Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Character creation and critique => Topic started by: Snack Happy on <10-10-10/0315:38>
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Figured I would see if you guys could make a 400BP character that is completely mundane with no cyber or augments just plain skills and stats just curios also want to know how viable the option would be.
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Shadowrun is, by design, a world where magic is feared and envied, and where technology is an ubiquitous presense that constantly tempts people with the promise of becoming more than human. Therefore, magic and augmentation can both augment a character's ability to superhuman levels at a comparatively cheap cost.
Mundanes are playable. But they are far, far from optimal. Be aware of that before you make one. They are more of an advanced roleplayer's choice, a decision to deliberately gimp your character to make the experience more challenging. The one tangible advantage that an unaugmented mundane has is the ability to pass through any magical or cybernetic scanner without breaking a sweat. They will also usually have more skills, but between skillwires, and all of the skill and Attribute boosts that are available, the augmented character with three initiative passes and several Attributes boosted up to 9 might actually have more skills/higher dice pools than his unaugmented counterpart, too.
An unaugmented mundane will be second-best at anything he does, but can still do a decent job at some specialties. Generally, a mundane character will depend on stealth, cunning, and setting the terms of the confrontation to survive. They can be acceptable snipers, hackers, faces, detectives, and techies.
Here's one quick example:
Face
Race: Elven
BREAKDOWN (400 Points)
Core Attributes: 200
Special Attributes: 40
Race: 30
Active Skills: 140
Qualities: +30
Contacts: 10
Resources: 10
=Attributes=
Body: 3
Agility: 4
Reaction: 3
Strength: 2
Charisma: 7
Intuition: 4
Logic: 3
Willpower: 5
Edge: 5
Essence: 6.0
=Qualities=
First Impression
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Allergy/Silver, Moderate
Low Pain Tolerance
Sensitive System
=Active Skills=
Gymnastics/Dance: 4/+2
Influence Group: 4
Intimidation: 4
Perception/Visual: 4/+2
Pistols/Semi-Automatic: 4/+2
Stealth Skill Group: 3
=Knowledge Skills=
English: N
Japanese: 4
Sperethiel: 4
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Local Area Knowledge: 4
Psychology: 3
Seattle Night Spots: 3
Street crime/Vice: 2/+2
=Contacts=
Fixer (4 Connection/2 Loyalty)
Hacker (2 Connection/2 Loyalty)
=Lifestyle and Gear=
50,000 Nuyen to spend on Lifestyles and Gear.
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In the majority of times I played SR, my character was mundane - no magic, no cyber. He survived mainly because the GM liked him (there, I said it) and because he was with powered-up characters.
I got a bit of a rep as a mago-phobe in those years though.
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Not really going to play it just curious what one would look like or what build ideas you guys would use.
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I would probably usually go with high Edge, good mix of skills, and mainly non-combat skills, where having a high dice pool and multiple initiative passes is not as important. Sniping is kind of the exception, since you will both have time to aim and (usually) have an unaware target. Being a metatype such as an elf or troll can be an advantage (a troll can soak lots of damage, an elf can be a good face or have an Agility close to that of an augmented human, etc.), and with the points you save on resources and/or Magic, you can afford it. Non-cyber tech such as medkits, ruthenium sneak suits, and MagLock passkeys can give you an edge.
The effectiveness of a mundane character also depends a lot on the challenges that a GM throws at the group, and how the other characters are put together. A well-crafted mundane won't stand up to a well-crafted adept or augmented character, but not every character will be min-maxed to the same effectiveness. And if the rest of the group consists of two street samurai and a combat mage focused solely on combat, then the mundane guy with first aid, a van the group can use, some social skills, some sneaking ability, and a MagLock passkey might very well get lots of opportunities to shine. Mundane characters are less effective with everything else being equal, but that isn't always the case.
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With a 400 point mundane, I'd probably take some really odd approaches.
First off, combat's out. Enough armor, weapons and skills to defeat the average mugger only.
Similarly for being a wheelman, drone runner or hacker.
However, he could really shine as an infiltrator. Follow the logic here:
At the highest levels of security having a tone of cyberware or being Awakened is a detriment. Why? Everyone who has access and either of the above is under increased scrutiny. Furthermore they don't have the astral/cyber signature that you the infiltrator do. When you're being scanned to within an inch of your life, sometimes it pays to be clean. Our "super normal" would need a lot of disguise skill, a lot of social skill, some good gear and contacts. The upside is that he has 400 points to spend on attributes (Charisma, Intuition and Edge), skills (Social and some technical and Disguise) and gear gear gear.
