Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: frederick.johansen on <03-11-18/0558:01>
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My best friend's son (21 years old) wanted to learn how to GM Shadowrun. So he brought me the books and said, "Learn this and teach me." Ok, not quite like that, but that's the essence of it. I've been learning most of the rules and have started getting a handle on the mechanics. I actually like the breadth of the rules. Still need to learn rigging, the Matrix is still real funky, and some trouble with figuring what is and is not useful where it comes to spell casting. Overall we're getting there though, bit by bit.
The biggest problem we're having though is that the players get wiped out in pretty much every fight they get into. We're playing Splintered State (an introductory adventure) and they have been defeated in every conflict they have gotten into.
I don't even know what to tell them to do different. No matter what, all three player's characters are dead within the first three combat rounds, if it takes that long. The most bizarre fight is the one we had stop halfway through tonight. It is almost the end, they were in the middle of selling both commlinks and combined data to Tosh and crew, when the meet gets interrupted by Brackhaven's people. By the beginning of the second round two of the three player's characters are dead (exceeded overflow). Meanwhile Brackhaven's people have some minor wounds except for one that got a bad mono filament whipping by one of the player's character before they died. None of Tosh's people have taken a single wound, and that was with Brackhaven's people concentrating their fire on Tosh's people. I'm having the players run Tosh's people as well as their own characters. Soon the fight is going to be entirely between NPCs.
What are some common mistakes players make that result in them being dead and / or unable to successfully take out their opponents? What might I be doing wrong as a GM that is killing all of the players (three times now)? The answers I have found searching the Internet mostly falling the categories of "don't get into combat" or "you're stupid" or "you should be playing Shadowrun". I don't find any of these answers as very helpful.
Help!
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Without a more detailed description it's hard to say what you are doing wrong.
So I can only tell you the basics:
- Don't get into fights you can't win. SR has one of the more deadly combat systems
- If you go into a fight have high initiative: Not only is who he shoots first most often the one who shoots last, you also can afford to use the full defense interrupt so you get your Willpower added as dice to your defense test. High Intuition and Reaction is also useful because:
- Have decent defense by having good Intuition + Reaction: Good defense is paramount. An Attack that can be reduced to zero net-hits does no damage at all.Use cover actively to gain defense and things like smoke grenades to reduce your enemies' dice pools.
- If all else fails, have decent soak through high Body + Armor: Get the best armor you can get. Not only can you reduce damage, but if the incoming damage doesn't exceed your armor rating you only suffer stun damage. That in turn can be treated easily - either with a stim patch or an hour of rest.
- If even that fails, you have edge to reroll all failed dice. Especially defense rolls profit from this
- The ultima ratio is to burn Edge permanently to gain automatically 4 net hits. It's expensive, but it does beat rolling a new character
- If all that doesn't work, your GM might want to take a look at the power level of your opposition. There are some archetypes with professionality levels in the core book.
- Finally: Don't stay around to get shot at if you don't have to. Don't be afraid to spend Edge to go first and have your runner run away if they are outgunned and outnumbered
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Some additional advice:
The players should be making use of ways to penalize incoming attacks. Crouching behind corners or cars for cover (+2 dice for defense test). Dropping smoke grenades to reduce visibility (-6 dice to attacker's roll). Turning off/shooting out the lights or casting darkness to reduce visibility. Just simply RUN to get +2 dice. Etc.
If the players are having trouble hitting the bad guys consider the opposite. Do things that reduce the opposition's dodge dice. Use grenades (no dodge test at all!). Use burst fire (possible with most guns- only SS can't burst fire). Use reach weapons in melee. Use suppressive fire; once its effectiveness has been demonstrated at the table it'll be used very often! (hint: the effectiveness isn't in random damage- it's in inflicting dice pool penalties!)
Not to point fingers but if I see palyers getting TPK'd three times, I'd suspect it's not entirely the players' fault. You might need to think about tamer opposition. Maybe try a D&D equivalent of a handful of goblins for 1st level PCs to cut their teeth on... something comparable in SR would be a half dozen poorly equipped Street Gangers with low Professional Ratings. Not only does it let the players feel good about kicking someone's hoop for a change, it'll help both you and them master the basics of the combat rules without derailing the adventure/campaign with a TPK.
