So, my question is: How did you, as a GM change the official Shadowrun game world canon around to suit your needs or storytelling?
Major changes, more subtle ways, all is appreciated, as my explicit goal is to steal share ideas

I'll start by explaining my stuff.
1.) I am running an online campaign of Survival of the Fittest right now, which began in late 2072 and has now progressed to early 2073. As such, the dragon conflict hasn't yet erupted as badly as it does in the official timeline, while some tensions are already brewing. After the campaign is finished, I'm thinking about making Hestaby Loremaster (mistress?) and have her use her influence to make the UN speech, but I am still undecided about this.

2.) In 2071, the Shroud surrounding Tir na nOg fell as the culmination of a long set of adventures and as such, the Irish elves are not protected any longer from horror magic and smuggling and other bad stuff™.
The story behind this is, that they used the power of the Wyld Hunt to uphold the Shroud, being able to call it forth only in a severely diminished state. The Tir leadership was only able to do this through a binding pact with the Master of the Hunt, which one particular NPC got wind of after a feud with Brane Deigh in the early 60s.
She was a 'mongrel' elf turned world-class assassin, born from an Irish politician and his Asian wife. Being constantly harassed at court for her heritage, she didn't get too involved with her home country and got kind of bitter, culminating in the feud and her being exiled, which she couldn't care less about at the time but didn't want to concede defeat.
After finding out about the pact when researching weaknesses of her enemy, she hired different groups of player PCs for obtaining more and crucial information. Then she returned to the Tir together with a PC to obtain the final piece of intel, but got caught while infiltrating the Seelie Court.
She and the PC were then sentenced by Brane Deigh to death by Wyld Hunt, which the assassin kind of counted on, as she wanted to wrest control of the Hunt from the court and use it for her own plans. Unable to do this because of missing information, this was a desperate final gambit. However, she had qualms about letting her companion get killed for her sake, after the PC had helped her so much, often even unasked and for some reason always staying loyal. So they ran and almost arrived at the sea to escape the Hunt by the old rule, where the NPC then turned and challenged the Master of the Hunt to a duel.
She subsequently barely won, and took control of the Hunt and their metaplane, which now serves its original purpose again, i.e. hunting down enemies of humanity, such as horrors, gods and the like. This is, of course, not common knowledge.

3.) The metaplanes aren't just planes but I treat them more like the planes in D&D.
Travel is possible, but difficult, and SR magical theory still treats them as described in the sourcebooks, but they are so much more. Astral Gate power allows people to pass over physically, because I like it better that way. Astral travel there still requires the ability to astrally project, being an initiate and besting the gatekeeper. The deep metaplanes are hostile to life, though and not readily accessible.
There is a central plane from which to access all the usual metaplanes, the crossroads, where a large tavern offers rest and food for travelers from all planes, The Inn Between. It features a barter system as virtues may be radically different from plane to plane, and it is considered a neutral zone. (Well, except for the Hunt. They are not welcome there, for various reasons)

4.) I don't use AIs that much.
DEUS, Megaira and whatever their names all were/are are kind of part of my canon, but I do not use feral AIs or AI player characters or other NPC AIs. Whether I just don't use them, or if they don't exist in my world, I haven't yet decided on.

5.) I make almost no use of WAR!
Bogota is not a port city, thank you very much. As most of us agreed to not talk about this topic, I won't expand further.
The conflict is there, but it is not an all out war.

Maybe I'll edit further if I can think of more examples, but for now, I'd like to see what you can think of
Thanks in advance!

I had a time-rewound game starting in the 2050s in SR3. I played with events a bit to keep things unpredictable.

I made Bug City happen to Denver. Its a lot more interesting when it becomes a multinational problem, and not all the nations agree on , well, anything. The Souix and the UCAS (with Ares support) each quarantined the treaty Zone unilaterally, without asking their neighbors or notifying each other, which led to some .. interesting... clashes. They managed to keep it to a dull roar between each other, but they did have to crush a military column from the Ute. Sadly the PCs bugged out so missed a lot of the shadow work.

