There, I spelled out GM in title so it will be partially searchable. I'm planning 2 parts, mostly stream of thought. Part 1 is creating a game, part 2 is creating runs.

My game is dead. Too many schedule conflicts. I thought I'd write down what I did and what I learned. Hopefully someone can make use of it.

Shadowrun is episodic. You get hired for a job, do the job, and nobody admits to knowing anything about it afterward. That makes creating runs easier, because they don't have to have anything to do with anything. It also means keeping plot threads is more difficult. I was putting up weekly updates of my game partly so players and I could remember what happened in the last episode, let alone 2-3 earlier. Having an A plot and B plot helps with that, but also confuses things a bit (good news! you don't need red herrings, because players will create their own). I'll be using my game as an example, because I have the information from it with me.

To design a game, you need 3 things. What type of game it will be (serious, beer-and-peanuts, serious with dark humor, etc.), what story do you want to tell as a GM, and how long should it be. For my game, I went longer because I was introducing new players to the world. I decided to keep the plot simple: cyberzombies will happen, and get shot. Also, we went for a semi-serious game.

Second, I needed structure. This one is an okay place to start, but I received comments that the plot started too slow. My recommendation is to never go more than 3 runs without plot, probably every 2nd or 3rd would be the sweet spot (until the end, where every run is plot). The best takeaway is the use of themes: "plot run", "faction run", "location run", "personal runs", etc. The personal runs can also be other types of runs, but should happen around the middle of the game. Early enough to tie up loose ends later, late enough to really know the characters and tailor the run to what they'd want and not re-use ideas from other runs. For further structure, pick something out to give you ideas for the run. Cowboy Bebop used jazz songs, I used feelings from Wiccan holidays (had a Wiccan mage, and had the information at hand from researching for the character), line by line of a song would work, tarot stuff, whatever. My themes looked like this:


Third, I wrote out the plot in broad strokes. I ended up with 10 plot runs in 24 months, which is probably too few. They were going to set everything in motion by hitting Evo for Docwagon, then start working for an Evo Johnson to put together the information they needed for creating cyberzombies, somehow end up involved in the testing, put the pieces together, then start hitting back against Evo, with a final fight and assistance from interesting characters.

Fourth, I started putting a plan together. Yule is about new hope and endings, so December is the month we both started and would have ended with. 1 run a month made the math on run payments easier. I put together an excel sheet (it's what I've got) which looked like this at the end:

There was a lot less structure in there early on. There are still question marks in there from where I put down different ideas as I thought of them. Everything is double-spaced to make moving runs around easier, but I'm somewhat restricted to what made sense plotwise and with the month. That made it feel like putting everything together was an interesting puzzle for me.

The last thing I did was calculate how much karma and nuyen they would make each run. I was shooting for 3 karma per runner each month, plus one of the bonus karma for doing something interesting or having the right skills. 4 karma total each run. The rewards part of the game wasn't interesting for anyone, and took up a lot of time, so we just went with 4 karma per game. Things were going to ramp up in year 2, so I added one karma each run to the second year. 105 karma total for all of the runs, so I made guesses of what each character's karma advancement would look like, and looked at how much nuyen it would take for the sam to keep up with the mage (who knows what a rigger is going to do with nuyen, so they didn't come into the calculation). I came up with about 1/2 million nuyen each. They'd make some on 'ware discounts and selling ware they'd upgraded, and negotiation. About 4,000 nuyen per karma works for that, and I can add more nuyen later if necessary. I planned to have them scrape by for a few months, then ramp up (they were starting to get some nice toys just as we ended). I added the 2,000 nuyen for a low lifestyle for the first year, and middle for the second year. Excel works nicely for all of the math parts. Especially because they'd get paid better or worse depending on the run, but I had a tally of how much they'd earned (both base and after negotiation), how much I wanted them to earn (base), and what the difference was (big paying corporate run coming up, better do some hooding to get the average down). I let the players know the ballpark amounts so they could plan ahead. I also kept year one payments a bit lower, knowing it would throw calculations off a bit (lot) if the sam/rigger became cyberzombies. Beta/Deltaware to squeeze out some use out of your 5.999 essence is much more expensive than standard to fill your 8-10 essence. Charging for the surgery or recovery costs can make up some of the difference, but it's good to know ahead of time what to expect. My recommendation: calculate out both numbers if you plan on making it an option. Maybe do 3,500 nuyen/karma first half, and 4,500 second half (or whatever your characters need to have reasonable advancement). In fact, having plans B and C for options your players might take is probably always advisable. They won't follow any of them, but it gives you something close to extrapolate from.