Some mistakes the GM might make that end up making the fight way too hard for the players:
Not having the bad guys suffer a surprise roll when the players set up some kind of an ambush
Giving each nameless mook his own edge pool rather than having all the nameless mooks share one edge pool between them
Not sticking to the guidelines of behavior tactics per the assigned Professional Rating (not even the cops will fight fanatically to the death; even wounding one guy ends most packs' will to fight at low PR levels)
Overly using omniscience. This can happen in any RPG, but in SR's lethal system it's got magnified result when it occurs. The GM knows what'd be the perfect tactic to screw the players over- but there really ought to be a reasonable reason why the NPCs would know do the perfect thing to screw the players. Example: If a mage is sustaining buffs on the street sam, it's not fair to have the NPCs snipe the mage down while the sammie is up in the NPCs' junk wrecking them. "Geek the mage first!" is a common in-universe trope, but unless the NPCs know he IS a mage somehow it makes more roleplaying sense for the NPCs to focus on the sammie slicing them up.
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The more advanced stuff is covered so I will deal with some basics here:
Are the PC's wearing armor? In the Shadowrun universe children wear armor to go to elementary school. Never, ever, go without armor.
Is there at least one combat capable PC? I mean someone with the ability and equipment to oneshot whoever needs to be put down, and to do so quickly and repeatedly? Are the other PC's at least somewhat competent at combat?
Are they dumping ability scores? Playing an old, infirm decker / mage / whatever with a body of 1 might sound fun and look good on paper, a body 1-2 is just stage dressing for being sent home in a body bag.
Are they aware of the existence of edge and what it does?
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If you can send us one of two of the PC's sheets, we can get a good idea if its character build (like not wearing armor, like Shadowcat said). It could be a misunderstanding of how combat works, as well, either on your part as a GM or on the Players' parts. Are you certain you're doing attacks and damage correctly, allowing the right defense and resist rolls, etc?
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Yeah i second Firebugs questions. SR can be deadly, but none of the 5th mods really are, unless they are just triggering every possible combat. Another point, SR combat very rarely last until round three. Generally fights are decided in round 1 and cleaned up in round 2, if combat runs longer then something out of the ordinary, or your player have bitten off more then they can chew.
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Marcus is right, though I do believe that Splintered State can actually be quite dangerous, as it involved several encounters of the PCs being ambushed (which in SR is a big deal). It's meant for new characters, but maybe not new players. After all, it includes a big cameo in it for people who played the old SR games.
Could you also give us a simple turn-by-turn summary of how the first loss went? That way I can really tell where it's coming from.
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Threat Level: Published adventures generally assume a full team of five or six players. If you're only running with three players, you'll want to adjust the opposition accordingly. Start with fewer opponents, lower skill levels, lighter weapons, or less lethal ammo (consider that regular, flechette, gel, and stick-n-shock are merely "restricted" so anyone can carry them with a convincing license, but explosive, hollow-point, and APDS are "forbidden" and guaranteed to cause trouble). Compare the average dice pools of the opposition to your players, and make sure the players have an advantage for routine encounters.
Defense Pool: Most attacks are resisted by Reaction + Intuition. Combat characters will want points in these, and the best reaction enhancers they can get. Adepts and magicians can boost this with Combat Sense. Take advantage of cover (+2 Partial, +4 Good) whenever you can.
Damage Soak: When you're hit, you still get a chance to reduce damage with Body + Armor. Orks and trolls have great Body attributes to start with. Add bone density augmentation and orthoskin (SR5 p.459) as soon as you can afford it, or bone lacing and dermal plating (p.454) if you're on a budget.
Armor: Wear the best armor you can get away with. Every shadowrunner should have a closet full of armor clothing (rating 6), and you can almost always get away with an armor vest (rating 9), or often an armor jacket (rating 12) if the weather justifies it ... which in Seattle it usually does. Keep a set of full body armor (rating 15, +3 w/ helmet) in the trunk for excursions into the barrens. (SR5, p.436-438)
Edge: Don't overlook the benefits of Blitz (roll 5d6 initiative) and Seize the Initiative (move to the top of the initiative order) in combat. And you can always burn a point of Edge to avoid death. (SR5, p.56-57)
Tactics: Use spirits and illusions to draw enemy fire, use suppressive fire to lower dice pools, control visibility with smoke grenades and hacker hijinks, make the mage hard to spot (and/or make someone else look like the mage).