Fuchi was going to collapse the same (Villiers appears to be a sociopath and pure poison in the long run to any company he moves in on), but I was going to lay hints on it happening to Ares.

The Arcology was going to go into lockdown, and Deus was going to awaken, but in response to a dangerous weaponized viral meme which gets loose in the Arc. Think of a self-mutating viral brainwashing program that fell into the hands of religious extremists, who don't understand what they are playing with, which is designed to bridge the gap between a person's wetware and hardware. It gets loose and starts to develop rudimentary emergent group behaviors. Sort of a cross between the One True Faith and an ant farm. Toss in a fledgling Deus who has to evolve to survive and fight off infection attempts, and maintain quarantine on the Arc, and you have a full out war going on between multiple factions.

Sadly my game never got to the Arc.

All I could think of is: "He Fights Crime!"

In my campaigns, I often change MANY things, and making a full list would be too long.

When GMing for one-shot games where I can't stray too far from canon, here are a few concepts I like to use:

The Matrix is not the Internet: The Matrix is not an open Internet. It's a closed system full of walled gardens. There are no global search engine, you use your MSP browse tool, which returns what the MSP wants you to see. If you want to access something outside of your MSP walled garden, you need to know the exact address. Open-source software is pretty much illegal, and corporations have nearly total control over the Matrix.

Magic isn't the shining beacon of hope: Magic corrupts the same way cyberware takes away humanity. Many mages are always looking for more power, no matter the costs. Environmental-friendly magic-using states are the same as any states. A small elite uses their power to exploit masses and grow their power even more.

Armed journalists: Journalists have got the right to use force (including lethal force) when necessary (for example to expose a scheme that would result in deaths).

Gangs aren't all a bunch of useless punks: The bigger gangs are forced that have to be reckoned with. Sure, a single ganger will rarely match a Shadowrunner in a one on one fight, but they've got the contacts, the business and the firepower they need to achieve their goals.

Downtown Seattle is more like a 80s inner city than a safe and shiny city center

I was actually talking to one of my players about this last night.

Our current game runs to about Running Wild metaplot-wise, and I'm willing to play picky-choosey with the canon that's been published since. So the events of Clutch are happening, just not in the order published and for different reasons (that I can't wait to get into once our current hiatus loosens up). Also, Denver is a little different, has a different crime family involved in the CAS sector, and Ghostwalker has a team of specialists running around Batman style to take care of things he can't openly take care of.

SURGE is a little bit more common, as are AI and technomancers. I like my Sixth World weird.

Dunkelzahn isn't dead. Or is he?

The dragon behind Aztlan has revealed himself. Sort of.

Basically, my games are a lot more modern fantasy than 80s throwback cyberpunk, with a dash of Cowboy Bebop and Firefly, mixed with Burn Notice.

That's all I can think of off of the top of my head.

I changed many things when 4th came around, and I am keeping a number of elements in my 4E games official 4E discarded. Here's some of them.

The Matrix is not the Internet
Much like Blade said. The Matrix is a network of walled gardens, even in 4E's wireless state, there are walled off sections that only connect via SAN and internally either heavily encrypt or just use landlines. The wireless, free-for-all Matrix is a top layer that belies the complex network of corporate intranets below. As such, my Matrix works a lot more like the previous incarnations. You still need your own browse program, and browsing for data still takes substantial time. On the up side, this balcanisation makes the mere existence of Shadowrunners possible, as well as multiple fake SINs with the same biometric data.