Everything I did here and everything you do is the starting point. Things will come up in-game, and plans will change. This work isn't what gets things "done", it what saves you time later when you need to shift everything around.

Part 2: Iduno how to write runs well, either.

My steps were write a follow-up while I still remembered what happened (I kept some notes during runs), check the list for the over-arching plot and compare to what sounded fun/what the players wanted, research on whatever idea I had, and put something together (If I had no ideas, it was based on an action movie or a stupid joke). I also had a running list of things I had seen in various forms of entertainment which I used about half of, so it was definitely worth the time.

The first step, follow-up, was usually a news item showing how the characters actions were viewed by the corporations (or a pirate trid operator, or told second-hand from another runner). I usually added some stuff from the timeline thrown in as background, because it would be weird if there was a monthly news show just saying what you did, and also just to acclimate the characters to the world. Reading the timeline every week also gave me a feeling for what was about to happen in Seattle, and how it might affect things (KE taking over for LS). It ended up as a half-page that one of my players could read while I got everything arranged, which also gave them a chance to discuss/make dumb jokes.

The second step is where plans get re-adjusted. It's also where I get ideas. For example, my 4th plot mission involved the street sam (also, named Sam) getting kidnapped as part of the cyberzombie experiments. I had talked to the players ahead of time, and gave them the option of becoming a cyberzombie, but nobody jumped at the bait. I knew that a few games ahead of time, so I brought back the ork sam who hired them for the first mission (and who I had planned on having as a recurring character anyway). His personality fit taking a high-risk high-reward procedure, and I didn't have to worry about losing a character. The pre-set skeleton came in handy when I needed a location run, and Remembrance Day (of the night of rage) was nearby. I moved the location run to coincide, and had the run take place in the Ork Underground. It was a bit early, but the players did some thinking about how the Night of Rage had affected them (they were all metas, but one was in Japan at the time...). Lower-hanging fruit like the Summer Solstice being a time involving crops and abundance of wildlife combining with a location run were easy (yay! planning ahead works).

The third step is the interesting one for me. "Here's a thing, I want to know what Shadowrun does with it." As mentioned, I looked into the history of the Ork Underground (and Seattle Underground), well-known locations, who the security was. I ended up having them save a musician because of a description of a Jem and the Holograms episode description that mentioned the Seattle Underground. It would make sense to have a slight background count to get the mage used to the idea of them, especially around Remembrance Day. It would also make sense to have low lighting, which orks benefit more from than other metatypes. It's one die different than thermo-vision, but it affects everyone equally (except the opposition). Skraacha as security, not fond of outsiders, but there is a more open tourist area. My adepts initiation test/personal run involved the type of research into Japanese "stuff" the character would have done. Very cursory and half-understood information about culture, with as much coming from Anime as possible. After writing detailed runs, it was an interesting challenge to myself in an attempt to create a confused/ADHD and Americanized version of Japan's history (several eras) ported to the future and with any real understanding eroded by the passage of time. I just now realized I was probably trying to create a somewhat more serious version of Futurama's ancient Earth history. I learned about the motorcycle gangs for the easily-understood Akira references, some religion stuff from the point-of-view of someone who didn't follow a religion, threw in research that pretty much started and ended with the ideas of ninjas. The run against KE's new offices got me to find a place where it would make sense to have an office for a police corporation. I looked up the courthouse, and happened to find a tall office building in a government area of Seattle, near the courthouse, that would possibly have come open (especially with Ares' money) in the next 50 years. Finding that address means I knew what other buildings were nearby (the courthouse, a DOT building, other government stuff), so I knew the response time for outside help to any alarms would be pretty much instantaneous, and have ideas of how the characters might be able to gain access. It also led to excellent situation where a helicopter (mode of transportation) found its was into the side of the Department of Transportation, partly because I had taken 5 minutes to find the actual location the run would take place in. Because the game took place at my apartment, I was able to put a map up on the TV when the players asked where they were going. Getting that detailed can have impressive results, and really doesn't take any longer than just making something up. Plus, it gives me ideas and keeps verisimilitude.

The last step is putting it all together, and writing up what things might happen if the players go to the right/wrong places at the right/wrong times. My notes (written in notepad, and kept on a flash-drive for usability on almost any computer) were usually a "read this to players", some GM-only notes to remind me what I was planning, a list of things that happen and where (whether or not the players see), and either stats or a reference to the stats for opposition to save table time (I learned this the hard way). The hardest runs to write were the ones I did the least research for. I also liked to create a plan for a good security system (like security-conscious people would create), then find things that wouldn't work. Maybe accounting found a "better deal" than the expensive piece of equipment, parts got disabled/not turned on so employees can actually get in/out, maybe KE didn't expect people to get past the early stuff so everything else was a cakewalk, a corp might focus on magic/physical/matrix security and do a poor job on one or two of the others, maybe a guard left their computer unlocked. Whatever I've seen/read of humans doing to screw up security. It made it more of a puzzle that legwork and creativity could get by. That's probably also why I wanted to determine ahead of time where everything was. If the players came up with something unexpected, the horrible traps got bypassed.

