I would have to agree here. However, given that the SR system is not very good at handling precision (in fact, it is precisely awful at it), you need to be careful of making this sort of thing unreasonably difficult. It's a judgement call based on the character's skill or lack thereof as to whether or not you think he might have trouble with stalling in the middle of combat, and from there, possibly making a reasonable (stress reasonable) test. This sort of thing absolutely needs to be flexible to work around the many problems with the SR system; it's just not geared for handling little stuff like this, and you can really go overboard with it if you're not careful.

I've never even had a vehicle that needed a key to start in Shadowrun. They've all either been magnetic card, or biometric activated. If it was a system with autonav, all my character has to do is sit down, and tell it where it's going, and it'll take care of everything itself.

Starting the bike should not have required a check (as supported in the rules). Heck, even driving away could have been done without a check, if it had been done calmly. When the motorcycle started taking shots, then the checks would've started, or if he peeled out at maximum acceleration.

DocMortand:

What happened was that Sahandrian (Elf Face/Decker), Phaeton (Human rigger/streetsam/biker), Ceres (SURGEd Night One Cat Shaman), and I (The Foreigner, Human Magician's Way Adept, and follower of the Invisible Way--the "newbie") had been hired by another 'runner, "Glasswalker" ("Walker" for short) to do an extraction on NovaTech's Seattle facility--Walker had been contacted by someone who wanted to get out, and the corp was willing to kill the individual in question in order to keep the edge she had provided--the extractee (is that a word? ) was an elderly woman, but we didn't find that out until we'd actually met her. Walker's intel was faulty, and had identified the target as a young man.

Anyway, Phaeton was on his way, after stopping off at his apartment to pick up his gear. Sahandrian was providing information and overwatch. Meanwhile, Ceres, Walker and I managed, after a few tense moments (mostly stumbling around in the dark ; I think I tripped over a Devil Rat or something ; then Ceres and I had the misfortune to--almost literally-- stumble over a dead Metahuman), to cross to the building in question via a Levitate spell (courtesy of Ceres), and enter via the fire escape.

By this time, Phaeton has arrived, and he sees something (someone?) suspicious. He decides to follow whoever/whatever it is. Walker informs him via headphone that we're ready to leave. (This was after I panicked and nearly shot our mark; what can I say? It makes me nervous when sadistic GMs--are you reading this, Sahandrian?--have NPCs sneak up on me out of the blue and start talking.)

Walker's message gives Phaeton an idea--provide a distraction. So he blows the front door off of its hinges with an HE Minigrenade from his Ares Alpha. Unfortunately, this draws the attention of the guy he was tailing--a heavily cybered Ork, street name "Phobos", from a resident-to-our-campaign group of mercenaries called the "Devilkin". After a protracted gunfight, Phaeton manages to put Phobos out of commission, but is seriously wounded in the process--he was 1 Damage Box from bleeding to death, although his cyberware (read "Pain Editor") kept him conscious.

At this point, Phobos's backup arrives--an even-more-menacing cybered Troll, street name "Deimos". Deimos lifts Phaeton off the floor with one hand around his neck, basically telling Phaeton not to even *TRY* killing him, because nothing in Phaeton's (rather considerable) arsenal is adequate to the task, and turns to help his fallen teammate. Phaeton takes his advice, and manages to get outside and hide behind a Dumpster.

Meanwhile, Walker, Ceres, and I have managed to get away, with Ceres having used a fire-related spell to incinerate everything in the extractee's files that we couldn't bring with us. Just as we're about to part company with Walker, Ceres smells blood, and calls Phaeton on her cell phone. We track him to a side alleyway, call DocWagon and, between her Healing spells and my Rating 6 Medkit, manage to stabilize him long enough for them to transport him to the nearest clinic.

At which point Walker gives us a 20,000 Credstick, and he and the mark drive away in a limo which mysteriously appeared just as we were leaving the building.

(Ever try to split 20,000 three ways? It isn't easy.)

Phaeton took 10,000, mostly for medical bills; Ceres got 6,000, and I got 4,000.

