[CrimsonY]

Hello, my name is Yanick.

I recently joined a group of friends who are already running an active Shadowrun campaign and I'm looking into ways to spare them some time on running me through the basics of just about everything "shadowrun", I'm pretty sure they will love to tell me everything they know about this fascinating world within the game, but I'm also curious about this forum and the resources it has to offer, as I'm new here as well.

So far all I know is... and correct me if I'm wrong. The steam game Shadowrun returns is great fun, I like it so far, about midway through the story dead man switch. Shadowrun is a Cyberpunk meets medieval high fantasy in a near future era where anything can happen, no one cares about you and are ready to do anything to take everything you have include your body parts, this also mean there's quite a few career opportunity for those not too concerned with moral issues.

I've already started browsing the forum for character creation tips and such, but I would greatly appreciate if anyone who's used to the forum and knows a few good pages or article about good guidelines or interesting summary of what to look for at first, as getting starter can become quite a chore when facing several pages of content all seemingly equally important.

I'm thinking links towards pages you found interesting or helpful.

Most important of all: if you take the time to answer me, thank you for your time.

[Senko]

What are you looking for exactly, tips/guidelines on character creation or more general ones about the world?

[Mirikon]

Sorry, couldn't help myself. Anyways, now that you're being inducted into the wonderful world of Shadowrun, here's some things to know:

1. You are not heroes. Put away your ideas of buckling swashes and saving maidens and raiding dragon's lairs. That shit will get you killed. You're a shadowrunner. Sometimes you do the right thing. Sometimes you shoot people in the face for money. Sometimes that's the same thing.
2. Kicking in the door with guns blazing is NEVER Plan A. Shadowrun can get very lethal, very quick. If you are stupid, you're gonna die.
3. Respect the NPCs. Sure, in a D&D world you can mouth off to the king, because at high levels you can, literally, blow up a kingdom. But in Shadowrun, you'll never be more than a cog in the machine.
4. There's no such thing as a fair fight. There's only the person standing at the end. Find any advantage you can (within the rules, natch) and exploit the hell out of it. If you're not cheating, you're not trying.
5. Shoot straight. Conserve Ammo. Always check six. And never, ever cut a deal with a dragon.


Now, looking up the history of the world will take you ages. Your best bets are to find a copy of the Sixth World Almanac from 4th edition (it has a Cliff's notes version of SR world history), and the Shadowrun wiki http://shadowrun.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

As far as the 'feel' of things, here's some viewing material that'll help set the mood: Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Die Hard, Leverage (TV show), Ocean's Eleven, The Sting, Johnny Mnemonic.

[Medicineman]

As far as the 'feel' of things, here's some viewing material that'll help set the mood: Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Die Hard, Leverage (TV show), Ocean's Eleven, The Sting, Johnny Mnemonic.

don't forget Robocop (the old one from Paul Verhoeven and with Peter Weller )
 ,Judge Dredd (rather the New one than the Old One with Sly )
and Demolition Man
(and lots of other Movies)

@ Crimson Y
Welcome to the Forum

HougH!
Medicineman

[Jack_Spade]

About creating a character:

Obviously you should play what you want, but there are a few archetypes (which you find also in the book) you can take as inspiration:

The Face: Someone with good social skills, ready to negotiate, con and in a pinch lead the team. Quite often an elf due to their high base charisma
The Sam: Short for Street Samurai, those are warriors that use cyberware to become faster, stronger and more durable then ordinary humans. The iconic weapon is the Katana, but you don't necessarily need one to become a Sam - an Assault Rifle will do nicely
The Mage: A spell slinger, capable of doing things no one else can: Calling spirits to aid you in and out of battle, chucking fireballs and making you and levitating your team. There are variants depending on what flavor you want: Shamans, Druids, scientific minded mages or even psionics.
The Hacker: Someone who handles the matrix comes in two flavors: So called Deckers, who need sofisticated and expensive hardware to manipulate the matrix and Technomancers who have an innate mystic ability to do likewise. Deckers are generally considered to be better at this game in 5th edition, although Technomancers have unique abilities to call up techno-spirits to aid them in their endeavors.
The Adept: Someone who channels magic into their body to become stronger, faster, more durable or an absolute master in a skill.
The Rigger: Someone who doesn't rely on his body at all but sends his mind into a machine to become one with it - super piloting skills included. Alternatively they direct a network of drones to do the battling for them.