The last run I wrote up was going to take place in the ACHE, so I wrote up options for the mall area (security keeping the prisoners in) and the areas that had not been 100% re-taken from Deus' creations (puzzles created by a mad god-AI to test or torture people, good stuff). I've got that run half-written, so you can see what I did with it:


became (with some cut-and-paste updated stats from another forum):

I still have a list of what the floors were used for in Shutdown/Brainscan, but the game fell apart before I decided which floors would be used. With a bit more polish, it would have been a fully-planned run. Where else does the monorail go? What weaknesses do the security systems have (age?)?

Final thoughts: I never learned how to use lifestyle rules, SINs, or reputation except in vague ways, but I'm not sure how much it impacted the enjoyment of the game. Shadowrun has enough moving parts already.
Knowing your group and the characters as much as possible makes it easier to create an entertaining experience. It did take them a bit to realize I was more of an audience than their opponent, due to bad gaming experiences in the past.
Preparing and researching as much as I can ahead of time allowed me to be lazy gave me plenty of inspirations and ideas to use in the game. Even if I never used or re-used something, it was an interesting thing I learned.
The restrictions I put on myself were usually helpful. When they weren't I could ignore one or two (they were my restrictions) and find ideas elsewhere. Having 3-5 things I "had to" have in a run meant two or three line up in a really cool way. That kept me motivated and feeling creative.

What would you do different? What can you take from what I did?
Having security all pre-determined helped with the fairness and puzzle aspects of the game. That was great. It also made the difficulty really unpredictable. I should also have ways of increasing/decreasing the difficulty (although I did have some ideas for that for the ACHE run).

That sounds cool. I have only whipped something up using Inkscape when I needed maps. Apart from T:AL, all the SR material is set in foreign countries (although Germany is a lot more familiar than America) so I don't have that real-life Background Knowledge/America skill to call on. Apart from Cablegate and the twin towers event, everything I know about America comes from SR source books and novels. Being familiar with the areas described, to the extent you just know without having to look it up whether Seattle to Denver is fifteen minutes in the car or twelve hours in an aeroplane, would certainly bring a lot more confidence to the GM's presentation.
I think the fact that you considered character runs, personalised to the backstory / goals of individual players / characters, speaks volumes. It shows that the effort they put into their backstory actually matters to someone, and it means something and will have an effect in the story world. It's not just wasted time. When I play, I tend to find GMs dismiss backstory entirely; the worst regard any efforts aside from optimising raw damage-boxes-per-second inflicted with great suspicion... "if you aren't obsessed with good old healthy genocide, you must be up to no good!" So for that depth, I appreciate your approach! When I GM, instead of the players realising I'm more audience than opponent, they struggle to realise that they are not the audience. Maybe I tend to play with uni students most of all, but the majority definitely arrive with the attitude that I am providing an entertainment service they can passively observe, or play with their phones, or not bother turning up if they forget... I also write up summaries of the game and email them out to the team to make sure everyone's accomplishments and specialities get to shine in the spotlight, and so they are mindful of context at the start of next episode. But rarely at the start of play has anyone bothered to skim-read the email. No doubt their lecturers get the same treatment - but at least they're being paid for it!
Certainly doesn't sound like there was any laziness I can see! You seem to have a positive attitude to the demise of the game, even if it wasn't how you planned things to end, so that's good that the world-building was sufficiently satisfying for you. I'm a little jaded from my most recent GMing because it was four hours travel each way for me and over the three years it ran fortnightly I failed to inspire care-factor. Coming away from a closed game the way you are is better.
Hmm... I might put everything up on a neocities.org website for everyone in the future to copy? Plans, logs, characters, maps... someone might even compile it into a dedicated adventure PDF, robust as the sources you drew inspiration from. Imitation is the highest form of flattery.

No maps (I think I gave the Seattle addresses, and google maps is what I used), but I put pretty much everything here: http://forums.dumpshock.com/index.php?showtopic=41935

NPCs were from the BBB (weak opposition), or the players -1 die (hard opposition) for the most part. I think the ones I built myself were the dodging merc from the ork underground (weak skills, but had MBW 1 or 2), the KE exec (had lots of headware, decent stats/skills, but nothing seriously combat-based), and the 4 elemental ninjas from Boost's run, which I posted.