting hurt again.

Keep in mind that the Spirit Pact Power only gives access to one Pact, so your FSPC has to have an extra Power Points devoted to Spirit Pact, in addition to the free one for being a FSPC (Spirit Pact sidebar, page 93, Runner's Companion).

For your group wanting to make their own firm, I'd either use it as a springboard for more shadowrun missions (Ok guys, legal contract this time. Get the info, but you can't use any illegal materials or methods. ect.) or have them pay out for a Day Job quality to represent it.


Generally correct. I could see a Barrens gang-leader going for it. It would give him an edge over the competition. Maybe do some demonstrations every now and then to make the gang think he's blessed by the spirits and immune to backstabbing or something.

...which happens not so rarely. GM permitting a player might also take a karmic loan, "I offer my next X Karma if you drag me out of this hell".

For balancing you might also draw on the host of stories about devil pacts where the mortals avoid their part of the bargain.

Most shadowrunners are good enough at security that they could start a security firm. There's probably a reason why they don't, and why we play Shadowrun instead of "Private Security". Here is a few things I can think of:

- Legality. You runners need real SINs. A fake SIN will fail sooner or later, even a rating 6 fake SIN. Especially when doing security business.
- Bureaucracy and administration: Do you runners know how to create a business and handle it?
- Barriers to entry: For me, the megacorps have made it as hard as possible to start a business that could compete with their interests. This could be by using patents, marketing or not exactly legal solutions.
- Competition: Let's say some firm wants a company for a security contract, and hesitate between Knight Errant and the PC company. Knight Errant might want to take a deeper look at who their competitors are, get suspicions that they might have criminal origins, and use this to destroy them.
- Availability: Runing a small business takes a huge amount of time. How can they afford time to run? How to handle things when they come back from a run with bullet wounds everywhere and they have to meet a client in one hour?

Screw that, do a Michael Westen/Leverage Consulting & Associates kind of gig. Completely unofficial. And pretty much illegal. Maybe with a perfectly legal pub or restaurant on the side.

Thanks for the compliment. It's an idea that just came to me. I wouldn't expect to actually gain much karma from the arrangement, it's more of an incentive to draw some mages into forming an initiatory group with him. The use of the Formula Pact is dangerous for the spirit, but I like to give the GM something he can use if he feels things are getting out of control with the character. I try to play Random in a way that doesn't break the game.

The idea was in response to a failed recruitment into a magical group. Random didn't get along with the recruiter, and was told that they were the only group in town who were interested because he has a reputation (I'm not sure what the reputation is however). So why not create his own? The Pacts would be enticements for recruiting members to overcome his reputation.

He already has the Life Pact, gaining the Formula Pact would come after a couple of initiations. I've also considered getting and offering the Drain Pact in addition to or instead of the Formula Pact.

With a life pact, start an underground fighting arena. Get pacted up with all the fighters, draw extra large crowds because the fights can be all the more bloody when you're there to keep the fighters alive. Earn karma and money.

On a similar note, a Life Pact spirit would be wildly famous in the Barrens.

Step 1: Find a willing GM
Step 2: Capture a Cow-Shapeshifter
Step 3: Open a steakhouse
Step 4: ???
Step 5: PROFIT!

fuck that noise, you have any idea what that stuff is worth in terms of telesma? O.o

Just thought about this a second time and had an idea for a Free Spirit job:

Devil's Dues Karma Repo -- karmic payback guaranteed
Call our friendly experts now on 0-800-BOFH

Hmm . . bidding away your soul on death for immortality . .
Or cheating by becoming a cyber-zombie or making generous use of leonization treatments.

Or going to great, great lengths to snag Harlequinn or Ehran's DNA and having yourself gene-therapy'd to be an Immortal Elf.

Or getting a spirit pact and leonization with an emergency cyber-zombie-procedure prepared just for you . .

Of course, the problem with bidding away your soul on death and then cheating the payment by becoming ageless is that you're still not immortal. You can still die due to massive trauma. If nothing else, they can do you up like Art Dankwalther.

The cyberzombie route is a bit more like an evicted tenant trahsing the place in spite before leaving - despite the improvements, going cyberzombie isn't exactly a recipe for longevity. But your soul - ifessence is any kind of measure for such things - is not what i'd call in pristine condition once you're done.

