From: [f--h--e] at [kpc.com] Reply-To: [f--h--e] at [kpc.com] Errors-To: [flashlife request] at [kpc.com] Subject: Flashlife V3 #4 To: [f--h--e] at [kpc.com] From: Carl Rigney (moderator) <[flashlife request] at [kpc.com]> Flashlife Fri, 28 Feb, 1992 Volume 3 : Issue 4 Today's topics: Kicking Bird and Brian Dunn? (Jeremy Lyn Hart) APDS ammunition (The Elder Dan) Mundanes in Astral Space (Scott Perrine) Caspar's Questions (Andrew David Weiland) Law Enforcement And You (John Martin) Re: Law Enforcement and You (Carl Rigney) Questions about destroying barriers (Jason) Shamanism (Scratch) [Flashlife is now up to 324 subscribers on 4 continents, but submissions have been very light, which is why its coming out bimonthly. I send out a digest whenever enough material accumulates to make it worthwhile. --CDR] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 16 Jan 92 22:27:44 CST From: Jeremy Lyn Hart <[j--e--l] at [rice.edu]> Subject: Kicking Bird and Brian Dunn? Hey, chum-pals, I'm lookin' for some people I can't get ahold of: Kicking Bird - I read a post in a back issue someplace about a Navajo "skindancer" archetype, and was wondering if somebody (Kicking Bird himself or another kind soul) could send it to me. Please? Brian Dunn - Around the same issue, Mr. Sin said he was collectin' NPCs/PCs for some kinda book. Anybody got this? Can you send it to me, please? I'd even appreciate it if somebody could just tell me what ISSUE these (the skinwalker and the NPCs) were posted in! Thanks in advance. Later. Vyper, Shadowrunner Extradordinaire (even if he DOES live in a telephone booth!) [j--e--l] at [owlnet.rice.edu] (Jeremy L. Hart) -------------------------- Date: Thu, 23 Jan 92 19:53:42 -0800 From: [e--d--r] at [ucscb.UCSC.EDU] (The Elder Dan) Subject: APDS ammunition Is it just me, or is APDS ammo (as designed under Street Samurai Catalog rules) really not worth the trouble? It's really not *that* dangerous. And I hate un-dangerous things, so our campaign has used this substitute: First, the round's Power is increased by 1. Second, the taget's armor is reduced (for the purposes of that one shot) by an amount equal to 1/2 the new Power of the round, rounded down. Thus, APDS holdout ammo would do 4L1 and the target would have 2 less armor. APDS Assault ammo would do 6M3 and the target would have 3 less armor. If the APDS counteracts more armor than the target has, the power of the round goes up an *additional* point per extra "counteracted" point, for when the target resists with Body. EXAMPLE: Using holdout 4L1 ammo on unarmored target. This is 2 levels of counteraction beyond what is needed. Thus, the attack becomes a 6L1 round. Cost should be adjusted to 125y instead of the listed 70y, just as a token nod of the head to game balance. The real key is to not let your players see more than 10 rounds of this stuff in, oh, a game month or so. On the rare occasions they *do* find it, they will probably blow it on the next well-armored target that comes along, leaving them without any when the REAL threat comes along. :) --Palamino, The Horse's Mouth "Bye for now. Keep your teeth clean." [ I'd suggest just ignoring APDS ammo, which also works well for most of the other stuff in the Street Samurai Escalation Guide. I will note that ammo costs are pocket change in most campaigns I know of; increasing ammo costs 70% wouldn't even be noticed. --CDR] -------------------------- Date: Thu, 23 Jan 92 23:01 CST From: [s w p] at [engr15.uark.edu] (Scott Perrine) Subject: Mundanes in Astral Space The Grimoire contains several references to mundanes in Astral Space. In particular, the chapter on Astral Space gives damage values for mundanes, and gives the example of samurai accompanying a mage on an Astral Quest. How did they get there? Is there a spell called 'Astral Buddy' or some sort of circle that can carry all mundos who are inside to Astral Space that I'm not aware of? I play the mage in our group, and I'd like to know. We were playing the 'Peace- keepers' adventure recently, and I was the only astrally active character. When your job is to hunt down a shaman, you could use some help fighting spells and spirits. Thanks! [In a later message Scott answers his own question: --CDR] I found the answer to my own question a while after I sent in the e-mail. A mundane can gain access to Astral Space through an Astral Gateway formed by a free spirit with the power of the same name. If anyone knows of any other way(s) of doing this, please let me know. The other 'runners tend to want to gloss over any possible astral scenes, since they already plan to make a snack run during the decker's Matrix run. Thanks! -- Nightshade (Scott Perrine) -------------------------- Date: Tue, 28 Jan 1992 19:14:41 -0500 (EST) From: Andrew David Weiland <[aw 1 s] at [andrew.cmu.edu]> Subject: Caspar's Questions Caspar Facius writes, (spell checking added below) >Greetings Fellow Deckers. This is my first article on the net, and i >am not quite use to the terms which you are using, so please bear with me. We're not all deckers (I haven't even customized my CMU account yet, and I've been here 2-1/2 years). But welcome. >First question: We were playing Shadowrun late last night, and .... >we had a quite annoying discussion of whether someone standing and >firing against a vehicle would get the same terrain modifiers as if he >was in the car. He's basically aiming at a moving target; +1 target numbers. I believe this is the same penalty as the one