The Crash did not happen as dramatically.
Because of the fragmented structure of the Matrix, more ofit could be salvaged. The Crash mainly was a prolonged blackout, with some areas being back online almost immediately, and some areas being hit hard. Winternight was much less successful and really just caused the Twins and nuked the SOX again; all other bombs were found and disarmed timely. Yormungand was a lot less effective than in System Failure, and the Crash mainly caused infrastructure and data damage, not millions of deaths; neither did it destroy the world economy (because the swift recovery afterwards made no sense at all). After that event, WiFi Matrix systems were pushed by a bunch of corps to cash in on a corp-pushed Euphoria about a supposedly all-new, safe Matrix, but below the surface, more things remained the same. There still are no search engines, there still is a need for VR and the backbone of the Matrix is as wired as ever. Also, Matrix Programs tend to be called Utilities, while all programs that do not add to CPU load are called Apps. It makes that much more sense to me.

Elves are reborn as per Earthdawn mythology.
Probably, everybody is. Just because I like this as a vessel for stories.

The Metaplanes are more like a non-chaotic Warp of 40K than fictional visualisations of magical phenomena.
Yes, you could use it to travel through space. Theoretically.

Technomancers are rare, mysterious, and not a PC option.
Also, Technomancers and AI have a much more hostile image and are not widely accepted. The same goes of all the WoD refugees. There is no substantial vampire rights lobby. Technomancers are creations of AI, as per Brainscan and Psychotrope. Paragons are splinters of the big three AI, which shattered as per Neuromancer/Biochips and now exist mostly autonomously. There is no Matrix magic.

Great Dragons are not Godzilla
In fact, Ghostwalker only lived because he had enough Spirits to use as missile shields. One hit from a decent AA missile and a Great Dragon is toast. I really loath the overpowered way dragons are portrayed in 4E. While far above what a PC can match, a dragon hasn't got much of a chance against a dedicated modern military force if engaging them head-on. The danger of Shadowrun's dragons is how they use the world to their advantage and turn metahumanity's weapons against each other, not their toothy, clawy raw power.

Race still is an issue. So is sexism.
While I can see where this came from, it just is unbelievable. Racism in the 6th world is more fragmented and layered - do I like a white troll better than a black norm? - but it is aggravated, not removed. Also, sexism still exists, particularily in corporate culture (with some - Ares, Aztech, MCT - more than others like Shiawase, Horizon, and Telestrian) and non-western cultures.

The UCAS are blue America, the CAS red America.
Simplifying? Sure. But it makes making them distinct a lot easier. Both countries are split into regions that again are different, of course, being still rather big.

North America has actual borders
And they are being controlled. Many look like the US-Mexican border in Arizona. Many are patrolled by trigger-happy militias on both sides just itching for an excuse to kill someone on top of national militaries, drones and automatic sentry systems. Many are mined. Smuggling is NOT a piece of cake. A good deal of smuggling is done by T-Bird (as opposed to by car) for a reason.

WAR never happened
Bogotá is not a port city. It is not a jungle city either. the Aztlan-Amazonian war happens as a consequence of Ghost Cartels, but it happens more on the scale of the War on drugs in Colombia than World War III. Sirrug didn't destroy an entire island just like that (see above on dragons).

Megacorporations aren't nations just in terms of economical power, they also have distinct cultures.
All corps have their own, internal culture and lingo. From Ares' execs talking military American lingo (all these acronyms) to expected near-karoshi looks and extreme self-exploitation at MCT to giddy, bizarre retro 00s netspeak at Horizon, I try and make certain megacorp denizens are different from non-corpers. They live in their own, hermetic worlds, with their own customs, lingo and insider mentality, are condescending to hostile to outsiders, and you cannot just walk in and impersonate anyone, you have to learn to talk their talk and walk their walk. I'm wiritng this up as I go, as I am running a prolonged adventure about Horizon at the moment (which, in my world, incorporated Scientology, who form the backbone of their internal security and the spiritual backdrop of the corp), but it will be the same with any mega of sufficient size and composition (Saeder-Krupp, MCT, Evo, Aztechnology, Shiawase, Ares, Wuxing, Monobe, Telestrian, Proteus AG, Lusiada, KOB, Spinrad, ZIC ... NOT NeoNET, Universal Omnitech, AG Chemie, or other fragmented or very open corps though) - not the same culture obviously, bit a similar themed, exclusive culture developed around what I see as the core of the corporation. And they're all exclusive - Horizon's internal culture as much as MCT's, or Aztech's.