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Clearly ever table is different and every GM has their own ideas of what works what doesn't but in general when building PCs to be serious I'd aim for something along the lines of:
12+ in Reaction+intuition with an initiative total that average at-least low 20s
Soak/Resistance of about 20 with Armor rating 12+
Attack pools vary a lot but I'd aim for something in the range of 18 dice, with something along the lines of heavy pistol damage. Be very sure relevant limits (or accuracy) is high enough to make hitting on average is reasonable.
Then at-least couple points of edge, for when the dice just won't cooperate, or for when it really important. A strong edge pre-spent can take a character from good to amazing in a hurry. At that point, so long as characters focus fire, there's a mage to cover count-spelling and workable hacker solution characters should be good to go.
If that doesn't work then it maybe time to look at more specialized combat role coverage, put a tank archtype on the field w/ 40+ Resistance, some truly strong over watch options, and start taking a look team work roles.
Also i agree if you have killed them three times, it's time check system understanding as well, make some combat speced character and start them off vs prof rating ones, and build up from there. Keep raising prof rating and avoid silver bullet tactics. Until you find the spot that challenging without TPKing.
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Don't got much to add, because others beat me to it. However, I can't stress enough that SR combat is deadly, especially in comparison to games like D&D and Pathfinder. As the GM, you might run them through Food Fight, just to check everyone's understanding of the combat rules. If the team loses that, then it's probably a character build issue. Splintered State is actually not a good beginner's mission, as it does require some experience with the system in order to survive it. So, good luck, and let us know how things go, and we'll help as we can.
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Clearly ever table is different and every GM has their own ideas of what works what doesn't but in general when building PCs to be serious I'd aim for something along the lines of:
12+ in Reaction+intuition with an initiative total that average at-least low 20s
Soak/Resistance of about 20 with Armor rating 12+
Attack pools vary a lot but I'd aim for something in the range of 18 dice, with something along the lines of heavy pistol damage. Be very sure relevant limits (or accuracy) is high enough to make hitting on average is reasonable.
Then at-least couple points of edge, for when the dice just won't cooperate, or for when it really important. A strong edge pre-spent can take a character from good to amazing in a hurry. At that point, so long as characters focus fire, there's a mage to cover count-spelling and workable hacker solution characters should be good to go.
That's a really hardcore combat-focused build, Marcus. Not really the kind of thing every PC needs to be capable of. Though, if even one person on the table has a character like that, then you certainly won't fail against the encounters in Splintered State so you've definitely got a point there.
When I ran the module, I had a team of 3 PCs, who's dicepools were around 12-14. Armor was around 12 (because everyone can wear an armor jacket). I don't recall what their initiative was, but it definitely was high enough that getting only 1 pass was impossible while getting 3 passes wasn't. They handled it fine. For the record it was a hermetic mage, a combat decker (with a cyberarm) and... Man I don't remember the other one. Probably a street samurai or adept.
If the player's are making characters that are too weak, explain this to them:
In SR, most actions are opposed, so your target rolls against you. Usually they resist with 2 attributes. Since the average human attribute rating is 3, the average person on the street will resist with 6 dice.
A die only gets a hit 2/6 of the time, or 1/3rd. So, generally people say "every 3 dice is 1 hit on average". Because ties to go the defender when two people roll against eachother, that means in order to succeed more often than you fail in perfectly average conditions, a PC should have a dice pool of three higher than their opposition (so 9 in this case, for an average of 3 hits, vs their average of 2). That's the basic "competent employee" level of skill, where you're reliable enough to not mess up most of the time. This dice pool is okay for minor parts of your character, like if you want someone who's not a face but isn't incompetent at socializing. Or maybe a magician who's got combat spells to rely on but has an automatic weapon for backup.
Most of what PCs do, however, is much harder and involves facing opposition beyond the average layman. Thus, bumping up to 12 dice (4 hits on average) is what I consider the minimum of "specialist" in an area. Basically, a PC should not have any dice pools in their "area of expertise" that are lower than 12. This many dice represents a level of skill where the character can be expected succeed when things start actively working against them, or when they go against basic-trained opposition (who's job it is to stop them). Every 3 dice above 12 should be a measure of your character's impressiveness. Someone with 15 when they roll isn't just a specialist, they have a level of skill and experience that isn't easy to find. Someone with 18 is almost never going to fail except in extreme circumstances. And someone with 21+ is basically a genius at whatever they do, pulling off things that would be impossible for most people.
