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Message no. 1
From: Joshua T Brown <spamquat@****.COM>
Subject: Re: Runner's Attitudes (content - not flame)
Date: Tue, 1 Jul 1997 00:24:10 -0500
On Mon, 30 Jun 1997 22:06:06 -0500 TopCat <topcat@***.NET> writes:
>Okay... let's find that point and stretch it out a bit :)

Happy to oblige. I always enjoy discussing this kind of thing with
someone else bright enough to not take everything personally and let it
degenerate into a complete flamefest.... Don't let me down... Yer not
done yet, the argument (er... discussion) is just getting good.

>I've already gone through my reasons why I feel it is very much worth
>it to a megacorp to track down runners who hit them, so check back on
those
>previous postings for the particulars...

> What I propose requires such minimal effort & resources as to be almost
nothing to > a megacorp.

Don't forget, Even the Megas are comprised of individuals... MANY
individuals whose personal carelessness could be exploited. Persons of
responsibility who have flaws which might require selective
miscommunication to avoid their own faults being exposed. For example,
the mid-level exec who has a taste for joyboys, and is careless enough to
reveal something which the enterprising youth steals/remembers/videotapes
for sale to Joe Shadowrunner. Even if the exec finds out about his
mistake, he may not tell anyone for fear that his own stupidity or even
his exotic sexual habits may come to light. The potential for
miscommunication, coverups, etc, is mind-boggling and could explain how a
team gets in... totally discounting the "inside job" concept. Corps do
NOT think as a singular entity, as they have far too many individuals who
could screw up communication, and also see politics, below... (With the
notable possible exception of the Lofwyr-controlled S-K.... Ya mess with
Saeder-Krupp in my game, the most ya can hope for is an interesting death
scene and a nice funeral... see "Threats" for why)

Though you have identified your strength in debate by selectively
addressing only the points made which you can easily defeat with
semantics, and I do respect that.... (a man after my own heart <smirk>)
There *are* still valid arguments, the best of which have been left
unaddressed.

1) Politics - The matter of inside "scapegoats". Most corps, even the
leanest, meanest megas are riddled with the All-too-(meta)human weakness
of company politics. You seem to have completely failed to take this into
account. Behind the scenes, there is someone (We'll call him Bob) who
has access to the godlike technology, which for the sake of argument
we'll assume exists, to track and kill the runners. (Who are likely
SINless, and don't exist in most databases, likely were bright enough to
not reveal their faces, leave fingerprints, shell casings, material links
(Damn, I'm shedding again), etc, etc....)
Bob, due to human error, erroneous timing, an exploited flaw in
technology or planning, or just plain real bad luck, is in trouble. Some
runner jerks just busted in, and stole the new whatchamajigger. Yeah,
that's right, the blue one. <smirk>
If he releases the "hounds", then the corporate sharks who want his job,
or just don't want HIM to have it, might smell blood, and he might spend
his own energy finding someone else to blame further down the food chain,
to cover his own butt. Or, Alternatively, maybe the sharks DO smell
blood, and use their own resources to make Bob impotent until it is too
late, and the runners have gotten away with it, and Bob just sort of
vanishes when the bosses find out. There are 101 other company politics
reasons, conspiracies and other stuff which is beyond the runners
control, which to me, adds to both the paranoia and the overall
intelligence level of the game, taking it beyond "BLAM!" "Plugged me
another Shadowrunner," style games, to a complex web of intrigue,
doublecrosses and unlikely temporary allies which seems to better sum up
the overall flavor of the game as we know it.

2) "The way the game was designed to be played" -- Now THAT's egotism. In
many FASA-published modules (best examples are the ones with the Aztech
Assassin from Mercurial, his name slips the mind) Inter-corporate games,
good luck, or even less potentially compelling reasons allow the runners
to break in, get out, and even *gasp* get away from the Big Boys and
their hired guns, and it is often explained by politics.
If you're citing game design as the correct way for the Corps to be run,
you're as far off the mark as someone who makes the megas too easy.
FASA's made a point that though it may be as hard as fraggin' hell to
prove it, NO ONE is untouchable, mainly because the runner groups have no
Corp bosses to placate, no Corporate Court to worry about, less media
attention, a smaller consumer base to hide dirty deeds from, less large
scale competition, and fewer people to hide if things go wrong.
>
>Now here's where you missed... I specifically stated that swearing is
>the last resort of the person who has no way to express himself. <smirk>