For our world the big difference if that the Arcology was only down for a couple of weeks and Renraku is putting it back in service- there there are still...reports of unpleasant things that happen in back corners.

I've kept major events in the proper timeline.
Anything not tied to the core metaplot I've bent to fit my personal plot twists.
Always played down elves and dragons until they have to be dealt with, then the gloves come off.
I keep things like the matrix, borders and War loose and flexible so as to fit the story as needed.
Always follow rule one for mechanics and story "Have Fun"!

6.) Deltaware is more easily available.
You still need specialized connections, and you need to actively work towards it but big or specialized clinics can install the ware if you've got the money. You don't need to sell your soul to lay hands on it (although doing so makes it easier).
If it's worth it, you've got to decide on your own ...

A bit.

Interesting, though not my "cup of tea."

- When the big corporations became states in their own right, all that remained for traditional states to govern were the poor and the hopeless...and a few smaller industries that will become extraterritorial on the first chance to do so. The effective powers of the US president make Karzai look like the allmighty ruler of all Asia Minor in comparison, and for the most part he's acting on the whims of the CC anyway. There are a few non-corp counties where the government still has something to say, but those are dictatorships where the government defends its claim to power with an iron fist.

- Living in corpland is not exactly happy, either, it's basically early 20th century capitalism at its worst. For the most part, you're either part of the vast army of disenfranchised workers who can be kicked out at a moment's notice, or you are deemed valuable enough for a lifetime contract which WILL be enforced.

- The gangsta rap angle for orxploitation never was my thing (ok, not just for ork culture ), so instead they are skins. Disaffected attitude to politics, working class pride, masculine demeanor, ACAB, sounds about right...

I actually rarely get to enter details about the NAN in my games, but I changed a little thing.

The NAN are a more of melting-pot of natives, latinos, Mormons, and a quite large number of people of European descent.

This was the result of brutal action of the US federal agencies and armed forces, and their corporate contractors against the SAIM. Think of Afghanistan or Iraq-style counter-insurgency on US soil, with air strikes that miss their target and kill civilians, or soldiers raiding every home in a block at night, lining up families in the street for identity check, because "actionable intelligence" says one SAIM sympathizer may live there (and half of the time, said sympathizer actually was a local eco-activist whose links to the SAIM had been invented by crooked corporate contractors on the behalf of the oil companies). Quite a bunch of far-right anti-federalist militias even put their latent racism aside to join the SAIM in their fight against the evil Big Government.
By 2016, a sizeable part of the population in the states where most of these operations took place were willing to leave the Union (it also paved the way for the CAS and California later on), and the Federal government cancelled elections "for security reasons" where the independentist parties were leading the polls. vice-president William Jarman 2015 campaigned against the "inhumane" action of the Garrety Administration (which he was part of) and, once elected, enacted an executive order that called for the extermination of the natives, branding it as "focusing on the real enemy". It was way too late however. The shamans of the Ghost Dance threatened to make the super-volcano of Yellowstone erupts and cause a world-scale disaster finally brought the Federal government to negotiate.

