[Davidvs]

2) Even very casual users of some very minor drugs risks the eventual progression into Burnout stages

No they don't. Not if they simply not use every now and then. It would take AGES for some Drugs to ever become a problem. If you drink Soykaf ALL the time, you'd be rolling once every 10 weeks. Let's assume Soykaf is Psysiological, so Body+Willpower to resist, that's 6 dice for normal people. 2/3 chance to succeed, so once every 30 weeks you'd fail. So you'd have to be dosing on Soykaf for 2.5 years average in a row without ever taking a break to start hitting Burnout. If you're a runner with decent stats, it's 90%, so 100 weeks per failed test. That's 8 years average of constant Soykaf drinking before Burnout. That's CONSTANT use. Casual users have only very small risk of ever hitting an addiction level, nevermind all.

The fact that with average rolls, someone will hit a coma in 8 years of 1 soykaf per week is outrageous.  There are people who have lived decades, drinking the real world coffee equivalent once or twice per day, and never advanced past mild addiction at worst.  And again, this system does nothing to differentiate between someone who uses Kamikaze once per week, or once per day, or once per hour.

Why is it outrageous about soykaf? Real world coffee is a natural product and soykaf is a man-made substitute. Why is it a stretch that the man-made one would be worse for you? I see it as the companies that make it might add something to it - like cigarette companies adding nicotine. Look at how harmful the sugar substitutes are. I also question your idea of a caffeine junkie compared to what I see all the time.

[FasterN8]

It's a stretch because the "worse" that were talking about is death.  Even cigrettes take longer than 3 years to kill you.  I cant count the number of people i've known who cannot go a couple days without caffeine, let alone the couple weeks it takes to avoid an addiction test.

Applying these rules to their logical end means that the worlds primary morning drink also becomes the #1 cause of death in the 6th world.  Frankly thats ridiculous, so i agree there should be some cap on how bad certain addictions can get.

[DeathStrobe]

Where is this 3 year number coming from?

Soykaf has an addiction rating of 1 at a threshold of 2.

So that means you need to make the Soykaf addiction every 10 weeks.

Assuming you drink every single day that does not increase the threshold but merely keeps it at 2. No overdosing since Soykaf has no actual in game effect, its merely a flavor addiction.

Say we are Joe Average, 3 to all stats, 2.5 children, working for the Generic Mega Corporation Inc. We drink Soykaf every single day.

He has a 1/3 chance to fail his addiction test. So after 30 weeks he fails and steps up to mild addiction. 60 weeks he steps up to moderate addiction. 90 weeks he's at severe and his wife is growing concern that he might be drinking too much soykaf. 120 weeks he's a burn out and his wife is filing for divorce. 150 weeks he has lost a point of will power and the corporation has kicked him out of the enclave for violent mood swings.

Joe is now at a 2/5 chance to pass his addiction test. Lets give him the benefit of a doubt though and assume he can pass twice. So that's 180 weeks and he's now living on the street and loses a point of body. 3/5 chance of failing his test. And on week 200 he moves in with some Neo Anarchists and thinks it was his former employee that ruined his life and loses another point of will power (2 body 1 will). He's at 3/4 chance to fail and on week 210 he's kicked out of the Neo Anarchists  squatter community for stealing.  He's at 8/9 chance to fail. And on week 220 he is comatose in the streets and dies that day do to lack of medical attention.

220 weeks is about 4 years and a handful of months. Well...he should have probably have used edge when it started to become a real problem. Then he could have kept going forever.

I don't know. I don't think its that bad. Most players will be rocking more body and will power then 3 to both. And they have edge to reroll failure. Its sounds pretty difficult for addiction to become a real problem in all honesty.

[Namikaze]

In addition to that, DeathStrobe, Joe Wageslave can't afford the soykaf anymore without a job or anything.  So he'll eventually be forced to withdraw, which could give him the ability to recover.

[Lucean]

Why is it outrageous about soykaf? Real world coffee is a natural product and soykaf is a man-made substitute. Why is it a stretch that the man-made one would be worse for you? I see it as the companies that make it might add something to it - like cigarette companies adding nicotine. Look at how harmful the sugar substitutes are. I also question your idea of a caffeine junkie compared to what I see all the time.

Quoted for truth!
We're not talking about caffeine, as the addiction is labeled as soykaf, which obviously is not the same as the coffee we know today.
So how is it too much of a stretch for people playing a role-playing game based on imagination that something like that could be possible?
With cigarettes it's also not the addiction that can cause bodily harm and death, but the poisoning of the body because of the ingredients.