So as a simple breakdown figure 200 points on stats
50 on gear
150 on skills and contacts
Balance positive and negative qualities
Best of all there's nothing to stop you from adding magic and/or cyberwear later. Since this is a starting character it could be fun to have him start as a particularly talented corp kid who's living out his slumming fantasies by trying to be a Runner. As time goes on he'll actually grow into the role. Gives an excuse to take all sorts of cool things like a SIN, the Born Rich quality etc.
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I like the infiltrator idea it seems it would be interesting. At that point something along the lines of latent awakening would be interesting thrown in for some more RPing.
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I didn't think the Weapon Specialist (Sample Char) was bad as a Mundane. I viewed it as a great growth based character. One good fight, and the sudden temptation of Cybering is apparent. One bad fight, and the Character must accept some cyber to survive. Fun stuffs.
JMO
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If the ware and being awekened/TM was out i might go with somethink like this:
Combat face
Dryad
Body 3
Agility 7
Reaction 4
Strength 2
Charisma 8
Intuition 3
Logic 3
Willpower 3
Edge 4
Positive qualities:
Surge level 2
Metegenetic Improvement (Charisma)
Metegenetic Improvement (Agility)
Negative qualities:
In Debt (30000)
Unusual Hair(Blue)
Extravagant Eyes(silver) }these 2 can be changed to any metagenetic negative quality/qualities worth -10BP
Addiction (Mild) [Galak]
Skills:
Athletics (Group) 2
Pistols(semiautomatics) 4(+2)
Automatics(Assault rifles) 4(+2)
Con 5
Etiquette 3
Negotiation 5
What ever you want as free knowledge skills
Gear:
40k nuyen(2BP spend for money) to spend on comlink, contact lenses with smartlink, couple of pimped out guns and other essentials.
20BP left to buy a couple contacts with or someting else
She has 15 dice to shoot smatlinked semi-automatic pistols and Assault rifles.
16 dice for Con and Negotiation
15 dice for etiquette
Social pools are one higher if she's taken a dose of Galak.
Should probaply also buy a few doses of IP enchanting drugs for those fights where 1IP just isn't enough.
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The only problem with that is that Metavariants are automatically maxed out on distinctive qualities for no BP bonus. If you're a dryad, people notice.
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The only problem with that is that Metavariants are automatically maxed out on distinctive qualities for no BP bonus. If you're a dryad, people notice.
She's a face, people are supposed to notice when she makes an entry ;)
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I'm currently building a character that could match your proposition (but ...)
My first idea was to make a simile "face" nuyen/contact oriented (he is runner because he want to, for revenge or something else, but not for money).
Erased 10 BP
Fame 20 BP
Astral Sight 5 BP
SINner 5 BP
Day job 15 BP
Vendetta 5 BP
Lost Loved One 5 BP
Compulsive 5BP
And :
- a lot of contacts (my current build have around 40 BP contacts)
- a lot of knowledge and language skills (22 skills in current build)
- a lot of fake sins
lifestyle "high" level (I play advanced lifestyle so it's a bit more than 10 000)
Like that, if you managed to keep your day work while running you win 50 000 nuyens per month minus your lifestyle cost.
The problem is the character is really hard to play without a sleep regulator.
The conclusion is this character will use money for augmentations...
My last build is "augmented" with nanoware (priceless combo with knowledge skills) and bioware and it is a really interesting solution but I think you can still play without.
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You could also make a decent hacker using only non-invasive tech. You wouldn't be very fast (unless you used stimulants), but lots of matrix stuff is independent of speed, especially if you're very stealthy.
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There's nothing explicitly in the rules about incompatible flaws, but I have a hard time reconciling a SINner with a day job, and the erased quality.
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There's nothing explicitly in the rules about incompatible flaws, but I have a hard time reconciling a SINner with a day job, and the erased quality.
You tell whatever is doing the erasing to leave the job, and most of the connected SIN alone?
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The only problem with that is that Metavariants are automatically maxed out on distinctive qualities for no BP bonus. If you're a dryad, people notice.
She's a face, people are supposed to notice when she makes an entry ;)
Yes, but you can't also take Distinctive Style/Features for additional BP.
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Erased only takes away negative things. It still allows you to function in society.