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As others have said, without some specifics, it is hard to know how to diagnose the problem, so I'll just put up some general guidelines I've found to be helpful.
1. This is NOT D&D. Forget that stand there and smack them until they stop moving shit, because while in D&D you're still good to go as long as you have 1 HP, in SR, you get tagged a couple times and you're in deep shit.
2. Cover is your friend. When bullets are flying, find cover, or your new street name is Bulletsponge Chromepants.
3. You are not Rambo, or any other action movie hero. Do not charge into a building with guns blazing unless you have no choice.
4. Fair fights are for the dojo, or tournaments. On the run, cheat. Cheat early, cheat often, cheat whenever possible, so that you are standing and the other guy isn't when all is said and done.
5. Once you pull the pin, Mr. Grenade is not your friend. The guys with guns who'd like to shoot you are also not your friends. But since you're a nice guy, make sure to introduce Mr. Grenade to the guys with guns and see if THEY can be friends. Enclosed spaces are the best place for this kind of friend-making.
6. Running like a scared little girl is ALWAYS an option.
7. A perfect run will have runners never needing to pull their weapons. If your plan STARTS with a gunfight, you need a new plan.
8. Gunfights are a democracy, and the enemy gets a vote.
9. Try to target someone's weakness. If you see a troll in heavy armor with an assault cannon, try hitting him with a mindbolt, or something else that goes off of WIL instead of BOD. If there is an elf with lightning coming from his hands, hit him with everything as quickly as possible.
10. ALWAYS GEEK THE MAGE FIRST!!! If you cannot tell who is the mage, geek the troll with the assault cannon first.
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Lots of very useful stuff! A significant issue is that we've done the characters using the life modules, and I've pushed the players to make characters that feel like people they want to try out being and not just a pile of stats. I don't want to completely deviate from that, but I do want to help guide the players into making sure their characters are actually good at what they are supposed to be doing. I also took on the responsibility of teaching the players how the game works, so their lack of understanding largely traces back to me.
So, first, what we have in the party -
Lyela: an elven mage following the Path of the Wheel (high Charisma that is part of her drain resistance roll) trying to be Wendy from Fairy Tail (only who kills people)
Biku: an aspected mage (well, an apprentice actually) that is lightly augmented (bioware only, if I remember right), mostly orientated towards regular combat augmented with illusion (invisibility mostly)
Ixis: a partially cybered troll who uses a mix of ranged and close combat
So, stuff my player do right -
1) Everyone has 12+ armor
2) They use cover instinctively
3) Biku and Ixis both have Reaction, Intuition and augmentations enough that they normally have initiative of somewhere between 18 and 22.
4) They avoid combat like a turd in a pool unless there is no other way to get what they want.
5) They enjoy the role playing side of the game, and do well with it, including making good use of the mix of non-combat skills that they have.
From reading the posts and then reviewing the rules some, I've realized some glaring issues (so much so that I feel ridiculous not recognizing this before) -
The players do not use Edge, pretty much at all, ever. If I prod them to, they will, so they are aware of what it can do, but just don't use it. I don't have their opponents use Edge at all because, well, they are already kicking the players' asses.
Neither I or the players have used interrupts. I've been aware of them, but haven't given them the thought they deserve. The players have some knowledge of them, but have completely ignored it.
The players don't have any specializations. Given that very few of their ability scores are maxed, this is a particular problem. I will be getting across to them that they need a minimum of a 12 die dice pool for any task they are expecting to pull off routinely, particularly if people are shooting at you.
Neither mage has any bound spirits. This is really completely ridiculous for Lyela, since Lucy (from the anime) essentially has a stable of bound spirits. Additionally when they were prepping for a possible hostile situation, they didn't cast any spells in preparation. They scouted the meeting site, and Biku setup a firing position to cover the actual meet, but he didn't pre-cast Invisibility (which he was planning on using pretty much for the entire length of any combat), and Lyela didn't make any magic preparations either.
The mages have no foci. Lyela has, maybe, five spells total.
Even when prodded, I can not get the players to get anything other than regular ammo....which I just don't get.
Likewise they won't get any weapon accessories. Ironically Lyela filled her armor with gizmos...she thought she had to.....but not any extra elemental protection. They also do not use any armor add-ons (the ones that add to your armor value), including Ixis who can wear a fire hydrant as a helmet (trolls are so freaking strong).
