Coming from a (years ago) Cyberpunk 2020 background, I always felt that canon Shadowrun was designed to make the characters heroes. Or at least better people than the street-scum that they deal with. Most of the characters in the novels seem to be relatively...good guys.

I've been playing a character with the "Pacifist -1" flaw. Basically means he uses gell rounds whenever possible, will even stabilise the odd bad-guy if possible, and won't kill in cold blood. Also won't harm innocents and will stay away from outright crimes like kidnapping, extortion (ok, there has been an exception to that one, but they bloody deserved it damnit ) and other 'darker' practices.

Basically cause I got sick of the "I'm-an-orphan-got screwed-over-by-everyone-Samurai, and I can do what I want cause I was a nice guy, but I have to survive, and everyone was bad to me so now I don't care anymore and am a bloodthirsty slot who will sell his team-mates for cash"

Got bored with the stereotype and wanted something fresh. It just seems that EVERYONE's game mentioned contains runners who will murder, rape, extort, deal in BTL/drugs and use Micros0ft products on a regular basis.

So what's the deal, anyone else play "ethical" groups or characters? Do people feel the game was intended to be played as bloodthirsty mercenaries? Whatever "type" of character you play, WHY do you play them?

Lately, my PCs, and those of my group, seem to:

*Try not to kill cops, for professional reasons (as in, your shadowrunning profession ends when you kill a cop)

*Try not to kill bystanders, for moral & professional reasons. Then again, this rarely comes up - I don't recall any recent runs that involved fighting security in public. There were some self-defense actions in public - two of the current PCs have high-value "hunted" flaws - but the only injured bystanders were injured by the hunters.

*Try minimize bloodshed in general - generally, only the people shooting (or thinking of shooting) at us die. Again, for moral & professional reasons. Then again, there have been moments where expedience dictated less discriminate HMG hosing.

*Try to minimize random violence when off-duty, though there's an exception in the group (the PC who randomly kills civilians - like waiters - who annoy him by not knowing the answers to his questions).

I see "ethical" characters all the time. I think most people find it too easy to go with the totally amoral route so they eventually want a challenge.

Lately I'm playing a relativ moral-concerned character, unfortunatly the rest of the team is the most reckless and bloodthirsty until now in the campaign.
My character (a magicians way adept/ dragonslayer shaman), would never harm and innocent and recently the definition is getting broader as the teammates are getting even more violent. But there is some few problems
1. Her weapons are a savalette guardian ( to which she hasn't succeded finding gelrounds), a monowhip (not particular good for avoiding killing) and a regular whip, which she mostly use for entangling opponents (as 2L stun against doupple impact doesn't matter much)
2. She really hates the various criminal organizations, and my GM really likes to make all our clashes with the yakuza, to meetings with 15-years old boys with fullautomatic weapons. Where the dilemma comes to kill them or not, sinces she hates their organization, she don't want to kill children, and still they posses a threat...
3. and lately, if she finally succiding in incapacitating an opponent without killing him, her teammembers is beginning to finsh them of, for her, as they know she won't do it.

Btw right now she have to live with a feeling of being guilty, as she executed a yakuzaboy, after the rest of the team has tortured him. (She could't stop them, and killed out of mercy, after he refused her offer for freedom) but anyway, she regret her action.

My former character was a young female elven combatmage, who tossed manaballs left and right. She is soon coming back, but more reclutant to killing, as her twinbrother was killed on a run and she had learned a bit about mortallity.

Anyway I never play icycold killermachines, as I see it very unrealistic and thinks it makes the character 2-dimensional, but that's just my opinion

i find moral characters to be a great deal of fun, if you play it up. have a clear idea of what those morals are, why they have them and in what situations they'd really consider breaking them.

Over 4+ years of play, our team has had several moral characters (don't harm innocent people, don't steal from charity organizations, don't betray your comrades for personal gain, treat/heal police officers and innocent bystanders, etc.).

We've also had a few psychopaths, but not as many as we've had moral characters.

Sometimes our players take a break from their main character to roleplay someone who has an opposite moral code to either their main character or to their own moral code.

We enjoy the roleplaying interactions when team members have different moral codes.

My previous group was an interesting mix...