After the Treaty of Denver was signed, there maybe was something like one third or one half of the population that actually moved. The NAN divisions into Pueblo, Ute, Sioux, Salish, Tsimshian, Algonkian, Athabascan and Aleut councils were military "control zones" who weren't intended to become actual states. The NAN were supposed to be a patchwork of tribal lands and "anglos" municipalities living according to their own laws. However, each of the councils went on to became a state or near-state for different reasons:

- Corporations had Greenland joining the Treaty of Denver and merging with the Aleut, so that the sea route and natural resources of the Northwest Passage, now free of ice, would be under the control of a non-hostile government that includes Denmark-educated politicians of Greenland, instead of only a bunch of former SAIM guerilla fighters and terrorists. The Athabaskan went a similar route, their government being only a framework for the Athabascan Oil corporation to operate on the behalf of oil companies.
- The Sioux Council decided to maintain a standing military force on the border with the US, and thus established mandatory military service, taxes to sustain the forces, and all the administration that surround.
- The tribes of the Ute Council established a government as the counterweight to the Mormon community, who would have otherwise been way too powerful.
- The Pueblo Council had to deal with large metropolitan areas like Phoenix, Albuquerque and Sante Fe, where the "community" approach wasn't going to work like it did in Montana or Idaho. To avoid setting up an actual state, they created the Pueblo corporation who would serve the same functions on a contractual basis.
- Shamans in the Salish Council wanted to enact stringent environmental regulations. Their military force became the Rangers and Border Patrols, whose primary missions were to find and stop illegal exploitations that remained inside their control zone. For the rest, tribes and communities would keep their own laws.

Not this is not very different from what those countries are like in canon, except the demographics are different. Also, actual "pinkskin tribes" are rare, since there is no actual use for them ; it is mostly a very derogatory term used in the US.

Reading the Ancient files again had my jaw drop, just saying.


I took this idea to heart, my campaign is still in a fledgling state but I'm starting to flesh out some of the corps.
Ares are shaping up to be militaristic uniform fetishist like the imperial guards.

Also, apparently there is now New Gothenburg (NY)...

Well, the megacorp cultures are still rather sketchy, except for Horizon's, but here's what I thought:

Ares is a mix of OCP, Mad Men and Neoconservativism. It's part Groverist/Randian dog eat dog capitalism (the OCP part), part good ol' American values and aggressive sense of mission, and part this innate feeling they are the best at everything that makes everybody who is not American instantly hate them. ares also is among the mroe sexist corp cultures, relegating women in marriage to part-time jobs for the sake of traditional family duty. However, recently, Knight's adoption of Weyland-Yutani business principles, Vogel's liberalism and the military-style, all-american conservative corporate backbone have been increasingly at odds, leading to cracks in Ares' Cleaver family image.

Aztechnology is old-style drug lord swagger, militarism and aztec revivalist neospiritualism. An opressive, sometimes 1984-ish openly oppressive corporate culture pervades everything, and citizens are expected to be ready to lay their life down for the Sun God. Also, Aztech is the most sexist corp to live in, beating out even Ares and MCT/Renraku. Also, since state and corp are impossible to separate, Aztechnologists frequently feel they're the elite of the State of Aztlan and look down on the noncitizens in Aztlan itself.

Evo is Aperture Labs, part every mad science corp ever, and a dash of soviet apparatchickness rolled in one. They tend to experiment on people, too, but are more subtle than either UO or Proteus AG. Evo's japanese remainders are largely marginalised internally and pretty bitter about it, making the corp the second next to NEoNET with minority problems and massive inner struggles. That Buttercup sometimes makes jumpy, foolish decisions doesn't exactly help. On a side note, UO is Umbrella meets Virek Corp, and Proteus is Rapture (yes, creepy).

Horizon is a freakish mix of hyperactve nerd corp culture in Google's vein, Apple-like leader cultishness (though in SR, Apple is an Ares brand), mind-numbing, sometimes downright ignorant optimism, oppressive liberalism, hyperactive reality media-like behavior, and has absorbed Scientology as internal security and corporate cult. It is a goofy to funny surface, but gets more and more opressive, exploitive and downright terrifying the more you examine it and the more in depth you go. They mass-manipulate their citizens with subliminal BTL signals in the corp's internal network, they are just as cynic about their businesses as any other corp, but cover up in liberal bleeding-heart goodyness, and they are as intolerant as Ares, MCT, Renraku or Aztech, just about different things. Like the Federation from Serenity, they "meant it forn the best!" But ultimately, they do more damage than good. I also have formulated a lingo chart here.

