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Spider
I'm all with John on that one. I like the way the rules in SR are made (really). One of the major grudge i hold is the good-old 7 and 13 on D6 problem. Aside of that, i think the system is quite interpealling...

I would just add that while i quite agree that the D20 system is so simple to GM(i remember doing some DnD game to get a slack of all the Matrix-Magic-Rigging D6 mechanics madness), that same simplicity is also the major downfall of the system. After a while i just need more possibility, more depth, and i quite like to go outside the heroic system. I also notice that the D20 system is quite pass or fail, "you got 19, sorry it take 20 to succeed" on a simple roll. I prefer the idea to get more dice for a developped statistic and more modifiers and also a more detailed scale of success.

What i frankly don't like here is the "One system to rule them all type of argument" that simply spit on the SR D6 system. WoD have it's quality, SR have a lots of thoses(my personnal favorite) and DnD have some others. In the past years the gaming industry is really on that "D20 hype that suggest you to buy 1,000 much expensives rulebooks". IMHO, thoses universes begin to look too much like videogame description to me(or a Wizards cards-game, guess the'll soon make a crossover where you need expansion pack over and over for your character to lvl-up?) eek.gif The best quality about SR products is (i think) the fact that the developer don't take the GM and players for fools... They really try to justify every supplements and make it rich. When they don't they get punished in here and there!

But no offense, i guess thoses crossovers subjects tend to bring our preferences and differences reallu on the surface...
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Modesitt
John: Do you think a GM should design his adventures in a vaccuum, without considering what his PCs are capable of at all? Should the groups runs require cracking maglock keypads, even though no one in the group has electronics or electronics B/R? Should he just design his runs and say to his players "Sucks to be you" if they happen to not have a rigger or a decker around when one is needed?

Because I think he should keep in mind the groups abilities and design the runs around them.

There is no excuse for a GM to knowingly give runs to the PCs that they are destined to fail due to character design. Every single test he requires the PCs to make should be considered with the PCs abilities in mind. Some tests should be dead-simple because the PCs are experts. Some tests should be somewhat difficult, but possible for the PCs because of their awesome skills. Some tests simply shouldn't be there because no one has those skills.

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The very same page you refer to for the amazingly detailed chart, featuring such insightful entries as "simple" "routine" and "average", are several comments about GMs changing TNs on the fly because of the PCs abilities changing. A GM should design runs with the idea that the PCs should be able to succeed(Most of the time anyway - Designing a run that the PCs are supposed to fail can work out well) and set TNs accordingly. A "difficult" rating 6 maglock becomes childs play for a runner with microscopic vision and a good skill rating. Simply setting the TN at 6 and assuming that that will make it Difficult to succeed is stupidity incarnate.

Statistics are your friends. There's no excuse for making them difficult instead of nice, pleasent, easy female friends that are easy to work with.
Glyph
I guess I'm kind of in the middle of the issue. I think GMs should design their adventures to challenge the PCs, but I think the degree of difficulty should come from the type of challenge they are facing, not from metagaming alterations to their environment.

In other words, they might be facing better-armored security guards with heavier weapons and higher weapons skills, because they are being sent on more lucrative and dangerous runs. But that guy guarding the warehouse by the docks should still have a pistols skill of 4 - it shouldn't increase to 6 just because the PCs got better.

I would help keep the game challenging by steering them (mostly) towards challenges that fit their abilities. But not every challenge will be an exact fit for them. A street punk will still be a street punk, and an elven assassin will still be an elven assassin. And for some runs, they may either need to work with another pro with a certain desired skill (such as decking), or they will get into trouble in the middle of the run because they didn't do enough legwork, or were too cheap to split the take with an extra person.
John Campbell
No, assuming that your basic maglock should suddenly get more difficult to crack just because a PC got microscopic vision and a decent skill is stupidity incarnate. Not only is it inconsistent, it totally negates the benefit of actually improving the character... why get microscopic vision if it just means that the GM is going to make all of the maglocks more difficult to maintain his precious pre-set failure rate? Forget the upgrade, keep going up against easier locks, and spend the money on ale and whores. There's certainly no point in getting better gear if it just means that the GM is going to change the world to keep the difficulty the same.

I don't custom-tailor runs to PCs, at least not beyond the basics like, "If they don't have a decker, no Johnson is going to hire them for a run that requires a decker, at least not without providing one or recommending that they subcontract one." I build runs that make sense in the context of the campaign world, and that it makes sense that the Johnson would hire the particular group of PC runners for, keeping in mind that the Johnson may not know the details of the opposition... or even the details of the PCs' capabilities. I set things like maglock difficulties - measured on the absolute scale, not relative to any PC's ability - to whatever seems appropriate, given the means and motivations of the people installing the locks.