I don't think the players appreciate the difference BF / FA makes, even though their defense rolls have gotten penalized when it has been used against them. Ixis is firing a Defiance T-250, in SA mode, but only single shots (no SA bursts). This is despite being a big troll with RC built into his arms (his high Strength).
None of them have any throwing weapon skill, so none of them use grenades.
So.....I'm thinking I'm going to wrap up Splintered State early, letting the players survive by burning a point of Edge each. They will have some karma from the adventure to make some tweaks to their characters, and some loot for changes to their gear. Then I'm going to try them out on Sprawl Wilds, though I need to read it more yet to make sure it works for them and myself.
Some things I don't understand, that I could use some help with -
a) both sides have low light and thermographic vision. Who would want to use smoke / therm smoke grenades, how would they use them, and what would the impact be?
b) bad dude with a SMG gets close enough to Ixis that Ixis can potentially move into melee range. What are the attacker and defender modifiers I need to keep in mind in such a situation (Ixis entering melee, bad dude trying to shoot Ixis while they are in the melee, etc). Ixis uses a combat axe in melee, for what it is worth.
c) I am hoping I can ask without starting a shooting war: one side has a decker, the other side (multiple people with multiple wireless enabled devices) has their devices running silent and slaved to commlinks. How does the decker go from start to blowing up a gun? Mostly it is the Matrix perception part of things that has me confused, but a run through would be good to make sure I'm not dorking something else up.
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Matrix perception RAW is a nightmare. Carry a couple hundred stealth tags on your person, run the cheapest possible commlink on silent, and the world's best decker will never find you. House rule it to make sense to you and your players.
Also, priority is the default for a reason, a character can have optimized stats and still be organic. You will really have to softball your players because of what you forced on them.
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Well there's one problem Combat Axes are basically useless.
Accuracy 4, mean anything that reasonably competent will never get hit.
So to me it sounds like i'd just have them remake, and get pools up. 12 is really too low. If a prof 1 ganger has a decent chance of parrying your melee focused character, they are really not ready for the mods.
Do they understand limit and that edge lets you bypass limit?
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With high charisma your teams mage should always bring at least two bound spirits to any encounter plus whipping up a new decent force spirit is only a complex action and should also be done as part of the preparations if you're expecting trouble and also even when you're not, so that's potentially 3 spirits on your teams side right then and there. Also 5 spells are a little low, which spells do the mage have? Heal, armor,improved invisibility, levitate combat Sense. .....thats 5 fairly essential spells right there and that doesn't even include any combat spells, which is a viable way to play for sure but with only 3 characters your team needs all the combat capabilities they can muster, so that makes it even more important with the extra spirits.
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Hey there mate.
My tips are these:
1) Gear
The thing I've found new players struggle with is the staggering amount if items in the game. They don't have the tricks and so don't compete. Outside of gear that they may specially own (ie. hazmat suits, full body armor etc.) I believe all characters should, at all times, be wearing:
a) Contact lenses: (image link, flare compensation, smartlink (everyone should have a gun))
b) Glasses: (visual enhancement, thermographics)
c) Earbuds: (dampening, soundlink)
d) RFID tags: some simple tags can help your team set up ambushes, or if they scout out a staging area they want to use, detect an ambush waiting for them
e) Fashion gas mask/respirator: Don't want to be a freak but still want a gas mask? Fashion :D
2) Reaching augmented limits
So excluding exceptions, all Stats can be raised by a max of 4 above what they currently are at (not magic, resonance or edge). Drugs are dangerous, but this is a dangerous game where runners will likely kill themselves trying to get an edge. No runner should be 'happy' running their primary attributes unaugmented. Drugs, bio, cyber or magic.
3) Dice + Edge
I happen to run for and play in a particularly high powered group. 12 is definitely a bare minimum. Edge can be amazing though. To address them comment of the Combat Axe having a low accuracy. If hits occur 1/3 of the time, using edge lets you roll 2/3 of your total again whilst breaking the limit. Edge is the runner's amazing moment of breaking what should be possible. It's those moments when a street sam drops an orc with a holdout lol.
Seeing as 6 is an average max attribute, 6 + spec is the starting skill cap you're already at 14. Getting a +2 on that is easy (mentor spirit, smartlink), getting 16. Augmented max takes you to 20.
