Welcome to Wolverine's Brain Spasm's 3. This was due out much
earlier than it got published. Matter of fact I had it written
over a month ago when my beloved computer decided to have a hardware
failure. Fortuneately I acted quick enough that I managed to save
almost everything stored on aforementioned hardware, but Spasm
3, and everything in it was lost forever...
So here is my attempt at a replacement. Admittedly it deals with
nothing it would have originally dealt with... Well maybe one
article later on but we'll see...
Now to deal with something that really pissed me off. Admittedly it happened several months ago, but recently my anger over this incident came back, empowering me to write this article.
Several month's ago I was on Shadowland, in a chat room to be precise having an unusually good time. It's not that nothing ever happens in the chat room (it's just that nothing ever seems to happen while I'm there.) Anyway, I'm chilling having a good time, and we're even considering having a game. Now I have'nt been a regular PC in a couple hundred years, so I was thrilled at this prospect. Well then the GM asked us to describe our characters and the shit hit the fan... so to speak.
I simply started describing my character, a low-powered character, off of the streets of the barrens, who had gone to prison and been paroled. Then I seemingly made the mistake of mentioning I'd performed a couple of hits...
And once the people I eventually had the problem with got it through their thick skulls, and had it processed through their tiny walnut sized brains that by "hits" I meant wetwork, they lit into me as if I was the ultimate incarnation of evil.
Now after getting insulted several times over what seemed to be a suddenly malfunctioning computer. (Not really, it had been acting up all day) I asked what the hell their problem was with wetwork. Now, there are probably a million and one valid arguments about the problems of doing wetwork, but I got presented with what is probably the dumbest fucking argument ever when the idiot replied, "It's immoral you Moron!"
Immoral! Immoral! My god, everything a typical Shadowruner does is `immoral' You think kidnapping a guy is moral? (We like to call it extraction, but it is kidnapping.) You think stealing is moral? You think lying is moral? You think killing in general is moral? Do you think anything a Shadowrunner does in a typical day of surviving the shadows is moral? We'll this is the exact argument I would have then used to the pinhead I was talking to but unfortunately my computer then picked that time to give up the fight, and I got booted. We'll since then I"ve put thought, and what's more, research into this. I had players who would, and regularly did do wetwork runs. Then, after a little searching, I found players who wouldn't do wetwork and I found out something intresting. Those who would do wetwork, researched the job more, planned more, were more careful, researched wetwork jobs more throughly than any other jobs before accepting, and killed less often than those that had a problem with wetwork! Now admitedly for some of the players who would commit wetwork it was a simple matter that they wouldn't kill someone unless they were payed to do it, but it's a start. Now don't get me wrong here, it is acceptable to have a player that won't commit wetwork, just make sure it is because of a higher standard (like pacifism, or a high regard for human life.) If you get someone who will not do wetwork, make it hell for them every time they kill someone. Often those who just reject wetwork straight out of hand are what we in the world of RPG's call Munchkins, get rid of them now! (Or at least smack them around a bit to improve their attitude.)
Dwarf's and Cyberlimbs
Now as I'm sure many of you have figured out by now, the Brain Spasm's are the places where I put both my rants, and my house rules. The above was a rant. This is a house rule. Long ago, Cybertechnology came out and changed the rules for the starting strength of a Troll's cyberlimb, to the average strength of a Troll instead of a human. This was easily explanable as that you simply had more to work with as a Troll. This greatly upset me. Don't get me wrong, I like the rule and everything, it just seems to me that they left out two very important parts. Dwarfs, and Orks. If it stands that a Troll's cyberlimb has the average strength of a Troll, it should stand that a Dwarf's, and a Ork's cyberlimbs should have the average strength of a Dwarf or an Ork at no extra cost, and no extra essence loss. This house rule sees that it does.
Other Races and Cyberlimbs
Now, because of the number of the standard five races of Shadowrun, companies mass produce cyberlimbs for all these races. Thus giving us a standard price. When someone makes a Troll Cyberarm, it's fairly certain that some Troll somewhere will buy it. This is not the case for non-standard races. Because of the fare rarity of other races (such as in the Shadowrun Companion) it would not make sense to mass produce cyberlimbs for them, as it would not be certain that the limbs would get bought by a member of the race it was made for. Thus comes this house rule. When someone of one of these "other" races goes to buy a cyberlimb, they have two options. 1)Get the limb custom made, which means something like a 50%-150% increase in price, and the time it takes to find one, or 2)Buy a limb from the race closest to them. So a Hobgoblin would buy and Ork's limb, and a Minotaur would buy a Trolls limb, and so on and so on. The problem with the second option is that the limb should often malfunction as it wasn't made for the race it's been installed in. This should be a comical effect, and should not be used to kill or injure your Runners. Of special note, since Delta Cyberware is always custom made for it's user, this rule should not be used to further increase it's price.
Well, that's all for Wolverine's Brain Spasm 3. It didn't actually
cover anything that was in the original Spasm 3. (Except maybe
that last line in ~What's your Problem?!'). E-mail
me, and tell me what you thought.
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