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From:	Josh a320@*********.com
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 03:38:32 -0000

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-----Original Message-----
From: Josh <a320@*********.com>
To: shadowrun <shadowrun@*********.com>
Date: Thursday, August 17, 2000 6:54 AM
Subject: First Shadowrun game

I'm a long time GM with D&D and Starwars so I know all about running a game. About a
month we picked up the books and finally decided to get a game going. What are some of the
things I should really look for in a game? And any tips for making combat go by quicker,
cause it seems like with all the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night! Well
thanks for any advice ya give.

J

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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><B>-----Original
Message-----</B><BR><B>From:
</B>Josh <<A
href="mailto:a320@*********.com">a320@*********.com</A>><BR><B>To:

</B>shadowrun <<A
href="mailto:shadowrun@*********.com">shadowrun@*********.com</A>><BR><B>Date:

</B>Thursday, August 17, 2000 6:54 AM<BR><B>Subject: </B>First
Shadowrun
game<BR><BR></DIV></FONT>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2>I'm a long time GM with D&D
and Starwars so
I know all about running a game. About a month we picked up the books and
finally decided to get a game going. What are some of the things I should really
look for in a game? And any tips for making combat go by quicker, cause it seems
like with all the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night! Well thanks
for any advice ya give.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000
size=2>J</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>

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From:	Fyre - AKA Colin fyre@******.demon.co.uk
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 09:53:58 +0100

Message no. 2 In article <000f01c007fc$9f6dcc60$09010101@******>, Josh
<a320@*********.com> writes
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Josh <a320@*********.com>
> To: shadowrun <shadowrun@*********.com>
> Date: Thursday, August 17, 2000 6:54 AM
> Subject: First Shadowrun game
>
> I'm a long time GM with D&D and Starwars so I know all about
> running a game. About a month we picked up the books and finally
> decided to get a game going. What are some of the things I should
> really look for in a game? And any tips for making combat go by
> quicker, cause it seems like with all the rolls you can make a
> battle can take up one night! Well thanks for any advice ya give.
>
Heh: Good games don't always involve battle for a start.

Sneak round, use your abilities to get in, but combat only really goes
down when the drek hits the fan...

Or when the GM smiles... Quite often when the GM smiles too. :)

Also: Combat takes a while, but unless the opponents are fed in 1 at a
time I think that the players would be dead _long_ before the end of
that combat... They'd be overwhelmed.

Stuff to look for in a game? Assuming you've got good characters in a
good group: A difficulty-balanced story where big shit happens. I don't
know about you; but I'd rather be at the centre of a big corporate plot
than doing someone's laundry while the rest of the team provide cover.
Try reading some of the shadowrun novels or other source books for
inspiration. For instance: If you want to run a magical campaign, try
reading MITS.
DarkFyre
--
fyre@******.demon.co.uk

From:	Jean-FranÃ§ois Major maje123@*******.com
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 07:44:49 EDT

Message no. 3 >I'm a long time GM with D&D and Starwars so I know all about running a
>game. About a month we picked up the books and finally decided to get a
>game going. What are some of the things I should really look for in a game?
>And any tips for making combat go by quicker, cause it seems like with all
>the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night! Well thanks for any
>advice ya give.