-- Foreigner

3rd try: It specifically states that no check is needed for doing something normal with a vehicle. Getting on and starting, even getting going from a stop sure seems to fit the "normal" definition.

Let's simplify this:

Is there a test to start a vehicle? No.
Was the character in combat? Yes.
Should there have been an Acceleration test? Absolutely not.

He was not pushing his bike to the limits. He was not doing anything crazy like, say, jumping six buildings and landing perfectly. He was not doing 90 in six-lane traffic that is, at most, going 60, doding and weaving between cars and gaps. He was not in a maddening car chase.

What he was doing was accelerating to get the fuck out of there.

Ever played a game called "Bigger or Better?" There you are, trying to do things as fast as possible and get back to an appointed area before anyone else. So, naturally, you're speeding and shaving off time whenever possible (like everybody jumping in a car, starting it before you hit the seat, and accelerating before anybody else is 100% in the car). It doesn't take a check to do that, it takes good timing and the ability to not fuck things up (id est make sure people are most of the way in and have a good grip on something before flooring it).

Most people with licenses have Car (or whatever vehicle) 1. Give them several years of experience (or just make them good right off the bat like some people) and they have Car 2. If they've narrowly avoided lots and lots of accidents and can rather easily navigate the aforementioned six-lane highway doing the aforementioned speed, then they probably have Car 3. Anything above is, generally, for stunt drivers and the like.

Just because you can't do something doesn't mean nobody else can.

As I said before, none of the vehicles I've used in Shadowrun have required keys. I have a magnetic card on my person (if not a rigger) that works both the door and the igntion by proximity (okay, so I guess it's like a key). If it's a bike, I twist the throttle, if it's a car, I put my hands on the steering wheel, a foot on the peddle, and go. Now, if one of those people shooting at me actually hits, either the character, or the vehicle, then some dice should roll. I would simply say, 'hell no' to making a starting test because its arbitrary, and can really smack of a GM jerking the player around.

I'm with you all the way on that one. Sprawl Survival Guide pretty much backs up that view on the tech available in the way of proximity capabilities and such.

I'll just say that I'll bet it can be hard to do *very* simple things if people are shooting at you.

Right, but most of the complications I can think of are already covered in the rules. I think what is rubbing most people the wrong way is suddenly popping an extra test on a player. If any of those shots are hitting, then there is a good chance that driving and crash tests might follow anyway. If the player doesn't do anything more complicated than go in a straight line at a controlable speed, I don't see the need to saddle them with another one.

After playing the Arc shutdown with a GM who was rather insecure in his role, and occasionly made himself feel better with random, unavoidable mono whip decapitations of PCs (hey, it's the Arc. It's full of deathtraps, and people to die in them. Make a new character. He'll be in the next zombie room the PCs find), I'm a little touchy about things that could come across as GMs jerking around players.

Getting on a bike and driving away, even under fire, no problem, no extra tests. Peeling out of there, popping a wheelie and burning rubber, that takes a drive test, and I believe there is a modifier for being in combat.

Any threat that the gunfire imposed would be have been resolved with the Dodge tests or Body tests involved.

seems people more or less agree that there should be a test, what we cant agree on is what test...

Close, but you mixed a few things up.

A check would be needed for the unusually high acceleration he will want. Remember acceleration during a combat turn is base acceleration 8 successes on driving test target handling.

Trying to do this opens up the possibility of no successes or a rule of 1 situation, if your happy with base acceleration then no need to roll.

Edward

Sahandrian:

Sorry.

I *TOLD* you that my memory wasn't very good....

--Foreigner

I'd probably not have asked for a Bike test, since my mate's car starts at the push of a button after automatically unlocking the doors for him - SR definately states in various places these things only get more accurate.

What I'd possibly have called for, and I'm still making up my mind as to whether I'd have bothered, is a Quickness or Reaction test to see if the character can do all those things together in the right order. But mostly I'm thinking I wouldn't have bothered.