Point taken, I stand corrected.
Hopefully, I'll not miss again. <smirk>

==============================================================
The Kumquat -- Josh Brown -- Kumquat@*****.com -- Spamquat@****.com --
Shadowrun Page Still Under Development -- Coming Soon!
"Support Whirled Peas" -- <smirk> -- "Whatever, Man" --
"Woo Hoo!" --
....Don't hate me Because I'm... ahh, screw it, hate me. <smirk>
Message no. 2
From: Joshua T Brown <spamquat@****.COM>
Subject: Re: Runner's Attitudes (content - not flame)
Date: Wed, 2 Jul 1997 23:02:16 -0500
Just curious....
The message with this topic was my posting on corporate Politics and the
like....
Did it make it to the list?
If so, TopCat.... are you planning a response? Can't think of one? Too
busy to form a retort? Merely ignoring it?
If no one saw it, I'll repost.

Thanx in Advance.
==============================================================
The Kumquat -- Josh Brown -- Kumquat@*****.com -- Spamquat@****.com --
Shadowrun Page Still Under Development -- Coming Soon!
"Support Whirled Peas" -- <smirk> -- "Whatever, Man" --
"Woo Hoo!" --
....Don't hate me Because I'm... ahh, screw it, hate me. <smirk>
Message no. 3
From: TopCat <topcat@***.NET>
Subject: Re: Runner's Attitudes (content - not flame)
Date: Thu, 3 Jul 1997 15:37:19 -0500
Sorry that it took me a while to respond. The slight subject change line
placed this message at the bottom of the thread so I hadn't gotten to it
until today.

At 12:24 AM 7/1/97 -0500, Joshua wrote:
>On Mon, 30 Jun 1997 22:06:06 -0500 TopCat <topcat@***.NET> writes:
>>Okay... let's find that point and stretch it out a bit :)

>Happy to oblige. I always enjoy discussing this kind of thing with
>someone else bright enough to not take everything personally and let it
>degenerate into a complete flamefest.... Don't let me down... Yer not
>done yet, the argument (er... discussion) is just getting good.

I have no desire to get into a flamefest, because I enjoy taking apart
rampant flamers too much to do so ;)

>Don't forget, Even the Megas are comprised of individuals... MANY
>individuals whose personal carelessness could be exploited. Persons of
>responsibility who have flaws which might require selective
>miscommunication to avoid their own faults being exposed. For example,
>the mid-level exec who has a taste for joyboys, and is careless enough to
>reveal something which the enterprising youth steals/remembers/videotapes
>for sale to Joe Shadowrunner. Even if the exec finds out about his
>mistake, he may not tell anyone for fear that his own stupidity or even
>his exotic sexual habits may come to light. The potential for
>miscommunication, coverups, etc, is mind-boggling and could explain how a
>team gets in... totally discounting the "inside job" concept. Corps do
>NOT think as a singular entity, as they have far too many individuals who
>could screw up communication, and also see politics, below... (With the
>notable possible exception of the Lofwyr-controlled S-K.... Ya mess with
>Saeder-Krupp in my game, the most ya can hope for is an interesting death
>scene and a nice funeral... see "Threats" for why)

I do not feel that corps think as a singular entity, nor do I feel that
given members of said corp are totally without fault. The sort of executive
who would want something hidden and had any degree of power worth exploiting
would also be the sort of executive who'd want everyone dead who knew about
the evidence. How's he go about it? Shadowrunners, of course. Get the
blackmail evidence back and everything's fine from there on out. The corp
had nothing to do with this, just one executive with a desire, some nuyen,
and some connections.

Also, if the runners decide to ever use their trumpcard, then they're in
trouble. The exec no longer has anything to worry about (the worst has
already happened) and he'll be of a frame of mind that is just south of
stable. What happens from that point on is anyone's guess.

I agree with the degree of security with S-K and would also use Aztechnology
similarly. They're degree of security and tolerance exceeds even those of
other megacorps.

In today's corporate world, if you become a problem, you're gone (management
only, union labor doesn't have to work to get paid here). They simply can't
afford to have incompetence at high levels. Now, this doesn't mean that it
doesn't exist. It means that if you want to keep your job, maybe you decide
not to express your raging anti-meta views. If someone does find out that
you don't like metas, then everyone that knows you, including the metas in
your employ, can come up and say "he's always seemed rather accepting of
them to me" and the situation is dismissed as hateful rumormongering.