Well, I've been DMing Shadowrun for 2 years, so I may not yet be an expert,
but I know what works with my players.
Use the contacts. A LOT. Somebody talked about this a few weeks ago, and I
tried it, and THIS is what makes interesting adventures: have the runners be
called or meet their contacts for pretty much anything! One of my player
had a Troll Gun Dealer named Gonzo: at one point, he received a call from
his rigger/smuggler to tell him he was at Cascade Ork and that he met
another dealer who had pretty impressive stuff at very low cost: "hey, is
there any gun you really want right now, buddy?". When he got back to town,
he didn't just "dump" the guns at his place and take the money: they met at
a restaurant, talked about other things, then went where the smuggler keeps
his merchandise (carefully buried under a docks bridge) and made the deal.
It might sound a little longer, but it's a lot more fun, and it makes more
"real" games: after all, if you just make business with a level 2 contact
(who's supposed to be a buddy), I'd say he'll crash down to level 1 pretty
quickly.
And I won't even talk to you about Gonzo and the Mafia Boss with who he
plays golf on rooftops. ;-)
Second: think a lot about the details. If a character forgets to act
in an appropriate way, have the consequences crash down on him. In my
previous example, Gonzo received a call from his hitman, and the next
minute, a restaurant's client's face near him exploded under the impact of a
Barret round (I don't know who posted this idea a few weeks ago, but it was
really cool: thank you!). Everybody panicked (as they should have), but
Gonzo got silently up, paid his bill, and calmly walked away, "like he knew
it was gonna happen". Well next thing he knew, he had a little
"conversation" with 2 Lone Star cops that were around. Eventually, he'll
learn to act "the believable way".
Make your adventures so that everybody can do what they're good at:
the decker should deck and haywire security systems, the mage should use his
spells and beat awakened critters, and the mercenary should... blow up a
couple of things? And the car puisuit on the highway: always worked for my
riggers. Also, always bring in a little something that will exploit the
character's weaknesses: so that they understand they depend on each other.
Ew, for the whole "slow combat thing". Well, here's the way I do it:
having your players know well how the combat system works helps a lot. Have
them keep D6s of separate colors exclusively for their pools (I know that
requires a lot of dice, though: we use 20, and sometimes we run out of them:
hopefully, D6s are the most easy to get). When they use their pool dices,
they just put them away, and when the pools refresh, they get them back.
That helps "a lot".
Always stress your players to act quickly: they shouldn't have time
to think much, there's a firefight going on and THEY'RE THE TARGETS. Have
them remember that. Also, I don't go for the whole "that many free actions
and stuff". I let my players do 2 simple actions or 1 complex, and they can
do any reasonable amount of free actiosn (I find especially funny the "speak
ONE word" free action).
Also, I don't keep notes on exactly how many pool dices their
opponents have (having to keep how many dices are left for an opposition of
8 weapon specialist is just... a nightmare). Instead, I usually go "by
heart", and don't put too much combat pool dices (usually 1-2) per attack,
to keep it reasonabel. That really helps speed up things, and the players
don't notice. Also, as the game will come to you more instinctly, you'll
learn to make TNs "on the fly", during combat. Meanwhile, the GM Screen is
a blessing.
I hope that helped.
Jean-F. Major
Major2000@*******.com
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From:	Nimster nimster@*********.net.il
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 16:48:49 +0200

Message no. 4 This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

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Damn man, don't send messages in HTML. Makes it way harder to read/reply etc.

Well, you can
A) Go freeform
B) Go FUDGE/Window System/etc.
c) see that the rules are not *THAT* complicated: roll for initiative, then a player
chooses an action, he rolls combat skill+dice, modified, count successes. Defender rolls
dodge, modified if he likes to, then rolls body+dice vs weapon strength minus armor,
grading of damage is done, and voila.
It only gets complicated once you use grenades, special ammo etc. But like every system,
even rolemaster becomes quick and easy after using it for long.
I'm a long time GM with D&D and Starwars so I know all about running a game. About a
month we picked up the books and finally decided to get a game going. What are some of the
things I should really look for in a game? And any tips for making combat go by quicker,
cause it seems like with all the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night! Well
thanks for any advice ya give.

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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Damn man, don't send messages in HTML.
Makes it way
harder to read/reply etc.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>Well, you can </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>A) Go freeform</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>B) Go FUDGE/Window System/etc.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>c) see that the rules are not *THAT* complicated: roll
for
initiative, then a player chooses an action, he rolls combat skill+dice,
modified, count successes. Defender rolls dodge, modified if he likes to,
then rolls body+dice vs weapon strength minus armor, grading of damage is
done, and voila.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2>It only gets complicated once you use grenades, special
ammo
etc. But like every system, even rolemaster becomes quick and easy after using
it for long.</FONT><FONT face=Arial></DIV>
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style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT:
#000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"></FONT>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000 size=2>I'm a long time GM with
D&D and Starwars
so I know all about running a game. About a month we picked up the books and
finally decided to get a game going. What are some of the things I should
really look for in a game? And any tips for making combat go by quicker, cause
it seems like with all the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night!
Well thanks for any advice ya give.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#000000
size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2></FONT><FONT
size=2></FONT> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>

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From:	Nimster nimster@*********.net.il
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 17:08:53 +0200

Message no. 5 > Always stress your players to act quickly: they shouldn't have time
> to think much, there's a firefight going on and THEY'RE THE TARGETS. Have
> them remember that. Also, I don't go for the whole "that many free
actions
> and stuff". I let my players do 2 simple actions or 1 complex, and they
can
> do any reasonable amount of free actiosn (I find especially funny the
"speak
> ONE word" free action).