As a matter of note, I have known people for whom starting vehicles under fire is a normal day at the office and they'd just not be seen dead (okay, that's all they'd be) on a bike in a combat situation. But for them, they wouldn't even need to test for peeling away with the pedal to the floor and in full control.

When I run games, I keep in mind the one rule I've used over and above the SR rules at times - can the Human body/mind do this and if so how much, if any, training/experience would it take. I even take this into account when playing.

We were playing a one-shot "break into the compond and steal something" game and one of the PCs playing a mage spotted the automated HVARs mounted at the corners of the building.

So, he thought he'd be clever and use improved invisibility with levitate to float up to the guns and disable them. "It works on video cameras and other electronics," he said, "I'll be fine."

Lo and behold, the gun managed to track him and fire a decent amount of lead through his body, which quickly become visible, fell from the air and bounced on the ground.

As it turns out, the HVARs were equipped with ultrasound sensors (which the GM didn't count as visual, causing another invisibility argument.)

Oops.

From a game, years and years ago:

GM: As you peer down the alley, a metal orb comes bouncing out of the darkness at you.

Player: I pick it up and read it.

GM: Huh?

Player: I pick it up amd read it. Does it have anything written on it?

GM: Yeah.

Player: What's it say?

GM: Uh, it says, "U.C.A.S. Ordinance"

Then the grenade exploded.

The M67 grenade that the US currently uses says:

Grenade, Hand, Frag, Delay, M67
Comp B, {Lot Number?}

The M18 smoke grenade says:

M18
Smoke
{Color}
{Lot Number?}

The Mk3A2 Grenade says:

Grenade Hand
Offensive MK3A2
TNT
{Lot Number}

... and now, back to your regularly scheduled program.

Dissecting ajoke is like dissecting a frog. It isn't amusing and the frog is dead.

spook, your gm was right about ultrasound not being affected by imp. invisibility. check out the ultrasound cyberware for canon info.

Not a character death (yet) but still mighty funny.

Its a party of 5 people, all experienced in shadowrunning and/or general sneaking around. The J has recently acquired a creepy old house that he wants them to check out. Of course, everything appears legit, so he hands over the keys and all the info he has available.

They arrive at the house, and on the second day, discover a scary, secret door in the basement. The group crowds around it, vaguely reminiscent of the apes in 2001 examining the obelisk.

"It's heavy oak and appears to be quite well reinforced."
"I think I might be able to pick the lock!" says one.
"Let me fire some rounds through it, I think we could knock it down," says the other
"I have demolitions skill," says the third, "we could blow it up."

One of the players comments OOC if there's anything they should be considering.
"They key, perhaps." I comment idly.
"Oh yes! The key! The key! Try the key!"
"I'm confused... Is this a metaphorical key?"
"The key ring our Johnson gave us. All this not breaking in is strange, isn't it?"
"Ah... Legal activity, no wonder I'm confused."

Of course, the key works. (Normally, I'd let them blow stuff up, but I was anxious for them to move on).

So the crew splits up. Upstairs we have the drone rigger and the only female of the group, the corporate spy, who's a pacifist and armed with a dinky stun baton. Proceeding through the door is a professional assassin, a guerilla fighter, and the decker in full combat armor plus three guns. They're tied to a rope the corp spy upstairs is feeding to them slowly.

They follow the spiral staircase down into a deep, underground cavern. The entire room is too dark for them to see far, even with low light. The three sit there, debating if they should move on. I just silently imagine these three men, armed to the teeth, going:
"Hey guys? I uh... I'm kinda scared."
"Yeah, I know man, so am I. Maybe... Maybe we should go back up and see if they need any help upstairs."
"No way, go on, it's just the darkness."
"No, YOU go on!"
*Sound of people checking weapons and peering into the inky black*

I finally got bored and force the people upstairs to go down. The female corporate spy, the one with few combat skills and no weapons of note, leads the group into the dark.

*sigh*

"Strange. The cave floor is moist."

That's why my characters always carry flashlights. Even the ones who can see in the dark and have ultrasound.