And you are certainly not immune to having your legs broken by some professional spirit enforcers

Immortal elves are all at initiate grade, what, twenty or so? And have thousands of years' worth of skill and cunning on top of that. Your chances of successfully stealing a DNA sample from one of them and then avoiding reprisal are only marginally better than your chances of successfully stealing from a Great Dragon.

Well you got Frosty, she's not that old and powerful... Yet, then again she got Harl watching her back

They bleed like anyone else. Blood contains DNA. *shrug*

They have the capacity for bleeding. Doesn't mean that you can make them bleed.

Yup. They can be killed to. But not likely by PCs.

Of course, I tend to think that any GM who actually uses immortal elves or great dragons or any of that sort of BS should just get rid of his players and write his own bad fanfic.

There's also the issue that blood is a material link, and immortal elves haven't survived since the Fourth World by leaving that sort of thing lying around.

IEs and GDs can be perfectly fine options for having the players go a run for the more magical elements in the SR universe, such as artifacts or some special focus.

If I wanted railroading in my gaming I'd play Rail Baron.

It's railroading to offer the players a run that doesn't involve a high-end corporation? Why shouldn't the large-scale magical powers have stuff they want people to steal for them?

You don't need to make them bleed.

You just need to be hidden under a nearby rock when someone else makes them bleed.

That, or seduce them. Somehow, I don't think Harlequinn is the kind of guy to have a Trojan in his wallet.

I would not let them make two companies. This has potential to break your game: rigger&hacker will have their jobs and spirit will not be interested (or vice versa). Besides it looks like he just wants free karma. Let him find some initiatory group, but not as a separate business. Other guys will surely need magical support. Use their ambition to bind the team, find something interesting for the spirit guy to do in security.

Running security company might be a lot of fun in the same way running a Lone Star/DocWagon team might be. Even better: LS/DW are established corps, not some puny underdogs. I would not be afraid about "free money", for me it's opportunity to make them work double for the money!

Some ideas:

1. Red tape:
"You didn't know you *have* to pay social security/medical insurance/other bullshit?",
"You say you paid your taxes, but that's UCAS and majority of your income was obtained inside Ares Corporation territories, so you need to pay tax here. And obtain Ares license. And...",
"You've used custom drones and in our 127 page long contract it specifically says you have to use of-the-shelf ones. And also that you have to have license for customizing drones on Horizon turf"

2. Lack of money:
"Now do you understand that you are a small startup? We cannot pay more than 1000 nujens"
"You're nice guys, but Lone Star is giving us 50% reduction"
"We would gladly use your services, but you don't have required Platinium DocWagon insurance, so you're not compliant with our Contractors Policy"
"Glad that we signed this contract! Be sure to follow Appendix #47, that describes equipment you are allowed to take into Renraku territories. No, unfortunately we cannot allow for your MTC drones. Be sure to check our online catalogue!"


3. Fuckups
"Oh, sorry. We really wanted real life scenario, so we could not replace guards ammo with gel rounds"
"Well, our contract only mentioned replacing ammo, besides how can we replace barghest teeth? So your medical bill wont be covered"
"The contract mentions you're not responsible for any personal injury or property damage of Evo Corp. But those guards/drones/hell hounds we subcontract from Lone Star, so be sure to check with them."
"We really liked your work. Now could you please return stolen item? What other team?!?"

4. Competition
"We have contract and we don't care your equipment was superglued"
"What do you mean it was not your drone? Don't try to con us!"
"You have been served. The contract specifically says not to mention anything to press"
"You have been served. This nice LoneStar officer believes that although he agreed to be shot at with gel rounds, but stuff that you've used does not classify as gel rounds, it soft-impact bullet."
"Good morning, gentelmen. I'm John-The-Lawyer and I charge 750 nujen per 15 minutes increment"

This really looks like heaps of fun. Make them believe that they can make it, give them hope. Then crush them, almost to the bottom. And then give them some hope again. And again, and again. Just like real business. See if they persevere.

He probably has a spell to cover that.

Yeah, it's called Sterilize. Nothing special about that one.

Ninja'd!

Heard there is an adept metamagic with a similar effect, Falcon punch!