There is a lot of overlap possible in all those roles, so don't be limited by them.
That said: Focused characters tend to do better in there specific rolls than generalists.

About principles of the game and character creation:
Sooner or later there will be conflict. Initiative is a very important stat in this game. Going first generally also means getting more actions. And since this a relatively deadly system the one to shoot first is usually the one to shoot last also.
Incidentally high Ini correlates with a high defense.

High attributes (including special ones like Magic) are recommended for most roles since they are in pretty much every dice pool and they are quite expensive to improve.

And welcome to the Forum 

[gradivus]

For your first character I suggest staying away from matrix archetypes (deckers and technomancers) as the matrix rules are the easiest pitfalls in the game.

And a character that does several things

well is better than a character that is mediocre in a lot of things.

[Mirikon]

To echo what the others said, when I make a character for myself, I try to make sure they are able to fill at least two different roles, a main and a sideline. It might be a Mage who can double as a Face in a pinch, or a Street Samurai who has skills in demolition, or... well, you get the point. Being able to have something to fall back on when your primary role isn't useful (being able to talk nice isn't terribly useful in the middle of a firefight) is a good thing. But it is better to specialize in one or two things than to do five things poorly.

I started with D&D, back in the 3.5 days, so most of my examples of learning new systems involve that. When you first pick up D&D, it is easier to start with a Fighter, rather than jumping straight into playing a Wizard. Spellcasting and spell selection in D&D takes familiarity with the system to really 'get', whereas 'hit them with the hammer' is easy to figure out. Give yourself a break, and start with something that isn't a Rigger or Decker for your first character.

[Raiderjoseph]

Sure, in a D&D world you can mouth off to the king, because at high levels you can, literally, blow up a kingdom. But in Shadowrun, you'll never be more than a cog in the machine.

Dude i played a level 20 wizard once. Can confirm. Pretty damn powerful.(Although they can be killed at the hands of a level 20 rogue or even a bard, if they know their stuff, easily.)Look up Wish. Ive heard many a gm suffer due to creative players and the spell wish. Some ban it entirely. Favorite story thus far(i was in this campaign i can vouch)was a player wished to turn into the Tarrasque in order to fight a an army of orcs(think battle of helms deep level here.). Small problem, he didnt state he was in full control so GUESS HOW OUR PCS DIED?(Ps if you think DnD anythings are overpowered the Tarrasque is what we think is overpowered. If Erza Scarlet was a monster in DnD it would be the Tarrasque.)

[CrimsonY]

Thanks to everyone for their answers, I'll answer everyone separately for clarity, but it's still a lot of text and I'm sorry.

@Senko.   Pretty much anything really, sorry if that made my post vague.
Also if there is a thread for something like: "Compiled resources list" or anything post that tries to join everything for quick access then I'd love to know.


@Mirikon.   Very appropriate, thank you now I feel welcome AND scared. As for your guideline I'll make sure to remember that, now I'm curious to see if you mean actual dragons of legends, which would be awesome, or just a person calling themselves that due to their position of power. Either way I'll say: A good GM always has a way of punishing players who try to stay high on the "avatar strength" feel and in a realist world of any genre and setting, there should always be a consequence to standing out and abusing your strength no matter if you are good or bad or even just opportunist, from a hobo fighting the cold to Superman's own Lex Luther, if there is no opposition you're just a guy brushing his teeth with a toothbrush and up to a laser guided brushinator 3000 doom machine, without conflict storytelling is just not interesting to me and the characters are just sheet of paper being filled with perks.

Thank you for your movie ideas and I've found the first 22 pages on a PDF preview for the sixth world almanac, I'm sure it'll do at least until I start playing, hopefully soon.