That is the ONE rule that is very important (free actions I mean - the one
word per free action is an OPTION, I hate it when people diss that). If you
had smart players, you would've had situations like Okay, there are no free
actions right? well it doesn't sound unreasonable to me that I hide under
cover in my first turn in combat. then every consecutive turn I wth free
action bend out of the cover (for example a corner), take my 2 simple
actions, and hide back in. After all, it's only like moving your head a
little. Would you allow that? Sec guards don't keep grenades so they won't
ruin the corporate compound, and if the sec guard is stupid enough to just
go behind the corner where the shadowrunner is you're playing mindless
killing machines not real sec guards. That's where free actions come to
place. To get out of cover, even a corner, is not a free, but a simple
action, since it constitutes of 2 free actions: Change position, to bend
over, and OBSERVE, since you need to re-look at what's going on. Now a
combat phase where a runner would want to do that will look like:
start of combat
runner takes 2 simple actions while running to the cover. He's now standing
at the cover, but still uncovered - he hasnt taken a free action to change
position to covered. He can only do that in the end of the turn of whoever
acts after him. - If its a guard, the guard gets a shot at him before he is
covered. Then, next turn he takes his free action to change position, and a
free action - which is now the second this turn, therefor a simple action,
to observe, or if he doesn't, he has the blind fire +8 TN modifier, and can
hit his friends. So he now has only 1 free action, which limits him, and
thus balances the 'hiding shootout' a lot better. Then he's still out, again
until the one next to him plays, another free shot at him if it's a guard.
It's still worth it to hide - it eliminates *all* guards shooting you, but
with no system your players gonna be VERY mad when you try to explain to
them why they can't come out of cover, shoot, enter cover in 1 turn. It
sounds reasonable . :)

From:	Gurth gurth@******.nl
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 19:20:39 +0200

Message no. 6 According to Josh, at 3:38 on 17 Aug 00, the word on the street was...

> I'm a long time GM with D&D and Starwars so I know all about running a
> game. About a month we picked up the books and finally decided to get a
> game going. What are some of the things I should really look for in a
> game?

What do you mean by that? I don't understand what you're asking here...

> And any tips for making combat go by quicker, cause it seems like with
> all the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night! Well thanks
> for any advice ya give.

Practice, practice, practice :) Combat can take a fairly long time in the
beginning, and even when you know all the rules it'll still take half an
hour or more to play out a small fight. The tricks would be to keep fights
small and don't use any optional rules (from books other than the main
rules) until you've got the basics down. Using high-powered weapons also
cuts down on the time combat takes, but that may not entirely be the way
to go... ;)

--
Gurth@******.nl - http://www.xs4all.nl/~gurth/index.html
Imagine doing just what the Big Bang did
-> NAGEE Editor * ShadowRN GridSec * Unofficial Shadowrun Guru <-
-> The Plastic Warriors Page: http://plastic.dumpshock.com <-

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Incubated into the First Church of the Sqooshy Ball, 21-05-1998

From:	Phil Smith phil_urbanhell@*******.com
Subject:	First Shadowrun game
Date:	Thu, 17 Aug 2000 19:54:15 GMT

Message no. 7 >From: "Josh" <a320@*********.com>
<snip>
>And any tips for making combat go by quicker, cause it seems like with all
>the rolls you can make a battle can take up one night!

I never roll initiatives in a game; it really slows things down when you
have to roll for all of the NPCs. If I'm organised I may roll the first
three initiatives for each NPC before the game, if not I pick a number that
makes sense, or sometimes I roll dice for the fastest NPC and apply that to
all of them, removeing dice where apropriate.

A CP2020 trick is to have players make ten perception tests before hand and
right down the results, when a perception test is called for just check what
that character rolled and cross off that result, when you have used all ten
for each character just start from the top again.

Don't bother distributing combat pool and stuff for NPCs, just grab a load
of dice that look about right and roll. If you're dealing with a lot of
NPCs just roll a dice and if it looks good they succede in whatever they are
trying to do. The contence of this paragraph should only be used if you are
really trying to make things work fast.

Oh, and do not use the rules from M&M for damage; they make a lot of sense
but they will slow your game down no end.

As for genral tips; make sure that the players know the rules for every
piece of equipment they own and how to work everything they are likely to
do; no "I want to ----. Erm, how does that work?" If they don't know the
rules for something, they can't do it because the GM has enough to worry
about without having to work the PC's side of things as well.

Apart from that all normal GMing rules apply; the GM reserves the right to
disallow anything even if it is in the rules, you're on the PC's side, not
the NPC's, encourage the players to develop a personality for their PCs,
anything that happens outside of the GM screen really happened, no time
travel, fighting between players sounds like fun in the short run but will
result in a pissed off GM very quickly ect.

Phil

Let us assume we have a can opener.
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