The Cat Shaman was the motherly type, the Coyote Shaman was prettymuch insane and well beyond morals (although he's harmless if you leave him and anyone he values alone), the elven ninja/samurai adept was a nice enough guy if you discounted the fact that his Vindictive flaw essentially functioned as a Combat Monster flaw (he pursued the fleeing Blood Spirit down the nuke plant tunnels by HIMSELF, for cripe's sake...), the ork merc was pure freelance, the ork ex-go-ganger was a jerk with a massive Bad Rep flaw but was more redeemable than the ork merc, the Japanese human empath was...Well...An empath, the elven sam/assassin was sociable enough despite her frequent brooding after she became turned into a woman by a free spirit when she was still a male (it was a weird game/group...), my rigger/sam namesake was ridiculously paranoid but generally neutral and wouldn't backstab someone who gained his trust (although that's difficult to do, so he generally was the quiet though not apathetic type), the elf decker/face was plenty sociable and generally quite ethical (probably more so than the rest), my combat decker dislikes children but otherwise is generally moral and agreeable, and my wakiyambi SURGE otaku is a goofball and a pacifist.

And thus concludes the Oversized Post of Doom +3.

My group just played the DNA/DOA module and we managed to incapacitate everyone in the sector using stunball/stunbolt and/or suppressed pistols. We actually casted Treat on anyone we gave deadly wounds too and tied everyone up with duct tape and rope and stacked them up in a room. While the doggies that we stunned we taped/tied up to the card table to reenact the dogs playing poker scene....

We left a note with 30k nuyen and said that they needed it more than us (in terms of security). Left and on the way out turned back on the security stuff and elevator access, etc....

It was silly, but oh it's so much more worthwhile than slaughtering everyone in a place.

One of my characters was playing an Elven Paladin. It is a "different" sort of ethics he uses (a very elf centric one) but he is basically "good" and only running in the shadows to aid his master in the elven court.

our group is on an island full of shedim. i'm not sure if our sudden reticence about killing people counts as 'morality' or not.

Depends on how quickly they realise that feeding people though a wood chipper negates the shedim threat.

Not if they're master shedim.

A shedim can regenerate a host up to the condition it was in at the moment of possession. This can happen as you are taking the body to the chipper or (for the sick minded) at the moment of death as the victim is being chipped. It'll be rather disturbing as the body tries to maul you and an endless stream of bits and pieces is exiting the chipper, but it is still a valid host.

If you're going to kill when shedim are about, you need a pyromaniac. Ashes can't be possessed. A fire obsessed spell slinger works well because his fuel recharges at one box each hour or better.

It's kinda odd for me to read this thread, because the vast majority of the characters that run through our table are very much "ethical" or at the very least uber professional.

Our games have developed in a vein akin to the old looney toons cartoon where Wile E Coyote and the sheep dog go off to "work" together. They sip coffee and talk bulldrek until they clock in like long time co-workers, however after they clock in, they become bitter enemies trying to stop each other at every turn. Then the whistle blows, they clock back out and go home like the fighting and trying to kill each other never happened.

Granted sometimes Lonestar and the targets of the runs (or their security) don't exactly see it the same way and Johnsons aren't exactly upfront with the runners....

But there's still somewhat of a theme that runs through the characters: no wetwork, no children, no innocents, never get personal with any run and never kill when incapacitating will work just as well. However, without the whackjobs to put these "ethical" runners in relief, it does loose an edge somehow. I guess without exploring how truly messed up a runner could be, the "ethical" ones still look like a bunch of criminals.

So in essence, don't go overboard with the "ethical" runners either In my opinion, part of the grit of Shadowrun comes from the nature of the society of the Shadows. The reaction of "And these are the good guys?!" gives a visceral weight to Shadowrun I find pleasing.

Though, this thread has given me the germ of the idea of what I'm going to run when I GM next. Thanks.

Hm, seems like I have a somewhat peculiar view on ethics in the shadows... I like to run my games in a way that the players are moral beings in an amoral world (and I do play my own PCs that way, too). Just playing "all is good" and sticking to your moral code without a hitch does get boring fast. To me the fun comes from the conflict of the PC's moral codex with the harsh reality. Things get interesting when the Players/PCs are forced to act against their own morals. To me this is a means to explore the dark depths and rifts of the human psyche. In the end it's about inner conlicts, priorities, decisions and consequences.
Like the character who had to shoot a kid in self defense and was traumatized by it for months.
In my games, the PC who has a somewhat humane moral code, consciously breaks it against his will and then plays out the mental consequences gets the most karma. Likewise, an ice-cold character with no morals at all who mindlessly but professionaly and successfully works his way through the runs will get next to no karma from me except for the bare minimum for completing the job.

I also like to have moral PCs in my group and face them with amoral NPCs to show them the harshness of the world, partially to see how they deal with it but mainly to ensure them in their moral path, to make them feel disgusted and repelled by this lack of morals. And I do hope (probably in vain) that the players take some of the experiences from the gaming table with them into their lives...