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I find it highly amusing there is a thread for "Most Mundane Shadowrunner" and "Superhuman Shadowrunner" going at the same time. Just sayin'.
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Erased only takes away negative things. It still allows you to function in society.
I've currently got a character with Erased and Data Shadow. In his public persona he's unbelievably easy to find because he needs to be in order to be effective. His actual runs, Gridlink records, pictures on random ATM cameras etc get erased. So anyone looking for a particular (fake) SIN, or license plate or whatever is out of luck. Anyone looking for "a well dressed Dryad in the Barrens" gets a pretty hefty bonus and probably ends up finding his blog page.
For a SINner, its even cooler. You're Batman. Harmless civilian by day, Shadowrunner by night.
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The only problem with that is that Metavariants are automatically maxed out on distinctive qualities for no BP bonus. If you're a dryad, people notice.
She's a face, people are supposed to notice when she makes an entry ;)
Yes, but you can't also take Distinctive Style/Features for additional BP.
What are you trying to say, my build doesn't have distinctive style listed as a negative quality ??? ???
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There's nothing explicitly in the rules about incompatible flaws, but I have a hard time reconciling a SINner with a day job, and the erased quality.
You tell whatever is doing the erasing to leave the job, and most of the connected SIN alone?
What I'm saying is, you have an official SIN, on the one hand, which is a negative quality, and on the other hand, you have a quality that lets you burn your SIN any time you want. I wouldn't have a problem with it if either 1) The erased quality didn't work on either of the two negative qualities, or 2) The player has to pay off the flaw with karma if he uses Erased to get rid of it.
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Negative qualities:
Unusual Hair(Blue)
Extravagant Eyes(silver) }these 2 can be changed to any metagenetic negative quality/qualities worth -10BP
Yep, my mistake, actually. These are separate from the normal distinctive style.
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Those are actually the two ones I pick most often myself, at least for changelings with glamour. SURGE II could also be called "I'm an anime character!"
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Haha. Wish I'd thought of that with my last character. Everything else was built around being so distinctive that there's no point in trying to hide.
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OK, here's a super-mundane thought I've been tinkering with but haven't started to build. The basic concept is stolen from The Surrogates.
Low physical stats, possibly even crippled (although not necessarily, could be just a bored kid). Trust fund and/or Day Job. Definitely SINner.
He's a rigger, after a fashion. Interfaces with the world via Mimic enabled humaniform drone. A Manservant can have Touch Sensors, Mimic and Satcom added and still be less than 10,000 nuyen. Its not too impressive, but it can use normal gear and he can hot-sim it to feel like a physically able person. Now I just need to dig into the rules for upping the Pilot, Response, Sensor etc. Armor's no problem since it can use normal human gear. I'm also considering moving the sat link and a retrans unit to a smaller drone (or just using a comlink) so the Manservant can add in Pimped Ride (equivalent to 'sculpt). Overall, it'll need plenty of encryption and ECCM to keep the link stable but its a lot easier to lose a drone than a body. Sure, he's not as good as a full tilt rigger doing the same thing and he's not as good as a full cyborg but I think it makes for a really fun concept.
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Human Information Broker, low stats, Edge 6, high data search, minimal hacking skills plus Agent 4 on 2nd commlink, good influence skills, great forgery, and a TON of awesome contacts in every field.
The one I'm working out atm is 45 so he had his eyes and ears replaced. I threw in a cerebral booster to aid his knowledge-craft and a cyber-shotgun in his normal arm for shock value as his only weapon.
A character like this seems like no match for a guard, but there's more than one way to run the shadows. There will be opportunities to shine on every job. Information is power, and so is knowing lots of people who have both.
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Actually an idea I had for an Allergy Neg Qual would probably never get allowed. But here goes . . .
Allergy (uncommon, severe): Orichalcum.
I conceived of this as the character having a biological analogue to the O-stuff in his/her blood. And, it's magenetic. Although I considered that the character was NOT Awakened, they could very well be dual-natured.
The biological orichalcum can't be used as alchemical orichalcum, though - part and parcel.
I may have been watching Stargate SG-1 and Smallville a bit much though ::)
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OK, so only semi-related note. As I was working on my spoiled rich kid playing with his drones I had to wonder at the weapon mount rules. In theory a minidrone (or even a microdrone) can mount two LMG's with 250 rounds of ammo. Now that's obviously a bit much for something that fits in your pocket. Is there a clarification somewhere that I'm missing? Does a holdout with normal ammo on a minidrone sound reasonable?