[Joush]

Why is it outrageous about soykaf? Real world coffee is a natural product and soykaf is a man-made substitute. Why is it a stretch that the man-made one would be worse for you? I see it as the companies that make it might add something to it - like cigarette companies adding nicotine. Look at how harmful the sugar substitutes are. I also question your idea of a caffeine junkie compared to what I see all the time.

Quoted for truth!
We're not talking about caffeine, as the addiction is labeled as soykaf, which obviously is not the same as the coffee we know today.
So how is it too much of a stretch for people playing a role-playing game based on imagination that something like that could be possible?
With cigarettes it's also not the addiction that can cause bodily harm and death, but the poisoning of the body because of the ingredients.

Because it's intended, in game, as the generic substitute for coffee, not something that kills it's users faster then crystal meth.

'Coffee!'™ should not, by the logic of the fictional setting, be potentially lethal. The rules utterly fail to model any drug that simply isn't very harmful.

[Xenon]

Good thing this game have GMs to take over at edge cases where the rules might fail...

If a player want to have a burnout addiction to a coffee then who am I to stop him.
His addiction is so severe that he suffers a -3 dice pool modifier for social tests and if he don't get his fix (many times per day) then he would suffer a negative dice pool modifier of 6 dice. For this he get 25 Karma at chargen.

...but I would not force my players to take addiction tests every 10 weeks just because they had coffee

[Lucean]

Because it's intended, in game, as the generic substitute for coffee, not something that kills it's users faster then crystal meth.

Since the rules disagree with you, maybe you could look it up, if your claim is really true?
Soykaf =/ Coffee

[SlowDeck]

Because it's intended, in game, as the generic substitute for coffee, not something that kills it's users faster then crystal meth.

Since the rules disagree with you, maybe you could look it up, if your claim is really true?
Soykaf =/ Coffee

Seattle 2072, along with a lot of other items, make it clear that soykaf = coffee.

And, actually, coffee, if abused, really can kill you that fast. It's just that it's very hard to abuse it to that level due to the tolerance people build up combined with some of the physical side-effects when you're getting close.

[Medicineman]

For Me Soykaf is cheap coffee made for lower class people and the  standard
real Coffee is nearly the same but made from real coffeebeans(not from Soy) and therefore more expensive
(but now, since Atzlan is on no good Terms with Amazonia, real Coffee will get even more expensive)

with a dance in a coffee plantation
Medicineman

[Joush]

Because it's intended, in game, as the generic substitute for coffee, not something that kills it's users faster then crystal meth.

Since the rules disagree with you, maybe you could look it up, if your claim is really true?
Soykaf =/ Coffee

Seattle 2072, along with a lot of other items, make it clear that soykaf = coffee.

And, actually, coffee, if abused, really can kill you that fast. It's just that it's very hard to abuse it to that level due to the tolerance people build up combined with some of the physical side-effects when you're getting close.

90% of Americans consume more then 20mg of caffeine a day. Moderate use of caffeine as a stimulant is totally safe for adults without complicating factors. You are right that caffeine can be dangerous in large doses, but it's exceptionally difficult to absorb a dangerous amount from tea or coffee (if nothing else, it's a lot to swallow).

There are a lot of drugs like this. 30 grams of alcohol a day, 40mg of caffeine and wash it down with a milligram of nicotine every day and, assuming you avoid smoking, you aren't reducing your life expectancy by an hour.

[Michael Chandra]

Follow up question.

Can you use Edge for the Addiction test ?

That actually came up in a debate, where someone made claims about developer intent and the developer in question came in and gave his personal view on it.

Short summary: It really depends on the GM and the flavor of the game. I personally would suggest "no" myself, but it really depends on your game.

http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=15809.msg280394#msg280394
http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=15809.msg280668#msg280668

Disclaimer: I asked him about his own view on it by PM back then, but without intending to use it in the debate, just personal curiosity. He then decided to post it for all to see.

[DeathStrobe]

You also have to keep in mind that the game system maybe slightly exaggerated for the purpose of being able to be used by PCs.

In order to make Soykaf, alcohol, etc a legitimate threat to a PC, who in fact don't have to take it all the time and thus can game the system to avoid a lot of addiction tests, also have higher than normal attributes and edge to reroll, the addiction tests are almost impossible to fail.

[Tarislar]

http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=15809.msg280394#msg280394
http://forums.shadowruntabletop.com/index.php?topic=15809.msg280668#msg280668

Thanks for the link.  It looks like there is nothing saying it specifically can't be used which is what I was thinking.


So do I have this right,  if you don't use something for 3 weeks before your addiction test comes up then there basically is no addiction test because its a threshold of 0 ?

Which is why some of those 8-9 addiction items are so bad because you have no chance to ever let the threshold get down to 0 ?