To me, Shadowrun is not a tactical action game. It's more like theater, like a good novel. It's about drama, it's about human souls surviving in a mean world. It's about tragical heroes, about the heroes of everyday life. It's about finding one's own way, about reflecting upon your deeds and your feelings. It's about making mistakes and growing with them, learning from them.

Sorry, I got carried away by my own enthusiasm. Did I get too melodramatic again?

Edited for clarity

After all the years of killing every single enemy jumping around in front of my MPs, I started ...caring about the poor guards (the few that are left ;) ) with families at home, the innocent bystanders only leaving the house for some chips and coke for the evening with her girlfriend...
not to mention that runners celebrating their daily slaughter at work don't look too professional after all...
So my long-time-played sammie decided from now on not to harm anyone he meets...too many ghosts of killed guys visiting every night anyway...even try to convince the others to use some gel rounds for more professionality or just from a greater responsibility... they are stronger, faster, much more powerful than any "normal" human being out there...so uncle ben's phrase "with great power..." and so on comes to mind..

I think I just overdid it a little with my new chaosmage...maybe a little bit too much Trigun for me :)=
so this guy uses most of his power to prevent killing.
Magic Fingers to point barrels in a...less lethal direction. treat for healing deadly wounded enemies, having his ally cast armor on other endangered enemies, using gel rounds or more preferable tasers (i just _love_ these things) and permanent talk about "non-lethal" methods...I only fear it becomes a bit annoying...for the others..we'll see

Sandman666, awesome post man, I guess you've just reminded me why I carry on playing a "good" character. With the conflicts currently developing in our game, I think there's one hell of a story developing.

I had a friend whose PC looked on ethics as a form of professionalism. If he wasn't paid to kill, he will not do it. Any person that he hurt in the course of the run, he did so because that person prevented his successful completion of that run. He never used non-lethal options, all his options were lethal. Either he didn't kill or you are dead, nothing done halfway.

Ethics?

Depends on my character. I normally choose to play "good" characters but I have had great fun playing a 55 - 60 year old assasin who would only kill if he had a contract on you. Otherwise you got gel rounds - didn't want to waste a possible job later ...

My current character used to be on the corp. payroll and has a level two contact who works in corp. security, so he has a different view on why he shouldn't kill the opposition.

- theartthief

All characters should have their own code of ethics, including the socalled "bad" ones. They may not be conventional exactly, but they should exist. The best villains tend to have very good reasons why they became villains, and generally believe they are in the right.

It could be something like, will not give money to charity, as it never helped him when he was young, and will not kill people with green hair, because their best friends that was killed by bugs had green hair.

This is something silly and pretty minor, but can still be a pain in the arse for this character. What if a target they are after is at a charity ball. They can no longer go the easy route of paying to get in, as it's against their ethics.

Any character who says they have certain ethics and goes against them at the drop of a hat is not roleplaying. They should be punished accordingly.

Sepherim was a decker who wouldn't kill anyone. He used gel rounds if necessary, and if there was need for other measures, he'd try to search for an intelligent plant and surround the threat. He didn't even have a Black Hammer program.

Er, even after it's confirmed on the street, most people don't have a Black Hammer program.

~J

I've always tried to play characters with at least SOME morals. My recent GMing was an attempt to inspire the same, but when you have a ghoul who will eat out of those red biohazard bags in a hospital and who will cut off someone's foot and eat it in front of him during interrogation... well, it's a little challenging.

*Sigh* I sooo feel your pain...

I used to prefer running games where the players were at least sort of "moral," and "professional," when I started. That was ten years ago. Now my tastes run to the opposite end. I prefer characters who are unwashed and imperfect. The thugs and the lowlifes who are struggling to get by, who will lie, cheat, and steal to get ahead, because everyone does right? They're not uber-professional; they make mistakes, get addicted to drugs, gambling, btls, and strip joints, get in trouble with gangsters and loan sharks. I in fact find no character MORE tiresome than the Professional who runs the shadows by the book.

It's more fun when the players are forced to do something that compromises their morals, anyway. As a GM, it can be entertaining to see players try to think of an alternate route and as a player, it's great to think of something the GM hasn't.

I don't know if anyone has brought this up, but a good assassin will tend to have a rather strict code of behavior. As an example, I had a character who's behavior was dictated by the old school mafia code (no women or children, etc).

Amoral killers would likely be rare and would tend to be left to fend for themselves when the rest of the group realizes how much trouble they really can be.

As long as they're intelligent amoral killers rather than just thrill-killers, they're not trouble, they're better for the team than someone with principles.

~J