for firing from a car. >Third question: do any of you people allow character generation using >alpa/beta cyperware? Absolutely not! The Essence 6 is the only limiting factor for the samurai. Letting him get rid of that is like letting your mages initiate themselves before play. Remember also that alpha/betaware is new technology, and your character certainly didn't buy all of his equipment last week. >Forth question: what is the minimum range of standard and Air-timed >grenades? There's no minimum range, but the maximum error is equal to half the distance the grenade was thrown. Air-timed grenades might have a range below which range cannot be estimated. >Now here is a little goody for those of you who have gotten fed up with >the existing combat rules. > >Armor: >Light armor give's 1 autosucces and its rating to BODY >Heavy armor give's 2 autosucceses and its rating to BODY I've used these rules and they work reasonably well. If you use them, be sure to tone down Firepower ammo (force 6) and don't use the autofire rules in the Black Book. [I'd credit Mary Kuhner & Jon Yamato with those armor rules since that's where I heard them first, shortly after Shadowrun came out. I recommend them too. --CDR ] >Grenades: >Standard 5D2 >I.P.E 6D2 >Mini 5D2 > >[These grenades are much too deadly in my opinion, real-world grenades >almost never actually kill. These are cinematic grenades. But then >some people prefer to run Shadowrun in a cinematic style, so adjust to >taste. --CDR] I didn't do this, though I raised damge for standard grenades to 6S2 instead of 6M3 (since i thought grenades should be able to inflict serious wounds). The players liked this, but they still thought that grenades should really be able to kill people. Then they came up with the idea of throwing multiple grenades for a burst-type effect. A set of 7 IPE grenades in a van (=overpressure) were the final event in that campaign. Caspar continues, >1. Have you guys any rules about the minimum strength of carrying and >firing heavy weapons.I mean, can a human fire a MMG standing? The machine guns described in the Street Samurai Catalog and in various game artworks are a lot smaller than modern machine guns. I suppose this is the result of stronger alloys. In any case, the limiting factor on Shadowrun machine guns is not weight but recoil, which is already covered in the rules. >2. We have a MAJOR problemo with spirits and there immunity to >normal weapons, and i was thinking about the possibility of having >bullets (and spears) made out that rare expensive material (forgot the >name, but it costs 88K pr. unit). And thereby nailing thus friggers. An Oriachulum spear could be very effective. But if I have to pay 88K for a bullet, I want it to level a city block, and the spirit with it. Remember that nothing is impossible when you're using Oriachulum; just damn expensive! Of course there are cheaper ways of getting astral armor. >3. When someone is to get away, and decites to run can he 1) run >Quickness * Movment mod. pr. action or 2) Quickness * Movement pr. >rount. Quickness * Movement pr. round, and he can't attack. A character may move Quickness meters each action and still attack; this allows a high-wired character (4 actions) full movements and attacks. You may want to reduce the movement/action by 3/4 for dwarves and trolls. Of course this begs the question of why the average 8' troll can't run as fast as the average 5' dwarf. [Note that this answer is not quite correct. At least in the first edition rules, one of your actions can be a full run, for Quickness * Movement meters, but on your other actions if any you can move Quickness meters in each. You can't attack while doing the full run, but you can do a move and attack. A common house rule is that the full run takes the entire turn, not just an action. --CDR ] >4. When using a spell lock, does it cost 1 karma point each time a new >spell is being held. The bad news is that spell locks can only hold a single spell. Tough luck. -- Andrew D. M. U. Weiland [aw 1 s] at [andrew.cmu.edu] -------------------------- Date: Thu, 6 Feb 92 12:13:30 -0800 From: [j--n] at [gibbons.com] (John Martin) Subject: Law Enforcement And You In the runs I have Game Mastered, I have encountered many situations where the players want to bring all available weaponry they own with them whenever possible. Not that this bothers me, but realistically a group of people walking down the street with Submachine guns and heavy body armor just doesn't seem to feasible to me. I was wondering if any of you have run into this problem and how do you go about dealing with it. I have seen some of the tables that deal with law enforcement, such as the one in the back of the Sprawl Sites book. But those laws seem really drastic and (if the player is found guilty) could put a real dampener on your game when you have multiple player characters in the Lone Star Lockup. I have tried techniques like having roving gangs start taking pot shots at the player characters, using the rational that the gangs would want what the players have. Gang Member: "Oh look at that chummer with all the neat tech. Boy I could sure use some of it. Lets take it from him boys." Rest of Gang: "Wizard, Lets do it!" But this seems to just reinforce the notion that the Player Characters should bring heavy weaponry to fend off the gangs. Any suggestions on how to fix my situation would be greatly appreciated. -- John Martin [j--n] at [gibbons.com] -------------------------- Date: Thu, 6 Feb 92 17:50:12 PST From: [c d r] at [kpc.com] (Carl Rigney) Subject: Re: Law Enforcement and You The quick answer is, go ahead and have the cops crush them. Look at what the police response TODAY would be to a heavily-armed gang. Police don't fight fair - they use overwhelming force because it's not a contest, it's their job. They have the entire resources of a city to call upon, and if that's not enough, there's always the national guard. -- Carl Rigney [c d r] at [kpc.com] "I still don't think giving her 'bambi eyes' is going to get you a flamethrower." -------------------------- Date: Mon, 17 Feb 92 10:45:19 -0800 From: [j--s--n] at [tfs.COM] Subject: Questions about destroying barriers There is a small section in the SR combat chapter on the ratings of barriers, but I seem unable to find the rules for taking them out. Pointers? How Tos? Thanx -- Jason [Please reply to Jason via email unless you have a definitive answer, and he can summarize to the List. --CDR ] -------------------------- Date: Wed, 15 Jan 92 20:57:26 -0500 From: [s c rat c h] at [hpb.cis.pitt.edu] Subject: Shamanism Prefatory Note: I mailed this to Carl during Flashlife's hiatus and it never (as far as I know) saw the light of day, so I'm mailing it in again. I think shamanic players might find the insight useful. [Your previous article on it with a detailed TOC was in Volume 3 #2 --CDR] Shamanism, An Overview A while ago I came across an interesting book titled "Shamanism", apparently a compilation of articles, papers, and essays taking a serious look at the social phenomenon of shamanism. I think it might be quite useful as a source for GMs and/or players in Shadowrun games handling shaman characters. I've read the book a bit, and synthesized a sense of what a shaman is and does, according to the essays. Here it is, for your amusement, eddification, and possibly use... A shaman's activities focus on entering what Michael Harne calls a "shamanic state of consciousness." All of his activities seem to be involved in what happens when he or she enters that state of consciousness, and in reference to it when in a normal state of consciousness. The terms and concepts used to explain and discuss what happens in this state of consciousness vary according to the shaman's culture, but the overall purpose seems to remain the same. "To most of us, there exists a clear distinction between products that we make (equipment, books) and those that exist in the world (human nature, gods). But as the anthropologist, Michael Taussing (1980) wisely notes, `time, space, matter, cause, relation, human nature, and society itself are social products, created by man just as are the different types of tools, farming systems, clothes, houses, monuments, languages, myths, and so on, that mankind has produced since the dawn of human life.' But to their participants, all cultures tend to present these categories as if they were not social products, but elemental and immutable `givens.'" -- Crazy Wisdom: The Shaman As Mediator of Realities. So all of us are raised and educated within this societal framework - the concepts and ways of our society in a large part define our thinking. At times this becomes a problem, as we are unable to deal with a situation because it requires us to modify the societal framework. That's the shaman's job. The shaman uses any of a variety of means - drugs, drumming [*], dancing to fatigue, starvation, exhaustion, meditation - to collapse the societal framework like the house of cards that it is. Normally this is a very dangerous thing; if you aren't operating within the same framework as your society, you're generally considered insane. But the shaman's job is to step outside that framework, destroy it, and then rebuild it, wholely or in modified form appropriate to the needs of the moment. Thus, the shaman can deal with problems that other members of his or her society cannot. [*]: Recently the drummer of the Grateful Dead published a book and a CD, titled _Drumming_On_The_Edge_of_Magic_, about drumming and the role that the music form has played in societies throughout history. Shamanic drumming is one of the subjects. So any deadhead shaman players out there... Now... what exactly this works out to is dependent upon how far you feel the fluidity of reality and the importance of the social framework extend. In a very "normal" world this means that the shaman is more flexible, adaptable, more able to deal with unusual situations that challenge the preconceptions of his or her society. In a fantastic or surreal world, this means that the shaman is able to actually change the foundation of the world. If the world exists, as some have suggested, solely as we collectively perceive it, then a knowledgable shaman should be able to make major changes... All of this leaves unaddressed the questions of the "geography" of the shamanic state of consciousness, and how the shaman interprets and discusses it later on. Also ignored are the questions of intelligences beyond the normal that the shaman encounters in his or her sojourns. These could be other intelligences that we normally cannot perceive, or they could be a part of our own psyche that we normally suppress and hear only with our subconscious, or they could be parts of our drives given form and voice by the fluidity of the visions. -- Steven J. Owens [s c rat c h] at [hpb.cis.pitt.edu] -------------------------- End of Flashlife **************************