Anyone in corporate management has been dealing with backstabbing and
positioning and the art of the deal longer than any shadowrunner could
possibly imagine. Politicking becomes second-nature (first?) after a while
or you find yourself out of the fold and locked into a dead-end nothing
position. They'll know best how to play one person off the other and work
through blinds in the corporate or shadow realms to achieve their desired
end. Example...

You know that one group of runners has been hitting you repeatedly. You
know they're good, because they've gotten away with it so far (not against a
mega they wouldn't, but that's another post...). So you work through a
couple blinds and hire that group to run on you again, something similar to
what they've done before. When they do, you spring a trap and they die the
death that all runners risk. Nobody's the wiser as to how it really went
down, your security appears improved, and everyone's happy.

>Though you have identified your strength in debate by selectively
>addressing only the points made which you can easily defeat with
>semantics, and I do respect that.... (a man after my own heart <smirk>)

Why thank you :) His whole arhgument could be dealt with in such a manner
and I've brought out a good amount of evidence which helped me do so, but
semantics and wit kill a point whereas evidence is always ignored by the
opposition.

>There *are* still valid arguments, the best of which have been left
>unaddressed.

Here we go...

>1) Politics - The matter of inside "scapegoats". Most corps, even the
>leanest, meanest megas are riddled with the All-too-(meta)human weakness
>of company politics. You seem to have completely failed to take this into
>account. Behind the scenes, there is someone (We'll call him Bob) who
>has access to the godlike technology, which for the sake of argument
>we'll assume exists, to track and kill the runners. (Who are likely
>SINless, and don't exist in most databases, likely were bright enough to
>not reveal their faces, leave fingerprints, shell casings, material links
>(Damn, I'm shedding again), etc, etc....)

Don't need tech, need contacts. The streets have their own politics and
they dance to the nuyen macarena. My tech alone would keep them from
getting in, doing the job, and getting out, but as your example continues, I
see that I forgot to plug it in and put the guard's work schedule out for
them... fair enough, on with the next part...

>Bob, due to human error, erroneous timing, an exploited flaw in
>technology or planning, or just plain real bad luck, is in trouble. Some
>runner jerks just busted in, and stole the new whatchamajigger. Yeah,
>that's right, the blue one. <smirk>

And I liked the blue one...

>If he releases the "hounds", then the corporate sharks who want his job,
>or just don't want HIM to have it, might smell blood, and he might spend
>his own energy finding someone else to blame further down the food chain,
>to cover his own butt.

Ahh, the infamous CYA memo. Any corper without the capacity to shift blame
quickly if not imediately deserves an ignoble demise, especially someone in
management (I'd wonder how he got there without that particualr skill) ;)

> Or, Alternatively, maybe the sharks DO smell
>blood, and use their own resources to make Bob impotent until it is too
>late, and the runners have gotten away with it, and Bob just sort of
>vanishes when the bosses find out.

If Bob sits around and takes it, then he'll get eaten alive by the political
sharks. If Bob gets starts things in motion immediately to get the
situation resolved, people and resources can be swept up and on the move
before anyone knows that it was Bob who screwed up. After all, the guy
seemed in charge when he went up to the VP for an emergency conference
following the situation. Now there's a corp-wide hush order on that
break-in. A couple weeks later, some runnres turn up dead on the beach.

> There are 101 other company politics
>reasons, conspiracies and other stuff which is beyond the runners
>control, which to me, adds to both the paranoia and the overall
>intelligence level of the game, taking it beyond "BLAM!" "Plugged me
>another Shadowrunner," style games, to a complex web of intrigue,
>doublecrosses and unlikely temporary allies which seems to better sum up
>the overall flavor of the game as we know it.

Agreed and wholeheartedly so, but remember that the corporate/political
world mastered the doublecross millenia ago. Pitting this degree of skill
against a runner-team would result in some bad days and sleeples nights for
said team.

Allies are often interesting to me. While Paul accuses me of using one big
happy corporate world, I do not. Corps compete with each other for market
share, it's what they do. Often, however, they do work together. If one
corp wants something that another corp has they rarely will attempt to steal
it, but will try to lease the technologies or purchase rights to use them
indefinitely. One corp gets cash for something they've already developed
and they can point out that even their competitors use their products. The
other corp gets a technology much cheaper than if they'd taken the time to
develop it themselves. Happens nearly every day.