We'd managed to massively screw up a villains plans, and he wanted to have a little 'chat' with us about it (this was a law abiding campaign, btw).

Note from villain. "You will have noticed the kidnapping of a girl's school class in the morning news feed. You will go to the corner of X and Y at 8pm. If you're not all there, the girls die. If anyone tries to follow you, the girls die. If you try anything funny, the girls die."

GM: (as evening rolls around) What do you do?
Player A: I'm at the corner early.
Player B: Me too.
Player C: I show up fashionably late.
GM: You're fucking kidding me.

I'm not going to go on about the idiot runners who decided to knife-fight in a plane's cockpit. Instead, I'll talk about something more recent.

The run took place in a weapons manufacturing facility. The one runner in question was 'Neo', who was a direct rip from The Matrix except without all the neat bullet-stopping powers.

The problem was that Neo liked guns. He carried guns in his boots, in the thigh pockets of his BDU's, in waist holsters, in shouler holsters, in wrist holsters, in the small of his back, down his pants and pretty much anywhere else he could conceivably fit them and still remain in motion. Did I mention that he liked guns?

So during a covert operation in an Ares manufacturing facility, Neo decides to help himself to a little five-fingered discounting and make off with a few of Ares' latest products. However, this is supposed to be a covert operation. There are workers. There are guards. There is a security rigger.

Apparently his plan was to snatch the finished weapons off the production line and no one would be the wiser. Of course, this failed, and he was forced to put his new acquisitions to use. Unfortunately he failed the perception tests (I gave him three) and the intelligence check that would have told him that modern weapons are manufactured sans firing pins, for just this very reason. They add the firing pins later. They are also manufactured without internal smartlinks, clips or ammo. So Neo had just picked up two very expensive paperweights -- expensive because his actions caused the whole run to go south, losing him the payment of 4,000 , and earning him the enmity of his team.

I didn't have to kill the guy -- the team did it for me.

His next character was a decker who continued his streak of cluelessness. After having received a load of tagged chips as payment for a run, his best idea was to sell them on eBay. Surprisingly, the other runners thought this was a great idea. It wasn't so great when a joint Yamatetsu-Lone Star task force came knocking on the decker's door (he'd listed his real address in eBay's information archives).

Sandoval Smith:

Why does that exchange in the kidnapping scenario you mentioned remind me of the sequence in DIRTY HARRY in which Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood) is trying to save kidnapped 14-year-old schoolgirl Ann Mary Deacon (Debralee Scott, who was actually 18 at the time) from the psychopathic murderer/extortionist-turned-kidnapper Scorpio (Andrew Robinson) ?

Not to mention the sequence in which Scorpio kidnaps an entire busload of schoolchildren near the end of the film.



--Foreigner

*sigh* I haven't run for my psychotic team a long time. Last time I changed their campaign so they work for FBI now (it wasn't hard, because as usual they ended up dead in previous run. I have posted here, with that pricey thingy that they killed each other over.) And surprisingly they did normally.
Let's see what future holds, I will run for them 2 weeks later.

I remembered. From good team. They crossed ways with Renraku assault team and got away... thought so. Of course, being legal citizens and living in their real address generally wasn't a good idea.

Team dwarf "I put security on my doors and also on his floor.
Me: "Sure, you have done that. You sit and watch TV, when your floor alarm triggers. What do you do?"
Dwarf "Uh, I continue watching TV."
Me: "Ok, now your door alarm triggers. What do you do?"
Dwarf "Uh, I continue watching TV. Maybe stray cat..."
Me: "You hear explosion and doors flies in smashing your TV. You see couple of heavily cybered guys in place of your doors."

Well, he got caught and spilled all information they needed. Luckily for him, information was important enough,so samurays used stun bullets and he even got a little reward from corp. You know, if pawns can be reused, let them live.

P.S. In most those situations, like enemies blocking escape my clueless player would probably die. Unless he manages to overroll them.

Sandoval Smith:

Okay.

I wasn't certain. It just sounded strangely familiar....