MCT and Renrakuare actually quite similar culturally, but swear they'Re distinct. The corporate creed is based on japanese values of seclusion against all foreign influences, Buddhism and choice Taoist values, cutthroat business and karoshi, the act of working yourself literally to death. If you do not look tired and have a family life, you are a slacker, so looking tired is much more important than actually getting stuff done, which makes them a bit cumbersome at times. MCT also has a slightly more violent, street attitude and less stringent corporate fashion, which makes Renraku citizens think of MCT citizens as gangsta-like barbarians because they occasionally unbutton their shirts' necks, and maybe even have a tiny tattoo somewhere and sometimes even a nonstandard haircut!

NeoNET has no distinct culture because it is really three different corps that are quite distinct trying to work together. Transys is English mad science, with a dash of oppression and fascism. Novatech is Richard Villier's personal little Stark Industries, and would fall apart with him gone, and Erika is a libertarian scandinavian corp that desperatly tries nto to be overwhelmed by much more repressive structures in either Transys or Novatech.

Saeder-Krupp is run by an inhuman monster with a penchant for micromanagement and eating subjects (Lofwyr actually only very rarely does that, but allows this rumor to perpetuate). As such, it is governed by fear. Everyone constantly is aware that an Agent of the dragon could be watching, which leads to self censorship, a high degree of profitability and burnout. However, S-K also is the most egalitarian mega to live in, sicne Lofwyr considers discrimination grains in the cogs of his big machine and works hard to keep things strictly meritocratic.

Shiawase is a bit of an oddity among Japanocorps because it emphathises inner wealth over meeting deadlines and karoshi. Not that Shiawase does not expect you to work, but it does not expect you to look like you get 7 hours of sleep a week, tops. It also expects you to actually süpend some time with your family. They call this principle corporate zen (or whatever the Corp guide calls it). Hence, Shiawase citizens tend to be happier than those of Renraku and MCT - but they'Re also mroe racist, as Shiawase upholds the Yamato ideal even more than it's sister corps.

Wuxing is based on a mix of traditional chinese values and a very anglo-saxon business model, it's citizens caring surprisingly little about greasing palms, but alla bout keeping face. Also, the corp is by far the most spiritual one, and common services and rituals (either Daoist or Buddhist) are the norm.

Ideas are appreciated!

No need to have tired employees when there's sleep regulators, or long haul

Sleep regulators still require 3 hours a day, and Haul will knock you flat after three days. But yes. That's part of their culture, of course. If you don't do Haul and have a Sleep Reg, you are not committed, citizen.

Crank.

Hmm. Double post. I wonder how that happened.

The hard part is getting a free spirit able a portal for that 2.5 mile long spaceship.

I wrote in a couple of chaos cults once as a cameo for some toxic magicians. You can guess who the 4 toxic mentor spirits were.
The PCs didn't veer that way in the plot though, so I never got to use my nurglings.

Different prime runner NPCs. These aren't people who act like GMPCs or anything like that, but these are these Street Legends types that pretty much exist in my canon. I'm actually almost considering writing some stories with them that take place in the SR world(non-profit of course, just for fun.) I've had a hell of a lot of fun coming up with them over the time I've played and always wanted to use them for stuff. They have character sheets(again, prime-runner level stuff), but for me it's more fun to write.

They include(the ones I'm listing know each other, as do a couple more, but there are others with no affiliation)

Lyn Reynolds, 'Silver'-a human 'magical scientist', Silver devotes her time to the 'science of magic', or learning how to cross the two together. Actually very rich, her time spent is typically done in research...and also, she does what she does to get hints and tips toward other creations that the corporations are working on, though she certainly tries to keep her own work a secret. An extremely adept Hermetic mage, she was well-schooled and fantastically intelligent, knowing an enormous variety of spells. She is not afraid to let loose with devastating combat spells if necessary, though due to the importance of staying low often goes for subtle methods. Her lab is quite impressive, and she has been trying to work on several projects that involve crossing technology and magic together. Silver has worked closer to the streets, as well-it was there she met Monster and Spanky, the fixer. Silver stands around five-seven and slim with long, silverish hair(hence her name) with fair skin and a very good style of dress(though she'll dress down sometimes), and is often chauffered about by Henry, her butler.