If that situation involves identical research, then it becomes interesting
as the corps really can't be allies for this (too much market share at
stake). What happens then? You try to hire the best and brightest for your
project while they try to hire the best and brightest for theirs. While the
projects are ongoing you attempt to figure out (through industrial
espionage, which could be much simpler and cheaper than shadowrunners...why
hire runners when you've got moles who work there?) how far your opposition
is in his project compared to you. When you come to a situation where your
moles and informers can't get the info you want and the need to know what
they have exceeds a certain level, then you hire runners.

If you hire runners to steal a tech that's already out there and then modify
it a bit and put it out as your own, you end up facing the Corporate Court
with a difficult situation to explain. Hence, research and personnel will
be the focus of most, if not all, runs.

>2) "The way the game was designed to be played" -- Now THAT's egotism. In
>many FASA-published modules (best examples are the ones with the Aztech
>Assassin from Mercurial, his name slips the mind) Inter-corporate games,
>good luck, or even less potentially compelling reasons allow the runners
>to break in, get out, and even *gasp* get away from the Big Boys and
>their hired guns, and it is often explained by politics.

As I've mentioned before, I consider the published modules just that side of
useless. I've never used them and I doubt that I ever will. Failure in one
of those can only come from truly pitiful die-rolling as every opportunity
is there for the runners to get the job done and get out alive, well, rich,
and karma-laden. There is no challenge there, no thinking. If you bumble,
there's another opportunity. If you can't decide what to do, someone tells you.

Recently, with their multi-module books, I've been more impressed. Why?
They can't lay out a huge safety net for the runners in the span of a
ten-page storyline with pictures.

>If you're citing game design as the correct way for the Corps to be run,
>you're as far off the mark as someone who makes the megas too easy.

Am I? The game itself sets the megacorps up as small market-driven nations.
No, they aren't as big as the UCAS or Japan, but they are huge in resources
and minimal in social unrest. You don't see the mailroom rebelling against
accounting and throwing rocks at them from down the hall. Anyway, these
megacorps essentially rule any consumer-based society (which includes most
of the world). They tell consumers what to buy and who to buy it from.
Such power as this cannot be discounted. Imagine Microsoft as it is now.
They all but rule the OS market and are a multi-billion dollar company.
They'd just be one division of a megacorp. Microsoft, whether some people
like it or not, can create unofficial standards just by putting the word
"Microsoft" on any given product. Megacorps can do that with products
ranging from computer hardware to industrial tools to medical and military
equipment to toys and every product in between (yes, every). They also
provide the nuyen which make the shadows worth living in for an
infinitessimal percentage of the population.

So they are the towering gods of society in 205X. They have connections
ranging frm the lowest street scum to the highest political offices in
nations such as the UCAS. They have their big corporate thumbs in every pie
around, whether that pie belongs to the CAS military or Joe Shadowrunner.
They like it that way and nobody has the strength to change it.

>FASA's made a point that though it may be as hard as fraggin' hell to
>prove it, NO ONE is untouchable, mainly because the runner groups have no
>Corp bosses to placate, no Corporate Court to worry about, less media
>attention, a smaller consumer base to hide dirty deeds from, less large
>scale competition, and fewer people to hide if things go wrong.

Ah, but they do have corp bosses to placate otherwise they wouldn't have
anyone to hire them for runs. Unless they work for someone else, in which
case they have to keep them happy. Or if they work on someone's turf, they
have to keep them happy. Also have to keep all the shadowpeople that know
you happy or you could be sold out. All it takes is one disgruntled
runner-wannabe and your cover could be blown bigtime.
--
Bob Ooton
topcat@***.net
Message no. 4
From: David Buehrer <dbuehrer@****.ORG>
Subject: Re: Runner's Attitudes (content - not flame)
Date: Thu, 3 Jul 1997 14:49:55 -0600
Bob, I gotta ask. What is the point as to whether or not a corp will
geek a runner that succesfully... runs against said corp?

-David
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/1068/homepage.htm
--
Yoink! - The sound of a crescent roll being stolen.
Message no. 5
From: TopCat <topcat@***.NET>
Subject: Re: Runner's Attitudes (content - not flame)
Date: Thu, 3 Jul 1997 17:08:58 -0500
At 02:49 PM 7/3/97 -0600, David wrote:
>Bob, I gotta ask. What is the point as to whether or not a corp will
>geek a runner that succesfully... runs against said corp?