--Foreigner

The best part of that exchange was the look of disbelief on the GM's face as he said, "You're _fucking_ (the emphasis he put on that was what made it hilarious) kidding me."

Then the player admitted that yes, he was, and that he actually showed up early too. Which was good, because law abiding or not, he'd delivered that line with such a straight face that the other players and I were about ready to geek him (as soon as he theoretically showed up).

Ingredients:

(2) Propane Tanks
(1) Mesh-Plastic Office Swivelchair
(1) Roll of Duct Tape
(1) Chunk of C-4 w/Timer
(1) Surveying Device
(1) Lighter
(3) Metallic Objects
(1) Wile E. Coyote 'runner
(1) Spiderman 'runner
(1) Smoke-'em-while-you-got-'em 'runner
(3) Surviving 'runners, AKA: "Common Sense Anchors" of the group

The goal was to enter the basement of a building, set the charge, and get out. Simple enough. Half of the 'yen up front, half on completion.

Stupid parlor tricks on behalf of the six person team meant that they were eventually cornered in a warehouse on the waterfront - mostly empty save for the large girders and metal framework overhead, and assorted two foot high pressurized tanks about the area. Picture a covered boat hangar for light watercraft, and that's the gist of it.

One entrance point blocked, other option was to swim. The three surviving runners in the session decided to find out how to busy themselves with opening up the large hangar door while Spidey-runner perched on a girder overhead for a better angle on the force outside of the entrance point.

Runner 1: "Hey, I've got an idea...Help me with this bag."

Apparently, this was the McGuyver-esque's one line prior to attempting something that ALWAYS involved Duct Tape. His bright idea came from seeing something in the media about an office chair, and propellants.

It would have been easier just to have walked away, but no. Wile E. Coyote made some rolls that were too good to ignore, so Smokes, Spidey, and him all worked on "The Plan": Which consisted of sending this contraption made of scavenged items in the boathouse rocketing towards the doorway, hopeful enough to cause a large enough dent in the 25'x30' boathouse entrance for an escape.

Yes, a roll was failed, and the chair went straight up - rather than the direction intended.

Yes, Spidey was tingling, not from a special sense other than "On Fire".

Smokes? Lit up like an Xmas tree. The private security force following the 'runners were another squad hired by Mr. J, bent on making sure that no evidence was left behind in regards to the initial contract. The fireworks show INSIDE of the boathouse, with Girder-Snapping Action™ ensured that things would be messy. He was the nearest target once the team broke through the entrance barricade.

The other three? Well, they could not get the door open, but they did manage to scrounge up some goggles/masks nearby, and went under the hangar door.

Meanwhile, the engineer was pinned under a steel girder from the fireworks show.

Just yesterday I experienced a totally cool whole-party annihilation.

The GM was the guy who posts here as MagicalPrettyMatt, or something similar to that. Anyway, the campaign was both an alternative setting and a military setting where the PCs are all these superpowered delta-ware toting government million dollar men.

The PCs were being sent into an archeological site in South America with the mission of eliminating opfor's antiair emplacements and resucing some archeologists. Opfor had numbers, magic, and lots of snipers.

So it starts out pretty methodical. Lots of opfor dies, the AA emplacements are destroyed. Someone spazzes and drills an archeologist, though. Thats what the archeologist gets for not having as much combat pool as Indiana Jones!

After the AA emplacements are destroyed and we become aware that there is evil magic within the ruins, there come new orders to go inside a pyramid and search for survivors.

The GM asks if we go up to the little temple on top of the pyramid, and we say we do. However, because we're silly people, we forgot to say that we secure the area first and make sure there are no snipers.

So, yeah...we go up, frag the room, shoot a few guys, and then we all get sniped out. Since the snipers hid successfully no dodge test, no combat pool, no nothing. Whole party destroyed within a single combat turn.

I thought that was righteously awesome. It's not every day you get to see all the PCs get sniped out. And it was totally our fault, too, for not securing the area first.

So, I had a lot of fun that session, but it's also a cool story of a wipeout.

This is from when I first started playing shadowrun. There were a couple veteran shadowrunners and a couple newbies.

