Shadowrun d20???

[Krieg]

I had the same basic discussion with another fan of a very bad, non-d20 game. For them, it was a perceived loss of control of property to Wizards, their thorn in their side. Another point is that the rabid Fans said that they will totally abandon said company, even though the potential in money making was far greater. Then there is the head of said company: who is paranoid and egomaniacal in the extreme and is so attached to one of his beloved game worlds that he is deluded into thinking that all of his fans are Green-Eyed Monsters.

Be nice to Kevin, it's not his fault. Just ask him!

 

[Ranger REG]

Technically. However, the "Offense" and "Defense" Options have set BAB and save progressions (depending on which save "tree" a player takes). In this respect the options mimic classes.

Perhaps, but at least they're by choice of features rather than choice of classes.

Shadowrun, being totally skill-based has no attack or save progressions.

Then you should try BESM d20, which have combat skills both offense and defense (it also have BAB and Save progressions but you could always eliminate them); or MnM where you "buy" your progressions with power points earned as XP (no standard XP, but single-digit PP reward).

You don't know what you're missing. Besides, reports of CoC being a character shredder are vastly exaggerated (especially CoC d20).

You may be right. Then again, if I know I'll be dead tomorrow, I probably won't have any regret not playing it.

 

[Achan hiArusa]

Fixed HPs

Just set "hit points" = Con and they never go up (let them buy toughness once or twice). It has worked for GURPs and BRP. I am working on a WoD conversion (for my players) and use a point buy for ability scores allowing me to assess wound penalties once they get below 8 hp.

For d20 CoC I used that rule and it cured players of charging into combat everytime. They had to think and be creative in defeating a monster (if they survived their SAN checks of course). In fact, I just simply ported the BRP rules over for HP and healing, and kept everything else the same (except I used story awards exclusively for awarding xps. I used the WoD system and gave out 100 xp times level for each of the WoD awards).

 

[Sir Elton]

Be nice to Kevin, it's not his fault. Just ask him!

I tried. He won't listen to me.

 

[Seraphimpunk]

homebrew shadowrun d20

Well, for magic, i was tossing around these ideas.

• Drain: will save for half damage ( DC 10 + spell level + circumstance modfiers from drain formula). Successful save = half damage. Any points over reduce the damage more. ex will save dc 15 vs 12 points of damage, character gets an 18 total. half damage from 12 = 6. 18-15 =3. reducing the total subdual damage of the spell to 3.
• Force: have spells that have a variable 1-6 level. not hard, d20 modern caps spells at 5th level, and has cantrips. you learn a spell at X level and can cast it at any level less than the one you learned it at.
• Drain Formulas: Most spells have a formula that converts right from SR3. ex Armor has +2(M) in SR3, tha would mean DC 12 + spell level to resist drain. Moderate would be like 2d6.
• No separate Magic Attribute: 3 base classes for magically active characters. Adept, Shaman and Hermetic. Your level in the class indicates you magical power. its a 6 level advanced class which can be taken at 1st level. The prerequisite is just an Awakened/Magically Active feat. If you try and cast a 4th level spell as a 3rd level Shaman, you'll suffer +1d6 to drain and it'll be hit point damage instead of nonlethal damage.

And for cyberware:

• Feats: windfall feat gives +4 bonus to wealth, i suggest a cybered feat which gives a +6 bonus just on rolls to buy cybernetics.
• Cost: Shadowrun cyber has costs listed, and d20 modern has item puchars cost conversion table thingie on pg 204. Just figure the cost and convert.
• Saves: Fortitude saves when getting cyberware. Fail your save and your dark essence / negative essence / bad karma starts to accrue point by point. Each point of the negative essence gives the character a negative caster level. And the negative essance goes from 0-6. Characters with cyber can take a feat to reduce their negative essence, but the prerequisite is having a piece of cyber removed, or replaced with alphaware/betaware or deltaware.
• Effect: most effects can be figured by +1 or +2's. like bone lacing giving a bonus to natural armor and letting characters do lethal damage with unarmed attacks ( stil would need a feat to not provoke an AoOp). Dermal plating +1 natural armor / rating. wired reflexes a bonus of +2 to dex/ rating, boosted just gives a bonus to initiative, etc.

Matrix:
Don't convert it. use a Background feat from the Adventure or Aberrant stuff, and give characters Contacts that are deckers or hire deckers. people are right, its too tough to game with deckers. It splits the party up and makes you run 2 games at once. Even with a Ghost in the Shell where the decker goes into the enemy system at the same time as the group, its tough because of the distorted time of the Matrix.

Races:
I wouldn't just use the D&D races, the skill modifiers for them aren't congruous with shadowrun, and there's no precident for skill bonuses to SR races. I'd definitely give humans a bonus feat and skill points, and not metahumans.
Dwarves & Orks i'd make +1 ECL, Elves and Trolls +2 ECL.
I'd also have it so starting level is 6th level, so you have characters that actually can go on tough runs, can play cybered runners well with cool equip, or a full mage, or any combination thereof.
Troll mages would start the game with a max of 4 levels in a magic class, but thats fine, its still got room for improvement, they also start off with fewer skill points and a lower wealth bonus. Which i think fits in pretty well with shadowrun's Priority system.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

I know my old shadowrun GM would hate the idea but I like it (we quit his game and kicked him out of the D&D game anyway cause he's a jerk).