If the PCs have a lock specialist who can walk through them like they're not there, well, good for them. They won't have any trouble with the locks. That's their reward for thinking to get a lock specialist. But they'll probably have more trouble elsewhere because the lock specialist might not be as good at, say, stealth, as he would be if he hadn't put so much cash and Karma into cracking locks. If the PCs don't have anyone who can tell a maglock from a hole in the ground, they'll have some trouble with the locks. But that doesn't mean they'll automatically fail the run... because they didn't put the resources into having a lock specialist, they almost certainly have strengths in other areas that they can use to work around the problem. The only times I've seen a single obstacle fail an entire run were with GMs who couldn't cope with players jumping the rails. Me, I figure I'm doing well if the PCs even hit all the obstacles that I'd pregenerated instead of going off on some weird tangent with a crazy Rube-Goldberg plan and making me improvise half the session.

There's almost always more than one way to accomplish any given task, and players are really good at coming up with the ones that the GM never even thought of, much less deliberately guaranteed them a perfect 75% chance of success at. Can't open a lock? Time to improvise. Try a different route. Mug someone who has a key. Burn it open with thermite. Set up surveillance to capture the passcode from someone going through. Turn someone invisible and have them pass through with a security patrol, then let everyone else in once they're inside. Crawl through the air ducts, or have a minidrone crawl through the air ducts and open the door from the inside. Have the face talk the opposition into willingly letting him in. Blast it open. Mind control someone who has access. Hire a subcontractor with a crazy-high Electronics skill and microscopic vision. Deck their security system and pop the lock from Matrix-side. Go through the window. Or the roof. Snake a fiber-optic cable inside and use Magic Fingers to open the door... or to do whatever it was you needed to do behind the door. Have the troll kick it in. Come up with an alternate plan that doesn't even require getting access to behind the door.

They may even try these alternate plans before they even attempt to unlock the door. Especially if they know they're no good at cracking maglocks.

Hell, watching players who've just realized that they've run into an obstacle that they can't pass without putting their brains in gear is half the fun of GMing. And watching the GM when the crazy plan that he never anticipated starts to come together is half the fun of playing. Thinking up an unorthodox solution to a simple problem is a whole hell of a lot more fun than throwing just exactly enough dice at it until it goes away.

And, worse comes to worst, you fail the run, take the hit to your rep, and go home and learn how to crack a fragging maglock so that you won't fail the next one. Chalk it up to experience.
Weredigo
QUOTE
Do you think a GM should design his adventures in a vaccuum, without considering what his PCs are capable of at all? Should the groups runs require cracking maglock keypads, even though no one in the group has electronics or electronics B/R? Should he just design his runs and say to his players "Sucks to be you" if they happen to not have a rigger or a decker around when one is needed?


The easy way I usually avoid that situation is I have a group of skills that I deem to be the "Skills Necessary for a Shadowrunner to survive One Day" and just make sure that characters start with those skills, then the skills that come with being thier archetype, and then any other skill they want/think they need. That way, whatever situation I put them in they can find a way to survive or turn to thier advantage, even if defaulting to Atts is necessary.

QUOTE
There's almost always more than one way to accomplish any given task, and players are really good at coming up with the ones that the GM never even thought of
Even after the GM has thought about 101 way and an "uhm, problem with that..." for each one but about 4. Yup, very familiar with players who can pull miracles out of thin air.

QUOTE
They may even try these alternate plans before they even attempt to unlock the door. Especially if they know they're no good at cracking maglocks.


Had one player who was GREAT at cracking any lock. Till one day he was just having bad luck with the Dice. As a fair GM I'll allow rerolls on something like that, but it's always got a +1 to the TN, but he just kept botching it. Then his buddy tried to Kick the door down... null success, botched so badly when we were done rolling that he'd even fallen over backards due to unbalance, landed flat on his back and passed out from the impact, air forced out of lungs plus real hard bang to the noggin, then the spell caster tries, botch, botch, botch, botch, botch, ( "Uhm, before you try casting that next spell it's time for a drain check") you guessed it, Botch, burn out. Then the lock picker pulls out his pistol and shoots the lock off ( Way more successes then he needed, like triple the target number ), Great, the door's open. small problem, your Dwarf and Your magic user are lying on the ground unconcious, what are you gonna do?

"Try again tomorrow." best thing that character ever did.
nezumi
I'll definitely toss my hat in with the 'go SR system'. Heck, I started a thread recently because I love the SR system so much, I want to use it outside of the SR universe. Degrees of success are great, almost as good as an actual bell curve when it comes to probability.
tisoz
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