Shadowrun 4th Edition: Helpful Hints?

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I don't understand hat. In SR; I can have a murder mystery, followed by a smuggle trip overland or over the ocean, followed by some hunt for gouls in the sewers, and then followed by meddling in mafia politics, or corp politics, or politics...

I can't imagine a plot I cannot run in SR.

How do you motivate mercenaries into handling a murder mystery? Would anyone hire them for that? What's the police doing (a general "modern" genre problem - in a pseudo-medieval setting the answer is pretty simple - nothing. They aren't detectives)?
That's my problem.

Maybe I just need to work a little harder. I really would like to sit down and make a Shadowrun campaign that works and stays interesting over a long time. But I'll have to take the time for it, and I am not there yet.

 

[Fenes]

How do you motivate mercenaries into handling a murder mystery? Would anyone hire them for that? What's the police doing (a general "modern" genre problem - in a pseudo-medieval setting the answer is pretty simple - nothing. They aren't detectives)?
That's my problem.

Maybe I just need to work a little harder. I really would like to sit down and make a Shadowrun campaign that works and stays interesting over a long time. But I'll have to take the time for it, and I am not there yet.

Yes, you need work harder. Murder mystery? A SR group can be hired directly for it - like a manhunt, when the father of the victim hires them to track down and kill the killer. Or they are hired to recover some data from a scientist, but since the scientist was murdered, and the data disappeared, the murderer may have it, so they must find it. Or they get hired as bodyguards, and their charge is killed, and the contract had a "revenge" clause. Or a detective in a case is faced with political pressure, and hires/leans on the group to help him out in exchange for some creative file sharing/suppressing. Or the victim was a friend of one of the runners, and he doesn't trust the police. Or the police doesn't care, since it was a SINless. Or the case was closed by the police, and a friend of the runners (or of the Johnson who hires the runners) was framed for it.

I really do not see you problem at all.

 

[DogBackward]

Thanks for the tips, guys. I think I'll be able to keep my players from getting too powerful; they're both pretty mellow about that sort of thing on their own, anyhow. And none of them are going for hackers or astral mages or anything, so that should keep things from bogging down.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Derren]

And none of them are going for hackers or astral mages or anything, so that should keep things from bogging down.

I think in 4E hacking is a bit easier to incorporate into the normal game as now everything is wireless so the hacker can go with the party instead of sitting at home surfing the matrix.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

As an SR 4E specific problem, I believe one big thing to watch out for is stun-based spells, particularly Stunball or whatever it's called (AE stun), which can completely dominate combat fairly easily. There are ways to deal with them, I understand, but they're something to look out for.

 

[MoonRock]

Shadow run can be difficult we played 2nd for about a year. In the end to get the best out of it we limmited the starting cash. So the party started off as normal gangers.

This worked so much better as Cyberware and Bioware was only given to you from start if you had somthing in the back ground all of the most expensive stuff like fly by wire and titaninium Bone shething was out. it ment that when you finaly got something good it felt like it was great (specialy when the physiad actualy means somthing to the party.)

Also GM's house rule no trolls PC's: we found a troll with al the starting cash = Unbalanced Killing machine.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Shadow run can be difficult we played 2nd for about a year. In the end to get the best out of it we limmited the starting cash. So the party started off as normal gangers.

This worked so much better as Cyberware and Bioware was only given to you from start if you had somthing in the back ground all of the most expensive stuff like fly by wire and titaninium Bone shething was out. it ment that when you finaly got something good it felt like it was great (specialy when the physiad actualy means somthing to the party.)

Also GM's house rule no trolls PC's: we found a troll with al the starting cash = Unbalanced Killing machine.

Shadowrun assumes moderate experienced and competent PCs with its standard character creation system. And unfortunately, the advancement in Shadowrun is very slow after that. Trying to improve your core skills, ability scores or getting better cyberware takes a long time.

In D&D, after one or two sessions, you get a level and advance several aspects of your character and find usable loot every time.
In Shadowrun, after one or two sessions, you might be able to improve one of your secondary skills. After 10 sessions, you might be able to afford an upgrade to your existing cyberware, and a mage might be able to initiate or bind a power focus.

If you start off as a low powered character (Ganger or something like that), these effects will be lessened. But then, you can't play in the same league as "real" runners...

 

[Fenes]

The rate of advancement depends heavily on the campaign and GM. The book states some base rates, but the bought missions have at times much bigger payouts.

It is possible though to create characters who are almost maxed in their speciality at character generation.