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There's nothing explicitly in the rules about incompatible flaws, but I have a hard time reconciling a SINner with a day job, and the erased quality.
You tell whatever is doing the erasing to leave the job, and most of the connected SIN alone?
What I'm saying is, you have an official SIN, on the one hand, which is a negative quality, and on the other hand, you have a quality that lets you burn your SIN any time you want. I wouldn't have a problem with it if either 1) The erased quality didn't work on either of the two negative qualities, or 2) The player has to pay off the flaw with karma if he uses Erased to get rid of it.
Erased quality is not a "perfect cleaner" and for example if a good inspector start investigating on a crime scene and find a palm print, he will immediately find "who" was there because they have your biometric data (probably out of reach of eraser) with your sin. If the report "vanish", the good inspector would probably notice that...
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Isn't it the case that most meta-humans are mendanes an by extension also most runners? Wouldn't that make a group of adepts, mages and other crazy characters at the very least unlikely?
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Isn't it the case that most meta-humans are mendanes an by extension also most runners? Wouldn't that make a group of adepts, mages and other crazy characters at the very least unlikely?
The OP included no ware to requirement for mundane, so using the term that way mundanes are really really rare as shadowrunners.
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Isn't it the case that most meta-humans are mendanes an by extension also most runners? Wouldn't that make a group of adepts, mages and other crazy characters at the very least unlikely?
The OP included no ware to requirement for mundane, so using the term that way mundanes are really really rare as shadowrunners.
Ok, fair enough!
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There's nothing explicitly in the rules about incompatible flaws, but I have a hard time reconciling a SINner with a day job, and the erased quality.
You tell whatever is doing the erasing to leave the job, and most of the connected SIN alone?
What I'm saying is, you have an official SIN, on the one hand, which is a negative quality, and on the other hand, you have a quality that lets you burn your SIN any time you want. I wouldn't have a problem with it if either 1) The erased quality didn't work on either of the two negative qualities, or 2) The player has to pay off the flaw with karma if he uses Erased to get rid of it.
As a GM, my stance is, no matter how you get rid of them, getting rid of a negative quality costs the Karma. And, that's supported by the RAW, so my player's can't complain:
If the gamemaster feels that a character has made the necessary changes to shrug off a negative quality, he can allow that character to pay twice the quality's BP cost to remove it.
"Erased" doesn't obviate that requirement. ;D
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Tinkering with mundane characters again. Human+Lucky+75 points=8 Edge. The guy's mostly just OK but when the chips are down he always comes through.
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Tinkering with mundane characters again. Human+Lucky+75 points=8 Edge. The guy's mostly just OK but when the chips are down he always comes through.
Ah, the famous mister Lucky 8)
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Actually seems kinda fun but it sucks up points like being a Mage. He doesn't have much choice but to be a Mundane. Looks like I'm going to head stealth/surveillance with him and a Michael Westin "When you're burned. . ." background.
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Tinkering with mundane characters again. Human+Lucky+75 points=8 Edge. The guy's mostly just OK but when the chips are down he always comes through.
Jeez... Does that even work moderately? He must be very limited.
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My rough sketch has two other attributes at 5, most of the rest at 3, (or a third at 5 if two of them go down to 2), Stealth skill group at 4, Perception at 6, half a dozen other skills and a good five points of gear (mostly in a chameleon suit and a good pair of guns). For following and spying on people or for a surprise attack, he's surprisingly good. I'm still tweaking it to get him some decent Athletics skill, too. And remember, eight times per session he rolls +8 dice with rule of 6. So that's a pretty big deal.
BP breakdown is basically:
Attributes 200
Edge 75
Positive+Negative Qualities 0
Gear 5
Skills 120
He's Hung Out To Dry and has Amnesia so I didn't take Contacts. I'm actually really uncomfortable with that but it'll make an interesting challenge.
He'll never out fight a Street Sam but most investigative bonuses are available in non-implant version. I was honestly expecting to have more points (wouldn't mind some Chemsitry and Armorer) but a 15 dice pool for stealth is nothing to sneeze at and it can always be boosted to 23 when it really matters.
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My GF's weapon specialist started out, and has remained thus far, completely mundane. She's saving up for some bioware mods to boost initiative, but that's about it. Everything else is peripheral (meaning not magic or implants). The character has held her own pretty well. She's had to get creative a few times when fighting heavily modded or magical adversaries, but rockets and grenades go a long way as equalizers.