'Monster': Real name: Kain Dalziel. A Fomori that lives up to his name in both his jaw-dropping size and ferocity with a physical strength that some joke is only seen in comics, he also *doesn't* live up to his name in terms of looks; besides being Fomori he has had some fairly hefty cosmetic surgery to make him look like a gigantic and extrordinarily handsome human. Practically scraping three meters with fair, almost pale skin and a mane of long, black hair(I sort of picture a horned version of Jackie Estacado from the Darkness), he's in his late twenties and has worked as a basic knee(or facebreaker) for hire, though he was betrayed and shot with a high calibur sniper rifle to the chest...which he survived and was healed back to health by Silver. He was a touch unhappy with this and proceeded to horribly massacre his old employers, apparently 'stomping one guy into so much paste they had to scrape him off the ground with a shovel.' He's an adept with high-grade cyber/bio mixed in, relying on his heavy gloves and iron-loaded boots to do most of his filthy work, though he's skilled with a variety of small arms like pistols and SMGs.


Henry Oldsworth: Silver's butler, and apparently a fairly skilled man himself, though he doesn't seem to ever be seen doing anything, and even Silver doesn't know his past; she just knows he's always been there. In his mid sixties with trim silver hair and a well-kept mustache, he wears fine clothing and is never seen to eat anything even resembling soy; anyone he takes care of is gifted with his uncanny ability to know exactly what they need. (Yes, this character was heavily influenced by Alfred Pennyworth.) He tends to show up at odd times, and usually just behaves as a chauffer, cook, and butler. Apparently there's rumored to be a rocket launcher in the back of his limo, but no one really knows for sure.


'Mama'-a 40 something human Hispanic woman who is heavyset and loves spicy cooking; she runs a talismonger shop and is apparently an extremely skilled magician following the path of Santeria. Her casting, however, is typically not known to runners-if used as an NPC in the game world, a large amount of trust would have to be built up before she would even allude to her magical skill, let alone actually use it; she is extremely adept in ritual magic, and has a whole lot of other contacts in her Santeria circles that make her a very, very, very bad person to cross or stiff on *anything*, though if she becomes close to people, she's truly like a 'Mama'-while she prefers more subtle magic than a manabolt to the chest, people who mess with those she is close to have found sudden 'accidents' happening of the very bad kind. She's fairly short, and while she speaks fluent English it is her second language; Mama typically curses or mutters to herself in Spanish.


I also invented some different corporations that I use, who make some different weapons and vehicles(some reskinned but some custom made and sold as well, though balanced within the game world). It would probably be faster to me to just write a story sometime.

I removed Magicians and Adepts from the setting. There are simply Awakened (Mystic Adepts).

I set my game in San Francisco area, which allowed me the freedom to make up plenty of things.

San Fran sprawl covers the entire area around the san fran bay

The government has more control then in other cities.
The Mayor is a native American Dragon. Most people just call him The Mayor, that's even what it says on his cards.
The mayor is one of the few to effectively check the megacorps power, so the mayor is quite unpopular with the megacorps, with two exceptions. The mayor Has a friendly Rivalry with Lofwyr, and has a respect for Evo's Transhumanistic ambitions. As a result those Corps have a bit more dominance in the area.