4) Using Etiquette and knowledge skills
Don't want to be stabbed in the back, betrayed or made a scapegoat? Knowing exactly how much to bribe, politely blackmail and threaten is essential in this world. You shouldn't be interacting with anyone without these rolls. This, plus knowledge skills in corporate tactics, security design etc. are what will stop you walking into traps to begin with.
Hope this helps.
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Packing along some extra spirits is fine, but remaking the characters is the only safe way. If players pools are 12 or below forget the rest, they won't make it. A mage with 5 spells, a burned aspected mage and a sam that's melee weapon that has an accuracy of 4. Not meaning to be rude but that's all dead man walking. You're done son. Start over, Take look in the character review section on this forums, if you go back far enough there are examples of pretty anything and everything, if you can't find it just, ask folks will help. You don't have to reach my spec, though it will get the job done. But they better at minimum break 14 dice and a limit of 6, and have everything they really need to fully cover their roles. You can cover all primary rolls with 3, it just means building smart. Or leave a roll open and slap an NPC in there, it nice easy way to help guide a newbie group.
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Marcus is correct. You really need dice pools in the 14+ range and at least a 6 limit for your primary skills. Spellcasting for mages, the primary combat skill for the sammy, and so on. With three, you're going to have to build smart if you want to live. You need the three Ms: Meat, Matrix, Magic. Let me go into my recommendations for the three.
Meat: A melee Street Samurai can be a badass thing. But the Combat Axe is not. That's a ganger weapon, for someone who wants big and intimidating. You want big and intimidating, but you also want to actually be effective? You want a Claymore from Run and Gun, with a Personalized Grip mod, so you have a weapon that is Acc 6, Reach 2, (STR+5)P DV, -5 AP. The 14R availability is a stumbling block, unless you want to drop restricted gear on it. But 4600 nuyen (4500 for the sword, 100 for the mod) isn't too much for a runner to pull together if you want that to be your first 'in game' purchase. Until then, you want to be using a Polearm for your two-handed melee intimidation needs. Now, if you're going for the light, quick melee sammy, then the katana and a plethora of small blades is always a damn good option. Sure, it is cliche, but that's because it works. Now, even a sammy that majors in melee should at least minor in a ranged weapon of some sort. Why? Because melee only works in melee, and sometimes you can't get from where you are to where the other guy is without either setting off alarms or getting full of lead.The two ranged weapon skills I'd take a long, hard look at if I was making a STR-focused melee sammy would be Archery and Throwing. Both do damage off your STR, which is a big bonus for you. They fire slower than an automatic, sure, but they're quiet, which makes for a good way to do takedowns from a distance without letting the whole world know where you are.
Matrix: You need to have someone who can handle your Matrix needs. Dice pools of 12-14 across the Cracking and Electronics groups are a must, as a bare minimum. Always be looking for ways to exploit your skills, but watch your OS. Don't play a technomancer unless you're doing it as a pet class with the sprites, because they got royally shafted this edition, and just can't compete. Decide whether you want to be the brute force hacker or the sneaky hacker, and gear for it, but don't specialize so far you can't switch modes if you have to. Make sure you have some kind of weapon skill (I'd go with either pistols or longarms, myself) for those times when you can't just hack your way out of trouble.
Magic: A mage lives or dies by their spells. Now, you can get by with only 5 spells, but they'd better be the RIGHT spells. Two combat spells (one direct and one indirect), Heal (if I have to explain why, you need to turn in your dice), Increase Reflexes (because this makes you able to do more), and some kind of battlefield control. Illusions like Opium Den are always a winner as they provide a flat area debuff to everyone who is in the area, or manipulations like Shadow or Ice Sheet can make getting around difficult for the enemy. Or you could do some badass things with Trid Phantasm if you're clever. Physical Barrier is always good for throwing up a temporary roadblock to keep people from following you. Or you can go the other way and get some of the mindbender spells like Mind Probe or Control Thoughts.
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So for minimum dice pools (gathered from this thread and some others), is this about right for absolute minimums?
Primary skill: 14
Secondary skills (that you rely on at all): 9
Limits applied to use of primary skill: 6
Dodge dice: 12
Soak dice: 18
Initiative: reliably 11
Also, any good suggestions for Matrix Perception house rules, or links to recommended forum postings covering same?