GM: The window to the apartment shatters.

Vetern Runner #1: I yell "sniper" and dive behind the couch.

Vetern Runner #2: I run to the door of the apartment and head down the stairs.

Me: I follow the him out the door.

Newbie: I look at the window to see where the shot came from.

I took this from Jauren's post in Gaming Session Quotes

I happened to GM this encounter

Scenario: The group of runners (1 troll sammy, 1 elf rigger, 1 dwarf mage, and a human otaku) had just snuck into a minor corp headquarters. They're armed enough to take out the entire corp and still have bullets left over to shoot their way past Lone Star. I was the otaku.

Note the elf was loaded with EX-Ex and white phosphorous minigrenades.

The Otaku and the elf (who is henceforth refered to as "The Idiot") were walking on a platform that, for some unfathomable reason, was made entirely out of completely see-through plastic. The otaku, being severely afraid of heights, made the mistake of looking down, which prompted a freeze of horror.

The Idiot, instead of doing anything remotely intelligent, did the following.

The Idiot: I look down. What do I see?
GM: You see several guards walking.
The Idiot: Drek! I shoot them with my MGL.

EX-Explosive ammo shall be henceforth known thoughout Aztlan as "Dos Equis"

If you're talking about the ammo, it's excellent, albeit a bit pricey. If you're talking about the beer, it's good, but only because Latin beer in general is only half a step away from mule piss, and so if you're in a place that offers Dos Equis, I doubt you have a lot of better options.

Makes me wonder who tried the mule piss to find that out...

Long live the Belgian beers!!

Hmm, Chimay Bleue... yummy

To add my stone to the original thread, this happened in our group some... arg... nine years ago (getting older and older everyday:)) ; it isn't exactly a character death, but something effectively died that day...

We were on a simple run (whose goal was to find evidences of corruption of city's officials -we were in Seattle- by Fushi (I said it was a long time ago;))).

Pepe, our Troll ganger (of his true name Josef Petrwski but hey int 1 sometimes limits pronunciation), a magnet's dream come true considering the amount of cyberware he had, decided for once to make a little intel before striking the offices.

So he went to his troll gangers' buddies and spent the afternoon and part of the evening involving himself in beer contests and the like, all the while pretending to be looking for rumors.

After a few hours drinking and singing, our bonelaced and thick-skulled friend decides to meet us so we can partake our discoveries (I guess his news would have been that his friends held no information but plenty of excellent stout).

Walking as casually as a drunk troll can manage, he suddenly sees another ganger (a weakling human) sitting on a bin and waving at him ; he gets closer (having trouble accommodating his vision) and the guy tells him he wants Pepe's money for passage right.

Picture that : the huge troll (Strength and Body over 13 if I remember correctly) who takes canon shots in the chest routinely (poetic license) against the pathetic ganger (strength and body 3 if lucky) who manages to cut himself while shaving, make your bets...

Even Pepe with his alcohol-imbibed brain can picture the odds and says "no drek!". But anyway, to be even more guaranteed to win if possible, Pepe gets his Predator out (ignoring the GM pleas to respect the "street combat code" amongst gangers saying he's too drunk to think while we're mumbling to ourselves "didn't need that").

Being the fastest (cyberware...), Pepe fires his gun but, being in melee, lacking the best part of any gun skill (he preferred assault canon) and making one of the worst dice roll ever make him miss the human ganger.

The poor panicked guy yells for help (from hidden friends) while gesturing in despair with his baseball bat. Thanks to his sky-high skill (3 or 4 at most), said ganger even manages to land a hit. Pepe decides to soak it so as to keep more combat pool for his next shot as he wants the fight over quick...

The fight WAS brief... from the 13+ dices he cast, the higher was a... 1 ... Nearly knocked out, still trying to focus his vision on his opponent, Pepe didn't hear the other ganger who smashed a metal pipe on his cyberskull.

When Pepe woke up, he still had his pants on but that was all... yep, as I told earlier, he didn't die that day but his pride sure did...

Erchael