@Medecineman   I remember vaguely the old Robocop, the newest judge Dredd was great in it's depiction of a ruined post modern world as well as a good action movie. And oh man! I forgot all about demolition man, quick google search and I read "Hey you wouldn't happen to know how to use the three shells?" and the memories came flooding back, thank you xD.
With all those examples now I can think of a lot of ways my character building could go, I guess I'll leave out the hocus pocus to weirdos at least until I know the system better. ( Not that I have anything against magic users inside such games in general).

[CrimsonY]

@Jack_Spade, @gradivus and @Mirikon.   The archetypes were vaguely discussed in the steam game and your precision clarify them well, thanks Jack.

In the steam game you could really get any skills you wanted but it's just smarter to pick as many skills of one base stats as you can, rather then one of each as it's just easier for example to max INT and then get decking, drones etc... rather then half INT and Charisma and then decking and spirits from each. after I get to know the system more I suppose it won't always be true, given that having a full specialization with all melee or all ranged weapons individually won't do much good, having only two hands and so much inventory space.

As I do not know how the tabletop system works, I can only make assumptions but with your help I have a better idea of what to ask my DM when I'll make a character.

[CrimsonY]

Now here's a little something about my own experience at tabletop RPG (little is an euphemism as this post is a wall of text already.)


Aside from D&D as a kid, what really ignited my passion for tabletop was FFG's recent edition of Star Wars, I have only praises towards it, with very little limitation and only possibilities, the dice system is also a nice change of pace from D20 and offer very malleable results for storytelling, some ppl complain about the price of custom dices, but
')3)' PFFFffffffffff really you can make a table for normal D12, D8 and D6 and if you're that cheap get PDF online or something ( I know money doesn't grow on trees, but still). Enough shameless promotion however, just meant to say it revived and ignited my passion for tabletop so much that I'm here for something new and it's on.
As for character building I learned it's best to stick to this formula, I feel it's similar to what you pointed out:
1) Invest a lot on doing one thing well as you flesh out your character's job or background etc... (I feel it's appropriate for this game as based on what I've read so far, you need a reason to be "hired" in a group of shadow runners and putting: "I'm good at stuff" alone on a blank page and call it your resume will ensure your phone remains silent and your pockets empty.)
2) Make sure you have at least one decent way of handling yourself in combat. (Because combat is inevitable and staying alive seems like a decent goal in life.)
3) The rest of your "exp" or character creation resources can go in whatever else you feel like getting, to round up your character how you want to.


 I'm not bothered when it comes to "choosing last" when someone else wanted or has made exactly what I wanted to do and often enjoy filling roles left out by other players, a good example of this is my first Star Wars character: I really wanted to play a Wookie just for fun and because it was a possible race, but my group didn't have any medic, queue in the amazing system I mentioned earlier and I ended making a Wookie medic... it's not even as bad as it sounds, I invested in INT and medicine with starting exp and since I had good natural strength I ended up filling a role of tank of sort in combat, often keeping attention as more skilled gunners would do the real damage. Never mind that no one trusted a Wookie to tend to their wounds, it's not like they could run away once I had them pined on their back, I wore gloves off course, my hairs were probably cleaner then their insides anyway. Everyone loved that character (mainly because no one else could take hits and/or knew how to use a scalpel), I find it sad he ended up a Sith Lord called Darth Sternum... oh well, such is life!

[CrimsonY]

Sam seems like a simple enough first character and I've always loved the implants and bionics aspect when present in games, I've read somewhere that implants reduce magic potential so I assume they are opposite and that means that adept are the very opposite of Sams, since they both seem to focus on combat training and hard work, but one through technological augmentations and the other through training, mediation and force of will, with chi and all.

If the adept gets the chi, does a sam get any kind of "skills" or implants are their own rewards?

Lastly, if I do a Sam I'd like to have mechanic as a secondary gig, not necessarily drones, but just mechanic and/or Biotech in general, as I assume knowing how implants and augmentation works will save me a lot of junk tech mistake.

Again thank you all for your time and being so welcoming, this forum seems very active and with a very nice community, it's great.