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Yes, those pools/limits are what you should aim for, unless you are specifically running a low power campaign, then the opposition won't/shouldn't have any dice pools above about 7-8.
As for using the Matrix, I personally make it much simplified from the RAW, because RAW means that deckers/TMs have almost no impact on combat, which I find greatly boring for those who choose to play such characters.
When I run Matrix characters at my table, I have the player(s) involved roll only once to affect something, with harder to affect items meaning more successes needed on the test (ie higher threshold). Makes Matrix usage viable in group play.
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So for minimum dice pools (gathered from this thread and some others), is this about right for absolute minimums?
Primary skill: 14
Secondary skills (that you rely on at all): 9
Limits applied to use of primary skill: 6
Dodge dice: 12
Soak dice: 18
Initiative: reliably 11
Also, any good suggestions for Matrix Perception house rules, or links to recommended forum postings covering same?
Initiative+Reaction =12 then hopefully +2d6 that gives you 19 on average, it won't be to bad push that little further for 3 passes.
Dodge as an active defense should be higher if your losing init to use it.
For matrix perception i recommend only allow things with a sleaze rating to use run silent. It greatly limits the stupidity that can be involved in it.
But that does very much work in the deckers favor.
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I'm going to be the contrarian (to a slight extent).
I don't think that huge dice pools (or any specific numbers) are a must for any game, BUT..
As the GM you have to make sure that the opposition is appropriate.
If the players have dice pools of 10, then so should the bad guys.
The mage doesn't have to have spirits, but if he doesn't then the bad guys probably shouldn't. If he does then so should they.
After I set up a combat encounter I run through what is likely to happen in the first round and do a "sanity check" for what the outcome of attacks are likely to be and what "reasonable" dice pools are for the enemies..
When I had my team ambushed and the ambushers had a sniper, I made sure that there was an NPC to take the first shot,
otherwise a PC would have died instantly. Obviously that's just not good for the game.
If I didn't do that I would have run the numbers and made the sniper shoot the Troll and made sure it didn't take him out instantly.
This is NOT cheating. RPG's are about cooperative story telling and the story isn't very good (as you have noticed) if the PCs get wiped out instantly.
Given that, it is also OK to fudge things either way to make the story better.
All that being said. You may (as others have suggested) want to take a look at a little min-max'ing / optimization on the players parts so they can be more capable.
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I'll beat the dead horse one more time: Shadowrun has a combat system designed to kill quickly. The old "charge" mentality in D&D will get you shredded quick.
From a GM's standpoint I can tell you what I did when faced with this exact situation. My current group had never played Shadowrun but had a lot of experience with other platforms (i.e. D&D). I had played before and understood the vast differences in the system so I stripped their first encounter down to the barest of basics. I gave them a background story and had them wind up in the Rats Nest in the Redmond Barrens. No cyberware, no magic, no nothing other than a 3 skill points in unarmed combat, clubs, blades, and long guns. Their first encounter was fighting (you probably guessed it) giant rats. They only had various clubs and spears and one rifle, salvaged from a Rat's Nester who was killed by the rats. It was an extremely basic fight but it worked well to help them understand the combat system (and wound up for one hilarious situation where the troll glitched several tests so badly that I had the rats grab him by the ankles and drag him through the trash for the rest of the fight). After that I slowly added in pieces of the game, such as vehicles and magic. After about four or five sessions they were given their resources and allowed to purchase cyberware and other stuff. You don't have to play the game the traditional way; I'd actually suggest against it if you've never GM'd a game because you're learning as much as they are. Start off very simple and build up to it. Just my two cents.
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I have them pull in a decker NPC when they really need it, so that's how they cover that angle. I'd like to be able to have them able to go through the published adventures and missions without a lot of futzing with adjusting the enemies, so I'm hoping that some "right sizing" of their dice pools will help with that. Oh, to clarify, the players do take cover and make every effort to not get shot at. Also, only one of the three players have ever played D&D or any other tabletop RPG before. One element that has been emphasized in this thread that I don't think my players or myself really have understood is that there isn't really much slack to take wounds. Even if you are not going to die, the wounds modifier quickly makes just about all actions impossible.
So we'll be doing some character adjustments, they'll be reading up on Edge and magic use for the Awakened characters, and we'll go from there. I appreciate all the help!