Good question and I have to say that it comes down to realism for me.
Gaming without any degree of realism with regard to the game setting bothers me.

First off, one of my major points is that they couldn't get through
megacorporate security without an obscene degree of complicaitons. Not only
do they have to get through it once, they've got to do a job once they're
in, and then they've got to get out.

During said time, they *will* be seen and security will be alerted, no
matter if they're gutterpunk street scum or ex-military types or
ex-corporate types, they will be noticed. No amount of stealth successes,
planning, or wearing of black, will get you through a building peppered with
cameras and loaded with security only megacorps can think of and afford.

Now, through some miracle (and this would require no small amount of divine
intervention) all of the runners manage to get out, everywhere they've been
and everything they've done has been recorded. Their faces, if visible,
will be on record. Their body styles and build will be known, their facial
structure will be known if it's a form-fitting mask, their eyes most likely
will be seen, their equipment and style of dress noticed as well. Their
method and skill of operations can be divined from watching security
recordings and their degree of familiarity can be ascertained from that as
well (if one guy seems kind of "off" and the rest look and move like a
precision chronograph, then it's a good bet that the "off" guy was an extra
and the core of the team is X members in size).

Now, also assuming divine intervention, the corp decides not to pursue the
criminals as they escape. What can they do? They can try to get to them
before they give the data or whatever to their contractor. How do they do this?

The corp goes through it's own shadow resources and looks for teams fitting
that description and M.O. that may be in the area and can't be traced back
to any other jobs happening very recently. With the wealth of information
that can be gleaned form simply viewing the security records, there should
be little trouble indeed finding the perpetrators. Grease a few of the
right palms and your runner team is found.

Now that you've found them, what do you do? Hit them hard and fast in the
hope that they haven't given over the data or whatever yet. If they have,
then you save one for interrogation and find out what you can about their
contractor. If they haven't, then your decisive and intelligent reaction to
the situation saved the corporation.

What do you hit them with? Whatever you want. Hit them with your own
troops, shadowrunners, Lone Star (or whatever security service is around,
they need money and you've got money to blow), bounty hunters, or whatever
else you feel like throwing at them. Just make sure it's enough (you
already know how the runners act together from your own security, so you can
gauge from there).

Now, assuming that the divine winds blew upon the runners again and they got
rid of the stuff, what was achieved? You found out what was taken exactly
and for whom it was taken (most likely this'll happen, may require some
backtracking, but it'll happen). You also let everyone in the shadows know
that running against you is a bad idea. Why? Because this team died for
it. Now, fewer people want to run on you and it costs your competitors more
to hire those that will. A couple more teams die and fewer still will run
on you and the price goes up that much more. As fewer and fewer runs hit
your corp, people begin to realize just how safe your corp is. Public
confidence rises, stock price rises, market share rises, and people want to
work for you. Your corp becomes much the better for having adopted this
practice.

Now, there are those that illogically link the killing of runners who run
against said corp and the killing of runners who run for said corp (Ashlocke
for one, that poor guy). Just because I take a strong stance on those who
hit me doesn't mean I'll kill those that hit for me. To do so would be
stupid and corps aren't stupid. Well, at least in my game they aren't.

There are also those who say it isn't worth it to go after the runners.
Read above and remember that the corp doesn't know that the runners still
don't have the data or whatever. Risk losing what could easily be regained
or maybe exercise some overkill in the name of reputation while learning
exactly what was taken and exactly where it went. Not a tough choice for
me, not a tough choice for anyone.

There are those that believe the shadows are a sort of union/brotherhood
that would never turn on each other. I find this simply ludicrous.
Throughout most of the SR products are examples of shadows being used
against or turning against shadows.

There are those who believe that a corp would spend huge amounts of
resources to keep another corp from finding the runners. Runners are tools
to corps and they've got a whole garage full of extras of that particular
tool. If one of the tools breaks, they grab a new one. It's no big deal.
There's no reason to spend that money when there's always another
tool/shadowrunner looking for a job.

So there's the gist of my point. It can be gleaned from all of my posts,
but it looks kind of nice all in one place like this. It's logical, it
doesn't rant or rave, and it presents a very realistic view in no uncertain
terms. Realism is the key throughout.
--
Bob Ooton
topcat@***.net

Further Reading

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