One of the things that the mayor did to oppose the power of corporations was to reinstate public law enforcement. The San Francisco Police Department was reformed in 2061. Since then it has fulfilled its mission to protect and serve admirably. The SFPD is a mixed blessing for runners. They have a low rate of corruption so bribing your way out isn't as often an option. On the flipside, the SFPD are often the employer of runners, and can be a powerful friend to have. shorter sentencing, or even the opportunity to do "community service" instead of jail time are some benefits.
The SFPD have a heated rivalry with Lonestar, and often clash over jurisdictions. Lonestar is usually found in the upperclass and corporate controlled areas, while SFPD is in most everywhere else. The SFPD control most of the city, but Lonestar is still not to be trifled with.

Alcatraz is a magical, and matrix dead zone, where technomancers and mages are imprisoned. There have been no escapes since it reopened.

There is a massive AI in the matrix. Someone made it, and no-one knows who it was, or how. It's called the Leviathan. Whatever it's goals are, if it has any, are a mystery. It often hires people to do odd jobs. These jobs very from taking a picture of something specific, to stealing a very specific, and inconsequential item. Stories of runners hired to simply pick up a piece of trash off a street, of groups hired to steal an execs lucky tie are common. The jobs are weird, but they pay well, though they can quickly become interesting. A job to simply say hello to a bank teller can end with you thwarting a bank robbery. Whether or not such occurrences are planned by the Leviathan is debated.

San Fran is a relatively green city. roof top gardens are the norm, and public parks are common. There are still areas of undeveloped nature near the city, notably Muir Woods.

In my game I also have legal, if highly regulated, puppet parlors. There are still illegal puppet parlors of course, and they are often the target of police raids.

There is a space elevator just outside the sprawl. It is owned jointly by EVO, and Saeder Krupp.

There are some other stuff, but that's most of the major stuff

The Leviathan wouldn't be to keen on some silly metahuman machine using her alias... On the other hand she's probably preoccupied with the whole egg affair.
Edit: Don't try to be clever with metaplot references at 4 in the morning. I was refering to the sea dragon obviously.

there's something else called the leviathan? I was unaware of that. I knew sea dragons were referred to as leviathans, but not that their was a specific one.

The sea dragon is the only great leviathan (presumably) left in the sixth world. Check out the link in my signature if you want to learn more. Good ol' AH knows his lore and stuff.

Uhm. Your Lofwyr is a lot nicer than canon Lofwyr. Canon Lofwyr doesn't have friendly rivalries. Actually, he pretty much doesn't have friendly, period.

I run SR3.

I run it with:
Fewer Native Americans
Elves face a LOT more racism.
More 'weird stuff' floating around.
Soviet Union is still basically around and basically an oppressive, anti-corporate, totalitarian state (although perhaps better than the UCAS).

What kind of 'weird stuff' would that be?

I'd assume more prominence given to paracritters, parabotany, parageology and various changelings.

Wow. This. I love all of this.

Exactly.

(But no SURGE. Should have mentioned that, I guess. I don't use YOTC.)

True, and used. The crash caused a major disruption of logistics, with different organizations taking different time to react.


Magic corrupts MORE than cyberware. The dark secret is that casters of the evil traditions relate better to an accomplished mage than Joe Wageslave or Jane Ganger on the street. How bad can casting with your own blood be?

I´ll try that one time. "The public has a right to know: You have no privacy, citizen. The media can not only intrude and report what it wants, it can also shoot you if you resist. No, those media corps never take and never took bribes." "We want a report on Ares Facility X, we heard of damaged products. They won´t allow our team in, so you can use any force you want. 10k¥ per team member, triple if you get us all data on the prototypes and development so that we can prove their misdeed."


In extension, You Are Not A Special Snowflake. A few pieces of ware won´t set you apart, and there is always someone to take your place if you slip. All those criminals around you reinvest their ill-gotten gains, too.

My Lofwyr is an accomplished soprano opera singer and has the face of Nicholas Cage. Also he bathes in chlorine trifluoride.

~Umi

Rocket fuel?

A quote on chlorine triflouride, from John Clark's out-of-print Ignition!:


~Umi