[ProfGast]

So as a caution the tabletop game, while inhabiting the same world as the SR:Returns, Dragonfall and Hong Kong, has significantly different mechanics.  For example, while Adepts, Mages and Shamans are all different in the computer game, they're more unified in the tabletop game.  They're all "magic" classes.  Indeed, Mages and Shamans are the same thing, just different traditions.  Chi is certainly a concept, but the main Special Attribute for any of those classes is Magic.

In any case you're right that Physical Adepts and Samurai have much the same powers, and indeed can have identical abilities but with different sources.  However, each is more "efficient" at getting things done one way than the other. 

Generally speaking a cybered Street Samurai will focus on increasing physical attributes and durability.  He has access to all sorts of installed electronics that the metahuman body could never duplicate.

Conversely, the Physical Adept specializes more in honed skills and intangibles.  Where a Street Samurai can very easily build himself to take a short burst of Assault Rifle Fire to the chest with minimal ill effects, the Adept will specialize in never ever being hit.  Where the street samurai can demonstrate the advantages given by chrome, and bio-engineered flesh, the Adept demonstrates the heights at which the metahuman body performs at, running across the surface of water, up walls, or walking across fresh drifted snow without leaving a trace.

[CrimsonY]

@ProfGast. Thank you, this is very nice to know more in-depth definition of the archetypes as they don't appear so obvious at first glance.

And so I see this world is full on science vs magic vs virtual reality apparently, more than the surface (or steam games let on at first).

With my background at with the star wars universe, I was wondering why anyone would bring a sword to a gunfight, while a light-saber has an obvious explanation, I thought there was just no logical reason to use an ordinary sword in this world, given that in the game you just end up getting a full auto unload to the face and silencers exist for stealth missions, or just a plain knife and rifle combo.

I'll read/talk more about it when I next meet my group for sure, as I'm starting to like where this is going.

[Mirikon]

Sure, in a D&D world you can mouth off to the king, because at high levels you can, literally, blow up a kingdom. But in Shadowrun, you'll never be more than a cog in the machine.

Dude i played a level 20 wizard once. Can confirm. Pretty damn powerful.(Although they can be killed at the hands of a level 20 rogue or even a bard, if they know their stuff, easily.)Look up Wish. Ive heard many a gm suffer due to creative players and the spell wish. Some ban it entirely. Favorite story thus far(i was in this campaign i can vouch)was a player wished to turn into the Tarrasque in order to fight a an army of orcs(think battle of helms deep level here.). Small problem, he didnt state he was in full control so GUESS HOW OUR PCS DIED?(Ps if you think DnD anythings are overpowered the Tarrasque is what we think is overpowered. If Erza Scarlet was a monster in DnD it would be the Tarrasque.)

Remind me to tell you about the time I was in an epic campaign where we were going up against some bloody idiot who thought it was a good idea to start a Tarrasque factory. Plane-hopping into a modern world where we 'acquired' some assault rifles with depleted uranium bullets, tossing a Tarrasque with a couple templates into a pocket dimension so we could deal with it when we found a scroll of Wish, and fighting several groups of Half-Tarrasques... Good times.

As for Wish, woe be to the players who think they can get cute with that spell. For every such player, there is a GM who has perfected the art of Wish-twisting. Sure, you get what you wished for. But didn't anyone ever tell you to be careful what you wish for?

With my background at with the star wars universe, I was wondering why anyone would bring a sword to a gunfight, while a light-saber has an obvious explanation, I thought there was just no logical reason to use an ordinary sword in this world, given that in the game you just end up getting a full auto unload to the face and silencers exist for stealth missions, or just a plain knife and rifle combo.

Actually, there are plenty of reasons to bring a sword to a gunfight. All depends on how you use them. A sword never runs out of ammo, and is quiet. And while I wouldn't want to cross the width of a football field to get into range of someone with a gun, understand that a great deal of the fighting in Shadowrun is in fairly close quarters, which enforces some parity. I could go on, but suffice to say that for any combat-focused character, it pays to have both melee and ranged options available.