For racial mods I'd do this:

Elves +4 dexterity, +4 charisma, lowlight vision, 40ft speed, +1 ECL
Humans: As D&D
Orks: +6 con, +4 str, lowlight vision, -2 int, -2 cha, +1 ECL
Dwarves: Small size, 20ft speed, +2 con, +4 str, +2 wis, dark vision 60ft, +1 ECL
Trolls: Large size, +10 con, +8 str, -4 int, -4 cha, -2 dex, +1 natural armor, dark vision 60ft, +2 ECL

I don't know about a fort save to negate essence loss, if any save it should be will, but there proably shouldn't be a save at all. Otherwise you'll have high level mages all cybered out.

 

[Pax]

Well, i was just talking about nothing really special, just the core rules (he was just a human) with some additional equipment. Specialized in a single gun, and some bioware, the guy wasn't even using any cyberware. You might want to call it powergaming, but something to that extreme isn't really possible with the core rules, a starting character with one shot one kill i mean.

Oh, no?

Maxxed-out Pistols skill, specialised in an Ares Viper Slivergun. Smartlinked, of course, and with both thermo & lo-light vision, as well as flare comps, in the eyes. Crank the combat pool as far as it'll go - about 8 dice, done "right" - and dropit all alongside yur 8-die skill wiht the gun. Burst fire mode.

Damage code on the Viper starts out 9S, burst fire brings it to 12D. Sixteen dice, at close range, with a TN of 2? Should be 13 or 14 successes - to not be dropped on the first shot, you'd have to get 14 or 16 successes between dodging and soak, unless you're wearing better than street-weight armor. Let's call it 13 successes for now.

And that's one simple action; the follow-on shot may only have 8 dice behind it, but with another 12D hit coming your way ...

Let's say you're a typical "brick"-type street-sammie - ork or troll, lots of bodmods to boost your ability to soak damage. Say a soak of 12 dice (quite nicely jacked up, that), plus your own near-top-of-the-line 8-die combat pool. Assume the typical Secure Long coat for armor, at 4/1 or thereabouts; your target for dodging or resisting the damage is (12-4=) 8. So you have to roll a 6, then reroll a 2 or better, to get a success on defense.

With 20 dice, you should get three-and-a-third sixes, of which, about 2.75 successes will be generated. Let's say you pull off 3 successes. Now you blow karma to reroll failures; 17 more dice, should get - let's call it another three successes. A slightly lucky roll for you, but not extraordinarily so.

Guess what, that's six successes, to my thirteen; I have you by seven, and stage up three times.

Not that it matters, unless you're using the optional "more than deadly" rules. You drop like a sackof potatoes, several dozen fine tungsten slivers having turned some vital part or other (probably your brain, with that kind of hit) into orkburger.

Conversely, let's assume you get an astounding sixteen net successes, still blowing karma. That's an obscenely lucky roll, as any SR veteran will ralise given the numbers I'm throwing around here. So, your sixteen to my thirteen is three successes in yoru favor; that stages me down a notch, so the damage is only (S)erious, not (D)eadly.

Which is where the second shot comes in. Yes, I've only 8 dice, and fired a burst this round, so my TN is now 5; no biggie. one-third of those dice should come up successes ... 2 or 3. I'll call it 2.

You only have those 12 BODY dice to soak with this time, same TN of 8; even if you get FOUR successes (very much against the odds, unless you have more Karma Pool to blow on another reroll), that's still only two successes in your favor ... staging down to a (S)erious wound again.

(S)erious + (S)erious = (D)eadly and two boxes of overflow. Sack of potatoes, take two.

And that's a starting character, with only 90K nuyen towards gear and cyberwear - not a million-nuyen "WarBorg". With a basically off-the-shelf gun, no less.

^_^ Oh, the Viper was my favorite SR gun - can't you tell? ^_^ Granted, using it was a bit of a gamble, 'cause with enough armor, they could just bounce Slivergun shots like they were mosquitos - but then, in a supplement (the Lonestar book, in fact) ... out came the Ruger Thunderbolt. ^_^ Bingo, instant secondary gun, hehehe.

As for a Shadowrun d20 fan-conversion, I'd very much like to see something like that done. Once I get d20 Future, I'll have to lookover my surviving SR books, and see what I can come up with. ^_^

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Well, the real powergamer in Shadowrun just needs a Shotgun with burst fire capability.
If the enemey doesn`t use hardened armor, he is dead, regardless of his armor. Burst with full choke. The damage might only be 2T effectively, but the target number to hit is also only 2. So, statistically, you need 6 more success then I do to negate the damage. And I can shot a second burst. And if there are multiple targets within the area ... as one in my group uses to say: "dead as a dodo"
Out of my group used to visit Cons (here in Germany), and when someone was setting up a Shadowrun game, they sometimes (maybe always) used this combo, especially if they saw there were some "wanna-be" powergamers around who didn`t use shotguns (and thus proved their luck of intellect and graps of the Shadowrun Rules)

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[DelayedReactionMan]

I don't think a D20 Shadowrun system would work, simply because low level characters deserve to be able to kill people in one shot. SR is far more "realistic" than D20 is, and part of that realism is that bullets kill people. Throughout history offensive power has outleaped defensive power, and it's no different in SR. Levels, hit points, and D20-type skill checks really don't fit into the nitty-gritty atmosphere that Shadowrun is pushing.

Am I suggesting it would be doomed to failure? No, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who would be interested. But as a personal fan of SR, I can't really say I'd like it as a D20 conversion, and I think a lot of people agree with me.