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Message no. 1
From: HUTH@***.EDU
Subject: Essence lost and behavior modifications
Date: Tue, 23 Feb 93 23:35:04 CET
I seem to remember a comment somewhere in SR1 that characters who hit 0
essence go loony and should be turned over to the GM (of course, Fasa
confused the issue by offering the Troll Sam in SSC for player use). I
see two ways to read this. First, characters suffer no behavior mods until
they reach 0 essence; Second, they suffer problems before they get to 0
essence that they can no longer control when they hit 0. Personally, I
prefer the second, because I do feel that the installation of cyberware
reduces your basic humanity. This does not have to mean that every Sam
turns into an emotionless freak. On the contrary, I think that those with
extensive cyberware would be somewhat erratic personalities, as they
constantly fight to retain or reclaim the humanity they surgically
removed.

I also seem to remember (I've gotta start remembering to bring my rulebooks)
that it is not possible to regain essence once lost, but if you remove a
piece of cyberware you have an open essence block that can be filled with
other cyberware.

Finally (don't I have something better to do?), a personal comment on all
the social skills: they should not exist except for the etiquette skills
that give you real information (about gang boundaries, for example).
Negotiation, interrogation and the like should be roleplayed. For me, at
least, even though I often play Street Sams, the most priceless game moments
have not come from thrilling battles but from Gm character/player inter-
action (Just a bit ago, Highlander and Co captured a dwarf they needed to
grill, so Highlander pulled a drill out of his pocket, turned it on, then
started fumbling around in his pockets muttering "Oops, guess I left the
Dentistry skillsoft at home. Oh well. <starts prying dwarf mouth open>").
Hilarious from a gamer's point of view, but terrifying from a prisoners point
of view (the dwarf talked, and no roll was necessary). This allows the
players to develop real strong personalities that are missed when they die
(my personal tribute to Xavier--sorry to digress). If the GM wants to say
(oops-scratch last word) have a definite measure of which characters are better
negotiators he can still use the skills, but still make the character roleplay-
don't let anyone without the skill get involved without increasing the
difficulty (they're amateurs and screw things up). Why do I bring all this
up? In response to the post that suggested penalties on social skills for
heavily cybered characters. As already pointed out, sometimes having obvious
mods helps social skills (interrogation), and other times its a hindrance. But
all these problems should be roleplayed. Sorry for the soapbox .1Y speech.

-Spectre <14:52:01/02/23/54>

P.S.: To whomever wondered: No, I am not a free spirit; If you're really
interested I'll poste my family history on Shadowtk, starting with Gramma
Banshee, and ending with my baby nephew Poltergeist. See ya in the Shadows.

-Spectre <14:04:04/02/23/54>

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These messages were posted a long time ago on a mailing list far, far away. The copyright to their contents probably lies with the original authors of the individual messages, but since they were published in an electronic forum that anyone could subscribe to, and the logs were available to subscribers and most likely non-subscribers as well, it's felt that re-publishing them here is a kind of public service.